Page 72 of Winter Nights at the Bay Bookshop
I closed the bookshop door behind me moments later and locked it. Lily was standing by the Christmas tree with her back to me, trembling.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I said.
She whipped round to face me, tears streaking her cheeks. ‘Why did he do that to me?’
I had no answer. What sort of man called their daughter something so derogatory and then daubed it across her shop? What sort of person gathered up dog poo especially to throw it through a letterbox? Justin Mayes was one seriously disturbed individual. So I gave the only response I could and wrapped my arms round her, holding her tightly as she sobbed against my chest.
‘I needed that,’ she said, stepping back and looking up at me with bloodshot eyes. ‘Do you think I should have told Sergeant Haines?’
‘It has to be your decision, Lily. But doyouthink you should have told him?’
She glanced out of the window to where he and his colleague were talking.
‘I don’t know.’
I understood why she might feel conflicted, but I really hoped she would tell the police about Justin. There had to be consequences for vandalism like this. If there weren’t, he might do it again.
‘If this was Cassie’s shop and her estranged father had just done that, what would you advise her to do?’
Lily closed her eyes for a moment and took a few deep breaths. When she opened them, she gave me a weak smile, nodded and headed for the door. I reached for the rubber gloves in the cleaning caddy and made a start on the floor, grateful that the bookshop had wooden flooring rather than carpet, which would have been harder to clean. There was a can of air freshener behind the counter so I gave a generous spray before going into the yard to empty the dirty water down the drain. When I returned with a stepladder and a fresh bucket of water for scrubbing the sign, Lily was closing the door behind her.
‘I told him it was Justin,’ she said, before exhaling slowly. ‘That was hard.’
‘I can imagine.’ I put everything down and hugged her once more. ‘Are you okay?’
‘Not really, but there’s nothing I can do about it. I’ve got a shop to get open.’
I gave her a gentle squeeze and released her so she could get on. ‘The floor’s done and I’ll clean the sign as soon as the police car moves.’
‘Thank you for being here.’
‘Nowhere else I’d rather be.’
The police car left so I went outside while Lily logged onto the system. Cleaning the sign took some elbow grease but it would have been a lot worse if Justin had used gloss paint. The white paint he’d used to cover up the original letters was emulsion and he’d used spray paint for his replacement letters which came off as I scrubbed and scraped the emulsion.
Half an hour after opening time, there was no physical evidence left from what Justin had done, all the cleaning products were stored away and the smell had gone. I went down to the staff room and sent up mugs of coffee in Jeeves but, when I returned to the till, one look at Lily’s pale cheeks and the unshed tears sparkling in her eyes showed the emotional impact.
‘Do you want some time out?’ I asked. ‘I can keep an eye on things.’
I thought she’d protest but she nodded slowly. ‘I still can’t believe he did that.’
‘Me neither.’ I hugged her tightly. ‘Take as long as you need. I’ll send your coffee back down in Jeeves.’
One of our regular customers came in and Lily welcomed her warmly before disappearing down the stairs. I hated Justin Mayes for what he’d done to Lily. She was kind and friendly to everyone she met and she didn’t deserve to have anyone treat her with anything other than love and respect. Even when I’d been unkind to her at school, she’d still kept trying and she’d been so understanding and forgiving when I’d shared my story. But Justin didn’t deserve her understanding or forgiveness. The difference between him and me was that I’d been an eleven-year-old kid in a lot of pain and he was a grown adult – her father – who should have known better.
37
LILY
The walk down the stairs to the staff room seemed to take forever. My body felt weary, my eyes burned from the tears already shed as well as the threat of more to come and my legs were shaking so I had to grip tightly to the handrail. Outside the staff room, I cursed under my breath for taking three attempts to punch in the four-digit code to unlock the door before sinking down onto one of the dining-table chairs.
As soon as the door closed behind me, there was no point trying to fight my emotions. I sank my head into my hands as tears rained down my cheeks and splashed onto the wooden table. Justin was a terrible father. He’d never shown me any affection and had repeatedly disappointed me over the years but the fact that he met up with me every so often had led me to believe that I had to mean something to him. Clearly I didn’t or he’d have never done something so cruel. What made it worse was that it was premeditated. He’d spent two nights gathering what he needed – including all that dog mess – before unleashing all his anger and hate. I’d told him he didn’t know me, but it seemed he knew one thing – how much Bay Books meant to me and how attacking my beloved bookshop would be like attacking me.
I grabbed a tissue from the box in the middle of the table and wiped my cheeks but it was fruitless because the tears kept falling and I might as well let them. I’d never let myself cry about Justin before. Even that awful Christmas Day holed up in a hotel room on my own, I’d refused to do it. I’d always told myself that I knew he was unreliable and that, if I was daft enough to keep him in my life, I shouldn’t be surprised each time he let me down so there was no point in getting upset about it. But now all the hurt and frustration came pouring out and I needed to let it.
I’d been right to cut Justin out of my life and, even though I’d hesitated about it at first, telling Sergeant Haines that it was Justin on Anne-Marie’s CCTV had also been the right thing to do. I couldn’t allow a misguided sense of loyalty for the shared genes sway me towards leniency. Justin needed to know he’d been seen. He needed to know that bad decisions had consequences. And he needed to know that he could never contact me or come near me again.
I was so grateful to Lars for not pushing me into what he thought I should do and encouraging me to reach my own decision, although he’d shared afterwards that he thought I’d made the right choice.
