Jamie sat still for a moment, in thought. Then he stood and disappeared into the bedroom. He returned within seconds. ‘On Friday,’ he said, ‘I got home just before you did. I went into the bedroom and took off my shoes.’ He raised his hand and opened his palm. An object on a leather thong dropped and dangled. ‘Then I found this on the floor.’
Sara looked up. When she saw what was swinging in front of her, she was surprised to feel her whole body relax. Relief washed through her. In fact, she felt almost giddy. She reached up and took in her fist Eldon Carson’s papier mâché Eye-in-the-Pyramid pendant. Sara realised that she had subconsciously been dreading this moment ever since she had moved back to London two-and-a-half years ago. It was true that she’d had no idea that video images of her from the day Rhodri died existed, but this – this she had been waiting for. Still, Sara had not spent much time considering what she would say if Jamie ever found the pendant, and had certainly never entertained any thoughts about getting rid of it. But now Sara understood how much stress its concealment had caused her. Now that stress was gone.
In a soft breath, the first thing she said was, ‘You’ve damaged it.’
Jamie looked down. His anger seemed to drain away, leaving only puzzlement. ‘What?’
Sara held it out. ‘You must have rubbed it. You’ve worn off the gloss. And look – the edge has crumbled away.’
Jamie reached for it to have a closer look, but Sara pulled it back. She held the disk protectively. ‘It’s only papier mâché,’ she added.
The calmness of her response, and maybe her wistful reaction to the damage, appeared to increase Jamie’s confusion. He really didn’t seem to know how to respond. Still, Sara had only bought a moment of flummoxed silence. She would need to tell him something. But what? Was she willing to admit to her clandestine relationship with Eldon Carson in Aberystwyth – a secret conspiracy Jamie might view as a kind of treason? More than that, one that would add another layer of complicity to her visit to her dying brother’s house. Could Sara find the strength to explain that she was, in fact, psychic?
That wouldn’t be strength, she thought. It would be foolishness.
If anyone had asked Jamie whether Sara believed in psychic powers, he would have said no. She had once told him that most people who claimed to have them were either deluded or lying. In fact, at one time, Jamie would have been likelier to accept the existence of psychics than Sara was, even with all of her academic knowledge of the occult. No – she couldn’t tell her partner any of her deepest secrets. They were much too strange. Too far removed from the Sara Jones Jamie thought he knew, and maybe even loved. Such knowledge would have the strength to shatter their relationship. Before Jamie had time to ask Sara where she had got the pendant, she spoke.
‘I made this,’ she said quietly.
Jamie’s blank expression shifted slowly into something like disgust. ‘You made it? For God’s sake, Sara – why?’
Sara lowered her gaze, licked her lips, and thought rapidly. She looked back up towards him, and actual tears welled in her eyes. Even though she was about to lie, she didn’t need to fake her emotions.
‘That’s the question, isn’t it?’ she said in a trembling voice. ‘Maybe before you climb on your high horse, you might try to answer it. For you, Aberystwyth was nothing more than another investigation – and maybe, as a bonus, the chance to reconcile with me. But for me, Jamie … for me, it was linked to so much more. To my home, to my childhood community, to my best friend – and even to my parents’ murders. And in case you’ve forgotten, it all ended with my brother’s suicide. That summer in Aberystwyth cast a different light on everything I’ve ever experienced. And if there’s one image that symbolised the whole of what happened, and whatever it all meant, it is this. This bloody Eye-in-the-Pyramid that the killer made his own.’
At some point in her speech, they had locked eyes. Jamie’s were guarded, watchful. Waiting for her to go on. To explain. To justify.
‘If you could ever understand that,’ she said, ‘you’d realise why I had to run to London after Rhodri was attacked. And, afterwards, why I couldn’t bring myself to explain what I’d seen.’
‘You recreated the killer’s symbol because you watched your brother die?’
‘I made it so I won’t forget. Believe me, it’s a tempting option – to accept everything I have now and not look back.’ She lowered her eyes. ‘But I need to remind myself of where I’ve been, and what has changed.’
