The Half Sister, page 7
‘Anything else?’ he asks dourly.
Lauren eyes the miniature bottles of gin that line the shelves and wonders whether it would make her pounding head better or worse.
‘Erm, no thanks, just these,’ she says, instantly regretting it.
He hands her change from a five-pound note, and she turns, practically bumping into the man standing behind her.
‘Lauren?’ he says, startled.
She looks at him, before pulling back, as if she’s trying to shrink herself. She wishes she could turn back around and become anonymous again, because nothing about this encounter is how she’d imagined it being for all these years.
‘Justin!’ she says, once she’s made the split-second decision that there’s no way out of this. She instinctively runs a hand through her hair, as if hoping that by some small miracle, her straggly ends have transformed themselves into lustrous curls. Are her cheeks still mascara-stained from when she’d sobbed at the traffic lights earlier? Does she look like a crying clown? Or had she even put make-up on this morning? She doesn’t know which she’d rather right now.
‘Oh my God,’ says Justin. ‘Lauren! I can’t believe it. How . . . I mean . . . how are you?’
She allows her hair to fall forward, in the naive belief that it will cover the colour in her furiously burning cheeks.
‘I’m good,’ she says. ‘Gosh, it’s been a while – a long while. I heard you moved to Chicago.’
He nods animatedly. ‘Yes, about twenty years ago. Not long after we – you know.’
Lauren looks at the floor, wishing it would open up and swallow her whole.
‘But I’ve been back for a few months now.’
She wants to ask him all the questions she’s spent the last two decades asking herself. Who did he marry? Does he have children? Has he changed? Why did he leave when she needed him most? The only one she can safely answer is he looks even better than he did when he was eighteen. A few grey hairs pepper his temples and his jawline isn’t quite so defined, but his eyes are still the kindest she’s ever seen.
Sweat is prickling under her arms, and although her heart wants to stay in this moment for ever, her practical head is yelling at her to say what needs to be said and get out of there.
‘So, what are you doing now?’ she says, finally finding her voice.
‘Well, I got divorced a year or so ago,’ he starts, and Lauren can’t help herself from doing a virtual leap. ‘So when my company asked if I’d be interested in running the UK operation, it seemed like the right time to come home.’
The weight of the next question lies heavy on her lips, knowing that the answer will impact her far more than she’d like. Yet still she can’t stop herself.
‘And . . . children,’ she says. ‘Do you have children?’
He looks away, out onto the petrol station forecourt, where time seems to have stood still, and swallows hard. Lauren knows what’s coming.
‘Erm, yep, two,’ he says, clearing his throat.
She bites down on her lip to stop herself from crying.
‘And what about you?’ he asks hoarsely. ‘Married? Kids?’
How could such a simple question be so difficult to answer? She looks out to her car, where, no doubt, Armageddon is in full swing, and before she knows it, she’s shaking her head.
‘N-no,’ she mutters, feeling as if she’s lost control of her senses. She’s sure her brain is telling her head to nod, but no matter how hard she tries, she can’t seem to comply.
‘Wow,’ says Justin, shaking his head from side to side. ‘I’ve just always assumed that . . .’
‘No,’ she says, more assertively. ‘It just wasn’t to be.’
‘Wow,’ he says again, before laughing nervously. ‘It’s so good to see you.’
Lauren can’t help but feel disappointed. In herself, for how she looks and what she’s said, but most of all because she knows this chance meeting is coming to its natural end.
Ever since Justin had told her it was over, not a day has gone by when she hasn’t thought about him, wondering how their perfect life together had gone so wrong.
‘But how can you say that?’ she’d cried down the phone, the day before her seventeenth birthday.
‘It’s just how I feel,’ he’d said, matter-of-factly.
‘You told me you loved me two days ago. You promised we’d be together for ever. What’s changed?’
‘You!’ he’d said. ‘You’re not the person I thought you were.’
None of what he was saying made any sense. ‘Of course I am. I’m still me.’
