DEAD SECRET a gripping detective thriller full of suspense

by JANICE FROST

  He would try to accept what she had done — and she knew he would try quite hard, for Richard was at heart a weak man, desperate for love. However much he tried, one day, sooner or later, the words would tumble out, “You’re not the woman I thought you were.” Nancy was tired of keeping her secret. She longed for someone impartial to guide her through the moral uncertainty that had beset her throughout all the years since Amy had come into her life. She wanted someone to tell her, once and for all, that she had been right — or wrong; for she was ready to be judged, even harshly, in return for some moral clarity.

  Nancy closed her eyes and kneaded her forehead with her knuckles. It was still early in the day but she had awoken with a dull headache that was sucking away any promise the day might hold. The clock on her bedside table glowed distractingly. Eleven thirty. She had risen at five, unable to sleep, and sat in the living room watching the news. She found the repetition of the same stories over and over again oddly comforting, even though she could not concentrate on the content.

  At six, when Richard came downstairs, she had pretended to be asleep. He kissed her lightly on the cheek and crept from the room, leaving the TV on. To her surprise, he had not returned to kiss her again before leaving for work. She had hoped he wouldn’t, because she didn’t like deceiving him, yet she couldn’t help her prick of disappointment.

  In the kitchen, she found a note saying that he would stay at his own house for a couple of days to give her some space. Tears stung Nancy’s eyes at the thought of the pain she was causing this kind-hearted man whose love she didn’t deserve.

  Now, lying on her bed in a mid-morning slump, she wondered whether she would bother to move before he returned. In two days’ time would he find her still lying there, weighted to the mattress by grief and self-pity?

  Someone was knocking on her front door. Nancy stood up, a sudden cramp knotting her calf and she rubbed the back of her leg vigorously for a few moments, growing irritated when the sound persisted. She made it to her bedroom window in time to see a deliveryman retreating down the garden path, a long rectangular box tucked under his arm. Flowers. From Richard, no doubt. She watched guiltily as the man took the package next door, wishing she’d gone downstairs in time to catch him. Now her nosey neighbour Maureen would have another excuse to come knocking and prying.

  The light from the window made her eyes ache and the pain in her head was getting worse. She took a couple of painkillers and lay down again, hoping to sleep but, underneath the pain, her mind was intent on remembering.

  The last time Nancy had seen Amy alive, her daughter had come to ‘In Stitches,’ to meet her for afternoon tea; they’d gone to the new patisserie and, as always, Amy had ordered the most expensive items on the menu. Nancy didn’t care; she was happy to see Amy, happy to pay to spend time in her company.

  Amy had been wearing a smart designer dress and an expensive-looking gold and coral necklace which she claimed was a gift from a boy she had dated a couple of times. She didn’t reveal much about him, except to say that he was a student in her year and that he had wealthy parents who gave him a generous allowance. They had only dated two or three times before Amy called it a day.

  Nancy hadn’t commented, except to admire the necklace, but she had wondered about it; however generous the boy’s parents were, buying such an expensive gift must have left him out of pocket. Nor was it was the sort of gift you gave someone after a couple of dates.

  Amy had been wearing the necklace the night she was killed. For the time being, it was in the possession of the police in a plastic evidence bag along with the other items that her daughter had been wearing that night. Eventually it would be returned to Nancy, which was not right; Amy was supposed to inherit Nancy’s riches, not the other way around.

  At last the mildly analgesic effect of the painkillers began to kick in, and Nancy felt a faint, chemically-induced glow of well-being numb the edges of her depression. Sleep would come now, deep enough, she hoped, to obliterate all sense of pain, past and present.

  Perversely, she lay awake, obsessing over the past. Since Amy’s murder, she kept experiencing her past like a victim of post-traumatic stress disorder, in random flashes that shocked her with their intensity. It was like the nightmares she had suffered when she first moved to Shelton, which had lessened with time, as her carefully constructed story about the past began to seem real to her. She thought again of the night Debbie had turned up at her door, bruised and beaten, and the aggressive way Debbie had warned her off contacting social services. Knowing the care system as she did, that would be the last thing Nancy would do. She knew that the only way she could keep Peter and Emily safe was to continue to be involved in their lives, acting as a safety net between their inadequate parents and the pitfalls of state care.

