Nicole
Nicole
The front door slams with a loud, furious thud. The two officers look at each other before turning back to Nathaniel.
‘Did you know already about your father’s affair with Isla Richardson, before it was mentioned today?’
Nicole’s breath halts in her chest. Never in her life has she more desperately wanted her son to be ignorant of something.
Nathaniel shakes his head, and Nicole experiences a rush of relief.
The male officer raises his eyebrows. ‘Do you know anything about a series of anonymous emails that were sent to Isla Richardson in the months before she died?’
Fear tiptoes along Nicole’s spine as she watches Nathaniel’s eyes flit around the room, before landing on the floor.
‘No.’
‘You sure about that?’
Nathaniel nods, but Nicole can see it clearly on his face, as if it were written in indelible ink: the barely concealed lie.
‘So you don’t know anything about an account with the name FSW23BS that was sending Isla abusive emails over the summer?’
Nathaniel shakes his head. ‘No.’
Part of Nicole wants to scream, to urge him to tell the truth, whatever that may be. To pause time so that she can grab both her boys, bundle them into Andrew’s car, transport them as far away from here as possible. To save them both from this unholy mess.
‘That’s interesting. Because we’ve obtained the IP address of those emails and it’s registered to your parents’ account. Might you know anything about that?’
There is a deafening silence. Nicole stares at Nathaniel, wills it not to be true even as she witnesses the guilt on his face. She sees Andrew shaking his head, experiences a moment of unmitigated hatred towards him.
‘Are you suggesting it was Nathaniel who sent all those emails to Isla?’ Nicole hears the fear in her voice, can do nothing to contain it.
‘It wasn’t me. I didn’t do anything.’ Nathaniel’s voice is thin, unconvincing, and there is no mistaking – at least not to Nicole – the culpability in it.
Nicole thinks back to the emails Abby showed her – the venom, the abuse, the vulgar misogynistic language – and she does not want to believe that her son – her gentle, kind, thoughtful boy – is capable of such bile. But when she looks at Nathaniel, it is not possible to deny the guilt in his expression. She experiences a surge of regret that she did not force a conversation with him sooner about his feelings for Isla, that she never noticed his crush had taken on a different dimension.
The thought strikes her that if Nathaniel sent all those emails, then he has known for months about his father’s affair with Isla. He has lived alone with that terrible knowledge, has borne by himself that dreadful burden. She cannot imagine what it must have done to him, learning that the first girl he ever loved was sleeping with his father. All she knows is that she will never, ever forgive Andrew for putting their son in that hideous position.
‘Nathaniel?’ Nicole places a hand on his arm but he shakes her off.
The female officer continues. ‘We know how you felt about Isla. Your feelings were well known among your school friends.’
‘It wasn’t me—’
‘Do you know it’s an offence to send abusive emails?’ The male officer’s voice is stern, challenging, goading Nathaniel into a response.
‘Oh, come on – he’s clearly upset. If he did do it – which there’s no tangible evidence I can see that he did – it’s not a big deal. Kids are always doing stuff like this online.’
Nicole winces at Andrew’s belittling tone. She assumes he has not seen the emails Isla was sent, does not understand their level of malice.
The male officer eyes Andrew with something bordering contempt. ‘I’m afraid it’s a bit more serious than that. Malicious communications carry a maximum sentence of two years’ imprisonment.’
‘Two years?’ Nicole experiences a flash of alarm. She looks at Nathaniel, registers his panic.
‘Can you tell us where you were the night Isla Richardson was killed?’
Nathaniel swallows hard, his Adam’s apple rising and falling. Nicole silently implores him not to lie, not to make things even harder on himself.
‘I was at a party.’
‘The party at Meera Rani’s house? The party Isla attended?’
Nathaniel nods. Despair lodges in Nicole’s throat. She knows he was not at the party. Sita Rani told her so. A voice screams in her head for Nathaniel not to be so foolish. But she knows she cannot intervene, that she may make things even worse for him if she does.
‘See, we’ve spoken to a lot of people who were at that party, and nobody can recall you being there. Nobody recalls you even being invited.’
The officer leaves the point hanging, does not ask a question, the ellipsis at the end of his sentence lingering in the air, waiting for Nathaniel to incriminate himself.
‘I wasn’t there for long.’
‘So where were you for the rest of the evening?’
Nathaniel hesitates, and it’s as if Nicole can pre-empt what falsehood he is going to deliver before he even speaks.
‘I was at a friend’s.’
‘Which friend?’
‘Elliot. Elliot Mercer.’
Apprehension coils in Nicole’s stomach. The officers exchange a knowing look, as though, unbeknown to Nathaniel, they have been involved in a game of chess, and her son has just been outmanoeuvred.
‘But Elliot Mercer was at the party.’
‘Not all night. We left early—’
‘Nathaniel.’ Nicole’s voice is more febrile than she intended; she does not want to betray the extent of her anxiety, does not want the officers to think she has reason to be scared.
Her son turns to her, and her heart seems to shatter as tears pool at the corners of his eyes.
‘Nathaniel, we know Elliot Mercer was at the party right to the end because he gave a statement to officers when they arrived at the scene. So, I’m going to ask you again: where were you the night Isla Richardson was killed?’
Nathaniel shakes his head, blinking away his tears. ‘I wasn’t anywhere, I was just hanging out, I didn’t have anything to do with Isla’s death, I swear.’
‘Come on, you can see he’s distressed.’ Andrew steps forward, tries to take control of the situation. ‘There’s no way he’d have anything to do with what happened to Isla.’
Nicole remains rooted to the spot, paralysed with fear.
It is the female officer who speaks next, who says the words Nicole has been dreading, words she hoped so fervently never to hear.
‘Nathaniel Forrester, I’m arresting you on suspicion of causing death by dangerous driving and for offences under the Malicious Communications Act. You do not have to say anything...’
The rest of the officer’s caution bleeds into Nicole’s ears as she witnesses the bewilderment on Andrew’s face as though he has never, for one moment, contemplated the possible repercussions of his actions. She sees the terror in Nathaniel’s eyes, and is acutely aware that the house of cards is tumbling down around her.