Talking to Strangers, page 4
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The Simmonses’ house is a smart detached villa on one of the big roads down to Worthing seafront. I have to squeeze past a lethal holly bush to get to the front door and manage to snag my new tights. I’m still swearing when the door opens. Mary Simmons stands in front of me, swaying slightly, so pale her features are almost invisible.
“Hello, Mrs. Simmons,” I say gently, hoping she hasn’t heard me effing and jeffing. “I am so sorry to hear about Karen. You must be devastated. My name’s Kiki Nunn and I’m a reporter. I just wondered if I could talk to you about your daughter.”
“She was a lovely girl. Everyone loved Karen,” she says, and her mouth trembles. “Why would anyone kill her?”
“I know,” I say. “It’s so shocking. She was such a nice woman.”
Mrs. Simmons blinks. “Did you know Karen?”
“A bit—I met her last week, and we spent an evening together at a pub in Ebbing. Look, I don’t want to keep you on the doorstep in the cold. Is it okay if I come in for a minute?”
She blinks again and nods.
There are no lights on in the house when Mary Simmons leads me through to the sitting room, and my eyes take a moment to adjust to the gloom. When they do, I can see Karen’s dad is dozing, head back, on the sofa.
“I’ve given him one of my sleeping pills—he was so upset,” Mary whispers and slumps down beside him, while I perch on the nearest chair.
“How did you say you knew Karen?” she says. “Did she do your hair?”
My hand goes automatically to my unruly fringe. “No, as I said, it was more of a social thing,” I remind her.
“That’s right,” Mary says, and reaches for a photo album on the coffee table. “She was so much fun, wasn’t she? I was just looking at these. This was taken in Tenerife ten years ago,” she croaks, grief fighting to close her throat. Karen looks fabulous—laughing up from a sun lounger, hair in a messy bun, and wearing film-star sunglasses. “And this was my nephew’s wedding. Karen did all the little girls’ hair. All those ringlets and updos. She didn’t have time to do her own in the end. But she just wanted everyone else to be happy.”
I sit quietly, taking it all in, as Mary carries on narrating her dead daughter’s life. When she gets to the last page of the album, her head drops. “This is all we’ve got left,” she says. “I can’t stop looking at the pictures since they told us. It’s like she’s still here when I’m looking at them.”
The words light up in my head. It’s the quote I’ll use to finish my interview with the devastated parents. The kicker, the old subs used to call it. Clickbait, now. I reach over and pat her arm in sympathy, and she looks up at me. “Do you know what happened to Karen?” she pleads, and I can smell the sharp tang of desperation on her breath.
I wish I could tell her something. “Haven’t the police told you anything?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “We’re meeting the woman detective in charge this afternoon. Our family liaison officer, Jenny, is taking us. She’s been so kind—she’s just gone to pick up a prescription for me.”
I catch myself glancing out the window to check the FLO is not coming up the path. Thank goodness I arrived when she was out. I’ll be out on my ear as soon as she gets back.
“But why was Karen in a wood? In the middle of the night?” Mary suddenly asks, her voice shrill. “What did they do to her?”
“I don’t know, Mrs. Simmons. I am so sorry. When did you last talk to her?”
“Last week,” Mary says, closing her eyes. “Was it someone she knew, do you think?” she whispers, shrinking down in her seat as if she can hide from the horrific reality. “We didn’t meet many of her boyfriends—none seemed to last long. I don’t know why. Karen was so pretty, and such a kind person. But none stuck. I can’t say what she was looking for, but she didn’t seem to find it. And lately, she’s kept her private life to herself.”
I gulp a breath and plunge in. “Well, had Karen told you she’d met some new people?”
“No,” she says, and her head jerks up. “Who?”
“I don’t know their names, but Karen told me she was using dating websites.”
“Oh, God,” Mrs. Simmons groans.
Cliff Simmons stirs on the sofa.
“Are you all right, love?” Mary says.
“Who’s this?” Cliff says loudly.
