Picking up the framed photograph next to her bed, Marie Huston stared at the two smiling faces that gazed back at her.
The pain inside her was as strong as ever, despite the fact that it felt like a whole other world now. A different time completely.
Beautiful Cassie and her, both of them looking so happy and carefree.
The image of her father had been torn from the picture. Ripped into a hundred pieces. It was the only photo she had of her and her sister together – the image that they’d used in the newspaper reports.
The media had milked her family tragedy for all it was worth. Portraying them just as he’d have wanted. Their father. A happy little family. The widowed father, and his two darling daughters.
That’s what it would look like, if you didn’t know any better.
And no one had known any better. Their father had made sure of that.
Making sure to the outside world, to anyone watching, that no one knew their dark, sordid secrets.
And they’d had many, many secrets.
Secrets, that their father had said, if they’d spoken about to anyone, would get them sent away to a children’s prison. He’d told them that people wouldn’t understand. That people would think Marie and Cassie were bad.
And of course, Marie and Cassie had hung on his every word.
They’d believed all of his sick, twisted threats and mind games.
Why wouldn’t they?
He was their parent, their father.
Why would he mean them any harm?
All those times when he’d sneaked into their beds at night and made them do all those disgusting things to him.
When he made them do all those things that they didn’t want to do.
That was love. That’s how they had to show him how much they loved him.
Marie gripped the frame tightly in her palm, her fingers turning white from the force of the hold.
She was glad he was no longer part of the picture. He didn’t deserve to be there.
The problem their father had was that little girls grew up eventually.
They find out stuff. And at five years older than her younger sister, Cassie, finally Marie had found out. All those things that their father had subjected both of them to for all of these years had been wrong.
All those things he had done to them.
It wasn’t love.
It was sick, and twisted, and evil.
Marie’s only saving grace from the abuse had been puberty. Later than some of the other girls at school, Marie had been fifteen when she finally got her monthly cycle and her breasts had started to grow, and she’d been so happy because it miraculously meant that her father didn’t want her any more.
The nightly visits suddenly stopped.
It had given Marie a sense of relief at first. But her respite soon became Cassie’s sole burden.
Marie had seen it in her younger sister’s eyes; each morning she’d recognised the pain and suffering behind them: the broken shell of a girl now that Cassie was their father’s only release.
Her little Cassie.
The girl that had often danced around the kitchen like a maniac, giggling and laughing with Marie.
They always did that when it was just the two of them. Whenever they were free of him.
But now it was as if the light had gone out behind her eyes.
And when she did look at Marie, it was only hate that grew there. Resentment that Marie was getting off scot free. That she was the only one suffering.
Cassie had gone so far inside herself that even Marie couldn’t reach her anymore. Her sister had started wetting the bed. Then her behaviour had started to change at school too. Cassie had started getting into fights. Lashing out at the people around her, to the point where she’d almost been expelled for punching one girl in the face and giving her a black eye.
That’s when Marie had decided that she needed to do something drastic. Something to stop her father from hurting Cassie any more than she was clearly hurting already.
So, Marie had offered herself to him then.
Squeezing her eyes shut, remembering how she had lain in his bed one night, waiting for him. How she’d been so willing to give herself to him. A sacrifice.
Using herself as a bargaining card, just so that he would leave poor Cassie alone.
But her father had simply rejected her.
Not only that, but he’d got some kind of a sick power trip from humiliating Marie too. Turning her down and marching her naked from his room.
Then, later that night, she’d heard them.
Her father and her sister.
Those disgusting noises. Cassie crying.
Placing the photograph back down on the bedside cabinet, overwhelmed by memories, Marie Huston smoothed down her new, crisp, blue nurse’s uniform before checking her hair was tidy in the mirror. Not a strand out of place.
She was determined to make a good first impression today at her new job.
After years of studying and training, she was working in the Burns Unit at Chelsea and Westminster Hospital.