Sara dangled the damaged pendant by its leather thong. ‘I am a psychiatrist,’ she added. ‘I know about confronting the past. If I choose to use this awful symbol to do that – to make sure I never slip into some sort of self-satisfied dream state – then who are you to say I can’t?’
Jamie was silent for a long while. Sara was surprised that – even though she had meant to deceive, or avoid, or at least to distract – much of what she’d told him had been true. Especially about her desire to forget. The idea that she could find some sort of cosmic reset button to take her back to a time before Eldon Carson was alluring. It would be wonderful to lose all memory that she had ever been psychic, and not to be plagued with uncertainty over any vision that flashed before her mind’s eye.
‘It’s going to take me time to work out what I think of all this,’ Jamie said.
‘Of course,’ Sara agreed. She reached out and brushed her fingers lightly against his thigh.
‘And I can’t do it here,’ Jamie added.
Sara stopped mid-stroke. ‘What?’
‘I think I’m going to leave for a while,’ he said.
‘To go where?’ she asked.
‘Somewhere I can think,’ he said.
Jamie backed away from her reach. ‘This past week, we’ve been going in different directions,’ he explained. ‘You don’t want me working with Vos – and I think I want to.’
‘Vos,’ Sara said with more vehemence than she’d intended, ‘just tried to threaten me.’
‘That’s not how I see it,’ Jamie said. ‘He was pointing out how vulnerable your carelessness has made you. He was showing you how useful he can be. You need to decide if you can accept that.’
He turned towards the bedroom, to pack. ‘And I need to decide if I can accept …’
Jamie looked about the room, focusing on nothing. ‘If I can accept all this,’ he concluded.
FIFTEEN
In Holly Lodge, the smell of a fried breakfast still hung in the air. It mingled with the ubiquitous odour of disinfectant and, today, a waft of lilac blossoms through the sunroom’s half-open window. Down the hall, a woman wailed. Not, Jamie guessed, for a particular outcome, but from some existential dread. He flipped through a several-months-old copy of the Oldie, trying to distract himself from that noise, as well as the clatter of dishes in the dining room, and the myriad other individual cacophonies that echoed through this residential home’s corridors.
Before long, a new tone joined the soundscape – Jamie heard Doris-the-nurse’s voice murmuring words of encouragement in the hallway. The sound was accompanied by the rustle of fabric and the occasional clack of a walking stick against the wall. ‘Goddamn it, let go of me. I can walk,’ he heard his father say.
Doris made a dubious hum. ‘You can fall over, too,’ she said. ‘You want to do that?’
Doris led George into the sunroom holding his arm, her hand underneath his elbow. When they stopped, she placed her hand around George’s back, resting it on his hip to steady him. George looked to Jamie and rolled his eyes. ‘It’s like we’re dating,’ he muttered.
Jamie smiled at Doris. ‘You make a lovely couple,’ he said.
‘Jesus help me,’ Doris replied, and eased Jamie’s father into a chair. ‘He’s all yours,’ she sang, and retreated swiftly.
‘You’re speaking quite clearly today, Dad,’ Jamie observed.
‘Where’s your mum?’ George asked.
‘I didn’t tell her I was coming. I wanted to talk to you alone.’
George frowned. ‘She ill?’
‘Mum never gets ill,’ Jamie said. ‘She’s healthy as a horse.’
It was Wednesday morning, and Jamie had spent the night in a nearby hotel. Although his mother’s cottage was close to the nursing home, Jamie had not wanted to visit. He knew that choice would have led to her presence here, this morning – and Jamie had wanted to be alone with his father. ‘This is about me, Dad,’ he said. ‘I wanted to ask your advice.’
George Harding frowned, as though his son might be playing a trick on him. Jamie explained that he had been financing his law degree by doing some consultancy for a defence company. This alone seemed to raise Jamie in George’s estimation – he nodded seriously and leaned forward in the floral-patterned chair. ‘So, what’s the problem?’ George asked.
Jamie explained that he was involved in a business transaction that wasn’t entirely legal. He thought it might be a test, he said, to see how he would handle himself in such a situation. Jamie assured his father that the level of illegality was minor, and that he personally was in little danger. On top of that, he said, he did not intend to continue working on the wrong side of the law, even with the support of a major defence company. But in this instance, he thought it best to go along with the plan, and establish a reputation as a trustworthy player.
