Chapter Fourteen
IT HAD BEEN AFTER NINE o’clock by the time they got back to the station. It was a little while later when Rafferty picked up his own car from the car park and headed for his Ma’s house.
After visiting the Bignalls’ beautiful manor house home, and seeing again the elegance of the Christmas tree in their sitting room with its subtle silver and gold decorations, the eyeball-searing yuletide gaudiness that met him as he turned into his Ma’s road on the council estate almost caused him to stall the car. Although not normally one to flinch at such flamboyantly exuberant colours, even Rafferty admitted that the vision before his eyes was completely over the top.
Between his last visit and this one, Ma’s next door neighbour had surpassed herself. Still trailing his Ma – the pro
