Off the Record

by Rose, Alison

She felt his question vibrating through his broad chest. ‘That’s a great way to release tension,’ she laughed softly determined to keep it light.

  ‘Yeah. But it does create a whole new kind of tension,’ he replied, moving his body against hers. She felt his hardness against her belly. ‘Do you feel what you do to me, babe?’

  ‘I told you before not to call me that, Brand.’

  He chuckled softly and nuzzled her neck. ‘Yeah I know. I couldn’t resist. Sorry. I can’t think straight when you’re this close.’

  Kate moved, breaking the contact between their bodies. She couldn’t deal with his desire right now. She sighed with relief when he seemed to understand and he stepped away, taking hold of her hands.

  ‘Is life ever going to calm down again? I can hardly remember what it was like before I met you.’

  ‘I hope so, Kate. I really do. But every day something comes up that has to be dealt with. It comes with the territory.’

  ‘All the time?’

  ‘Pretty much. Not always this serious, y’know? But there’s always something. You have to learn to deal with it. The choices are: embrace it, and turn your whole life into a photo opportunity; adapt, and learn when to smile for the camera and when to run like hell; or become a hermit and give up on life.’

  ‘So, this is a time to smile for the camera?’

  ‘You got it,’ he nodded. ‘If we let him run with the picture, it takes the pressure off our parents for a couple of days. It could get a bit hot for the two of us, though. Can you handle it?’

  ‘Hmmph! I can handle anything that windbag throws at me! And when I win the Pulitzer Prize writing for another paper, he’ll be sorry!’

  ‘That’s my girl!’

  Kate was torn between accepting that she was his girl, or calling him on it. But maybe this wasn’t the time for a confrontation – look where it had got her a few minutes ago! Perhaps now was the time to run like hell.

  ‘I’ve got to go.’ She pulled away. ‘The others will be waiting. We’ve got a movie to watch, apparently.’

  ‘I’m coming with you.’

  Kate gave him a relieved smile. ‘Good. You can hold my hand during the scary bits.’

  If the police officers at the Devizes Divisional Headquarters were surprised to see the two women escorted by an American celebrity and his burly security men, they made no comment. In the normal course of things, both women would have baulked at being surrounded and herded like sheep, but since the fire neither of them was inclined to protest.

  In fact, right now the only time Kate felt truly safe was when she could see and feel Paul beside her. Maybe it was something to do with the fact that he’d saved her life. But while she and her mother had been called to see the CCTV film, his presence, together with security manager Jake and one of his best men made everyone feel better.

  They were shown into a large meeting room where the tapes from the garage CCTV system were loaded into a video machine. The garage owner had helped the investigating officers to set the tape at a few minutes before the suspect arrived.

  ‘At least we don’t have to sit through hours of watching people paying for their petrol and newspapers,’ muttered Kate as the TV screen filled with the grainy interior of their local petrol station.

  ‘We’d just like you to watch and tell us if you recognise anybody on the screen, please, ladies.’

  It was all very routine at first. Then Alex sat forward.

  ‘Mum? Who is it?’

  ‘Isn’t that one of your old classmates – Hannah someone? She used to live over at Ford, I think.’

  Kate stared at the young woman paying for some milk. ‘Good grief! Hannah James! Lord, she’s put on some weight since we left school.’

  ‘Ladies, we need you to look for someone with a petrol can,’ the detective interrupted.

  Jake smothered a laugh with a cough. Kate grinned at him, welcoming the moment of light relief. Her mother looked sheepish.

  ‘Sorry, officer,’ she apologised. ‘It’s just that I recognise most of the people who’ve been on the tape so far. It’s a small community, you know. I just hadn’t seen young Hannah for a while, and it took me by surprise.’

  ‘That’s all right, Reverend. Carry on please.’

  More customers came and went, some known, others not. None of them caused any ripples of alarm. And then a stranger came in and picked up a petrol can.

  It was difficult to see whether it was a man or woman at first. Whoever it was wore a baseball cap and a loose sweatshirt over nondescript jeans. But as the clerk rang up the sale, the stranger looked up.

  ‘Son of a bitch!’ Jake surged to his feet. ‘Hold it right there!’

  The image was immediately frozen on the screen and Kate gasped.

