‘N
ina requires looking after. She’s a very special person, you know? About three years ago in Sainsbury’s car park, an old lady dropped her purse as she got into her car. Nina ran so fast through a line of cars, grabbed the purse and ran after the old lady as she drove away. She was so grateful she tried to give Nina some money.’ Lloyd jabbed with his index finger at the surface of the wooden table dividing him from Danny and Mark. ‘Know what? She refused, of course. Not that anyone would have ever found out. They were talking for a couple of minutes before Nina finally accepted a Swiss roll from the old lady’s shopping.’ Lloyd threw his head back and laughed. ‘What a sweetie.’
It had been a really good Swiss roll, too. Reminded me of Sunday tea at my nan’s when me and my sister were still able to row about who got the biggest slice. I’d never declared that Swiss roll to my senior officer. I panicked momentarily, thinking back on it. On duty it could have constituted a bribe. Would I be in trouble for accepting a Swiss roll? But I remembered the day clearly, and I was definitely not on duty so I was off the hook. Oh, and then I remembered – I really didn’t care.
Lloyd continued to boast to the officers about how his job gave him freedom to travel, allowing him to follow me, and how I hadn’t suspected a thing. He was quite right about that. Somehow it was impossible to even feel that frightened, despite knowing the truth. I had dissociated myself so completely from Lloyd, I was beginning to feel as if I was
in a trance. I began to wonder why a bell was ringing in the interview, then, back in real time, jumped when I realised it was someone at my front door.
I hesitated in the hallway, pondering whether I should get a knife or simply not answer it.
‘Nina,’ called a male voice. ‘It’s me, Bill. You OK?’
I was good at voice recognition. It was Bill. I glanced in the hallway mirror. I was no Scarlett Johansson, but after the week I’d had I doubted that Scarlett Johansson would look too sassy. To be fair, her breath probably didn’t smell of puke even on her worst days. I ran my tongue around my teeth and opened the door.
‘Hey, Bill.’ I attempted a seductive greeting but it sounded like I had a sore throat.
He frowned, a glimmer of concern, and said, ‘You OK?’ He peered over my shoulder. ‘Can I come in?’ He took a step forward.
I was sure I smelt of vomit, so I didn’t want to let him in. But Bill was probably genuinely worried about me, and he might have thought that I was acting oddly because I was being held hostage. Knowing what I did about him, if I refused to let him in he would most likely dial 999 and a van of burly men would arrive.
And my television screen showed a police interview. A police interview I couldn’t possibly possess without someone’s help. This was much worse than an unpleasant odour.
‘Course you can, Bill, but I am a bit tired. It’s been a long week and the place is a mess.’
‘Doesn’t bother me. Been a single bloke for so long now that I doubt it’s any worse than I’m used to.’
There was something about his smile and the ever-
so-slight
tilt of his head. I failed to recall if I’d always liked men with dark wavy hair or if he was the exception. In my hand, I had the remote control. If I let him in, and walked into the lounge ahead of him, I could turn the television off as I
entered and he wouldn’t see the interview. I could then put the kettle on, go to the bathroom and clean my teeth for the second time since I’d sat down to hear what Lloyd had to say. My plan was foolproof.
I moved out of the doorway and muttered something about making tea. I managed to turn the screen off before he got in the lounge. I crossed to the kitchen, filled the kettle and called, ‘I won’t be two minutes,’ before heading for the stairs. Then, satisfied that I had much improved breath, I returned to the lounge to find Bill in the armchair and two mugs of tea on the coffee table.
‘Made yours with milk, no sugar. That’s right isn’t it?’
‘Thanks, Bill. Great to see you. Don’t think I’ve ever seen you out of work before.’
‘I’ve seen you a couple of times,’ he replied before picking up his drink. For crying out loud, please don’t let him be another stalker, I thought, and it must have shown on my face. Realising what he’d just said, he blanched, put his cup down without taking a sip and ran his fingers through his hair. ‘That came out wrong, I’m sorry. I’ve been in town and you’ve gone into a shop as I’ve been coming out, that kind of thing.’
