Really Rose

Jackie was acting strangely when Jamie got home from school.

"What's wrong Gran?" he wanted to know. "Are you okay?"

"Yeah, sorry sweetheart. It was just something on the news," Jackie told him

"Oh you mean those two girls who are missing?" Jamie wondered. "We heard about it at school. I hope they're okay."

"We all do Jamie," Jackie replied as she got up.

How could she admit it was his real father who was leading the investigation? That was up to Rose to tell him and maybe it was time? If she did, she'd also have to admit it to Donna. How would Donna take it? As Rose walked home, she was debating what to do about it.

After catching up with what Jamie had been doing at school and Jamie going to his room, Rose asked for her mother's advice.

"Only you can tell him Rose," Jackie insisted. "I get that ya don't want to upset him though. He has to know sometimes, maybe it's best gettin' it over with?"

"Yeah but I don't know where to start Mum," Rose admitted. "I already told Donna a few years ago, well she guessed anyway."

"Tell me what Mum?" Jamie interrupted her. "What aren't you telling me?"

"Sit down Jamie," Rose told him as she pulled a chair out for him.

"Mum, what's wrong?" poor Jamie wanted to know. "Is it about dad?"

"How did ya guess?" Rose asked him.

"I heard you saying Donna's name. Just tell me," Jamie insisted.

"This isn't going to be easy Jamie," Rose started to tell him. "Yes, it's about your dad. Jamie, he wasn't your real dad, he just took responsibility for you, before you were even born. We told everyone except your gran that you were his."

She could see the look on Jamie's face.

"Why did you do that?" Jamie wanted to know. "So who's my real dad if it wasn't him?"

"Me and your real dad split up just before I found out. Your other dad, well, for some reason I told him before I told everyone else. He'd been trying to get me to go out with him when I split from your real dad. I told him and he wanted to look after me," Rose began to explain.

"Who's my real dad then? Didn't you even tell him about me?" Jamie asked, Rose seeing tears in his eyes.

"Jamie, I couldn't, it was getting too complicated. I let him get away because I wouldn't go where he lived," Rose admitted.

"Why Mum?" Jamie asked her, rubbing his eyes.

Jackie went to sit beside him and put her arm around him.

"Your mum had a good reason Jamie," Jackie told him. "It was to do with me. Your real dad lived in Scotland, something happened there when we lived there and she didn't want to go back."

"That's where it got complicated Jamie," Rose carried on telling him.

"Why did it get complicated?" Jamie wanted to know.

"I can't explain it," Rose replied, not wanting to admit she'd let Tess get the better of her.

"What about now?" Jamie asked her. "What about when who I thought was my dad died?"

"Jamie, I loved who became your dad," Rose admitted. "Really I did and we hardly ever mentioned it. He loved you very much. It made no difference to him that you weren't his own."

"What about Donna, does she know?" Jamie asked her.

"I told her a few years ago but she'd already guessed," Rose told him. "Jamie, I held back telling ya, I should have known that ya would find out eventually. You were too upset when he died to have told ya before."

She let it sink in for a few minutes before she got Jackie to move and went to sit next to him.

"Jamie, I'd known him for years before you were born. He was really good to me. He could have left me to bring you up on my own but he didn't," Rose tried to explain.

"I managed with you," her mother reminded her.

"I know Mum, that's not the point though. Jamie, he just wanted the best for you and he always treated you as his own," Rose insisted. "I had no idea I was gonna have to tell ya without him being here."

"Then just tell me who my real father is then," Jamie then insisted.

"His name is Alec Hardy, the detective who's been on the news about those two missing girls," Rose had to admit.

"Mum, I saw the news. He looks a bit like dad," Jamie told her. "How did you know him?"

"Me and your gran lived in Scotland for three years. We met at school and we were really close friends," Rose admitted. "He became my boyfriend when we were fifteen but when I left, he used to come down every holiday with his older half brother."

"Well why did you never tell him about me?" Jamie wanted to know.

"I should have done, I'm sorry I never did before now," Rose replied. "We were always inseparable and he wanted to come down here to do his police training but back then, there were very few opportunities," Rose explained.

"Why didn't you go back to Scotland though?" Jamie was curious.

Rose looked across at her mother. They still didn't want to talk about what had brought them back to London.

"Tell him Rose," Jackie insisted. "Jamie, I made a big mistake taking your mum up to live in Scotland," Jackie admitted. "Things went wrong and we had to leave in a hurry and she didn't want to leave your real dad. It was my fault."

"Mum, we've been over this," Rose reminded her. "Jamie, something had happened and I was too scared to go back. I'm sorry you didn't know until now."

Jamie got up and Rose thought he was going to storm out of the room. He surprised her by going to give her a hug, Jackie clasping her hands over her mouth.

"Don't blame your mum," Jackie insisted. "I shouldn't have dragged her all the way up there."

"Mum, ya didn't know what was gonna happen," Rose reminded her.

"Huh, really?" Jackie asked Rose.

"It's okay," Jamie tried to tell them both. "So, it was that detective who was on TV?" he wanted to make sure.