  ‘I know that woman! She was in Manchester when Mum was pushed.’

  Paul swore. ‘God dammit! Who the hell let her out?’

  Everyone turned to face him except Jake, who was reaching for his phone. ‘I gotta let the boss know about this.’

  Kate felt a chill run down her spine at the expression on Paul’s face. It was as though he’d been turned to stone. She wasn’t even sure if he was breathing.

  The detective in charge stood up and confronted Jake. ‘Actually, sir, if you know who this person is, it’s me you need to be talking to right now.’

  ‘I’ll tell you everything I know, man, no problem. But that woman poses a serious risk to my boss, so the quicker I tell him about this, the better.’

  Kate felt the cold chill of dread spread and surround her as she turned back to the screen and looked again into the grey eyes of the woman they’d encountered outside the arena in Manchester.

  ‘Who is she?’ she asked.

  Jake held up a hand for silence as his call connected.

  ‘Yeah, boss, it’s me. It’s not good. You’d better call the guys together. Some damned fool let Roxanne loose.’

  Paul walked out of the room. She could see him lean against the wall outside, breathing hard.

  ‘Should we go after him?’ her mother asked.

  She shook her head. She knew instinctively he needed to be alone for a few minutes. His shock had been palpable. Instead she pointed at the image on the screen.

  ‘Roxanne?’ she asked quietly.

  Alex shrugged and shook her head.

  ‘Has Johnson mentioned a Roxanne?’

  ‘No. He hasn’t mentioned any women, not even Paul’s mother.’

  ‘We’ve got her on tape buying a can of gasoline from the local gas station,’ Jake continued his report. ‘Your guess is as good as mine. She could still be around here, or she’s heading for you.’

  Kate felt her mother tense beside her. She put a hand on her arm. ‘Don’t worry, Mum. Now we know who she is, it’ll only be a matter of time before she’s caught.’

  ‘But she almost killed you, Kate. What kind of a person would do that? Goodness knows I’ve seen and heard a lot of things as a priest, but I’ve never …’

  Kate drew her mother into her arms as the older woman began to cry quietly. ‘Hush, Mum, it’s OK. I’m OK.’

  ‘No it’s not OK, darling! I nearly lost you, and now this woman might be going after Johnson as well!’

  ‘OK, boss. Yeah, no problem. They’re safe with me. You take care of yourself, and we’ll see you soon.’ Jake ended the call.

  The next hour was a nightmare as the detective arranged for them all to give their statements separately. Kate hated to leave her mother alone when she was so distressed, and she was worried sick about Paul. His silence, his agony frightened her. But the detective in charge was already unhappy that Jake had reported to his employer before speaking to the police about what he knew, and quickly allocated everyone to a different policeman and interview room.

  Finally they were free to leave. Paul still said nothing as he directed them into the car, grim-faced and alert. As soon as the doors closed, the car moved off. Kate snapped on her seatbelt, aware that Paul had settled himself
on the other side of her mother. It hurt that he hadn’t sat by her. Right now they both needed some comfort.

  ‘Paul?’

  He cut her a glance. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Who is this woman, and why is she doing this?’

  ‘Not now, OK?’

  ‘Yes, now! Don’t you think Mum and I have a right to know?’

  ‘She’s right, Paul,’ Jake commented from the front passenger seat. ‘They need to know.’

  Paul closed his eyes. ‘Sure, OK. You do it. Tell ’em the whole damned, sick story,’ he sighed, turning away to look out of the window, cutting himself off from the conversation.

  Jake turned in his seat to face them, grim-faced.

  ‘She’s bad news, Kate. She once worked for Johnson as his housekeeper. Over a few months some of Johnson’s personal stuff went missing – nothing valuable, just photographs, clothes, books.’ He shrugged. ‘No one realised what was going on at first, but then one of my guys got friendly with Roxanne and he noticed a couple of Johnson’s shirts in her closet. When he challenged her, she said she’d been sleeping with the boss.’

  Kate cast a brief glance at her mother. Alexandra kept her clear gaze on Jake. Well, if her mum wouldn’t ask, she would! ‘And was she?’

  Her mother blinked and took a deep breath, as though bracing herself.

