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“A world of. It’s mandatory for the IPCC to be involved if one of their officers is on duty.” Independent Police Complaints Commission, I registered.
“In case he was pursuing a suspect, or something?”
Dad went quiet.
“Dad?” I was sure I could hear the cogs in his brain in full motion.
“I should have thought of it.” He spoke like he was kicking himself for being remiss.
“Thought of what?”
“Bowen was travelling home after a shift. If he was knackered, having worked excessive hours, the IPCC may still get involved and any investigation could take weeks.”
And that would make a terrible situation worse, I thought in dismay.
“Either way, it won’t be long before it hits the nationals.”
“Really?” I was horrified. The thought of our private grief trawled through by strangers was hard to bear. That it might also provide some hack with a sensational story along the lines of ‘Drunk Nurse Kills Police Officer’ was intolerable
I expected Dad to say something about the allegation that Scarlet was drunk. He didn’t, and, from the clipped tone, I had the strong impression it wouldn’t be wise to reveal it.
He didn’t speak for a moment but, even on the other end of the line, I could tell he was thinking and trying to get a handle on the chain of events. “You weren’t aware of any problems? Something she was upset about that might have made her distracted?”
I pushed every horrible thought away about the name of a mystery man scribbled on a piece of paper, the suggestion of suicide, a mysterious visit to a crappy hotel in London and the whopping lie Scarlet had told her husband. I told him I didn’t know. “How’s Mum?”
“Exhausted. I persuaded her to take a sedative. She’s sleeping now.”
“Dad?” I blurted out. “Do you mind if I don’t come with you and mum tomorrow?”
“Oh,” he said, obviously taken aback.
“Sorry. It’s —”
“Of course, Molly, I understand.” Except he didn’t. Until seeing Nate, I’d been determined to go, wanted to, but now I had plans.
Chapter 11 (#ulink_a39305cb-f312-5fbf-8fe8-83f9352f1de8)
First thing the next day, I texted Fliss Fiander, Scarlet’s best friend, and asked if I could visit that morning. She replied: Any time after ten. So very sorry, Molly.
To reach my car, I routinely take the scenic route down the garden where I have a home office over a carport. This is where I park the vehicular love of my life, a flashy white Fiat 500.
Except that morning it was no longer white.
With a hand clamped to my mouth, I gaped at what I could see of the bonnet, which wasn’t very much through a slurry of mashed flesh and bone. Reminiscent of a scene from The Walking Dead gore and shiny intestines spattered the windscreen. The smell, in the high temperature, was one of rotting meat and decay.
Heart in my throat, I took a pace nearer to try and identify exactly what I was looking at. Closer inspection revealed snarling fangs glinting in the sunshine. Curved claws attached to once powerful paws protruded from a coagulated mass of remains. The black and white marking would once have been striking. Tufts of thick black and white fur streaked with blood was all that signified that the roadkill belonged to a badger.
Anger flared inside me. I’d not accidentally run something over. I hadn’t sleepwalked in the night, offed a creature and driven back to home turf. The tableau before my eyes was the worst kind of sick joke.
Shaking, I walked to the edge of the carport and onto the pavement to check the road both ways. Cars, pedestrians, school kids coming and going; everywhere perversely ordinary. The pub across the road had only closed down a couple of months before. Empty and boarded up, it had provided the perpetrator with the perfect cover to carry out their grisly mission undetected. It also suggested a planner and not an opportunist.
I ought to call the police but, with so many unanswered questions about Scarlet’s death remaining, I didn’t want it to detract from any investigation. Of one thing I was certain: the timing was significant. I had no enemies and no business rivals. Could this be a retaliatory act for Scarlet’s actions? I resolved to call my dad.
Stepping back into the shade, I crouched down, staring hard at the floor, searching with my fingertips for anything that might have been left behind. Careful to avoid bird shit from a family of nesting house martins; grit, dirt and dust were the only items coating my nails. Disappointed, I straightened up, returned to the house where I dug out a dust-mask reserved for sanding down old furniture and clamped it on. Next, I grabbed a roll of thick black bin liners and a pair of rubber gloves from under the kitchen sink.
Back in the carport, I did what I had to do. The beast was heavier than I’d anticipated. Blood splashed my sandals and guts stained my clothes. The stink was indescribable and penetrated my face gear. Fortunately, I’d passed on breakfast that morning as bile filled my mouth.
Having got the worst off the car, and dumping the bags to one side, I hosed down the rest, flinching at the sight of tissue and animal fluids circling the drain. The smell would take longer to dissipate.
