Remix (2010) (13 page)

“Phil Sharott?”

“You’ve done your research. Yes. I had a manager before, but he wasn’t anything like as good as Phil.”

“When did you switch?”

“Six months ago. I’d kept in touch with Phil, he was very kind to me after poor Bryan died. And he believes in me.”

Emma chatted disarmingly for a while about her singing, her new album, and her plans for the next year. She did it very well; promoting herself but not in an obvious, tedious way. Plainly ambitious, she was able to laugh at her own plans to storm the music business.

“I tried for The X Factor, but didn’t get on - just as well, back then Simon Cowell would have shredded me. You must swear not to tell anyone this, it’s
too
embarrassing, but four or five years ago, when I’d try anything, I went to an audition to represent Britain in the Eurovision Song Contest. I was terribly nervous, the song I had wasn’t brilliant and of course I didn’t get it. Lucky for me really, it wouldn’t have done my street cred any good. But I got to meet Terry Wogan, and you never know when a contact like that might be useful.”

“Have you always wanted to be a singer?”

“Yes, though I’d like to act as well. Be like Madonna was, but with a more successful film career.” She laughed. “I don’t want much.”

“Better than working as a secretary.”
There, I’d worked it in.

“Is that what you did before you were a journalist?”

“Er…yes.”
Oh…she thought I meant me.

Emma picked up the teapot, shook it gently, and poured. I helped myself to milk, and tried a different approach.

“So how did you meet Bryan?”

A tiny pause, or did I imagine it? I licked sugar off my fingers and had a sip of tea. Lapsang Souchong, too smoky for my taste. I like Indian tea.

“I was working as a temp. I did one week for Phil while his secretary was sick. That’s how Phil and I met. Bryan was so sweet, he asked for my phone number on my last day.”

“Oh, I’m sure I read somewhere you were an estate agent…”

“That’s right. I temped once when I was between jobs. How’s the cake? Is it all right?”

“Delicious. Which temping agency?”

Emma looked at me, a little surprised. “Why?”

“I wondered if it was one I worked for.”

“I can’t remember. It was years ago, and not for long. Secretarial something…oh, I forgot, d’you mind terribly signing this? There’s a copy for you.”

She reached to the counter for two pieces of A4 paper. I read the top one;
I agree not to disclose anything related to me by Emma Redfern except for the purpose of writing a book about the Bryan Orr case, and more particularly not to make available such information to the press…

I dated and signed it, remembering to use my pseudonym. Emma put her copy behind her on the counter; I folded mine and tucked it in my handbag.

“Can I ask you about The Voices In My Head? The individual band members, and what they were like? You must have known them very well.”

“Yes, after that first week, when I started going out with Bryan, I saw quite a lot of them. Bryan liked me to be with him, he always got me to come along. Have you met them yet?”

“Yes.”

“So you’ll know…Dave Calder is a sweetheart, you want to pick him up and cuddle him. And Jeff…he’s outrageous, but if you’ve met him you’ll know that.” Emma looked at me shrewdly. “Did he make a pass at you?”

“Yes.”

“Quite a crude one?” I nodded. Emma’s voice went lower. “I hadn’t met him, it was my first day with Phil at the recording studios, and I was making coffee. He came up behind me and put his hand up my skirt. Phil told him off, and he made some stupid joke. I was quite upset, because I’d been so excited about meeting the band.”

“Poor you!”

“Oh, it was all right, Phil said that’s just the way he was, not to take any notice. He was right, Jeff was okay after that. And Bryan and Dave were really nice to me, even before they knew me.”

“Do you mind talking about Bryan Orr?”

“No. It used to be too painful, all I could think of was that dreadful day…but now I can remember the good times. Bryan loved me so much, you know; he’d have done anything for me. He was going to write me a song. He wanted to marry me, but I’d known him such a short time.” Emma lowered her eyelids, and her lovely mouth turned down. “Of course, now I wish I’d said yes and made him happy.”

“What about Ric Kealey?”