  After that night, and Debbie’s revelation that she had abandoned her children to the violent Wade, Nancy looked upon Debbie’s estate as a moral void, a place where you could act according to your own sense of right and wrong. Nancy was only twenty; her moral sense was inchoate. She grew to believe that, in her case at least, the ends justified the means. Now Amy’s death had resurrected all the old doubts and thrown her moral compass out of kilter.

  “I’m sorry,” Nancy whispered — to Amy, to Debbie Clark’s ghost, to the girl she had been, but most of all, to Richard, for she now knew what she had to do to put things right.

  * * *

  A small crowd had gathered on the pavement where the emergency services were parked outside the entrance to the house where Becci and Amy had shared a home. Ava looked up at the first floor window, flinching at the sight of Nancy’s pretty handmade curtains, the thought of all those lovingly stitched cushions, the carefully chosen rugs. The house had absorbed so much tragedy in such a short time, and yet it looked so cared for. The path leading up to the door was weed and clutter free, the door itself recently painted a fresh sky blue, the brass fittings polished to a sheen.

  Neal parked his car in front of the house next door, behind the gaping doors of a waiting ambulance. A paramedic greeted them with a sombre expression as they stepped out of the vehicle. Two uniformed officers standing sentinel at the gate, shuffled out of the way to let them through.

  “What happened here?” Neal asked.

  “Cleaner found two bodies in the back bedroom when she came by to clean the flat, sir. One male, one female, believed to be Rebecca Jones and Gary Reid. She’s inside having a cup of tea with PC Dale. Says she didn’t touch anything, just saw them on the bed and knew they were dead so she phoned 999 straightaway. Dale got here first but by then Mrs Pringle, the cleaner, had attracted the attention of a couple of neighbours. None of them’s been inside, sir, so the scene hasn’t been compromised.”

  Neal nodded approvingly. ”Good work.”

  Inside the house, someone, probably Dale or one of the other officers had cordoned off the stairs with crisscrossed tape. Neal and Ava ducked under the tape and took the steps to the bedroom two at a time. No doubt one of the constables would already have made notes, but Ava was jotting down her own observations.

  The most obvious detail was the absence of violence. Nothing in the room appeared to have been disturbed. There was no sign that anyone but Gary and Becci had been in the room. The couple lay intertwined on the bed, Gary’s hand clasped around the TV remote control, but the set had been turned off — not with the remote, or it would have been on stand-by.

  “Someone turned the TV off,” Ava remarked. “The cleaner? These two look like they were watching it and fell asleep.” It wasn’t quite true, then, that the scene was uncompromised.

  “Cause of death,” Neal said, walking over to the gas fire, an out-dated, utilitarian-looking model placed in front of an original tiled fireplace. “Carbon monoxide poisoning? Judging from their appearance.” He checked the switch on the fire; it was turned to the off position; a window sash had been thrown open to admit fresh air.

  They found PC Dale and Mrs Pringle drinking tea in the
kitchen. Mrs Pringle was pale and quiet; not the sort of woman who made a fuss, it seemed. She answered Neal and Ava’s questions calmly and without drama. Yes, she had turned the TV off. Ditto the gas fire ‘on account of the smell of gas.’ She had also opened the window. No, she hadn’t touched anything else; no she hadn’t noticed anything out of place. How did she know that Becci and Gary were dead? asked Neal. She replied that she, ‘just knew,’ which was as good an answer as any. That, and the fact that they hadn’t responded to her wake up calls.

  “Was this an accident?” Ava asked, when she and Neal were safely out of earshot across the hallway. “The fire could have been tampered with. Maybe someone had a reason for wanting to shut these two up. The same someone who murdered Amy.”

  Neal looked sceptical, “They’re not necessarily connected. We have to explore all the possibilities, Merry. Including the one that suggests these deaths, even if not accidental, have nothing to do with Amy’s case.”

  “Becci and Gary were hiding something from us that day we interviewed them.”

