‘You understand how we feel about people outside the community, don’t you, India? You know they are not to be trusted. You know their values are misguided, that they’ll tempt you into a life of sin. You’ll be suffocated by the negative emotions that you’ve learned to overcome. So why did you do it?’
‘I like him.’ It was an honest answer, and lies wouldn’t help me now.
‘How much?’ one of the men in the room asked, and I knew what he was saying.
‘I like him,’ I repeated.
One by one the people in the room bombarded me with questions – how I’d met him, what I’d said to him, what he’d asked about our lives – every question loaded with animosity because I had broken the rules. And each of them designed to please Aram.
‘Did you allow him to touch you?’ Aram finally asked.
I tried my best to hold my head high, even though I was dying inside with shame. ‘Yes,’ I whispered.
‘Tell us exactly what you allowed him to do to you.’
I twisted my head towards where he was sitting to one side. ‘What do you mean?’
‘You know what I mean, India. I want you to describe everything he did, from the first touch to the last.’
My legs started to shake. I knew what he was doing. This was ritual humiliation, and it would get worse. I was feeling light-headed with the strain. ‘We didn’t make love.’
‘I don’t know why you would use that phrase. You’re talking about sex. It’s copulation. It’s pleasure. Love is an excuse, not a reality. But that’s not the question I asked. You must describe, step by step, his assault on your body, and yours on his.’
Many times over the years I had been forced to stand in this room, made to feel demeaned, penitent, guilty, but never had I felt so ashamed of my actions. My voice cracked as I spoke.
‘He touched my hand, and I wrapped my fingers round his. He led me into a field. We hadn’t kissed when I saw him before, but this time we did. We lay down on the grass.’
I said no more.
‘And then?’ Aram asked.
‘We kissed again.’
‘Where were his hands, India? Where were yours? Where was his tongue? I asked you to be specific. You need to see our disgust, and we need to feel your shame.’
I gulped, and the tears began to flow. I was eighteen, a virgin. I’d never even been kissed before, and now I had to recount details of the most exciting thing that had ever happened to me in front of all the people who mattered, and feel their contempt.
‘He put his tongue in my mouth. I had my hands on his hips. We lay on our sides facing each other, our bodies aligned against each other. I put my hands behind him to draw him closer. His hand slipped inside my T-shirt.’ My voice was barely audible. ‘He touched my breast.’
I fell silent, apart from the gulps between sobs.
‘And then?’
‘Nothing! I promise you, that was all. He stopped. He said we have plenty of time – the whole of the summer before he goes to university. He was kind to me.’
‘Would you have liked more?’
My head was spinning, but I shook it vigorously, unable to look at Aram because he would know I was lying.
‘Are you going to see him again?’
‘No! Of course not. I made a mistake, and I’m so sorry.’
I could feel the tension in the room, everyone wondering what would happen next. But I think I knew before Aram said anything.
‘I’m glad you’ve come to that conclusion yourself, India. Because there will be no further opportunities. Your shoes have already been removed from your room, and the car will no longer be available to you.’
I stared at him in horror.
He turned to the rest of the room. ‘Leave us, please. I need to speak with India.’
No one demurred; they all got up and quietly left the room. Dad seemed to hesitate, but only for a second, and I was left standing, head bowed, tears still dripping onto the floor.
‘I’m disappointed in you, India.’
‘I know,’ I whispered.
‘But I’m not surprised.’
I lifted my head and looked at him. What did he mean?
‘Finally, I think you’re ready. Come with me.’
He stood and held out his hand, and I didn’t hesitate to grasp it. He led me through the door and up the stairs to his rooms. Only the chosen few ever went in there, and despite being one of those closest to him, I only ever went to the outer room – the one he called his study. This was his private area. His sitting room and his bedroom.
He led me straight through and stood by the bed.
‘I’ve been waiting, India, but now it’s time. Your body is telling you that you’re ready to be a woman. I’m your teacher, India, and it’s my job to show you what being a woman means.’
His eyes held me mesmerised, and as I looked into them a dizziness washed over me. I didn’t know if this was what I wanted, but it never occurred to me to refuse.
46
Becky was getting frustrated. All the evidence pointed to Martha Porter, and yet Tom seemed ambivalent. He said it was too neat. She flicked the switch on the kettle, deciding that the routine task of making tea would dull her brain for a moment and give it a chance to rest. She pulled a teabag out of the box, staring sightlessly at the kettle as it slowly came to the boil.
The people they had spoken to about Martha – from her landlord to the childminder and the staff at the office – agreed that while she didn’t volunteer information about herself and was evasive if asked personal questions, she was quiet, organised, efficient. Nobody had ever seen her display anger or any form of unpleasantness towards others – except Elise, whom she simply ignored as far as possible. She was, more than anything, polite. Predictably, Elise said Martha was just plain weird.
Instead of trying to understand their main suspect, maybe if they knew more about Genevieve it might help them to figure out why someone would have wanted her dead. Becky decided to finish making her tea, then call Sara Osborne.
As she wandered back through the incident room, Rob bounced in. He gave her a grin and scooted over to her.