‘I know what you meant, Bill. Please don’t apologise.’ As if I could be annoyed with Bill.
‘I just wanted to make sure that you were OK. You looked shaken up yesterday when we got to Lloyd’s house. I would have called round last night but I saw that Welsh DS and she said that you were staying somewhere else.’
‘Not a boyfriend’s house,’ I blurted out. ‘The Premier Inn, just the Premier Inn. The Premier Inn, on my own.’
By now he had probably grasped that I’d stayed at the Premier Inn.
He winced as he drank his tea. Mine was still very hot but he seemed to be prepared to take the impending mouth ulcers and oral numbness – anything to get away. While he was getting some feeling back in his lips, I said. ‘We used to
bump into each other all the time when I worked in the office downstairs.’
‘I’m glad I keep seeing you. I’m even more pleased that you don’t have one of those wicker bars stocked with Babycham.’
‘How do you know? You haven’t been in the bedroom yet.’ I blushed. We both looked at our drinks.
Bill stood up to leave. I seemed to be ruining my chances here. It had been easier to talk to him on the phone, though the last day or so might have played a part in the tension I sensed developing between us. He turned to face me and said, ‘How about that drink in the next couple of days?’
‘That would be great, Bill.’ I grinned at him.
With his hand on the lounge door-handle, he paused and said, ‘I’ll call you in the morning.’
‘Can’t wait.’ I followed him to the front door. As he opened it, he hesitated. I supposed it was difficult for men: if you tried a kiss at this stage, it might seem too pushy; if you didn’t, it might be construed as lack of interest. He probably didn’t want to come across as some sort of creepy weirdo turning up on my doorstep having found out about Lloyd’s antics and then trying to snog me.
Turned out that wasn’t the cause of his hesitation.
‘This probably won’t mean much to you right now,’ said Bill, ‘but on the way back to the nick Jake Lloyd kept telling me how he’d never hurt you. He claims everything he did was his deluded way of making sure you were alright.’
I could tell from the way Bill had started to move from one foot to the other that what he was saying was making him uncomfortable. I assumed he wanted to tell me without sounding as if he was condoning Lloyd’s behaviour.
‘Are you sure you’re OK by yourself tonight, Nina?’ He looked down at his feet. ‘Sorry, that was forward-sounding, especially as I’ve probably scared you half to death. What I meant was, are you sure that you don’t want me to drive you to a friend’s or relative’s house? Or – er – the Premier Inn?’
‘Really, I’m fine. Put up with a lot more in the past.’
‘In that case, goodnight, but call if you need anything at all.’ He stepped out of my house. ‘And we’ll definitely go for that drink some time,’ he said as he backed away down the concrete path.
I waved him off and shut the door on the world. As I paused at the hallway mirror, I said out loud, ‘Top that, then, Scarlett Johansson. Don’t know who you’re going to the pub with, but I bet he’s no Bill Harrison.’
S
miling, I went back to the living room. The remote control was still on the coffee table. Of course – the interview. Surely even that couldn’t ruin my present mood. Trouble was, I had no idea how much worse the content was going to get.
I sat back on the sofa and continued watching Lloyd tell all to Danny and Mark with hardly any effort on their part. Lloyd talked and talked. Most of it was about me and how he’d followed me home, especially on evenings when I’d gone out with friends and had a good drink. Turned out he was worried that I would meet someone dangerous when I was too inebriated to take care of myself. The story of the old lady dropping her purse in the car park was the tip of the iceberg. He knew just about every detail of my life: the part-time job I’d had when I was at school; where I went to the dentist; boyfriends I’d had, including the Russian loser, and that I’d tried ice-skating a few times but got annoyed when I’d continually fallen over and injured myself. His concern even appeared genuine when he recalled the time I head-butted the ice. There seemed to be nothing he didn’t know about me. Throughout the interview, he maintained that he meant me no harm but had been watching over me.
Bill might have been right, but I still felt my flesh crawl at the thought of Jake Lloyd being my guardian angel.
According to Lloyd, it couldn’t be harassment as I hadn’t known he was watching me. Legally, he did have a point. Problem I had was that he had been doing it for over twenty years and I hadn’t had a clue.
