by Helen Cooper
Then she looked at her husband and recognized what he was doing. His shoulders were drawn forward. There were pain lines in his face. He was trying to keep himself upright, like someone who’d been struck in the stomach and didn’t want to fold.
Steph got up and stepped toward him but he flinched away as though wary of a second blow. Suddenly all she felt was blistering guilt. “Paul, I . . .”
He straightened and they looked at one another. Then a loud beep startled them. It was just a text message alert, coming from Paul’s pocket, but the acoustics of the church and the tension of the moment made it feel like a small explosion. Paul blinked as if waking from a confusing dream. His hand hovered toward his pocket, his gaze still on Steph. Finally he broke eye contact and drew out his phone. The moment seemed to cave in.
“I have to go,” he said, staring at his screen.
“No, Paul—”
“I’m sorry.” He was already moving toward the church door. “But I really have to this time. I’ve just had some information . . . Steph, I don’t want you drawn into this. Please go home, stay safe. And I’ll be back, I promise. With Freya.”
She saw how his face had now transformed. He was fired up, reawakened, but all it stirred in Steph was a new rise of panic. Paul thrust open the church door. As he disappeared yet again, intent on reversing whatever damage he was convinced he’d caused, a chill of doubt spread beneath Steph’s skin.
“Wait!” she called, but her legs were shaking too much to follow.
29.
KATE
Twenty-five years earlier
Friday arrives. The day that Mum and Nick are due to go away for the weekend. At school I can’t concentrate, can’t eat, can’t remember anything about algebra or the Second World War or even Romeo and Juliet. When the bell goes I hurtle home, not even bothering to pick up my untouched lunchbox when it tumbles out of my bag. I’m not sure why I think I might be able to stop them leaving at the very last minute. Maybe if I pretend to be ill again. Or maybe if I don’t come home at all, they’ll have to postpone their trip to look for me. I halt in front of the tower block, imagining Mum frantic and fraught, searching the neighborhood. Phone calls to my teachers and the mums of my classmates. Could I really set all of that in motion?
A wild plan forms in my head. But then I lift my eyes and see Nick, framed in our window, staring down at me. Waving. There’s a giant lump in my throat as I wave mechanically back. And nothing to do but walk inside.
Their luggage waits in our hallway. A smell of bacon leaks out of the kitchen as I drop my rucksack beside Mum’s overnight bag. Last-chance thoughts of destroying their suitcases parade through my mind. I could throw them out of the window, watch them plummet four floors.
“Hi, Kate,” Nick shouts from the kitchen.
Why is he greeting me, not Mum? Is she not here? And where’s Becca? My nerves dance as I push the kitchen door. Nick’s frying bacon on the stove. The air is full of the sizzling noise, the meaty smell. He’s whistling, cheerful today, glugging a beer.
“Where is everyone?” I ask.
“Your mum got held up at work. She’ll be home soon and then we’re heading for our train. I’m starving, though.” He grins and flips the bacon, beads of fat spitting from the pan, then cracks two eggs against the rim of a bowl.
“Becca’s having a shower.” He beats the eggs, fork rattling. “You two looking forward to having the place to yourselves?”
“I guess.”
He turns and looks at me. The fork’s in his fist with slug-trails of yellow dripping from its prongs. “Your mum really needs this break.” There’s a warning there, his smile shrinking: Don’t stand in our way.
I feel tears building, and hurry out of the room before he sees them. Sitting on my bed, I run my finger up and down a ladder in my tights until Becca appears, wearing my dressing gown, a towel wrapped around her hair. As soon as I see her, the tears burst.
“Kay-Kay.” She sits beside me. The towel slips from her hair and water spatters my arm. I see she’s been dyeing her hair dark purple—the white towel is stained with indigo streaks.
“I’ve got to do something,” I say.
“The police?”
“No, no, you were right about that.”
“I could come back with you, help you explain . . .”