“A reporter. She wants to know about Karen.”
I watch as she fusses over her husband, straightening his hair and patting his trembling hand. I wonder how they’ll cope. The bereaved can cling together on a life raft of denial—or sink into grief in separate rooms.
I feel the sudden urge to have a moment alone to gather my thoughts. “Can I use your loo?” I say and stand up.
“Top of the stairs,” Mary mutters. “Opposite Karen’s room.”
The door to Karen’s bedroom is ajar, and I hesitate before pushing it open. I’m only having a look, I tell myself. And Karen clearly hasn’t slept in this room for years. It’s almost bare. The single bed has been stripped down to the mattress, and a lonely cardboard box stands on the dressing table.
It’s a different world from her flat above the salon. Karen had twiddled a fader light switch to gradually reveal the sitting room when I took her home from the Neptune last week. “Wow! You could get a coach party on that sofa,” I said. On the wall behind it was a neon sign that beamed Love. Karen had to move heart-shaped cushions to lie on it, nearly knocking over a lamp draped with silk scarves.
“Do you want another drink?” she said, pointing at a table with a dozen bottles of sticky-looking holiday souvenir liqueurs, but I went and made her a black instant coffee.
The archway to the kitchen was flanked by framed photos of people strolling hand in hand on the sand and dancing in a tight embrace. I had a look as I passed. Neither featured Karen. It was almost like a stage set or something—weirdly impersonal. But her teenage bedroom doesn’t offer any clues, either.
I open the flaps of Karen’s box of belongings and have a look. There’s a hoodie, a hair dryer with no plug, an ancient baby doll with a lazy eye and ballpoint pen tattoos, and two small photo albums. I have a quick flick through—the pictures look like they date from when Karen’s salon opened in Ebbing, judging from the blond streaks everyone is rocking.
Mary is waiting for me at the foot of the stairs when I come down with the albums in my hand.
“Sorry, I took the wrong door,” I say quickly. “I hope you don’t mind—I saw these and there are lovely photos of Karen in them. Is it okay if I use some of the pictures for the article?”
“Er, yes. I suppose so,” Mrs. Simmons says. “What are you going to write about her?”
“Just what you’ve told me—about her life and how everyone loved her. I’m talking to her friends and some of her hairdressing clients as well. About the weeks leading up to her death.”
“Not this online dating?” she says.
“The thing is,” I say carefully, “Karen told her friends about it. And me. She did an interview about it.”
“Oh, God!” Mary cries. “What did she say?”
“That she’d met some very nice men—but not all. She’d had, well, a mixed experience. Like most people who use these websites.” There is a silence and I stumble on. “It might help the police find the killer. If she met him online.”
As if summoned, Jenny the FLO calls through the door: “Mary, it’s me. Can you let me in?”
With a quick hello as she comes in, I slip past her and away. I can hear Mary filling her in as I skirt the holly. I text Miles to expect another call.
NINE
ANNIE
Saturday, February 15, 2020
She started weeping as soon as she got through the door from work. The news about the body had capsized her. Even the house didn’t feel safe anymore. The pain at the base of her skull made her slide down onto the floor in her coat and curl in on herself.
Annie clutched at happy memories, desperate to stop herself sinking further. The boys—always her first impulse. But the tense family gathering the night before crowded in and darkened her thoughts. Their firstborn, Xander, clever and remote in his London clothes, with his London girlfriend and unfathomable job in underwriting; Gav, still the baby and drifting through life. Just the two of them, now. She’d been so looking forward to seeing Xander. It was a rare home appearance. A flying visit on his way to some awful Las Vegas–themed stag weekend in Brighton. And bringing Emily, the girlfriend they’d never met, to eat Henry’s famous roast. Gav had managed to rouse himself from his room, and they’d made such an effort, Annie and Henry working as a team in the kitchen, peeling, rinsing, salting, simmering, searing, basting, whipping, chopping.