Today was finally her fresh start, her new beginning. Something to focus on, which might, in some way, ease the burden that weighed so heavily upon her soul.
She glanced back one last time at the face of her beloved beautiful sister, Cassie, feeling her tears threaten once more, as she picked up the photo and kissed it gently.
Marie had never meant for Cassie to die.
Nancy Byrne’s body was soaked in a thick film of sweat. Her hair clammy, trailing down her face and sticking to her skin.
The pain in her body was so acute, so agonising, that she thought she was going to pass out. Or throw up again.
She could still feel the slimy film that coated her teeth. The rancid bitter taste of hot burning bile in the back of her throat.
All she wanted to do was collapse into an exhausted slumber and wake up when this was all over. Only there was no chance of that.
Not with the continual pain that was building inside her.
The feeling of her insides being ripped out of her.
‘I can’t do this!’ Nancy screamed as another wave of agony washed over her, the intensity building with every contraction.
‘You can, Nancy. Trust me. You can do this,’ Jan Barker said as she squeezed Nancy’s right hand to offer the woman some encouragement. Having worked as a midwife at King’s College Hospital for the past decade, Jan was certain that the young woman was almost there. She just needed to keep her strength up. To stay motivated. ‘A couple more pushes and that baby of yours is going to be here, Nancy. We’re so close. You’re almost there, darling.’
Nancy shook her head disbelievingly. Glad that the midwife, at least, had some faith in her.
‘There’s nothing left in me. Please. I really can’t do this.’
Staring up at the clock on the wall, she’d lost track of time, but she knew she’d been in labour now for almost twenty hours.
Her mother was at her side too.
‘Come on, Nancy!’ Colleen Byrne piped up, placing a hand on her daughter’s head to show her affection. ‘The baby’s almost here, you’ve got to focus, Nancy!’
In her element ever since the midwife had called her to the hospital as Nancy’s next of kin, Colleen had been lapping up every minute of being involved with Nancy’s labour.
And what a privilege that was, witnessing her first precious grandchild being born into the world.
Oblivious to the fact that Nancy didn’t actually want her there, she smiled down at her daughter, offering her words of encouragement.
‘This little baby is coming, Nancy, whether you like it or not. You need to be strong for your child, darling,’ Colleen cooed, embracing the one opportunity she’d been given to finally be there for Nancy in her time of need.
Maybe this was her chance to fix things with her daughter. To unite them both and help heal the bond that they’d never really had between them.
‘Strong for my child?’ Nancy spat, her mother’s words like a red flag to a raging bull. ‘You’d know all about that, wouldn’t you, Colleen? Mother of the bleeding year! And can you please stop rubbing my bloody head,’ Nancy said, breathlessly, shrugging her mother’s hand from her hair. Frustrated then as she bore down once more as another almighty contraction surged through her body.
Nancy let out a low, deep moan, grabbing at the tube for the gas and air before muffling her despair as she inhaled a huge lungful.
‘It’s all right! She hasn’t got a very high pain threshold! I won’t take it personally,’ Colleen quipped to the nurse beside her, rolling her eyes. ‘And I do know all about it, Nancy. This bit at least. I gave birth to you and your brother on my own too, you know. That father of yours that you insist on placing on a pedestal was nowhere to be seen both times that I was in labour. Too busy working, supposedly, to make it to the hospital in time for either of his children’s entrances into the world. That was Jimmy, all right! I don’t think he even met Daniel until your brother was almost three hours old…’
‘Jesus, Colleen. The last thing I need to hear right now is you slagging off my dad…’ Nancy warned the woman, her tone curt. This was hard enough without being reminded that her father wasn’t here anymore. That he’d never meet his first grandchild. And the very last person she wanted mentioned today of all days was her waster of a brother. Trust Colleen to take her opportunity to get in her two pence worth and bring up Daniel once again.
The woman just wouldn’t let it go.
