Sticks and Stones

by Jo Jakeman

  CONTENTS

  Cover

  About the Book

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Title Page

  Epigraph

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  Twenty-Eight

  Twenty-Nine

  Thirty

  Thirty-One

  Thirty-Two

  Thirty-Three

  Thirty-Four

  Thirty-Five

  Thirty-Six

  Thirty-Seven

  Thirty-Eight

  Thirty-Nine

  Forty

  Forty-One

  Acknowledgements

  Copyright

  ABOUT THE BOOK

  Imogen’s husband is a bad man. His ex-wife and his new mistress might have different perspectives but Imogen thinks she knows the truth. And now he’s given her an ultimatum: get out of the family home in the next fortnight or I’ll fight you for custody of our son.

  In a moment of madness, Imogen does something unthinkable: she locks her husband in the cellar. Now she’s in control. But how far will she go to protect her son and punish her husband? And what will happen when his ex and his girlfriend get tangled up in her plans?

  Sticks and Stones is a deliciously twisting psychological thriller from an exciting new voice.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Jo Jakeman was the winner of the Friday Night Live 2016 competition at the York Festival of Writing. Born in Cyprus, she worked for many years in the City of London before moving to Derbyshire with her husband and twin boys. Sticks and Stones is her debut thriller.

  Find out more at www.jojakeman.com.

  For James

  Sticks and stones may break my bones

  But words will never hurt me.

  Traditional

  ONE

  The day of Phillip’s funeral

  I expected to feel free, unburdened, but when the curtains close around Phillip Rochester’s satin-lined coffin, all I feel is indigestion.

  Naomi perches on the front row, shifting uncomfortably as the congregation whispers at her back. There are creases under her eyes where cried-out mascara threads its way through the cracked veneer. I wonder what she’s crying for because, after all he’s done, I am certain that it is not for him.

  The vicar talked of a man who bore so little resemblance to the Phillip I knew, that I almost shed a tear. It is a time for lies and cover-ups, not truthful observations.

  I twist my wedding band with my left thumb. No engagement ring. ‘Too flashy, Immie. You’re not that kind of girl.’ Five hundred and forty-eight days have passed since Phillip left me. I know I should take the ring off, but no amount of soap can free me from the snare. Years of marital misuse have thickened my hands, my waist and my heart.

  I am sitting five rows back, in the seat closest to the wall, as befits the ex-wife. Though, in reality, am I his widow? We didn’t finalise the divorce. The paperwork is still on the sideboard along with the unpaid bills and the condolence cards. Fancy that. Me. A widow.

  Some might say I shouldn’t be here at all. Friends from my old life try not to stare at me but they can’t help themselves. When our eyes bump into each other there is a timid acknowledgement, an apology of sorts, before a gosh-look-at-the time glance at wrists and a scurrying for the chapel door. Nobody called when Phillip traded me in. They went with him into his new life along with the Bruce Springsteen CDs and the coffee machine.

  Mother sits by my side alternately tutting and sighing, unsure whether to be angry or sad. She promised not to speak during the service and, though the effort is nearly crippling her, she has kept her word. Her eyes burn holes into my temples. I know that her nostrils will be flaring like they always do when she is displeased. Mother tends to convey more through her eyes than her mouth, and I regret not telling her to keep those shut too.

  We disagreed on whether Alistair should attend his father’s funeral. She says that, at six years old, he is too young. I say that he should be here to say goodbye, to keep up the pretence that Phillip will be missed. Mother won. Some battles aren’t worth fighting. We wrote notes attached to helium balloons instead. Up, up and away. Bye-bye, Daddy. Rot in hell, Phillip.

  There are simple flowers at the front of the crematorium and Pachelbel’s Canon is piped in from an invisible source. Everything has been carefully orchestrated to whitewash the darkness of death and disinfect the walls against the smell of decay. A palate-cleanser, if you like, between death and the wake. Naomi has booked the function room at the Old Bell, but I won’t go in case the sherry loosens my lips and I smile a smile that shouldn’t be seen at a funeral.

  As the mournful parade passes us by, we file out of our rows with the order of service in hand. Phillip’s photograph on the front is a grotesque grinning spectre. It was taken before he was promoted to CID. A decade ago at least. I used to think he looked so handsome in that uniform.

  Mother stands in line to pay her respects to Naomi. It will be a brief conversation as high opinion is in short supply. My best friend, Rachel, is talking to DC Chris Miller with a red shawl fastened about her shoulders. She refused to wear black. As she rightly pointed out, black is a sign of respect. Both she and Chris held Phillip in the same regard. I’d hoped it would be Chris leading the inquest into Phillip’s death, but they’ve brought in someone from further afield. Neutral.

  I’m aware of Ruby behind me, though I am careful not to make eye contact with her. She is wearing a diaphanous frock of fresh-bruise purple, the most sombre outfit she owns. It’s the first time I’ve seen her wearing shoes. Usually barefoot, sometimes in flimsy flip-flops, it’s anyone’s guess whether this is a nod to conformity or she has simply come equipped to dance on Phillip’s grave. She sits in the back row, as far away from the coffin as she can get, and commensurate with her ex-ex-wife status. The first Mrs Rochester, the woman that Naomi and I have been measured against, holds an icy-white tissue under her nose, a pomander against the contagion of grief.