‘I’m sorry, but I just don’t love you anymore,’ he’d said before putting the phone down.
No matter how many times she’d tried calling him back and no matter how many times she’d pleaded with his mum to let her see him, he’d never spoken to her again. Just like that, he’d destroyed two and a half years of a love so intense that she didn’t think she’d ever breathe again.
Why why why? she wants to scream now, as he pulls her into an awkward embrace. She closes her eyes as her chin rests on his shoulder, his familiar smell transporting her back to those painful teenage years. Despite the harrowing memories, she wishes she could stay here, because no matter what, Justin had always made her feel safe. He’d never treat her like Simon does.
‘Good to see you too,’ she says, removing herself from his arms.
She’s already working out whether she’s got enough time to get to her car and drive off before he pays for his fuel. She doesn’t know why she lied to him, but now that she has, she can’t run the risk of him seeing two red-faced babies screaming in the back seat.
‘Take care,’ she says, backing out the shop door.
He offers a sad smile and raises his hand.
She turns and hurriedly makes her way to her car, just managing to get a grip on the handle when she hears her name being called.
‘Lauren, wait up.’
‘Shit, shit, shit,’ she says under her breath before turning and almost running back to him.
Justin laughs nervously. ‘Listen, I know this may sound completely crazy, but do you want to get together?’ He looks everywhere but at her. ‘For a catch-up.’
Lauren’s mouth dries up and she feels as if she has a tennis ball lodged in her throat.
‘No, you’re right,’ he says, without her saying a word. ‘It’s probably not a good—’
‘I’d love to,’ she says, without even realizing it. What the hell was she thinking?
Justin grins. ‘Really? Wow, great, can I give you my number?’
Her head’s racing at a million miles an hour, wondering how she’s got herself into this situation and how to get herself out of it. All the time, knowing that she doesn’t want to.
‘Or perhaps I can take yours?’
She shakes her head, thinking of Simon and what he would do if he found out that she’d given her number to another man. It’d be bad enough if he thought it was a stranger. She can’t bear to think what he’d do if he knew it was the boy she once loved more than anything.
‘No, I’ll call you,’ says Lauren quickly, before realizing in a hot-headed panic that her phone is in the car. She hops from one foot to another as she contemplates what to do. If she goes to get it, he’s likely to follow, and then what will he think? She hedges her bets, hoping that the one she puts money on won’t let her down.
‘Listen,’ she says. ‘I really need to be somewhere, but if you call my number now, I’ll have your details, and I’ll give you a call in the next couple of days.’
Justin punches the digits into his phone with a quiet determination as she recites them. ‘If I don’t hear from you, I’ll ring you.’
‘No!’ says Lauren, far too abruptly. ‘I’ll call you.’
‘You promise?’
She can’t help but go back to him and reach up to give him a kiss on the cheek. ‘I promise,’ she says, walking away, wondering how she’s leaving the petrol station with even more problems than she came in with.
12
Kate
‘Hey,’ says Matt, smiling as he emerges from the revolving door of his office building. He slips an arm around Kate’s waist and kisses her cheek. ‘You okay?’
She could be honest and say, No, my mother and sister are being the worst versions of themselves, and Jess might well be my sister, but she smiles and says, ‘yes’, instead.
‘To what do I owe this pleasure?’ he asks, as they hold hands and fall in step with each other. ‘You don’t normally come up to meet me.’ His offices are only four blocks away from Kate’s, but they’re further from the station, so on the rare occasions they leave work at the same time, Matt would always walk down to Kate.
‘I just needed to get out,’ she says. It’s not a lie. Since her suspicions had been confirmed, she’d found it difficult to concentrate, but she wasn’t sure she wanted to share her muddled thoughts just yet. At least not until she’d managed to unravel them in her own head.
‘It was pretty quiet this afternoon,’ she goes on. ‘So once I’d put tomorrow’s stories to bed, I wanted some fresh air.’
