Simon’s appointment with Everlsey Bank was for ten-thirty so he had a light breakfast and left his mother’s house just before nine-thirty. Leaving after the rush hour would get him into town in plenty of time to go to the Registry Office to collect the death certificate then on to the bank.
He found a parking space a few doors down. The queue in the Registry Office was short so he was outside in less than twenty minutes.
Wearing smart jeans and a casual shirt, and clutching Jessica’s ‘bank’ files, he walked through the double electronic doors of Eversley Bank and headed for the reception desk. The young lady asked him to take a seat and said that Mr Frizzell wouldn’t be long. “Can I get you anything to drink, Mr Price?”
Simon looked at her name badge. “Just some water please, Carol.” He felt as if he’d had enough tea recently to the point of sloshing as he walked.
Carol smiled and disappeared into a back room. Simon sat in one of two reception chairs and picked up a ‘Banking Times’ magazine. He glanced at the contents but wasn’t paying attention and before he knew it, a tall figured loomed over him.
“Mr Price?” The man smiled sympathetically.
“Yes.”
“I’m John Frizzell. Would you like to follow me.”
Simon followed the manager into a side room and was directed to another seat.
The man sat behind the desk and tapped a few keys on the computer keyboard. He stabbed at the enter key with a flourish as if part of an amateur dramatics class. “I’m so sorry to hear about your sister. It was on the local news last night. Terrible, just terrible. I can’t imagine what you and your family must be going through.”
“Thank you, Mr Frizzell.”
“John, please. And you’re here to tie up your sister’s affairs.”
“Sort of. I’m waiting for probate, which I think I’ll be dealing with as Jessica listed me as next of kin. My mum’s… it’s best that I deal with this.”
“Of course. There are wheels that we can get in motion until probate comes through.”
Simon stared at a certificate on the wall behind John. ‘Wheels in motion’ seemed to be everyone’s favourite phrase in these circumstances.
“Mr Price?”
“Sorry. I wanted to ask you about these two accounts actually.”
“I must just ask you, before we proceed, if I can take a copy of the paperwork you will have been given. Data Protection Act and all that.”
Simon handed over the Death Certificate and other documents that the police had given him and Mr Frizzell left the room.
He returned a couple of minutes later with the glass of water Carol had gone in search of.
“Thank you,” Simon said as the glass was put in front of him.
John passed the original forms back to Simon who put them into one of the ‘bank’ files. He then pulled out the two latest statements and handed them to the manager.
“Ah yes. Her private and business accounts.”
“Business account? I thought she worked for someone else. A solicitor’s?”
“She did but the number two account was a business account, for her self-employment status.”
“Self-employed? Doing what, do you know?”
“I’m sorry I don’t. Because both accounts were registered in her name and her co-signature’s on the second, we don’t need to know and we didn’t ask.”
“Co-signature? Do you have the other name?”
“Certainly.” John scrolled the screen. “Alexis Starr. Double r.”
Both men paused. “You don’t look surprised,” the bank manager continued.
“I am, but I’m not. I’ve been hearing the name Alexis a lot over the last few hours but I don’t know who she is. Do you have a current address for her?”
“Let me have a look... Here we go. Yes, it’s the same as your sister’s.”
“I thought so.”
“But you don’t know who she is?”
“No. I never met her at Jess’ house. Do you know when she became a co-signature?”
“February last year, when the second account was set up. The first was set up in 1993…”
“When… Jessica started working?”
“That sounds about right, going by her date of birth.”
“And was this Alexis a co-signature on her first account?”
“No, just the second.”
“The business account.”
“Yes.”
“So, lodger or friend and business partner but not girlfriend.”
“Mr Price?”
“Sorry, thinking out loud. A partner of a few years would normally be on a private account as well as a business account, yes?”
“Not always but quite often, especially if they live together.”
“Mmm. Do you recall ever having met Alexis?”
“No, sorry, I don’t, but I can ask my colleagues.”
“If you don’t mind, that would be great.”
“Certainly. Leave it with me and I’ll see what I can find out for you.”
“Thanks very much.”
“And you’ll let me know when probate comes through then we can have a chat about what you and your parents want to do with the money? What sort of investments we can help them with?”
“There’s only my mum and I. My father died…”
“I’m sorry. I should have remembered. They had an account here.”
“It’s OK. You’re not expected to remember everyone.”
“No, but I do remember your sister.”
“You do?”
“Oh yes, she was the one who deposited most if not all of the money.”
“Really?”
“I saw her on numerous occasions. I often oversee large deposits.”
“And large withdrawals?”
“Always, except I don’t think there ever have been any from your sister’s account other than to buy her house. If there were they’ll show up on the statements you have there.”
Simon nodded and smiled.
“So, thank you again for calling in Mr Price and again, I’m so sorry about your sister. Please pass on our condolences to your mother and if there’s anything else we can…”
“Thank you. I’ll bear that in mind.”
Simon’s brain was a swirl as he drove to his sister’s. The main objective of the trip was to check the emails but he also wanted to do more digging, find out anything he could on Alexis Starr. Whatever Jess’ files, electronic or paper, Google or Yahoo had on her, he wanted to know the connection between them. Whatever it took, he’d find it.