I shake my head, shuddering at the memory of my failure yesterday. Nick’s got us trapped in a corner and I’m too pathetic to haul us out. I hear him whistling again from the kitchen, and the carefree tune makes me want to explode.
Then my gaze snags on something. A small plastic tub on the bedside table. “Your pills.”
Becca glances at the clock. “Oh, you’re right, I’m due some.”
“No . . .” I pause, forming the sentence in my head before I let it leave my mouth. “Couldn’t we give him a couple?”
“What?”
I remember Becca vomiting into the toilet the first night she stayed with us, blaming it on the combination of alcohol and tablets. “We could put some in his food or beer. If he’s sick, they won’t be able to go tonight.”
“Kate—”
“It would buy us some time.”
“But—”
“One dose won’t do any harm, just upset his stomach, right?”
“Probably.” She tilts her head like she’s reassessing me. For better or worse, I’m not sure. “I don’t know. I’m no expert. I just take them.”
“Did you get sick the first time?”
“I think so, a bit.”
“It might shake him up,” I persist. “What with the pills and the beer . . . They might stay at home, at least for tonight. Then we could work out another plan, a proper one.”
Becca’s eyes travel toward the bottle of tablets. “Kate . . . it’s poisoning.” Her lips smack around the word as though she doesn’t know whether she likes the taste of it or not.
“He’ll just think he’s got a bug.” I grab her hand. “If we let him take her away, I’ve got this horrible, horrible feeling she won’t make it back.”
“Jesus, Kate, I’d do anything for you and your mum, you know that. But this feels . . . extreme.”
I’m almost proud. Bet she never thought I’d be willing to go this far. It’s rarely been me convincing Becca before. All our life she’s been the one with the bold ideas, while I’m usually the hesitator.
I grab for the pills but she gets there first, holding them to her chest. “Kate, come on.”
“You said you were here to help.”
“For fuck’s sake, I am. But spiking a guy’s drink?”
“He’s not just a guy. He’s . . . he’s . . .” My tears surge back and Becca reaches out to me: She never could stand to see me cry. But I blink my eyes clear and take my chance to snatch the pills. “He’s the guy who gave my mum a hundred bruises.” I close my fingers around the tub and for the first time in weeks, perhaps the first time ever, I feel powerful.
30.
PAUL
Paul charged toward home, the rain still hammering down, his car an exasperating distance away. On his street, the colored ink was bleeding out of the Freya posters, making grotesque rainbows in the puddles. He took several down and folded them gently inside his coat as if to keep her dry. Glancing up at his flat, he imagined his parents and George inside, wondering what was going on. There was no time to explain. Where would he even begin?
Paul got into his car and reread the text that had interrupted his talk with Steph.
It’s Yvette. This is my personal number—use this from now on. I did some digging. Sanderson still lives near the Chainwell Estate. Don’t say anything to Glover. Please be careful. I hope I’m doing the right thing here.
She’d followed it with an address and postcode. Paul keyed it into his GPS, still disbelieving even as the location was confirmed. Sanderson had
moved barely two miles from the old tower block, had stayed close to the memories all this time.
Thank you, Paul replied to Yvette. So much. His chest swelled with gratitude and hope, temporarily masking his dread of the journey he now had to make. As he set off, anxieties old and new swarmed in. The echo of Steph’s question in the stillness of the church.
Did you kill someone?
Once this nightmare was over—and he had to believe it would be—how could he make his wife and daughter understand, and forgive him? How could he even describe his former life of confused identity, confused loyalties? Buddying up with a man who’d potentially committed an unforgivable crime; getting closer than he should have to a woman who had no clue who he was. Freya and Steph would surely see him differently if they knew, just as he’d always feared.
