Don't You Dare

by A J Waines

  I laugh. ‘It sounds so sexist, but it’s not like that. Mum seems to think he’s going to “rescue” me, but I see us making an incredible partnership instead. A formidable team. Peter says I inspire him, make him feel like he can take risks and branch out. I make him creative, help him see possibilities, open his eyes and make him dream. It’s not all one way.’

  ‘Is it true love?’

  ‘I think so…’ I stop. ‘I’m not sure.’

  She shakes her head. ‘Your doubt is there for a reason, Pequeño. It’s too easy to make mistakes.’

  ‘That’s true. At the moment, there are too many gaps. I don’t know what he wants for the future – if we want the same things. I don’t even know where we’re going to settle. We’ve talked generally about stuff, but we haven’t made any proper plans. It’s all too open-ended, even for me!’

  I attempt to laugh, but it sounds hollow.

  ‘Trust your heart. If you’re not ready, he should respect you. If he truly loves you, he will give you space and time.’ She looks up gingerly. ‘Then you might need to speak plainly to your mother.’

  It’s the last bit I’m dreading the most. If I can’t go ahead with the wedding, how the hell am I going to tell her?

  I reach over, pull Maria’s hand towards me and kiss it. ‘Thank you.’

  ‘This is for the rest of your life, Pequeño, you have to be certain. Don’t let anyone push you into anything.’

  As we hug outside on the pavement, I realise I’ve done well. I’ve got through this close encounter with my best friend without blurting out the whole story. I also know her advice is spot on and I can no longer avoid it – I’m going to have to speak to Peter as soon as I can.

  29

  Rachel

  ‘Where the hell have you been?’ I ask, as Beth strolls in through the front door two days after waltzing off.

  ‘I’ve been at Peter’s place. I told you,’ she says, parking her trolley bag at the foot of the stairs.

  ‘I’ve been ringing his apartment. Why didn’t you answer?’

  ‘I’ve been out. Besides, I needed space to think, Mum. That’s why I went.’

  To get away from me, in other words.

  I clear my throat. ‘Have you spoken to anyone?’

  She strips off her jacket but doesn’t sit down. ‘I saw Maria, but don’t worry, we didn’t talk about…that.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Beth looks brighter I notice. There’s colour in her cheeks for a change.

  ‘I’ve been worried sick.’ I take a step towards her and she slides into my arms. We fold around each other in a firm embrace and I breathe in the herbal smell of her hair.

  ‘What have you been doing all this time?’ I mutter into her neck.

  ‘Saw a film, went for walks. I made a cake at Peter’s this morning.’ She dips into a plastic bag by her feet. ‘lemon drizzle cake – your favourite.’

  She hands me a plastic container.

  ‘Sweetheart…’ My throat clams shut, I can barely get the words out.

  I put the cake on the table and beckon for her to come outside. The sun is out, making the colours sharp as if the world has become three-dimensional all of a sudden. There’s no breeze for once, allowing the soothing rays to settle on my bare arms.

  ‘I’ve been sweeping the patio,’ I tell her, setting out the tattered deckchairs I’d propped against the shed. ‘Orange juice?’

  She nods and throws her scarf over the back of one of them. ‘And a piece of cake,’ she says, coyly, sticking her tongue between her teeth.

  I come back with a tray holding our refreshments, sit down and stretch back, shutting my eyes against the sun’s brightness. A faint smell of blossom floats over the fence from the neighbour’s shrubs. I’m emerging from a dark tunnel having been trapped for months. Everything is going to be fine.

  Beth reaches into her pocket and puts something on the table. It’s a new phone.

  I snatch a breath.

  ‘I got it yesterday,’ she explains, ‘It’s okay, it’s just a cheap one.’

  I try not to look uneasy. ‘Have you called Peter?’ I say, trying to keep the tremor out of my voice.

  ‘Not yet, but I’m going to.’

  ‘When we last spoke about the wedding, he said he was going to be out of range for…ages,’ I say, gulping down the panic in my voice.

  ‘Whatever…I’ll try in a while, then,’ she says, clearly disappointed.