###
Chapter 20: Simon
The house felt cold as Simon opened the front door to number fifty-one Berry Avenue. He wiggled his key out of the lock and pushed open the front door. The book still lay where he’d left it and the lounge door at the same angle, give or take a degree or two. He sighed. So, Alexis hadn’t turned up. Granted it had only been a few hours but he had hoped she would have had to return for some of her things even if it wasn’t to stay the night. And she would have moved the book, wouldn’t she?
Bolting up the stairs, missing every other step, he headed for the main bedroom and looked in the middle and right cupboards first but everything was where it had been the day before. He opened the right wardrobe, hoping that although they were Jessica’s clothes, Alexis may have preferred something more... ordinary. But again, nothing had moved.
Heading to the back bedroom, he leant down to the skirting wall sockets and flicked on both switches. After typing in the password, Simon let the computer do its stuff while he switched the heating to constant and returned downstairs to put on the kettle. He looked in the fridge for something to eat and made a mental note to check the sell-by dates. Jess had always been fussier than him, and he’d tease her for chucking stuff out the day after the ‘use by’ but she was of the ‘it’s there for a reason’ camp and he supposed it made sense.
Adding milk and sugar to his tea, he threw the spoon into the washing up bowl and
made another mental note to do the washing up before he left. The kitchen had been spotless when he’d first arrived but the empty cups and plates he’d created from the tea and sandwiches now made an ugly pile in the sink. That was another thing they’d differed on. He’d throw everything in the bowl whereas she’d neatly stack on the right draining board. “What’s the point of having two draining boards if you don’t use them,” she’d said, “and if you shove everything in the bowl you’ve only then got to take them all out again when you want to fill it with clean water.” The directions of toilet rolls were another bone of contention; he was an in-facer, whereas hers had to face out. “You can’t get to them properly if they’re clung against the wall. If they face out there is plenty of space to grab the end.” He couldn’t argue with that logic but guessed that some siblings had to be different; like a PC and Mac – they were born that way. She’d stopped short of hotel bedroom-style folding the end corners of the toilet rolls in, but then nothing would have surprised Simon. He’d never been to her office but imagined her impeccably neat desk with drawers of pens and pencils, filed in rows liked soldiers on parade.
He turned on both taps and squirted in some washing up liquid, then topped the bowl up with the remainder of the boiled water and dumped the cups, plates and cutlery in being careful to not let any of the suds spill over the top. As he did this he stared out the window and looked around the back garden. It was the exception to the rule. Whilst Jessica’s house was almost spotless, the garden was definitely a work-in-progress. It looked like there had been a plan but it had been done in stages and each stage appeared to have been interrupted. It didn’t matter. Simon saw little point in doing anything to it, especially at this time of year, when whoever bought the house would… what was the saying?… put their own stamp on it. The shed would have to be sorted but unless there was anything he or his mum wanted, the new owners could have whatever was in there as far as he was concerned.
With the washing up done and left to drain, Simon returned upstairs. He pulled out the study chair and slumped down. Pulling it forward with his feet until the wheels hit the footrest, he made himself comfortable.
There were five replies; all from friends but none knew of anyone called Alexis. It occurred to Simon that if the two girls lived together then it was likely that they shared the computer. He typed ‘Alexis’ in the Finder search bar and waited for a moment before ‘0 items’ appeared at the bottom of the screen. That didn’t make sense. She must have used the computer for something, called documents or files by her name or written some kind of correspondence from that address. Jess surely would have photos on there of the two of them. Simon flicked over to the ‘Mail’ system and did the same search but frowned at the same result.
He decided that the next route was the internet so double-clicked on the Safari ‘compass’ and waited for the preset home pages to appear.
He typed ‘Alexis Starr’ into Google and clicked on the magnifying glass icon. In a mere 0.23 seconds, the screen revealed over twelve million results; the first page showing just ten of them.
The first link was to Alexis’ MySpace page. “Yes!” Simon clenched his fist and punched the air. “Unusual name, this must be her.” He smiled as he clicked on the first link but then read on.
“Bugger. Female, eighteen years old, Strong Island NY / Peacham, Vermont, United States. There must be others.” He clicked the back arrow, returning him to the results page.
“Alexis Starr’s professional profile… excellent. We already know she’s a business woman. She this must be… oh. Sales Manager, IBM, Stevenage. Mmm… could be. Stevenage isn’t that far away. She’s a manager for a large international company so she could be working away.” That would have explained the fancy clothes thought she couldn’t imagine sequins and leather in a client meeting. Simon smiled. Actually, yes, he could imagine… He shook his head. “Get to the point, Simon.” There was no photograph on the page but there was a bright orange ‘view full profile’ button so Simon clicked on that. He was greeted with a log-in screen so decided to go to the other search engine links before going through the process of setting up an account, if he needed to be that thorough.
