Chapter 46

Because Mum was Dad’s biggest mistake. She’d been ten years younger and had completely turned his head on a night out in Loughborough. They’d met, married, and had Jason within a year. By the time Shane had followed, she’d been restless and bored, always flicking through magazines about other people’s lives, always ready to foist them off on Dad or a babysitter the minute she could and go somewhere else. And then when Shane was four…

Dad had been in Germany on an eight-week training course, and Mum had dropped Jason and Shane off at Nana Hannah’s for the weekend. Shane remembered the weekend. He remembered later, too, the nice lady with the red hair from social services coming to talk to Nana Hannah, and Jason letting Shane crawl into bed with him for the first time in months because Mum—Mummy—wasn’t coming back. Only she hadn’t died like Luke’s mother. There’d been no accident, no tragedy, no grieving husband and children left behind. She’d just…gone. Walked away. Forever.