Deceit. [COMPLETED.]

Chapter 47

"The impact."
[Tina Laroche]

Tina Laroche stood watching from a distance.

She felt calm. She knew exactly what was required of her and despite the occasional lapses in concentration she was still on course on what she had to do.

'Get down this instance. I've told you before. This is not a playground.'

The mother she was watching, a Mrs Attwood, sounded tired. It was a good thing. She had three children to cope with in a crowded shopping mall heaving with weekend browsers. Too many things to go wrong, too many distraction for one person to cope with, the perfect opportunity for what she had in mind.

Cheryl Attwood was shouting at one of the daughter's, a pretty young girl of a slightly darker skin to that of her other two sisters and the one that Tina herself was watching like a hawk.

The young girl looked happy enough. She was hanging onto the hand rail looking down at a troupe of theatrical clowns three storeys below. A juggling act was underway. The young girl had pulled herself up onto her tiptoes without a care of any danger while her mother pleading for her to come away.

Tina Laroche stood against a pillar. She blended in well with the other shoppers and with time on her hands, she was able to reflect back to when it had all began, the moment when she and her friend Jenny Stamford had first met.

A delicate smile escaped from her small, well-defined cheeks as she recalled how petite and frail her friend had looked that spring morning and how quiet she had been during the first few days in the convent. Oh, they had made up for it all right in the end. Inseparable they had become, always getting into trouble but then, she thought to herself, her smile receding somewhat, they had needed to make trouble. They had needed distractions, needed way to forget why they were there because without them, then all that would have been left was the harsh reality of why they had been there and that, she thought angrily, was something they had desperately wanted to forget.

Cheryl Attwood was beginning to loose patience now. She was waving her arms vigorously at the young daughter hanging desperately to the rails. It brought back more memories, Tina empathising with Cheryl's worried look. After all it may have been only a brief moment in time but Tina had been a mother once.

So so long ago. So very long ago and he had been such a joy too, oh how he had always smiled, always lit up the room whenever he had been there. Even during the most difficult of times when he was teething, there had rarely been a time when her Frederick wasn't opening his mouth into a great big grin.

Tina's eyes glazed over for a moment.

His death had been so wrong as all deaths were. The loud screeching of a lorry's brakes, the ear shattering noise of the impact as the drunken driver lost control sending his truck careering into the bus stop and then afterwards  there was the heart wrenching cries as people were thrown in all directions.

They said her Frederick had died instantly.

That at least had been a blessing but there wasn't a day that went by without a silent wish being spoken for his resurrection which was why, Tina thought so determinedly, that her friend must never suffer the same anguish or pain that she was having to endure endlessly over these last few years.

She glanced at her watch. It was two O'clock. She had been following Cheryl Attwood now since they had arrived at the shopping mall and she was sure that the mother would be ready for a much needed break soon, a cup of coffee maybe at the very least.

And in a small way Tina hated what she had to do but at the same time, she knew deep down that there was just no other way.

Her friend Jenny had given her so much. She had helped her to read and write using one of the bibles at the convent. She had paid for all the care needed when she had been set low in hospital after the birth. She had even paid for the college fees needed when Tina had decided to go into nursing and then, she reflected ruefully, her friend had paid for the much needed lawyer when Tina had to fight off the father's claim for custody.

Jenny had also been there after Frederick's death. In fact, Tina mused, she couldn't think of a time when her friend Jenny Stamford had not been in her life.

'Can we just go down and see them please mummy? Can't we? Can't we just go down for even a few minutes? We'll be good we promise.'

The dark skinned child, Danielle her name was, was now pleading with her mother to get closer to the clowns but there wasn't the time. Cheryl Attwood had two large carrier bags in each hand and looked heavily laden and she was trying to explain that they all still had school things to buy.

Cheryl Attwood tried one last time to get her daughter to come away from the rails informing her this time that if she didn't behave then her father would be told. It did the trick. The girl came away sullen faced.

Tina heard the reprimand and at the mention of the father created a mental picture in her head of where he was right now, away from it all, away from any influence, unable to even lift a finger.

She knew a lot about the 'Attwood's', she had made it her priority to know ever since her friend Jenny had first hatched the plan and despite knowing the devastation she was about to cause, Tina was able to sooth her conscience with the knowledge that something good would come out of it.

The daughter had rejoined her mother's side and they were off again. The other two children were bickering and no one saw her coming. No one saw the determined stride Tina Laroche was making towards them and no one saw the impact until it was too late.

And then, exactly on cue, the next stage of an elaborate plan had just sprung into place and there wasn't a thing anyone could do about it.

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Some of you already knew that this day would come.

Well it is here and the lives of the "Attwoods" are about to be changed forever.

Kirk talked of fate at the beginning. Was all this fated I ask?

Could Kirk have actually stopped any of this from happening?

Your answers as always make my day.

Take care.
JU