As I pull a chair up close, I see Adam hovering in the doorway, stethoscope dangling from around his neck, his hand raised in acknowledgement. Olive spots him and quietly sets her fingers reassuringly on top of mine. I exhale slowly, realising I’ve been holding my breath for a long time.
‘Don’t worry,’ she whispers, barely audible. ‘We’ll get the bastard.’ It’s Adam. That’s what she’s telling me. I can’t move, as if I’m manacled to the chair and begin to make what is intended to sound like vacuous small talk. My voice is shaky and shrill. Adam strolls across, throws professional caution to the wind, and leans down and tries to kiss me on the cheek. Olive closes her eyes for a second; she doesn’t want to watch.
‘How are we today?’ He’s going to use his stethoscope, perhaps to strangle her I think, bizarre thoughts invading my common sense. The patient keeps her eyes closed. It’s deliberate. Olive is pretending to be asleep but suddenly she opens them wide and stares accusingly at him.
‘My phone. Where is it? Someone’s stolen it,’ she snaps in his face. Adam smiles in a calm self-assured professional way while he straightens her top sheet.
‘Don’t worry, Olive. One of the nurses has it at her desk for charging. You remember you were worried it had run out of battery?’ He’s plausible; very plausible. It’s his forte. Perhaps I’m too tired, my mind overactive. The bitter taste of coffee has furred up the inside of my mouth and I can feel a persistent throbbing in my left temple.
‘I’ll go and get it for you now. You should be ready to go home in a couple of days.’ He smiles, wide and gleaming. I’m meant to be proud of him, in awe of his bedside manner and dedication. Perspiration is dripping from my forehead and Adam leans across me to reach the window clasp.
‘Would you like me to crack the window, Olive, let some air through? It’s very hot in here. The nurses can shut it if it gets too cold.’ Olive doesn’t answer, but ignores his gestures of concern.
‘I need my phone now. Bob is expecting me to call him. I didn’t ask you to take it away.’
Once Adam has left us alone to get the phone, Olive says she’s something to show me. She tried apparently to send them through to me seconds before her battery died. Photographs she took. She asks if I got them. I’m not sure what she’s talking about. We watch Adam return with the phone. He hands it directly to the patient.
‘There we are then. Fully charged.’ He sounds as if he’s talking to a small child, after having successfully located an errant football from behind the bushes. He is seriously underestimating my elderly friend.
Adam disappears again, stethoscope swinging and his green gown gaping loosely open which means his work day is nearly over. It’ll take him about an hour to change his clothes, scrub down and make his way home. I have an hour left with Olive and I need to hear what she has to say and see what is on her phone.
48
Alexis
The traffic is unending as it blocks the roads home from the hospital. The seven o’clock news announces the latest terrorist attack with gruesome descriptions of bloodshed and gore broadcast over the airwaves. I turn off the radio and concentrate on getting home. I need to reach the house before Adam.
The rain batters the windscreen and the inside of the car has steamed up. I slowly wend my way up through Hampstead and when I stop at the next set of traffic lights, I phone Gary and curse the poor signal at the lock-up, being forced to leave yet another voicemail. I tell him to wait for me that I might be a bit late but that I will definitely be there. I check the time again and realise it will probably be nearer nine before I get to him but I need to go home first.
I crawl up Riverside Close, prepared to turn round if Adam’s car is in the driveway but the house is in darkness with no obvious signs of life. I scan the neighbours’ homes for bright lights to help quell my fears and calm my pounding heart. I fumble with my keys and drop them on the ground as I anxiously keep checking for the appearance of vehicles.
I don’t turn on the hall light as I enter as I don’t want to illuminate my shadow. I begin my search. Time is of the essence.
The door keys which are used to gain access to the patio and back garden have been moved. They’re not in the usual drawer. I wrench open all the drawers in the kitchen, then move into the hall to check in the sideboard but can’t find them. I decide to go out the front again and skirt round the other properties and gain access into the rear garden, through the gate by the river.
There’s still no sign of Adam. I scurry across the road, down the small side alleyway, and follow the path through the woods behind the houses.