  The mouthful of cake I was about to have has no appeal anymore. I’m flattening down the edge into crumbs, toying with it, when I hear the doorbell. Beth is nearest the backdoor and gets up. She comes back with all of the new colour wiped from her cheeks.

  ‘It’s the police again,’ she says, pitching her voice higher than normal in a bid to sound casual.

  We both go inside. It’s the same officers, but it’s PC Atkins who takes the lead, this time. PC Dean stays by the front door, but PC Atkins sits down, which unnerves me. It implies she doesn’t intend this visit to be brief.

  She has pale eyelashes, almost white, and her hair is beach-blonde and tied back. Several wisps have escaped from under her hat and are floating against her forehead like feathers.

  ‘There’s nothing to be alarmed about. We’re just conducting house-to-house enquiries. We’re in the process of putting together a picture of Mr Jacobson’s last movements and the final sightings of him,’ she says.

  I sit beside her while Beth sits on the pouf – the seat that’s furthest away.

  ‘To be honest, we’re a bit confused.’ PC Atkins glances down at her notebook and turns to address Beth. ‘Miss Kendall, you said you bumped into Mr Jacobson at Winchester train station at around 6.30 p.m. on Tuesday, March 7th, but didn’t recognise him, is that right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And you’ve had no other contact with him since you met him at a party in December?’

  ‘That’s right.’

  She takes a laboured breath. ‘No contact at all, before or after then?’

  Shit…

  ‘I don’t think so…’

  ‘Okay.’ PC Atkins turns to a fresh page in her notepad. ‘Can you tell us where you were between Wednesday evening, 8th March and Friday evening that same week?’

  Why is she asking this? What has happened to bring them back to us?

  I step in. ‘Are you allowed to ask these kinds of questions? I mean, shouldn’t we have a lawyer or something?’ I try to make my voice sound breezy, as though this whole set-up strikes me as a time-wasting exercise.

  Her head whips round to face me. ‘You’re free to ask us to leave,’ she says, pointedly, ‘but these are just standard questions as part of the house-to-house investigation.’ She stares at me. ‘Are you okay to continue?’

  ‘Fine,’ I say, nipping my lips together.

  PC Atkins repeats her question. PC Dean is poised to take notes.

  ‘I’m not sure,’ says Beth. ‘I’ll need to check my online calendar.’

  Good thinking, Beth – how many people know exactly where they were three weeks ago?

  She disappears to fetch the laptop, while I avoid looking at the officers.

  ‘Right,’ says Beth, resting it on her knees. ‘On the Wednesday evening I was here with Mum, having tea at about 6.30 p.m. and later, I went over to see my grandad in Abbot’s Worthy. I met a friend, Angie Wilton, on the way, in Conway St.’

  ‘What time was this?’

  ‘I bumped into her…er, it would have been just before nine o’clock. Then I caught the bus to Abbot’s Worthy.’

  PC Atkins glances over to the officer by the door. ‘That seems quite late to be setting out to pay your grandfather a visit. What made you go over at that time?’

  My fingers, folded loosely in my lap, twitch. Beth and I never did agree a reason for her late visit to see Adrian.

  I force myself to keep my hands still. I’m counting on Beth, praying she’s thought this through.

&nbs
p; ‘He’d…lost his watch,’ she says, drawing out the words. ‘My grandma gave it to him and he was distressed. He gets easily confused and upset about things and he’d rung to see if I could go over and find it.’

  A shiver of panic scampers down my back. Only Adrian didn’t ring up. If the police check our phone records they’ll find out he never made any call.

  Beth carries on, ‘I found it, but it was late by then, so I stayed the night.’

  ‘And the Thursday and Friday?’

  ‘I came back here on Thursday morning, did some work – research at home for a quiz show, then after tea, Mum and I watched Basic Instinct from about eight-ish,’ she points to the DVD in a stack beside the television. ‘After that, we went to bed.’

  PC Atkins draws a line in her notebook and Beth goes on to tell the truth about where she was on Friday. By then it was all over, although the police don’t know that.

  PC Dean is planted in front of the doorway like a bouncer. ‘Can you give us a brief rundown of where you were, Ms Kendall?’ he asks.

  I feel Beth’s eyes burning into my skin.

