But by Degrees

by Kit Eyre

  They mumbled agreement and stepped towards the door in unison. Only when it clicked did I sway on the spot. I had to brace myself on the filing cabinet.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ I asked Harriet.

  ‘Sit down.’

  I sagged into the nearest chair, barely aware of her leaving the room. Instead, I pressed my head into my hands, beads of sweat drizzling along my fingers. I tried to shut my ears against the rumblings in the main office and, when that didn’t work, I tuned into the purr of Harriet’s computer and hummed along with it.

  The door opened and I raised my head. It was only Harriet. She plonked a plastic cup of water down on the edge of the desk then I heard the squeak of the blinds as she twisted them shut. Afterwards, she returned to her chair.

  ‘Don’t just look at it. I tell you, what I wouldn’t give for a fag right now. Flipping sign not to give up, this is. Danni, honestly, drink the bloody water.’

  It took three attempts before the cup crinkled against my palm and I managed to lever it up towards my mouth. I gulped down half the water then let the cup plop back onto the desk.

  ‘Anymore and I might be sick.’

  ‘You look like you already have been.’

  I lowered my eyes into the carpet.

  Harriet exhaled. ‘Don’t worry about it. I would’ve been the same.’

  The silence dragged until I had to break it or I would’ve suffocated under the normality seeping through the blinds. I grasped onto the first thought that occurred to me, raising my chin.

  ‘Why does he want us to lock up? I mean, the cars are outside and we’re meant to be going home. Won’t people worry, come to check on us?’

  She picked up another pen and began twirling it around her thumbs. ‘You’re right there. You’d better ask him when he calls back.’

  My stomach squirmed. ‘Me?’

  ‘It’s for the – Danni, Danni!’

  I’d bolted from the chair and yanked the door open. Phlegm was swirling around my throat, catching under my tongue. I screwed my eyes half-closed and strode across the office, more from memory than anything else. When my shoe clumped against the door, I opened my eyes and pressed through into the lower hallway.

  The office door creaked shut behind me. Ahead, the weathered mosaic panels on the main door glistened in the fading light. It’d be so easy to walk out; straight through the car park and keep walking. All I had to do was turn the handle and I’d be free.

  My eyes caught on the cellar door to the left and my chest contracted. It wasn’t like I could go anywhere without Jude, and she probably couldn’t go anywhere without Michael. More than that, she cared about people round here. The girls on my team, for a start. I might’ve taken her job all those months ago, but I hadn’t taken her role as Gerbera’s agony aunt, nor did I want to.

  I dropped my attention into the carpet and rounded the banister with my eyes focused on the metallic casing trembling at every motion. Two weeks and we’d have been out of here. Two weeks and the phone would’ve redirected to our shiny new office in Leeds with half the board on the premises and Vincent Knight ready and waiting to talk to this nutter. Why hadn’t he waited? Why had I been the one on the damn phone?

  ‘Sweetheart, careful.’

  My forehead butted into Jude’s elbow on the step above. She swept her arms around my shoulders to stop me tumbling backwards and I buried myself in her familiar scent. An hour ago I hadn’t been able to look at her; now, I couldn’t get close enough. I’d claw through her shirt if I thought scraping my fingers against her bare skin would take away the ache in the pit of my stomach.

  She pressed a kiss to my head. ‘Are you okay?’

  For a long time, I couldn’t answer. I kept my nose burrowed into her shirt, trailing my fingers along her spine and feeling her body mould against my own. Finally, a pipe gurgled and I started back. Once again, her arms kept me steady, only this time I was gazing into her eyes.

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ I murmured.

  A hand caressed my cheek. ‘What for? None of this is your –’

  ‘In the cellar.’ I blinked away tears and stretched up to catch her lips in a sweet kiss. ‘I’m sorry.’

  She inhaled deeply then drew my body against hers. I could feel her trembling, so I tightened my own grip around her waist with one hand and stroked her hair with the other. Another noise in the building startled us both, and my eyes wound up locked with hers again, words on the tip of my tongue.

  Then the door on the lower landing squealed. I took a step down and Jude took one up. By the time Harriet whipped around the banister, there was nothing but air between us.