"Yeah. Jamie, I already told ya I loved who you knew as your dad. Nothing can change that but I also still loved your real dad," she assured him.

"So why did you never tell him about me?" Jamie asked again.

"Because when he moved back to his home town after training, someone new was there and she turned his head I suppose?" Rose wondered how to word it. "She must have somehow got to him and kept him away from me. Back then, I was scared of what would happen if I went back."

She didn't want to make things complicated.

"Would she have stopped you seeing him?" Jamie wanted to know.

"Yeah, I think she would," Rose replied. "I don't know what prevented him coming to see me when he'd promised. If he'd come down when he was supposed to, I think I would have finally gone back with him. So, ya have relatives back in Paisley."

"Cool," Jamie smiled. "What are you going to do now?" he wondered.

"Now, that's the big question," Rose smiled back. "Do ya want to meet him? I mean if he'll even see me, let alone talk to me."

"He will Rose," Jackie tried to assure her. "There again, he might have got married?"

"Well I suppose he deserves to know?" Rose wondered.

"Then call that police station tomorrow," Jackie suggested.

"Yeah, I want to meet him," Jamie agreed. "Will he want to meet me though?"

That was what worried Rose. How would Alec take it when she told him he had a fifteen year old son? There seemed only one way to find out.

"I'm gonna call him tomorrow and ask if he'll meet me." Rose decided.

"Well he can only say no," Jackie told her.

So after Jamie set off for school the next morning, Rose got the number for the station but was told Alec was already out.

"Well, can ya give him a message?" Rose asked the sergeant.

"I'll make sure he gets it. Who's calling?" Rose was asked.

"Just say Rose," Rose told him, thinking she may as well get it over with and Alec could decide if he wanted her to call back. "I'll call back later."

She hoped Alec would get the message and if not, she'd get the train down tomorrow and go and face him. He could only turn her away or refuse to take her call. Unluckily for her, the desk sergeant was on the phone when Alec arrived back at the station.

"Any messages?" Alec asked the officer.

The man just shrugged his shoulders, forgetting about Rose's call. That was until Tess was passing ten minutes later.

"Ma'am, DI Hardy got a call earlier, some woman's calling him back," Tess was told.

"Is she now?" Tess replied, not bothered one way or the other now their divorce was just weeks away.

She had got what she wanted, there was no point in pretending they could salvage anything of their marriage. What had possessed her to marry him when all he did was pine over his ex girlfriend? She'd had her sights set on him when she first transferred to Paisley and he'd been easy to entice.

It hadn't stayed like that though, had it, she asked herself as she deliberately avoided his office and not bothered giving him the message. There would only be one woman calling him after he'd been in the news. Dave was being far more understanding these days than Alec was. That was the only reason she had finally given in and signed her copy of the divorce papers.

Now, she was waiting for Dave to get his divorce but he was taking his time over it, which annoyed her since she'd mainly signed hers for him. Alec had been smug over it, she had thought. Had she forced him into getting married? She'd done what was necessary in order to get posted back home again and Alec had been the way. She could have chosen any male in the police station in Paisley but Alec had been a challenge and she'd won.

Rose was anxious all day and the others notice as she was summoned to her boss's office.

"Come on Rose, you've been acting strangely since you got that call from your mother yesterday," Graham was telling her. "What was it all about?"

She thought she was lucky getting away with a phone call. She wouldn't normally.

"You saw the news, about those two girls going missing?" she asked him.

"Yes, it's very distressing Rose but is that the cause for you to be a little off?" Graham wondered.

"Well not exactly," Rose had to admit. "The lead detective in the case. I used to know him, we were engaged, before I married James."

"I see then?" Graham pondered. "Can I ask what happened?"

"Well, there was someone working with him and I let him get away," was all she wanted to say. "That's the short version."

"I don't suppose you want to say any more?" Graham asked her.

"It's not that, it's just really personal," Rose admitted. "I've got some leave coming, can ya manage without me for few days?"

"How many days?" Graham wanted to know.

"Until Monday? I was gonna go down there, see if I can talk to him," Rose told him.

"What if he won't talk to you?" Graham wondered.

"Then I'll be back on Thursday," Rose told him, thinking that would be the case.

"It's a bit short notice but we'll manage," Graham told her. "You go talk to him, it must be really important?"

"Yeah, it is, thanks. Don't tell the others, please?" she asked him.

So she packed a canvas bag with a few things she might need if she had to find a hotel for a few nights and Jackie assured her Jamie would be fine while she was away.

"I've never had to leave him before," Rose reminded her mother.

"Ya never had a reason. Rose, he's old enough to be left now ya know?" Jackie laughed. "Just find Alec and whatever happened before, don't let it get in the way this time."

"I won't Mum," Rose assured her. "I'd best go talk to Jamie then?"

When she told Jamie she was going to see Alec, he had a few questions.

"Are you bringing him back with you?" was his first question.

"He may not be able to get away Jamie? He has to find those two missing girls," Rose replied.

Just then, Jackie appeared at the doorway.

"Rose, come here," Jackie beckoned her away from Jamie. "I didn't want to say anything in front of him. Rose, they found the youngest girl, in the nearby river."

