'You are offering me vodka? Sure you don't want one now your fucking secret's out?'

Maggie looked into her sister's bloated face, remembering when she had been everything to her, had been the mainstay of her life. And she had been, there had been a time when Jackie had been the whole of her world, when she had always included her little sister in everything.

Maggie was more man aware that loneliness had been the real reason then, but it had also been because Maggie had taken on the kids for her.

She had practically brought the girls up, and she had to admit she had enjoyed every second of it, unlike this sorry item in front of her who only saw her kids as a wage each week, people to chain their father to the floor and make him cough up in more ways than one.

Maggie had played with them, bathed them, tidied up for Jackie and listened to her as she had run down everyone within a five-mile range – family especially, mates, and anyone she was jealous of. Since that encompassed everyone in the world she could get very irate. Jackie slaughtered everybody, and she did it in such a way that it was ages before you realised exactly what she was doing.

By the time she had been fourteen Maggie had stopped wanting to be like her, and instead become adamant that her life would be the complete opposite of Jackie's. She would pay her own bills, look after herself if needs be, but she was determined not to become a part of the man she was with like Jackie had.

Jackie's biggest fear was being left without a man, her man, but it was the man she loved so much, who had reduced her to the fat, scruffy wreck she was now. She was living proof that love was not the wonderful emotion young girls thought it was going to be. The man she loved had raped her little sister and yet she still had the power to delude herself, because everything was always about Jackie, never about anyone else.

'Was little Jimmy Freddie's son? I need to know.'

Jackie sounded so self-righteous and so fucking banal all at the same time, it was better than a play as far as Maggie was concerned. This woman had always been an innate coward, and this was being proved to her once again. Jackie only kicked off when she knew that the fight she had caused would be stopped.

Maggie laughed, but it sounded forced and it also made her sound like a woman who had had enough, enough of life, enough of the world and enough of the woman in front of her.

'If you really thought that there was anything remotely true in what you are saying, me and you would be rolling around the floor fighting now, Jack, and you know it.'

'Too fucking right.'

'But we ain't, are we, Jackie?'

The sarcasm was evident and Jackie Jackson had to acknowledge that her little sister was a force in her own right.

'There's still plenty of time for that, lady.' She pointed a grubby finger at her sister as she said loudly and in a voice full of her own self-pity, 'You always had your eye on my fucking Freddie, you always got what you wanted out of life. I was never good enough for Mum and Dad, it was always you! Now, the one thing I have and you fucking think you can take it!'

'What are you on about, Mum? Maggie is the best thing that ever happened to you, or us!' Dianna realised immediately she should have kept this gem of wisdom to herself, and Kimberley pushed Roxanne out of her way as she went to her mother and said angrily, 'I was winding you up, Mum, please listen to me.'

Jackie wanted to take the exit and leave the madness of her world, but she couldn't. This would eat at her now and she knew she had to sort it out today once and for all, no matter what the cost.

'Either go home and sober up, Jackie, or talk to me properly, OK?'

There was a steely quality to her sister's voice that Jackie had never heard before. In fact, she would go as far as to say that it was distinctly disrespectful.

'I will break your fucking neck, you cunt!'

Maggie sighed once more. 'Is that really the best you can do, Jack? Call me names, call me a cunt, the one word that I hate more than any other? I just realised, Sis, it sums you up lovely, doesn't it? I lost my child and you think you can come round here shouting the odds, because you think I wanted the piece of shit you married. You had better sort yourself out, mate. Listen to yourself now and again, you selfish, drunken fat bitch!'

Maggie waved her hand at Jackie like she was nothing and turned to the girls, who were huddled together in various stages of shock.

'Take her home, for fuck's sake. Get her out of my sight!'

The animosity was almost tangible between the two women now.

'I'll fucking kill you, Maggie Jackson. You'll fucking regret taking the piss out of me, lady.'

Maggie turned back towards her sister. She spoke quietly, and with menace, enunciating every word slowly and clearly, her own well-manicured finger poking her sister in the face.

'You lay one hand on me, Jack, and I will wrap you around this house. I am capable of it and all, mate. You don't scare me any more, you haven't scared me since I was at school. You are a big, fat, bloated, mouthy, fucking no neck, and that is your problem. You know that better than anyone else does and that knowledge kills you.'

Maggie was shaking her head in disappointed anger. 'I buried my baby and you would still bring this shit to my door? If there's any killing to be done this day, it will be done by me, get it? And you remember that if you bring this little soiree into my Jimmy's world, Freddie and you will both be finished, and I will see to that personally. You are not welcome here, Jackie. I have carried you for years and I don't fucking need this crap in my life any more. Now fuck off home before I really lose my rag.'

Chapter Twenty-Nine

'Please tell me what the fuck is really going on, Jimmy. Me nerves are nearly busted with all this.' Glenford was laughing as he spoke but Jimmy knew he meant it seriously.

'I told you, I ain't carrying him no more. I have had enough of him. Not before time, is it? Anyone else would have aimed him out the door years ago. But he was family, and I swallowed because of that. End of story.'

'Beginning of the story, more like.'

Jimmy shrugged, and Glenford knew that he would not get any more from him. Instead, he asked, 'Is he still on a promise?'

'From what I gather, yeah.' Jimmy grinned now. 'Freddie and his skirt, eh? I remember when he was released and he was clocking anything with a pulse.'

Glenford laughed loudly now, his new gold teeth glinting in the weak afternoon sun. 'It his hobby. Strange is what keeps the man alive.' Then he sat down on the comfortable leather sofa in Jimmy's office and said seriously, 'What is this about, man? I can feel your anger, feel your body rhythms are all out of sync. I just want to help you, man, you are me best friend and you know that. I think there's a good chance that I am yours as well, you know.'

Jimmy nodded in acknowledgement.

Glenford was shaking his heavy dreads in consternation now, and, picking up half a joint from the heavy white soapstone ashtray in front of him, he relit it. Puffing on it heavily he said, 'Since Jimmy Junior, you ain't been right, you specially ain't been right with Freddie. It's almost like you blaming him.'

Jimmy loved this man like a brother, and he wasn't surprised that he had worked out the cause of his problems so easily, but he could not say out loud what was still careering around his head every second of every day.

Freddie's son had killed his baby, his boy, his life's blood.

Freddie was on the laughing gear. The girl had provided a decent bit of sniff and, mixed with the whisky and Freddie's bad humour, he was now rocking.