‘She moved things from her sofa so I had somewhere to sit and she said, “Phin? Where is Phin?”

‘And then of course, I stopped. Because the truth was that I’d run away and I’d left him there, locked in his room. And if I explained why he was locked in his room then I’d have to explain everything else. And I looked at her and she was so damaged and I was so damaged and I should have told her everything. But I just couldn’t do it. So I told her that the adults had killed themselves in a pact. That Henry, Lucy and Phin were still at the house with you. That the police were coming. That it would all be OK. And I know it sounds ridiculous. But remember: remember where I’d been, what I’d been through. My allegiances were so skewed. We children had had no one but each other for years. Lucy and I were inseparable, as close as real sisters … well, up until she got pregnant.’

‘Lucy?’ says Libby. ‘Lucy got pregnant?’

‘Yes,’ says Clemency. ‘I thought … Did you not know?’

Libby’s heart starts to race. ‘Know what?’

‘That Lucy was …’

But Libby already knows what she’s about to say. Her hand goes to her throat and she says. ‘Lucy was what?’

‘Well, she was your mother.’

Libby stares hard at the photo of the mouth cancer on Clemency’s cigarette packet, takes in every vile, disgusting detail, to try to block out the wave of sickness coming towards her. Her mother is not a beautiful socialite with Priscilla Presley hair. Her mother is a teenage girl.

‘Who was my father?’ she says after a moment Clemency looks at her apologetically and says, ‘It was … my father.’

Libby nods. She’d been half expecting this.

‘How old was Lucy?’

Clemency’s chin drops into her chest. ‘She was fourteen. My father was in his forties.’

Libby blinks, slowly. ‘And was it …? Did he—?’

‘No,’ says Clemency. ‘No. Not according to Lucy. According to Lucy it was …’

‘Consensual?’

‘Yes.’

‘But she was so young. I mean, that’s still legally rape.’

‘Yes. But my father … he was very charismatic. He had a way, a way of making you feel special. Or a way of making you feel worthless. And it was always better to be one of the special ones. You know, I can see how it happened. I can see … But that’s not to say I didn’t hate it. I did hate it. I hated him for it. And I hated her.’

They fall silent for a moment. Libby lets the revelations of the last few minutes sink in. Her mother was a teenage girl. A teenage girl, now a middle-aged woman lost somewhere in the world. Her father was a dirty old man, a child abuser, an animal. And at this thought, Libby starts at the sound of a notification coming from her phone. It’s a WhatsApp message from a number she doesn’t recognise.

‘Sorry,’ she says to Clemency, picking up her phone. ‘Can I just?’

There’s a photo attached. The caption says, We’re waiting here for you! Come back!

Libby recognises the location of the photo. It’s the house in Cheyne Walk. And there, sitting on the floor, holding up her hands to the camera is a woman: slender, dark-haired, very tanned. She’s wearing a sleeveless vest and has some tattoos encircling her sinewy arms. To her left is a beautiful young boy, also tanned and dark-haired, and a gorgeous little girl with gold-tinged curls, olive skin and green, green eyes. On the floor by their feet is a little brown, black and white dog, panting in the heat.

And in the foreground of the photograph, holding the camera at arm’s length and beaming into the lens with very white teeth is the man who calls himself Phin. She turns the screen to face Clemency.

‘Is that …?’

‘Oh my God.’ Clemency brings a fingertip closer to the screen and points at the woman. ‘That’s her! That’s Lucy.’

Libby uses her fingertips on the screen to stretch out the woman’s face. Lucy looks like Martina, the woman she’d briefly thought was her mother. She has the dark skin and the glossy black hair, but hers is singed rusty brown at the tips. Her forehead is lightly lined. Her eyes are dark brown, like Martina’s. Like her son’s. She looks weathered; she looks tired. She looks absolutely beautiful.

They get to Cheyne Walk five hours later.

At the door, Libby feels for the house keys in the pocket of her handbag. She could just let herself in; it’s her house after all. And then she gulps as it hits her. It’s not her house. It’s not her house at all. The house was for Martina and Henry’s baby. A baby that was never born.