"No? Oh, well that's a shock," Rose replied. "Who found her?" she asked, hoping it hadn't been Alec.

"They didn't say, they'll give more details later I expect?" Jackie wondered.

"Do ya think I should still go tomorrow?" Rose asked. "I booked the time off work."

"I don't see why ya can't go Rose? It may not have been Alec who found her," Jackie tried to assure her.

"Yeah but I have this awful feeling it would've been him," Rose told her.

"Yeah, it would probably have been him," Jackie agreed.

Rose went back in Jamie's room and he asked what they had been talking about. She broke the news to him and tried to cheer him up.

"Jamie, if he wants to see ya, I'll bring him back with me or if he can't get away, I'll get him up here as soon as he's able to."

"I know you will Mum," Jamie replied, giving her a hug.

"Hey, when did you get so tall?" Rose had to laugh.

"You never noticed Mum?" Jamie also laughed.

Rose set of nervously the following morning, getting the underground to the station she could get to Sandbrook from and she got a seat to herself and debated calling Alec again. She got up the courage and waited for her call answering, feeling like a teenager again.

"Sorry, he's out," she was told upon being asked what she wanted.

"I left a message for him yesterday," Rose insisted. "Did ya give him my message?"

"We're in the middle of a massive murder investigation," the desk sergeant reminded her. "I told someone in his department."

Had it been Tess or had it been someone else, Rose wondered. Well she was on her way there now and if she lost her courage, she'd cross over to the opposite platform and catch the next train back. Maybe Alec wouldn't want her turning up when he had a murder inquiry to conduct?

Alec had still been trying to get over the shock of finding the youngest girl in the river the day before. He'd been trying to avoid Tess when he got into the office and had then gone straight to the estate to see the youngest girl's parents. Tess had wanted to join him but he was in no mood to listen to her constantly berating him.

"I told you about digging up our garden," Ricky shouted at Alec as he stood on the doorstep. "Where were you yesterday after they found my Pippa then?"

"I was the one who found her," Alec admitted.

He'd been checked over by the paramedics but had dismissed their suggestion he was taken to the emergency department at the local hospital.

Ricky wasn't about to back down.

"You could have told us yourself," Ricky grumbled.

"Leave it Ricky," his wife insisted. "It won't bring our Pippa back. We'd prefer we dealt with Tess," she turned her attention to Alec.

"Fine, I will make sure she is free to answer any questions you have," Alec agreed, thinking he too would prefer for Tess to deal with them.

This was one of the hardest things about being responsible for a missing persons investigation.

"What about Lisa?" Cate then asked him.

"Sorry, there is no news as yet. We're concentrating around where she lived," Alec told them.

"She hated it there, she's hardly likely to have gone back," Ricky told him. "Can we see Pippa now? When can we make arrangements for her funeral?"

"You can make a formal identification if you wish or we can do it just on photographic identification if you prefer? I would advise only one of you went. I'll have a police car standing by to take you. We left it with it getting late yesterday," Alec told Ricky. "We can't release her until we're sure we catch the right person responsible."

"We can't accept that," Ricky insisted.

"Ricky, let them catch whoever killed our daughter," Cate insisted. "I want her back as much as you do."

After telling the driver posted outside the house to take Ricky to ID Pippa, he went back to the station, forgetting to ask if there'd been any message for him but the sergeant called after him.

"Sir, there's been two message for you, DS Henchard took one of them yesterday."

"She never told me," Alec replied.

"Sir, I think both messages were from the same person? Maybe someone saw something that night?" the sergeant told him, forgetting the name of the person who had called.

Alec went by Tess's desk, scowling as Dave dared to look in his direction.

"You took a message for me yesterday and you never bothered telling me?" Alec asked her.

"With what was going on yesterday, is it any wonder?" Tess replied. "I was told someone rang for you, they would have rung back if it was important."

Since nothing else had been mentioned, all he could do was wait for whoever it was to call back. Could he get his hopes up and dare think it could be Rose who had seen him on the news? No, he couldn't allow himself to think it would be her. Rose would bound to have got married to Donna's cousin James so he had to get the idea out of his head.

He tried to get back to going through information that had been passed to him but he couldn't concentrate. Rose had just got off the train and looked at the local map to see where the police station was, finding out there were two so she got her phone out to look them up and see which one the phone number she had called belonged to.

Nervously, she followed the direction to the one in the town centre and stood outside, trying to get up the courage to enter. Two uniformed officers were just coming out and the male officer held the door for her.

"Is everything okay?" the female officer asked her.

"What? Oh yeah, sorry. Yeah, I'm fine, thanks," Rose replied, catching the door.

There was only one way of finding out if Alec would agree to see her so she walked up to the front desk.

"Is DI Hardy in?" she asked when the desk sergeant wanted to know why she was there.

"Are you the person who called him?" she was asked.

"Yeah, that was me," Rose replied nervously.

"He was in a while ago, I didn't see him go back out. Let me try and get hold of him," the sergeant told her. "Sir, there's someone to see you," Alec was told when he answered with his usual 'what now?'.

Was it really Rose, he asked himself when he said he would be right there.