Talking to Strangers, page 20
“I did not take any photos in Knapton Wood,” Clayton said, his voice flat. “My wife was carrying my phone. I believe she may have dropped it. The camera could have gone off accidentally.”
“Your wife?” Elise said slowly. She couldn’t believe he was throwing poor terrified Evelyn Clayton under the bus.
She turned to Caro and nodded. Her sergeant got up immediately and left the room.
“She’s only downstairs, so we’ll see what she has to say,” Elise said, and Noel Clayton struggled to his feet. “Sit down, please. We’ll talk to her on her own.”
“This is outrageous,” he exploded—but he didn’t sound outraged anymore. Just scared.
* * *
—
Evelyn Clayton was silent when she was brought up to a separate interview room. Elise realized it was the first time she’d spoken to her without her husband being present, and she felt a stab of irritation that she hadn’t done it earlier.
The woman looked like a rabbit in the headlights. She had no one to prompt her now. No matter how often her eyes darted around the room.
“Mrs. Clayton,” Elise said gently. “I just have a few questions about the morning you and your husband found Karen Simmons’s body.”
Evelyn Clayton’s head went down, and her hair fell like a curtain to hide her face.
“Did you take photographs of the victim?”
“Me?” Evelyn Clayton squeaked, and her head shot back up.
“Did anyone take photos of Karen?” Elise said quickly.
“No, no,” she protested. “I was so shocked, I just did what Noel told me.” Her eyes lost focus for a moment as she remembered. “What has he said?”
“Did you have a phone with you?”
“No, I’d left my bag at home—I don’t like leaving it in the car up there,” she said, tucking her hair behind her ear with a trembling hand.
“Did you use your husband’s phone?”
“No, Noel won’t let me. He doesn’t like anyone touching it. Anyway, he used it to call the police while I ran back to the car. I was so scared I fell over.”
They let the Claytons go while they examined Noel’s phone, and Elise watched as he hustled his wife into their car outside the police station. Evelyn was cowering in the passenger seat as Clayton roared off.
“God, I hope she’s okay,” Caro said from behind her. “Maybe we should check on her later?”
“Okay—do that, but we need to get on,” Elise said. But she didn’t know what was next. She reached into her pocket for her notes—they weren’t there. She’d left them on her desk. For a second, she felt the queasy terror of being exposed as an imposter. A woman pretending to be a senior detective. Sweat prickled in her armpits and palms.
“Boss?” Caro reached for her. “You’ve gone very pale—are you okay?”
Elise wanted to say, No, I can’t do this anymore. I’m drowning in this investigation. I’m going to let Karen down. But she forced herself to cough up a laugh instead. “Missed breakfast. I’m fine.”
Finding Karen’s killer was down to her. There was no cavalry coming.
FIFTY-ONE
ELISE
Saturday, February 22, 2020
At seven fifty-eight p.m., Elise stood by her front door, plucking at bobbled wool on the sleeves of her jacket. She was aware of every inch of her skin. She could feel the silicone insert against her scar in her post-op bra, the mascara spiking her lashes, the red polish on her nails that she’d smudged while putting on her little black dress and had to repaint. She felt so unlike herself that she had to look in the mirror to make sure she was still there.
The knock made her stomach lurch, and she needed to pee again.
“Come in—I won’t be a minute,” she squeaked as she opened the door and fled to the loo.
“You look nice,” he called as she disappeared.
Mal had chosen a posh pub deep in the Downs, all wooden beams and a haze of fish and brown butter. He wanted to take Elise’s jacket as they were shown their table next to an open fire, but she insisted on keeping it on. She should never have worn her black dress. What had she been thinking? It was sleeveless and clung to her—and, she’d remembered too late, was what she’d been wearing on the night her ex had dumped her. Elise tried to focus on the menu but started perspiring in the heat.
“Are you okay? You look hot,” Mal said. And then laughed. “Sorry. That came out wrong. Although, of course, you are. Oh, God, I’m getting this all round my neck. Are you sure you don’t want to take your jacket off?” Elise laughed, too, and pulled it off—quickly, like a sticking plaster.
“That’s better,” she said, trying to stop her hands reaching to cover her chest. Drawing attention to it.
“I’m having the garlic prawns. How about you?” Mal said, pretending not to notice.
Elise shook her head. “Sea bass for me, please.”
It was all so easy after that. Mal insisted she have a glass of Chablis to go with her fish while he stuck to sparkling water. “Designated driver tonight. Don’t want to get in trouble with the law!” He beamed and she grinned back and let go of the tension in her neck and shoulders.
“These are great. Try one,” Mal said. Elise reached over and picked up the smallest prawn, peeled it carefully, and then licked her fingers. He was right; it was delicious.
They didn’t say much on the drive home. He put on some chill-out music, and they sat in an easy silence. Elise hadn’t felt so relaxed for a year.
“Thanks for this, Mal. It’s been exactly what I needed.”
“And me.” He glanced across.
