“I’ve really got to do this?” he tries one more time. He resorts to doing a Daisy; attempting to look wide-eyed and innocent so his boss will pity him. Instead he looks like a slightly constipated teddy bear.
“Stop whining and get on with it,” his boss orders.
He stands, towering over her, then trudges away, resigned to his fate.
“Wish someone like that’d pop round mine,” he grumbles mutinously. “My bath could do with a good going over. And there’s hair needs winkling out of the drain in the shower.”
Before visiting Laura Weir, Mike does a background check. She is twenty-three, lives alone in a flat on Drury Road, Colchester, has no convictions, a clean driving licence, and is five feet five inches.
Her mum, Jackie, forty-eight, dad, Seamus, fifty, and younger brother Marcus, sixteen, were killed in a crash four years ago when she was just nineteen. He sucks in his breath, a backward whistle of shock. That must have been devastating. Bad enough what has happened to him, but to cope with your entire family being wiped out…it does not bear thinking about.
It explains why she probably has a bad case of the crazies. Poor girl must be cracking up under the strain of grief.
With nothing else to do with his day, Mike is on his way to her residence by ten o’clock.
CHAPTER THIRTY-TWO
~ Moonflower ~
Instability
The detective standing in Laura’s flat makes her realise how small the place is. Instead of feeling intimidated by his massive frame, Laura likes this Detective Sergeant Michael Bishop. There is something about him she trusts – although that mackintosh is hilarious, really needs a decent wash and iron. Yet he emanates calm and inner strength, and even kindness, somehow.
He takes a place at one end of the sofa and turns towards her. She takes the other end, draws her coltish long legs up in front of her, and pulls her huge, baggy jumper over her knees to encase her limbs entirely. Here goes nothing.
“Someone is breaking into my flat,” she says.
“You’ve had things stolen?” asks ‘just-call-me-Mike’.
Laura hugs her knees for comfort but lifts her chin higher, stubborn.
“A surveillance camera. A photo from my birthday a couple of years ago. And I’m fairly certain my favourite t-shirt’s been nicked too: it’s just plain, dark green, long sleeves, nothing special.”
From the penetrating look he is giving her, Laura guesses he realises the t-shirt means more to her than she is willing to let on. But she does not want to explain that it is the last thing her brother bought her before his death, it will lead her down a road she does not wish to travel right now.
“But it’s not just that they’ve disappeared. Things keep happening. I’ll come home and the washing up has been done, or the place tidied up, or, or…or the ironing done, or something. Sometimes groceries have been put in my fridge. Do you have any idea how freaky that is?
“I’ve even come home to a hot meal waiting for me. A hot meal! Do you know what that means? It means whoever did it can only have left minutes before I got back here.
“I know this sounds crazy, okay? I know! But someone is coming into my home and doing weird stuff to scare me. Sometimes it even happens at night when I’m here, asleep!”
Finally she pauses for breath, leaping up suddenly to pace. Glares at Mike, challenging him to dare disbelieve her. Mike’s kind, deep brown eyes meet her blue ones.
“Have you seen any signs of forced entry?”
“This again! No – and believe me, I’ve looked.”
He does not look away. Neither does she. “Well, then, how do you think someone has managed to get inside? Unless it’s someone with a key; does anyone else have a key?” His voice is calm, quiet, but commanding.
“Look, these are all questions I answered at the station when I filed the report. No, no one else has a key. And no, I don’t know how someone is managing to get in – but they are.”
Silence. The only sound is the scritch-scratch of Mike’s fingers against his beard. Laura can see him weighing up her story, and is terrified he will write her off as a lunatic. Yet his mouth has not twitched once as if he is fighting laughter.
But now he is standing up and Laura is scared. And when she is scared she gets angry.
“You’re not going already, are you?” she demands
He gives a gentle smile. “Let’s have a look at your doors and windows, see if we can figure out what’s going on.”
Relief floods through her. Finally, someone is listening to her.
“Thank you,” she whispers. Then remembers: “Oh! I forgot the most important thing! The flowers!”
She hurries from the room, returning with a bedraggled bouquet, stems broken and bent at angles. Mike looks bemused.
“I’d shoved them in the bin,” she explains. “The flowers started arriving at about the same time as I noticed stuff happening around the flat. I didn’t even connect the two things at first. Thing is, I thought a lot of the stuff was in my head; that I’d done the washing up in a daydream and forgotten, you know? But it got more and more, until there was no way I could be doing all those things and not realise it. It felt like someone was trying to drive me mad.”
She gives an apologetic shrug for her lack of belief in herself. “The bouquets got weird too. They were pretty at first, but sometimes now they have the oddest things in them, like lumps of moss or something. There’s never any note, and I’ve no idea who is sending them. I’ve asked around, of course, but everyone’s clueless… Can you, I don’t know, dust them for fingerprints or something?”
Laura proffers them hopefully. Mike takes them from her but shakes his head as he gazes down at them.
“No, we can’t dust these, I’m afraid. You say they didn’t come with a note, or wrapped in cellophane?”
Laura says no.
“Then there’s nothing we can do with them, sorry,” says Mike, handing back the beaten up flowers.