  I stand and edge my way past the eye-dabbers and the head-shakers until I feel the sun on my face and smell the freshly mown grass. I squint against the sudden glare and a treacherous tear escapes my eye.

  A stranger touches his cold hand to my elbow in a shared moment of I-know-how-it-feels, but how could he? There are only three of us here – Naomi, Ruby and I – who realise how satisfying it feels to know that Phillip Rochester got the death he deserved.

  TWO

  22 days before the funeral

  The Barn was one of those new-old houses. Only one storey, but never to be referred to as a bungalow. Large sand-coloured bricks and small dark windows with their frames painted National Trust green show that history has been given the once-over with a bleach wipe. Everything is reclaimed, sourced with the utmost integrity from salvage yards and auction houses. Old made to look new, and new made to look old.

  I’d never set foot inside The Barn. It was laughable that barns were des res rather than shacks for animals. Farmers made a fortune selling dilapidated sheds with planning permission, and I could think of no better habitat for Phillip and his heifer.

  I rang the doorbell and waited as the echo of the
bell chime ran off down the hallway. I adjusted my armour: handbag across my chest, leather gloves pulled tightly over my wrists, and my scarf wound about my neck like ribbons on a maypole.

  It wasn’t easy for me to see Phillip in his new life, in his new house, with his new girlfriend, but this wasn’t about me. This was about Alistair.

  We had agreed to be grown-up about the whole situation. Civil. For the sake of our son. But there was still the small matter of finalising the divorce, and it wasn’t bringing out the best in either of us.

  On paper, we would split everything amicably down the middle.

  For better, for worse.

  For richer, for poorer.

  In sickness and in health.

  Left to Phillip, I would be awarded worse, poorer and sickness while he got the rest. My solicitor said no one won by going through the courts. I told her, where Phillip was concerned, I couldn’t win anyway.

  Alistair hadn’t suffered when his father left us. In fact he might have felt life was considerably better. I know I did. Alternate weekends were conducted through clenched teeth and false smiles. Lately, however, Phillip wanted more than I was willing to give. More family time with Alistair and a woman who wasn’t family; more sleepovers where sleep was never had. The more he wanted to take, the less I wanted to give.

  With calls going unanswered and solicitor’s letters ignored, I’d agreed to have ‘a word’ with Phillip but, standing in front of The Barn as day tipped into night, I still hadn’t made up my mind which word it would be.

  I stretched out a gloved finger to press the bell again, when I heard a door open. Footsteps getting louder.

  The girlfriend answered the door wearing next-to-nothing. She was attempting to pass off a sash of denim across her hips as a skirt, and I wondered how high their heating bills must be. She folded her thin arms under her chest and leaned against the doorframe with a faint smirk tickling the corners of her mouth.

  Her long red hair was out of a bottle, but I suppose it suited her pale skin and brown eyes. I was transfixed by her eyelashes: so thick and long. Real? False? Questions that could just as easily have been about the woman. And the breasts.

  ‘Imogen. What a nice surprise,’ she said.

  She should’ve given her face fair warning before she spoke, because it betrayed her in her lie.

  ‘Hello, Naomi. Is he in?’ I asked.

  ‘Not back yet.’

  ‘Can I come in and wait?’

  ‘Does he know you’re comin’?’

  We looked at each other expectantly: her expecting me to go away, and me expecting her to find some manners, though my manners stopped me from saying so.

  ‘Come on in then, but you’ll have to tek off yer shoes.’ She spoke with an unfamiliar, difficult-to-place twang that suggested north of Derbyshire and sheep farming. Perhaps that’s why she felt at home in The Barn.

  Out of politeness, I told her she had a lovely home, and I wasn’t even lying. The house smelled white: of vanilla, and lilies, and bed sheets drying in the sun. Everything was cream or soft grey, giving the impression of moving through low-lying cloud. Beware of turbulence, I thought. Her head snapped to look at me and I wondered whether I’d spoken out loud and out of turn.

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ I said, ‘just beautiful.’

  She waited while I unzipped my boots. I saw her take in my odd socks and she seemed to grow two inches taller at the sight. I bristled, feeling shabby and unkempt beside her painted nails and stencilled eyebrows.

  ‘Renovations have been a chuffing nightmare. The beams,’ she pointed above our heads to the exposed rafters, ‘are the original beams of the local abbey. They reckon they used them to build the farm after the abbey burned down. There’s a conservation order on ’em. We had to get special permission to open all this up and, even then, we had to be dead careful what we did.’

  She’d adopted an air of false irritation, which belied her pride in her home.

  ‘Really?’ I said. ‘Fancy all that fuss for second-hand wood.’

  I took off my gloves and scarf, folding and pushing them into my Mary Poppins bag to get lost amongst the used tissues, old receipts and Pokémon cards.

