Gemma stood and wandered over to the window, her back to her family. Scott stood up too.
‘Gem . . .’
‘You said it was over.’
‘I know. I know what I said. But—’
She whirled on him. ‘YOU SAID YOU’D SORT IT ALL OUT!’
He was conscious of Daniel still on the sofa, and he turned to him.
‘Go to your room, Daniel.’
Daniel rose. The expression on his face was hard to read. He seemed to be wrestling with his emotions.
‘You lied to me,’ Daniel said.
‘What? No. I didn’t—’
‘You did! You told me you made the man better, but you didn’t make him better. He’s dead, and now his brother is really upset with me.’
‘All right, Daniel. Let’s talk about this later, okay? I’ll explain everything.’
But Daniel was already storming out of the room. ‘You lied to me,’ he said again. Seconds later, his bedroom door was slammed shut.
Shit, Scott thought. Now everyone hates me.
He tried again with his wife. ‘Gem . . .’
‘You were wrong, Scott.’
‘Wrong? What about?’
‘We should have gone to the police straight away. We should have told them exactly what had happened.’
‘We discussed all this. We made a decision. We agreed.’
‘I don’t care what we agreed. I didn’t expect this to happen. You promised me it wouldn’t. And now we’ve got both the police and criminals breathing down our neck. We have to tell the truth.’
‘No. No we don’t.’
‘Scott—’
‘No, Gemma. It’s too late for that. We have to see it out.’
‘See what out? You heard the brother. They want money. Money we haven’t got. Why didn’t you listen to me about hanging on to the money?’
Scott stepped towards her, but she backed away. ‘We’re not criminals, Gem. It wouldn’t have been right to keep the money. You know that.’
‘But if you’d kept it—’
‘I know. But I didn’t, and there’s no changing that. We have to make the best of a bad situation.’
She stared at him in disbelief. ‘A bad situation? It’s an impossible situation. You heard that scumbag. When we don’t pay him, he’ll go to the police. We need to own up before he drops us in it. It’ll go in our favour.’
‘Gemma. Listen to me. It won’t come to that. I’ll pay him what I can, and I’ll make him understand that it’s all we have.’
Her face became suddenly grave. ‘Wait a minute. Pay him what you can? What exactly do you mean?’
‘Well, we’ve a bit put by, and—’
‘Hold on. You’re talking about our savings? You want to give away all of our savings?’
‘I don’t think we have a choice.’
‘No. We worked our fingers to the bone for that money, Scott. Daniel’s benefits are in there. Some of that money belongs to him.’
‘I know. But this will be for him. It’ll be for all of us.’
‘It’s our holiday fund. Our Christmas money.’
‘Then we’ll have a smaller Christmas this year, and a holiday at home next year.’
‘And when the car breaks down? Or something else goes wrong?’
‘We’ll manage. I’ll ask Gavin if he can throw more work my way, or I’ll get a weekend job. I’ll build up our savings again.’
She looked at him long and hard, and then she shook her head.