‘Well, the bike was a bit of a turn-up, wasn’t it?’ he said, obviously delighted with his find.
Becky knew she would have to put a slight dent in his enthusiasm by repeating what Tom had said.
‘Despite that,’ she said when she saw the disappointment in the sergeant’s eyes, ‘the bike could yet prove decisive. Let’s see what comes back from forensics. It does at least make it all feasible. It always seemed a bit of a long shot that she walked.’
Becky told him about her visit to Eddie Carlson and that it seemed Genevieve had tried to get in touch with him.
‘Can you call her friends again, Rob? Maybe try those you thought the least phoney to see if they know of any reason why she might have wanted to see Eddie. I’ll call Sara Osborne – see if she can help. And then I think the boss has the lovely job of going to ask Niall Strachan exactly the same question.’
Rob pulled a face. ‘I always feel for people who lose a loved one only to find out all the dirty secrets that should have died with them. Someone my mum knows lost her husband of thirty years, only to discover that for twenty of them he’d had a mistress. He actually died in her bed. No bloody idea how someone deals with that sort of crap.’
Rob wandered off a good deal less exuberant than when he’d come in, and Becky picked up the phone.
‘Becky!’ Tom’s voice interrupted her thoughts as she finished her call to Sara Osborne.
‘What’s up?’
‘Come on – you’re with me.’
Becky didn’t question him, just grabbed her light summer jacket, her keys and her bag and followed him as he hurried from the incident room.
‘What’s going on?’ she asked as they both ran down the stairs, Tom too impatient to wait for the lift.
‘I think we’re being too soft on Niall Strachan. I’ve had a call from someone in the XO-Tech o
ffice – a man called Danny West. Please don’t say “I told you so”, but his reading of the situation with Martha is very different to the one we’ve heard. He’s backing up what the other woman in the office – Caroline, I think she was called – told us. He’s also convinced that Martha wouldn’t have had anything to do with Niall. He didn’t want to say so in front of the others, because he said it’s hard enough being the only bloke in the sales and marketing office without stirring things up by disagreeing openly with bloody Elise, who would have made his life hell. He says it’s like being in a gang with one ultimate leader. Disagree with her, and everyone has to turn against you for their own safety. Metaphorically speaking, I presume.’
‘I wouldn’t want to work with her, that’s for sure. But we saw the emails Martha sent. There was nothing misleading about those, was there?’
‘The content suggested that she was obsessed with Niall, but they came from her Gmail account, not her office account. I’ve asked the tech team to take another look, and they’ve confirmed what Ted told you – there’s nothing in Martha’s browser history to suggest that she accessed Gmail from her computer, although the emails were buried deep in her temporary Internet files. As Ted says, “it’s a weird one”, especially as the IP address shows the email originated in XO-Tech’s offices.’
‘Are you thinking someone else could have set up this email address?’ Becky asked.
By now they had reached Tom’s car. He jumped into the driving seat. ‘Of course! I could set up a Gmail account in a version of your name, if I wanted to. All they had to do was wait until Martha logged on to her computer and left the room – I don’t know, to go to the bathroom or whatever – then send an email, wipe Gmail from the browser history, and that’s it! What I’m saying is, we can’t assume it was definitely Martha. I’m not saying it wasn’t either. I’m just not prepared to close my mind to other possibilities.’
Becky was silent for a moment.
‘Bloody Elise!’ she said as she spun round to face Tom. ‘I wouldn’t put it past her, you know – to stir up trouble. I wonder if she’s got a bit of a thing about Niall herself? She said she’d been to the house with some papers for him, and according to one of the girls Niall invited her in for a drink as it was late afternoon. She went on and on about the inside of the house, until the one guy in that office – Danny, I presume – risked his life by telling her to shut up.’
‘It’s an interesting idea. Would she be that devious? I don’t know why I’m asking that; people never fail to surprise me with what they’re capable of – good and bad.’
‘Here’s a wild theory. What if Elise has fallen for Niall but thinks he’s got a thing about Martha? What better way of getting rid of both of her competitors than to kill off his wife and make her greatest rival the prime suspect?’
‘I know they say truth is stranger than fiction, Becky, but can you honestly believe she’s clever enough? I guess we’d better see what Mr Strachan has to say.’
47
MARTHA
The police are getting closer. I can feel it. By now they will know everything there is to know about Martha Porter, and that isn’t much. Because of Alfie, they will look harder, worried that a child is missing and with someone they suspect of murder.
I would never hurt Alfie, but they don’t know that.
I can’t make him sleep in the car for another night. I know children are resilient, but so much has changed for him in the past couple of days. He must be confused. Our lives have always been very ordered – Alfie goes to school every day or to the childminder in the holidays, and I go to work. Always at the same time. I pick him up at the same time, and we go home. We watch TV for an hour, have something to eat, read or play a game, and then it’s bed. It’s not exciting, but it’s safe – and one thing I have wanted since the day I knew about Alfie was to keep him safe. There’s no way I can rectify all of my mistakes, but there are things I can do to ensure my son has as normal a life as possible. The thought of what that entails makes me shiver.
