Page 47 of The Girlfriend’s Secret

‘And I don’t want to lose our sons,’ I add. ‘But I fear that this woman is trying to take them from us. If she has her way, Joel will never speak to us again and Scott will be in prison for something he didn’t do.’

‘Nobody is going to prison,’ Frederik says calmly. ‘Your mother died in an accident and only Haven is suggesting otherwise. Not anybody else and certainly not the police. We don’t know why she is making up these false stories about Scott, but they won’t lead anywhere. They certainly won’t lead to our family breaking up. I promise you that.’

‘How can you promise it?’ I ask anxiously. ‘How can you know for sure that this situation isn’t going to get worse, not better?’

‘Because I’ll see to it that it doesn’t get any worse,’ Frederik says, pausing and turning to look at me. I stop walking too and we stand face to face on the park path, staring into one another’s eyes, totally undistracted by any other people who pass us.

‘I have a bad feeling about this,’ I admit to my husband. ‘I can’t shake it.’

Frederik lets out a sigh, but I’m not paranoid. My fears are entrenched in something very real.

‘I know Scott didn’t hurt his grandmother and it’s insane for someone to suggest it,’ I say. ‘But if Haven’s accusation about Scott gets to the police, I fear they will take it seriously based on what he did in the past.’

Frederik knows exactly what I am talking about.

‘No,’ he says. ‘That was a long time ago and it was completely different.’

‘It was violent conduct and it could be used as proof that he has a temper and is prone to outbursts of violence.’

‘It was a drunken fight outside a pub when he was eighteen years old,’ Frederik cries. ‘He wasn’t the first young guy to drink one too many beers and end up in a fight, and he won’t be the last.’

‘But he got a criminal record. He punched someone who ended up in hospital. Scott was charged. Yes, he didn’t go to prison, but there will be a record of it, and it will come up if Haven gives the police a reason to look at him again.’

‘No self-respecting police officer is going to think that somebody who has a fight outside with his mates when he was a teenager is then capable of murder ten years later. Scott, like most people, was a fool at eighteen. But now he is a grown-up, hard-working, respected member of society and that’s what the police will care about, which is why they will dismiss this silly notion that he is a murderer, just like we have already done.’

I want to believe my husband. I want to believe it could be as easy as that. But the fact is, Scott is not perfect. He made a mistake in the past, albeit a drunken mistake that some other men his age might make, and while nobody died, he can’t claim to have a flawless history. I hope Haven doesn’t know about it or it would only strengthen her resolve in thinking that Scott is a bad guy. But surely Joel hasn’t told her what his older brother did a decade ago. It’s barely worth mentioning. We’ve all moved on, Scott in particular. He’s more ashamed than anybody that he once got so drunk that he punched someone and they needed the care of a paramedic. He is not that guy anymore and he is certainly not a murderer.

‘I just want this to be over,’ I say to my husband as we start walking again.

‘I know,’ he replies. ‘Hopefully it will be.’

With no way of knowing that for sure, we complete the rest of our walk in worried silence. Meanwhile, Haven is out there somewhere, with my youngest son, probably living her best life as they discuss what to spend the inheritance money on.

That young woman is wreaking havoc wherever she goes.

What will she do next?

THIRTY-THREE

HAVEN

A hotel room is usually a place for a person to relax. But that doesn’t really apply to me as I enter the room where me and my boyfriend are due to stay for a couple of nights.

‘This is great!’ Joel cries as he admires the double bed, spacious bathroom and the large flatscreen TV on the wall. ‘I could get used to this.’

‘I’m sure the credit card company could get used to it too,’ I say, reminding him that we are only here because he used a credit card to fund it. But it’s not a problem because he’ll have £75,000 very soon, although I still think we should be wise with money, where we can be. That’s why I object to his idea that we order a bottle of champagne to the room.

‘Spoilsport,’ Joel says before taking off his T-shirt. ‘I’m going to test the shower in here. You want to join me?’

‘I think I’m just going to try and rest for a minute,’ I say, looking at the bed.

‘Suit yourself,’ Joel replies before disappearing into the bathroom.

I hear the shower turn on and, within seconds, Joel is whistling. He seems content, far more content than I thought he would be, given his delicate family situation right now. How is he able to separate all of that from his mind and find some peace? I would have thought he would be cut up about the rift that was developing between us and his parents, never mind the potential issue of his brother and him being at war if Joel stays on my side.

I get onto the bed and do what I told Joel I was aiming to do. I try to relax. But it doesn’t work, not even after turning the TV on and trying to distract myself with something on there. By the time Joel emerges from the bathroom with a towel wrapped around his waist, only one of us looks like we are refreshed.

‘You look tired,’ he says as he walks to my side of the bed and gives me a kiss on the head. ‘I was thinking I might go out for a walk. Maybe grab a beer somewhere. How about you stay here and rest? I could be back in about an hour and a half. How does that sound?’