‘Miranda?’
She woke with a start. How long had she been asleep? And how long had Holly been there, lingering in the doorway?
‘Oh God, you stink,’ Miranda said, wrinkling her nose against the smell of booze and weed smoke. She checked the time. ‘Why are you back? It’s not midnight yet.’
‘I wasn’t feeling well.’
‘Huh. I wonder why.’
Suddenly, from the bed, Mum said, ‘I want you both to make me a promise.’
Miranda got up and went over to her. ‘I thought you were asleep.’
She tried to adjust Mum’s pillows, but Elizabeth shook her off. ‘Stop fussing. Listen to me. After I’m gone, it’s going to be down to you two to keep the family together. I know what will happen. Your dad will throw himself into his work. And Lewis is so immature, such a dreamer. I need you to look after them, okay? And each other. This family…’ Her voice faded out, and Miranda had a terrifying thought. Had she had a moment of clarity and then died? But then she spoke again. ‘Family is everything. We stick together. We protect each other. Our reputation. Our legacy. No matter what. Say it.’
‘No matter what,’ Miranda repeated, a lump in her throat.
Holly came a little closer. She said it, too.
‘Now, I need to sleep.’ She fell quiet, and this time Mirandawas convinced Mum was asleep. But as she got up to tiptoe away, Holly a step behind her, Mum said it again, a whisper, barely audible.
‘Family is everything.’
34
2025
Holly said, ‘I don’t like driving when it’s icy, not when I’ve had a couple of drinks.’ She handed me the key and I got behind the wheel, quickly figuring out the Jeep’s controls. It was so old it had a tape deck. I guessed Zack must have driven Charles back to the house in his Land Rover, leaving the Jeep at the pub for the two sisters to get home in.
‘Let’s go,’ Holly said, her voice all business.
As I drove, I glanced at Miranda in the rear-view mirror, watching to see if she got her phone out. She didn’t. I began to wonder if there was some way to get her on my side. I couldn’t risk simply telling her that I’d watched Zack shoot Morag– she almost certainly wouldn’t believe me– but perhaps I could try another tactic.
‘You know it’s not Jasmine’s fault that she looks like your mum, don’t you?’ I asked her. ‘She’s the victim here. One of the victims, I should say, along with you two.’
‘What are you wittering on about?’
‘Your dad and Zack kept it secret from you. I know how much that hurt you. If my spouse kept something like that from me…’
She folded her arms. ‘Oh, he’s going to pay. Believe me.When we get home, he’s going to wish it was him who’d fallen to his death in that cave.’
‘He deserves everything he gets,’ I said.
In the mirror, I saw her narrow her eyes. ‘I thought you men always stick together. You’re just pretending to sympathize to look good in front of Holly.’
‘That’s not true at all. I think it’s awful what he did. The app itself is horrific. The very idea of it makes my skin crawl. And to use it to bring someone into your life who looks like your mother, without caring about how you would feel.’ This was all easy to say, because it was the truth. ‘If I were you, I’d divorce him.’
‘Me, too,’ Holly said.
‘Oh, that will never happen,’ said Miranda.
‘Really?’ I was disappointed. ‘Because you love him too much?’
‘Why are you grilling me about my marriage?’
‘Sorry. I was trying to sympathize with you, that’s all.’
There was a long silence. This hadn’t gone the way I’d hoped. But then she said, ‘I’ve already had one failed marriage. You think I want to be like Jasmine’s trailer-trash mother, with a string of divorces behind her?’