‘You’re okay though, right?’ he asks, stopping and turning to look at her.
Commuters tut as they’re forced to sidestep around them on the pavement.
Kate instinctively touches her stomach and nods.
‘Nothing’s happened?’ Matt presses.
She shakes her head. ‘I’m just tired.’
‘That’s all it is?’ asks Matt, in a way that suggests he thinks she might be hiding something.
‘Yes,’ she says, smiling at his concern. ‘That’s all.’ She links her arm through his, encouraging him to start walking again.
‘Mmm,’ he mutters, looking at her through narrowed eyes, as if he’s still not quite convinced.
‘Anyway, how’s your day been?’ she asks, eager to change the subject. ‘How did the interviews go? Find anyone suitable?’
Matt groans. ‘Everyone pre-lunch was a write-off, but there were one or two candidates this afternoon that are promising.’
‘Is that because you had a couple of drinks in you by then?’ she asks, laughing. ‘Did your beer goggles make them a more attractive proposition?’
Matt nudges her playfully with an elbow. ‘I’ll have you know I’ve remained sober all day, thank you very much.’
‘That’s unusual for you,’ Kate teases. ‘For a Monday.’
He smiles as he swings open the door into the station, holding it for an attractive woman and her canine companion. ‘Ah cute,’ he comments after her.
Kate raises her eyebrows. ‘Is that the dog or the human?’
Matt rolls his eyes. ‘So, there were two stand-out applicants this afternoon, but with very different backgrounds. One’s straight out of university, having graduated in journalism. The other left school at eighteen, took a work experience position at the local paper and never left. She’s having to supplement her minimum wage by working in a bar in the evenings and at weekends.’
‘Okay,’ says Kate.
‘So, who would you plump for?’
‘The one who’s working on a paper,’ says Kate, without hesitation.
‘Really?’
‘Absolutely. She really wants it, so much so that she’s prepared to work for next to nothing. I assume she’s writing for the paper?’
‘Yeah, but only at a very local level.’
‘But that doesn’t matter, because you’ll be training her up anyway. You’ll want her to do things your way and it’ll be a hell of a lot easier teaching someone who’s willing to learn versus someone who’s spent the last three years in a classroom and thinks they know everything already.’
‘Speaking from experience, are we?’ he says, smiling.
‘Actually, I did know everything by the time you took me on.’
Matt rolls his eyes in mock exasperation. ‘Or so you thought.’
‘I think you’ll find I taught you things,’ says Kate with a cheeky glint in her eye. ‘Not the other way around.’
Matt laughs. ‘So, you’d do yourself out of a job? You’d take the worker over the slacker?’
‘Oi, just because I went to university doesn’t make me a slacker,’ says Kate, breaking away from Matt to tap in at the ticket barrier. ‘I worked my arse off when I was there.’
‘So, you’d definitely go for experience over education?’ asks Matt, as they jump on the escalator.
‘If that’s all that’s separating them, yes.’
‘Okay, on your head be it,’ says Matt. ‘Have you heard anything from your mum or Lauren?’
Kate tells him about this morning, and the DNA match that Lauren is claiming to have found. Just the thought of her putting their personal details online makes Kate’s chest tighten. How could she have been so stupid?
‘It might not be your sister’s finest hour,’ he admits. ‘But it doesn’t necessarily mean that the girl is who she says she is.’
‘How do you mean?’ asks Kate, desperate to find any other scenario than the one that’s whirring around her head, making her feel as if she’s going mad.
‘Well, there’s got to be some semblance of a match there, especially if they’ve used an ancestry website, but it doesn’t necessarily mean that the players are playing by the rules.’
Kate looks at him confused. ‘So you’re saying there’s room for error?’
‘Put it like this; these big genealogy sites are not in the habit of making mistakes, otherwise we’d all be running around thinking our mother was our sister and our children weren’t our own.’
Kate can’t help but laugh. When he puts it like that . . .
