‘Really, they should have been getting advice about this,’ Kelvin says. ‘If nothing else, they could have rung the National Debtline, got some pointers on restructuring.’
‘They’re too proud for that,’ Clare says, astutely. ‘I think they’ve had their heads in the sand.’
In white powder, more like, I think, chewing a stuffed olive. Though Clare and I have not shared so much as a bowl of peanuts since her discovery of my affair, I’ve helped myself to a plateful of snacks, confident I won’t be chastised. Appearances are important to her; she won’t humiliate me in front of a stranger.
Kelvin is reaching the end of his roll call of shame. ‘On December the second, they took out a new credit card and were able to withdraw almost ten thousand pounds on it.’
‘Ten grand?’ Clare echoes. ‘Well, they didn’t use it for the rent, obviously.’
‘They paid off one of the other loans?’ I suggest.
‘There’s no evidence of them doing that. Since it was withdrawn in cash, I’d suggest it was for personal spending, something they didn’t want to be traced.’ He pauses, looks at Clare, as if for her approval. Evidently, it is given, because he expands his chest as if poised to say something significant. ‘If you want my opinion, you and Piers could be right.’
‘Right about what?’ I ask, but he doesn’t respond. I turn to Clare. ‘Please, tell me.’
The look she gives me then makes my stomach drop. It’s a deep, complicated look, expressive of extreme and conflicting emotions. It’s a look that says, Much as I hate to help a bastard like you, I’m about to because what’s going on here is too fucking serious for party politics.
Cowed, ashamed, and seriously spooked, I ask again what they’re talking about.
Finally, she tells me: ‘We think Kit and Melia are setting you up.’
35
30 December 2019
There is a moment of hideous breakneck freefall when all I can do is gawp. Finally, I recover my vocal cords: ‘Setting me up in what way?’
Clare’s expression deepens. ‘They’re pretending something terrible has happened to him, something you caused, so Melia can claim on Kit’s life insurance.’
Something you caused. My heart rate accelerates and I think I’m going to be sick.
‘It’s a really great policy, as you can imagine, given who he works for. The basic payout would be well over a million.’
I put down my plate. ‘You think this because they withdrew a bunch of cash?’
‘Yes, you need cash when you go into hiding, you can’t go using cashpoints or contactless, you can’t do anything that can be traced to your old identity.’ Clare looks to Kelvin for confirmation and he gives a quick nod.
‘Old identity?’ The muscles in my cheeks are numb with shock. ‘I don’t understand.’
‘I know it sounds crazy, but Piers and I discussed it in depth and if you think it through, it adds up. They may have been planning it for some time, months probably. Your little fling with her might have been strategic – I assume she was the one who initiated it?’ Again, Clare glances at Kelvin, who this time looks down at his sparkling water. He has turned pink, but for a white zone at his hairline.
My mouth is so dry my tongue is sticking to the roof of my mouth. I peel it away to repeat, ‘Strategic?’
‘Yes, to create a motive for you to kill Kit. You said the police as good as accused you when they interviewed you. And you said you thought Kit suspected something about you and her. Well, I bet he’s known all along. It may have been his idea in the first place.’
‘Jesus, Clare.’ My senses are under attack: as well as the dry mouth and stiff face, there’s a burning sensation behind my eyes, a jangling in my ears.
She continues: ‘Think about it. It’s not a coincidence that you were the last person to see him – they planned it that way. Last Monday was the perfect night to do it, Christmas drinks, everyone wasted. It would have been easy for him to start an argument, make sure there was a camera nearby. The fact that you went off to Edinburgh the next morning was a bonus – it makes it look like you couldn’t get out of town fast enough. Meanwhile, Melia gets him into hiding and reports him missing to the police. Confesses to her affair, says she was scared you were jealous or possessive. She doesn’t even need to accuse you directly, it’s their job to put two and two together and you can bet your life they will. Have they been in touch since Friday?’
‘Yes.’ I gulp, straining to process her narrative, rattled off with a terrible ring of plausibility. ‘One of the detectives came round this morning.’
