The Half Truth (6 page)

Tina watched from her window as the BMW drew off down the road. She craned her neck until it had disappeared out of sight. A little feeling of unease snuck up on her and she glanced up and down the road, half expecting to see Pavel outside.

What exactly he was doing back in the UK, she had no idea. Had he really been spying on her? She wished she could have found out more about what he had been up to when he had lived in the UK, but John had been tight-lipped.

She wondered if Sasha had known anything. He had certainly never given her any indication that Pavel was mixed up in anything as serious as murder. Sasha would have told her. They shared everything. She turned away from the window and her eyes came to rest on the photo frame on the mantelpiece. She walked over and picked it up. A sparkly frame with bits of tiny mirror tiles, sparkly glass, a bric-a-brac home-crafted frame that Sasha had given her. Inside was a photograph of the two of them, taken on Brighton Pier.

She smiled. The frame really wasn’t her style and didn’t fit in with anything else in the house. She remembered how proud Sasha had been when he had presented it to her. She had wanted to laugh, but he had been deadly serious when he said how precious it was. A token of how precious she was and how precious their love was. How sad that they had so little time together. She replaced the frame.

‘I’m going to pop upstairs to get changed,’ she said to Dimitri. ‘Then I’ll go next door and see if Mr Cooper wants some tea. You okay there?’

A brief ‘yes’ in reply, which didn’t even involve her son taking his eyes from the screen. Okay, the TV wasn’t the ideal babysitter, but today she was grateful for it.

Tina sighed to herself as she climbed the stairs, picking up a couple of toys that Dimitri had discarded at some point that morning before school. All she ever seemed to do was tidy up after him. How was it possible a six-year-old could make so much mess? She reached the landing and, just to prove her point, there was a sprinkling of what looked like powder on the carpet.

She scuffed it with her foot in an attempt to rub it in. She paused. Not simply because she knew she was being lazy and should really get the Hoover out, but because the powder had a grey tinge to it. What on earth had he tipped out? She looked into his bedroom and noticed an old cardboard box in the corner that he had brought home from school. Well, he told her it was a robot, hence the silver foil stuck randomly all over it, together with milk-bottle lids. The dust and dirt had probably come from there. She went to call out his name and tell him to come and tidy up, but stopped herself.

Tina rubbed her face with her hands. All this business with being followed and now Pavel being in the UK, stirring up emotions about Sasha, was getting to her. She needed to stay rational and not let the stress take its effect on her and, as a result, on Dimitri. She couldn’t tell him off for playing. She’d clear it up and say no more.

When she went next door to Mr Cooper’s. It was no surprise that the back door was unlocked and he was dozing in his chair with classical music coming from the old radiogram beside him. Stepping into Mr Cooper’s living room was like going back in time by about fifty years. Despite Tina enjoying the comforts of modern-day living, she always felt a comfort in Mr Cooper’s home. It reminded her of her Nan’s house and gave a reassuring warm, nostalgic feel.

Today, however, she didn’t get that usual wrap of warmth. The house felt different. She couldn’t put her finger on exactly what it was but there was an odd atmosphere. She gave herself a mental shake. Things were definitely getting to her.

She decided not to disturb Mr Cooper in his mid-afternoon nap, she would simply pop back later with a plate of dinner. Retracing her steps into the hall, Tina glanced towards the front door to see if there was any post. A collection of envelopes lay scattered on the doormat. They mostly looked like junk mail. Mr Cooper rarely got any personal post. All his bills were paid by direct debits and, apart from his daughter in Australia, there wasn’t really anyone else in his life. Tina bent to collect the mail all the same and flicked through to make sure there wasn’t anything important-looking. If not, she’d put it straight in the recycling, like she usually did.

The bang from upstairs made Tina jump. It sounded like a door. Tina stood still and listened, but all she could hear was her heart thumping inside her chest, as if trying to beat its way out. Then another bang, this one not quite so violent. Tina looked up the darkened staircase. Mr Cooper never went upstairs any more, his legs weren’t up to it. Tina had only been up there once herself, when he had needed an extra blanket last winter. He had spilt tea on his usual one and she had offered to take it home and put it through her washing machine. Tina remembered from then that upstairs was like a museum, dark where the curtains were kept drawn, mainly to stop the wind blowing through the gaps in the wooden window frames. Mr Cooper had never seen the need to invest in the upkeep of his property, not one for double glazing or central heating. He had managed all his life without it and didn’t see why he needed it in his senior years. Tina remembered how most of the bedroom furniture was covered with off-white dust sheets.

