Innocent

by Kinsley, Erin

  ‘But how’s he got in touch with her? And how can she be recording? It isn’t possible.’

  ‘As to the first question, you’re right that Mr Roe was a wedding guest. When your nanny picked up little Flora, he followed her home. Straightforward, really.’

  ‘But she’d never have spoken about us to some stranger, I know she wouldn’t. I trust her.’

  ‘Maybe that isn’t wise. Do you have CCTV?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Why don’t you check it for the day of the wedding, see what you can find? Secondly, I’ve consulted my nephew – he’s a bit of a whizz in the technology department – and he’s told me how to check your Alexa machine and see what’s been recorded. Apparently there’s an app you can download to your phone – here it is, Voicegram – which connects to Alexa and sends sound files to wherever, via email, I suppose. I’m going to send you his instructions to look inside your machine and see exactly what’s there. Do you think you can do that?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And if you find conversations recorded, and you didn’t record them, Tris certainly didn’t, which only leaves your nanny. So you have your proof.’

  ‘Then what?’

  ‘Then you fire her without references.’

  ‘She’ll be angry. She’ll tell everyone what she’s heard.’

  ‘Not if you warn her I’ll come after her for breach of her non-disclosure agreement. I’m sure you can persuade her it would be far better for her if she doesn’t mess with me.’

  Duncan’s words have made another hole in Izzy’s heart. Tristan and Bridget? Bridget’s the woman she trusts with her daughter’s care.

  She wanders into the room they call the study, a room they rarely use; being at the back of the house, it’s gloomy even during summer, and over time it’s become the place for sorting household finances, paying bills, dealing with dull correspondence. There’s a laptop on the desk, a joint one they use for only those purposes, and bookshelves loaded with Tris’s prized collection of boyhood annuals, alongside his books on planes and cars and architecture.

  At the far end of the bookshelves is the unit which controls the CCTV camera, set up to monitor callers at the front door. Tris had it installed when they first moved in, but Izzy had all but forgotten about it. She can’t remember an occasion when they’ve needed the recordings. Sterndale has always been a safe place for them. Until now.

  The camera is well hidden by the wisteria trailing down from the wall. Bridget probably doesn’t even know it’s there.

  She brushes dust from the lid of the laptop, opens it up and signs in. This has always been Tris’s thing, but she can easily learn. The app’s easy to spot on the welcome screen; she clicks on it, and goes to the View History tab. The video from the day of the wedding is in the archive. She pulls it up and skims through it.

  The quality isn’t great; a frond of wisteria splits the frame in two, and the lens needs a clean. But here they are, the three of them, Flora so pretty in her bridesmaid’s dress, herself and Tris seeming so happy together. How could she have got it so wrong? Sipping on her wine, she fast-forwards through more of that day. Here’s Bridget leaving in the Fiat to come and collect Flora from the hotel; not long after, here she is returning in the Range Rover.

  What happened next?

  She runs through the next half-hour at double speed, but that’s too fast, because she almost misses him. She’s looking for a car, but there is no car, just a man on foot, in formal trousers, a shirt and a loosened tie, wandering down the drive with his hands in his pockets, looking behind him to make sure he isn’t seen. He rings the doorbell, and he waits.

  She rewinds the video a few seconds, to a place where the man’s face is most clearly visible, and freezes it to compare it with the photo DS Weld sent to her phone.

  Same guy. No doubt about it. That’s Murray Roe.

  Bridget opens the door to him; it must be Bridget, though she’s standing inside the doorway and can’t be seen. They have a conversation, though it seems Roe is doing most of the talking, his animated body language suggesting he’s putting plenty of energy into his spiel so she doesn’t slam the door in his face.

  And she doesn’t slam the door. She invites him in.

  He’s in the house for twenty minutes. Then the video shows him walking away up the drive. Hands in pockets. Smiling.

  Her mobile pings with an incoming message: Duncan’s instructions on how to get inside Alexa. Izzy doesn’t even have the Alexa app on her phone – that was another of Tris’s toys. She downloads it now, and while she’s in the online store, confirms the existence of the app Duncan’s nephew mentioned, Voicegram. There are so many technical tricks out there she’s unaware of or doesn’t understand.

