A Face in the Crowd: An absolutely unputdownable psychological thriller

by Kerry Wilkinson

  ‘You’re lying.’ Her words say one thing but the tone says something else. She knows it’s not beyond the realms of something that could have happened.

  ‘He asked if I wanted to pop upstairs.’

  ‘You’re a filthy liar.’

  ‘I’m not. Why would I lie? He’d only been out of prison for a few weeks after whacking that bloke with a bat.’

  It’s true. All of it.

  Melanie doesn’t move, but her voice is a slithering snake’s: ‘He was provoked.’

  ‘Because smashing someone with a bat from behind is always the way to deal with a problem…’

  We stand apart, in more ways than one. I’ve never told her this before, never told anyone about Alex trying it on with me. Ben had an important week with work and I didn’t want to interrupt that with tales about his brother groping me. I was also worried that he might not believe it.

  After the crash, when it was revealed that Alex was among the dead, there seemed no reason to mention it, plus who was I going to tell? Things feel different now. I’ve never had that much animosity towards Melanie before, but I can’t escape the sense that I’ve missed something. Her jacket was in the flat opposite mine. The one from which music has been taunting me. I don’t believe her that it was stolen.

  ‘Go,’ Melanie says. Her voice is a low growl. ‘Go, or I’ll call the police.’

  I move towards the front door but turn back to where Melanie hasn’t moved from the dimness of the kitchen. This is what I’ve been waiting five years to say.

  ‘You can’t keep blaming me for what happened,’ I say, ‘I wanted to marry Ben. I wanted the house and all that – but I had a job, too. I thought we both wanted the same thing. I never forced him to go on trips and, even if I had, I didn’t know he was spending our savings to fund it all. He stole everything I had. He lied to me and he lied to you. We both have that in common.’

  I can barely see Melanie among the shadow, but her outline slumps to the side as she rests on the counter behind. She says nothing. I know she’ll never concede this point, even though she knows it is true. She tells herself I killed Ben because I pushed him to buy me nice things. She told me I killed Alex because Ben roped him into whatever get-rich-quick scheme they had going on.

  ‘Just go,’ she says.

  ‘If you didn’t leave your coat in my building, then who did?’

  I’m not expecting an answer and Melanie sighs wearily. ‘Go.’

  So I do.

  It’s only as I’m out the door, down the path, and halfway back to the bus stop that I remember what she said in the kitchen. You already killed my son.

  In the days and weeks after the crash, she would rage at me regularly at how I was responsible for killing her boys.

  Boys. Plural. Suddenly, now, only ‘son’.

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Billy’s ears prick as a firework booms into the night sky. There are still two days until Bonfire Night but nobody seems to care. Bluey-green sprinkles of light seep through my blinds, even though they’re closed. It truly is the time of year when all the knobheads come out. All sorts of weapons are rightfully banned in the UK – but tubes filled with gunpowder? Go for it, mate.

  The fact Billy is reacting to the fireworks is something, though. He’s alert, awake and wanting assurance. He’s eaten a little more food and didn’t mind his second dose of medicine. He was awake when I got home from Melanie’s and the turnaround is incredible.

  I’m comforting him as much as he’s comforting me. There was something about the photo of Ben and Alex that stuck with me in a way I cannot explain. The completeness of Ben’s arm tattoo means it would have had to be taken close to the crash – and the brothers looked so similar. Perhaps they always had and I’d somehow missed it? It’s hard to know.

  For some reason, I picture the wolf that Tyler pointed out when we were trick or treating. There was a moment, in the murk, when the costumed head was down, in which I saw Ben. It was the light, I’m sure, and yet Alex was five years younger than his brother. Five years have passed.

  And then poor Harry was bashed in the back of the head by someone in the exact kind of attack for which Alex went to prison.

  You’ve already killed my son.

  Singular.

