Memory Scents (24 page)

              “Are you ready?” Grace’s voice broke her train of thought.

              “Yes, I’m ready.” She wanted to tell Grace she needed to go home, but the words wouldn’t come out of her mouth. Something inside Chrissie was urging her to go with Grace. She needed to talk to her, to glean some sort of information from her without her knowing what she was doing.

              “Get this place cleaned up.” Grace snapped at Tim on her way out of the door.

              “I’m going fishing at the weekend. I’ll do it when I get back.” He slurred, not bothering to get out of his chair.

              “Oh do what you like!” Grace snapped, and slammed the door.

              Chrissie’s mind was whirring, flitting from one memory to the next, as she felt Grace’s footsteps behind her on the path. They got into the car, both silent.

              Chrissie reasoned with herself that the Fisherman’s Friend and the rum smell could belong to anyone. But there was something else. A familiarity when she’d got close to him.

              “Has Tim said something to you?”

              “Um…Sorry?”

              “Tim. Has he upset you?” Grace was trying to figure out the change in her friend.

              “No not at all. Sorry Grace, he just reminded me of someone. Have you left him?”

              The question startled Grace at first and it was a few seconds before she answered.

              “I’m not sure. I think I’ve done it without realising it.”

              Grace filled Chrissie in on what had happened with her sister as they made their way to her house. Chrissie was finding it hard to pay attention to what was being said, but as Grace rested on telling her about Tim, she noticed a change in her tone.

          
Chrissie was beginning to wonder if Grace knew what her husband had done, but then she realised what a ridiculous thought that was. If she knew she would have reported him, surely?

              Chrissie physically shook herself; the whole thing was ridiculous. He was a retired police officer, an upstanding member of the community. He didn’t even look like a serial killer, Chrissie thought to herself. But then it dawned on her; what was a serial killer supposed to look like?

              “Are you sure you’re ok?” Grace said, again.

              “I’m fine. I just had some news from my parents that disturbed me a bit.”

              “Oh. What?” Grace pulled the car into her sister’s drive.

              “I told you about the regression therapy and all that? Well, Sarah told me it could be a childhood memory, a theory that I dismissed until my mother phoned. But it turns out it’s true, only I got away. From whoever snatched me, I mean.”

              Grace was silent as the information penetrated her mind.

              “You’re Christine, the one that got away.” Grace’s voice was almost a whisper. It was all rushing to her like a head on collision.

              “How did you know that?”

              “It was all over the papers. Why hadn’t I connected it before?” Grace was talking to herself more than to Chrissie.

              “That’s why you’re so familiar to me. I recognise you from the pictures.”

          
A flurry, a bit like a snow storm flittered through Chrissies mind and fragments of memory melted as they landed in her head.

              They sat in silence for some time before they made their way into the house. There was so much said in that silence. They were both going over the same thing in their heads, only from completely different directions. But eventually their minds would bring them onto the same path. It was just a matter of time, which of them was going to say it out loud first.

              Grace sighed, knowing they both knew the same thing.

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

              For what he thought was the last time, Tim pressed the buzzer on the double doors of the retirement home. One of the usual voices greeted him over the intercom; Veronica, the home manager. But instead of buzzing him in as she normally did when she heard his name, she asked him to wait there.

              Tim frowned, wondering what was going on. Perhaps one of the residents had had an accident, he thought. Tim could see Veronica coming down the corridor, an air of authority wafting around her. He found her a little bit intimidating, which was unusual for Tim. She was always dressed in a power suit, immaculate nails, makeup, and blonde hair tied up in a chignon. She looked totally out of place there. She would have looked more fitting in an expensive restaurant.

              “Hello Tim. Step into the office, would you?” She was pleasant, but there was obviously something very wrong.

              All sorts of things were moving through his mind, but he wasn’t panicking. He thought perhaps she’d died, and they’d been trying to get hold of him while he was on his way there.

              Veronica proffered for him to take a seat, as she positioned herself in front of a large leather bound desk.

              “Is there something wrong, Veronica?” Tim put on his best calm and concerned voice and linked his hands on his lap like a vicar might.

              Calculated cash sums were already running through his head.

              “I’m really sorry to have to tell you this, Tim…”

              Tim didn’t hear anything else Veronica said. Elation was sweeping over him. The old witch had finally died of her own accord. That was until he caught the last words out of Veronica’s mouth.

              “…she doesn’t want to see you at the moment.”

              “Sorry, what did you say?”

              “Unfortunately, your mother doesn’t want to see you at the moment. We have to respect her wishes, Tim. Did you have some sort of difficulty with her last time you were here?”

              Tim snapped back to reality.

              “No. Why? What did she say?” Tim’s face appeared to darken.

              ”She has just requested not to see you at the moment. She’s made an official request, which means I can’t let you in to see her. I’m really sorry.”

              “Well, she’s obviously had another stroke or she’s going senile.”

              “I’m afraid not. The doctor’s been in to see her and he says she’s doing quite well and appears to be of sound mind.”

              “Appears to be? That’s not good enough. I want some more tests done. You can’t stop me seeing my own mother.” Tim was becoming irate. His brain was trying to grasp the concept that someone, a woman, was telling him what to do.

              “It’s not us, Tim. Your mother has requested we don’t let you in and we have to respect that.”

              “I don’t have to respect anything. She’s my mother, for fuck’s sake!” Tim banged his fist on the desk, causing Veronica to flinch slightly.

              She looked at him properly for the first time since he’d arrived and noticed how rough he looked. Unclean, unshaven and there was a smell of stale alcohol wafting across the desk to her nostrils with each word he spat.

              “I don’t know and I don’t want to know what problems you’ve had with each other, but I suggest you go home and call us in a week’s time. See what the situation is then.” She stood up, walked to the door and gestured for him to leave. She didn’t like his aggressive behaviour and wanted him off the premises as quickly as possible. She was starting to see what Daphne had been talking about.

