A noise from downstairs makes me freeze. Is Mark back so soon? No, there’s no one down there, just house noises. I might not get another chance, so I decide to check the loft room. What had been a dusty loft hidden by a trapdoor in the ceiling when we’d moved in had been transformed by my fair hand – and an army of helpful builders – into a beautiful bedroom intended for Dylan when he was a teenager. The ladder had been replaced by a set of stairs and a skylight had been set into the roof. Any teenager would love it; it’s so unfair that my little boy will never get the chance.
Now I move quickly up the stairs and my breath catches as I enter the room. It clearly hasn’t been used as a bedroom since I left. It’s filled with boxes, each one with labels such as ‘Pictures’ and ‘Pregnancy Stuff’, but there are other, less apparently painful boxes as well, two marked ‘Magazines’ and another four ‘Uni Stuff’. I open the top of one of the ‘Uni Stuff’ boxes. Inside are three lever arch files, each full of lecture notes and essays. Seeing as I already know how much of a swot my ex-husband is, neither the copious amount of notes nor the highly graded assignments comes as a surprise. The second university box contains more files of lecture notes, and I’m about to give up when I see Mark’s certificates lying in the top of the third one. They’re still in their frames and they aren’t damaged, so I can’t see any reason for them not to be on the walls. I lift them out and put them to one side. Underneath are photographs: Mark with friends at bars, at various balls and festivals. More than a few are of a beautiful red-haired girl, fresh-faced and smiling. Her nose and cheeks are smattered with freckles and she doesn’t appear to be wearing any make-up, but it’s her eyes that have me captivated. They are a vivid emerald green and are full of such genuine happiness that I can’t help but envy her, whoever she is. This feeling deepens the more photos I flick through. Now this girl has her arms around Mark,
my Mark
; now they are kissing, holding the camera at arm’s length and taking the picture themselves, huge grins on their faces. The more photographs I see, the clearer it is that this is a couple deeply in love, and yet I have never even heard of her. Why would Mark have kept this from me? Between this and the mysterious money, it is looking like I didn’t know my husband as well as I thought.
I turn each photo over but there’s nothing written on the back. More and more pictures of the happy couple make my throat tighten and my heart ache, yet I can’t stop. The girl on a beach, Mark wearing a backpack and walking gear, somewhere that looks hot. I have to get out of here. I manage to put the photos back in the box and replace the certificates, and I’m about ten seconds from leaving when I hear the key turn in the front door.
30
Jack: 27 November 1992
He hated getting mud on his shoes.
He hated mud on his shoes and he fucking hated the woods. Woods were for bears and tree-huggers, and he was neither. Bears, tree-huggers and dead bodies.
They’d left her on the edge where the newer trees had been planted, not thickening up for another hundred metres. Idiots! Further in and the animals might have got to her before the police did. She might not have been found for days. Weeks if that bitch Whitaker hadn’t got her knickers in a twist and reported the girl missing already.
Well he sure as hell wasn’t moving her. He was already going to have to burn these clothes and he hadn’t even touched the body. What a waste of a fucking expensive suit.
He knew he shouldn’t have come but he needed to see for himself. You couldn’t rely on anyone in this world; he hadn’t got to where he was without learning that. You did what needed doing and you didn’t entrust the important stuff to weak-minded idiots who would never amount to anything.
The light had faded completely now but the moonlight here among the sparse trees kissed the ground and slid over everything on it. There was no noise except the crunching of leaves under his feet. When he breathed out he saw his breath crystallise in front of him. In a few hours this mud would be rock hard, frosty and crunchy underfoot. She would be frozen like an ice pop.
He stepped as close as he dared to the body. Even in death the girl was breathtakingly beautiful. A random image of some girl gone to seed, a junkie dead from the cold, flashed through his mind. This one looked nothing like that sort of criminal scum. Despite the clumps of mud and leaves that clung to her long red hair, you could still see it had been in good condition. Her clothes were clean and good quality. She would have looked like any other nineteen-year-old girl were it not for the gaping blood-filled smile in her throat and the glassy lifelessness of those eyes.