‘No danger?’ George clarified.
‘I don’t think so. I’m really just relaying messages from one party to the next.’
‘And it’s well-paid?’
‘It is.’
George blew air from his cheeks. He used his right hand to ease his troublesome left arm into a more comfortable position. ‘You said they’re testing you,’ he noted.
‘I think so.’
‘And you need the money, right?’
‘Sure.’
George Harding pondered, wiping a fleck of spittle from his lips with his good hand. Finally, he said, ‘Nobody gets hurt?’
‘No.’
‘OK,’ George said, leaning back in his chair. ‘Then I’ll ask again. What’s the problem?’
Jamie sighed. ‘My partner.’
George furrowed his brow.
‘My girlfriend,’ Jamie clarified. ‘The one you have the photo of.’
He explained to his father that Sara had qualms about the arms industry in general – and, specifically, about Jamie’s involvement in illegal deals. He did not tell him how, yesterday evening, he had fled the flat with no intention of going back any time soon. Nor did he tell George how he had switched off his phone because Sara had rung several times in the night, and Jamie had found it too painful to keep declining her calls.
‘You’re the only person I know who’s had to face this,’ Jamie said. ‘When you were investigated by the Met, how did Mum react?’
‘Fine,’ George said curtly.
‘Really?’
‘Your mother’s supportive. Always has been.’ George Harding’s eyes drifted away from Jamie and looked into the distance. Something in them softened. ‘Did she know about it before I got caught? I don’t know. I told her we could afford to send you to that school, and she chose to believe me.’
Jamie brushed his hair from his eyes. ‘Sara’s not like that. She always needs to know the truth.’
George shrugged. ‘Not always a good thing.’ He arched an eyebrow. ‘You love her?’
Jamie hesitated. Of course he did – but it was more complicated than that. Finally, he gave a short nod. He did not say that, recently, Sara had been hiding things from him, or that he was beginning to doubt he knew her as well as he’d thought he did.
‘Well, I don’t know what to tell you,’ George sighed. ‘She sounds like a do-gooder to me. You know, the self-righteous sort. Holier-than-thou. If you love her, then, hell – you’re going to have to put up with that. But you’ve also got to do what you think’s right. Life’s not black-and-white, you know – not the way people like your girlfriend seem to imagine it is.’
George Harding looked down, and added, ‘Sometimes you do the wrong thing for the right reasons.’
Jamie nodded. ‘Thanks, Dad. You’ve helped.’
‘What are you going to do?’ his father asked.
‘Take some time to think,’ Jamie replied.
‘Smart,’ said George.
Jamie stood, and told his father he’d ask Doris to help him back to his room. George asked for a wheelchair – he was feeling tired.
‘And, Jamie,’ he added, ‘Keep coming to see me, OK? We don’t talk enough.’
Jamie said he would – and for the first time ever, he meant it.
Sara had spent the last hour of Wednesday morning in Ellen’s office, discussing the ways in which the housing requirements of a client interacted with his mental health needs. It had felt good; wrapping herself in the routine of work was like placing a soft gauze over Jamie’s absence. There were so many things that could have caused Sara to feel out of control if she allowed them to distract her. Far more than simply not knowing where Jamie was. She could have worried about whether her explanation about the pendant had been enough to waylay his suspicion and disgust. Worse, Sara could have felt unbalanced by the sudden shift in power Gerrit Vos had achieved over her. If she had truly allowed herself to confront that reality, she knew she would fall into another spiral of self-recrimination – Why did I tell Vos what I knew about South Africa? And why did I trust Andy to keep his mouth shut?
As Sara walked along the dank basement hallway towards her own office, she met her fellow counsellor, Rohini. In the fluorescent glare, Rohini met Sara’s eyes with quivering compassion. ‘Sara, I’m so sorry,’ she said.
Sara blinked, and adopted a neutral expression.
‘If you want to talk about it,’ Rohini went on, ‘I have some time.’