“Ric…he was so gorgeous, that’s the first thing you noticed about him. Film star good looks. I remember, when Phil introduced us, I was literally speechless, like a schoolgirl. Totally in awe of this guy. A rock god.” She laughed a little, ruefully. “And he was always so rude to me.”

“Was he? Why?”

“I don’t know. I don’t think he liked it when I started going out with Bryan. He and Bryan were at school together, you know. They were best friends.” Emma pushed her plate with its untouched sandwich away from her. “Ric was always getting at me. Because I was there quite a lot with Bryan, he started calling me the
Fifth Voice
, and I could tell he didn’t mean it in a nice way. I tried to ignore his attitude, but it got worse. Then he started staring at me. I used to catch him doing it, and when our eyes met he didn’t smile, he’d just go on staring…” She shivered. I waited, but she seemed to have stopped.

“Why did he do that?”

“I think he fancied me. He used to make excuses to be alone with me. If I left the room, he’d follow. Discreetly. But when we
were
alone, he’d just put me down. Everything I said was stupid, or boring. He made me cry once. I don’t think Bryan noticed, and I didn’t say anything, because Ric was his friend.”

So there
had
been more between them than Ric admitted, and he
had
found her attractive…but couldn’t do anything about it while she was going out with Bryan. And his (not very nice) way of dealing with it was being horrid to Emma. Not his type, indeed. I thought he’d been hiding something. And he had…and no wonder, because the truth showed him in a bad light.

“I started getting silent phone calls in the middle of the night on my mobile when Bryan was away, never when he was there. Hardly anyone had the number. There’s no proof it was Ric, of course, but he knew when I was alone, and he could have got the number easily, too.”
He still had the number…
“I didn’t report it or tell anyone because of Bryan. But I remember one night, the band was doing a charity concert in Birmingham. I hadn’t gone, though I wanted to, because my agent was taking me to an awards ceremony, and I couldn’t get out of it. I was in the flat on my own. The phone rang five separate times. It was scary. In the end I stopped trying to sleep. I got up, wrapped the duvet round me, and watched a film.”

“Why didn’t you turn the phone off?”

“My mother had an operation the week before. She was only just out of hospital. My father might have needed to get hold of me.”

I was getting a bad feeling in the pit of my stomach. This was a side to Ric I hadn’t encountered, and I didn’t like it. I was afraid, going by Emma’s beautiful, troubled face, there was more to come, and I wouldn’t like that either.

“The next morning, when Bryan came home, Ric was with him. He said, ‘Emma, you look terrible. Huge bags under your eyes. Didn’t you get any sleep last night?’ Then he smiled.”

There were cake crumbs on the ridged surface of the antique wooden table. Old pitch pine. Like Saladin’s stand. The wood might have come from the same forest. I pressed my finger on some crumbs, and transferred them to my plate.

“The day before Bryan died, I went with him to Tiger Studios. The band was doing a remix. They couldn’t get on with it because Ric hadn’t arrived. We were hanging around for hours, then he showed up. He was drunk, and stoned too. Not staggering-about-drunk - Ric didn’t do that. He just got so no one could deal with him - he was out of control.”
That’s what he’d said…
“He was really offensive to Jeff, and Jeff just took it, and that surprised me. Then he started on Bryan, and Bryan was like, come on guys, we’re here to do a remix. Ric said, and three years later I can remember every word of it, ‘So what’s Emma doing here, then? I didn’t realize remixing was among her areas of expertise, in fact I’d rather assumed there was only one thing she was good for, and that’s got nothing to do with music.’ And then Bryan hit him.”

This tallied with Ric’s own account, except Ric had said he couldn’t remember how the fight started. Emma’s story sounded all too plausible.

