The Bones of You (7 page)

“Please. You should see my house. And it’s just me.” She follows me in.

“Have a seat. I’ll finish throwing this together, and we can eat outside.”

“Great.” Laura perches on one of the battered wooden chairs, tanned legs neatly arranged, skirt reaching just above her knees.

“So, how are you getting on? Are you finding out what you need?”

“Slowly . . . There are always people who want to talk for ages about nothing of relevance to Rosie. And others who don’t want to know me.”

Like me,
I’m thinking.

“It isn’t personal,” she goes on. “But just by nature of being a reporter, some people think you’re the devil’s spawn.”

The spoon I’m holding slips out of my hand, clattering to the floor.

But as we sit outside, lunch laid out on the table under the shade of our old oak tree, as the spark of our old friendship is rekindled, I start to relax. I’m curious, too, about Laura’s life.

“So, tell me. Why did you move?”

“They offered me a job. Ten years ago.” She helps herself to salad and slices of ham. “It was a job I couldn’t refuse. You see, I went back to school and studied psychology.
Lifetime
wanted someone to write about mental health issues. At that point, I just wanted to get away from here.... It was the right job at the right time. I was lucky.”

“No children?” I’ve already noticed the absence of a wedding ring.

She shakes her head. “There was a guy. It’s a long story. . . . Anyway, as it turns out, I’m better off without him. I have great friends. And I love my work.”

But as we eat, I have to ask. “So . . .” I hesitate, not sure how to put this. “How is what you write different from everyone else?”

“Well”—her voice becomes more businesslike—“forget everything you’ve ever thought about the gutter press. I’m not interested in hitting the headlines. There’s always a story, but I want more than that. I guess, with Rosie, I’m looking from her parents’ angle. Trying to find out not just what but why it happened. Was Rosie already a victim in some way even before her death? I suppose you could say it’s what’s behind the story that interests me.”

As she speaks, suddenly I have goose bumps, realizing that aside from wanting to see a murderer caught, I, too, want to know.
Why?

“Okay,” I say quietly. “Ask me anything you like.”

She looks surprised. “You’re sure, Kate? I completely understand if you’d rather not.”

“No. It’s fine. I’ve thought about it. And I do trust you. It’s not like it will hurt Jo. It might even help.”

Laura looks grateful. “Thank you. Do you have time . . . if we make a start now?”

I nod as she reaches into her bag and pulls out a leather-bound notebook.

“Okay. So, why don’t you tell me how you know the Andersons.”

I tell Laura what I told the police, including about the necklace, while she takes notes, only at the end pausing to ask a question.

“Isn’t your daughter a similar age?”

I nod. Laura’s been doing her homework, but then, what did I expect?

“They weren’t friends?”

“Not particularly. It wasn’t that they didn’t get on. They were just very different.”

“And they didn’t spend time together with the horses?”

“No.”

“Did that surprise you?”

“I never used to think about it. It was a hot summer, and Grace used to ride out early in the morning. Her social life took up her evenings. It’s just how it was.”

An echo of Grace’s words bounces back to me.
She never comes when I’m around, does she? It’s as if it’s not just the horses she wants. It’s you.

A frown wrinkles my forehead. “Grace commented on it, though. Just the once. That Rosie came over only when she wasn’t around.”

Laura writes it down, then sits thoughtfully, her head slightly tilted to one side.

“I’ve talked to a few people,” she says quietly, “who, in all honesty, probably didn’t know her as well as you. I’m trying to build a picture of the people in her life. Her relationships. What she did, where she went, who might have seen her . . . One or two mentioned seeing her with a boy. No one has a bad word to say about her—or any of the Andersons. One or two bitchy comments about Jo, perhaps, but she’s incredibly beautiful. People are jealous of that.”

“Grace told me there were some boys hanging around. Druggies. One of her friends bought some weed from them.”

Laura looks at me questioningly.

“I just keep thinking . . .” I hesitate.

“Kate, there will always be someone selling weed.”

“It’s not that so much. It’s just, well, I keep wondering if maybe Rosie knew them. Or got caught up with them because of someone else. Like Poppy, her friend.”

“That’s the other thing.... There are all these rumors, Kate, about a boyfriend, but no one seems to have come up with who he is.”

“Jo told me ages ago there wasn’t one.”

Laura frowns. “Maybe she didn’t know. I should try and talk to Poppy. Do you know where she lives?”

“I can find out from Grace. But I wouldn’t get your hopes up. And be careful. Her family is quite . . . intimidating, I guess you’d say.”

“Oh. Okay.”

Laura reaches into her bag and passes me a card. “If you think of anything else, could you call me?”

 

Shortly after she leaves, a knock at the door startles me.

“Mrs. McKay?” It’s Sergeant Beauman, and I notice another uniformed figure sitting in the police car that’s parked outside. “Sorry to disturb you again, but would you mind if we had a look round your stable yard?”

“Of course not. What, now?”

She nods.

“Okay. I’ll just get my boots.”

I go to fetch them, wondering what they think they’re going to find, deeply unsettled just at the thought.

 

As if that’s not enough, that evening, before Angus gets home, I hear another car pull up, then footsteps running up the path and a loud hammering at the back door. Through the kitchen window I see it’s Jo.

I hurry to the door and open it, horrified. She looks distraught. Her eyes are puffy and red; her hair is all over the place; her body shaking with huge, racking sobs.

“Jo . . . what is it? What’s happened?”

I hold out my arms, and she falls into them, an awful animal sound coming from her as finally her grief vents itself.

Much later, when at last she quietens, I get her onto a chair, still clinging to me, then seize both her arms.

“I’m so sorry,” she sobs. “I didn’t know where else to go.”

“It’s okay, Jo. Really it is.”

But she raises her tearstained face. “It isn’t, Kate. It never will be.”

“What is it? What’s happened? Have the police found Rosie’s murderer?”

She shakes her head, then whispers, “
Neal.
”

As she says his name, I’m struck by the chill of fear, because this family has suffered enough, too much. “Has something happened to him? Jo?”

Her face is stricken, her words blurring into each other. “Had a row. Neal said . . . I’m a bad mother. . . .”

I’m horrified. They’re both suffering, both hurting. How can he be so cruel?

“Oh, Jo, that’s an awful thing to say. Of course you’re not. You loved her. She was your daughter.”

But she wrenches herself back, away from me.

“You don’t understand.” Her eyes are wild, darting all around, as though she’s looking for something. “I should have been able to protect her. . . .”