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He stares at her. ‘We aren’t talking about this in front of our children.’
‘I need to know.’
‘Why are you asking me now?’
‘I was a child.’
His face folds then hardens into a frown. ‘So was I.’
Lydia steps towards him. ‘She said no, and then what? You raped her and then tried to kill her?’
I hurry to sit between Ash and Ava, ineffectively covering one ear each. They bullied my daughter. She was driven here, to this room, by the people who failed her, and they had failed her terribly. But, but… they’re just children, and I love them.
‘Lydia – please.’
Lydia sneers. ‘“Lydia please” what?’ She looks back at Tristan. ‘That’s what happened. And then your mother helped you cover it up by manipulating Frances, Mina and me. We lied for you. We got Miss Smith arrested. Of course she killed herself. Her against the Beaufort-Bradleys? What a thing to be accused of.’
Tristan shakes his head, staring at his children. ‘Don’t listen.’ He scowls at Lydia. ‘Miss Smith was a flirt. Everyone knew it. She was taunting me. No, I didn’t rape her. Do you even remember those skirts? She was… game. But it turned out I wasn’t. And she didn’t like that.’ He breathes out slowly and looks like he might cry, tears balancing on the rims of his eyelids.
Lydia’s cheeks are flushed. ‘You always were a very good actor.’
Mina rubs her eyes. ‘Tristan, no one really thought Miss Smith was a flirt until we told them she was.’
Lydia slams her hand against the counter, and Ash and Ava jump in my arms. ‘We killed Miss Smith. We all have responsibility. Tristan, you’re beyond the pale. But Frances, Mina, we made sure he got away with it, and she’d never have killed herself if it weren’t for that. And you’ve been burying your heads in the sand since that day, and now your kids are fucking evil little mini-daddies, and your daughter, Frances, she’s so depressed she thinks the answer is suicide, and you don’t even ask her how she is in the mornings. Do you know your daughter exists, Frances?’
My mouth drops open. ‘Suicide? Did she tell you she?—’
‘I’ve never raped anyone,’ says Tristan.
‘Well, that depends how you define it,’ snaps Mina. Lydia and I whip round to face her, and I feel her children tensing against me. I want to run over and hug her.
Tristan gawps like a fish, incredulous. Whatever Mina is referring to, he doesn’t believe he did it.
‘Mina, Lydia, there are children here,’ I say at last.
Lydia looks over. ‘Bullies. Just as ready to cover for Daddy as the rest of you.’
‘They’re children,’ I say again.
Mina covers her eyes. ‘I’ve recorded this whole thing,’ she says. ‘From the moment we got in the car, Tristan. And there’s no way Georgia doesn’t have copies of that tape.’
Georgia. Georgia did this. Georgia killed my daughter. Because of what we did.
I feel the world ripple around me. I swallow down my bile and grit my teeth.
Tristan jerks towards Mina but stops himself. ‘It’s a good job then, isn’t it, that I haven’t at any point made an admission of guilt, and whatever is on the tape – like I said at the time – is easy to misinterpret. But you can’t convict someone because you might, at a push, be able to read a single piece of evidence one way. Especially when, upon hearing her charges, the accused decided not to face them but to take her own life.’
‘Dad,’ Ash speaks up, and I wrap my arm tight around his body. ‘Are you saying you don’t care if that tape gets out? Because I don’t know what’s on it, but you just ripped it up in front of us, and it sounds like you’ve gone all in on keeping it a secret.’ He tries to keep his voice steady, but at the end it breaks.
‘You too, Ash? My own son?’
‘If it’s not a problem, then why is it a problem?’ Ash sets his jaw, but tears spill down his cheeks.
‘What’s on that tape – it isn’t enough to convict anyone of anything. Except maybe Frances.’
‘What?’
‘Well, you hid the tape. You made sure the police wouldn’t get a crucial piece of evidence.’