Locking the connecting door, I retreated to the house, where I peeled off my bloody clothes, tossed them into a plastic carrier bag and took another shower.
Dry and dressed, I called Dad and explained what happened. Whether it was the heat, or grief, it seemed to take him an age to process. “Are you all right?”
“Sort of.” I wasn’t.
“Some people are utter ghouls. I’m only sorry that you’ve been on the receiving end.”
“It’s just so extreme,” I mumbled. Dad didn’t know about the notes, didn’t know about Scarlet’s trip to London, the inconsistencies of her life.
“When people are upset, they sometimes do awful things. Unfortunately, I’m familiar with the species. It could have been a friend or family member close to Richard Bowen’s.”
Dad’s suggestion opened up a valid possibility I’d not had time to fully consider.
“The best thing you can do, Molly, is to forget this ever happened.”
“Forget?”
“Darling.” I recognised that tone. It was specially reserved for telling me, in the nicest way, that I was excitable and gifted with an overactive imagination.
“I’m not making this up,” I said crossly.
“Of course, you’re not. Leave everything where it is, and I’ll come and dispose of it later. Whatever you do, I don’t want either Nate or your mother finding out. This remains between the two of us.”
“I understand,” I said reluctantly.
“Good girl, I knew you’d be strong enough. Now I really must go.”
I had not forgotten my parents’ pilgrimage to the scene of the accident. And despite what my Dad said, I would not forget the grisly gift delivered to my carport, or the messy message it sent.
Chapter 12 (#ulink_1b40b3c2-65b6-55ea-bf70-1013eab51fb4)
Dressed in T-shirt and joggers, sweatband banishing her long honey-coloured hair, and with top of the range trainers on her feet, Fliss Fiander had obviously returned from a run or the gym. I could see she was upset. Her make-up wasn’t quite so immaculate or au naturel and her long dark lashes, which I suspected were permanently dyed, looked damp. Having never got the hang of applying foundation and lipstick, my look was more natural meets ‘can’t be arsed.’ There was a difference.
Towering over me, she threw her arms wide, gave me a hug, and invited me in. “You look tired out, Molly.”
“Didn’t get much sleep last night.” Correction: didn’t get any sleep last night and that was before this morning’s incident. On the drive over, self-doubt assailed me. Was I speculating too much about my sister’s trip to London? Could there be a completely innocent reason? Was I making deductions without the evidence to back them up regarding the notes found? In a way, it would be more comforting because then I didn’t need to be scared. Well, not much.
“Samuel’s out with the au pair so we have the house to ourselves. Come on through.”
I removed my flip-flops, my toes sinking into inches of thick oatmeal-coloured carpet and followed Fliss into a house that was the epitome of knockout design. The Fianders were ‘hired help’ folk, with staff for every aspect of their lives. I was as likely to watch Fliss Fiander with a mop and bucket in her hand as see her buy a sweater from the clothes section of the local supermarket. Designer girl. Designer house.
She appraised me in a way that I found faintly intrusive. Had Scarlet confided in her about our row? Did she know about Scarlet’s trip to the Capital?
“I’m about to make tea. Camomile or fruit?”
“Fruit would be fine.” I hated camomile. Like drinking distilled weeds.
From the kitchen, tri-fold doors led out onto a terrace with modernist furniture that matched the slate grey marble paving slabs and probably cost as much as the entire contents of my house. Beyond: a lush garden with ornamental paths, statues, arbours, exotic-looking plants and summerhouse. Outdoor Grand Design meets Hanging Gardens of Babylon.
“Pop outside, make yourself at home. I won’t be a second.”
I slid into a seat, stretched out in the sunshine, abruptly slain by the thought that it should be Scarlet sitting here with her best friend, not me.
“There you go.” With a creamy smile, Fliss handed me a glass that came inside another, presumably to prevent condensation. I thanked her and she viewed me with a sombre expression. “Scarlet really was my very best friend, and me and Louis are totally devastated. I can’t imagine how you must feel. It’s such a shock. Your poor parents and Zach, poor Nate too.”
Grim, I nodded, took a tentative sip, wished I hadn’t. “You’ve spoken to Nate?”
“Briefly.”
“Did he tell you that Scarlet lied about attending a conference and that he suspected her of having an affair?”