“They had a fight - it was dreadful - Dave and Jeff pulled them apart. Ric left, and you’ve probably read about what Bryan yelled at him. It was in the papers. The next day I was on my own in Bryan’s flat. I’d moved in with him the month before. The bell went, and it was Ric, and he pushed his way in. I told him Bryan was out, and there was no point him waiting, because Bryan didn’t want to see him. He told me to mind my own business. Then he started shouting at me, and I slapped him. He grabbed my arm, pulled me towards him and kissed me. He was very strong. I struggled, but I couldn’t get away. I tried to, but I couldn’t.”

Emma paused, and her big hazel eyes filled with tears.

“And then he raped me.”

Chapter

16

*

I sat at the table, unable to speak for a moment, staring at her, shock and dismay squeezing my heart and making my legs tremble. I felt winded. Ric had raped her…and lied to me about it. I’d thought I knew him, and I was wrong. I didn’t know him at all.

“That’s…awful…” I put my hand on her shoulder. Her perfume was stronger close to.

A tear spilled on to Emma’s cheek. “He kept saying it was what I wanted, he’d seen the way I looked at him, and I said no, and he just laughed and dragged me into the bedroom. I said, please, Ric, don’t, think of Bryan, and he said, fuck Bryan.”

Emma wiped away the tears with the inside of her wrist. I dug into my bag, found a wodge of tissues and gave them to her. She mopped her eyes. The tears were pouring out of them, running down her face. She was crying the way I had when my mother died.

“I did my best to fight him off, but I was so much smaller than him, I hadn’t got a chance. In the end I stopped resisting and let him get on with it, get it over with. I didn’t hear Bryan come in. Suddenly he was in the room, pulling Ric off me, screaming at him, hitting him. I couldn’t bear it, I had to get away. I ran out of there, and kept running till I got to my flat in Kings Cross. I ran a bath, I took off all my clothes and put them in the bin, I scrubbed myself, washed my hair, ran the water out and did it again to try to feel clean. I had bruises all over. I couldn’t stop sobbing. Everything was spoiled.”

“Oh
poor
you, how terrible…” I patted her, inadequately. “How could he… Is it too painful to talk about? You don’t have to tell me, I’ll go away if you want.”

Emma said, “No, I feel better getting it out into the open. I’ve hidden it for so long…” She blew her nose, and gave a small smile. “There, I’m all right now.”

“So what did you do? Did you ring the police?”

“I couldn’t face it - their questions, examinations, looking for evidence…” Emma shuddered. “And do you know the conviction rate for rape?” I shook my head. “Six per cent. That’s all. And you have to wait for months, and go to court, and be called a liar, and be in all the papers…”

I looked away from her pale, distraught face - still beautiful even though her eyes were swollen and her nose pink - and gazed at my plate. I felt as if I’d never eat again. I felt sick.

Emma sat up straight. “But now I want people to know. What happened, what Ric Kealey was really like. Because it’s the truth, and it should be told. I wasn’t strong enough before, but I am now. I’m doing an exclusive interview with the
News of the World
next week. They’re paying me, but that’s not the point. It’ll be good publicity for my album. Do you think that’s frightfully cynical of me?”

“No…if it makes you feel better about it…if it turns an appalling experience to something positive…”

She breathed deeply; she was calmer, less vulnerable. Maybe it had helped her, telling me. “What else do you want to know? I’m okay now.”

“If you’re sure? What happened when you went back to the flat and found Bryan?”

Emma’s eyes closed briefly, as if to shut out the memory. “That was the worst moment of my life. I rang Bryan, and he didn’t answer. So I went back to the flat. I didn’t want to, after what happened. I was afraid Ric might still be there. I let myself in. My hand was shaking so much I could hardly get the key in the lock. I opened the door slowly, listening. The flat was silent. I thought maybe it was empty. Then I saw Bryan sitting against the wall. There was blood on the carpet, but I didn’t realize he was dead at first. I went up to him and tried to rouse him. I saw the knife and pulled it out…” Emma took a deep breath. “Blood gushed out of the wound, and ran over my hand. I was terrified. His head fell forwards. I dialled 999, got the police and an ambulance. I was hysterical, and the girl the other end was so calm…it was unreal.”