“She’s adorable,” Pete said as Tally tucked the bedclothes tightly around Darcey and nestled Gary the Gorilla next to her, a gift from Kinga that Cash detested. He thought it wasn’t feminine enough for his special girl, but Darcey loved it, and Tally had discovered her daughter slept better when Gary was in close proximity.

“She wasn’t adorable at three this morning,” Tally grumbled. “Screamed the house down. Good job we don’t have close neighbours. They’d be reporting us for noise pollution.” She leaned over the cot and kissed her daughter’s forehead. “Wouldn’t change a second, though.”

Pete draped an arm casually over her shoulder. “Let’s go and eat, and then you can tell me what’s bugging you.”

Tally gave him a weak smile. “Am I that transparent?”

“Nah,” Pete said. “But I’ve known you your whole life, kid.”

Cash had already put the water on to boil, so they were ready to eat five minutes later. Pete did his usual trick of wearing more sauce than he ate, and the familiarity of it comforted Tally when she needed it the most. This wonderful man had been her saviour after her dad died, taking her in, letting her disrupt his perfect bachelor lifestyle with teenage hormones and temper tantrums.

As he dropped his fork, a goofy grin appeared on his face, and he pointed to his red-splattered shirt. Tally jumped from her chair and flung her arms around him.

“I don’t tell you this often enough, Uncle Pete, but I love you to death. I’ll never forget what you did for me when Dad died.”

“Hey, hey,” he said, absentmindedly patting her arm. As she pulled away, she caught the puzzled look he gave Cash, who simply shrugged.

Pete tapped the rim of his wine glass. “Why don’t you fill that up and then tell me what’s going on.”

Cash did the honours, and when he searched for Tally’s hand beneath the table, his long fingers easily wrapping around hers, a tidal wave of emotions hit her. Blinking back imminent tears, she squeezed his hand, hoping he understood the silent message.

“Not long after you left yesterday, there was a knock at the door. I assumed one of you had forgotten something. When I opened it, a woman I had a brief conversation with at the hospital the day after Darcey’s birth was outside. At the time, she told me her name was Meredith and she was visiting her granddaughter. She seemed lovely. Warm.”

Tally paused to take a sip of water.

“I was confused about what she was doing at my house, until she blurted out she was my mother.”

Pete gasped, a strangled, shocked, quick intake of breath. “No. That can’t be right. Your mum’s name was Martine.”

“I know. That’s what I said. She told me she changed her name years back. That Martine was nothing like Meredith.”

Pete scrambled to his feet and began pacing. He was blinking rapidly as though he couldn’t quite believe what was unfolding in front of him, and he kept tugging on the tails of his shirt as he flashed the occasional sideways glance at her.

“What else did she say?”

“I didn’t give her much chance to say anything. She told me she wanted to explain. I refused, and then Cash turned up and asked her to leave.”

“I actually told her to fuck off,” Cash said.

His interjection was a welcome relief, and even Pete’s lips curved upward with the hint of a smile. “Right answer.”

“She left a contact number,” Tally said. “Wants me to call her.”

Pete stopped pacing and sat back down. He picked up Tally’s free hand, leaving her other one still firmly in Cash’s grasp. “She’s bad news, Tal. I know your dad and I weren’t exactly forthcoming in telling you what went on, but believe me when I say it was for your own good. We only ever had your best interests at heart.”

“I understand.” Tally’s heart began to pound. “But now that she has turned up, I need to know what happened. I need to know everything.”

He nodded, but the maelstrom of emotions shifting across his face told a different story.

“Everything,” she reiterated. “I don’t want it sugar-coated, and I don’t want anything left out. I’m a big girl now with a child of my own.”

He sighed as his eyes fell shut for a second or two, no doubt allowing him time to gather his thoughts. “I hoped this day would never come. When your dad died, I expected you to ask about your mum, but you never did. Almost as though you thought it was disrespectful to John. As the years passed, I began to hope we’d never hear from her again and you’d forget all about her.”

“And if she hadn’t turned up, you’d have been right.”

“Still fucking everything up,” Pete muttered, almost to himself. He took a sip of wine—well, more like a gulp—and when he placed the glass back down, his face had taken on a resigned, if not quite receptive, expression.