His whirling thoughts accompanied him along the motorway and distracted him from his approach to Nottingham. Then, suddenly, his destination seemed to be moving toward him, rather than the other way round, and he was falling into a once-familiar part of the city, becoming enclosed by dilapidated buildings and burned-out social clubs. Perhaps it was the years that had passed, or the life Paul now lived, but the estate seemed sadder than ever. Paint peeled off the houses like flaking eczema; the whole place reeked of blocked drains.
He parked where he could and sat for a moment, afraid that as soon as he got out he’d be someone else. Someone capable of causing irreversible damage. He thought of Freya, of Steph, of the clean smell of home and the breeze along the Thames. Until he felt calm enough to get out of the car.
As he discreetly followed his phone’s directions, his eyes sought blonde ponytails, navy Puffa jackets, sneakers with mint-green soles. Instead he saw the landmarks of his former life, like objects from a dream: the streets he’d stalk at night when insomnia plagued him; the corner where a phone booth had once stood, from which he would call in his updates to Glover. He passed the closed-down pub where Sanderson used to drink, and Paul, too, once he’d managed to befriend him. Countless hours spent trying to get his target drunk, trying to tease out confessions, hints, anything. Some nights, when he could, Paul would take Nathalie there alone. They’d play dominoes in the back room, shooting smiles at one another, touching knees beneath the table. And Paul would forget, too often, to ask her things relevant to the investigation. Would forget he had any other purpose but to try to make her happier for a few hours.
Pain seeped across his chest. He rammed his fist against it and counted his breaths. He couldn’t have a panic attack now. Couldn’t run away, like his mind was shouting at him to do. Chin up, he used to tell Freya at half-time in soccer, if her head was dropping with defeat. He saw her pushing her fringe out of her eyes, straightening her blue-team bib, never one to give up without a fight.
She’d had permanently grazed knees at that age. When Paul thought of her childhood, he thought of endless jungle animal plasters. He imagined sticking one over his thrashing heart now, his messed-up head. Patch yourself up and press on.
The outer fringes of the estate were less familiar. He found himself in a maze of sleepy terraces, punctuated by shops that weren’t obviously either open or closed. Then Google Maps told him, matter-of-factly, that he’d reached his destination. An unassuming cul-de-sac with a faded no ball games sign. Paul took a deep breath and pulled up his hood, trying to remember how to become invisible.
Ducking behind a tree, he stared across at number 18. A small, unremarkable house. He didn’t know what he’d expected. He used his phone camera to zoom in subtly, seeing no lights or movement. When he panned up toward a dark window in the roof, he wasn’t sure why it sent a zip of adrenaline through his blood, an urge to holler his daughter’s name. Freya, are you in there? He could feel her everywhere now, even in this place where she didn’t belong.
What now? Wait, watch? Paul had almost forgotten the periods of anxious limbo that were a big part of investigating. The constant, smoldering fear—of discovery, of failure. He didn’t even have the cushion of a false identity anymore, the support of listening ears at the end of a wire. In fact, he felt gut-wrenchingly alone.
He had only one lifeline. In the shadow of the tree, he speed-texted Yvette: Do you know if Sanderson works? What are the chances of him being out right now?
Then, more waiting. Staring at his phone, at the house, left and right along the street. Spooking at every sound.
Finally, a reply: He works in a garage. Taylor’s. I don’t know his working hours but according to their website it closes at 6.
Paul checked the time: 4:40.
Tom Glover’s voice filled his head now, ordering him away. But Paul was far beyond caring about the consequences for himself or the police. Further down the street he found a small alleyway, overgrown with weeds, which led him round the back to a row of locked gates. He counted until he reached the right one, his gaze sweeping the rear of Sanderson’s house.
Stripping off his coat, Paul was reminded of how he’d felt after the Sanderson job had come to an abrupt end and he’d finally peeled off the clothes he’d worn while “in character.” He’d taken a long bath in searing-hot water, as though to burn away the last of Paul Jacobs, but afterward he’d felt empty. The real Paul hadn’t been waiting for him after he’d shed the snakeskin of his false persona. As months had passed he’d feared he’d never find him again, until he’d met Steph and she’d slowly helped him believe he still had substance, without even really knowing she was doing it.