The third link was for an American actress who again was unlikely but a possibility so Simon clicked on the blue underlined text. “Maybe, maybe not.” An American actress, yes, but in porn movies. That would explain the outfits but Simon had a feeling that ‘his’ Alexis was English. He worked his way down the links and was getting nowhere fast. Despite the unusual name, there were lots of needles in this proverbial haystack and he’d gone from seriously underwhelmed to overloaded so decided he’d give the bank another go. Being the only solid lead on Alexis’ connection with his sister, he called the Eversley Bank and asked for John Frizzell. Tucked the cordless handset under his chin, he closed his eyes while serenaded by what sounded like Chopin.
It occurred to him while he was on hold that he’d not told the phone company about the situation, their details hadn’t been in the utilities folder, but it saved his mobile bill if he made calls from the landline, plus he’d need to use it for the broadband so he decided to leave them ’til last.
“Hello?” a voice said, interrupting a particularly mellow piano solo. “Mr Price?”
Simon’s eyes sprung open and he grabbed the handset.
“Sorry, hi. Is that Mr Frizzell?”
“Yes, Mr Price. What can I help you with?”
“I wondered if you’d found anything out about Jessica’s business partner, Alexis Starr.”
“Yes and no, Mr Price.”
“Simon, please.”
“OK, Simon. Our records show that Jessica opened the account in February last year.”
“Yes.”
“In both the names of herself and Alexis Starr.”
“Yes…” Simon frowned, learning nothing new.
“They both had to sign the initial paperwork.”
“Yes…” Simon put his right hand out sideways then rotated it as if to hurry the man up. It failed to do the trick.
“Which your sister did.”
“OK.”
“When she set up the account.”
Simon remained silent.
“And Alexis…”
Hoorah! Simon thought.
“…signed a couple of weeks later. The dates are thirteen days apart.”
“So someone saw her.”
“Y…es.”
“So they can tell me what she looks like.”
“Erm, no.”
“I’m sorry, I don’t understand.”
“The paperwork was administered by a colleague who left a couple of months later. So I’m afraid that’s a dead end.”
Dead loss, more like. Simon smiled an air stewardess’ grin at the phone and thanked the manager, who offered to be a call away if he needed anything else.
Simon chewed his left thumbnail as he frowned at the screen. He’d been doing a lot of frowning but he guessed it was better than bawling his eyes out. This had almost become a game and he was like a dog with a bone when there were loose ends to be tied and it seemed that in Jessica’s life, there were plenty of those.
###
Chapter 21: Beth and Nate
A loud moaning within inches of her left ear greeted Beth as she woke the next morning. Rolling over to face her husband, she normally found him attractive but he’d slobbered in his sleep and had bedding imprints in his cheeks. With a sudden urge to vomit, she threw back the duvet and raced to the bathroom. Unsure as to whether it was the baby or Nate that was making her feel sick, her mind wandered back to the mobile phone in his jacket pocket. Switching off the bathroom light, she looked in at the sleeping figure in the bedroom before heading down the stairs.
The names and numbers of the last two callers were stored in Beth’s own mobile so she wasn’t sure what else she needed to do until she saw the flashing yellow envelope.
“Of course, text messages.” This one had come from Veronica so Beth unlock
ed the key lock and pressed the ‘view’ button. Would whoever now owns this phone, please ring me. I’ve been trying to get hold of Alexis and am getting worried. It’s not like her. If you know her or where she is, please ring.
Veronica wasn’t the only one getting worried. This no longer seemed to be a simple case of a previous owner trading it in for a newer model, not that she’d believed Nate’s story anyway. She’d hoped…
She heard a snort from upstairs and froze. Snoring resumed and she went into the phone’s inbox. There were as few messages as there were contacts, and all but one were from Veronica. The second one was from Daniel; an irate message asking her what had happened and why had she done what she’d done.
“Did you dump him, Alexis?” Beth smiled. She’d remembered the two names when Simon had rung because of TV characters. Jessica Rabbit and Alexis… 1980s, big shoulder pads, Dynasty. Alexis Carrington. Played by… the blonde, now silver-haired woman who’d been on one of those Celebrity Big Brothers? No, Masterchef. Hell’s Kitchen. She shook her head.
“Linda Evans,” she whispered under her breath, “married the older chap, Blake. But then who did Joan Collins play? Krystal. Linda Evans was Krystal, Blake’s wife. So if Joan Collins was Alexis, which Carrington did she marry? And wasn’t she a Colby?” She tapped the back of the mobile against her upper lip. No, the Colbys were after Dynasty so Alexis was a Carrington, but whose?
As Beth tried working out the Carrington / Colby family trees, she heard a creaking floorboard overhead and the slam of the bathroom door.
“Shit.” She put both mobiles side by side and typed Daniel’s number into her own. She quickly read Veronica’s other messages, and returned the phone to its main screen. She heard whistling from overhead: ‘Valerie’, Nate’s favourite song of the moment, especially the Zutons’ cover. More versions than Gershwin’s Summertime, she’d ribbed him.
She heard the toilet flush, so marched out to the hall and stuffed Nate’s mobile back into his jacket pocket. She was still at the bottom of the stairs when the bathroom door opened. She swung round to face the top. “Honey?”
After Jessica: A mystery novella Page 6