He washed his sooty hands, and switched on his laptop, but he didn’t have an internet connection. He dashed out to his car and started the engine, jerking it into gear. It screeched around corners until he pulled up outside his own house. He leapt out, yanking his laptop from the front seat, and ran up the path. He didn’t even bother to close the car door. Thank goodness he’d forgotten to cancel the phone and internet at his house. The nearest direct flights to Toulouse were from Bristol, and the next one was early afternoon. It would be a push to make it in time, but he booked a ticket.
Once on the motorway, he tried to relax his grip on the steering wheel, feeling the ache in his neck and shoulders again. At least the airport was this side of the city. He couldn’t stop glancing at the clock on the car dashboard. Finally, he saw the signs for the airport. He hurtled around the car park. There had to be at least one empty space. He waited as someone reversed slowly out of a park. ‘Come on, speed up,’ he muttered, as the other driver drove forward a little, and then reversed again. He ran into the departures area with a few minutes to spare.
He shook his head when the woman asked him if he had luggage to check in. After he’d booked the ticket, he’d shoved his laptop back into the padded bag and thrown some underwear into the other compartment, but he didn’t have a full change of clothes. It wasn’t until he sat on the narrow, uncomfortable seat that he relaxed, or a version of it. What did he expect to find in Saint Catherine?
It must be Liam. How else would this Duval woman know to ring him?
Liam had faked his suicide, and left them to face debts they couldn’t pay and threats of violence. But was he Chris Toogood?
‘Are you scared of flying?’ asked the woman next to him.
He looked at her blankly, and she nodded at his hands shaking on the armrest.
‘My brother just died.’
She didn’t bother him again.
*
At Toulouse, he remembered to change some money and then found the hire car booths. The girl behind the counter gave him a map and showed him the route.
‘E9, for about an hour,’ he muttered, as he looked for the hire car in the car park. ‘What was the name of the place to look for? Off the motorway there and past Le something or other, and then look for signs for Saint Catherine. Remember, they drive on the other side of the road.’ Must stop talking to myself.
He drove within the speed limit for a while, and as his confidence grew, he increased the speed. Even with the stress of previous days, he gave a few brief glances at the countryside and the old stone farmhouses in the distance.
The signs came up faster than he expected, and he turned off the main road. He drove through a small town, the stone houses with their tiled roofs looked deserted, wooden window shutters closed against the late afternoon sun. In the next town, a group of old men sat around a table outside a café. They were immersed in a game, and didn’t even glance up as he passed.
He took a few wrong turns, but eventually saw the sign announcing he had arrived in Saint Catherine. The streets were narrow and cobbled, and unlike the other towns he’d driven through, it didn’t seem to have a main street. He drove around, and finally took a left turn that led to the town square. Colourful flower baskets hung from the shop walls, but all that interested him was the Boulangerie. He came to a row of parking spaces and pulled into one. It was good to get out of the car and stretch. As he eased the aches in his legs and shoulders, he turned and saw the shop sign Boulangerie – Pâtisserie.
Thank goodness. Perhaps he was close to some answers.
There wasn’t much left in the shop, and Tom glanced at his watch. He’d made reasonable time, but it was late in the afternoon. Lucky the shop hadn’t already closed.
A man came through from the kitchen area behind the shop. Now he’d have to try out his schoolboy French. He pulled back his shoulders, and used one of the sentences he’d practiced in the car. Where could he find Vivienne Duval?
‘Ah, you are the Englishman Vivienne expects. The brother of Chris.’
Tom nodded; relieved the man’s English was better than his French. The man looked Tom up and down, and then drew a rough map on a paper bag.
He must have passed the inspection test.
‘Will only take ten minutes in car.’ The man handed over the pencil-drawn map.
He had made this huge assumption it was something to do with Liam, with an even more bizarre guess that Chris was Liam, or the other way around. What if this turned out to be a stranger? How many Chris Toogood’s could there be in the world? Plenty. But how many would leave a message for him?