Daniel had gone. Fuck knows where or what had happened to him, Nancy no longer cared. As long as she never had to set eyes on him again.
‘There’s a time and a place, Colleen! And trust me when I say, it isn’t now.’ Nancy winced then, the pain almost too much to bear. Between that and having to listen to her mother’s bitter comments, it was all Nancy could do not to scream.
Sensing the tension between the two women, Jan Barker stepped in.
‘I’m just going to check Nancy’s temperature,’ the nurse lied, sensing Nancy’s discomfort at having her overbearing mother in the room with her, lecturing her. Colleen Byrne was only adding to her daughter’s pain.
Jan ushered the woman further back from the bed, away from Nancy’s direct vicinity.
Colleen continued talking through Nancy’s contractions, oblivious.
‘Well, it’s not right, is it? That you’re doing this on your own. What about the father, Nancy? Have you even told him that you’re in labour?’ Colleen asked now, tight-lipped, knowing that she was pushing her luck fishing for answers about the identity of her first grandchild’s birth father, but also knowing her daughter well enough to know that Nancy Byrne wasn’t going to tell her shit.
The girl could be so pig-headedly stubborn sometimes.
Colleen had no idea why Nancy was so adamant about keeping the father of her child a secret from them all. Though that was Nancy all over. She liked to do things her way, or no way. Just like Jimmy, she was. Her father’s daughter through and through.
Though it was about time that Nancy told her who had fathered her first baby, and Colleen figured that the fact that her daughter was now off her head on gas and air might finally make her talk.
Though, of course, Colleen had called that theory wrong too.
Instantly putting Nancy’s back up at her questioning.
‘Please, Colleen.’ Nancy spoke through gritted teeth. ‘Not now, yeah?’
‘Okay!’ Colleen nodded. ‘Though I don’t know why you have to be so secretive about the whole thing, Nancy. It’s 2004, you can do what you want. No one’s judging you. If you want to be a single mum, and bring up a child on your own, who are any of us to stop you? I just don’t think it’s fair on the child. To not have a father.’
Colleen stared at Nancy then, the sudden realisation hitting her.
‘Is that it, Nancy? Is that why you don’t want to tell us? Because you don’t know who the father is?’
‘Oh, please! Get her out of here, will you? She’s doing my head in,’ Nancy shouted, as she felt yet another wave of agony wash over her. ‘Please, I’m in enough pain as it is without her adding to my misery…’
‘Mrs Byrne!’ Jan Barker said then, her voice as stern as her expression. ‘I think it would be a good idea if you waited outside.’
‘What and miss my first grandchild being born?’ Colleen screeched incredulously.
Though she couldn’t help but feel tearful at the sight of her daughter lying in the hospital bed. About to bring her own child into the world. The fact that even this wouldn’t bring the two women together. The damage that had been done between them over the years was irreparable.
She’d overstepped the mark, she realised that now. She was only trying to help. To get closer to Nancy by letting her know that she could confide in her.
‘I’m sorry, Nancy. Please let me stay.’ Colleen started crying then. Huge wracking sobs shaking her body. ‘I just want to make things right. I just want to help! Be a good grandmother to this baby. Start as we mean to go on…’
Nancy faltered. A tiny part of her wanted that too.
Maybe it was the fear she felt about becoming a new mum? Or the fact that Colleen was one of the few family members she and this baby had left.
Her mother, her nan and grandad.
She wanted her baby to have a family, of course she did. Maybe she was being too hard on the woman?
‘Look, Nancy has asked for you to leave, so if you don’t mind,’ Jan Barker said, as she stared at the monitors and noticed the sudden change in the readings. ‘You need to leave now,’ she ordered, as she guided Colleen Byrne towards the door.
‘We should have gone private!’ Colleen sneered, catching the look the nurse and her daughter exchanged. ‘At least that lot know what they are doing. They get paid enough—’
‘Colleen!’ Nancy shouted then. No longer interested in her mother’s opinions.