He had to park in a road around the corner from the cottages, and they walked slowly home, arms bumping. Elise couldn’t speak as she wrestled with what next. They’d get to her door first. Two more streetlights, then home. She should ask him in. But she’d decided to slow it down…hadn’t she? Her heart drummed against her ribs and her stomach churned with anticipation as she wondered if her breath smelled of garlic. She was halfway to the sofa with him in her head when the dread tripped her up. And she felt the sensation of someone else’s hand on her missing flesh.
“Good night,” she said hoarsely when they reached her doorstep. She gave him a small kiss on the cheek.
“Right,” Mal said, looking disappointed. “I wondered if you fancied a nightcap? I’ve got some Calvados and choccy.”
Elise’s key hovered by the lock. Go on! Do it! It’s time!
But her phone vibrated in her pocket. “Oh, I’m so sorry—it’ll be work. I’ve got to take this,” she muttered, trying to disguise her relief. She quickly pushed the key in.
“Yep. Next time, hey?” he said, smiling.
“Definitely.”
SUNDAY:
DAY 9
FIFTY-TWO
ANNIE
Sunday, February 23, 2020
There was nothing on the Sussex Today website when Annie looked first thing. She’d been terrified an interview with her would be there—what would Henry say? And then bitterly disappointed when it wasn’t. She kept scrolling, even though she knew it wasn’t there. All that pushing for information, but the reporter hadn’t written a word. She lay back down in bed and buried her head in her pillow. Henry was right. It was all in her mind. No one else wanted to know.
“I’m staying in bed for a bit,” Annie called down to Henry. “I’ve got a bit of a headache.”
He didn’t reply. Perhaps he hadn’t heard her. Or didn’t want to.
“There’s nothing in the fridge,” he shouted up a bit later, and she cringed. She’d been busted. The neglectful partner. “We’ll go to Sainsbury’s to buy stuff for lunch on the way back from surf club,” he added, but didn’t wait for an answer before banging the front door behind him.
Annie stared at the ceiling for a bit, then hoisted herself onto her elbows. Perhaps she just hadn’t told the right people. She sat on the edge of the bed and found the number for the police station at Southfold. She listened to herself ringing the switchboard and asking to speak to the officer in charge of the murder inquiry as if on autopilot.
She heard someone call out: “I’ve got an Annie Curtis on the phone asking for you, boss. Shall I take a message?”
Annie didn’t hear the answer, but they took her number and said someone would call her back.
“Mrs. Curtis?” DI King said when Annie picked up the phone ten minutes later. She couldn’t speak for a moment. She suddenly didn’t know how to begin.
“Yes. I’m sorry to bother you,” she stumbled on. “I know you’re busy, but I need to talk to someone about what happened to my son.”
“In Knapton Wood?” the detective said. She sounded sharp. Like one of those pointed instruments that dentists use. Probing. “What do you need to talk about, Mrs. Curtis?”
“I need to know why it happened. The whole truth,” Annie said. And that was it. That was what she needed. “There are things I don’t understand. I mean…” She struggled to finish her sentence.
“Take your time,” DI King said, but Annie could hear the note of impatience. “Look, where are you living now?” she added. “Are you still in the area?”
“Southsea,” Annie said.
“Right. Well, perhaps it would be easier if you come in to see me.”
“I can come now.”
“Well, okay,” DI King said. “You can ask for me at the desk.”
* * *
—
Elise King didn’t look like the policewoman they’d sent when Archie died. She looked like Annie. Tired. Winter skin. Two women struggling to keep everything going.
“Come this way, Mrs. Curtis,” the inspector said, her voice echoing off the bare corridor walls. “Actually, I had you on my list to contact.”
This caught Annie off guard, and all she could say was “Oh, right.”
“Yes, I wanted to talk to you about Karen Simmons’s vigil last week,” DI King went on, hanging Annie’s coat over a spare chair in the interview room. “I’m trying to identify some of the crowd. Particularly the males. You were there with two men, weren’t you?”
Annie’s heart thumped so hard against her chest she was sure the detective could hear it. She wished she was still in her kitchen with the smell of toast from Henry’s breakfast instead of the airless interview room.
“So, who did you go with, Mrs. Curtis?” DI King persisted.
“Er, my sons, Xander and Gavin.”
“Do they live with you?”
“Only Gavin—he’s fourteen—nearly fifteen. Xander’s in his twenties. He works up in London but he’s staying at the moment.”
“Right,” the detective said, and wrote down Xander’s address and mobile number. Then looked back up at her.
“Can I ask why you went?” she said.
“Lots of people went,” Annie said quietly.
“Yes, but if I can be direct with you, Mrs. Curtis, they hadn’t had a child killed in that wood. It must have been a very special friendship with Karen to bring you back, surely?”
“Um, well, I knew Karen from when I used to live in Ebbing years ago,” Annie said. “She did my hair back then. Karen was such a kind girl—she used to give the kids a sticker and a lollipop after their haircut.”
“That’s nice.” DI King gave her a tired smile.
But Annie couldn’t smile back. Couldn’t move her face too much in case it cracked and all her grief came flooding out. She was already struggling to hold back her tears.
“Yes,” Annie gulped.
“I can see that revisiting that time is very painful for you,” DI King said, “but that’s exactly what you did last week.”
Annie shrugged helplessly.