The door banged again from upstairs. Steeling herself, Tina acceded that she would have to go up and close it properly, although she did wonder why it had started banging now. The ascent of the staircase set her nerves jangling.

‘This is so stupid,’ she muttered to herself. ‘What on earth am I afraid of? It’s just a house. Exactly like mine.’ She was now at the top of the stairs and she hastily located the light switch. The landing was immediately swathed in light and Tina was thankful that Mr Cooper had never felt the need to convert the landing light to one of those energy-saving bulbs that seemed to take an eternity to reach their full power.

Tina quickly identified the door that was responsible for banging. She went to poke her head round the doorway but stopped and switched on the light. Sadly, this one wasn’t working at all.

All Tina’s senses were telling her not to go into the room.

Her i-phone bursting into life from her pocket made her let out a startled scream. Her body jumped involuntarily and her breath caught in the back of her throat.

‘Shit!’ She held her hand to her racing heart and groped in her jeans pocket for her phone.

‘John Police’ flashed up across the screen.

Tina accepted the call. ‘Hello.’ She closed the bedroom door, giving it an extra tug, until she heard the click of the catch fitting into the lock.

‘Hi, Tina. It’s me, John. Everything okay?’

She pushed the bedroom door to ensure it wouldn’t come open again. ‘Hi, John. Yes, all okay. I’m at Mr Cooper’s.’

‘Just letting you know that I’ll be parked up outside tonight.’

‘Just you?’

‘Yeah. Martin’s follow up some leads. If you need me, shout.’

‘Thanks, that’s good to know.’ Tina immediately felt herself relax. ‘Have you eaten?’

‘Yes, thanks. Don’t worry about me, you carry on as normal.’

‘Are you planning to be there all night?’

‘Pretty much. Martin will be back down tomorrow.’ He sounded casual, as if it was a regular thing.

‘All night in the car? Will you be okay?’

She heard him laugh before he spoke. It was a gentle laugh, filled with warmth. ‘I’ll be fine. I’ve staked out in worse places, I can assure you. Now, don’t forget, anything that’s bothering you, call me. Anything at all.’

‘Thank you. I’ll try not to freak out, though, if there are any creepy crawlies about. I’m not sure spiders count as emergencies.’

She ended the call and was very aware of the smile that had, at some point, pasted itself on her face. It was still there as she left Mr Cooper, still dozing in his chair, and went back next door to get the tea ready.

Tina wasn’t sure what woke her first. The soft whimper of Dimitri crying or the unfamiliar creak of floorboards. Creaks that didn’t happen as the house breathed in and out, slumbering its way through the night. No, those creaks were embedded in her subconscious, they didn’t stir her. The creaks she heard tonight were different. They had a sense of rhythm and weight to them.

She was up and grabbing her dressing gown as these thoughts filtered their way through her sleep-muffled brain. Dimitri’s whimper had turned into a cry.

‘Mummy!’

‘It’s okay, darling. I’m coming.’

Tina pushed open her son’s bedroom door. It was ajar. She had left it closed. She always closed his door. Perhaps he had been up in the night. That would explain the unusual groaning of the floorboards. She let out a deep breath and calmed herself as she entered the room.

Dimitri was lying in bed, the duvet pulled over his head. She could see his feet jiggling. He pulled the cover down and called out her name again, before hiding his face under the racing-car fabric.

‘It’s mummy,’ said Tina rushing to the side of his bed. She pulled the cover back and stroked his head. ‘Dimitri. Mummy’s here.’ Enveloping him into her arms, she held him tight, making reassuring soothing noises. His little body relaxed into her and his arms wrapped around her neck. Soon his crying eased.

‘There was a monster in my room,’ he said.

‘It’s all gone now. You must have been dreaming,’ said Tina. She pulled away from her son and smiled, holding her hand to his rosy cheek. The shaft of light from the hall cast a shadow across the bed, leaving the rest of the room in darkness.

Tina turned to look across the room. Dark corners and unidentified black shapes invaded the room. By day the furniture and furnishing were comforting. By night menacing. Alien in the darkness.

Unable to rely on sight, she listened intently. The atmosphere was heavy. She felt Dimitri’s body stiffen. Through the thin cotton of her nightshirt, his fingernails dug into her back. Tina wasn’t sure what she was listening for. Anything that shouldn’t be there. Footsteps. Breathing. Movement.

