Page 74 of On the Edge

He nodded, pain etched on his face.

‘How?’

‘It came up in the post-mortem,’ he whispered.‘Faye doesn’t know.I didn’t think she could bear it, after what we went through.’He looked up, his eyes glassy.‘Eleven miscarriages and a stillbirth.Maddie was our miracle.I’d given up by then, but Faye never did.And then we lost her too.’

Nel could feel his pain in her chest.

‘So I spared her from knowing that Maddie was …’ His voice trailed off.

‘How?’Nel asked.

‘Paul O’Neill, the local cop, was an old friend of mine.He was leading the investigation.I asked him to close the case and he was happy to.He thought it was an accident or a suicide anyway.’

‘I suppose he made the autopsy report disappear from the case file?And the statement from my dad?’

‘He owed me a favour.’

It was simple.That was the way the world worked for men like Geoff Marshall.She tried hard to conceal her irritation.She hated that boys club bullshit.

‘You won’t tell Faye, will you?She’s been struggling since you’ve been back.She was doing better for a while, but now she’s … withdrawn again.’

Usually Nel would have felt guilty and questioned her reasons for pursuing it, but this time she didn’t.‘I’m sorry,’ she said.

In her head she added,but I’m doing this anyway.

Chapter 45

‘O’Neill made the autopsy report disappear,’ Nel said as soon as Jimmy opened the passenger door.

She’d been dreading seeing him since their awkward interaction at the Grand, but she was desperate to tell him what she’d learned through her conversation with Geoff.She’d messaged him as soon as she left the Marshalls’ place, telling him she had new information.On the short drive to pick him up, she’d decided she wouldn’t acknowledge the incident at the pub at all.Hopefully he would do the same, and they could both pretend it never happened.

He looked at her, wide-eyed.‘How do you know?’

‘Geoff Marshall told me.’

Nel filled him in on their conversation as she drove to the beach.They reached the car park as she finished.Jimmy sat in stunned silence.

Eventually he shook his head.‘That dodgy bastard.’

‘He was just trying to spare Faye more pain,’ she said.It didn’t make it right, but she could understand why he did it.

‘I’m talking about O’Neill.’

‘Oh.Yeah, it’s pretty bad.’

‘Nothing shits me like corrupt cops.’His mouth was a hard thin line.Nel could sense his quiet fury.

They walked in silence along the boardwalk that ran over the lagoon and along the beach as a pelican soared overhead.Silver sunlight danced on the breaking waves in the distance.

‘You think Geoff’s telling the truth about why he got the case dropped?’Jimmy asked.

Nel wasn’t following.‘What do you mean?’

‘He said it was to spare Faye from the pain.D’you think that’s it?’

She frowned.‘You think he didn’t want people to know Maddie was pregnant?’

He picked up a pebble and turned it over in his fingers as they walked.‘It wouldn’t have been a good look for him.His base is very conservative.It wouldn’t have been ideal for him to have a dead teenage daughter, especially one who turned out to be pregnant.’He skimmed the pebble across the lagoon, watched it bounce once, twice, three times, sending ripples across the surface.