‘Wonderful,’ Sara said. She realised she could not maintain a charade of comprehension. ‘Talk about what?’
For a moment, Rohini’s expression blanked, then she blushed. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry,’ she breathed. ‘I didn’t realise that you …’
Without warning, she moaned and clasped Sara in a tight hug. Sara held herself awkwardly, staring at a spot on the wall where a patch of old plaster had crumbled away.
‘Find Jo,’ Rohini said softly into her ear. ‘Talk to her. Then, if you want someone to share with, you’ll find me in my office.’
Rohini detached from Sara, holding her at arm’s length, and offered a sad-but-reassuring smile. ‘A little heart-to-heart, na?’ she said.
She turned and fled down the hallway. Sara watched her go, then cocked her head. What on earth was wrong? She concentrated …
And an impression washed over her in answer. It felt as real as the crumbling plaster, and far more solid.
I have just lost my job.
Sara felt certain of it. And yet, the mere idea was ludicrous. She’d had no warning that anything was wrong here at the clinic. In fact, things had seemed to be going very well -
It’s Vos, her senses told her. He’s leaned on Andy.
Of course he had. Andy’s company funded Sara’s position, for goodness’ sake. And it was at the beck and call of Thorndike Aerospace, its biggest client by far. When push came to shove, Andy’s loyalty to Sara could never outweigh the health of his business, nor the wellbeing of the people who relied on his paycheques.
Sara noticed her pulse was racing. She forced herself to breathe slowly. Why get upset about being sacked? Money wasn’t an issue, she told herself. In fact, she had always been willing to offer her time for free; it had been Andy who’d insisted her job come with a salary. If Andy had withdrawn his funding, Sara could always offer to work as a volunteer. Then Gerrit Vos would have no control over what she did with her time.
Although, Sara sensed, Jo might have some qualms about accepting charity from an employee she had just let go. Sara began to consider alternatives: maybe she could take a break, let things calm down, and then return after a suitable pause. That seemed a good plan. It would give her time to s
ort out the other, many, looming problems in her life.
Sara, you’re getting ahead of yourself, she thought. Jo hasn’t even sacked you yet.
Then, as Sara walked the final few steps to her office, she felt her phone vibrate. She thumbed the icon and looked at the screen. On it was a text from Nicole. It read, Gerrit says you’ll get a message from him soon.
Sara snorted grimly and opened her office door. When she found Jo sitting sad-faced in the chair next to her desk, she wasn’t at all surprised.
Within three hours of Jamie’s telephone call to Gerrit Vos, both men were outside the Green Street flat. Jamie took a step backwards and looked up. He hadn’t even known Thorndike had a place like this. He found himself wondering whether Sara knew about it, before stifling the thought. ‘I wasn’t aware you were in Hampshire this morning,’ Jamie apologised. ‘You didn’t need to come all this way so quickly. I could have wandered the West End for a while, or even got a hotel room.’
‘Don’t be an idiot,’ Vos interrupted bluffly. ‘I said you could ring yesterday evening. Frankly, I was expecting it.’
Jamie did not mention he’d spent the night in Kent, or had sought his father’s opinion before dialling Vos’s number. He had rung from Holly Lodge’s car park, and Vos had given him the Mayfair address. Jamie hadn’t arrived at the building’s front door too long before Vos. As soon as Vos got there, he asked where Jamie had parked. Jamie said his Range Rover was in the Park Lane car park, and he hoped the old banger felt special – it was costing him twenty pounds an hour. Vos gave Jamie a resident’s permit. ‘Rescue your car as soon as you can,’ he advised, ‘or Andy will need to pay you more just to cover your parking.’
Despite what he’d just said, Vos immediately led Jamie upstairs. Jamie got a brief tour of his new, temporary home – where the linen was kept, where the thermostat was. ‘I won’t be here long,’ he promised as they moved from feature to feature. ‘I’m just giving Sara some time to think.’
‘Stay as long as you like,’ Vos said, turning on the bathroom tap. He tugged the plunger that switched over to the shower. ‘As I said last night, it’s the wise choice.’
Blind Spot Page 17