‘The police were here this morning? In the house?’ Her voice rises an octave. ‘That’s not a good sign, Jamie. This drugs thing is a total red herring, probably meant to lull you into a false sense of security. They’re playing you – Kit and Melia are playing you!’
I know when Clare’s convinced, and she’s convinced. Her intensity is infectious, making my pulse pound. I turn to Kelvin for a more balanced appraisal. ‘Tell me about this insurance policy. They don’t pay out on missing persons cases, do they?’
‘Not unless the insured person has been declared dead,’ he says, simply.
‘Don’t you get it?’ Clare cries. ‘People tend to get declared dead when someone’s been found guilty of their murder! And you don’t always need a body to prove it. We’ve seen it on those true crime shows, it can really happen!’ She is becoming upset, pulling furiously at the roots of her fringe until a strand of blonde hair stands on end.
I try to steady my breathing, wrench the momentum from her. ‘Let’s talk this through. You’re saying Kit’s faked his own murder and disappeared intentionally. Where do you suggest he’s hiding? Rio? The Costa del Sol?’
I’ve intended a level of sarcasm, but she answers me straight: ‘That’s a point, it would be good to know if his passport’s missing. The police would have checked that, right? Or he may be closer than we think, people often are when they go into hiding. You remember that guy who faked his own death in a canoeing accident? He turned out to have been living a couple of doors down from his “widow” all along.’
As I flush deeper, the wounds on my face smart. ‘You’re saying he’s still in St Mary’s?’
Kelvin, who has been chewing a fingertip, lets his hand drop and chips in: ‘I don’t know. There aren’t many properties you can rent for cash. And ten thousand pounds won’t last long in London.’
Clare’s eyes gleam as a new idea takes root. ‘What if they’re not paying? He could be squatting somewhere. We could start by checking the flats Melia has shown over the last few weeks; sometimes they’re empty for days at a time, even weeks. She could move him from place to place, tip him off if there was a viewing or cleaners coming in or whatever. For all we know, she took this job with this in mind. Set it all up and then looked around for a fall guy. She’s incredibly attractive, Kelvin. She could have targeted anyone and he’d have fallen for it. I’ll show you a photo on my phone . . .’
She could have targeted anyone: as Kelvin concedes Melia’s exceptional visual appeal (a wedding shot, I gather), the phrase rings in my ears, disturbs my equilibrium. I repeat my mantra: Trust me, Jamie.
‘The police need to check her phone,’ Clare adds. ‘See if she’s been communicating with an unknown number. Ask them, Jamie, when you next speak to them.’
‘Surely if she’d gone to these lengths she’d be using an untraceable pay-as-you-go?’ Kelvin says.
‘Maybe, but she’s not a professional criminal, she’ll make mistakes. Like the paper trail for this loan you’ve found, which is good for us. Good for Jamie.’ There’s a catch of tenderness in her voice, but she corrects herself quickly, remembering that we’re separated now, there is no ‘us’, and it causes a reciprocal pang in me. I was wrong to think she had any nefarious agenda in commissioning this investigation; only a very special person would have the grace to defend her cheating ex like this.
I sink my teeth into my lower lip till I’m close t
o breaking the skin. ‘I’m not sure, Clare. It’s a bit extreme. I mean, he must have had other options, mustn’t he? He could have applied for bankruptcy, for instance?’
‘Not if he wanted the insurance payout, he couldn’t.’
‘I really don’t think I was targeted,’ I say, absorbing an abrupt roll of emotion.
There’s brief silence. The air between Clare and me is charged, combustible.
‘There is another possibility,’ Kelvin says, with delicacy. ‘What if this isn’t an attempt to frame anyone, but just a long-term fraud that Jamie has somehow found himself tangled up in?’
‘Go on,’ Clare says.
‘Well, it’s true you’d get the payout more quickly if there was a murder conviction, but you’d probably still get it anyway, just later. It takes about seven years to get a legal declaration of death, according to my research.’
‘Seven years? Even with Kit working for an insurance company?’