  I explain that I popped in to the King’s Tavern to change the heating on Wednesday evening, then used Marvin’s car to get a few items at the supermarket. Thankfully that’s not a lie and I still have the receipt, if they need to check. My DNA will be all over the pub, the cellar too, but there’s nothing untoward about that, given that I work there.

  I try to drop in as many alibis as I can for the forty-eight-hour window they’re investigating, including the time Jeremy from next door came in to ask about our water bill on Thursday afternoon.

  ‘He thought his statement was really high and wanted to compare it with mine,’ I explain. ‘Turned out he’d got a leak.’

  It all sounds ordinary and spontaneous to my ears and I expect them to be on their way, but there’s more.

  PC Dean eyeballs Beth. ‘We’ve checked Mr Jacobson’s phone records and on Monday 6th March, three days before he went missing, a call was made from a mobile phone registered to you, Miss Kendall, lasting four minutes.’

  No, no that can’t be right…I have to draw on all my energy to stop myself getting to my feet.

  PC Atkins is speaking again. ‘Can you tell us why you made that call, Miss Kendall? You said you hadn’t had any contact with Mr Jacobson.’

  Beth gives me a wary stare as she opens her mouth.

  ‘No wait a minute, officer,’ I butt in, ‘she lost her phone…’

  PC Atkins sighs. ‘When was that?’

  Beth is shaking her head, looking agitated. ‘No, that was later, Mum…I lost my phone last Saturday.’

  Something shrinks inside me. We’re making a complete hash of this.

  Beth leans forward and clears her throat. ‘I did ring him. You know what…I forgot. Of course, I did.’ She throws her eyes up. ‘I’d had something to drink and it slipped my mind.’

  ‘Right,’ says PC Dean, with a huff. ‘So you did call Mr Jacobson.’ He vigorously scribbles a few words in his little book. ‘Can you tell me why you called Mr Jacobson that Monday night?’

  ‘Peter, my fiancé, is friends with him and he’d said Mr Jacobson could be helpful to my career. That’s why he introduced me at that party I mentioned. I was feeling miserable one night – I’ve had a run of crappy auditions and I’d had too much to drink…’ she glances over to me looking guilty. ‘I rang him to see if he might have some advice for me.’

  ‘How did you know his number?’

  ‘Peter had given me his card ages ago. I still had it in my purse. He was busy when I called and didn’t say much. I asked him some dumb questions about acting and he fobbed me off with vague clichés. He was just being polite because he and Peter were friends. That’s why I forgot. It wasn’t worth remembering.’

  ‘Have you had any other contact with Mr Jacobson?’ PC Atkins asks, stabbing the tip of the pen on her page. ‘Think very carefully.’

  ‘No. I don’t think so…honestly.’

  She looks close to tears.

  ‘I think we need to finish, there,’ I say. ‘My daughter clearly made a mistake…she forgot.’

  PC Dean steps into the porch and PC Atkins gets up without a word. Only once I’ve opened the front door does she stop and turn to us. ‘We may need to speak to you again,’ she says sourly, as the other officer pulls down his jacket sleeves.

  I calmly close the front door after them and turn to Beth.

  ‘I’m sorry, I’m so sorry…’ she says, rushing towards me.

  She stops when she reaches me, unsure about whether a hug is going to be welcome. I fold my arms, blocking her, shaking my head. ‘I don’t believe this. You rang him!’

  ‘It was just the once.’

  I send my eyes to the ceiling, ‘Just the once…’ I grind my teeth. ‘Why?’ I know it wasn’t for the reason she claimed earlier.

  ‘To let him know I’d got the spare set of keys to the pub…to confirm Wednesday night.’

  For fuck’s sake…

  I stare at my slippers. ‘It’s not looking good, Beth, it’s not looking good at all.’

  ‘There’s something else,’ she says, fiddling with her lip.

  I lean back against the wall, my body limp, waiting for the next bombshell.

  ‘After I’d told the officers about my alibis, I realised about the buses.’

  ‘What buses? What do you mean?’

  ‘I said I saw Angie just before 9 p.m. and she’ll confirm that. But I can’t have got a bus to Grandad’s after that.’ I stand open-mouthed as she delivers the final blow. ‘The police will know I lied. The last bus to Abbots Worthy is at eight thirty.’

