No Going Back by Casey Kelleher (black male authors TXT) 📗

‘Do you fancy a lift? It’s the very least I can do,’ Lucy said, leaning over and opening the passenger side door before Vivian could refuse.

Vivian smiled and got in.

‘Thank you, darling. It beats catching the bus. How was your day?’ Vivian sensed that Lucy was exhausted.

‘Tough. We’re in the middle of a murder enquiry. There was an attack on another potential victim. Luckily she managed to get away.’ Lucy shrugged her shoulders. Her eyes fixed on the road. As if there something more she wanted to say.

But Vivian knew not to pry.

Lucy’s job was confidential, and even the very little that Lucy told her was forbidden.

‘Can I ask you something, Vivian?’ she said finally.

‘Of course, anything.’

‘Do you think that it would make my nan worse if my mother’s case was reopened?’

‘Your mother’s case is being reopened? Has something happened? Do you have a suspect?’ Vivian said.

Lucy had filled Vivian in on everything about her mother’s death previously, because she knew that working in such close proximity to her nan for the amount of time she did, would throw a lot of things into light, and she wanted the woman to be prepared to deal with anything that might cause her nan to be upset.

And that obviously included her mother’s murder. It had affected Winnie badly at the time, but her illness seemed to bring it all up again, almost daily. Winnie was always so confused. Sometimes she forgot her daughter was even dead at all. Other times she remembered the pain of finding out over and over, as if she was reliving it all once again.

‘We don’t have anything concrete, no. But I remember something. His face. I remember his face. And I don’t know what to do. Because the last thing I want to do is cause my nan any more distress by dragging it all up again.’

‘Oh, my! Lucy!’ Vivian said, seeing the dilemma the girl was in. ‘That’s an awful lot for you to shoulder, honey. Have you spoken to anyone else?’

Lucy nodded.

‘I spoke to DS Morgan earlier today. And he advised me to talk to a forensic psychologist. But other than that no. Only you.’

‘Well, that’s good. I’m sure that DS Morgan will support you in any way that he can. He cares about you, and your mother’s case. He cares about your nan too,’ Vivian said, knowing how close Lucy was with DS Morgan. How she trusted him implicitly, and how he cared for Lucy enough to ensure that she did the right thing, for her.

‘Regarding your nan, I couldn’t really say. You know that I live by the term that honesty is not always the best policy when it comes to caring for someone with dementia. Those little white lies we feed our patients aren’t to make our job easier, they are to spare them from any unnecessary upset and distress.’

‘So, you think it would be too much for her to be questioned about it all? That it wouldn’t be a good idea for me to talk to her about it?’

Vivian pursed her mouth.

‘Their brains are often experiencing a completely different version of reality from us and anything like this, well, I don’t think she’d entirely understand it. I think it would be too much for her to process.’

Lucy nodded. That was what she’d thought. That she’d be dragging all of this up again, and for what? To upset her nan and cause her more heartache. Because it had been twenty years now. They hadn’t caught her mother’s killer back then, and there was no guarantee that they’d be able to catch him now. Especially when all she had to go on was a vague recollection of a face in her dreams.

‘But you need to do what’s right for you, too, Lucy,’ Vivian said as they pulled up outside her house a few minutes later. ‘You’ve got too much going on to suffer alone with this one. I’m always here for you, if you need to talk. You know that, don’t you?’

‘I do. Thank you.’

Satisfied with that, Vivian leaned over and kissed Lucy on the cheek.

‘I’ll hopefully see you tomorrow evening?’ Vivian said as she got out of the car, leaning down and giving Lucy a small smile. ‘Because I’m not sure I can take one more arse-whooping from that grandmother of yours. She takes Scrabble far too seriously.’

Lucy couldn’t help but laugh at that. Watching as Vivian made her way into her house, the windows all lit up, the movement of people inside, she felt a slight tinge of jealousy then as she pictured Vivian’s family. The loud, raucous laughter around the dinner table. The arguments. The love. She pulled away and made her way back to her nan’s empty house.

22

‘Fuck me, you’re really pushing the boat out, Jay-Jay. All the pubs in London and you pick this dive?’ Russ Boland said, standing over the man and eyeing him with disgust as he shoved half a cheeseburger in his mouth and a trail of ketchup ran down his chin.

It was no surprise to Russ that he, Jay-Jay and the barman were the only three people in here.

‘Nothing a lick of paint and a new carpet wouldn’t sort out.’ Jay-Jay shrugged. He wasn’t fussed about the place’s decor. The food was warm and the beer cold. Compared to the squat he was currently staying in it was a palace.

‘A lick of paint?’ Russ laughed at the man’s optimism. ‘The only thing that would improve this place is a fucking inferno! And is he fucking deaf or what?’ Russ nodded over towards the barman, who was standing directly under the huge flatscreen TV that hung over the bar, noise blasting from its speakers. ‘Cos if he ain’t already, he soon will be with that thing blaring. Still, at least the telly’s drowning out the noise of you shovelling that food into your face. No one’s gunna steal it on you, mate!’ Russ smirked.

He and Sam had it