It seems to take forever to reach the gate and for a moment I’m confused in the dark as to which one belongs to our property. My phone lights the way and I finally click open the gate leading back into our garden. There’s a small shed tucked neatly in the corner which houses Adam’s lawnmower and garden tools. I enter in the combination, fumbling with the rusting lock as I swivel it round to the four digits that make up the day and month of our wedding anniversary. It’s a date I plan to forget.
Once inside, I switch on the light. The bulb is weak, making only faint inroads into the gloom. There’s a neatly arranged row of gardening equipment leant up against one wall; a rake, hoe, broom and a large pair of secateurs. ‘Shit.’ I bang my head on the rafters when a tiny grey field mouse scuttles across my path and I have to put a hand over my mouth to stifle an automatic yelp.
My husband is methodical, organised, and I imagine his operating instruments displayed with similar precision to the gardening equipment. His outdoor footwear is lined up to the left of the door. There are walking boots, gardening shoes and an old pair of tennis shoes. His trainers are nowhere to be seen. He always leaves them here after a jog in the woods as the mud and wet debris get caked in the ridges of the soles. I wrack my brain trying to remember when I last saw him wearing them. I pull the tarpaulin off the top of the lawnmower, checking if they might have fallen down the back. I then lift out a pair of small step ladders and clamber up so that I can run my fingers along the top shelves of the metal rack. I’m sweating, my breath rasping. My ears are alert for a car which might pull in at the front of the house.
I stumble off the ladder when I hear a door slam and quickly flick off the light switch and stand very still. Through the small window I see the lights come on in the house and I can make out Adam’s silhouette in the kitchen. He’s looking out into the garden. I watch his back retreating into the hall and I quickly open the shed door, fumbling to reclose the lock and in a blind panic hurry towards the back gate.
I jog, follow the path of the river, glad that I had the foresight to wear my own trainers and build up pace, faster and faster away from our house. About half a mile further down, near where the river meets the motorway, I’ll turn right and wend my way back up to Riverside Close from the opposite direction. I need Adam to believe that I’ve been out jogging, trying to clear my head.
I pound on and will the exertion to calm me down. Up ahead I see a figure coming towards me. I emerge out on to the road and realise it’s another jogger. Only when they draw close do I realise it’s Adam.
We meet under a small street light and the first thing I notice are his trainers. They’re brand new, bright blue and orange, with the distinctive Nike logo emblazoned along the side. He will have carefully destroyed and thrown away his handmade Italian running shoes, the ones with the thick round black expensive maker’s mark embossed deeply into the underside of the sole. The imprint which Olive told me she had photographed. I know now that my husband is the killer.
49
Susan
‘What do you mean you were a member of this website?’ Roger is spitting, furious spurts of disbelief. ‘Join Me or whatever it’s called. Did you meet up with men? Is that what you’re telling me?’ For an awful moment I think my husband might be having a heart attack. His face has turned red, mottled and his cheeks have taken on a distinct ashen hue. He’s gripping the back of one of dining ro
om chairs to steady himself. I move towards him. I need to get closer and make him understand, let him look in my eyes and see that I’ve done nothing wrong. He needs to believe me; let me explain. No one will ever know otherwise.
‘Don’t come near me. While I’m out busting a gut to pay the mortgage, fund your gym fees and pay for unnecessary childcare, you’re out dating perverts you’ve met online.’ He’s not going to hear me out. Frightened, I step backwards. I’ve never heard Roger shout before because he is the one who listens. He’s the calm steady influence in our family and always quietly placates when I fly off the handle. He pacifies Noah when Tilly has sneakily nipped her brother when no one is looking. He soothes Tilly’s tears when she can’t do her homework. I’m scared. Roger is my rock, whatever was I thinking? I’m torn between guilt and a desperate need to get my story across, telling the half-truths necessary to keep my marriage intact. I can’t lose Roger.
‘Can we sit down? Please,’ I plead. Roger stares at me as if he’s seeing me for the first time.