“From the moment your dad met Martine, he idolised her. There was nothing he wouldn’t do for that woman, and although it kills me, I have to admit she did seem to feel the same way about him, at least at first. Thirty years ago, she was a real stunner, and your dad was convinced he was punching above his weight. But for whatever reason, Martine chose him.

“I remember on their wedding day John pulled me to one side and told me how happy he was, that all his dreams had come true. And when you were born, his life was complete. A stunning wife and a beautiful daughter. Who could hope for more?”

“Not me,” Cash murmured.

Tally turned to him and smiled. He was looking at her with such reverence, almost in awe. She’d seen that same look on his face several times since Darcey had been born, as if he couldn’t quite believe he was living this life. The irony was that she, too, thought she was punching above her weight.

“For the first year or so after you were born, everything seemed fine, but Martine wasn’t the sort of woman who relished being cooped up all day, especially with a baby. She began to crave excitement, something to contrast what she saw as a dull and boring existence. John tried his best, taking her to concerts, the theatre, nightclubs, even though he’d rather have stayed at home and cuddled up on the sofa with you and her. Over time, their innate differences began to show.

“And then, without warning, Martine seemed to accept her new life. She stopped pestering your dad to take her out. John was thrilled, obviously. The late nights while he was trying to build a career were beginning to take their toll, so her change of heart couldn’t have come at a better time.”

“How old was I then?” Tally said.

Pete’s nose crinkled. “About eighteen months.”

“So what went wrong?”

“John was desperate for you to have a sibling, and he pushed your mum pretty hard, but Martine wasn’t the maternal type. I don’t doubt she loved you then, but the thought of going through all that again… well, let’s just say she didn’t hide her horror. After a while, John gave up on the idea of another child and poured all his love into you.

“It took a while for him to realise something wasn’t quite right. It started with little things. Money would go missing from his wallet. An antique clock that had been left to him by your grandfather disappeared, supposedly broken. She lost her engagement ring. She’d always been slight, but she began to lose weight, enough that you could see her bones sticking through her clothes.”

“Didn’t get my arse from her, then,” Tally said, earning a sharp look from Cash.

Pete might as well have been in a trance for all the notice he took of the interruption. “When you were about two and a half, John came home from work early because he felt unwell. As soon as he opened the door, he knew something was wrong. You were clawing at the sides of your playpen, screaming for Martine at the top of your lungs. There was no sign of her. John picked you up and began shouting for her as he searched room to room. He found her passed out in the bathroom with a needle sticking out of her arm.”

“Drugs?” Tally whispered as Cash pressed closer.

Pete nodded. “Heroin. John called an ambulance, and she was rushed to hospital with a suspected overdose. When she recovered, she told John she’d tried it a few months earlier because she was bored.” Pete’s incredulous tone verbalised exactly how Tally was feeling inside.

“She took heroin as a way to mitigate boredom?”

“Believe me, your dad was just as horrified as I was. Because she’d OD’d with you in the house, social services got involved and threatened to take you into care. Your dad was almost insane with worry he’d lose you, and after several meetings, social services agreed to leave you in his care, but only if your mother went into rehab.”

“And did she?”

“Yes. The first time was fairly successful, and John thought that was it. She’d won her battle with heroin.”

“But she hadn’t?”

“Over the next eighteen months, your mum relapsed seven times.”

Cash hissed. “Holy shit.”

“And that’s why he threw her out?” Tally said.

Pete shook his head. “No. John supported her the whole way through. He was insistent she’d recover. He fully believed his love would be enough to get through to her. He never stopped loving her even after everything she’d done. The lying and stealing, selling things of sentimental value. Even with her neglect of you, he refused to give up on her, but it didn’t make a difference. By then, Martine had only one love in her life—heroin—and she’d do anything to get her next fix.”

“So what did happen?” Even as Tally asked the question, she almost wanted to slam her hands over her ears, to beg Pete to stop talking. She didn’t want to know. She didn’t need to know what the catalyst had been to her mum finally leaving. If her dad had forgiven everything that came before, the inciting event must have been truly awful.

“She’d been out of the last bout of rehab about six weeks. For the first two, John told me she was clean, but he knew the minute she relapsed. All the sneaking around and the lies began again, but this time, he made sure she couldn’t get her hands on any money, and they didn’t have much left in terms of possessions to sell. She’d already sold anything of value. He was insistent that if she couldn’t pay for the drugs, the pusher wouldn’t supply them. But he’d forgotten she did have one thing of value. At least to a certain type of person.”