The pain inside her was so strong now that she couldn’t physically bear it any longer.
‘This can’t be right?’ she cried. ‘This pain is killing me…’
‘Nancy?’
Jack Taylor stood in the doorway of the delivery suite. His sudden presence making everyone turn to look at him.
‘What’s happening? Is the baby okay?’
Looking from Nancy to Colleen then back to the chaos of the room.
‘Oh, please tell me you didn’t call Jack,’ Nancy groaned, her legs up in the stirrups now. Visibly distressed as it was, without Jack adding to it by turning up here unannounced.
She wanted to do this her way, but her mother’s interfering had put paid to that.
‘Well, I’m glad someone did, Nancy. I have a right to know.’
‘I was excited, I just wanted to share the news.’ Colleen apologised, shaking her head, confused at why Nancy seemed so angry suddenly. Jack Taylor had been like family to them all, and in the months since Jimmy’s murder, Jack had gone above and beyond to watch out for this family. Especially Nancy.
Though Jack sounded angry, too, now.
Colleen was puzzled by his turn of words.
‘“A right to know”?’
He looked as equally pissed off as Nancy did. As if he was somehow entitled to know what was going on. ‘What do you mean you have “a right”? I don’t understand…’
Reading Nancy’s and Jack’s expressions only confirmed what was suddenly dawning on her.
‘Jack’s the father, isn’t he? Jesus Christ!’
It all made sense now.
Why Nancy had been so secretive about her pregnancy for so long, why she hadn’t mentioned to a soul who the father was.
Jack had been acting strange, too, Colleen realised, recalling all the sniffing about the man had been doing. Constantly around at the house, even more so than usual. Always asking about Nancy and how she was doing throughout the pregnancy. Fussing over the girl.
Colleen had naively thought that the man was just looking out for them all, being a good, loyal friend. Especially after Jimmy’s murder.
That he’d had all their best interests at heart.
Only Jack had been more than just a friend to Nancy. That much was now blatantly clear.
‘Please tell me it isn’t true?’ Colleen snapped, incredulously.
The man was at least twice Nancy’s age. Old enough to be Nancy’s father.
Old enough to know better.
Before Jack could answer, Nancy let out an almighty scream, drowned out by the simultaneous sound of the alarms that were monitoring the baby’s heartbeat.
‘I think the baby’s distressed!’ Jan Barker shouted to the rest of the team, as pandemonium broke out in the room.
‘What’s wrong?’ Nancy screeched, seeing the urgency and chaos breaking out around her. ‘Please? Is the baby okay?’
The room was full of strangers all dressed in gowns and surgical masks, panicked looks etched on the obstetric team’s faces.
From the sudden commotion all around her, Nancy already knew the answer.
Something was wrong, something was very wrong.
‘It’s going to be okay, Nancy.’ Then, turning to Colleen and Jack, Jan Barker added, with urgency, ‘You both need to leave.’ This time it was an order. ‘The baby’s become a little distressed; we’ll have to use forceps. We need to get him or her out. Now.’
‘“Distressed”? What does that mean? What’s happening? You can’t make me leave. My daughter needs me.’
‘Just get the fuck out, Colleen,’ Nancy screeched. Done with her mother’s dramatics. ‘There’s something wrong with the baby. Are you too fucking selfish or stupid to understand that? Get out!’
Nancy had slumped back against the pillows then. Her face void of colour. Her eyes screwed tightly shut as a searing pain consumed her very being. Crying loudly now.
‘Come on, Colleen. Let’s respect Nancy’s wishes.’ Sensing the gravity of what was happening around them, and how distraught Nancy was, Jack Taylor intervened. Taking Colleen by the arm, he guided her out of the room to the seating area in the corridor.
Stung by her daughter’s words, by the pure hate in Nancy’s eyes, Colleen Byrne finally did as she was told.