Nothing was out of place and yet, as her mind jumped back to what had woken her in the first place, she knew there had been a foreign noise, one that did not belong in the house. One that threatened her.

‘Do you want to sleep in Mummy’s bed tonight?’ She didn’t wait for Dimitri to say yes. Tina pulled back the duvet and picking him up, carried him through to her bedroom. ‘There, we will look after each other.’

‘Can I have a glass of water, please?’ said Dimitri as Tina tucked the cover under his chin.

‘Of course.’

The words came out rather more freely than she felt. Going out into the hall, she closed the bedroom door tight behind her, checking it was shut firmly. Tina hurried across the landing. Pausing at the top of the staircase, she looked down into a well of darkness. She looked back at the bedroom door. An irrational feeling of wanting to be on the other side of the door with Dimitri crawled over her. Goosebumps prickled her skin. She glanced at Dimitri’s bedroom door. The blackness seemed to be reaching out, stretching its way onto the landing, curling itself around her ankles.

Tina fumbled for the two-way light switch at the top of the stairs. Immediately the downstairs was illuminated. She ran down the staircase and flicked the living-room light on, then the dining-room light as she navigated the hallway towards the kitchen. She cursed the energy-saving light bulbs. She wanted instant brightness, not the soft glow that slowly stretched its way into the corners of the rooms.

Entering the kitchen, she was grateful that the spotlights were more forthcoming, immediately bathing the room in white light.

Rascal stirred in his basket, lifting his head to see who had interrupted his sleep.

‘Sorry, fella,’ said Tina as she filled a glass from the water-filter jug in the fridge. ‘Go back to sleep now.’

She closed the kitchen door behind her. The next challenge was to make it up the stairs, switching the lights off and having the blackness follow her.

She ignored the slosh of water that spilled from the glass as she rounded the newel post and took the first stair. It was only water, it would dry and not stain. The sound of footsteps on the landing stopped her. Heavy footsteps. Too heavy to be Dimitri’s. Long strides. Too long to be those of a child. She looked up.

Two black-booted feet stood at the top of the stairs. Before she could look any further, darkness descended all around her as the lights were turned off from the upstairs switch.

She screamed. Dropped the glass of water. Her first thought was Dimitri. Whoever was in the house stood between her and her son. There was no space in her head for any other thought. Dimitri and his safety were paramount.

The thundering of booted feet on the staircase penetrated her thoughts. They were coming towards her. An automatic reaction to protect herself kicked in, but before she could throw herself out of the way, two hands grabbed her shoulders, pushing her backwards off the first step. She fought to muffle her scream. She could hear Dimitri calling her.

Oh God, please don’t let Dimitri come out. Please make him stay in the bedroom.

She stumbled backwards, hitting her head against the wall. The hands still held her. She felt the weight of his body against hers. One gloved hand came up and covered her mouth.

‘Shhhhhh.’ He hissed the noise in her ear. ‘Shhhhhh.’

Tina nodded furiously, fighting back the whimper in her throat. His voice was deep and loud in her ear. His breath hot on her neck. It seemed an age before he released his hand from her mouth – just a fraction. Convinced she wasn’t going to scream, he took it away completely.

In the darkness Tina couldn’t see what he was doing, but she could hear him grappling with the coats on the pegs at the bottom of the stairs, finally finding what he needed.

‘Mummy?’ Dimitri’s voice called out again.

The intruder gave Tina a nudge. She took her cue.

‘Stay there, Dimitri,’ she called out. ‘Stay in the bedroom. Do NOT come out.’

The man bundled Tina down the hall and into the living room, pushing her into the armchair. He gagged her with a scarf he had taken from the coat pegs, then forced her to bend forwards before binding her hands and feet together.

No sooner had he done this than he was gone. Down the hall and into the kitchen. She heard him unlock the back door. She didn’t wait to hear whether he shut it or not. She yanked and twisted her bound hands. Fortunately, there was enough stretch in the knitted scarf to pull her hands free. Some more fumbling and she released her feet. Pulling the scarf from her mouth she leapt out of the chair and ran upstairs.

She needed to get to Dimitri.

Tina burst into the bedroom. Dimitri was standing at the window. Tina ran over to him, sweeping her up into his arms. Dimitri wriggled an arm free and pointed to the street below.

‘Mummy, that man’s coming,’ said Dimitri.