Four o’clock. Bit early for a drink.
Being at home by myself was unsettling. I still had a feeling of being watched but knew how little sense that made with Jake Lloyd still in custody. I glanced over to the windowsill at the old photo of my sister and me as kids, wearing our favourite outfits. Hers was a short-sleeved yellow sundress; mine was a white T-shirt underneath red dungarees.
The clothes we’d been wearing.
My mum never liked anyone wearing red and white together. She said it was a bad omen – blood and bandages. I often wore red and white these days. I liked to defy demons. Made you stronger, sometimes.
My mobile jolted me through three and a half decades to the present day.
‘Hello, mate. What you up to?’ I asked Wingsy, answering the phone.
‘Just been speaking to the DCI,’ he informed me. ‘Your friend Jake Lloyd.’ Wingsy paused. ‘He’s about to be charged with murder.’
‘Murder? His aunt Daphne?’ I was incredulous.
‘No, not Daphne,’ came the hushed reply. ‘His cousin, Scott.’
‘He hanged himself in 2004, didn’t he? We read the report together. He left a suicide note and everything.’
‘Listen, Nin, I can’t say too much here. I’ve been advised not to talk to you – ’
‘Why on earth shouldn’t you talk to me? I’ve done nothing wrong.’
‘No, you have to understand, everyone is very nervous at the moment. The whole nick is tense. CPS authorised the charge minutes ago. There are still three unsolved linked murders and the only death we’ve detected was nine years ago, one that everyone thought was a suicide. DCI’s doing his fucking nut.’
‘Why is Lloyd being charged now, after all this time, Wingsy?’
‘Got to go. Call you later. Promise.’
The line went dead. I slumped back against the sofa. I had to find out why Lloyd was charged with Scott’s murder. It was unlikely that I would get any answers from the DCI. I thought about calling Catherine and decided that was unfair. If Wingsy didn’t want to talk to me in the open, she’d hardly be prepared to.
Now it was half-four, I uncorked a bottle of red. Figured that letting my hair down was safe with my very own stalker remanded in custody. I looked through the news for an update, but I didn’t really expect a press release yet. From what Wingsy had told me, it sounded as if the charge was being read to Lloyd at the custody desk as I
channel-hopped
.
Steadying myself for another dose of Jake Lloyd, I resumed watching the interview. From Danny and Mark’s body language, I got the impression that they were fairly comfortable with everything he had said and were striking up a rapport with him. I sat transfixed as Lloyd said, ‘Thank you, officers, but I have to tell you about the death of my cousin. It was all to protect Nina Foster, you know. By killing him I was doing the world a service.’ Simultaneously, Danny, Mark and I all leaned closer to Lloyd, them on the screen, me on my sofa.
I pressed ‘pause’ and topped up my glass. Of course, alcohol solved nothing, but I liked it. The self-satisfied smirk on his face was too much. I’d briefly imagined myself living in the crazy bastard’s house! I really did have bad taste in men.
Diane Lloyd had used the same expression – ‘doing the world a service’. I tried to call Wingsy but now his phone was off. I chewed my lip. A terrible habit.
It was an unusual phrase to use but I mulled over the possibility that it was a well-used phrase within the family. The thought that members of the same family might have conspired to murder each other was fanciful, something I
could not even comprehend. I was well aware how crime ripped a family’s fabric at the seams.
However, I allowed myself the freedom to consider that, if the Headingly-Lloyds had been in on it together, Diane Lloyd could have murdered her own sister after all, despite the reservations I had had earlier when speaking to June. The nagging doubt then was that the three unsolved murders had been committed by more than one person.
I followed this line of thought like a detective. I glugged my wine like a woman with a stalker embroiled in a murder investigation.
Myself and Wingsy knew the words that Diane had used, but so much had happened, I couldn’t remember if we had recorded them verbatim in our report of our visit to her. I paced my living room carpet, glass of dwindling wine in hand, weighing up how any of this fitted together. Chances were Wingsy could answer that. I tried his phone again. It was still switched off.
I pressed ‘play’.