Tom followed the instructions out of Saint Catherine, and along a road bordered by fields which stretched as far as he could see. A few minutes later, he turned onto a leafy lane, the sun slanting through branches. The road climbed gently for a mile or so, and as it levelled, he saw the house.
He had followed the map instructions so intently, he hadn’t thought about what to say to Vivienne. He sat in the car for a moment, but it didn’t help. His mouth was dry, while his hands were clammy on the steering wheel. Behind the sprawling one-storey stone house, the wood continued up a gentle incline. Opposite were open fields which stretched towards hills in the distance. Why had Liam been here, and how much did Vivienne Duval know?
Enough with these thoughts, they led nowhere. He needed to talk with Vivienne.
The front door opened as he got out of the car.
‘Hello,’ said Vivienne. ‘You must be Tom.’
She had long wavy brown hair, and a light dusting of freckles over her nose, but Tom noticed little else as he followed her to a veranda at the back of the house. She put a jug of iced tea and two glasses on a coffee table.
He helped himself to a drink, and sat on a wicker chair with a large blue cushion. Beyond the garden, the woods meandered up the hill.
‘I don’t know what to say.’ Tom drank some of the iced tea. ‘Your phone call was unexpected.’
‘You did not know Chris was here?’
He shook his head. ‘I’ll be honest with you, I’m not even sure if it’s my brother.’ He didn’t know how much to tell Vivienne.
‘I did wonder why different names, but it sometimes happens. Half-brothers?’
‘No.’ If only it could be that simple. Tom put his glass on the table. ‘Can I see him? Is it far away?’
‘Not far away. He is at the funeral directors in Dubois. I will drive you there.’
‘You don’t need to.’
‘You may not feel like driving afterwards, and as I said, it’s not far away.’
‘Your English is excellent,’ said Tom, when they were in her car.
‘My father is French and my mother English, so we speak both languages.’
‘It certainly helps me.’
Tom wasn’t good at small talk at the best of times. As they drove through the cobbled streets of the small town, he tried to breathe slowly and more deeply. He wasn’t sure he wanted to know. His recent experiences of learning anything new about Liam had all led to trouble.
Vivienne parked the car outside an inconspicuous stone building, and he walked with her to the double-width, brown doors. She rang the bell, and a few minutes later a dark-suited man opened the door. Vivienne spoke to him, and he gestured for them to come in. He spoke to them both, but Tom only understood a few words.
‘Chris is in the Chapel of Rest.’ Vivienne nodded to a door. ‘I’ll wait here for you.’
The walls were painted a shade of magnolia, and the evening sun shone through a mosaic of coloured glass. The hazy patterns of colour played and flickered on the cream walls, disturbed by dancing branches outside. Tom’s gaze settled on the coffin lid placed against the wall. He remembered the small metal plate on his father’s coffin, the name and dates declaring a biblical lifespan. At the moment, there was no metal plate on this coffin lid.
His feet felt welded to the floor, but he forced himself towards the coffin and looked down. The man’s expre
ssion was peaceful, and no signs of a car crash marred his face. The undertaker, or whatever they were called in France, had done a good job. His mother and father had looked as though they were off to a party, with overdone make-up. Tom touched the man’s forehead. Stupid, but he needed to make sure. The skin was cold, all spark extinguished.
Whatever Liam had done, he had died in France.
Chapter 20
Andi
If Martin and his wife Barbara were eager to know what initiated the unexpected visit, they gave no sign of it. Andi wasn’t sure what Steven had told them, and was too tired to care. She was relieved to be away from Bristol, and that Steven was with them.
Steven’s cousins, Martin and Richard, had run the family farm together until the previous year, when Richard had died in an accident. Steven and Andi weren’t surprised when Martin sold the farm. They wondered how Martin coped with the physical aspect of working the farm on his own, as well as the emotional ties and memories. Steven talked a lot about school holidays with his cousins on the farm, and Andi hoped they wouldn’t bring trouble with them.