For now, I’m going to concentrate on giving Alfie the best day I can, so I drive back to the seaside and I check into a small bed and breakfast. The sun has broken through the heavy cloud, and after we’ve dumped our few clothes in the room, we walk down to the beach, his hand in mine. He’s excited about everything he sees, and we find a shop so I can get him a bucket and spade. He’s never played in the sand before, not the real sand of a beach. I don’t have any swimming trunks for him, but it doesn’t matter. He can paddle for now. I have never taught him to swim – the thought of all those sociable mums inviting me to meet for coffee and maybe asking Alfie to their children’s parties was more than I could cope with. It’s one thing to avoid telling work colleagues the story of my life; it’s another to refuse to divulge anything to people who are trying to be friendly.
I don’t allow myself to make friends. Not since Leah – the only friend I’ve ever had. When she came to Lakeside she helped me see the world beyond its walls. I try not to think of her now. When memories hit me of those days spent listening to her as she told me how life could really be for someone of my age, I thrust them aside. But her name pops into my head when I’m least expecting it.
Leah. Leah.
Thinking of her is too painful, and I try to shut out the reminders, but they keep coming. Since I lost Leah I have stuck to one aspect of Aram’s teaching – never trust anyone; never divulge unnecessary information; never ask questions of others.
With Leah it had been different. She arrived in my life at a time when I needed someone, when I felt isolated from everyone around me. But her friendship with me was her ultimate downfall.
48
LAKESIDE
My mother’s relationship with me had been distant for years, but the day after Aram took my virginity I passed her in the corridor and she gave me a look of pure contempt. Over the following weeks I became an almost permanent fixture in his bed, and I realised I had taken the thing she wanted most in the world. The sad part was that I didn’t value it.
Alice had been asked to leave, and finally I understood why she despised me. She must have seen this coming, and as she left she accused me of plotting all along to steal Aram. It had never entered my head.
Aram was right about my body, though. It was ready, and it responded as a car responds when a foot is pressed to the accelerator. But my mind and soul remained detached. For months any thoughts I had about what was happening as he touched me were with the boy in the field, the boy who had talked about university life in Sheffield – the bars, the lectures, the cinema. He’d laughed when I told him I had only been to the cinema once, when I was eight. It was a very special treat back then, and now, of course, it wasn’t an option. There was nothing scathing about his laughter. He thought I was sweet and innocent, and that’s why he never pushed me. He also thought I was beautiful and wanted me to travel to Sheffield to see him when he went back there, so he could show me what life could be like. It was his body I yearned to lie next to mine at night, his young, free soul that I wanted to learn from, and I ached to understand how life might be in his world.
Despite those thoughts, the nights Aram chose someone else to join him in his bed were painful. I felt rejected, dismissed, as if I had failed to please him. I think he did it to punish me, but we never talked about it. It made me try all the harder to be everything he wanted me to be, and yet he must have known my heart wasn’t with him, even though my body was.
Over the next couple of years life settled into a rhythm that seemed effortless because of its predictability. Gradually my longing for the boy disappeared, but I still had dreams of one day finding someone like him, someone I could love without fear. I still wasn’t trusted to go out in the car, and Aram was right to have no confidence in me. There was something growing inside me – a desire to see beyond the river, the lake and the nearby village, to venture into uncharted territories, experiences and emotions – and he could sense it, as he could sense my every
thought. But he didn’t like it. He couldn’t understand how a part of me remained aloof from him, and it tormented him. I did nothing to disturb the status quo, and slowly the feelings of restlessness were carefully filed away in a box labelled impossible in my mind.
And there they stayed. Until Leah joined us.
Whenever an opening arose for a new recruit, either because Aram had evicted someone he deemed unsuitable, or more rarely when one of the community demanded to leave and was forced to sneak off in disgrace into the night, Aram would use his recently created YouTube channel to whip up an audience for one of his infrequent talks in cities around the country. These sessions gave him the opportunity to ask for donations so he could continue his work, and enabled him to identify those most suited to become part of the inner circle – the chosen few who were invited to live at Lakeside. And, of course, each new convert meant a new injection of cash.
His most recent outing to Liverpool had resulted in only one newcomer.
Leah Medway had travelled to Liverpool from her home in Stoke-on-Trent to listen to Aram speak. She had heard how he helped those who followed his guidance to regain balance and strength, and said he was exactly what she needed. Tall and skinny with glossy dark hair that just touched her shoulders, she made us love her from her first day. She stood at the front of the room where we were all gathered and talked about the pain she had experienced at the death of her mother, how it had left her feeling she had no one to love. Aram, as was his custom, showered her with affection and asked Mum to prepare a special dinner to welcome her.
She befriended me early on, but was sufficiently aware of the rules to know we couldn’t be seen to have any kind of exclusive relationship. That would result in one or both of us suffering some form of humiliation to drive us apart, and for the moment Leah was being love-bombed by everyone. It was difficult to find a private space with so many people around, but we managed to meet by the lake, out of sight of the house, as often as we could. When we weren’t together, Leah made sure she spent time with others too, but it was my company she enjoyed the most.
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