Thoughts of her fired his determination. He reached up to grip the top of Sanderson’s fence. Pull-ups had once been his forte, but now they got harder with each passing year. He gritted his teeth, bounced on the spot, used all his strength to heave himself up. The wood was sharp as he grasped for purchase. His left leg caught and he almost dropped headfirst, but managed to tumble sideways onto a damp lawn. He lay panting, bones groaning, and squinted up to see if he’d alerted any neighbors. There were no stirrings, so he crept to Sanderson’s back door.
Locked. Paul didn’t want to have to smash a window. He’d have to rely, if possible, on his knowledge of Sanderson. On the fact that he was a man of habits, who would never risk the indignity of being locked out of his own house.
Paul crawled around the patio, testing its slabs; none lifted. He patted the back wall but found no loose bricks. Once he’d checked the neglected plant pots, he turned his attention to the small shed. It was built on a wooden platform with a narrow gap between that and the ground. And there it was: a glimmer of metal. Paul found a stick and poked it beneath the shed, exhaling as he maneuvered a silver key toward him.
He hurried to the back door, slid in the key, and he was inside. Standing in the kitchen of the man who hated him most in the world, looking at a dark blue coffee cup in the sink, a leftover bread crust on a plate.
After more than twenty years, he had infiltrated Sanderson’s life once again.
31.
STEPH
Steph wasn’t sure how much time had passed. She’d been sitting in the church growing colder and colder, a swampy odor rising off her damp clothes. The stained-glass window had darkened in front of her, as if the figures it depicted had been put to bed.
She was haunted by Paul’s collapsed face when she’d asked her question. Had she hit on the truth, or was he just devastated she would think that of him? His phone kept going straight to voicemail, reminding her of Thursday evening, the start of it all, when she’d been trying to reach Freya. A similar feeling clawed at her now, a sense of menace she couldn’t quite pin down. And a rising undercurrent of guilt.
Leaving the church, she walked back through the relentless rain. With every step, the guilt swelled. Hypocrite, the trees seemed to say as the wind shook their wet leaves, showering her with even colder droplets.
Paul’s car was gone from their street. Steph hesitated in the hallway of their building, hearing Heather’s and Brian’s voic
es above, gathering herself to go up.
She jumped when the door to the ground-floor flat opened and Emma emerged.
“Steph?” she said. “I saw you come in—God, you’re soaked.”
Steph wasn’t sure whether the moisture on her face was mostly rain or tears. Her muscles had begun to shiver uncontrollably. She felt too exhausted to protest as Emma ushered her inside her flat and settled her on a sofa. A mug of chamomile tea was pressed into her hands, its heat bringing sensation back to her palms. Steph wrapped Freya’s scarf around the outside of her knuckles, like a bandage.
Then she felt something soft brush her ear. With surprise she realized Emma had fetched a towel and was squeezing the wet ends of her hair. The gentleness made Steph want to lean against her. For the first time she saw her neighbor as motherly, and felt a twinge of regret that they hadn’t been friends before. It was surely impossible now. Their lives were intertwining only in the worst way.
Why haven’t you got any friends, Mum? Freya had once asked her, quite casually, but the question had taken Steph aback.
I have friends, she’d said. I’ve got my colleagues, and other mums from school . . . and my book club . . .
But in truth she wasn’t close to any of those people, and she’d only been to the book club twice before realizing she liked to read and think about books much more than she liked to talk about them while eating breadsticks.
Anyway, you’re my best friend, she’d said to Freya with a smile. You and Daddy. Freya had been thirteen then, still just young enough to look pleased by that comment rather than roll her eyes. Three sides of a triangle, they used to call themselves, telling Freya that it was the strongest shape, building pyramids of cards or bridges of straws to demonstrate.