‘Yes, I’ve looked at De Warr’s standard policy for employees and there’s nothing to suggest it would be paid ahead of normal schedules. It’s not like being in a plane crash, anything could have happened to him. The question is, is it worth seven years of living off grid?’
‘Exactly how much are we talking about?’ I ask. ‘Clare said over a million?’
‘It’s actually two, or near as dammit. The death in service cover adds a chunk. He’d really have to trust his wife, though. The cheque, when it comes, will be in the name of Melia Roper.’
Kit updated the details promptly then, I think. It seems a very long time ago, champagne in Greenwich, but it was little more than four months.
Clare inhales, her widening eyes signalling yet another brainwave. ‘I bet that’s why they got married. It validated the policy in some way.’
‘It certainly increases the payout,’ says Kelvin.
‘We have to tell the police about this.’ Clare’s all set to dash to the police station right away and my heart gives a violent kick.
‘It’s definitely a theory worth pursuing,’ I say. ‘Wow. This is a lot to take in.’
‘You’re not on your own,’ Kelvin tells me, by way of a conclusion, and I see that in spite of the talk of my ‘fling’, he assumes we’re still together. He admires Clare for defending her man with such energy and intelligence.
He gets up to depart. I hear them at the door, her reassurances that his name will not be invoked outside these walls, certainly not in any conversations with the police. I hunt in the fridge for another alcohol-free lager and when I return to the living room Clare’s on the sofa with her laptop. ‘What are you doing?’
‘I’m looking up a number for your guy on the St Mary’s Police website, but they don’t seem to list detectives, only PCs.’
‘I think they’re based at Woolwich, it’ll be a much bigger team.’ I move close to her, careful not to make physical contact. ‘Wait, Clare, before you put your name to anything, have you thought how you’ll explain how you got this information? I don’t want you getting in trouble on my account. I’ve already put you through so much, I don’t want your job to be at risk as well.’
She pauses. In a heavily regulated business like estate agency, the slightest hint of financial impropriety can lead to suspension, and colluding with a hacker is more than a hint. ‘You’re right,’ she agrees. ‘Maybe it’s better to send it anonymously. You know, like a tip-off. Let’s see if they have a special email address for that on the Woolwich site. Oh, good, they do.’
I peer over her shoulder, struggling to focus. ‘If it’s just some admin address, they might not see that for days. I’ll ring first thing in the morning and get DC Merchison’s email address. If you forward me Kelvin’s file, I’ll make sure neither of your names are on it before I send it on.’
‘Good plan.’ Her fingers move across the keyboard and my phone pings as the file hits my inbox.
‘Thank you,’ I say. ‘Thank you for everything.’
Whenever I say thank you now, she never says you’re welcome. Usually, she leaves the room, but on this occasion she is not finished. ‘When you speak to him, there was one other thing I remembered. About Kit.’
‘What?’
‘That photo they showed us when we went there for dinner. The one on the mantelpiece that Kit used for the coke.’
I take a swallow of my crap placebo lager. ‘Melia in Cat on a Hot Tin Roof? I remember. What about it?’
‘When we went round on Friday, it wasn’t there.’
‘I didn’t notice. Why’s that relevant?’
‘Just that, if he deliberately disappeared last Monday, if he knew he was never going to be able to come back, he’d have chosen a few sentimental things to take with him.’
‘He must have loads of photos of Melia on his phone,’ I point out, but she dismisses this with an impatient gesture. ‘You heard Kelvin, they’ll both have switched to something untraceable. He can’t go turning his old phone on, he’d be tracked. So he grabs the photo at the last minute, something familiar, something he can hold in his hand. It’s hard to isolate yourself, emotionally, I mean. You need things to connect you, especially in a long game like his.’
I try not to shrug. The missing photo seems an inconsequential detail to me. It could have been moved to the bedroom or one of them could have hurled it at the wall during one of their rows. But I don’t like the way Clare’s building a case. If she’s remembered this detail, she’ll remember others too. She’s a natural investigator.
‘Okay, I’ll mention it,’ I say.