The flare of disappointment sparks another idea. “Oh! There’s the dress!” Laura exclaims. She hurries from the room, returning with the dress, cover, and hanger. “Someone left this in my wardrobe over Christmas. Umm, sometimes they put money in my purse too.”
The detective slides on a single latex glove to handle the gown, and again Laura feels calmer, knowing that her fears are not being dismissed.
“I’ll take it back to the station and see if we can get some prints,” Mike says.
She watches him inspect doors and windows, then straighten and lean against the wall.
“Laura, no one could come and go without leaving some kind of trace; thieves aren’t that good – or that bothered about hiding their tracks,” he says. Somehow he manages to tread the fine line between kindness and patronising. “These aren’t great locks though; maybe you should invest in some really good ones, I can get a list for you. Maybe have an alarm fitted too. You can get ones that can be set while you’re inside, so that they go off if there is movement anywhere but your bedroom. That should stop anyone.”
She is grateful he has said “stop anyone” rather than “that should put your mind at ease”, as though this is all in her head. At least he is not dismissing her story out of hand completely. She is bitterly disappointed though. Never has she felt so alone and helpless.
The pair say polite goodbyes, and she watches him lumber away, scratching his beard again, as though at a bothersome itch that will not go away.
***
Adam sits in his car, parked metres away from Mike’s own vehicle, and trembles with rage and shock.
The bitch. The absolute bitch. She is a liar, like his mother.
Dirty boy. Disgusting child. Who could love a pathetic creature like you?
His mother’s voice sneers at Adam from nowhere. His trembles of anger are suddenly replaced with seismic tremors of fear. Is his mother inside him? When he killed Sara had her soul entered him without him knowing it? Had she spent all this time watching, waiting, sabotaging
his chances with people?
A painful clench of his stomach. He throws open the door, leaning over just in time, vomit creating a Jackson Pollock on the pavement. He clings onto the car door for dear life, panting with panic as another wave of nausea takes him.
Ugly, useless child. Come here, let me punish you… That familiar voice tugs at him, dragging him into the past.
Hearing from his mother, coupled with Laura’s betrayal, makes it hard to know which is hurting the most. Adam is stunned by what Laura has done; reporting him to the police and pretending that she is scared by everything he has done for her. Why would she do this to him? The way she spoke about him makes him shiver afresh with horror. He had thought she was as pure and honest as his grandmother, but perhaps she is really as duplicitous and manipulative as his mother.
Part of him is tempted to confront her, but he is no good at confrontations. He will stutter and stammer, unable to get his words out, and if she is like his mother she will tear him apart. He does not think he has the strength to survive that.
Come here, you know you like it. Don’t you want to make me happy? Spoiled, selfish brat…
Adam pulls himself back into the driving seat, breathing ragged, trying to make sense of what is happening. His mother is not with him; she cannot be with him. He had been nowhere near her when she died so there was no way her soul could have entered his body. The terror of his childhood is so strong though. Adam needs to get away from Colchester, away from the memories, away from Laura and her betrayal, and back to safety. There is only one place in the world where he has ever felt calm, sheltered and loved: his gran’s house in Moseley. He has never felt her presence with him – something he often laments – but the house is his touchstone and it is to there he must hurry.
With a violent twist of the ignition key, Adam starts up his car and tears away, still wiping his mouth clean of vomit. His confusion does not disappear with the miles. He is raging with emotion and inside him he can feel Julie, Lisa, Sharon, Sandra, Alex, and Irene rebelling at the thought of an interloper being with them. They soar through his blood on the hunt for his mother.
As soon as he arrives at his Moseley home at around 3.30pm, he strides into his greenhouses, searching for the right flowers to convey his emotions. Snatches up his secateurs but cannot marshal his thoughts enough to choose the right blooms.
Inside him, his harem shriek their frustration, their souls boiling and bubbling like his anger. They join together until Adam is consumed, the flames of his fury leap from his body, and he is transformed into a phoenix, feels himself lifting up, up, up into air that seethes with orange, yellow and white hot flames.
Yet he is not burned by the inferno, and that is how he knows he really is the phoenix, the stuff of fairy tales. He will get his happy ending one way or another.
With that thought the roar of the fire increases, the world becomes white, and Adam tumbles into nothingness.
Hours later he comes to himself. It is morning and he is lying prone on the floor of his lounge as if someone has put him in the recovery position. He can only assume it is one of his ladies, and he thanks them. Beside him is the bouquet, ready for delivery.
Yellow roses to symbolise Laura’s spiritual infidelity to him; purple belladonna for the silence she should have kept. Her heartlessness is illustrated with amaranthus, the tiny, deep burgundy flowers coming in gatherings of ponytails that seem to droop towards the floor in shame. “Beware of excess,” is the warning from the saffron, to show Laura is close to pushing him too far. Finally nettles weave through the whole display, making Adam think of his mother as they once more shout the cruelty he has suffered.
He will send Laura this bouquet as a warning. She has one chance to put things right. Just one. Or she will suffer his wrath.