She puts the keys back into her bag and she calls the number attached to the WhatsApp message.

‘Hello?’

It’s a woman. Her voice is soft and melodic.

‘Is that … Lucy?’

‘Yes,’ says the woman. ‘Who’s this?’

‘This is … this is Serenity.’

61

Lucy puts the phone down and stares at Henry.

‘She’s here.’

They go to the front door together.

The dog starts to bark at the sound of people outside and Henry picks him up and tells him to shush.

Lucy’s heart races as her hand goes to the door handle. She touches her hair, smooths it down. She makes herself smile.

And there she is. The daughter that she had to leave behind. The daughter that she has killed to come back for.

Her daughter is average height, average build, nothing like the huge roly-poly baby she’d left behind in the Harrods cot. She has soft blond hair, but no curls. She has blue eyes, but not the pale aqua blue of the baby she’d had to abandon. She’s wearing cotton shorts, a short-sleeved blouse, pink canvas plimsolls. She’s clutching a grass-green handbag to her stomach. She’s wearing small gold sleepers with crystal drops hanging from them, just one in each ear lobe. She’s not wearing any make-up.

‘Serenity …?’

She nods. ‘Or Libby. For my day job.’ She laughs lightly.

Lucy laughs too. ‘Libby. Of course. You’re Libby. Come in. Come in.’

She has to resist the urge to put her arms around her. Instead she guides her into the hallway with just a hand against her shoulder.

Following behind Serenity is a big, handsome man with a beard. She introduces him as Miller Roe. She says, ‘He’s my friend.’

Lucy leads them all to the kitchen where her children sit waiting nervously.

‘Kids,’ she says, ‘this is Serenity. Or actually Libby. And Libby is …’

‘The baby?’ says Marco, his eyes wide.

‘Yes, Libby is the baby.’

‘Which baby, Mama?’ says Stella.

‘She’s the baby I had when I was very young. The baby I had to leave in London. The baby I never told anyone about, ever. She’s your big sister.’

Marco and Stella both sit with their jaws hanging open. Libby sort of waves at them. For a moment it is awkward. But then Marco says, ‘I knew it! I knew it all along! From the minute I saw it on your phone! I knew it would be your baby. I just knew it!’

He gets to his feet and runs across the kitchen and for a moment Lucy thinks he is running away, that he is angry with her for having a secret baby, but he runs towards Libby and throws his arms around her waist, squeezes her hard, and over the top of his head Lucy sees Libby’s eyes open with surprise but also with pleasure. She touches the top of his head and smiles at Lucy.

Then, of course, because Marco has done it, Stella follows suit and clings to Libby’s hips. And there, thinks Lucy, there they are. Her three babies. Together. At last. She stands with her hands clasped to her mouth and tears fall down her cheeks.

62

CHELSEA, 1994

I’m not completely heartless, Serenity, I promise.

Remember how I let you hold my finger the day you were born, how I looked at you and felt something bloom inside me? I still felt that, when you and I came face to face here two nights ago. You were still that baby to me; you still had that innocence about you, that total lack of guile.

But you had something else.

You had his blue eyes, his creamy skin, his long dark eyelashes.

You don’t look much like Lucy.

You don’t look anything like David Thomsen.

You look just like your dad.

And it’s ridiculous looking back on it that I couldn’t see it when it was right there under my nose. When your blond curls came through and your bright blue eyes and your full lips. How did David not see it? How did Birdie not see it? How did anyone not see it? I guess because it was impossible to believe. Impossible even to conceive.

That my sister was sleeping with David and Phin at the same time.

I didn’t find out until the day after Birdie’s birthday party.

Lucy and I had not decided what to do yet. Phin was thrashing about in his room, so I tied him to a radiator, to keep him safe. For his own good.

Lucy was appalled.

‘What are you doing?’ she cried.

‘He’s going to hurt himself,’ I said righteously. ‘It’s just until we decide what to do with him.’

She was holding you in her arms. You and she had not been apart for a moment since she’d taken you out of Birdie’s arms the night before.

‘We need to get him some help.’