“Wow, something smells amazing,” Xander’s girl had said as she walked through the door. It was her first time in the bosom of his family, and Annie could see she was putting on her best game.
Henry had kissed her on both cheeks, putting on his best game, too, while Annie had hovered nervously.
“Come through to the living room,” Annie had said, giving the girl a quick self-conscious peck. “Are these for me? You shouldn’t have.”
The roses were hand tied. No garage chrysanths with a perforated price tag half torn off. It must be serious.
Henry had fluttered around Emily, putting a glass of prosecco in her hand, making her laugh while Annie watched. He was wearing black jeans and his favorite flowery shirt. The strain of meeting the girlfriend for the first time had made Annie gulp her own drink and choke on it.
“Are you all right, Annie?” Henry had said, trying to pat her on the back as she coughed and her face got redder.
She’d had to mime getting a glass of water and disappeared into the sanctuary of the kitchen. Gav had followed.
“What can I do?” he’d said and put his arm around her shoulders. He was only fourteen but he towered over her—the little woman. “Strain the carrots, please,” Annie had said and pointed to a serving dish. It was part of a set they’d been given for their wedding a million years ago. Twenty-six years ago, actually. Anyway, there wasn’t much of the set left now—three ham-fisted boys helping with the washing-up and kicking footballs around in the house had seen to that.
Henry had suddenly appeared, grabbing for a tea towel and wrenching open the oven door. “I forgot about it,” he muttered. “It’ll be ruined.”
“It’ll be fine,” Annie had said quietly, wondering if there was something she could get out of the freezer as a last-minute replacement.
When they’d all sat round the dining room table later, the sound of overcooked beef being chewed into submission filling the silences, Annie had looked at Henry at the other end of the table and smiled. He was still the same man, wasn’t he? The groom who’d waited for her at the register office door, the wind whipping his hair and the fern on his carnation.
Same eyes, same lovely slow smile, same, same, same. But not.
Neither of them were those people who’d giggled with nerves as they’d exchanged vows about loving each other until death parted them. It had all sounded so romantic at twenty-two. Undying love. They’d had no idea how dirty and destructive death was.
Annie had carried on looking around the table at their sons. She suddenly wanted to gather them up in her arms and whisper her love to them, like when they were small.
“Mum,” Xander had been saying beside her, and Annie had realized he was telling her about the friends he was meeting and the costumes they’d bought on the internet, and tried to focus. But she hadn’t known any of the names. They belonged to Xander’s new life.
“Sounds like it’s going to be fun,” she’d said, and he’d turned back to Emily. He didn’t need his mother anymore. Any of them, really. In truth, the things that had bound the family together—the games, the holidays, the evenings by the telly—had always seemed to chafe Xander. He’d disappear off as soon as he could.
“Alexander has a wonderful imagination—he creates whole worlds in his head. But he prefers his own company,” the teachers had said, and Annie had tried not to hear the note of concern in their voices. She’d wanted to shout: He’s been through a terrible trauma—what do you expect?
Annie had startled when her eldest suddenly leaned forward and dinged his spoon against an empty glass. Emily had jumped, too, flushed red, and put her hand to her perfect throat.
“Can I have a bit of hush?” Xander had said. “We’ve got an announcement.”
And Annie had wanted to reach for Henry’s hand, but he was too far away, so she’d smiled over at him and he’d winked back.
“We’re getting married,” their son had said, then bent to kiss the girl at his side.
Annie had wanted to say how happy she was for them, but Henry had got in first and said it all. She didn’t blame him. He’d got into the habit years ago when grief had taken her words. When she’d retreated into herself and he’d become the family spokesman. He’d said all the right things, of course he had, but they’d been his things. Not hers. Annie had had to wait until later when they’d drunk lots of toasts, each one sillier than the last, and gone into the sitting room to look at old wedding photos.
Annie had sat on the arm of Xander’s chair while his bride-to-be, sandwiched between Henry and Gav on the sofa, cooed over Annie’s nineteen-nineties wedding dress.
