‘Are you sure you’re okay?’ said Cecilia to Rachel.

‘I’m so sorry.’

‘It’s not your fault,’ said Cecilia, and felt a hint of impatience. She’d come out for air, to stop herself from screaming, but she needed to get back now. She needed to start collecting facts. She did not need to talk to a bloody counsellor, thanks very much, she needed to see Dr Yue again, and this time she would take notes and ask questions and not worry about being nice.

‘You don’t understand,’ said Rachel. She fixed Cecilia with red, watery eyes. Her voice was high and weak. ‘It is my fault. I put my foot on the accelerator. I was trying to kill him, because he killed Janie.’

Cecilia grabbed for the side of Rachel’s seat, as if it were a precipice she’d been pushed from and stood up.

‘You were trying to kill John-Paul?’

‘Of course not. I was trying to kill Connor Whitby. He murdered Janie. I found this video, you see. It was proof.’

It was like somebody had grabbed Cecilia by the shoulders, spun her around and forced her to come face to face with the evidence of an atrocity.

There was no grappling for comprehension. She understood everything in an instant.

What John-Paul had done.

What she had done.

Their accountability to their daughter. The penalty Polly would pay for their crime.

Her entire body felt hollowed by the bright white light of a nuclear blast. She was a shell of her former self. Yet she didn’t shake. Her legs didn’t give way. She remained perfectly still.

Nothing really mattered any more. Nothing could be worse than this.

The important thing now was truth. It would not save Polly. It would not redeem them in any way. But it was absolutely necessary. It was an urgent task that Cecilia needed to cross off her list this very moment.

‘Connor didn’t kill Janie,’ said Cecilia. She could feel her jaw moving up and down as she talked. She was a puppet made of wood.

Rachel became very still. The texture of her soft, wet eyes changed, visibly hardening. ‘What do you mean?’

Cecilia heard the words come out of her dry, sour-tasting mouth. ‘My husband killed your daughter.’

Chapter fifty

Cecilia was crouched down next to Rachel’s chair, talking softly but clearly, her eyes just inches away. Rachel could hear and comprehend every word she said but she couldn’t seem to keep up. It wouldn’t sink in. The words were slipping straight off the surface of her mind. She felt a terrifying sensation, as if she was running desperately to catch something of vital importance.

Wait, she wanted to say. Wait, Cecilia. What?

‘I only found out the other night,’ said Cecilia. ‘The night of the Tupperware party.’

John-Paul Fitzpatrick. Was she trying to tell her that John-Paul Fitzpatrick murdered Janie? Rachel grabbed at Cecilia’s arm. ‘You’re saying it wasn’t Connor,’ she said. ‘You know for a fact that it wasn’t Connor. That he had nothing to do with it?’

A profound sadness crossed Cecilia’s face. ‘I know this for a fact,’ she said. ‘It wasn’t Connor. It was John-Paul.’

John-Paul Fitzpatrick. Virginia’s son. Cecilia’s husband. A tall, handsome, well-dressed, courteous man. A well-known, respected member of the school community. Rachel would greet him with a smile and a wave if she saw him at the local shops or a school event. John-Paul always led the school working bees. He wore a tool belt and a plain black baseball cap and held up a slide rule with impressive assurance. Last month, Rachel had watched Isabel Fitzpatrick run straight into her father’s arms when he picked her up after the Year 6 camp. It had struck Rachel because of the sheer joy on Isabel’s face when she saw John-Paul, and also because of Isabel’s resemblance to Janie. John-Paul had swung Isabel around in an arc, her legs flying, like she was a much younger child, and Rachel had felt a searing regret that Janie had never been that sort of daughter and Ed had never been that sort of father. Their uptight concerns about what other people thought seemed like such a waste. Why had they been so careful and contained with their love?

‘I should have told you,’ said Cecilia. ‘I should have told you the moment I knew.’

John-Paul Fitzpatrick.

He had such nice hair. Respectable-looking hair. Not like Connor Whitby’s shifty-looking bald head. John-Paul drove a shiny clean family car. Connor roared about on his grimy motorbike. It couldn’t be right. Cecilia must have it wrong. Rachel couldn’t seem to shift her hatred over from Connor. She’d hated Connor Whitby for so long, even when she hadn’t know for sure, even when she’d just suspected, she’d hated him for the possibility of what he’d done. She’d hated him for his very existence in Janie’s life. She’d hated him for being the last one to see Janie alive.

‘I don’t understand,’ she said to Cecilia. ‘Did Janie know John-Paul?’

‘They were in a sort of a secret relationship. They were dating, I guess you’d call it,’ said Cecilia. She was still crouched on the floor next to Rachel, and her face, which had been drained of colour, was now flooded with it. ‘John-Paul was in love with Janie, but then Janie said there was another boy, and she’d chosen the other boy, and then, he . . . Well. He lost his temper.’ Her words faded. ‘He was seventeen. It was a moment of madness. That makes it sound like I’m trying to excuse him. I promise I am absolutely not trying to excuse him, or what he did. Obviously. Of course there is no excuse. I’m sorry. I have to stand up. My knees. My knees are hurting.’

Rachel watched Cecilia rise to her feet with difficulty, look around for another chair, and drag it closer to Rachel’s before sitting down and leaning towards her, her brows knitted so fiercely she looked as if she were pleading for her life.

Janie had told John-Paul there was another boy. So the other boy was Connor Whitby.

Janie had had two boys interested in her, and Rachel had been completely unaware of it. Where had Rachel gone wrong as a mother that she’d had such little knowledge of her daughter’s life? Why hadn’t they exchanged confidences over ‘milk and cookies’ in the afternoon after school, like mother and daughter in an American sitcom? Rachel had only ever baked under duress. Janie used to eat buttered crackers for her afternoon tea. If only she’d baked for Janie, she thought with a sudden burst of savage self-loathing. Why hadn’t she baked? If she’d baked, and if Ed had swung Janie in joyful circles, then maybe everything could have been different.