As an unbelievable realisation swept over Tally, she wanted to turn back the clock, to forget she’d asked Pete to come over. She wanted to run upstairs and cuddle her daughter, to be connected to something innocent. Surely that would make this horror go away. Her mouth seemed to move without her brain giving permission.

“Go on,” she said, her voice scratching, as if the sound were being forced through wire wool.

“Your dad found out she was turning tricks in return for her daily fix.”

Even though she’d guessed, hearing the actual words was the worst thing that had ever happened in her life. Her mother had been a prostitute, selling her body to God knows who in return for heroin. She half expected a panic attack, but instead of the clammy sweats, escalated breathing, and constricted heart, she felt cold. Ice cold.

“How did he find out?” Cash asked.

Pete grimaced. “She gave him an STI.”

“They were still sleeping together?” Cash’s voice sounded strange, although that could have been because a fog had covered Tally, making it difficult to hear, like the way she felt when her ears kept popping during a plane’s descent.

“He always believed she’d win the battle in the end. And still, he forgave her, until he found out she was taking Tally along when she met her… clients.”

“What?” Tally managed to force the word through a mouth devoid of saliva. Her top lip was stuck to her teeth, and a cold sweat drenched her. Cash’s arm shot out to steady her, and she realised she’d started to waver.

“I got you, baby.”

“She took me with her?”

Pete nodded. “John went crazy when he found out. I happened to be visiting when she staggered through the door with you in tow, reeking of booze and fags and sex.”

“Fuck,” Cash bit out.

“She was high. And belligerent. She told John it was no fucking big deal. Said it was part of your sex education. I swear, Tal, when she said that, I thought he was going to kill her. He screamed at me to grab you, which I did. He had her by the hair. He dragged her upstairs, made her pack a bag. He chucked some money at her when he pushed her through the front door and told her if she ever came near you again, he’d kill her. She believed him. I believed him.”

“Didn’t she fight back? Didn’t she fight for me at all?” Tears dripped down Tally’s cheeks and over her chin, but she didn’t bother to wipe them. As terrible as her mother had been, something deep within her still craved a mother’s love.

“I’m so sorry, Tally, but in the end, she loved heroin more than she loved you. I hope you understand now why your dad and I never spoke about that time.”

She rose from her chair and cocked her head at the bottle of wine.

“I’m going to express some milk,” she said to Cash. “Then you’re going to pour me a very large glass of wine.”

As she headed for the stairs, Cash must have started to come after her because she heard Pete say, “Let her be,” before their voices faded.

Her legs might as well have been made of lead as she hauled herself upstairs. She couldn’t believe it. Her mother was a junkie and a prostitute who’d taken her own daughter to watch while she was fucked by God knows how many men at a time. And all to chase her next fix. She’d had it all—a healthy and happy child and an adoring husband who worked hard to forge a career that meant he’d be able to take care of them both. Yet she’d chosen to shoot her veins full of crap instead. Heroin had been preferable to life with her daughter.

No wonder Tally had confidence issues. Hatred rushed through her, making her light-headed with the strength of it. Martine, Meredith—whatever the hell her name was—had turned up the previous day wanting to explain. How could she explain what she’d done? How could anyone excuse that?

Tally bent over Darcey’s Moses basket, and as she looked at her sleeping daughter, the anger drained away. Darcey had her arms up by her head in a pose of surrender, blissfully unaware of the terrible truths her mother had heard that evening. Tally couldn’t imagine anything tearing her away from her daughter. She could never envisage a time when she’d choose drugs over her precious baby girl.

She sat in the rocking chair and attached the breast pump. Closing her eyes, she gave herself over to the odd suckling sensation. By the time she’d finished, she had enough feed to last Darcey through that night and half of the next day—and she’d made her decision.

Her legs were lighter on the way down. Taking control had removed the heavy weight from her shoulders, the weight she’d borne since her mother had turned up unannounced the previous day.

Cash clambered to his feet as soon as she appeared. She swapped the bottled breast milk for a large glass of wine. She took a sip. And then another, larger one.

“I needed that.”

“Are you okay?” Cash asked, concern lacing his voice.

She nodded. “I am.” She faced Pete. “I’m going to agree to her request to see me. And I want you here when she comes.”