Chapter 39
THIRTY-NINE
LIANE
PRESENT – VALERIE’S HOUSE
There can be a lot of motives for murder. Money is a common one, and that was my main driver. But I’d be lying if I hadn’t thought about how my mother’s death could be the catalyst for my youngest son to return from Australia and hopefully settle somewhere much closer to home.
I missed Joel terribly when he was overseas and found no solace in messages or occasional video calls.
I wanted him closer to me, where he could call around and say hi, share dinner with us, and be a proper part of our lives.
I admit that I have not been the best mother to him or his brother.
I said some terrible things to both Scott and Joel when they were growing up, things that I regret, but also things that I felt were true at the time.
Like how having them had denied me the chance to pursue a career I loved, or pack everything up and just go travelling, or just sleep in past six a.m. on a weekend when I was already exhausted from work.
I should never have told my sons that I blamed them for my difficult life, but I did, and that was a mistake.
But I have done my best to make up for it over the years, although I can still sense a distance between me and my children.
I could still see how Scott was struggling for money with his business yet refused to ever ask us for help or even move back home to save some money himself.
And like how Joel picked one of the furthest places on the planet to travel around when Europe was on his doorstep.
Both my boys need their space from me, just like I felt like I needed space from them when they were young.
But I have found a way to get Joel back from the other side of the world and now that he has his inheritance money, he intends to stay.
That’s good. If he had decided to take the money and use it to fund more travelling, I would have got his father to have a quiet conversation with him about how his grandmother would have wanted him to spend her money on something more secure than endless travelling.
Frederik would, under my instruction, lead Joel into buying or renting somewhere closer to home, under the pretence that it was ‘what his grandmother would have wanted’.
Knowing my youngest as well as I do, I know he would have felt guilty if he had gone against what he thought were his grandmother’s wishes and so he would have stayed put.
But as it turned out, that conversation didn’t need to occur because Joel has decided to stay of his own accord.
But there is a catch.
He is staying with her.
As long as Haven is on the scene, her and her false accusations against my son remain a problem.
She might not have guessed who the real killer in the family is, but she has guessed that there is one.
So I am going to have to make a plan to deal with her.
Will it be a similar plan to the one I made for my mother?
Will this plan also involve murder? I can’t see any other option if Haven doesn’t go away.
‘Joel’s here,’ Frederik says, looking up from his coffee at the kitchen window, and I turn around to see what he has seen.
When I do, I spot our son walking down our driveway towards the door, the bag he packed when he left here with him, but that’s all there is. There is no sign of Haven or her bag.
As my husband goes to open the door, I am wondering what has happened to send my son here so soon after he left. But I don’t have to wonder for long because it’s written all over Joel’s face when he enters the kitchen.
He looks sad. Lost. Single.
‘Are you okay?’ I ask him. ‘What’s happened?’
‘She’s left me,’ Joel mumbles back before Frederik walks in behind him looking sheepish. As I process that shocking but fantastic news, my husband opens the fridge and pulls a couple of beer bottles out.
‘It’s not too early,’ he says, as if reading my mind as he pops off the lids before handing one to his broken-hearted son. ‘Not at a time like this.’
Joel takes a long glug of his beer, and Frederik implores me with his eyes to not start talking yet.
I stay silent, even though I am itching to ask all the questions I have about why Haven has left.
I want to know what she said. Why she said it.
And where she has gone now. But I follow my husband’s lead and wait until Joel is ready to talk.
‘She said she couldn’t be with me after everything that had already happened between us all,’ Joel explains. ‘She said she didn’t want me to have to choose her over my family because I’d end up resenting her and it would never work.’
I remain silent because this is all sounding good so far.
‘I tried to tell her that we could work it out,’ Joel goes on. ‘I tried to tell her that we could all apologise and this would get better. But she didn’t believe me. She said it would never work. Not when my mother hated her.’
Joel looks at me then and I see tears in his eyes. Does he hate me too?
‘I didn’t hate Haven,’ I say firmly. ‘I was just looking out for my family, like I always do.’
‘Yeah,’ Joel replies quietly before taking another swig of beer.
‘I’m sorry, son,’ Frederik says then, putting a hand on Joel’s shoulder. ‘Break-ups are never easy.’
My husband is speaking from experience there because there have been several times during our marriage that we have been on the verge of breaking up.
Each of those times was because of me, or at least that was who Frederik blamed it on.
He said I could be a nasty person, that there was a side to me that was getting worse, that I brought bad energy into this house.
But every time, I managed to talk him around and keep him here, even going to a useless therapist to show how I was ‘willing to change’.
But now I don’t have to worry about him leaving me.
He won’t want to go anywhere now that we are rich and can do far more fun things than work all day and argue all night.
‘I’m sorry too,’ I say to Joel. ‘I didn’t want things to end like this. I just want you to be happy.’
I’m not sure if Joel believes that in this moment or blames me for effectively chasing away his girlfriend, but he doesn’t say anything. He just drinks more beer.
‘Where is Haven now?’ I ask then, eager to know her whereabouts. Hopefully she’s long gone, but it’s best to get confirmation.
‘She said she was going to go back to Australia,’ Joel says, which is music to my ears. She couldn’t get much further away than that, although I have to be careful not to show my happiness about that fact.
‘I see,’ is all I say.
There’s a bit of an awkward silence then as Joel stares at the label on his beer bottle whilst Frederik and I make eye contact but don’t have anything verbal to offer.
I figure it won’t be long until Joel decides he wants to be alone and goes upstairs to his bedroom and, once that happens, it will likely be a while before he emerges again for a chat.
So I decide to say one more thing before that can happen.
‘I know it’s hard right now, darling, but things will get easier and you will meet someone else one day,’ I say, eager to put the thought of another attractive woman in his mind so he forgets about the last one.
‘Just take it day by day, son,’ Frederik adds, slightly more sensibly than me and my hinting at finding somebody new already.
‘Yeah,’ Joel says before he finishes his beer and then does what I just predicted he would do. He says he wants to be alone and leaves the kitchen to go to his bedroom.
‘I suppose you’re happy about this,’ Frederik says to me once our son is well out of earshot.
‘Happy?’ I repeat. ‘Happy is an understatement.’
I’m not even going to pretend, not with my husband. So I don’t. I just let a large smile spread across my face, one that would mortify my son if he was here to see it, before I head over to the fridge and get a beer for myself.
‘Cheers,’ I say, raising the bottle towards my husband. ‘And so long, Haven. Here’s to never seeing you again.’