CHAPTER THIRTY-THREE
~ Scarlet Pimpernel ~
Assignation
EIGHTEEN MONTHS AGO
Sharon Humphreys was not happy. She should have been ecstatic. Today was the first day of her week-long break from her job as a social worker. When the August morning had dawned bright and warm, Sharon had vowed to make the most of it. Grabbing her rucksack, she had stuffed it with her camera, a copy of Anna Karenina, and a little blanket to lie on, so that she could make the most of the sunshine.
Her destination had been Wimbledon Common, a vast area of heathland and woodland within spitting distance of the city of London, and a ten-minute drive from her home.
It was good to be outside instead of cooped up in a dreary office. As she walked, Sharon revelled in seeing pretty peacock butterflies and red admirals, their scarlet wings standing out among the green leaves and grass. What a treat to have a riot of colour before her, instead of the dreary palette of mushroom and cream paint that adorned the walls at work.
All this made her happy. Her unhappiness was caused by something else entirely.
She had walked past the common’s windmill and into a wooded section, and was about go through a gap in a hedge of brambles that led to a fox den she knew of. There she hoped she might see some late cubs if she was very quiet and very patient. Perhaps she would even get to indulge her hobby and take some photographs. But before she could step through she had noticed that behind her was a man of about her age, twenty-four, or possibly slightly older.
Thanks to her pastime of wildlife watching, Sharon was used to taking in a lot with just a quick look. This man was swarthy-skinned. It was hard to say from that glance what his background might be: a very tanned Caucasian, of more Mediterranean descent, or even Asian.
He was about five feet ten, give or take, and although his shoulders were not particularly broad his body made a very pronounced inverted triangle thanks to his slim hips. His hair was quite long on the top and brushed upwards. It was balanced with a very neatly trimmed beard which would be considered designer stubble if it were any shorter.
Something about the way he held himself made her revise her earlier estimate about his age; she now hazarded he was about thirty-two. White with a tan. And very aware of his appearance. That was not based on his hair, facial or otherwise. It was his clothes, too: Marl grey hooded jacket top, unzipped over his jeans of identical colour, and revealing a vest top of a deeper slate grey. Everything co-ordinated and carefully put together.
All this Sharon saw in a second. A second more, she had realised with a sinking heart that he was heading to the same destination as she. There was a bench reasonably near the den opening, and he was probably on his way to it. No doubt he would not be able to keep still and would disturb the fox family if she tried to get a shot.
“I won’t bother,” she thought, irritated. “I’ll sit down by the beech trees instead.”
So there she settled, choosing the spot for many reasons but not least because she might get a couple of decent snaps of a jay that was above her. If she were lucky, and the light stayed good. Besides, it was peaceful there and a suntrap, surrounded as it was by a natural windbreak thanks to the hedge and trees.
She lay back, camera in hand, but the jay disappeared with a flash of its white rump. The sun warmed her, making her feel sleepy. It was tempting to snooze, but as that thought occurred to her it was chased off by a second: she had not seen any movement anywhere. Great, the man must have gone straight through rather than sitting on the bench near the fox den, as she had assumed. She could take a look and maybe get some pictures after all.
Sharon sat up eagerly.
And realised he had actually positioned himself on the far side of the hedge gap, lying on the floor, resting up on his elbows. He had done it so that he could watch her.
Paranoid! She laughed inwardly at herself.
Dismissing the thought, she jumped up, grabbed her backpack and decided to walk through to the fox den anyway. Marched past this guy without giving him a glance, gazed over towards the dark opening of the den for a minute, but could not see any signs of life. Disappointed, she walked out of the other side of the glade then stopped for a moment
, undecided as to what to do.
“I’ll walk straight back onto the path again, and back round to the beech trees,” she decided silently. There she could make the most of the sunshine, ensuring she sat well away from the man so that she wouldn’t get paranoid that he was watching her. She would forget the photos, just read her book.
Sharon started the circuitous route back and had just stepped into the beech glade when she noticed the man walking towards her. Something about the slightly exaggerated way he looked surprised when he saw her made Sharon wary. She slowed down, trying to look casual herself, while attempting to see where he was heading.
Her heart gave a little thump. Because he had slowed down too. It was as though he no longer knew where to go because she did not. She was getting a stronger and stronger vibe that something was going on with this person.
Finally he walked past her. But she could see him looking sidelong at her out of the side of his sunglasses, pretending that he wasn’t looking at her at all.
Perhaps he wanted to chat her up? Well, she was not in the mood, she had made that pretty clear from the bristling glare she had thrown his way. Sharon had never been the kind of person to leave anyone in doubt about what she was thinking or feeling – and generally she was thinking: “Bugger off and leave me alone.” She had always preferred the company of animals to people.
Still, now they both knew where they stood, she knew he would not be so thick-skinned as to approach her again. She was now safe to sit in the sunshine in peace.
Almost one minute later, he wandered by again, ostensibly studying his phone as if waiting for someone. Again she could see him looking at her, though; not much got past Sharon’s sharp eyes, which was one of the reasons she tended to have a low opinion of the human race. She glared at him openly this time, until he walked on by and once more disappeared into the gap in the thick brambles and holly.
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