  It’s easy to connect the Alexa unit to her phone, and she’s no doubt Bridget could have done it too. Duncan’s nephew’s sent clear instructions on how to get to the stored recordings, and she follows the steps one by one, until she finds a list of files ordered by date. Prior to Tris’s assault, there were almost none, just a couple of her and Flora chatting she’s prepared to accept might have been accidentally triggered.

  After that date, it’s a different story.

  There are over twenty recordings, and a few samples tell her it’s mostly her talking on the phone.

  The largest file is dated a couple of nights ago, when she and Laura had that long heart-to-heart. That was the evening she asked Bridget to stay late, and Bridget seemed pleased enough to do so, saying she could do with the overtime. Was there an ulterior motive?

  Still disbelieving, she clicks on the file, and hears her own and Laura’s voices grow louder as they walk into the kitchen from the hall, the gush of water into the kettle, and the beginning of that conversation, when Izzy told Laura everything.

  Duncan must be told, so he can properly stamp on it.

  But not the police. Murray Roe may not be the only one who’d like to cash in on a gutter-press story, and an anonymous source from inside the police would make Duncan’s efforts all in vain. For Flora’s sake, Tris’s reputation must be protected.

  One problem remains outstanding, though: how best to deal with treacherous Bridget.

  Thirty-nine

  The house phone is ringing. Izzy’s lost in the realms of sleep, dreaming she’s hunting some lost object, her path blocked by undergrowth whose thorns snag her dress and draw blood from her hands. Her subconscious weaves the ringing phone into the dream’s irrational plot, and by the time she’s awake and realising the sound is real, whoever’s calling will be close to hanging up.

  But she’s prepared for a call like this, and left a handset on the bedside table just in case. As she grabs it and presses the answer button, she notices the time: 4:18 a.m.

  ‘Mrs Savage, Isobel Savage?’ A voice she doesn’t know, a woman’s voice. In the background, another phone is ringing.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Are you next of kin to Tristan Savage?’

  Izzy’s mouth goes dry.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘I’m calling from the ICU on behalf of the medical team. There’s been a change in your husband’s condition, and they’re asking that you come in as soon as possible.’

  Izzy’s still confused by the abrupt awakening.

  ‘Now?’

  The voice sounds firm, insistent.

  ‘We suggest so, Mrs Savage. As soon as you can get here.’

  ‘There’s my daughter. I’ll have to find someone . . .’

  ‘I’ll tell them you’re on your way. Just come straight to ICU, someone will let you in.’

  Lying back on the pillows, she tries to make herself believe it could be good news, that Tris has woken up or shown some improvement, until the implication of the timing crushes that hope. No one phones at 4 a.m. with good news.

  She reaches out to touch Tris’s side of th
e bed.

  As soon as you can get here.

  Whatever he’s done, whoever he really is, she can’t help but still love him. Love doesn’t fade that fast; her anger at his betrayal is only on the surface, masking the true emotion in her heart. If he will only get better, they can work it out, stay together, have the life they always planned.

  And if she gets there quickly, maybe she can persuade him not to go.

  Laura’s mobile is on the dressing table, a feeble nod to keeping it some distance from her brain so it won’t be irradiated during the night.

  Like Izzy, she’s blurry with sleep, disorientated, heart pumping. As she stumbles from the bed, Aidan mumbles something she doesn’t hear over the ringtone – the fun one she chose for Izzy’s calls, so she knows who it is before she answers.

  ‘Izzy? Are you OK?’

  Izzy’s voice is not quite normal, and Laura knows she’s holding back tears.

  ‘I have to go to the hospital. They just rang.’

  ‘What did they say?’

  ‘Just that I need to go there now. The thing is, can you come and stay with Flora?’

  ‘Of course I will. I’ll come straight away. Oh, Izzy.’

  ‘I’ll see you in a few.’

  ‘I’m on my way.’

