Read Online Dead Wrong by Helen H. Durrant - Free Book Online Page A

even a sounding board. That was no basis for a relationship. He knew his faults, and relationships with women were high on the list. He’d been married and divorced, both before his twenty-first birthday. He’d made mistakes, always put the job first, and he doubted he could change now.
    They were sat in a semi-circle, in huge high-backed chairs with footrests. His mother sat at the end, so he was able to crouch down beside her.
    “You’re not so good . . .” He reached for her hand. She didn’t respond, didn’t even acknowledge his presence. As Monika had said, her legs were bandaged, but she seemed comfortable enough.
    It had happened quickly. One day she’d been running her own life and doing her best to organise his, then, as if a switch had been flicked, she was here. As care homes went, this place was fine, more than fine, with the added bonus of having Monika in charge. But it wasn’t how he’d imagined his mother would end up.
    He patted her thin, bony hand. Her skin was like paper, wrinkled and covered in brown stains. Age: he still couldn’t get his head around it. When had this happened, when had things changed so much?
    * * *
    Kelly Griggs stirred, groaning into the darkness. She flicked the switch on the lamp by her bed, and cursed as the bulb blew. She rolled over, groaned again and clamped her hands to her ears in self-defence. The tiny bedroom was filled with a crescendo of noise, that high-pitched wail that only a baby was capable of making. It was the sort of wail that demanded instant attention.
    The young girl rolled across the bed and rubbed her tired eyes. In the Moses basket beside her on the floor she could just make out the hungry bundle wriggling with impatience as he thrust tiny fists into a sucking mouth. Hungry as he was, Jack would have to wait until she sorted his milk. Kelly felt around on the cabinet beside her bed for cigarettes and her lighter.
    She’d have to see to him, she decided, lighting a cigarette and moving carefully in the dark bedroom towards the kitchen. Very soon the inhabitants of the entire deck would be awake and on her back, and she couldn’t risk that. Her neighbours were difficult enough to get on with as it was.
    It was the middle of the night. There was just no way she could keep this up, the same exhausting routine, week after week. She stumbled across the floor and heard a knock, knock from the adjoining flat.
    “The old biddy’s awake now,” Kelly told the screaming babe. The elderly woman next door was using her stick to rap on the wall, trying to stir her into action.
    “For God’s sake feed him, Kelly!” The walls must be made of cardboard, she thought, running a hand through her long, dark hair in exasperation.
    “You’ve got the whole deck up now, you lazy cow!” There was a final thump on the wall.
    She wasn’t lazy, she was tired, exhausted by the drudgery of it all. She had an infant to care for, and a new job to hold down. Ice had said he’d help. He’d promised her the day Jack was born that he wouldn’t let her down. That was three months ago, and she could count on the fingers of one hand the number of times she’d seen him since.
    Kelly lit a gas ring in the small kitchen, flicking on the light as she went. She poured the contents of a feed she’d made earlier into a pan for it to heat, while she lifted the distraught infant from his bed.
    She heard a knock, a rap at her front door. Bloody neighbours were taking this too far. Young babies cry, there wasn’t anything she could do about that.
    “Bugger off!” she screamed, as she rocked Jack in her arms. Moments later she had transferred the milk to a feeding bottle and stuck it in his mouth. He was quiet at last. Kelly would give whoever had come to her door a right roasting. She was in the mood.
    But the deck corridor was empty and the surrounding flats were dark and quiet. Whoever knocked had legged it sharpish. Then looking down, she saw it. A grotty-looking carrier bag,