  Even without her being a weekend stepmum to my son, and only half my age, and weight, I still wouldn’t have liked Naomi. People who didn’t know what Phillip was like assumed I was jealous. If I complained about him, they thought I was bitter at being thrown over for a younger woman; and if the tables were turned, I might have thought the same. I didn’t know Naomi, nor did I care to spend the time getting to know her. She’d be gone before long. From where I stood, she was shallow and self-obsessed. She was far too pretty to be a nice person, because the universe just didn’t work that way.

  Naomi made Phillip look good. She was the lover, the co-conspirator, the neon sign that proclaimed his dick still worked. To the outside world, Phillip had found love again after the breakdown of our marriage. Or slightly before, if you read his text messages when he left the room. I was a single mother gripping onto the final years of her thirties. Left behind. A solitary battered suitcase, doing another lap on the airport carousel.

  ‘Coffee or tea?’ she asked.

  ‘Is it filter coffee?’

  ‘Instant.’

  ‘I’ll have tea, thanks.’

  She held my gaze and blinked rapidly, eyelids tapping out Morse code for cow, then disappeared into the kitchen. I simply couldn’t help myself. I found it impossible to make life easy for her.

  The only drink I wanted was clear and served over ice, but how else would we survive awkward situations if we didn’t make tea to fill our time, hold tea to busy our hands and drink tea to stop our mouths from running away?

  I looked around the sparsely decorated room, my hands playing with the strap on my handbag. Phillip hated clutter. He was too embarrassed to bring people to our home because I could never elevate it to his standards. I wondered whether he had made me fearful of mess or whether I’d always had the tendency. Of course he was Phil nowadays. A reinvention. I wondered who he was trying to convince.

  On the beech table beneath the window were thirteen mismatched photo frames. Thirteen. I tensed. Good God, why were there thirteen? I picked up the picture of Phillip wearing a snorkelling mask and slid it into my bag between the folds of my scarf. Twelve. Far better. A curved, round and gentle number. My shoulders loosened and the flow of anxiety in my chest reduced to a mere trickle.

  I smiled to myself, pleased that I had diffused a potentially difficult situation. The therapist had taught me some breathing exercises, but sometimes it was easier to remove the problem entirely. The last thing I needed was to have a panic attack in front of The Girlfriend.

  I looked at the remaining, even-numbered photos. Phillip and Naomi on a beach, at a wedding, kissing dolphins. Naomi as Catwoman and Phillip as a plump Batman. It had been his standard party outfit through the years. His crime-fighting persona had always been important to him. Phillip had what I liked to call a hero-complex. He failed the tests to become a firefighter, and his poor attendance at school – and even poorer grades – barred him from the RAF and, though the uniform wasn’t as seductive, the police force was good enough.

  His job had even brought the lovely Naomi to his door. He’d told me about the woman who laughed uncontrollably when he caught her speeding. He’d implied that she was a dotty old dear who shouldn’t be driving, rather than an attractive adolescent who shouldn’t be making sheep’s eyes at another woman’s husband.

  Traffic violations usually went one of two ways. Either the drivers came up with excuses: lateness; not seeing the signs; wife in labour; dying parent. Or they accused him of being a jobsworth; of conning innocent people out of their hard-earned money; asking why he wasn’t out arresting real criminals.

  But the woman at the wheel simply threw her head back and laughed.

  ‘Do you know why I stopped you?’ Phillip asked.

  ‘Because I’m an idiot?’

 
; ‘This is a thirty-mile-an-hour zone.’

  ‘I weren’t doing thirty,’ she said.

  ‘What’s so funny?’

  ‘There’s no point denying it, is there? That’s the end of me licence too. I’ve been collecting points like there’s no tomorrow. If I don’t laugh, I’d cry.’ I didn’t find out until much later that he’d let her off the hook by suggesting he might have accidentally captured the speed of the car travelling behind her. Of course she couldn’t wait to thank him, and there’s only one thing that Phillip finds as satisfying as getting the bad guy, and that’s getting the girl.

  Naomi slithered into the room, her footsteps absorbed by the plush carpet.

  ‘Tea,’ she said, placing the cups on the pristine mirrored table. No grubby fingerprints from a small child or ring marks from cups and glasses.

  ‘Thanks. I was just admiring your photos.’ I placed my body between her and the table so she wouldn’t notice one was missing.

  ‘Why?’

  The question threw me. Why? Because I’m nosy? Because I want to know if your life is better than mine?

  ‘I don’t really know,’ I said. ‘They’re nice, aren’t they?’

  She shrugged and sat heavily on the sofa. I perched opposite her and smiled.

  It was the first time Naomi and I had been in the same room without Phillip circling us like a lion around his pride. I could have got some things off my chest. I could have launched into the wronged-wife routine. It would have been a good time for Naomi to apologise to me. Not that I minded her having Phillip, he was her problem now, but common decency should have pricked her conscience into addressing the tension between us.

  Phillip and I should have brought our relationship to an end years ago, but I clung to the dream of the childhood that had been denied to me. I’d grown up without a father and I didn’t want Alistair to do the same. Some people call me stubborn, I prefer ‘determined’. It wasn’t the breakdown of our marriage that bothered me. I didn’t look upon it as losing a husband but gaining a nemesis. One more person to consider, when I was hardly a people-person at the best of times.