  I blink away the thoughts and keep Billy close as I fill in yet more information for the job agency. While I’m doing that, I refresh my email over and over, waiting to see if the person who put up the posters has contacted me. There’s nothing but marketing. There never is. Dare to buy something small from a company once and they email three times a week for the rest of eternity.

  The agency’s questionnaire asks about, essentially, everything I’ve ever done since being conceived. I’m busy trying to remember what job I was doing eleven years ago when a new email alert pings.

  Can we meet?

  That’s all it says. I reload the page in case it hasn’t loaded properly but there are only three words. I think about leaving it there. Whoever this is doesn’t know me and he or she had a chance to reply properly. Instead, this is what was sent.

  I close the page and return to the questionnaire – except that I cannot concentrate. It still feels as if this is a test of who I am. Honest or not? Someone who takes responsibility for their actions, or a person who runs from them?

  It takes me a few attempts to figure out how to reply.

  What did you lose?

  The response fires back after barely a minute:

  I think you know. Can we meet?

  It feels as if someone has breathed into my ear. My entire body shivers. If I was in any doubt that this person is talking about the money, then that’s now gone. I think you know. It reads like a threat.

  I only noticed the posters after finding the guy in the green jacket covered in sew-on badges outside the building. It could have been him who put them up. I wonder if whoever it is can now trace me via the IP address on my email. I’ve heard of doxing and that sort of thing. Perhaps the posters were a trap and I fell into it…?

  Despite that, I still can’t escape the sense that this isn’t who I want to be. I was an honest person. I am an honest person.

  I can’t leave my flat tonight. What did you lose?

  I read the email back before sending and then realise my mistake.

  I can’t leave home tonight. What did you lose? If you don’t tell me, I will not reply.

  The new version feels a bit punchier. I do hold the cards, after all. Or, to be more precise, I hold the money. No point in letting him or her know that I live in a flat, either.

  The previous reply came after a minute, but nothing fires back this time. I refresh over and over until fifteen minutes have passed. After that, I manage to finish the agency questionnaire and then, for the first time in what feels like weeks, I go to the Open University website. With Billy at my side, things feel clearer and I finally get a little work done. No sooner am I on a roll, however, than my phone starts to ring. It’s an 07 mobile number that I don’t recognise. It’s dark outside, close to nine o’clock. It’s rare that anyone calls me at all, let alone at this time.

  ‘Hello…?’

  A tentative-sounding man’s voice replies. ‘Uh… we spoke the other day,’ he says.

  ‘Sorry, who is this?’

  ‘I’m from the bus company. You called about CCTV footage…?’

  In everything that’s happened, I’d forgotten about my moment of madness where I pretended I was some love-struck woman searching for a mystery man on the bus.

  He continues talking. ‘Sorry for the delay, but I’ve, um, got them.’

  ‘Got what?’

  ‘The stills from your bus. There are about fifty. I didn’t know who you were or what I was looking for. There were loads of people standing, so I grabbed the lot. You can have them all and figure out who you’re after.’

  He speaks quickly, one word blending into the next in a wave of nervous spluttering. I’m not sure if I picked up on it the other day but
he sounds young. He has one of those voices that has definitely broken but still lurches an octave or two on the odd word.

  ‘Can you email them to me?’ I ask, partly because my email is open in front of me.

  ‘I’ve already printed them,’ he says. ‘It’s cash only.’

  He stumbles over ‘cash’ and there’s a part of me that feels sorry for him. I can imagine some kid straight out of school hovering around a printer while checking over his shoulder in case a supervisor comes by.

  ‘Hundred quid,’ he says.

  ‘Um…’

  ‘Okay, seventy,’ he adds quickly, already talking his own price down. He’s got the negotiating skills and business brain of someone whose last name is Trump.

  ‘When do you want to meet?’ I ask.

  ‘Now?’

  I almost say yes – but am reluctant to be out in the dark. ‘It’s a bit late.’

  ‘I’ve got work in the morning.’