Andi and Steven hadn’t visited Martin and Barbara’s new home before, and it took them a few wrong turns before they eventually got there. Perhaps this was a good omen, and Dave and his unknown boss wouldn’t find them.
Martin considered the new property small, but with an acre of land it seemed large to Andi. He called the house new, although it was around a hundred years old, but parts of his old farmhouse were Tudor, so it was all relative. Barbara showed them around the house, while Martin took Steven out to the garage and workshop.
Andi preferred a more modern house, but the kitchen and bathrooms had been renovated recently.
Barbara took Andi, Sophie and Kristen upstairs to show the twins where they would sleep. ‘You can use the boys’ bedrooms. They’ll be so annoyed to have missed your visit. They’re on a school trip to Germany.’
Andi wondered whether they would have things sorted out before the boys were back. She wasn’t sure if the everyday chatter helped or not. Part of her wanted to scream that things weren’t okay, and might never be, but she welcomed the semblance of normality.
After dinner the girls disappeared upstairs to their rooms. Andi hurried after them.
‘Mum, we’ll just listen to some music,’ said Sophie.
Andi noticed their mobile phones. ‘Don’t tell anyone where we are.’
‘Why not? Uncle Liam’s problems haven’t got anything to do with us.’
‘Don’t tell anyone. We came here to get away from those men. If your friends know where we are, they might tell the wrong people.’
‘Okay.’
Andi wasn’t sure they realised how serious things were, but she didn’t want Sophie and Kristen to know Dave’s threats specifically involved them.
‘Anyway, it’s not as if we’re somewhere special,’ said Kristen. ‘Uncle Martin and Auntie Barbara are lovely and all that, but no one will be dead jealous we’re here.’
Back downstairs, Martin poured some wine. Andi took a gulp of hers, and sat on the couch. ‘I guess it’s best everyone knows what the trouble could be,’ she said to Steven.
He explained to Martin and Barbara, while Andi interrupted with things she’d forgotten to tell him, in their rush to leave Bristol. She watched Martin and Barbara, but tried not to stare. If they couldn’t stay here, where should they go? Scotland maybe. Find a hotel somewhere. She felt like a refugee. Maybe they should fly somewhere. Get out of the country. How far did Dave’s information and contacts reach?
‘You might not want us to stay,’ said Steven. ‘And we’d understand.’
Barbara stiffened, looking anxious, and pursed her lips.
‘Rubbish,’ said Martin. ‘You’re family and we don’t give in to threats. No one knows you’re here. We don’t have any neighbours close by, and we’ve got enough food for a while.’
Andi looked at Barbara, still not sure which way this would go. Barbara glanced back, and her mouth softened. She nodded. ‘Safety in numbers, I guess.’
The knot of dread in the pit of Andi’s stomach loosened a little. The threats were still there, but she felt safer here than she had in Bristol, where those men seemed to know everything they did. On the drive up, she had constantly checked behind them. Steven hadn’t laughed at her, and she knew he did the same.
Martin opened another bottle of wine, and the conversation moved to everyday subjects.
‘Come and look at this.’ Martin took them to a room close to the kitchen and dining room. ‘We think it was built for food storage, but the man who owned the house before us was a keen photographer. He used it as a darkroom.’
‘He must have been disappointed in digital cameras then,’ said Steven.
‘He moaned about it whenever we met him,’ said Barbara. ‘I didn’t tell him we’d decided to knock it out to make the other rooms larger.’
‘The door’s certainly solid,’ said Steven.
‘Most of the doors in the house are original,’ said Martin. ‘They’re certainly tougher than modern ones.’
Andi shivered, and moved out of the room. ‘It’s a bit claustrophobic. I wouldn’t want to get locked in there.’
They talked for a while longer, but she felt exhausted and yawned constantly. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m so tired.’
Barbara stood up. ‘I haven’t even shown you your room yet. Come on up.’