‘Did you know this Jason before he came to our house? Christ. He’s been in our house and you already knew him, didn’t you?’ I watch in horror as he puts a hand over his chest and seems to struggle for air. I go to pull a chair out for him, and insist he sits down. He ignores me but carries on with the venom. ‘Tell me the truth. When did you meet him? Did you have an affair with him?’
‘No, it was nothing like that!’ I exclaim, rather too loudly. Will he know I have the answers all prepared? ‘Lots of the ladies at the gym were having fun on the site, taking trips around London with new friends and I didn’t see the harm.’ I daren’t move.
‘You were sleeping with him, weren’t you?’
I’ve been practising. This is the part I need to get right.
‘No. It was only a bit of fun. I met him once. We went to London Zoo. I had no idea he was Caroline’s husband until he came to dinner. I was as shocked as anyone.’ That at least is the truth. Images flash past of the naked afternoon trysts in seedy hotel rooms and I can no longer make sense of what happened. Was I that bored or was it something else? As I look at Roger, bowed by the revelations, shoulders slumped in despair, I feel an emotion like I’ve been given a terminal diagnosis; or at least what I imagine it must feel like. I can’t lose this man. He’s my rock, my life, my love. I can see the end in sight but I need to fight.
‘Why did he turn up near my offices?’
Roger paces round the dining room, picks up picture frames, stares at the happy family images, and sets them down again. ‘Seems too much of a coincidence to me.’ He’s the prosecuting lawyer in full flight. ‘Why would he want to come and see me? Surely not to check out the competition.’ He laughs and waves away the preposterous notion with a swish of his hand. ‘I’m sorry, Susan, but I don’t think he was fighting for your heart. He didn’t strike me as the needy type. Now why would he turn up at my offices?’ Roger won’t stop. He’s like a dog with a bone, on a mission, as he prowls round the room. The jury is out. ‘Do you know what I think?’
I don’t want to hear. ‘Please calm down.’ I start to cry; it’s my only weapon against the ensuing verbal assault. I sit down and put my head in my hands and let the emotions pour out. He doesn’t come near me but carries on.
‘I think he might have been considering blackmail,’ he hisses, pulling my head up gently by my hair. ‘Look at me,’ he demands. White spittle has congealed in the corners of his lips. He looks as if he’s having some sort of fit and for a moment I don’t recognise his features, they’ve become so distorted by anger. I carry on crying, bawling like a spoilt child who has been discovered stealing forbidden sweets.
‘What do you think, Susan?’ He waits, and waits. ‘Tell me!’ he yells.
I blubber, desperate to make him understand, choking on the words as I speak. ‘I met him once. We went to the zoo, shared a coffee and went our separate ways. That was all. Then he came for dinner with Caroline and I realised what a dreadful mistake I’d made. There was no harm done.’
‘There’s talk that he extorted money from other ladies he appears to have met on the website. You need to tell me now if you ever gave him money.’ He emphasises the word ‘now’ in all its importance. I can’t own up to this. It would be tantamount to admitting we had slept together. I sniffle. Theatrical little noises emanate from my nose and I use my sleeve to wipe away the wet drips which have collected at the end of my nostrils.
‘Don’t be ridiculous. I’m not a prostitute, sleeping with men for money,’ I shout, not daring to look at him. I hear the words and suddenly the truth hits me in the face. That’s exactly what I am. Boredom, sex, lust, deceit, money, security; they all belong in the same melting pot, the melting pot of my life. The laughable thing is that I paid for the pleasure rather than the other way round. I daren’t imagine what Roger will do if he finds out about the missing cash. I’ve no idea how to replace it.
He goes silent, hovers for a brief second. He then heads for the front door and storms out of the house.
I hear the door slam. I don’t know what I’ll do. My first thoughts are for the children. I can’t lose them. I need to think. But as I get up and wander blindly into the kitchen, I realise that my future is no longer in my hands. Only Roger can save me; that and whether I might yet be able to convince him of my innocence.
50
Alexis
As Adam and I reach our driveway, side by side, I see Roger Harper leave his house and slam the door on his way out. His face has the thunderous set of a black cloud.