Satisfied, she sets aside her laptop and stacks the glasses and plates, removing them to the kitchen. Freed from her scrutiny, I allow my expression to change from gratitude to horror.
I take out my phone and, instead of downloading the file to send to Merchison in the morning, I compose a text:
How are you bearing up? No need to reply if you don’t want to.
Then I select Melia’s name and hit ‘Send’.
Almost instantly, she replies:
I asked you not to contact me.
I close the thread, lock the screen, and toss the phone onto the nearest armchair, calling to Clare that I’m nipping out to get some cigarettes.
She reappears in the doorway. ‘Don’t think you’re smoking in here!’ she snaps.
‘Of course not,’ I reply, meekly.
Fifteen minutes later, having duly picked up a pack from Sainsbury’s Local, I arrive on the corner of Tiding Street. I wait for a couple at the far end to go into their house and turn on the lights, before I approach the Ropers’ door, head down, and ring the bell.
Melia opens up without revealing more of herself than a swoop of dark hair, fingers curling around the edge of the door. ‘I got your message. Obviously.’
‘I wasn’t sure you’d remember.’ But it’s a stupid thing to say because Melia remembers everything and our emergency code is hardly a minor detail. Messages in plain sight, that’s what we agreed. No extra phones to be discovered, no secret threads.
I asked you not tocontact me means ‘I’m here, come now’.
How are you bearing up? means ‘We have a problem’. (I hate you means ‘I love you’.)
‘So what’s up?’ she says, bringing her face into view. Her eyes shine, her skin glows. She has not been crying today. ‘What is it, Jamie?’
‘It’s Clare,’ I tell her, and the choke in my voice is like stage fright. ‘She’s on to us.’
36
30 December 2019
Neither of us speaks again until I’ve followed her up the stairs and the door is closed behind us. Without warning, she barges me to the wall, her face upturned, and begins kissing me very fiercely. I’m shocked by how powerful my response is: a leap in body temperature, a flaring of every nerve on the surface of me.
‘Your heart’s going nuts,’ she says, more in wonder than alarm. ‘Tell me what’s happened – she knows we’re together?’
For a moment I’ve forgotten Melia isn’t a
ware of the scene on Friday before we came tearing round here, or about Clare’s weekend flight to her family. ‘She does, yes, but that’s not the issue. What I mean is she knows about this.’
Melia takes a step back and we face each other across the narrow hallway. Her deep intake of breath is audible. ‘What?’
‘She’s dug up a whole load of stuff about your and Kit’s finances and she’s basically guessed. She wants to tell the police you’re trying to frame me for murder to get the early insurance payment. She’s worked it all out, Me, it’s incredible.’
Melia’s eyes are clocks, their hands spinning madly, too fast to track. ‘When did this happen?’
‘About an hour ago. She had this guy around to brief us. He’s a financial investigator she hired, and he used some dodgy hacker to get confidential data.’
‘What data? For fuck’s sake, why would she do that?’
To help me, I think. Because no matter what she claims, Clare doesn’t hate me. She loves me. ‘Because she’s a problem solver,’ I say. Also true. ‘She’s a lot more impressive than the detectives, I have to say.’
There is a pause. ‘But she hasn’t told them her theory?’
‘No, she’s literally just told me. I’ve said it’s better that it comes from me and I’ll email the file to DC Merchison. I won’t, obviously, but I’ll have to come up with something credible to fob her off. She’s invested money now, so she’ll want results. I’ll have to fake some sort of email from the police.’
As she listens, Melia’s shoulders relax a notch. ‘You don’t need to do that. The main thing is to delay it till after tomorrow. Tell her Merchison’s taken a couple of days off for the New Year and you’ll contact him as soon as he’s back. By the time that comes around, it won’t matter and she can tell him her theory herself if she still thinks anyone’s interested.’ She smooths her hair behind her ears. ‘To be honest, they’ve probably already considered it if they’ve done their own financial digging. How can they not? I told them we’re in terrible debt and De Warr will tell them what a great life insurance policy he’s got. If Clare can figure it out, they can.’
The Other Passenger Page 21