Steven gave a slight frown, and they both followed Barbara upstairs.
‘Thank you so much for letting us stay. Especially with all the problems we’ve brought.’
‘Don’t worry,’ said Barbara. ‘I’m sure we’ll get everything sorted.’
Things might never get sorted, certainly not as easily as Barbara thought, but at least they were able to stay.
‘I’m sorry,’ said Steven, after Barbara took them to the guest bedroom and ensuite. ‘I never told them we weren’t living together. I’ll make up a bed on the floor.’
Andi put her arms around his waist. ‘Don’t worry about that. All I want right now is to feel you close.’
He held her. It felt so good to rest her head on his chest and forget about Dave, Mickey and faceless men who wanted to hurt her daughters.
Chapter 21
Tom
Tom pulled one of the chairs away from the wall, and sat where he could see Liam.
‘Why did you come here?’ The anger would return. They were in too much trouble for anything else, but all he could see now, was his younger brother.
He reached out and touched Liam’s forehead again, as if it might tell him something different. As children, they spent their days on the beach, fishing from the rocks or exploring the caves in the local bays. If they weren’t on the beach, they’d race up the hills beyond the village and down into the wooded valley. One summer they’d built a den in one of the trees. They had taken bits of wood from their father’s garage and offcuts from Jago’s shed, when he left it open.
They saw less of each other when Liam moved to London, but the distance didn’t make any difference to their friendship.
‘Why did you do this?’ The fraudulent transactions and the money – he could possibly understand that, but to disappear and leave him and Andi to face the threats. How could Liam do that?
When he came out of the chapel, he found Vivienne in the foyer.
‘I’m sorry you’ve had to wait.’
‘No matter. It is your brother?’ While she phrased it as a statement, there was a question in her voice.
‘Yes, it’s Liam.’ He noticed her expression. ‘Whatever he called himself here, his name is Liam Trethowan.’
‘I will take you back to my house.’
Tom sat in the car as Vivienne drove. Images raced through his mind. He didn’t believe violence solved anything, but his fist ached to punch something. Liam was flippant and irresponsible, but this? And now he was dead. The outcome Liam fabricated had happened.
He stared out of the windscree
n, barely aware they were at Vivienne’s house.
‘Come inside.’
He was so angry when he realised Liam faked his suicide, but it gave him a glimmer of hope. A faint possibility. Maybe, just maybe, Liam might appear with a solution to the trouble he’d caused. Now Liam would never turn up with a plan. The very worst Tom could believe, might happen.
He drank the brandy Vivienne gave him, and coughed as it stung the back of his throat.
‘Good, you have a bit more colour. I think you work outside and are usually tanned, not as you were just then.’
Tom let the brandy warm him, but felt the panic push its way forward. ‘How long was Liam here?’
‘I met him in the early spring.’ She didn’t remember the exact date, but early spring tied in with Liam’s disappearance.
‘How? I mean the towns around here aren’t very large. It’s not where I’d have expected Liam to stay.’ He paused, as he considered his words. ‘I’m sorry if that sounds rude, I didn’t mean it to be.’
‘It’s okay. I understand. Today has been a shock for you.’
‘So how did you meet Liam?’
‘I was on my way home from Dubois. Chris, I’m sorry, Liam had a problem with his car. I saw him on the side of the road and stopped. When he explained, I rang the garage in Dubois and they towed his car. He called the next day, and asked to take me to dinner as a thank you.’
‘Did he say why he was here?’
‘That he was on holiday, but he only had a rucksack with him.’ She shrugged. ‘He wasn’t far off the main road to Lyon, but who knows.’
‘You had dinner with him.’
She nodded. ‘He remained in Dubois for a few days and we met several times.’ Her gaze flickered to the window. ‘I wasn’t sure how much of what he said was the truth. I felt maybe it was partial truth, but not everything.’
‘But he lived here, with you, until recently?’
Lies of the Dead Page 14