Fliss flushed and frowned. “Hang on a sec. I must grab my sunnies. Squinting into the sun is so ageing,” she said. Needlessly, I thought. I stared off into the distance, listened to the birds, thought about a future I couldn’t see, feeling awkward because I had one and my sister didn’t. Feeling rotten because I wasn’t only trawling through my sister’s private life, I was about to trample on it too.
“That’s better.” Cartier sunglasses replaced the sweatband. She beamed an expansive, self-confident smile designed to recalibrate the conversation. Made no difference to me. I picked up right where I left off. “Was she?”
She threw me a ‘mustn’t speak ill of the dead’ stare, although it was difficult to deduce much at all through the impenetrability of graded brown lenses. A slight flare of the nostrils was her only ‘tell.’
I rephrased. “Would she confide in you if she were?” I tamed the jagging sensation underneath my skin.
“I’d like to think so.” Which wasn’t the same as ‘Yes.’ Fliss Fiander was choosing her answers with exquisite care. I needed to push her and I was shameless about it. “I really need you to be completely honest with me. And before you say a word, twenty-four hours ago, I didn’t think my sister capable of drinking vodka neat from the bottle and driving under the influence.”
“What?” she said with a jolt.
“Unconfirmed, but likely.”
She snatched at her drink.
“Please, Fliss. What happened yesterday is so odd, so left-field, any scrap of information that can explain the tragedy, I’d be grateful if you’d tell me.”
She rested her glass delicately on the low table in front of us, adjusted her sunglasses, and flicked both palms up in a defensive gesture. “There’s a saying about not shooting the messenger.”
Chapter 13 (#ulink_068f65f2-6ab2-590e-a907-ed04386b0f22)
“I’m a lousy shot.” It was supposed to put her at her ease. She responded with an imperious look that would take me years to perfect. “Sorry, please carry on.”
“A rumour, nothing more, and definitely not the sort of thing for public consumption,” she warned, “but Scarlet suspected Nate was the one having an affair.”
“Nate?”
She flashed a worldly look. I felt like a child who’d found out about the birds and the bees – apt in the circumstances. Was this why he didn’t want to show the police the note his wife had left? Was this why he didn’t pursue my sister about her unscheduled stay in a London hotel?
I quickly regrouped. “You say she was suspicious, but she had no evidence.”
“Apart from the bracelet he gave her at Christmas.”
I frowned in confusion.
“Scarlet reckoned it was a guilt gift.”
“Right,” I said, scrabbling to process what I was hearing, “So Scarlet had had suspicions for a while?”
“Uh-huh.”
“And it made her unhappy?”
“Of course.”
“Enough to make her lose concentration on a bright summer day, enough to kill herself and to hell with whoever was driving on the opposite side of the road?”
“Good God, Molly, I really don’t know anything for certain.”
“Well, what are you sure about?” I’d briefly lost volume control. I coughed, flicked Fliss an apologetic smile.
“She spent most of last year moping about Nate,” Fliss continued smoothly, “but then, this year, she was happy. Almost too happy.”
“How can you be too happy?”
“Giddy then.”
Giddy was not a word I’d use to describe my sister. And then it dawned on me. “Like she was having an affair as payback?”
“I’ll be honest, I thought she’d met someone after we got back from holiday in Jamaica in February. She looked different. Radiant. I think I teased her about having a fling.”
“Which she denied?”
“Fervently.”
I cast my mind back. I didn’t remember seeing much of Scarlet at the time. “Then what?”
“I didn’t see her for a few months until we threw a party for Samuel’s birthday at the beginning of June. Scarlet came, and she looked absolutely dreadful. Frankly, I was worried about her. She stayed on afterwards and I asked what was wrong.” She gave me a long appraising look.
Was this what it was all about? Two people fucking other people and one getting upset enough to —No, no, no. She wouldn’t. She couldn’t.
My sister had only three boyfriends, tops, before meeting Nate, one of which never went beyond first base. And yes, we talked about things like that. When I ordered a hunky strip-a-gram for her hen night, she almost passed out. She was no prude, but she exuded decency and doing stuff by the book, in every aspect of her life. There had to be more to it. What Fliss described was like a cheap scene played out in a soap in order to push up ratings.
Fliss glanced down at her perfectly manicured nails, examined them and looked at me straight. “I got the impression Scarlet was in a jam. She didn’t want anyone to know, Louis included, but she asked if she could borrow some money. Quite a lot, in fact.”
I felt the air punch out of me. Scarlet was always so careful. She didn’t earn a fortune, but Nate’s job paid well, and they were doing fine —or so I’d thought. “For what?”