  30

  Rachel

  Saturday, April 8 – one week before the wedding

  Nearly a week has passed since the visit from the police and we’ve not heard anything about the alibi that doesn’t fit.

  Beth and I are expecting the efficient PC Dean and prim PC Atkins to come back any day with questions about the bus service to Abbots Worthy. I’ve primed Beth to say that she and Angie must have got the time slightly out – by about half an hour – an easy mistake. That’s the only way Beth could have caught the last bus over to Adrian’s.

  Peter sent me a text earlier in the week to say he had to catch an urgent flight out to Colorado Springs, an area of the US where the signal is notoriously poor. It meant he would be out of contact for a few days. A blissful breathing space, while it lasted.

  Beth’s new phone – the one Peter doesn’t have the number for – is sitting innocently on the arm of the sofa. He’ll be back in range by now. I both welcome and dread the time when Beth speaks to him again. On the one hand, I want her to reach out to Peter, to seal their intentions to be man and wife. But I also know their experiences of the last two weeks aren’t going to match up.

  In Beth’s world, she’s had no contact with him and in Peter’s, he’s had her letter, exchanged instant messages and spoken to her twice, catching up and sharing loving sweet-nothings.

  What a shambles.

  Knowing Beth was going to call Peter, I staged the discovery of her original phone, claiming I found it under the drawers beside her bed when I was vacuuming her room. There are stacks of calls she’s missed and I don’t want her to lose out on anything important. I’ve deleted everything between Peter and I.

  ‘But, I checked there,’ she said, defiantly.

  A few hours before her hen night is due to begin, she joins me in the kitchen, saying she’s finally spoken to him.

  ‘How was it?’ I ask, innocuously, as I’m dragging wet laundry out of the washing machine. The spin isn’t working properly.

  ‘Fine. A bit weird, actually.’ She sticks out her bottom lip. ‘He didn’t seem particularly surprised to hear from me or grill me about not being in touch. Not at all, in fact. I thought he’d expect an explanation.’

  ‘He must have been very busy with work, Beth. He told me he’s been all over the place; New York, Los Angeles, C
olorado…and don’t forget, I’ve been filling him in on how you’ve been.’

  ‘Yeah…I suppose…’ She looks pensive. ‘Odd though, he was talking about an instant message I sent him a few days ago, but I didn’t send any.’

  ‘Oh, I’ve had that happen before,’ I tell her breezily. ‘Sometimes old messages come through ages after they were sent or get repeated, for some reason.’ I bundle past her with the laundry basket.

  She makes a little ‘hmmm’ sound, but thankfully, with the party hours away she doesn’t have long to reflect on it.

  She goes to her room, puts the latest CD by Miley Cyrus on loud and begins her ritual of trying on clothes to find the best outfit.

  I get the closest to feeling relaxed that I’ve been for weeks. My daughter is communicating with Peter, managing to hold her nerve and she’s taking the next step towards her wedding. I’m about to open a bottle of Prosecco so I can take up a glass to her, when there’s a loud rumbling and she comes charging down the stairs.

  ‘It was Peter on the phone again. Nancy’s just been in touch with him.’

  ‘Who’s Nancy?’

  ‘She’s a snooty friend of Amelia’s…a real busy-body. She’s putting all kinds of ideas into Peter’s head!’

  I push the unopened bottle of cheap fizz to one side and get her to sit down.

  ‘There were photos from that party in December, when Peter introduced me to Carl,’ she says. ‘They were posted on Facebook at the time and no one paid much attention. But Amelia has been manically going through everything to do with Carl in the last few months and she’s been checking the pictures again. She reckons she’s found a shot that shows Carl and I in the background, looking suspiciously like we’re sharing a “moment” – and she’s told Nancy.’

  ‘And Nancy has told Peter,’ I add. ‘That’s kind of her.’

  She nods, blowing hair out of her face, looking hot and bothered.

  ‘What did you say to Peter?’

  ‘Oh, well, I denied it, of course. I said Amelia’s just looking for a reason for his death and she’s going to be clutching at anything and claiming it’s suspicious. But she probably knows by now that I called Carl that Monday night.’