The Wronged: No parent should ever have to bury their child.... Kimberley Chambers

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СКАЧАТЬ She had never been one to suffer small talk with the neighbours. It bored the arse off her.

      ‘Your Brenda’s inebriated in the Maurice with some bloke, and Tara and Tommy are sat outside with a guy.’

      ‘Guy! What guy?’

      ‘A stuffed Guy, as in Fawkes. They’re being a bit rude, Queen, so I thought you should know. They aren’t asking for a penny for the Guy, they want a pound. Then when people won’t give them the money, they’re threatening to set your Vinny on to them. Well, Tara is anyway. I heard her say it to Mr Patel and old Mr Arthur.’

      To say Queenie was livid was putting it mildly. She had always classed such behaviour as begging and had given her boys such a clump when she’d caught them sitting outside the train station doing the same when they were nippers.

      Queenie grabbed her coat and front-door keys. Brenda was her only daughter; twenty-six years old now, but still the bane of Queenie’s life. The girl was an embarrassment, especially when she had alcohol inside her. She must have inherited an alcoholic gene from her father. That useless old bastard had spent more hours pissed in his lifetime than sober.

      ‘What you gonna do? You won’t tell Brenda it was me who told you, will ya? ’Cos I don’t want no trouble, Queen. I only knocked because I was worried about those kiddies.’

      ‘I’ll bastard well swing for her, Hilda, that’s what I’ll do,’ Queenie spat as she marched off down the road.

      ‘Oh, and before I forget, Queen, Lil got taken away in an ambulance earlier. Had a stroke, by all accounts. Big Stan told me she looked dead as they wheeled her out.’

      ‘Any more fucking joyful news?’ Queenie mumbled under her breath. Lil was in her nineties now, lived in the house between hers and Viv’s, and both had been dreading the old girl croaking it because they didn’t want new neighbours. Talk about it never rains but it pours.

      Vinny Butler took off his tie and suit jacket and stared at his reflection in the mirror. With his six-foot-two frame, piercing green eyes and jet-black hair, Vinny had always been a striking-looking man. But since Molly had been so cruelly taken from him, he’d lost weight, and felt far older than his thirty-five years.

      Vinny sat on his bed, put his head in his hands and wept. Apart from during the actual service, he had kept his emotions pent up all day. Molly’s send-off – unusually for anything involving his family – had gone without a hitch. The wake had been held at Nick’s, the restaurant that Vinny part-owned in Stratford. Even with all the tables and chairs removed, there hadn’t been enough room to accommodate the mourners. The club would have been a far more appropriate venue had circumstances been different and Molly had not been snatched from there.

      No parent expected to outlive their kids, especially when they were as young as Molly had been. Her death would haunt Vinny forever. With her curly blonde hair, big green eyes and infectious personality, Molly had been the light of Vinny’s life. He’d loved that child more than he had ever loved anybody. On the day he’d found out she was dead, part of him had died with her.

      ‘You OK, Dad? I’ve just been crying as well. I will always blame and hate myself for what happened. I know I never played with her much, but I did love her and I really do miss her,’ Little Vinny lied.

      Vinny patted the bed and when his son sat next to him, he put an arm around his shoulders. With his dark hair, bright green eyes and tall build, Little Vinny was most certainly a chip off the old block. ‘No point keep beating yourself up, boy. Not gonna bring Molly back, is it? I was proud of you today when you stood up and read that poem. Not an easy thing to do in a packed church.’

      ‘So, you don’t blame me no more then?’

      On the day Molly went missing there had been a flood in the club cellar. Vinny had left his son in charge of Molly while he went downstairs to sort it out, but the boy had fallen asleep. The main door of the club had accidentally been left open and it still wasn’t known if Molly had wandered outside or her killer had entered the club to abduct her.

      ‘No. I don’t blame you. There’s only one person to blame and that’s Jamie cunting Preston. He’ll pay for what he did one day. As soon as he’s released, I’ll be there waiting for him. An eye for an eye, son. Always remember that.’

      ‘I’ll help you kill him, Dad. I’ll be old enough then.’ Little Vinny shook his head. ‘I still can’t believe it. I mean, Jamie is your half-brother. I suppose that makes him my uncle, doesn’t it?’

      Vinny’s relationship with his father Albie had always been strained, and there would certainly never be any bridges built now. Jamie Preston was the result of an affair his father had indulged in many moons ago, and none of his family had even known the evil little shit existed until he had been arrested for Molly’s murder. To say Vinny had been shocked was an understatement. He’d thought an old enemy of his was the culprit, and had beaten Bobby Jackson so badly that he was still in hospital, unable to communicate with anybody. ‘Let’s go downstairs and get a drink, eh, boy?’

      ‘Can I have a cider, Dad?’

      ‘Yeah. Course you can.’

      Little Vinny could not help but smirk as he followed his father down the stairs. Life was so much better now his dad’s bird Joanna and Molly were no longer around. It was like it used to be when he was younger. Just him and his old man.

      Molly’s mother, Joanna Preston, was back at her parents’ place in Tiptree. She’d left the moment the funeral was over, unable to face the prospect of the wake, not with the Butlers lording it as if they were royalty, surrounded by all their gangster pals. Her only friend in that family was Michael’s wife, Nancy, who’d accompanied her home. Michael was nowhere as bad as his brother, but even so Nancy had had a lot to put up with and the two women had supported one another when the Butlers closed ranks. Both of them had been livid when Little Vinny had been allowed to stand up in church and read that poem, and even more angry when he had failed to mention them.

      ‘Thanks for seeing me home, Nance. I couldn’t have got through today if it wasn’t for you. Seeing Vinny again made me physically sick. I can’t believe I was ever in love with the bastard. I bet he told that horror of a son of his not to mention us in that poem. I know the way his evil mind works. And did you see his face when I asked him for Molly’s doll? The way he was smirking when he said I couldn’t have it because he’d put it in her coffin. I don’t believe him. He didn’t even have the guts to identify his own daughter’s body, so why would he have gone anywhere near her coffin? I bet he has the doll indoors. The police told me they gave it back to him last week.’

      ‘Vinny’s hateful, Jo. He always has been.’ Nancy wrapped an arm round her friend’s shoulders and gave her a hug. ‘I don’t mean this to sound horrible, but I reckon your dad was right: Vinny targeted you purposely because he knew you were Johnny Preston’s kid. I mean, if he loved you even a tiny bit he would never have treated you the way he has since Molly died. He has been a total and utter pig. If you ask me, you’re well rid of him.’ Seeing that Joanna was about to start crying again, she added softly: ‘I’ll have a word with Michael about the doll. He might be able to find out where it is.’

      The doll in question had been Molly’s pride and joy. Vinny had bought it for his daughter and named it after her. The little girl had taken Molly Dolly everywhere with her, wouldn’t go to sleep unless the doll was tucked in beside her of a night. The bedraggled, rain-soaked doll had been found a quarter of a mile away from where Molly’s tiny body was located. The police reckoned Molly had dropped it as her killer СКАЧАТЬ