He felt a small stab of regret. Things could have been so different for her, if only she hadn’t tried to play games with him, hanging off Shakespeare every time she saw him enter a room, pretending she wasn’t attracted to him. Billy was as bad, strutting around like Captain Big Balls spreading his feathers. Beth had had to find out what Jack was really like the hard way. She’d resisted his flowers, jewellery, even artwork, but she hadn’t been able to resist the chloroform-covered rag clamped over her mouth. Finally he’d made her weak at the knees, although not in the way he’d planned.
They’d re-dressed her; he was a little disappointed at that but he’d expected it. There was still no way the police wouldn’t know what had happened to her. It wouldn’t be long before they found her here; he’d better be quick about what he needed to do.
His hand flicked to his pocket, where the girl’s purse still sat, next to the syringe. Getting as close as he could without actually touching the body, he pressed the needle into the back of her knee and drew back. She hadn’t been dead long enough for her blood to thin into water yet, or to dry up, so what he got was a beautiful claret-red syringe.
As much as he’d like to hang around and watch them find her, he had work to do.
31
I’m frozen to the spot, petrified to move in case I give myself away. Maybe I was mistaken – I’m two floors up after all – but then the front door opens and I hear the sound of keys being thrown on to the table in the hallway, followed by the rustling of carrier bags and footsteps carrying them into the kitchen. This is it then. Back to Oakdale for me. There isn’t a chance I’m getting out of this; I mean I’m pretty sure ‘I forgot my purse and went to look for it in your loft’ isn’t going to work.
Maybe I still have time. I have two choices: I can find a place to hide and hope Mark goes out again before he discovers me, or I can make my way back to the office and climb out of the window on to the extension and risk being seen. Or breaking my neck. It isn’t really the best set of options I could hope for, but it’s all I’ve got. As silently as I can, I push open the door and listen for any noise. The banging of cupboards tells me that whoever’s down there is still putting away shopping, and it’s only a short dash down the stairs to the office. I make it in seconds, and now instead of being trapped in the loft I’m trapped in the office. Not really much of an improvement, I know, but I’m slightly closer to the ground floor.
The jump from the office window to the extension doesn’t look too bad, and I silently thank the con man at the conservatory place who convinced Mark to go for the expensive brick option, complete with foundations and planning permission, rather than the four pieces of glass I had in mind. That should take my weight quite comfortably, provided I don’t bounce off the bloody roof.
As quietly as I can, I open the window and peer out. The extension is directly below, next to the kitchen. It was my laundry room and I loved it. It may seem slightly ridiculous to spend all that money on an extra room just to stick my washing machine and tumble drier in, but I’m bloody glad now that we did. Moving as quickly as my heeled boots will allow, I hitch myself up on to the desk and push the window open as far as possible. This would be a really bad time for Mark to decide to put out his washing.
The kitchen door opens – Mark is coming up the stairs. I have to get out fast. I hurl my handbag out of the window, hearing it land with a thump on the extension roof, and swing my leg over the windowsill. A huge heave and I am sitting on the sill, both legs dangling over, as I hear Mark at the top of the stairs. It isn’t much of a drop – the real fall is from the extension to the ground – so I throw myself from the window, landing heavily. I can’t chance a look at whether Mark has come into the study, gone into the bedroom or simply to the loo. I am standing on the roof of my former laundry room – thankfully all in one piece – and I have to get off before someone spots me.
Dropping to all fours, as low as possible, I make my way to the edge of the roof. The drop here is around ten foot, which is eight foot more than I am comfortable with, but once again my choice in the matter seems limited. I don’t stop to think about how much the landing is going to hurt. I don’t know how long Mark is going to stay upstairs, and his arrival back in the kitchen will cause me some problems. Wrapping the strap of my handbag around my wrist, I squat over the edge, lower my legs down slowly and let go.
I won’t try and sound brave: the impact bloody hurts. As my knees try to recover from the shock, I manage to shuffle my way out of sight of the kitchen window. So far I haven’t cried out in pain and I am feeling pretty pleased with myself when I hear a key turn in the back door. Bad knees or not, I run.