              “You can’t do this! She can’t do this!” Tim shouted.

              It had no effect. Veronica continued to stand by the door, willing him to leave.Tim gave in, feeling like a scolded child under her glare.

              “Bitch!” he spat at her as she saw him out of the main doors.

              She alerted the other staff to his behaviour and made sure that under no circumstances was he to be let into the building. She had felt something really sinister from him, something she hadn’t noticed before.

              Tim used the incident as another excuse to drink himself into oblivion. He’d taken his anger out on the house by throwing a few things around when he got home. Some of his anger and violence was aimed at Grace too.

              The rum coursed through his veins, making everything feel better. It was the hangovers and tiredness that made him feel violent and vicious. The alcohol calmed him down, taking him by the hand and leading him to the drunken fuelled daze he liked to exist in.

              He sat at the kitchen table trying to work out a way of getting to his mother. He wasn’t allowed to talk to her and he didn’t know what she’d said to the people in the care home, so breaking in to the place wasn’t an option. They’d know it was him and he didn’t want to draw attention to himself.

              Verity’s face swam in front of his vision. Picture after picture of her smiling, her with his mother, her with his father, pictures of happier times when he wasn’t around, when Verity was still very much alive. It ran through his head that he’d have killed her had she still been around today.

              “Verity, fucking Verity!” he shouted to the blank wall.

              It was the losing that infuriated him more than anything, the fact that his mother had got there first. She was one step ahead of him and he hated that. He had never liked anyone getting one over him.

              As the rum mellowed him, he realised he needed to appeal to her better nature. He was, after all, the apple of her eye, well, the only apple left. Once he got back in her good books, he’d be allowed to see her again. It wouldn’t take long for her to give in, he just needed to play his cards right.

              The only way he could get through to her was to write her a letter. She liked letters; she’d be impressed by that. He was sure they’d pass a letter on to her in the retirement home, especially if he posted it. They wouldn’t know it was from him until she opened it.

              That night, Tim sat at his kitchen table and wrote the most heartfelt letter he’d ever written in his life. Convincing himself as he did so, that it was all an act to reach his ultimate goal.

*

              Grace had stayed at Chrissie’s for the weekend. They needed time in each other’s company for Grace to be able to relay everything she needed to Chrissie.

 
              Grace had started with the beginning of her marriage and led right up to what she found out about Tim all those months ago. She felt it was important for Chrissie to know everything from the start to fully understand her future plans for Tim.

              Chrissie had listened attentively as Grace had relayed every little detail. They spent most of the weekend going through every imaginable emotion together. Finding out Tim had tried to snatch Chrissie and that she had briefly known Nadine and Alice, had linked them together more so than they had been before.

              Had someone else told Chrissie they knew their husband was a serial killer she’d have run from the house and straight down to the nearest police station. But this was different, as things always were when they affected you personally. Grace had shown her the bigger picture, and she now felt like she’d watched a horrible film. Only this was real. And Grace had convinced her that her way was the better way of dealing with it all.

              Chrissie had never thought in her wildest dreams that she would ever plot to take another person’s life. But in her eyes, he wasn’t worthy of living.

              Chrissie thought that going out of the house and away from their big secret, she’d wobble and reality would hit her. But it didn’t. She felt the same about it when she was around other people as she did when it had first been talked about.

              She was still feeling a cocktail of emotions: anger, disgust, devastation and sadness, but also a strange feeling of relief. It was as if she’d always been aware of the whole situation, which she probably had in her subconscious. She was desperate to talk to Sarah about it and she hated keeping secrets from her but she knew she could never tell another soul. Grace had been very clear about that.

              Her relationship with Grace had changed along with her relationship with the house. It was no longer a house to her, but a home as well. Both had grown much stronger in a matter of days, and the secret she now shared with Grace would bind them forever.

              An atmosphere had descended on the house which Chrissie recognised from when she first viewed it. Whatever it was that had been haunting her had stopped, and there was a tranquillity that had landed like a summer mist. Chrissie put this down to the fact that all the blanks had been filled in, as if it had pushed her onto the path she was about to take.

              Chrissie and Grace had realised they were cut from the same mould. Their minds followed the same thought processes. When they discussed killing Tim, it appeared to be a fairly straight forward process. And as the days passed, the thought of it became less and less shocking. It was easier to digest because it involved him having an accident.

              Unfortunately for Tim, his drinking habits hadn’t gone unnoticed by either of the women and this was what they had decided to use to make his death look like an unfortunate accident. They had agreed to go ahead with their plans once Tim came back from his fishing trip. He was going to have a drink fuelled tragic accident.

              Grace didn’t really need Chrissie’s help doing it, she just wanted her support. Telling Chrissie everything had felt like the most natural thing in the world, and the relief had been immense. It hadn’t worried her that she might tell someone or report it to the police. Grace was past caring, she just wanted the whole sorry situation to be over. But it wasn’t the reason she’d told Chrissie. She’d told her because she trusted her. Something she’d not felt about anyone for a very long time. There was also a feeling of Chrissie being a stepping stone to her daughter; a link to the past, a much happier time.

              Grace also felt that Chrissie needed to know, after she’d found out she was the little girl that Tim had tried to turn into one of his victims. She knew their support for each other would last a lifetime.

              Even though they had spent most of the weekend talking about such a sinister subject, Grace had enjoyed the best few days she’d had in years. She felt free. Not as free as she’d feel once she got Tim out of her life, but even so, she felt better.

              The weekend was coming to a close and Grace decided it was time to get back to Eve’s house; she’d be coming home soon. The police, having been there the last few days had assured her they had finished their investigations for the time being.