  “We can’t be sure of that, either,” Neal said, “and even if they were, it wasn’t necessarily anything to do with Amy. People are often nervous around the police.”

  “Bit of a coincidence, though, isn’t it, sir? Even you have to admit that one.”

  “Even me?” Neal answered, sounding amused.

  Before Ava could make an embarrassed apology, he cut her off. “You’re wrong if you think I lack imagination Sergeant. I’m not a pedant. I’ve just learned by experience to rein in my initial responses — which may be the same as yours, by the way. Only difference is, I’m far too aware of all the instances of cases crashing because somewhere along the line, someone closed their mind to other possibilities.”

  Ava tried not to let her frustration show in her face, but she was not good at dissembling. From her point of view, she had been doing exactly what Neal was saying; opening her mind to all the possibilities. As if reading her thoughts, or, perhaps, her damaged ego, Neal added,

  “Of course the cases may be related. You’re right to bring it up. Look, I just want to be sure that you don’t become one of those detectives who single-mindedly pursues an idea to a disappointing end up a one-way street. There are enough of those types on the force already, and you’re so much better than that.”

  Coming from Neal, this was a sort of compliment and Ava accepted it as such. She didn’t look for praise from her DS and she knew he didn’t dispense it for its own sake. If there was a connection between the deaths, they’d find it. If not, then, she’d have other theories at the ready.

  They were distracted by a sudden banging on the door, and the pathologist walked briskly into the hallway, dressed, casually for him, in a pair of jeans and a zip-up hooded fleece.

  “What have you got for me this time?” Ashley Hunt asked, in his usual high spirits, which deflated within seconds of catching sight of the victims through the half open bedroom door.

  “Aw guys, not more kids?”

  “We don’t select your clients, Ash.” Neal said, dryly. They waited while he made a preliminary examination of the couple.

  “I think there’s little doubt we’re looking at carbon monoxide poisoning,” he concluded after only a couple of minutes. “Look at those rosy cheeks — dead giveaway, if you’ll excuse the pun. Victims always look like they’re glowing with health.” He glanced over at the windows, “I see someone’s already taken sensible measures.”

  “Thanks, Ash. I appreciate your arriving so promptly. I know you were on a day off.”

  “I wasn’t far away,” Hunt answered. “My favourite coffee shop is just around the corner and I had my bag in the car. Only too glad to help, if it means you catch the bastard who’s preying on all these young kids.”

  Ava glanced at Neal. Seemed like Ashley Hunt was drawing the same conclusions she had about the killer. Neal didn’t correct him. They watched as Hunt departed, pausing for a friendly word with one of the constables guarding the door, who apparently was his wife’s friend’s son. Hunt was one of those affable people who seem to know everyone.

  “Let’s treat these deaths as suspicious until we have confirmation one way or the other,” Neal said briskly.

  They spent the next half hour searching through the house. Becci’s room was freakishly tidy. Books were arranged on shelves in alphabetical order, nothing lay on the carpet except a pair of fluffy pink slippers, which had been placed side by side near the bed; it held no clutter, and no personal touches. It was a Spartan room that seemed to scream its lack of personality.

  “No knickknacks or photographs, not even any make up lying about. Becci’s tidiness borders on the obsessive,” Ava observed.”

  Neal walked over to Becci’s wardrobe.

  “Take a look at this,” he said, whistling. Inside, the rail was crammed with designer clothes and shoes.

  “Wow,” Ava said, pulling out coat hangers at random. “She didn’t buy these in Primark — Prada, Gucci, Stella McCartney. Who’d have thought our little mouse Becci had such expensive taste in clothes? And look at this, the majority of them are BNWT.”

  Seeing Neal’s look of puzzlement, she clarified, “Brand New With Tags.”

  “Are all these Becci’s?” Neal said, a look of incredulity on his face.

  “I’m guessing they were Amy’s,” Ava answered, holding a Nicole Farhi dress up and posing in front of a long mirror on the back of the wardrobe door.

  “Suits you,” Neal remarked. Ava made a face and returned the dress to the rail.

  “What makes you think they were Amy’s?”