  ‘Hell, no!’ He looked apologetically at Alexandra. ‘Sorry, ma’am, I mean heck, no. The boss don’t mess with the hired help. Roxanne was sick. She was convinced she was having a hot affair with Johnson, and she was the Dream Woman, and he was going to marry her. But the truth was that he was hardly home, and when he was he treated her the same as everyone else.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  Jake grimaced. ‘It wasn’t pretty, I can tell ya. Johnson got his stuff back and let her go. He didn’t press charges, just told her to go.’ He shook his head, disgusted. ‘That was our first mistake. Within a week she’d tried to kill one of my guys in a hit and run. He was lucky – just a few bruises. It took us months to track her down. And in the meantime that crazy damned … sorry, ma’am… Well, she’d caused havoc. Made Johnson and Paul’s lives he … um …’

  ‘It’s all right, Jake,’ Kate said drily. ‘She’s heard worse. So Roxanne made their lives hell. Just get on with it.’

  He rested a beefy arm along the back of his seat and rested his chin on it. Kate thought he looked tired and fed up. She could relate to that. Add scared, and feeling helpless to the mix, and you could bottle it and sell it as Kate Armstrong’s life right now. It seemed that everyone she cared about was under threat from this woman. She badly needed to feel Paul’s strength right now, but it was as though he’d left the car. He sat motionless, refusing to look at her, completely cut off from all human contact. And the more she heard about the murderous Roxanne, the more she worried about his reaction. She’d once researched post-traumatic stress disorder for a piece she wrote on soldiers returning from Iraq. Paul was showing classic signs of a man in the grip of past trauma. She wanted to hold him, but he was too far away, physically and emotionally.

  ‘OK,’ Jake went on. ‘She started a stalking campaign. Wherever Johnson went, she was there. We still can’t figure out how she knew where he was, but she always found him. She sent letters, emails; she called him on the phone. Sometimes she’d talk, sometimes not. The woman was crazy. We got restraining orders. The cops picked her up a few times, but this was before the latest stalking laws were passed. Until she hurt someone, there wasn’t a lot they could do.’

  ‘She hurt someone?’ Alexandra looked worried. Kate felt her tension rise another notch.

  ‘No, but she tried,’ Jake answered, looking grim. ‘Paul was at college. We thought he was OK, because Roxanne seemed focussed on his dad. But when she couldn’t get to Johnson, she decided to go after Paul.’ He paused, looking from Kate to Alexandra and then to Paul. ‘You OK with this, man? If you don’t want me to …’

  ‘Don’t even think about stopping now, Jake,’ Kate interrupted. ‘Paul’s already told me the basics, but my mother doesn’t know, and she should. That woman has caused havoc, over the past few weeks, what with muggings and text messages and now the fire. She could have killed us so I’d say we’ve got a right to know everything, don’t you?’

  ‘Kate, please!’ Alex shuddered.

  ‘Sorry, Mum, but you know what I mean. If this Roxanne is still out there, and she’s including us in her shenanigans, then we need to know what she’s capable of.’

  ‘I think we have a pretty good idea, darling, but I know what you mean.’ She gave her daughter’s shoulder a squeeze and looked across at Paul, her worry evident. ‘Paul?’ she asked.

  For a moment Kate thought he hadn’t even heard. But then he nodded. ‘She’s right, Jake, tell her.’

  ‘Yeah. Well, she turned up at Paul’s college with a knife.’

  ‘Oh, dear God!’ Alex exclaimed, horrified.

  Kate closed her eyes. She’d suspected this was coming. This Roxanne was same woman who had attacked Paul, and now she’d tried to kill her! Had she thought Paul was in the vicarage too? Was Roxanne still trying to kill him? Was he as scared for her as Kate was for him?

  ‘It’s OK, the kid’s fast. She didn’t touch him. Paul and his friends jumped her, got the knife away and held her, kicking and screaming until the cops arrived.’

  ‘We thought it was over,’ Paul spoke at last. ‘Roxanne was committed to a psychiatric hospital. She should’ve gone to jail.’

  ‘How long ago did this happen?’ Alex asked eventually.

