Abby
Abby
Abby spins around to where Nicole is standing behind her. Seeing the dread on Nicole’s face as to what this may do to her family, Abby’s contempt for her is almost as engulfing as her hatred of Andrew.
‘ Your kids? So your kids should be protected from what your husband has done while my daughter is what – collateral damage?’
‘Of course not—’
‘Did you know?’ Abby is aware she is shouting but she does not care if Nathaniel and Jack hear. They should hear. They have a right to know what kind of a monster their father is. What he is capable of.
There is a moment’s hesitation in which Nicole’s eyes dart furtively towards Andrew, then down at the ground, refusing to meet Abby’s gaze. And in that fleeting moment, Abby knows.
‘You knew? You knew and you didn’t tell me? You didn’t stop it? For god’s sake, what is wrong with you? How could you just stand by and let it happen?’
‘It’s not like that. I only found out a few weeks ago—’
‘ A few weeks ago? You’ve known for weeks and you haven’t said anything?’ Rage boils in Abby’s chest and she does not know how to withstand its ferocity.
‘Abby, believe me, I’m as appalled by it as you are—’
‘Are you? Are you really? You’re so appalled that you’ve still got him living in the house with you? Still playing happy families? Pretending nothing’s happened?’
‘No, not at all—’
‘All this time you’ve been comforting me, pretending to be my friend , pretending to care , and the whole time you knew that your husband had been sleeping with my daughter? How can you not have told me?’ Abby clasps her head in her hands, fingertips digging into her scalp until it hurts, wishing she could claw all thoughts from her head.
‘It’s not Nicole’s fault. I put her in an impossible situation. This is entirely on me.’
Abby does not acknowledge Andrew’s plea for clemency. She wants nothing whatsoever to do with him. All she wants is for the police to investigate him – investigate him seriously – as a suspect in her daughter’s death.
‘I’m so sorry.’
Abby feels a hand on her arm, looks down as if at some foreign object, sees the familiar Asscher cut diamond on Nicole’s fourth finger. Shrugging Nicole’s hand from her sleeve, she stares at her, bewildered. ‘How can you still have him in the house with you? How can you even bear to look at him?’
Abby watches as Nicole opens her mouth to speak, closes her lips, seems to decide against whatever she was going to say. She sees Nicole glance over at Andrew as though they are in this together, as though they are two musketeers in league against a common enemy, and she is aware of something rising up within her: a sense of indignation that she should be facing this alone, that Stuart is dead while Andrew is alive, that Nicole and Andrew have one another to help navigate this ordeal while she is by herself. She is overcome by a sense of injustice that Nicole has the option to rug-sweep this whole sickening episode; that she can carry on as though nothing has happened, can maintain the charade of their perfect, happy family until time immemorial if she so chooses. And the inequity of it – the violation that Andrew and Nicole have imposed on her – is too much, and she feels her voice harden, consonants solidifying in her mouth.
‘Did you know Isla was pregnant? That Andrew paid for her to have an abortion six weeks before she was killed? Did he tell you that?’