by Mark Edwards
Glasses rattled in the dishwasher and a woman on the other side of the bar let loose a high-pitched laugh. Isabel refilled her glass. The wine was thick, like blood, and earthy. She could feel herself tipping over into drunkenness but she didn’t care.
Since his confession, and especially since Christmas, things with Darpak had improved. They’d talked a lot, been honest with each other, and she really felt now that it was going to work out. Their marriage might even be better for it. He seemed genuinely terrified of losing her. They had both pictured a future without the other and hadn’t liked it. That didn’t stop black clouds enveloping her at least once a day, though, the memory of what had happened knocking her off her stride. It had happened on the way over here, making her crave a drink to numb the pain.
‘So what happened?’ Isabel asked.
‘I went along and he was . . . well, he was completely different to how he was last time. He actually apologised, said that he’d been out of order that day. He asked me to pass on his apology to you as well.’
‘Hmm. And what about his other assistant, Amber? Did he explain why he was so touchy-feely with her?’
‘He said he was aware how it looked, and that he knew he could be overly tactile sometimes. He said it went with the territory, that they worked in a sexually charged atmosphere. She was there. She agreed with him and said it was no big deal.’
‘What? They’re saying I overreacted?’
‘I don’t know. All I can say is that I didn’t see any sign that Amber was unhappy and uncomfortable, and he was a perfect gentleman with me. He didn’t make any inappropriate comments, didn’t touch me, didn’t try to make me take any clothes off. He told me to keep on exactly what I was wearing: jeans, a T-shirt and my leather jacket. He spent half an hour taking my photo, another half an hour chatting about the industry, giving me advice, and that was it.’
Isabel bit her tongue, stopping herself from saying that he shouldn’t be congratulated for not being a sleaze on this one occasion. But maybe she had been wrong about him. Whatever, she had never seen Nina so excited. She had the same energy about her that Jess had had the other day, when she announced her pregnancy.
‘So what happens next?’ Isabel asked.
‘He sent the photos over to this modelling agency he works with. It’s one of the big ones. Anyway, they called Gavin straight away and now they want me to go in and meet them, and get Gavin to take some more pictures so I can put together a portfolio. I’m going back to his studio next week.’
‘And do you . . . want to be a model?’
‘It’s not something I’ve ever thought about, but why not?’
‘Well.’ Izzy beckoned the waiter over. ‘We’d better have champagne, hadn’t we? Even if it does mean I’m going to have to find a new assistant.’
‘Oh, Izzy, I’m sorry. It might not lead to anything . . .’
‘Don’t be silly. I’ll find someone.’ The waiter appeared and took their order, and when the champagne came Isabel raised her glass and said, ‘To dreams coming true.’
But as they clinked glasses she felt an itch of foreboding. She wished she’d never had anything to do with Gavin Lawson. She had witnessed his inappropriate behaviour, the way he abused his power. But she had a feeling that it was just the tip of the iceberg. That there was something dangerous about him, beyond what she had already witnessed.
Chapter 34
Jessica made her mother a cup of tea with two heaped sugars and left her at the kitchen table. As Jessica left, Pete came in with armfuls of shopping bags, and Jessica wondered what Mum would tell him. The revelation that Izzy had hoaxed them, and never admitted it, had hit her hard. She was glad Mum had someone else she could talk to.
Jessica went out to her car. Something Mum had said while Jessica was making the tea echoed in her head: ‘If this person, whoever’s been manipulating Olivia, wanted us to believe Izzy was murdered, why play all the games? Why not just get her to come out and say it? Why does Olivia keep saying “It’s a secret”?’
Jessica couldn’t answer that, but it didn’t sway her conviction. She would demand the answer when she found out who it was.
Because she was going to find them. Somebody had messed with her little girl’s head. Somebody had fucked with her family. When she found out who it was . . .
It was two o’clock. Jessica had a little over an hour before she needed to pick up Olivia. She sat in the car with the heating running, waiting for the condensation that fogged the windscreen to clear, wishing it was as easy to clear the confusion inside her head. She closed her eyes and fought to stay calm, to stop the murderous thoughts, the revenge movie that was playing inside her mind. Now was not the time to lose control. She allowed herself one thump of the steering wheel, and it made her feel a tiny bit better. But only a tiny bit.
She made a decision: it was time to tell Will everything. They were going to have to talk it through with Olivia together, try to get her to tell them who had been telling her all this stuff. Frustratingly, he had already warned her he was going to be working late tonight because they were launching a new website. Despite this she texted him asking if there was any way he could get home before Olivia’s bedtime and he replied immediately, saying, I’ll do my best.
Trying to work out a strategy for how they could get the information out of their reticent four-year-old, Jessica started the engine and drove out of the quiet cul-de-sac towards the main road. She needed to turn right but there was no break in traffic flowing in the opposite direction. She tapped her hand impatiently on the wheel, trying to creep forward, indicator blinking.
There, pulled up by the kerb on the other side of the road, was the grey car.
Her heart jumped. The car was idling, with somebody in the driver’s seat. The traffic was still flowing from the right. She froze for a second, tempted to jump out and run across the road to the Hyundai.
