Torn: A terrified girl. A shocking secret. A terrible choice.

Chapter Seven (#u52406829-edbd-548c-b3fb-bca8b82c2d57)

As soon as Taylor secured her seatbelt I thanked her for co-operating (delivering the positive praise without a trace of the resentment swirling around my chest) and then relayed the information Maisie had given me about contact. Reece cheered on hearing the news but Taylor seemed to withdraw into herself, staring moodily out of the window. Knowing how desperate she was to see her mum, her muted reaction struck me as strange.

‘Rosi-e-e,’ Reece said. My heart sank. The number-plate game might just have been enough to tip me over the edge. ‘If someone offered you five hundred thousand million pounds to have a stinky name like Poo Poo would you do it?’

Jamie giggled, his breath catching as his chest rumbled in a loud wheeze. I smiled, brightening. This struck me as an easier game and one unlikely to result in unnecessary stress. ‘Erm, yes probably.’

‘Urgh, Mom!’ Jamie shrieked as if I’d actually agreed to change my name by deed poll. Since Karron’s visit, he had taken to calling me Mom instead of Mum, the rascal, squeezing in Americanisms wherever he could. He and Reece were staring at each other, mouths stretched open in shocked hilarity.

‘Would you do it for two hundred million pounds?’

‘Yep,’ I said definitely, enjoying their disgust.

‘One hundred million?’

‘Absolutely.’

‘How about half a million?’

‘Of course I would.’

‘A quarter of a million?’

I hesitated for a moment, to give the impression I was giving the matter my most serious consideration. ‘Erm, I don’t think so, no.’

In the rear-view mirror I could see the boys looking at each other. Jamie was smiling but Reece’s forehead had crumpled. Oh no, I thought, here we go. ‘So you wouldn’t do it for anything less than half a million?’

‘No I wouldn’t,’ I said with a nod of my head, guessing that a definite answer was what he would be most comfortable with.

He was quiet for a second or two and I began to relax, but then he made an anxious noise in his throat. ‘So you’re saying if someone offered you one pound less you wouldn’t do it?’

I paused. ‘Nope, definitely not.’

He slapped his forehead and ran his fingers over and over his hair. ‘You’re saying you wouldn’t do it, not even for just one pound different?’

‘Nope.’

‘That’s crazy!’ He and Jamie carolled, shaking their heads. Since Karron’s visit, it had been another one of Jamie’s catchphrases, one that Reece had adopted as his own. Jamie laughed again but Reece bumped his head in anguish, once, twice, three times against the glass.

About half a mile from Emily’s school, Taylor began kicking the back of my seat – a gentle nudge rather than an outright assault and so I quickly decided to ignore it – but, like the soft thrum of a dripping tap, it was the sort of low-level irritation that held the potential of driving a person to distraction. I knew that simply asking her to stop wouldn’t work and was likely to escalate the situation, so, with a ferocious grip on the steering wheel, I tried to drown out Reece’s continued horror at my barmy decision-making process with a steady stream of light banter. Our progress through the rush-hour traffic was painfully slow but I was determined not to let my irritation show.

The school receptionist was waiting with Emily in the school car park as I pulled in through the gates at 6.15 p.m., her bright smile relieving some of the guilt I felt at keeping her after hours. After thanking her and apologising profusely, I climbed back into the car, the steady pulse of a foot in my back starting up the minute my seat belt was secured. Breathe, Rosie, breathe, I coached, focussing my attention on the glistening fields of rapeseed we passed as we drove towards home, and the tree-lined hills beyond.

Progress was still slow and we didn’t pull into our quiet road until nearly quarter to seven. By then everyone was famished and, fearing that tempers were in danger of fraying, I decided not to ask Taylor about her mobile phone until she had eaten. I quickly fried some sausages and, after warming some beans and sprinkling them with grated cheese, I buttered some bread and asked Reece, who was circling, to help me carry everything through to the living room.

‘What’s this?’ Taylor asked, staring down at the tray I held in front of her. She had changed out of her school uniform and was wearing a T-shirt with the word ‘SEXY’ emblazoned across the front. Skin-tight trousers and skirts barely six inches long seemed to be de rigueur for the girls at Taylor’s school, and I could understand her wanting to fit in with the crowd, but blatant messages on clothes was a step too far, in my opinion. It wasn’t the right moment to ask her to change though – there was enough tension in the air – so I bit my lip to stop myself from saying anything. Who on earth had bought a T-shirt like that for a child of her age, I wondered.