  Fumbling in the dark, Laura pulls on yesterday’s clothes, not turning on the light so as to give Aidan a chance to go back to sleep.

  But he’s wide awake. ‘Where are you going?’

  ‘To Izzy’s. They’ve called her into the hospital. I said I’ll go and be with Flora.’

  She’s fastening the buckles on her sandals when he says, ‘That won’t be good news, then.’

  ‘It doesn’t sound good, does it? Poor Izzy. Poor Flora.’

  When she’s ready, she crosses to the bed and leans down to kiss his cheek. ‘I’ll give you a ring, let you know what’s going on.’

  As she stands up, he grasps her hand.

  ‘Tell Izzy I really hope he’s OK.’

  ‘I will. Go back to sleep. I’ll call you in a while.’

  While she waits for Laura, Izzy calls Eamon, who sounds so alert when he answers, Izzy wonders whether he has some inkling, some blood-borne awareness telling him his son’s in trouble, a kind of parental instinct she briefly hopes she’d have with Flora, before praying she’ll never have to find out.

  When she tells him the hospital have called, his response is brusque – OK, thanks, we’ll see you there – as if he’s been on standby, so ready to go Izzy pictures him lying fully clothed in the dark while Steph sleeps, prepared to answer an inevitable call. Maybe he’s suspected for some time this moment might come; maybe his unflappable optimism has always been no more than a mask concealing a foreboding he was hiding inside.

  Laura arrives. Izzy is waiting on the doorstep, and accepts a hug and promises to call before driving along the empty roads as fast as she dare. In the hospital car park there’s a space next to Steph and Eamon’s car. Since they’re still living out of suitcases at the Premier Inn, of course they’re there before her.

  The sky is growing lighter, a line of pink splitting the purples and storm greys. Running to the ticket machine, she fumbles with coins, thinking how ironic it will be if anything (an anything she daren’t name) happens in this couple of minutes she’s wasting being a law-abiding citizen. Before she met Tris she would have skipped the ticket and paid the fine, but he’s always encouraged her to be more mindful with money, to think of it as Flora’s future and take more care.

  She runs to put the ticket on the dashboard, then from the car park to the main building. Only A&E is open, and she doesn’t know the way from there to the ICU. An impassive security guard points the way, and she hurries down a silent, empty corridor which brings her, at last, to a bank of lifts she recognises. At the press of the call button, she hears the hefty machinery clunk into life, and tracks its crawling descent as the floors change on the indicator: 3, 2, 1, G.

  The doors slide open. Stepping inside, she presses for the third floor, and the steel doors seal her in. Only then, in this slowest part of her journey and almost at its end, does the thought occur to her: if this is bad news, she could be coming here for the very last time.

  No need to give up yet. She fights the swelling in her throat and the pricking in her eyes, determined she will not cry.

  Behind ICU’s locked door, the corridor is dark, lit only by a single light burning at the reception desk, where a female nurse bends over paperwork. Izzy presses the buzzer and the nurse looks up, recognises her and walks briskly to let her in. As she holds the door for Izzy to pass through, the nurse gives her an enigmatic smile which might be sympathy for the craziness of the hour, or for what she’s about to find.

  ‘How is he?’

  ‘Your mother-in-law’s already here,’ says the nurse, and as they round the corner, she points to Tris’s bed, concealed by curtains, which Izzy passes through.

  Steph is sitting on one side of the bed, dabbing her eyes; on the other, Eamon is holding his son’s hand. Izzy has never seen him do that before, and she finds it both touching and disturbing.

  Steph shakes her head at Izzy, and Izzy finds herself mimicking the gesture, only then asking what it means.

  ‘What’s going on? Why have they called us?’

  But one look at Tris, and she can see the change. Behind his oxygen mask, red spots of fever have bloomed on his cheeks. His breathing, too, is changed, no longer a silent, rhythmic rising and falling of his chest, but a rattling, faltering labour.

  Izzy shakes her head again, and Eamon says, ‘Pneumonia.’

  ‘I’ll get a chair,’ says Izzy, but she doesn’t move, and Eamon – who normally would fetch her one – stays where he is, keeping hold of his son’s hand.