It pulled away.
She screamed with frustration and leaned on the horn, desperate to get on to the main road so she could follow. Nobody stopped, and the Hyundai was almost out of sight now, heading east, though it was being slowed down by the traffic too. Did the driver know Jessica had spotted him or her?
She wound down her window, tried to make eye contact with the drivers flowing from the right, aching with frustration. Let me out, you bastards. Let me out.
Fuck it. She stabbed at the horn and pulled out into the traffic. A black Volkswagen hurtled towards her, a middle-aged man behind the wheel. She saw his mouth open with alarm a second before he stamped on the brake. He screeched to a halt just two feet from her door and stared at her with shock that quickly turned to anger. But she didn’t care. A gap opened in the traffic on the far side of the road and she put her foot down and swung into it, ignoring the furious beeps from the vehicles she’d forced to stop.
By driving close to the centre of the road and leaning her head out of the window, she could see the grey car, four vehicles ahead. A gap appeared on the opposite side of the road and she swerved into it, leaning on the horn again. The driver in front stared at her with horror as she pulled alongside him, but he slowed and allowed her to overtake, just as a truck came roaring towards her.
Now she was three cars behind the one she was pursuing.
She had never done anything like this. Never driven recklessly. She barely ever entered the fast lane on the motorway. But this was what desperation and anger did. And it felt good. Terrifying but exhilarating.
She was going to catch them. She was going to get answers.
The traffic lights ahead turned red. For a horrible moment she thought the Hyundai was going to sail through and get away, but the car in front of it stopped. She contemplated getting out and running through the traffic to beat on the Hyundai’s window, to finally see who had been following her. But the lights changed quickly and they were off again.
Almost immediately, the grey car turned left into a quieter side road. Jessica followed, but as she entered this new stre
et she couldn’t see them. There were side streets leading both left and right. She slowed down, craning her neck. The road to the left led into a maze of residential streets. The right turn would take her towards the centre of Beckenham.
She took a gamble. If she were trying to get away from someone she would head towards the centre, where it was easier to get lost. She turned right, putting her foot down, not caring that she was breaking the speed limit. A white van reversed out of a driveway and she sped around it, almost clipping its rear corner, eliciting another long, angry beep. But there was the grey car, about fifty metres ahead. Surprisingly, they appeared to be sticking to the thirty-mile-per-hour limit. They must have thought they’d shaken her.
She increased her speed to fifty. It was a long straight road with little traffic and even fewer pedestrians. Run-down businesses lined the street, overflowing bins left out for the next morning’s collection. She was gaining ground. There was a junction ahead, and the grey car was almost there, so Jessica pressed down the accelerator, hitting sixty, knowing at the back of her mind that this was lunacy, but unable to stop herself. She was almost on the Hyundai now. It was still going at thirty. The junction was fifteen seconds away.
The Hyundai’s brake lights came on as the driver slowed down and prepared to turn left at the junction. This was Jessica’s chance. She pulled level with her quarry, thumped the horn and, in what she would later think of as a suicidal move, swung in front of the Hyundai just before the junction and slammed on the brake.
If the grey car had been going any faster than twenty it would have smashed into her. But it juddered to a halt, six inches away from her rear bumper.
Jessica threw herself out of the car. There was a buzzing in her ears, white noise, and she could smell rubber, could see dots in her vision. It seemed that she was watching herself do this, floating above her car, and it crossed her mind that she had crashed, that she was dead. She looked around wildly, expecting to see Izzy welcoming her to the afterlife.
The door of the grey car opened and a man got out. He was young, with short, prematurely thinning hair and glasses, unremarkable apart from the stunned expression he wore. This was him? The man who had been following her? She didn’t recognise him.
‘Who are you?’ she screamed, jabbing him in the chest.
He stared at her, open-mouthed.
She wanted to punch him, to slap the faux-stupidity off his face.
‘Tell me!’
‘I don’t know who you are,’ he said. He had an accent. Eastern European, she thought. Polish or Romanian. ‘Why are you—’
‘Shut up!’ She stepped closer, her face inches from his. The buzzing in her ears grew louder, like a kettle boiling on a stove. ‘Why have you been following me?’
He blinked. ‘I haven’t.’
‘Don’t lie! I’ve seen you. And my sister too? How did you know her?’ She could hear her voice getting louder but couldn’t do anything to control it. ‘Was it you? Did you kill her?’
He took a step back, sheltering behind his open car door. ‘You are crazy. I don’t know you. What are you talking about?’
She stepped around the door, ready to grab hold of him and demand that he admit it, and then she saw her reflection in his side mirror. She didn’t recognise herself at first. Her face was red and sweaty, her eyes bulging. She looked like a madwoman. A creature from a horror film. The young guy cowered against his car, looking over her shoulder, searching out help. But there was no one around except an elderly woman walking her dog who called across the road, ‘Is everything all right?’
And it broke the spell. Jessica felt like Snow White, coughing up the poisoned apple, coming back to life and reality. The Eastern European man came into focus and the truth hit her. This was the wrong grey car.