‘So, it’s safe to say,’ he goes on, ‘that if you’ve uploaded your DNA, you’ll only be shown your proven matches.’
‘O-kay,’ says Kate hesitantly, unsure where he’s going with this, but open to all suggestions.
‘So essentially, the DNA has to have been a match to have brought Lauren and this girl together. But – bear with me here – what if, crazy as it sounds, the girl has somehow cooked the results.’
‘By doing what?’ asks Kate, stopping stock still on the platform.
‘I dunno,’ says Matt, shrugging his shoulders. ‘She might have uploaded your DNA, for example.’
‘What?’ shrieks Kate, the idea too far-fetched for her to take it even remotely seriously.
‘I’m just saying,’ says Matt. ‘There are other ways that a match could have occurred, without her actually being related to you.’
‘But why would anyone go to those kind of lengths?’ asks Kate, her investigative mind beginning to whir at the possibility.
‘They wouldn’t,’ says Matt decisively, as if sensing the runaway train Kate’s just jumped on. ‘And certainly not where you’re concerned because, let’s face it, you’re not exactly an intriguing dynasty that someone would commit forgery to be a part of.’
Kate playfully slaps his arm.
‘I’m just saying that it’s a possibility,’ says Matt. ‘That’s all. You might not want to take this girl at face value.’
She had no intention of doing so. ‘So how come you’re a genealogy expert all of a sudden?’ teases Kate, keen to inject some light-heartedness to lift her mood.
‘Aha,’ says Matt, tapping a finger to his nose conspiratorially. ‘Funnily enough, I had an interesting pitch come through from a freelancer today.’
‘If you’re prepared to tell me about it, it can’t be that interesting,’ says Kate sarcastically.
Matt smiles. ‘Well, it was a feature about police forces uploading DNA from unsolved crimes to genealogy websites in the hope of finding a match to their suspect.’
‘Oh,’ says Kate. ‘Go on.’
‘Well, it got me thinking, what with you finding yourself in this rather unsettling position, and I decided to do a bit of digging.’
Kate looks at him expectantly.
‘It’s already bringing in results in the States, on cold cases from decades ago,’ Matt goes on.
Kate shakes her head. ‘How?’
‘Because despite DNA being left at almost every crime scene, unless the suspect was already on the police database, there was no way of tracking him down. Now, with the help of these websites, the police are able to trace relatives of the suspect and track him down by working backwards through the family tree.’
‘Wow,’ says Kate. ‘So from millions of suspects, they’re now able to narrow it down to one family.’
‘Yep, and some offenders have already been charged and are awaiting trial,’ says Matt as triumphantly as if he’d made the arrests himself.
‘So that means that anyone dead, alive or otherwise has the potential to be identified,’ says Kate.
Matt nods. ‘It’s a game-changer.’
Indeed it is, thinks Kate.
‘So now that Lauren has put herself in this position, what does she make of it?’ Matt asks.
‘She seems pretty set on this girl being the real deal, but that’s because it would suit her to have Dad’s name dragged through the mud.’
Matt pulls a disbelieving face. ‘I know her and your father were never close, but still . . . it’s a bit of a leap. I mean, why would she want that?’
‘Because she knows that it would hurt me, and he’s no longer here to defend himself.’
‘But that just doesn’t make sense,’ says Matt through a frown. ‘I know you don’t always see eye to eye, but no more than me and my brother. That’s how siblings are; you love each other, but don’t necessarily like each other all of the time.’
‘I don’t think she has the first clue as to what she might have unleashed,’ says Kate bitterly.
‘Woah, let’s not get ahead of ourselves,’ says Matt, holding his hands up. ‘This girl might be exactly who she says she is. And if that’s the case, it’s not exactly going to be rocket science to work out who’s child she is.’
Kate bites down on her lip. If only it were that simple.
‘But then again, maybe Lauren knows something you and I don’t?’
Kate’s hackles rise. ‘Like what?’
‘I just think she might know more than she’s letting on . . . about your dad, I mean.’