“And you say you want to get to the truth about what happened to Archie sixteen years after his death. That there are things you don’t understand. Can you tell me what you mean?”
The effort of holding it all in was making Annie’s head ache, so she started so she could finish.
“I don’t understand why Archie was killed,” she blurted. “I’ve never understood it. It makes no sense. Xander was in a different part of the wood to Archie. Why did Nicky Donovan go looking for him? And attack him?”
The inspector paused and wrote something on a piece of paper. “How far was Xander from the den when he encountered Donovan?” she probed.
Encountered. We’re back to the meat of the police interview.
“Er, quite a bit away. I was shocked how far he’d wandered. He wasn’t supposed to go farther than the big tree, but he said they’d needed some more bits of wood.”
“So he was completely out of sight of Archie?”
Annie nodded gratefully. Someone was finally on the trail with her.
“So how did Donovan know that Archie was also in the wood?”
“That’s it. I don’t know. That’s what I’ve always wondered.”
And DI King nodded to herself and wrote some more. “It was a complicated crime scene,” she said quietly.
“You’ve looked at the files!” Annie cried, almost bouncing in her seat. “Why? What did you find?”
The detective stirred uneasily in her chair. “The association with Knapton Wood made me look,” she said. “And I remembered the boy in the tree house—your son. Look, I’ve only scanned through them quickly. Why didn’t you ask the original team your questions at the time?”
Annie shook her head. “I couldn’t string two words together at the start. And the drugs they gave me to dull the pain dulled everything. I should have made myself do it, but no one wanted me to. My husband Henry didn’t want me to. He just wanted to focus on rebuilding our life—for Xander. And then I had Gavin less than a year after Archie died, so I buried my doubts. But Karen’s death has brought it all back. And I can’t bury them again.”
DI King nodded slowly, and Annie saw her glance at her phone. “Please,” Annie said softly.
“Let’s go back to the day Archie was killed, then?” the detective said.
“I couldn’t remember afterward when it had gone quiet,” Annie murmured. “It was only when Xander stood in front of me that I realized something was very wrong. He was so pale and crying, and when I pulled him to me and cradled his head, my hand felt wet and it was smeared with blood when I looked. Xander’s hair was matted with blood.” Annie ground to a halt. She could see her son’s silent tears making tracks down his grubby cheeks and those dark, oozing clots and feel the blinding panic all over again.
“He couldn’t speak at first,” she made herself go on. “Then he told me Archie had fallen, and I tore through the gate toward the trees. I was calling for Archie. And then I found him.”
She had to stop. She’d run out of road.
DI King said: “Take a moment, Annie.”
She gulped a breath, and crashed on into the danger zone. She could see the scene as if it was unfolding now, that minute. And the blood was rushing in her ears again.
“I must have known he was dead,” Annie heard herself say. “I used to be a nurse and I knew what death looked like—but I picked him up and ran back to the house screaming for an ambulance. My husband, Henry, told me later the neighbors heard me and ran out of their gardens. There were suddenly lots of people and someone rang nine-nine-nine and I sat on the ground with Archie in my arms. I remember the lady next door was pressing a tea towel to Xander’s bleeding head and trying to comfort him. But he wouldn’t be held. He stood beside me, not speaking, his little fists clenched at his jawline. My poor boys.”
The detective cleared her throat. “That must have been terribly traumatic,” she muttered. “And when did Xander tell you about Nicky Donovan?”
“At the hospital. The police went immediately and arrested him at his mother’s house.”
“The team was convinced it had the right man,” DI King said quietly, as if to herself.
Annie tried to concentrate on what she was saying, but her thoughts kept skittering off. She swallowed hard. “I know. The police said people can do terrible things when they’re under extreme stress. But…I know this sounds completely mad, but in his photo Nicky Donovan didn’t look like a monster.”
“Okay,” DI King said, and Annie could hear the creep of pity in her voice. “But, sadly, killers don’t always look the part. And the investigators were right to say that severe pressure can make people act out of character—or lash out. And Donovan was about to be accused of sexually assaulting your eldest son. I believe the team were working on the theory that he may have been trying to silence Archie and, in his panic, used too much force.”
“No!” Annie gasped. “No one said that at the time. But his mother said he didn’t do it,” she whispered. “He told her he ran away in the opposite direction and never saw Archie.” She could immediately hear how ridiculous she sounded.
“The police have to deal with hard facts to get to the truth,” the inspector said kindly. “And there were clear indications that Donovan had contact with both of your sons. I’ve looked at the forensic reports, and there was evidence discovered on Xander’s and Archie’s clothing.”
Annie couldn’t look at her, and the detective cleared her throat again. “It is hardly surprising Donovan’s mum protested her son’s innocence,” she went on gently. “No mother wants to believe their child is capable of murder. But it is hardly unbiased opinion—or based on anything other than refusal to accept facts. Poor woman. I wonder what happened to her afterward?”
“She lives in the same house. I visited her last week,” Annie said, and the officer’s eyes narrowed. “I just wanted to talk to her. You won’t tell my husband, will you? I don’t want to upset him.”
“Right. But what did you and Mrs. Donovan talk about?”