Gasping for breath, my vision slightly blurred, I’m forced to stop at the end of the street. I lean against the McKinleys’ garden wall to steady myself and check the front room window for prying eyes. There is no one in and I haven’t been followed.
I walk the rest of the way back to my car thanking God with every step for my new-found fitness. Four years ago I probably wouldn’t have been able to pull my weight up on to the windowsill in the office, let alone drop from the laundry room roof and run for my life. I feel triumphant, more exhilarated than I have in years. The car’s still parked where I left it, no parking ticket or wheel clamp. I let myself in and collapse in an exhausted heap against the steering wheel.
‘How did it go? Did you get caught? Is this your “one phone call”?’ Nick answers on the first ring and instantly begins a verbal assault.
‘I haven’t been arrested. And I’m not sure if I found anything. I’ll leave you to work that out when I get back to yours. If that’s still OK?’
‘Sure.’ Some of the anxiety in his voice has dissipated on hearing I won’t be needing him to post bail. How much does a journalist earn these days anyway? ‘Drive safely,’ he adds, and hangs up. Smiling wryly, I put away my phone and start the car. Feeling somewhat calmer and even smugger than before, I begin the drive back to Nick’s house, both knees throbbing.
32
Forty minutes later, I pull into Nick’s street. After the initial adrenalin rush of my daring robbery and resulting escape had worn off, Mark’s words about finding our son had returned to hit me square in the stomach and I had to pull over twice on my journey to regain my breath.
‘Thank God.’ Nick’s words are those of relief, but he doesn’t look relieved. My euphoria subsides in an instant. He’s holding an envelope.
‘What’s that? Where did you get it?’
‘It was on the mat when I came to open the door. It wasn’t there ten minutes ago.’
There’s no child this time. The photographs that have been shoved through Nick’s door show a much more familiar figure. Although my back is to the camera, I recognise myself immediately. Dressed in a loose grey jumper, my hair short and dark, I’m standing at the door of my former home, waiting for my former husband to open the door to me. This photo is recent. This photo is from this morning.
The next picture shows Mark opening the door to me; another shows me leaving. The fourth shows me returning to the house and the fifth is of me dangling from the laundry room roof. I would laugh if it wasn’t so terrifying; I look ridiculous hanging there, suspended from the roof like a teenager climbing a tree. I thought myself so clever, escaping undetected like the Artful Dodger, but I’m not, am I? I was followed, caught on camera over and over again, then whoever followed me printed the photos and posted them through Nick’s front door. For what? A warning? Are these photographs on the desk of some police station as I stand here congratulating myself on being a free woman?
A banging at the front door brings me screeching back to reality. The police, already? It’s too late to run; for all I know they are at the back door waiting for another daring escape. I shove the photographs into my handbag and prepare to face the music. Nick opens the front door, both of us wearing our best ‘please, officer, I’m innocent’ look. Although that failed dismally for me the first time around, and I actually believed in my innocence that time.
Cassie stands on the front step, holding shopping bags and looking to anyone watching like the perfect Stepford Wife.
‘Jesus, am I glad to see you.’ I release the breath I’ve been holding and Nick lets her in. ‘What are you doing here?’
‘We’ve been looking into the trial,’ Cassie reminds me. I’d forgotten that meant her coming here, to Nick’s house, without me. ‘I went to get some shopping. How did it go?’
‘Not as well as I thought,’ I answer darkly. I lamely hold out the photographs. ‘These just arrived.’
Cassie looks through the photos and gasps, then passes them back to Nick, whose concerned look scares me even more. He leads the way into the sitting room, where he pulls the curtains closed and switches on the lights.
‘What’s that for?’ Cassie asks. Even I agree it’s overkill; we aren’t Bond and Moneypenny, after all.
‘They posted the photographs
here
. Before she even got here. Which means they knew she wasn’t going home.’
Cassie immediately checks over her shoulder, as though someone might be standing behind her with a camera or a tape recorder.