She backed away, whispering, ‘I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’
The man continued to stare at her as she sank down and sat on the kerb. He got back into his car, winding down the window. As he pulled away, he leaned out.
‘You need help,’ he called. ‘A doctor.’
Chapter 35
The elderly woman crossed the road tentatively.
‘Do you want me to call someone for you?’ the woman said.
All the adrenalin had drained from Jessica’s body. All she wanted to do was lie here, on the side of the road, and sleep. She could hardly feel the bitter wind that swept litter along the pavement. She didn’t want to move or have to deal with anything, with any of the shitstorm that swirled around her. She would just close her eyes and stay here until the bin men came and took her away.
The dog barked, shaking her out of her mortified stupor.
‘What time is it?’ Jessica asked, raising her face towards the woman. Her own voice sounded like it was coming from far away.
‘It’s half past two.’
Jessica pushed herself to her feet. Olivia and Felix. The school run. She was going to be so late.
She stumbled back to her car, leaving the woman and her dog staring after her, executed a three-point turn and sped away. She cringed, thinking about what she’d just done. She turned the radio on and up loud so it would block out the screaming in her head.
She collected Felix first. ‘Where were you?’ he demanded. ‘The school were about to call you. All the other children were picked up ages ago.’
She said sorry and led him up the slope to the early-years block. Olivia was, once again, the last child in the classroom. Maybe it would be a blessing for Olivia if social services came and took her away, Jessica thought. They can take her to a nice new family while I’m carted off to a padded cell.
Mrs Rose called Olivia’s name the moment she saw Jessica staggering up the path. The teacher looked almost as exhausted as Jessica felt. Ryan was clearing up the mess in the classroom. He looked in Jessica’s direction but she avoided his eye, embarrassed about being so late. Another thing that made her look like a bad parent.
Jessica took Olivia’s hand, leading her to the car.
‘How was your day, Livvy?’
‘Fine.’
‘What did you do? Wait, don’t tell me. You can’t remember.’
‘Mum,’ Felix said, ‘can I play a game on your phone?’
Felix got in the front seat with her mobile, immediately losing himself in Super Mario Run. As Jessica was fastening her daughter’s seat belt, Olivia said, ‘Mummy, do you want to play Scabble again when we get home?’
Felix snorted. He was in one of those annoying moods. ‘Scabble? It’s Scrabble, stupid.’
‘Felix! Don’t call your sister stupid.’ She lowered her voice to address Olivia. ‘Why do you want to do that?’
‘Because . . . Auntie Izzy wants to talk to you again.’
Jessica recoiled. She needed Olivia to stop believing she was being visited by a ghost.
She tried hard to keep the tremble out of her voice. ‘Sweetheart, if there’s something you want to tell me, you know you can do it anyway.’
Olivia frowned.
‘Like, if someone has been talking to you about Auntie Izzy, you can tell me. In fact, you should tell me.’
The frown deepened. ‘I can’t.’
‘Why not, Livvy?’
‘Because . . .’
Jessica waited, glancing at Felix to see if he was listening. The phone blasted out loud tinny music from the game and he seemed too absorbed to care about what his sister was saying.
Olivia shuffled in her seat. ‘Because if I do, Caspar will get sick and die.’
Jessica leaned further into the car. ‘Did someone say that to you? That if you told on them, Caspar would die?’
Olivia’s lower lip trembled.
‘Sweetheart, Caspar isn’t going to get sick or die. I promise. Hand on heart. Who told you that? Please, you have to tell me.’
But Olivia had gone pink, her eyes filling with water. At the same time, a white van came along the road and the driver sounded his horn, forcing Jessica to close the door. She got into t
he driver’s seat and was about to ask Olivia again, but the pinkness of her daughter’s face told her it would be better to wait till they got home.
As soon as they got into the house, Felix and Olivia dumped their shoes and coats on the floor. Felix headed to the kitchen to raid the cupboard and Olivia ran up the stairs to her bedroom. She knows I want to talk to her, Jessica thought. She was torn. She knew she had to go easy with Olivia, that if she pushed too hard her daughter would go mute. But she needed to know who’d told her Caspar would get sick.
She called up the stairs, ‘Would you like some ice cream?’ That would usually tempt Olivia down, but there was no response.
She went into the kitchen and found Felix eating a bag of crisps. Caspar sat at his feet, eyes fixed on the snacks, hoping one or two would drop.
‘Has Olivia said anything to you?’ she asked.
‘About what?’ Felix said through a mouthful of crisps.
‘About somebody talking to her about Auntie Izzy?’
He shook his head. ‘She never says anything that makes any sense.’
Jessica tutted. Sometimes she wished she’d had her children closer together, so they could be friends, but then remembered the age gap wasn’t by choice.
‘She’s only four, remember. You were her age once.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘Yeah, but I’m sure I never talked as much nonsense as her. Like, the other day she was going on about that necklace with the bat on it, saying she really needed it but you’d taken it away. She was, like, begging me to get it down for her.’
He hopped down from the stool he was sitting on and headed towards the fridge. Jessica blocked his path.
‘And did you?’
‘Yeah.’
So that explained how she’d got the necklace. Except . . .