would trust him with a key to her house – as Kim had known she would. She’d planted her seeds of doubt well. Insidious little things that they were, they’d taken root and grown until Cassie couldn’t see anything past them but the suspicion that had turned her into the monster Kim had wanted Adam to see. She’d wanted him to leave her. Had she wanted him for herself? Cassie wasn’t sure. She was certain, though, that Kim hadn’t wanted her to have him, the only thing worth having in her life… apart from Samuel. Kim had guessed that after losing Josh, she would bond with him. She’d lied about her friendship with Jemma, Cassie had known she had. Why in God’s name hadn’t she confronted her then?
Pushing the door open, she slipped silently inside and quickly checked the downstairs rooms. There was no one there, no sound but for the slow drip of the kitchen tap. Ignoring the crumbs on the work surface, the baby bottles that hadn’t been swilled, she made her way upstairs, instinctively checking the nursery first. He wasn’t here, her beautiful grandson. Crossing the room to place the flat of her hand on the empty cot mattress, she felt a deep sense of bereavement. Had he ever lain here at night, in the nursery she’d so carefully chosen the woodland theme for?
Her chest tightening, she shoved Kim’s bedroom door open. Casting a glance around, she noted the pink satin dress abandoned on the floor, the frilly underwear adorning the bed. Had Adam succumbed to her charms? Cassie had been so sure he’d cheated on her. The signs were all there. The body contact, the coy glances, the hair on the bed. But who had initiated the contact? The coy glances were all Kim’s. The hair, how else might that have got there?
Realising how easily she’d jumped to conclusions, nausea swilled inside her. She still didn’t know whether they were wrong or right, how far Adam might have been tempted, but she would never forget the fear and confusion in his eyes when she’d viciously turned on him. Swiping tears from her face, she closed the door and went along the landing to push open the door to the small box room.
Stepping in, her heart jolted – and then stopped dead.
She couldn’t quite take it in at first, the cork tiling decorating one of the walls, the many photographs pinned to it. A montage of photographs, mainly of her son. Josh out walking. Shopping in his casual clothes. Waiting at Worcester train station in his smart work clothes, disembarking at Birmingham.
Her breath caught painfully in her chest.
Bewildered, she studied them. They’d been taken over a period of time. She could tell by the changing seasons, by the length of his hair. It needed cutting in some. She would have nagged him to do that. Her eye was drawn to one she recognised, one she’d taken herself, the photograph that had gone missing from her hall. She had wondered about Kim that first time, when she’d found the photograph missing after she’d gone. But then, she’d imagined that Kim was as upset as she was, that she might have taken it as a small memento of Josh.
Her eyes drifted to the train timetables also pinned to the wall. That first visit, the emotional letter that followed it… Kim had wheedled her way in. She’d stalked Cassie’s son, manipulated him. She’d stalked them. Cassie took in the other photographs. She herself appeared in some of them, coming to and from the house. Mostly, though, they were of Adam. He was smiling in one or two, a sad, contemplative smile but one that still reflected his caring nature. In others he was pensive, distracted. She recognised the look. His mind would have been on Josh, his insufferable loss.
Tempted to rip the photographs from the board, to tear everything of Kim’s to shreds, tear her flame-red hair from her head, she swallowed the hatred burning her throat and backed quietly away instead. Her jaw clenched, her heart thrashing wildly, she was heading back to the stairs when her phone vibrated.
She needed to switch it off. She needed to be quiet, invisible until she was ready to make her presence known. Instinctively she checked it, and laughed, a short, hysterical bark. Kim, creative little thing that she was, had thoughtfully sent her another photograph.
Why would she do that, she wondered, send her a photograph of herself in her short, tarty pink