Taking a seat next to Jack Taylor just outside the room, they both sat in silence.
Waiting for some news, to hear the sound of the baby crying.
Waiting to hear anything.
The air was suddenly shattered by a piercing scream, followed by a silence so harrowing that Colleen wanted to cry herself, too, then. Only she knew she had to stay strong, for Nancy’s sake.
She closed her eyes to stop the tears from escaping, giving up on the hope of hearing the sweet sound of her first grandchild’s cry.
Bracing herself for the bad news, as the midwife stepped out of the room, Colleen clutched at Jack Taylor’s hand for support.
She couldn’t do this again.
She couldn’t lose another member of her family. She just couldn’t.
Only to her surprise, Jan Barker smiled.
‘I think I have someone who’d like to meet you both.’ Holding the door to the delivery suite wide open, she invited them both back in. ‘Congratulations, Daddy and Grandma. Nancy has just given birth to a very healthy and very beautiful little girl.’
‘Come on, girls. Stay out with us and have some fun?’ Flashing the two girls his most charming smile, Trey Coleman failed to keep the desperation from his tone as he watched them flag down a taxi outside The Ten Bells pub. ‘Or at least let us ponce a lift back up the West End?’
‘Sorry! No can do,’ the first girl said then, tartly, as she held the black cab’s door wide open for her friend. ‘We’re meeting some friends; there won’t be enough room for you two as well.’
Trey shook his head. He might be pissed but he wasn’t stupid.
These two money-grabbing tarts had taken him and Digsby for a right pair of mugs. After plying the two girls with jugs of cheap and cheerful potent cocktails that were on the menu, as many as their greedy little hearts desired, convinced by the girls’ unspoken promises that they were onto a sure thing, it seemed that wasn’t the case at all.
Not now that the East End boozer that was standing behind them was shut and the two lads had barely a penny left to their names.
And the pub had been busy; heaving, in fact.
That was the most annoying thing about tonight. The Ten Bells, in Spitalfields, was one of the best little pubs in the whole of the East End. A sure bet if you wanted to pull a couple of fit girls; only Trey and Digsby seemed shit out of luck tonight and had picked a pair of wrong’uns.
Trey had blown his entire week’s wages on these two trollops, to now realise that the only two people being played tonight had been him and Digsby all along.
They had been a right pair of gullible idiots.
‘Oh come on, girls. What are we meant to do? We’re both boracic now after spending out all night. At least give us your numbers.’
The first girl shrugged; then rolling her eyes up to her mate, she ducked inside the cab.
He eyed the second girl. His one, Mandy. They’d been talking and laughing all night. They had a connection.
Surely she wasn’t going to be as hard-nosed as her mate?
She faltered, holding on to the car door, eyeing Trey with a small wry smile on her face.
‘Okay. Have you got a pen?’
Tapping himself down, though he knew that he didn’t normally carry a pen on him, he eyed Digsby. He was desperate to at least get this girl’s number. That way the evening wouldn’t have been a complete waste of time and money.
‘Have you got a pen, Digs?’
Stuart Digsby shook his head.
‘Ahh, well, that’s a shame. Only, if you had one, I’d have told you to get back in it!’
The girl laughed then, before throwing the boys a cute little wave and jumping into the cab.
‘What?’ Trey looked at Digsby, the confusion all over his face. ‘I don’t get it?’
The joke going completely over his head.
‘A pen. Come on, Trey, think about it.’ He laughed then, catching his breath only to make grunting pig noises. ‘A pig pen. She was taking the piss out of you.’ Digsby smirked, despite himself.
The girls were a couple of money-grabbing cows, brazen as fuck too. Only the look on Trey’s face now was priceless.
‘Slags,’ Trey said, trying to save face. Watching as the taxi drove off into the distance. He could feel a wave of heat creeping up his neck; his face burning with humiliation at being made such a mug of.
Worse than that, he had no money left, not a single penny.
He’d been well and truly fleeced.