  He sounds so pathetic that I almost laugh. I glance across to Billy, who raises his head as if anticipating what’s about to happen.

  ‘I’ll have to bring my dog,’ I say.

  There’s a sigh from the other end: ‘Fine.’

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  ‘I’m so sorry, Bill.’

  Billy is decked out in his winter coat and booties that protect his paws from the salt they put on the pavements when the frost comes. He’s walking slowly and stopping every time another firework goes off. I figured being with him outside with the fireworks was better than leaving him inside by himself. After the scare at the vet’s, I’m not sure I want to leave him anyway.

  The guy from the bus company must live close because he suggested the park that’s nearest to where I live. I walk to the gates where I confronted the man with the green jacket covered in sew-on badges. It seems like days ago, but it was only this morning. So much has happened. It’s only when I get there that I realise the gates might be shut. There’s a sign about the park closing at sunset each day – but, though the gates are closed, there’s no lock. They open with a loud creak and I hurry inside, pulling them behind me.

  This park is part of Billy’s regular walking route and he seems to recognise it, tugging on his lead to go in one direction as I head in the other.

  ‘Come on, Bill,’ I hiss and he does as he’s told, following at my side.

  I agreed to meet here without really thinking about it. It was close, so I thought it would be simple – but I now realise how vulnerable I am. It’s dark and there are no street lamps. The only permanent light comes from the moon attempting to glimmer through the low cloud. There’s temporary illumination too. Sulphur hangs in the air and another rocket whizzes up over the trees on the far side of the park. There’s a bang and pink sparks fly in all directions. Poor Billy stops walking and I have to crouch at his side to persuade him to continue.

  The ‘bench near the fountain’ that my mystery man mentioned is a quarter way around the path that loops the park. There’s no one around when I get there, although Billy does pull ahead to lap the water at the bottom of the fountain. I let him at first – and then remember what the vet said about him possibly ingesting something harmful, so pull him away.

  Another firework fizzes and bangs from the same direction as the previous one. There’s a second or two in which the entire park is illuminated and then, as quickly as the light came, it’s gone. As far as I can tell, there’s nobody here but me.

  I do a lap of the fountain and then arrive back at the bench. The shadows feel darker and deeper than they did moments before. I’m not sure what else to do, so I sit. Billy takes this as a cue and plops himself on my feet. The cold wood of the bench is like needles through my jeans.

  ‘Sorry, Bill,’ I whisper. It’s cold enough that I can see my own breath.

  I check my watch. The person on the phone said ten but it’s already five past.

  I almost jump off the bench when my phone buzzes with a text. It’s Harry, telling me he’s slept most of the day. He’s attached a selfie of him with the bandage stretched diagonally across his head. ‘What do you think of my war wound?’ he asks, along with a smiley face and thumbs-up emoji. I think about replying but do nothing for the time being. I’ve already led him on with the kiss and don’t want to make it worse.

  Another firework bursts from the beyond the trees and then, as if from nowhere, someone in a hoody is barely steps away. The person’s head is down, hands in pockets. Billy hasn’t moved and I yelp in alarm. This stops the hoody on the spot. I have to wriggle my feet out from underneath Billy’s body so I can stand.

  ‘Have you got the money?’ the hoody asks. If anything, he sounds even younger in person. His voice trembles as his breath spirals into the air.

  ‘Have you got the photos?’

  He reaches into his top and pulls out an envelope. ‘Money first,’ he says – and I’m as sure as I can be that he’s seen this in a film at some point.

  I take three twenties and a ten from my pocket – more of the money that isn’t mine – and hold it towards him. He stretches for the cash with one hand while slowly offering the envelope with his other. It’s laughable, really. As if it’s a cartoon Cold War and we’re completing some sort of illicit handover. I suppose we are in a park after dark.

  He takes the money and I end up with the envelope – but, when that’s done, neither of us quite knows what to do next. It’s more shy than spy.

