Molly nodded, her face a mask of defiance. ‘I met Jeff Bryant the following week at The Limelight. He was rich, Summer, really rich. Father owned half of Boston. He was the rebel son but he was still the heir. I told him I was pregnant with his baby a few weeks later.’
Summer snorted. ‘You thought you could trap him but it backfired. He blew you out and you came back to London?’ said Summer, filling in the gaps. ‘And did you ever tell James about me?’
‘No,’ said Molly, ‘it was the only way, honey. James was decent. He would have wanted us to have stayed together and be a family. Well, I wasn’t going to hang around on the bloody breadline as a mother and artist’s muse.’
‘But you were making your own money!’ said Summer.
Molly laughed. ‘Not much. I was modelling just before the money exploded in the fashion industry; when Linda and Christie and Naomi came along you could stick another zero onto your rates. I was successful, sure, but the money wasn’t fantastic. Back then you needed a rich man, darling, to give you a life.’
‘And my father still doesn’t know about me?’ asked Summer.
‘No. It was for the best,’ said Molly, a note of pleading in her voice. ‘I wanted a better life for you. If I’ve ever pushed you with Adam, it’s because you don’t want to end up like me.’
‘But James is my father. I have a right to meet him, to know him.’
‘It’s not possible. Not now.’
‘Why?’ snapped Summer.
‘Because it’s been too bloody long!’ shouted Molly.
‘Maybe for you, but not for me,’ said Summer. ‘Do you know where he is?’
‘Summer, please. Let it go.’
Summer looked at her mother, dishevelled in her casual clothes, her hair messy, with lines on her face and puffy eyes from crying. She looked more like a stranger than ever before.
‘Get out,’ said Summer.
‘Summer, please. We need to talk about Adam, about the baby.’
‘Please, Molly, just get out. I need to be on my own.’
And, as Molly shut the door quietly behind her, Summer sank to the floor and began to sob, wondering how everything could have unravelled in her life so quickly.
64
There were a few lights on
in Karin’s house, glowing blush-pink behind the curtains as the dusk began to fall. For a few moments Erin sat outside in her car, the engine switched off, listening to the background noises: distant cars on a busier road, a breeze blowing leaves along the pavement. She didn’t get out of the car until she felt calm, knowing another scene with Karin would get her nowhere.
The house was grand, thought Erin as she walked up the steps, although too prim and pretty to be intimidating. Set a little back from the road, it was a tall, slim, white building with a shiny black door and Georgian windows with flower-filled window boxes. She rapped on the door with the big brass door knocker. Nothing. As much as she wanted to avoid Karin, the last thing she wanted was to let herself in with Adam’s keys. It seemed so intrusive and presumptuous. She could be doing anything in there – with anyone, she thought cynically. She walked round to the side of the house. A side window that looked onto the kitchen was slightly open. She peered through and called Karin’s name. The house remained silent.
After trying her mobile and land line one more time, Erin resigned herself to letting herself in. The door creaked open. The only sound was the tapping of Erin’s heels on the wooden floorboards. In front of her was a wide staircase lined with thick cream carpet; to the left of the entrance was a formal lounge. It was completely quiet. No hum of a television or bubbling of a pan on the stove, just the quiet of an empty house. She walked through the kitchen, a stunning space with white lacquered units and granite work surfaces. It was a show kitchen, a kitchen to be looked at, not cooked in thought Erin. Erin walked around the central Island; a lone bottle of wine stood on the side.
‘Karin. Are you home?’
Feeling more confident she was alone, Erin walked though into a big open dining space that ran along the back of the house. Erin put her car keys on the glass table; the jangle as they hit the surface unnerved her. Yesterday’s newspaper was on the table, along with some Italian magazines and a packet of chewing gum. She could see that the dining area ran into the lounge. Walking towards it she felt a sudden sense of unease. And then she saw her. Erin held her mouth and felt bile come up her throat. Karin was lying on the floor, dark hair splayed out round her, rivulets of blood spreading from her head like Medusa’s snakes. Oh, the blood. There was so much blood.
She edged closer, forcing herself to look, to see if there was any sign of life. Erin retched again and her knees gave way. She scrabbled around on the floor, reaching for her mobile in her bag, her hands quivering as she tried to punch in Adam’s number.
‘Erin,’ said Adam, his voice sounding irritated. ‘I’m at dinner, can I call you or Karin in half an hour?’
‘Please come quickly,’ whispered Erin, barely able to say the words. ‘I’m at the house. Karin’s here. I think she’s dead.’
The police got there quicker than Adam. Before Erin had time to process what was happening, the house had been cordoned off, red and blue lights swirled on the street, while officers were milling around with notepads and radios, barking orders and being deliberately vague about what they were doing.
Detective Chief Inspector Michael Wright from Scotland Yard’s murder squad did not look as if he belonged in Karin Cavendish’s drawing room. In fact, he didn’t look as it he belonged in any drawing room. Michael Wright was a cop cliché, at home in the pub and the bookies, lived and breathed the job for twenty years which had cost him his marriage and his health. He smoked forty Lambert & Butler a day and his drinking problem had escalated after his wife Lynn had kicked him out of the house three years earlier.