Hoisting himself up onto the wall that ran alongside the front of The Ten Bells pub, sitting side by side with Digsby, he dug his heels into the brickwork.
‘They were a right pair of stuck-up bitches anyway,’ Digsby said, trying to make his friend feel better. ‘Far too high-maintenance for us. Plus my one had a stonker of a nose on her. The only way she stood a chance with me, was for me to be paralytic. She probably knew that too. Wanted to make a fast exit before it started to get light or she’d turn into a gremlin or something,’ Digsby joked, pretending that he had standards for once, when they both knew that Digsby would shag his own grandmother if the room was dark enough.
‘Shit man, what are we gunna do now?’ Trey said, annoyed, glancing at the pub behind them that now sat in complete darkness.
There was no one else around; the street was completely empty.
Trey, Digsby and the two girls had been the last ones out of the pub doors. They’d practically been marched out by the bar staff, who had all followed them out shortly afterwards. Making a swift exit home after their busy shift.
‘I dunno mate.’ Stuart Digsby shrugged, knowing full well that neither of them had any money left. ‘We haven’t even got enough to get a kebab, let alone a cab home.’
Trey shrugged. He couldn’t be arsed to trudge his way halfway across London.
Not yet anyway.
Instead, he just sat there. His eyes lingering on the pub behind them, staring at the windows.
‘This place looks creepy now, don’t it?’ Trey said with a shiver. ‘Did you know that it used to be called Jack the Ripper back in the eighties?’
‘Yeah, wasn’t it because that psycho used to drink here or something?’ Preparing himself for one of Trey’s drunken history lessons about the place – Trey was always harping on about shit like this, more so when he’d had a few beers.
Digsby remembered hearing some kind of a rumour about the place, only he’d never paid that much attention to things like that.
‘No. Jack the Ripper didn’t drink there. But one of his victims did. His last victim in fact. My dad said that this place used to have loads of prossies hanging around out the front, touting for work. Black Mary they called her.’
‘Oh yeah, your old man an expert on where all the prossies hang out then, is he?’ Digsby chimed in, winding his mate up.
Trey gave Digsby a dig in the arm. Carrying on with his story then.
‘It’s fucked up though, isn’t it? That they changed the name of this place just to drag the tourists in. Jack the Ripper pub. A woman actually got murdered and it was just treated like some sort of gimmick.’ Trey shook his head. His tone disgusted.
‘Well, there ain’t no prossies hanging about out here anymore,’ Digsby said, sounding almost disappointed as he eyed the empty street. ‘And even if there were, unless they’re happy with £2.60 and half a packet of chewing gum in return for a blowie, we’d both be shit out of luck.’
‘My dad said that they reckon this place is haunted now. Apparently, Black Mary still roams her patch over there, where she used to tout for customers,’ Trey said, pointing over to the dark shadowy entrance of the alleyway that ran along the side of the pub.
‘Your dad sure knows a lot about this Black Mary. You sure he wasn’t banging her, ’en all?’ Digsby laughed then. ‘Dirty old bastard. What did he do, get caught trying to bag himself a hooker, and then made out that he was really doing a bit of ghost hunting? I’ve heard it all now. Your dad’s a right card, mate, I’ll give you that.’
Trey shook his head. His mate never took him seriously.
‘He didn’t see her. He saw her ghost. I swear to God, Digsby. He saw her. I’m telling you. He looked terrified when he told me. I could see the fear in his eyes. He said it was really late one night. And that no one had been around. The street had been empty. Just like it is now. The pub looked abandoned. Empty. Then he saw her, a young woman standing at the entrance of the alleyway. He said that she was crying. He said he went over to see if she was all right…’
‘Oh, I bet he did!’
‘Only when he got near to her, she just disappeared. Right in front of his eyes. He said that he could remember the sad look on her face. The weird Victorian clothes she wore. He said that she’d been so real, he cou. . .
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