‘He doesn’t look too happy,’ Adam quips as he takes my arm and leads me up the path. I wave at Susan who is looking out from the downstairs window but she doesn’t wave back. At least she’s seen me which suddenly seems to matter.
It’s eight thirty and I need to get to the lock-up, away from the house. Something makes me hesitate from telling Adam that I have an appointment; an evening client to meet. He won’t believe me. He’s pushing me forward, prodding insistently in the small of my back, daring me to try to escape. He stops on the doorstep and unties the laces of his new trainers, unmuddied by sticking to the roads, and sets them in the porch. He’ll put them in the shed later.
‘Don’t worry. I’ll not bring them inside. I wouldn’t dare dirty the hallway.’ He thinks he’s funny but he’s toying with me, testing the waters and pressing some buttons to see how I’ll react.
‘Was Olive okay when you left?’ I change tack, unlace my own trainers which I place alongside his. The close is deserted. I anxiously scout round for signs of life. Susan has moved away from the window, Roger has gone and darkness cloaks the other houses. The blue tape still marks out the grisly crime scene. Only a dim light glows in the Thompsons’. Bob will be home by himself, waiting patiently for Olive to phone and come back to him.
‘Yes, fine. Only she thinks someone deleted all the photos on her phone on purpose. I think she’s hallucinating. It was touch and go for a while you know.’ His eyes also skirt round the road and the action makes me uneasy. I don’t want him to register the black empty homes which would let him relax in the knowledge that we’re alone.
‘Bob’s home again,’ I point out, doubtful that the dim light behind the net curtains will cause Adam much concern. Bob is too old for him to worry about. Adam relocks the front door after us and pulls the chain across. He secures the extra bolts, top and bottom, the ones I installed after the night of his birthday.
‘You’ll not be going out again?’ It’s a rhetorical question. He knows I won’t and he’s making it quite clear it’s not on the agenda.
‘No. I need an early night. I’m exhausted. See you in the morning.’ I head towards the stairs, desperate to get away when I feel him tug me back by the arm.
‘Not so quick. I think we need to have a few words, don’t you?’ His eyes, which bore through me, are like hard lethal bullets; ready to fire if provoked.
‘What about? I’m tired. Can’t it wait?’ I try to act normally,
carry on as if I’ve no suspicions so that in the morning I can escape from the house and get to Gary. He’ll be able to help. I won’t sleep but Adam mustn’t know I’m worried.
‘No, not really. This Join Me thing. When were you going to tell me?’
My legs threaten to give way as I try to push his hand off my sleeve and carry on up the stairs.
‘Can we talk when I’ve had a shower? I’m filthy. I’ll only be ten minutes.’ I play for time, it’s my only option.
‘Okay but don’t keep me waiting.’ He smirks. ‘I’ll open a bottle of wine. What do you fancy? Rioja? Merlot? Your choice tonight.’ He lets go of my wrist and heads for the kitchen. I manage to reach the top of the stairs, my legs like jelly, my head reeling. I need to collect my thoughts and decide what to do.
Outside, there is an enormous peel of thunder and lightning cracks through the skylight, sharp and piercing. Rain pelts against the glass and I manage to get into the bathroom and lock the door before my phone beeps. I cough to cover the sound and quickly turn the volume to mute, leaning my back against the wood. A sudden knock at the door makes me freeze.
‘You don’t need to lock the door. I wouldn’t dare come in.’ Adam has followed me up the stairs. Perhaps he’s checking I haven’t tried to climb out the window. My heart pounds. I glance down at my phone. There’s a message from Gary with four pictures attached.
Hope you’re ok. Assume you can’t make it to lock-up so going home. Catch up tomorrow. Got these pictures from Olive, by the way. Any idea what they are? See you later. Gary
Three of the photos show footprints left by the handmade Italian trainers. Adam had treated himself when he decided to do the London Marathon last year. The distinctive embossed logo, Giro, the maker’s individual calling card, is clear and defined. I’ve got him. I keep all receipts and have their images backed up on the Cloud.
4 Riverside Close Page 24