  ‘I don’t want him to know we’re upset,’ says Steph, and laughs at her own absurdity as she wipes her nose. ‘I don’t want him to think we’ve given up on him.’

  Izzy looks around for the drip stands which have been keeping Tris alive.

  ‘Aren’t they giving him antibiotics? Where are his fluids?’

  Steph shakes her head again.

  ‘What exactly have they said?’ asks Izzy, dry-mouthed, not really wanting to know.

  ‘They said they’d wait until you got here before they took his oxygen away,’ says Eamon. ‘I’m afraid it’s hopeless, Izzy. We have to . . .’ Eamon’s last words are lost in a sob, and he lifts Tris’s hand to his lips and kisses it. ‘My boy. My dearest boy.’

  They hear footsteps, and a doctor draws back the curtain. He looks round at them all.

  ‘I am so very sorry, but there’s nothing more we can do. If you’re ready I’ll remove his oxygen, and then I’ll leave him with you.’

  Eamon sobs again. Steph’s face is ghastly with grief.

  She asks if he’ll be in pain, and the doctor shakes his head.

  ‘No, there’ll be no pain. His body is so weakened, once the oxygen is removed he’ll just slip away.’

  ‘No,’ says Izzy. She moves forward to the bed, and leaning in front of Steph, kisses Tris’s forehead. ‘He isn’t going to leave me. He doesn’t want to go.’

  ‘Izzy,’ says Eamon. ‘Come and sit here, be with him.’

  With a final kiss, he relinquishes Tris’s hand and goes to stand at the foot of the bed, allowing Izzy to sit down, and she picks up her husband’s hand and kisses it as his father has been doing.

  She leans down to Tris’s ear. ‘Stay with me. Flora and I need you. We all need you. Please don’t go.’

  The doctor gives a sigh, and steps forward to take the mask from Tris’s face.

  ‘He’s still so handsome,’ says Steph, stroking Tris’s cheek. ‘Still my handsome boy.’

  The doctor leaves them.

  In silence, they watch and wait. Moments pass, and minutes, until the
y no longer hear the crackle in Tris’s chest, and the red spots on his cheeks both melt away.

  Forty

  Golding knocks at Muir’s office door just as Muir’s hanging up the phone. Muir beckons him in, then leans back in his chair with his hands behind his head. His expression is sombre.

  ‘Morning, Nate. What can I do for you?’

  ‘I need to get a production order approved and forwarded to the court,’ says Nate. ‘I’ve emailed it to you but I just wanted to explain what it’s about. Is everything all right?’

  Muir leans forward on to his desk. ‘Bad news. Is Kirstie in yet?’

  ‘About ten minutes ago.’

  ‘Do me a favour, ask her to come in, will you? I’ll update you both together.’

  Golding beckons Weld over. She brings a large mug of coffee and when Muir gestures towards the chair next to Golding’s, sits down.

  ‘I just had a call,’ says Muir. ‘Tristan Savage died during the night.’

  ‘Oh no,’ says Weld. ‘I thought he was going to pull through.’

  ‘I’ll make a team announcement shortly,’ says Muir, ‘but the obvious change this means for us is that we’re now treating this case as murder. Brad Sherman will be putting out a statement later this morning, and no doubt there’ll be a press conference so someone can say all the right things about priorities and lines of enquiry. Meanwhile, I’ve been invited upstairs to brief the upper ranks on where we’re at, so I think it would be useful for us to have a quick catch-up on where we’re going next.’

  ‘Maybe I can start that ball rolling,’ says Golding. ‘The production orders I’ve emailed you relate to the account Tristan paid the twenty-five thousand into. It belongs to Aidan Ridley.’

  Muir and Weld look at him in surprise.

  ‘Really?’ asks Weld.

  ‘Yeah, I know, who would have thought?’ says Golding. ‘I would have told you last night but I thought it would wait. I went to see him yesterday, as soon as I found out, because what I thought was interesting was that the account Tristan paid into is with Lloyds, and all Aidan’s other accounts are with NatWest. That struck me as unusual.’