  ‘Thank Christ you haven’t done a runner. Knight’ll be here first thing in the morning. You can tell that to your man on the phone.’

  Chapter 5

  June 2011

  Vincent Knight was a success story; the Gerbera Living poster boy.

  Twenty years ago, he’d started his career as a dogsbody in the accounting centre, just like me. Back then, the setup was different with a smaller portfolio of homes and everyone on first-name terms with everybody else in the company. Harriet had worked with him, junior clerks on the same team. While she’d been happy to climb her way to House Manager and leave it there, he’d leapfrogged the middle tiers of management and ended up as regional manager for the Yorkshire and Humber portfolio.

  The way they painted it in the motivational presentations, he’d been welcomed with open arms, but I’d done a lot of reading since I’d left. Gemma had weaselled access through her contacts to chunks of correspondence no longer in the public domain, and there was plenty of concern about his lack of social care experience. It might’ve been standard practice for Gerbera these days, but back then it was an unwanted novelty and it took a while for him to win everyone round. A series of high-profile promotions later, he was firmly established on the board and no one seemed to remember that tricky middle period.

  Before that day, I hadn’t had much to do with him. Harriet was the main point of contact with the board, and the only time I’d spoken to him was when he did the rounds at a Christmas party one year. It was funny to think that after the move we would’ve been working in the same building, maybe sharing the same water cooler.

  ‘You okay?’ Gemma asked as we waited.

  I scraped my stick along the sparkling floor. ‘Not really.’

  She opened her mouth then snapped it closed when the door clattered. The woman reappeared, a bumbling dwarf next to Vincent Knight, and proudly gestured across as if he’d won us in a raffle. Knight looked every bit the reluctant businessman in his murky brown suit and dusky shirt. In the old days, he’d apparently been pedantically formal, but he’d moved with the times and cultivated a shabby-chic image that played well with the media. These days, every time he cut a ribbon, he was praised for being down-to-earth and normal.

  He nudged his rimless glasses up and tucked his arms behind his back. ‘Harriet, Danielle; good to see you again.’

  ‘It’s been a long time, Vincent,’ Harriet said.

  The familiarity brought a hard smile to his face. Maybe he took it as a reminder that he couldn’t boss us about anymore. Either way, his eyes pivoted towards Gemma and he surveyed her with feigned interest.

  ‘I don’t think we’ve met.’

  ‘No, I’m afraid not,’ she said smoothly. ‘I’m Gemma Conniton. I used to work for The Herald.’

  His expression locked. ‘Journalist?’

  ‘Photographer. Although I have worked with some of the best journalists in Yorkshire.’

  ‘How interesting.’ He glanced sideways with a pleasant expression. ‘Now, Mrs Sprakes, will you do the honours and show us round? That’s why these ladies have travelled all this way. I think your reputation for fantastic carrot cake’s spread all the way up to Yorkshire.’

  She bobbed in a half-curtsey. ‘Of course, Mr Knight.’

  ‘And I’ve told you to call me Vincent. Come on, ladies.’

  Mrs Spr
akes naturally took the lead, with Knight ushering me along behind her. Then he fell into step beside me, leaving Harriet and Gemma bringing up the rear. A shiver rippled all the way down into my bad leg as I realised I was effectively trapped with him.

  ‘This is the dining room and the main lounge,’ Mrs Sprakes said, waving left and right. Inquisitive wrinkled faces squinted at me from armchairs, probably wondering why we were interrupting their morning quiz show. ‘We’ve got around thirty residents at the moment. A little under capacity, but that happens sometimes. Now, we can go upstairs or into the kitchens. Which would you prefer, Mr Knight?’

  Fingers clamped around my wrist and urged me towards a thin doorway. ‘You all go up. I just want to show Danielle the view from this window while the sun’s out.’

  Gemma faltered, but Harriet tugged her along. I could hear Mrs Sprakes wittering as they climbed the staircase, her voice fading into the carpet once they hit the first floor. Any noises from the rest of the building were suffocated when Knight steered me into a storeroom, crammed with toilet rolls and incontinence pads, a broken chair propped up against the wall. He paused to close the door and I discreetly adjusted my balance. No way was I going to show him I was in pain or struggling to walk.