  ‘Well, Paul was eighteen,’ Jake answered. ‘That must be more than ten years ago. Long enough for us to miss the signs, when things started going crazy here.’ He shook his head, his expression grim. ‘Man, what I’d give to figure out how she got out and followed us over here without anybody knowing about it.’

  ‘You don’t think it was a coincidence she met Mum and I in Manchester, do you?’

  ‘I don’t know, Kate. Maybe. But how would she make the connection?’

  Kate shrugged. ‘She could have read one of my columns and then found out what I look like – there’s probably a shot or two of me on the internet if you look hard enough. Or she might have been hanging around near the band and seen me with the crew. I don’t know.’

  ‘We’d have spotted her if she was around the band,’ Jake disagreed. ‘Even after all these years I recognised her on that tape.’

  ‘Do you think it was Roxanne who pushed you?’ Jake asked Alexandra.

  ‘It’s possible, I suppose. But why?’

  The answer came to Kate, like a light being switched on in her brain. ‘Because you’re the real Dream Woman,’ she said. ‘The woman who broke Johnson’s heart. It’s easy enough to work out if you’ve got the basic facts.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Paul. ‘And you look just like your mom did at the time.’

  ‘Oh, man!’ Jake shifted round in his seat and began punching numbers into his phone. ‘Coincidence or not, as soon as Roxanne spotted you gals, you were marked. Now we’ve gotta work out whether she’ll keep coming after you, or if she’ll go for Johnson again.’

  ‘Or Paul.’ Even with her mother sitting between them, she felt his tension rise. ‘If I look like Mum, we can’t discount the fact that Paul looks just like his dad. Maybe she’s getting everyone mixed up.’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t help thinking that if she really is as mad as everyone thinks she is, how come she’s managed to get to England and do everything we think she’s done? She must be getting help, but how is she convincing someone to give it to her?’

  ‘She’s crazy, but she’s not stupid,’ said Paul. ‘Her family has money, and she’s smart. Working for my dad as a housekeeper was a means of getting to be with him. As to who is helping her, I’d sure like to know that myself. I can’t believe any of our guys would be dumb enough to do anything like that – it would be professional suicide. They’d never work again.’

  ‘Well, someone close to you mu
st be helping her,’ said Kate.

  ‘Will this nightmare never end?’ asked her mother.

  It’s only just beginning, Kate thought. She could see that this latest development was sending Paul into retreat again. Just when they needed each other most.

  Chapter Thirty-two

  ‘Were you ever going to tell me about Roxanne?’ Alex pinned his dad with her gaze.

  Johnson closed his eyes. He was pale and drawn, his handsome features ravaged by the stress of the situation.

  ‘She was history. Until Jake identified her on the tape, we thought she was locked up for good.’

  ‘So you never intended to tell me?’

  ‘There was no point,’ he shrugged.

  ‘No point? Of course there was a point!’

  ‘That’d be my fault, ma’am,’ said Paul quietly. ‘No one talks about it, because I didn’t want them to.’

  Kate’s mother went from angry to repentant in a moment. ‘Of course. It must have been awful for you, Paul. And for you, Johnson. I’m sorry. It’s just that this is all such a shock. I’ve been face to face with this woman. And last night … if Paul hadn’t … my Katie, she could have …’

  Kate moved to comfort her mother, but Johnson got there first. He wrapped Alex in his arms and let her weep.

  Kate’s expression made Paul’s heart break. He wanted to gather her up too, to feel her safe in his arms. But he was still reeling. The old feelings of isolation and unreality were threatening to overwhelm him. He put out a hand, Kate took it. He couldn’t figure out if it was her hand or his that was trembling.

  ‘Hey now, it’s OK, my love,’ Johnson soothed. ‘You’re safe. Kate’s safe. We’re all OK. I won’t let anything happen, I promise.’

  Paul felt as though a nuclear explosion was detonating in his head. He dropped her hand. ‘Dad, don’t!’ His terse words caught everyone’s attention. ‘Don’t make promises you can’t keep. She’s out there somewhere, and she won’t quit. As long as Alex and Kate are with us, they’re not safe. We should to send them away until this is all over.’

  Kate laughed.

  She laughed!

  ‘If you think I’m leaving now, Brand, you’ve got another think coming,’ she declared, sounding stronger than she had since the fire.