  “Remember how Amy was dressed when we found her? Think how Becci was dressed when we interviewed her the day after Amy’s death — this is more Amy’s style than Becci’s.”

  She went on, “Do you reckon Nancy Hill gave permission for Becci to have these? I reckon she didn’t even know her daughter had such a well-stocked wardrobe of designer gear. I bet Becci cleared Amy’s wardrobe out before Nancy even had a chance to look. Probably just after we turned up to interview her that day — remember she said Amy’s bedroom door was locked and we didn’t bother to check?

  She probably kept what she liked and put the rest on eBay. Maybe that’s what she and Gary were uneasy about the day we interviewed them. Should be easy enough for our tech guys to check if she’s been selling stuff, by looking on her laptop.”

  Neal nodded. “Expensive jewellery, expensive clothes. Nancy’s business is doing well, but she’s hardly a FTSE 100 contender. So where was Amy getting the money from to finance her designer lifestyle? Who or what was she involved with?”

  There was a name on the tip of Ava’s tongue, but she wasn’t about to say it aloud. Christopher Taylor had a sound alibi for the night of Amy’s death.

  “I’ll have Becci and Gary’s bank account details checked out, sir.”

  “Amy’s has already been scrutinised. There was no sign of any deposits other than an allowance from Nancy, which was generous but not enough to pay for all of this,” Neal said, running a hand along the line of garments on the clothes rail.

  “Looks like she was spending it as fast as she got it,” Ava remarked. On an impulse, she crossed to Becci’s bed and stuck a hand under the mattress. Her arm disappeared up to her elbow as she slid it along the bed.

  “Eureka!” she cried, tugging a creased manila envelope out and waving it in the air. The contents spilled out across the bed, a flurry of different coloured notes.

  “There must be a grand here if not more. No wonder Becci and Gary were uneasy about having a couple of cops in the house. This was Amy’s money, I’ll bet, along with the clothes. I’m beginning to wonder if Becci’s concern when Amy went missing was motivated by self-interest. She was certainly quick to capitalise on her friend’s death.”

  “Was Amy involved with someone other than Professor Taylor?” Neal asked, “A sugar daddy?” Ava wrinkled her nose in distaste at the term, but it was a possibility. Then a th
ought occurred to her.

  “Do you think it’s possible she was blackmailing someone, sir?”

  Neal pursed his lips.

  “The obvious candidate would be Taylor but on what grounds? If they were in a sexual relationship, Taylor wasn’t breaking any laws; they were both consenting adults. At most it would have been an abuse of his position of power and may have been a disciplinary offence, depending on what view the university takes of such affairs. It’s a moot point, anyway. Taylor has a cast-iron alibi for the night of Amy’s murder.”

  Back to that, Ava thought, unhappily. She said, “Supposing Becci knew Amy was blackmailing someone and she decided to carry it on after Amy’s death? If the person Amy was blackmailing killed her, why would he stop at Amy?”

  Neal didn’t dismiss her theory. Instead, he reminded her that they didn’t even know whether Becci and Gary had died as a result of a faulty appliance or deliberate tampering. In her mind, Ava was convinced it wasn’t the former, but she reined in her impulse to rush to a conclusion without proof. As Neal had reminded her, the worst thing a detective could do was close her mind to other possibilities. Things were not always as they seemed.

  * * *

  That evening, in the quietness of her secluded cottage, Ava sipped a second glass of wine and ruminated on the events of the day — and on the nature of her relationship with Christopher Taylor. There were five messages from him on her smartphone, asking when he could see her again. So far, she had been stalling him, saying that she was busy with the investigation and had no free time, hoping that he would work it out eventually. God knows, he was smart enough in every other sense, surely even someone with an ego as massive as his would click eventually that she wasn’t interested.

  Except, it wasn’t that simple, was it? Ava’s mind returned to the night she had spent in Taylor’s bed. However much she disliked the man, there was no doubt that he pushed all her buttons sexually, damn him. Even as her reason told her he was not a good bet, her body was betraying her with subtle feelings of arousal as she pictured the way she had last seen him, his long lean body wrapped in his exquisite Egyptian cotton sheet.