  ‘It’s a fairly bog-standard view, I’m afraid.’

  I glanced out of the window to the thin stretch of grass backing onto a dual carriageway. ‘Nice fresh air for the residents.’

  ‘Always fault, isn’t there?’ he queried, drumming on the windowsill. ‘Everything can’t be as we’d choose it to be. You know that better than most.’

  There was a chunk of plaster missing from the wall, I noticed. A spider had spun a web around the edges, though it fluttered in the air. Somewhere around here there must be a draught, a little pocket of destruction. No matter how well you built these places, there was always a chink. That was comforting.

  Finally, Knight continued, ‘The first time you walked into one of the Gerbera homes, they recognised you. It was Bournemouth, wasn’t it? You couldn’t honestly believe that just by going to the far end of the country you wouldn’t be recognised. It shattered the company, Danielle. Everyone knows, everyone remembers.’

  ‘Didn’t do the share prices any harm,’ I pointed out.

  ‘Don’t be blasé, it doesn’t suit you.’

  ‘With respect, Mr Knight, you don’t know me.’

  He knocked his hand against the sill. ‘I know you care. You wouldn’t be here if you didn’t. However, I struggle to see what you hope to achieve.’

  ‘I want an explanation. I want to know why.’

  ‘And you think I don’t?’ he demanded, crossing his arms. ‘That man used my name, for reasons we’ll never know because we can’t find him. The police can’t find him – what makes you think you can?’

  I scoffed. ‘They stopped looking when they went off on their bloody tangent.’

  ‘That isn’t my fault. We had nothing at all to do with the police investigation or the lines they chose to follow. In their defence, I understand why they took it seriously, even if it was patently ridiculous in hindsight. But you’re not going to find answers by popping into random homes up and down the country. There’s nothing to learn from poor members of staff who read about it all in the papers or saw it on the news.’

  A glimmer of light flickered in my brain. It was as though he’d struck a match and the flame was wavering back and forth into the shadows. I straightened up a touch, as much as I dared with my leg.

  ‘So why are you warning us off then?’ I questioned.

  His teeth nipped at his lower lip. I’d caught him on the hop and instinct told me to keep pushing it.

  ‘He mentioned your name, he wanted you there. I don’t think he pulled a name out of a hat. You don’t do something like that unless you’ve got a grudge. Innocent people –’

  ‘Obviously, he was deranged,’ Knight cut in. He held up a hand to silence me. ‘Now, listen, Danielle, you’ve turned this into some personal crusade. Harriet’s got her own reasons for participating in the charade. She needs vindication, I’m sure. As House Manager –’

  ‘Don’t you dare. Harriet did nothing wrong.’

  Knight raised an eyebrow. ‘You didn’t think that at the time. I recall Michael Hogarth giving quite the account of how distressed you were with Harriet’s actions in his debrief interview. He asked me to sit in, you see, as a Gerbera representative. He trusted me. Then again, I’m not sure that aids my case very much, does it?’

  A little knot of triumph had formed above his mouth before he finished. The casual reference to Michael had put me on the back foot – and he knew it. I searched for an avenue of attack, coming up blank. All I could see was Jude’s face swimming in front of me then swirling away as if down a plughole.

  ‘If you ask me,’ he continued, chafing his hands together, ‘you’re grieving far more for Jude Hogarth than anything else. This is just a distraction isn’t it. That girl you’ve got following you around out there is hardly a substitute.’

  White heat seared through my body, settling in my thigh. I clenched my jaw until my teeth ached then pasted a smile onto my face.

  ‘If you don’t mind, Mr Knight, I’d like to look round.’

  He stepped towards the door and eased it open. ‘And to try a piece of Mrs Sprakes’s famous carrot cake, I hope.’

  As I passed the wall, I scooped the spider’s web away with the tip of my stick. ‘Of course.’

  Harriet let out a guttural groan, sagging into the driver’s seat while Gemma slammed the door on her side. I pulled mine to with just enough force to hear it click.