“I’m so happy for you, love,” Annie had said and touched Xander’s hair, his blond curls long since shaved off. She’d felt the slight flinch but ignored it. She’d worried about him for so long, her quiet boy. But he was going to be fine.
“Thanks, Mum. She’s wonderful.”
Emily had raised her head and smiled, damp-eyed with happiness.
“She is. You are a lucky boy. Your whole life is in front of you. No looking back.”
“Mum…” And his eyes had gone blank.
Emily’s devoted ear had heard the ping of tension and she’d called across: “Come and look at this, Xander. You won’t believe your dad’s shoes.”
Annie had watched Emily stroking Xander’s face and caressing his arm like she herself used to do to Henry, and listened to her talking about her dream wedding. She wondered what this girl knew about them. What Xander had told her. Had he told her? Or was he planning a marriage held hostage by secrets?
She’d wanted to talk to Henry about it, but she’d been asleep by the time he’d dropped Xander and Emily off at the station. Annie had only seen Henry fleetingly this morning—he’d been up well before her and was spooning the last of his cereal into his mouth when she got downstairs.
“I slept in Xander’s room so I didn’t wake you last night,” he’d explained. “I didn’t, did I?”
Annie had shaken her head.
“Good. I’m off now—I’ve got to take the car over to the garage to get it checked. I only just got home last night—bit of a nightmare, actually,” he’d burbled as he stacked his bowl in the dishwasher. “A warning light came on, and it took an age to work out what it was.”
Annie was thinking about warning lights, deep in her head on the hallway floor, still in her coat, when she realized she wasn’t on her own in the house. Henry was blowing his nose noisily in another room.
He glanced up quickly when Annie came into the kitchen, but he didn’t speak. He carried on typing, face computer-blank.
“Henry,” Annie said as she sat down and reached to still his dancing hands. “Someone else has died in Knapton Wood. The girl who used to cut our hair.”
He looked at her for a moment as if she was a stranger. “Sorry, yes, I heard it on the local news,” he muttered. “Look, do you mind if I finish this bit of work? Anyway, it’s nothing to do with us.”
“But the police might want to talk to us,” she said quietly.
“The police?” Henry’s head shot up. “Why would they be interested in us? For God’s sake, Annie, our horror show is over. Has been for fifteen years.”
“Nearly sixteen,” she whispered to herself as she turned away. She knew it could never be over.
They’d kept the peace for years, complicit in their silence to ensure a fresh start was possible for their family. For years, they’d let sleeping dogs lie. But this new killing had stirred them. Would make them howl.
TEN
ELISE
Saturday, February 15, 2020
When she finally got home, Ronnie knocked just minutes later.
“Yes!” Elise barked at her and stood back to let her in. “Seriously, Ronnie, have you got cameras trained on my front door?”
“That’s an idea,” Ronnie laughed as she squeezed past into the front room. “Are they expensive? How was your day? Mine was rubbish. Ted’s been under my feet, fussing about his model railway tracks. He needs a left-hand bend. He’s driving me round the bloody left-hand bend.”
“Tea?”
“Well, if you haven’t got any gin.”
Elise laughed and put the kettle on.
“How’s it going? What’s the sitrep?”
“Sitrep? For God’s sake, Ronnie. This is not Line of Duty.”
“Well, I bet it was cold up at Knapton Wood,” Ronnie said, taking up her position on the high stool.
“Bitter. I can’t believe people walk there at dawn—the couple who found the body went in the dark.”
“The Claytons, wasn’t it?” Ronnie said. “Well, they’re a funny couple.”
Elise sighed. Ronnie had made it her business to have personal insights into almost every one of the town’s ten thousand inhabitants.
“Go on, then. I know you’re dying to tell me. Funny how?”
“Well, not hilarious. He doesn’t let that poor woman out of his sight.”
Elise nodded, unsurprised. She could still see the frozen look behind Mrs. Clayton’s eyes.
