Jail Bird

blink of an eye.

Oli knew she was doing the right thing. She should have done this before; she should never have let things get as far as they had.

‘I’d like you to go now, Jase,’ she said quietly.

Lily moved further into the kitchen, her eyes glued to Jase. She’d wondered what the hell was kicking off, all that shouting and screaming, and she’d heard…Jesus, she’d heard them shouting about him hitting Oli. That bruise on Oli’s face was as she suspected. She hadn’t slipped on the drive. This bolshy little fucker had hit her.

‘Yeah,’ added Lily, and went over to the back door and opened it wide. ‘Off you go.’

Jase gave Oli one last despairing look, sent Lily a glance of pure hatred, and stormed past her out of the door. She shut it behind her, locked it. They heard his car starting up with an angry roar. The wheels threw up gravel as he sped off down the drive. After a moment, Oli walked over like an automaton to the intercom and opened the gates. They watched the screen as he sped out, swerved onto the lane, and with a screech of tyres he was gone. Oli pressed the button to close the gates. Her hand was shaking. She looked at Lily and suddenly her eyes were full of tears.

‘You all right?’ asked Lily, opening her arms wide.

Oli nodded, and after a moment’s hesitation she gave a gasp and flung herself into Lily’s warm embrace. ‘I’ve got to talk to you,’ she sobbed. ‘I’ve got to tell you.’

‘Shh,’ said Lily, smoothing a hand over her daughter’s hair. ‘Later, sweetie. Tell me later.’

‘No! I want to tell you now.’ Oli gulped and drew back a little, her eyes swimming with tears.

‘All right then. What is it?’

‘Mum…oh God, I’ve been so stupid. I think I could be pregnant.’

Jase sped off down the road, crashing through the gears, his brain a whirl. Behind him, he saw the gates closing. Saw his future vanishing in front of his eyes. Christ, his chest hurt. It really hurt now. Had to cut down on the steroids soon. First, he had to find a way round this. Had to do it, get the King bitch, had to drop Lily King dead at Freddy’s feet like a dog dropping a gift for its owner. But now Oli had kicked him into touch. Now he couldn’t just stroll in the house and get the cow, like he’d wanted. He’d tried getting her outside the house, but inside was best. Inside was where she felt safe, relaxed. Getting back in Oli’s good books had been key to that. But now he didn’t have an easy way in at all, because Oli had blown him out.

Bloody Oli. Stupid little mare. One small tap and she went apeshit. He knew he shouldn’t have done it, but he’d never do it again. Of course he wouldn’t. Never.

He had to find a way through this. Had to.

But Christ – his chest hurt.

51

Lily was in the indoor pool in the early evening, doing laps back and forth, revelling in the luxury of it now that it was warm and silky on her skin, just the way she liked it. But there wasn’t much else about her situation that she liked.

She was so sad about Saz – broken-hearted really – because Saz didn’t seem to be weakening, not even by an inch. Saz and Richard were out this evening, playing squash or something, and she was glad. The atmosphere in the house when Saz was here was just awful.

She was really worried about Oli, but glad that she’d split with Jase. From the moment she’d first seen him, she’d had a bad feeling about Jase. And now this. She was still trying to get her head around it.

Oli could be pregnant.

Oli had poured her heart out to her mother, telling her everything, that Jase had persuaded her not to take precautions but she should have insisted. She was late for her period; she was never late. And she knew she should have taken a test already, made sure one way or another, but she had been too frightened, too worried.

Lily was furious with that jumped-up little bastard. She hoped that it was a false alarm. She even hoped there was someone else on the scene, someone who’d make better father material than one of Si King’s heavies. She said this to Oli.

‘No,’ Oli had told her tearfully. ‘There’s no one else. I was in love with him, Mum. Really in love, but when he did that

Hit her, thought Lily, feeling a choking, icy rage taking hold of her.

When he did that, Oli had seen the light. Thank God. But…now there could be a child.

‘Do you…’ Lily had spoken slowly, choosing her words with care. ‘…If you are, do you want to go on with the pregnancy, Oli? And have you told Jase you could be?’

‘No, I ain’t told him yet,’ said Oli, discarding another wad of sodden tissues.

Lily patted her arm, passed her more.

‘But I’ll have to, sooner or later. ‘Cos if I am, I’m keeping the baby.’ Oli looked at her mother with anxious, red-rimmed eyes.

‘It’s your decision, Oli,’ said Lily.

‘I know. I’ve thought about it a lot. I’d want to keep it.’

Lily forced a smile onto her face and thought: Holy shit, I could be a grandmother.

She wasn’t even forty, and her daughter was maybe going to have a baby.

‘It’ll be fine,’ she told Oli firmly.

Oli sniffed and blew her nose loudly. ‘You know what? I can’t believe I’m saying this, but…I’m so glad you’re back,’ she said.

Lily felt a warm glow as Oli said that. Lily knew she’d patched things up with Oli, and she was grateful for it. Saz’s early return had cooled things down a bit – Oli was clearly torn between loyalty to her sister and to her mum, and it showed. But Oli had turned to her in this time of crisis; Oli was on her side. Whether her relationship with Saz was beyond saving or not – well, that was in the lap of the gods. All she could do was be here, much as Saz didn’t want that. All she could do was be ready to welcome Saz with open arms when the moment came. If it did.

There were other things to concern her too, and she was busy mulling them over as she swam. She’d met all Leo’s girls now. And a fat lot of good it had done her. She listed them in her head.

Adrienne Thomson, wife of dull, worthy accountant Matt. Easy to see why Adrienne had embraced a tasty bit of rough like Leo.

Alice Blunt. Poor, demented girl, obsessed with Leo and ready to self-harm to force him closer. Now she was dead, drowned at her own hand.

Reba Stuart. Hard as nails and twice as nasty. On the bash for a living in those days, but now a madam. Maybe Reba was the sort of woman Leo should have married, not quiet, mousy Lily. A woman as tough as he was.

Then there was Julia. Poor scarred, once-beautiful Julia, hiding away from the world that judged her and found her ugly.

And the last two – Suki and Bev. A double act. She was willing to bet Leo had found that a huge turn-on, having two nearly identical women at once.

But the question was – had one of Leo’s whores killed him? Had one of them – just as a ‘for instance’ – disliked him boffing half the country, and kicked off on a grand scale?

It was a question to which she still didn’t have an answer. However, as she floated, thoughts drifted through her head. Adrienne drifted through; Adrienne who had kept a list of all Leo’s other women, who had been so proprietorial about Leo that she had hired Jack to trace them. But then, Adrienne had been a bit older than Leo, and just that bit more eager to hang onto him when the alternative was married life with Matt – or ‘Door-Matt’, as their circle of friends had called him behind his back all those years ago. Adrienne had walked all over the poor git, that was a fact, but he’d soaked it up, more fool him. He’d even stuck with her when it