My Husband's Son: A dark and gripping psychological thriller by Deborah O'Connor

meeting, but I’d make it right with the client. Take him out for dinner somewhere nice as an apology.
    I turned back to see Tommy returning with a green plastic box, a white cross on its side.
    ‘Everything OK?’ he asked, clicking it open.
    How much had he heard? What would he make of my lie?
    ‘Work,’ I said, shoving my phone into my bag.
    As he dabbed at my knee with cotton wool, I picked up the plaster he’d set out. Decorated with a forlorn-looking Eeyore, a bandage over his right ear, it hailed from an Elastoplast multi-pack that included Pooh, Tigger and Piglet.
    ‘How come you have these?’ I asked. ‘Do you have kids?’
    ‘I don’t,’ he said, ‘but we have lots of wee lads and lassies coming in the café and they like to put them on.’ He chuckled. ‘Whether they’ve hurt themselves or not.’ An expression I couldn’t quite get a handle on flickered across his face.
    I was trying to come up with another question, something that would give me the information I needed, when he patted my leg.
    ‘All done.’
    I examined the Eeyore plaster now covering my knee.
    ‘Thanks for your help. I appreciate it.’
    He got to his feet and looked down at me, as though he wasn’t sure how to respond.
    ‘I better get back to my kitchen,’ he said, eventually. ‘Nice to meet you, Heidi.’

Chapter Eleven
    Back home, I dumped my handbag on the front step and rootled around in it for my keys. My hip was already throbbing and now, as I returned to standing, I blanched at the pain. Hoping it was nothing a few tablets and a night with my feet up couldn’t sort, I was about to put the key in the lock when the door opened.
    ‘Thank God,’ said Jason, pulling me inside. ‘There’s already loads of people here.’ He wiped his hands on the blue-checked apron tied around his waist.
    I looked at him blankly.
    ‘The barbecue.’ He waited for me to respond. When I didn’t, he shook his head. ‘You forgot.’
    ‘The barbecue, of course,’ I said. We’d talked about it only this morning, but I’d been so focused on my plan to go back for another look at the boy that, as soon as I’d left the house, it had vanished from my mind.
    Jason was about to return to the kitchen when the doorbell rang.
    ‘More guests,’ he sighed, squeezing past me.
    ‘Carla!’ He greeted her with an exaggerated bow.
    My ears pricked up. This was an unexpected bonus. If there was anyone I could talk to about what I’d seen this afternoon, it was her.
    ‘Jason, Heidi,’ she said, giving me a wave hello.
    Wearing red lipstick and hooped silver earrings that brushed against her neck, I saw her hair streaks had been re-dyed a vivid, electric blue. A young man stood next to her.
    ‘This is Mark.’ She squeezed the man’s arm and beamed like he was a prize she had just won at the fair.
    ‘Glad to meet you, Mark,’ said Jason, pulling him close to shake hands so he could give Carla a secret thumbs up behind his back.
    I smiled and widened my eyes to show her how impressed I was with her new catch. At least twenty years younger, I now understood the source of her giddiness. Wearing jeans, an open-necked shirt and navy suit jacket, he was even taller than Carla and had wavy black hair swept back from his forehead, green eyes and a rosebud pout.
    ‘Hope you don’t mind me gatecrashing?’ he said and, without waiting for Jason to answer, followed Carla inside.
    While Jason went to tend to the barbecue, I stowed my handbag on the sofa in the living room and headed through to the kitchen. Mark was still there, alone.
    ‘Drink?’ I asked, hobbling over to the fridge. I needed to take some ibuprofen and soon.
    Distracted, he didn’t respond.
    I followed his gaze as it fell upon the portable defibrillator and two fire-blankets Jason had fixed to the wall, a list of printed instructions stuck up beside them. The defibrillator was the kind you normally only see at emergency points in train stations. Everything you needed to stop a