Lloyd initially sat very still, unblinking. After several seconds he said, ‘Scott was out of hand. He was getting worse. He kidnapped two children. We spoke little then, but after he went to prison I had to ask him why he did it. You see, officers, it should have been enough to follow the Foster girls’ case in the papers. There was never a need for him to try to re-enact it.’ Lloyd’s head moved from right to left as he searched the interviewing officers’ faces for some kind of praise for his actions.
‘Officers,’ he said, ‘I’m getting the sense that you don’t appreciate what I’ve done. Scott was dangerous. Sooner or later he would have killed someone. I stopped him the only way I could. I’d done my research, you see. I even went to speak to Henry Bastow.’
At the mention of the name, I reached my trembling hands towards the remote once more. Had Jake Lloyd any idea what he was doing to my sanity? Just hearing his name
gave Henry Bastow permission to invade my brain, my sanctuary, my soul. Lloyd had summoned up the devil. My devil, anyway. Fingers fumbling at the buttons, I stopped the DVD. This time I needed help.
Fighting to get my breathing back under control, I found the strength to move. There was only one thing for it: I was going to have to find out what was going on through official channels.
It would take all my willpower to pull myself together, to stop my voice from giving me away over the phone. I had to put on a braver front than I felt was possible: I couldn’t know that Jake Lloyd’s interview contained the two words guaranteed to render me useless unless someone had leaked the contents to me. Selling Wingsy out to Nottingham was not an option. But being a sitting duck wasn’t an idea I relished either.
I called Catherine. I heard a male voice say, ‘Catherine’s phone. Ray Hopkinson speaking.’
‘Hello, Ray,’ I said, voice wobbling more than I’d have liked. ‘It’s Nina Foster. Is Catherine able to speak – or perhaps you can help me?’
After a very brief pause, Ray said, ‘I can’t see her. How are you?’
‘Oh, yeah, I’m fine,’ I lied. I hardly knew the man so I wasn’t going to elaborate. ‘I was just wondering what had happened with Jake Lloyd. I heard he was being released.’
‘Hang on,’ he said before I heard muffled speech as if he had put his hand over the mouthpiece. I could hear his voice and another very faint male voice, then the sound of the phone being handed over.
‘Nina, Eric Nottingham here. How are you?’
‘Hi, boss. I’m good, thanks. What about Jake Lloyd? Where is he?’ I asked.
‘Still here. He’s been charged with the murder of Scott Headingly. I’m sending Catherine over to see you and explain. Are you at home?’ asked Nottingham.
‘Yes, I am.’ I knew not to ask too many questions. But there was one thing I did need to know. ‘Sir…’ I paused, took a deep breath and, feeling someone walk over my grave, said, ‘Could you check on Bastow for me? Make sure he’s staying put?’
‘Nina, I checked yesterday. He’s not going anywhere,’ said Nottingham. I hung up without saying goodbye, which I hated doing, but my tears were waterlogging the mouthpiece.
While waiting for Catherine’s arrival, I called Stan. He was never out of my thoughts.
When he answered, ‘Hello, Nina, how are you?’ I choked back tears.
‘I’m OK, Stan,’ I said. ‘Think I’m coming down with a cold. That’s why I probably sound a bit funny. How are you feeling?’
‘Very well, and very optimistic. The doctors are pleased with my progress and I have some further check-ups in a few days. Samantha is here tonight and said she would stay to look after me for as long as she can. But frankly, Nina, she’s tired. Sorry to impose on you but any chance you could come and stay with me for a day or two? You don’t need to do anything. It would just make her feel better knowing that you’re here.’
‘Course I can, Stan. Glad to be able to help,’ I said. I didn’t want to be alone but I wouldn’t have dreamt of asking Stan if I could stay with him. Being asked to visit suited me just fine. ‘I can come over tomorrow if that fits with you. I have a couple of days off. I’ll be over some time after midday – I’ll call you to tell you exactly when.’
‘Thank you, Nina. I look forward to it,’ said Stan. ‘That cold of yours isn’t sounding too bad.’
Well, it wouldn’t now, would it? I’d stopped crying.