  The hoody bobs on the spot and puts his hands in his pockets. ‘Right, see ya then,’ he says. The stuttering nerves have gone now he has the money and he’s talking as if we’re mates who’ll catch up again in a few hours.

  ‘Bye,’ I reply, and then he turns and dashes off towards the gates.

  I unstick the envelope and pull out a stack of paper, though it’s too dark to make out anything more than vague shapes on the pages. I tell Billy it’s time to go and then we follow after the hoody. By the time we’re through the gates and onto the pavement, the road is clear. It’s a short walk back to Hamilton House and then, when we get into the flat, Billy saunters off to his bed, while I sit on the sofa.

  The contents of the envelope are seemingly as promised. Images from a bus security camera have been printed on regular paper. They’re grainy and monochrome and, initially, I’m sure they’re from the wrong bus. I can’t find myself in any of the first dozen pictures – but then I realise it’s because I’m hidden by Mr Stinky. Once I identify him with his raised arm and phone in the other hand, I see myself slotted in behind. It’s like a Where’s Wally? puzzle.

  The bus is even more packed than I’d realised at the time. The me from the past is looking down in every image, a complete irrelevance. When I was in the middle of it, the crowd felt hostile and overbearing. From the images, there’s more of a friendliness. Many people are talking and smiling. Of everyone featured, it feels like it’s only me who is disengaged.

  Each image is time-stamped in roughly thirty-second intervals. I can see the moment after the bus had stopped and everyone moved around. The woman who was bleating about foreigners appears and, in the next shot, Mr Stinky has his arm down.

  There’s a claustrophobia that’s hard to avoid even by looking at the pictures. One after another, there are limbs wrapped around limbs. People packed far too tightly for it to ever be safe.

  I keep working through the stack until I reach the one in which I’m moving towards the front, trying to get off. I’m there in one; gone in the next. By that point, the envelope of money was already in my bag.

  Unsure of what I’m looking for, I go back to the beginning. It’s like a badly made flickbook of jumping images. People’s heads jerk wildly, limbs flap uncontrollably… and then I see it. A face I recognise belonging to a person standing directly behind me. A face that, surely, shouldn’t be there.

  I’m looking at the floor, oblivious to who and what is around me – while, at the same time, there is a person so close I could’ve touched him.

  Harry
.

  Chapter Thirty

  Thursday

  One of the most common pieces of advice people give, or get, is to ‘sleep on it’. It’s often followed up with something like, ‘It’ll seem different in the morning’, or ‘It’ll feel better in daylight’. None of that makes it clear what to do if sleep proves near impossible because of the situation, or if things seem exactly the same by sunrise.

  I sleep in short bursts but constantly jump awake, thinking Harry is standing at the side of the bed. It’s as if his presence edges across me and then I’m alert.

  At the time the CCTV still was taken, we had been messaging back and forth on the dating app for a couple of weeks. We had swapped photos but didn’t meet for real until we were in The Garden Café a little more than twenty-four hours later. I can’t quite get my head around the images. Harry is in seven consecutive photos, but I can’t work out if he’s already on the bus and works his way forward through the mass, or if he gets on at one of the stops. There are only two pictures in which it’s clearly him. One with a sideways profile; the other where he’s glancing up towards the camera and it’s a full front-on image. In the other five, he’s either looking down or turning away. There’s an umbrella in his hand, but he’s wearing jeans and jacket, like the other times I’ve seen him. In all of the seven images, I don’t look up once. I’m paying no attention to anyone around me.

  When Harry and I first saw one another at The Garden Café, I remember seeing something in his eyes that I thought was a hint of recognition. I didn’t know him, but I considered if he knew me.

  I wonder if, perhaps, Harry takes the same bus as me regularly and, for whatever reason, I’ve never noticed him. It could be possible.

  I scan through the faces of everyone else in the images and recognise perhaps one person – even though I took the same bus at the same time every day I was at work. That could be it, of course. I had a routine that was easy to follow if somebody wanted.