‘Come into the kitchen. We’ll be able to hear ourselves speak in there.’
Gina and Jacob waded through the hoarded boxes of laundry powder and the recycling pile. The kitchen table was covered in dusty pots full of dying spider plants.
‘I’m so sorry that we had to give you such terrible news, but it would really help us if we got to know a little more about Alexander,’ Gina said.
The woman slumped into a rickety chair. ‘He hated his full name. It was Alex.’ Gina sat on the bench along the back wall so that Jacob could get in next to her. The warmth of the house and the smoke from whatever they’d been burning under the grill was almost suffocating. Gina coughed a little, trying to ignore the smell of rot that hung in the air while trying to see through the dispersing smoke.
‘D’ya wan’ a drink?’ The man held a crud-infested cup up.
‘No, thank you,’ Jacob replied. Gina smiled, pleased that he’d read her mind.
He poured Eveline Peterson a brandy and held it out to her.
She took the glass and stared into the deep amber liquid, her head bowed, exposing white roots in her crimson red hair. ‘I’ve read the papers today. I know what happened to him, I can’t—’ She stared into the glass and made a click noise as she swallowed. ‘It’s turning my stomach now.’ She took another sip and winced. ‘I don’t normally drink.’
‘We’re definitely not judging you, Mrs Peterson.’
‘Oh, stop with the Mrs. It’s Miss, but I prefer Eveline. Peterson,’ she said with a smile as she stared vacantly into her drink. ‘Alex took his father’s name when I had him but we never married. We were meant to, but he sadly died of cancer at a young age.’
‘I’m sorry to hear that.’ Gina tilted her head slightly.
‘It was a long time ago. Gareth brought him up, didn’t you, love?’
The man nodded and sat beside her. ‘We did everything we could for him. Gave him whatever we could afford. I loved him like my own boy, he was my own. He even called me Dad.’ The man looked to one side and scratched the dimple in his stubbly chin.
‘How often did you see Alex?’
‘Never.’ Eveline began circling the rim of her glass with her finger. ‘We had to sever contact for our own health. When he started taking drugs, we just couldn’t cope with him any more.’ She wiped her eyes. ‘We should have done more.’
Her partner lay a chubby hand across her shoulder and pulled her towards him. ‘We did everything we could. Don’t upset yourself over that, love.’ He kissed her on the side of the head. ‘Eveline and I have been through a lot. We helped him so many times. He had a lovely wife and they had a beautiful baby boy, then he went and blew it all.’ The man fiddled with a stray hair under his chin. ‘After his redundancy things slowly got worse. He’d sit at home and fester all day, feeling inadequate as they struggled from hand to mouth each month. I mean, his wife had a good job an’ all, but they both needed to work.’ The man paused. ‘We didn’t know he had a problem before it was too late. He was already addicted to heroin. Nicky threw him out and he ended up here. It wasn’t safe for him to be around the baby with him being on drugs all the time. He ran up debts and then the bailiffs took Nicky’s car. ’Orrible times, they were.’
‘So he came to live with you?’
Eveline nodded and wiped her nose. ‘It was summer last year. We wanted to help get him off the drugs and we helped get him onto a methadone programme. We had a lot of hope until he strayed off the path again. He stole from us, used my credit card and got me into debt. He sold my dead grandmother’s wedding ring. All that could have been forgiven but he became violent when he couldn’t get his own way and started smashing the house up. We were scared of him – he kicked one of my dogs – and the neighbours fell out with us. It took weeks after we told him to leave for him to stop coming around. He threw a brick through the front window, poured paint stripper on our car, sent threatening messages. We couldn’t cope. He was no longer my son. I didn’t have a choice when I made him leave.’ She began to sob. ‘Maybe I should’ve tried harder to get him back on the drug programme, but he blew it and he didn’t want it.’
‘You did try ’ard, love. We did everything.’
She sniffled. ‘And we failed, because he’s dead.’
Jacob scribbled a few notes and Gina looked down. She could see the lines of pain etched into their faces. ‘I’m sorry and I know this is hard for you. When did you ask him to leave?’
‘It was last September. The last time we heard from him was in November of last year. We keep in touch with Nicky as we see little Joshua quite regularly. She’d have told us if she’d seen him.’
‘We’ll take Nicky’s details after we’ve finished speaking, if that’s okay? Do you know where he went after he left you?’
Eveline shook her head and blew her nose. ‘He said he was getting as far away from us and Nicky as possible. He hated us all.’
‘I’m sure that was the drugs talking.’ Gina wanted to offer Eveline a bit of comfort. ‘Did you know he’d come back to Cleevesford?’
‘No. I know what he did was bad but if I knew he was back, I’d have gone out looking for him. We had no idea.’ A few wisps of her red hair fell over her face as she hunched over the table and began playing with a spider plant leaf, wiping the dust with her finger from base to tip. ‘I feel terrible as we’d started to live again. I’d convinced myself he’d made a new life and things were better for him. I lied to myself so that I could get on with life. Maybe I was being selfish but things got easier. We managed to laugh again, we went on holidays, we had fun, and all this time he was out there, suffering, and now he’s been murdered.’
A lump formed in Gina’s throat. The baggage this poor couple were carrying felt greater than her own. She couldn’t imagine losing her grown up daughter, Hannah, in such a way. She couldn’t imagine the heartache it would cause her and her young granddaughter, Gracie. Pushing that image out of her mind, she looked up. ‘Is there anything else you can tell us? What was he like before all this?’
‘He was always a handful. Nicky put up with a lot. He was a drinker and he was a bit of a wild child. He got into trouble at school for not doing homework, skipping classes and occasionally for minor scuffles. We hoped he would calm down. We’re not aggressive in any way or form. I don’t know where he got it from. When he met and married Nicky, we couldn’t have been happier. He seemed calmer for a few years. He settled into a job at a medical supply factory on the industrial estate. We were so proud when he became a line supervisor. It doesn’t sound much but it was a lot for him. For the first time in his life, he seemed calm and settled, then the baby came along. All was fine for a bit then redundancies were announced and, unfortunately, he was on the list. After that, all he could get was low paid, short-term agency work. He’d gone from a respectable salary to odd-jobbing for minimum wage. They’d cancel him some days, at the last minute. With every job rejection, he became more and more depressed. That was the start of it all.’
Eveline licked her dry lips. ‘Can I see him now?’