  ‘That’ll be a great story,’ Harriet muttered, grinding the engine into life. ‘How did you die, Mrs Fitch? Well, some slimy prick in a shite-coloured jacket shovelled bloody carrot cake down my throat till I threw up and lost the will to live. Oh, is that the way you went? I wish I could’ve gone like that.’

  Gemma snickered. ‘Who exactly are you having this conversation with after you’re dead?’

  ‘No idea. Whoever’s up there, I suppose.’

  ‘Do you believe in God?’ I asked.

  She paused with one hand itching at the gearstick. ‘If you believe in hell, you’ve got to believe in the other. Not completely, but a bit.’

  ‘And do you?’ I questioned, watching her shoulders quiver a few inches ahead of me. ‘Believe in hell, I mean.’

  We began rolling backwards as she let off the handbrake. Within three seconds, she squealed the car round in an hourglass motion and twisted us towards the dual carriageway. I thought she was ignoring me until the roar of engines almost swallowed her last word on the subject.

  ‘Don’t you?’

  Chapter 6

  February 2010

  ‘Have the balls to do it yourself!’

  Harriet snorted, kicking her heel back against the front door. ‘It’s not about that.’

  ‘Well, I’ll do it then,’ Jude snapped.

  ‘No,’ I insisted.

  She rounded on me with her green eyes flashing. ‘You’re a supervisor, you’re not doing this.’

  ‘Neither are you,’ I said, my voice seesawing over the three words. ‘Please, Jude.’

  The ice from the last few weeks had melted away. If Harriet hadn’t been there, I would’ve kissed her again, hidden myself in her arms, but I had to make do with drinking in her strength. She’d fight Harriet tooth and nail on this if I wanted her to. The truth was, though, that the only idea more terrifying than me being on that phone was her having to do it.

  Eventually, Jude’s attention flickered to Harriet and she cleared her throat. ‘I’m sitting in on the call.’

  ‘Afraid not. I need you down here with me.’

  ‘You’ve gotta be joking,’ Jude retorted. ‘You need someone to hold your hand so you stick Danni up there on her own? That’s bullshit and you know it.’

  Harriet growled and scrubbed her forehead. ‘If you give me half a chance . . . I was going to say tha
t Michael should sit with her.’

  I swayed on the spot. Jude reached out to steady me and her nails sank into my throat. When I flinched, she jolted her hand away and I blinked back the sharp tears burning my eyelids. I twisted my gaze over to Harriet, pecking at the brittle front door with her knuckles.

  ‘It’s fine,’ I said. ‘Michael’s fine.’

  Aftershave prickled at my skin.

  As Michael shifted in the chair beside me, I had to prise open my eyes and blink away the sting. His gaze was fixed on me, eyebrows crinkled and a weak smile tugging at his lips. For ten minutes we’d been sat silently, our knees almost touching under the desk. Maybe it hadn’t been his intention to pen me in against the wall, but the sense of being trapped with him spun around my brain more vividly than the fact we were all trapped in this building.

  Both of us flinched when the phone rang. Michael patted my arm as I slotted the headset on and fumbled for the button, feeling the crackle as the call connected shiver through my body.

  ‘Hello?’

  ‘Have you done what I said?’ he questioned without preamble.

  ‘Y-yes.’ I gritted my teeth as Michael’s fingers skimmed my arm again then added, ‘I’ve got someone sat with me now. Is that all right?’

  ‘Depends who it is. I’m not talking to that cow Fitch.’

  ‘Harriet?’

  He snorted. ‘I know you’ve had a shock, but you’re not thick. Of course Harriet. Who else is there on the bloody staff called Fitch? Not like getting confused with Hogarths, is it?’

  I edged further away from Michael until my head tapped against the wall. ‘Just wondered if you knew her, that’s all.’

  ‘Nice try, Danni,’ he replied. ‘Who is it then? Who’s sat with you?’

  ‘It’s – it’s Michael.’

  ‘Michael?’

  ‘Is that all right?’ I repeated.

  ‘From the sound of it, you’re the one who’s not happy. Anyway, forget that. You could have Princess Di sat next to you and I’d still want you on the phone. Have you got that? Don’t go palming me off, I’m not having it.’