The Loving Husband (32 page)

He stopped, she could see him resetting.

He sat back. ‘She doesn’t want you,’ said Gerard, smiling again. ‘I’d wash your hands of it if I were you, not like you haven’t got commitments elsewhere.’ She kept her face still.

‘Last time I looked at the conditions of my employment,’ she said quietly, ‘I stay on the job as long as the investigation runs, unless you find evidence of misconduct, of which there is none. And you wouldn’t want to be scurrying around looking for another FLO at this stage, would you, DS Gerard?’

‘All I’m saying,’ said Gerard, reasonable, ‘is remember who’s paying you. Kick back a bit. I can move you off this any time I want, and you know it.’

‘What do you think was on the hard drive?’ she said, tough. ‘Are you saying she took that too? From what I heard, there’s evidence he had it with him.’

‘Could have been anything in that briefcase.’ Gerard sat back, watching her. ‘She could have destroyed the hard drive and his phone while she was at it. We don’t know what he found out about her.’

‘A one-night stand?’ She scoffed. ‘You don’t need a hard drive to store that piece of information.’

‘More than that,’ said Gerard, and his smile spread. ‘You know it is. Not just that she’s been seen with a man, either. It’s who he is.’

‘Family liaison should be for missing kids, and that’s it,’ said Carswell, drumming his skinny fingers on the table top, a slop of ketchup on the side of the plate between his hands. Spouting Gerard again: she ignored him. She was thinking, hard. Other agencies, like who? Another agency that could have this case off them, who could get Craddock to take a Skype conference at crack of dawn.

‘See that book she had in her sitting room?’ said Carswell, sitting up straight, eager. ‘Very fifty shades, I don’t think.’

Gerard clicked his tongue. ‘Porn for the middle classes,’ he said with a sour laugh. ‘They should see what we see. And it was her kitchen knife. Woman’s weapon of choice.’

Ali stared at him. ‘You think she could do that to her husband, I mean, physically?’ She gave up, her hands flat on the melamine table top. ‘He had his guts hanging out, from what I hear.’

‘Who’s saying she was on her own?’ he said, calm and cold. ‘There’s men all over her, this one.’

Ali recoiled, because his hand was so close she felt the brush of the hairs on his knuckle. His little finger extended and tapped hers, softly.

‘I want her under police protection,’ she said, trying to ignore the flush that spread uncomfortably under her blouse. She didn’t move her hand – let him move his. ‘I want her out of there, whether she likes it or not. You’re playing her; you know that the more you offer her some grotty safe house, the harder she’s going to dig her heels in. She’s a victim until you have charges to press. But it suits you to have her out there, doesn’t it, for all the world to see, in the middle of nowhere next to a stinking chicken barn. If she did it, alone or with whatever man you’ve got pegged for her, she’ll crack, is that the theory? If someone else did it, he’s going to come after her, her and her kids, but that doesn’t matter to you, does it?’ She came to a halt, out of breath, the anger still pumping, she leaned towards him. ‘Because you’ve got her dangling.’

And you love it, she thought as he just kept smiling, it’s where you want women, full stop.

‘Gonna nail her,’ said Carswell, gleeful, but Gerard didn’t turn his head, he didn’t speak.

Men all over this one. Who had Fran Hall been seeing? A new boyfriend? Where would she meet one, not the type to go on Tinder, was she? Internet: no computer either. New boyfriend, old boyfriend, business contact, mate. She needed to talk to Sadie Watts.

‘She’s vulnerable, and it’s our duty to protect her and her kids,’ she said, unable to shut up. She had no power, and they both knew it, but that wasn’t going to stop her. Gerard sat perfectly still and she could feel him checking her out, examining her unwashed hair, her roots, her knackered skin. She stared him down.

‘She’s a bitch,’ said Gerard and Ali looked for witnesses but all she could see were backs turned to her, lined up along the service counter.

‘She’s a bitch,’ he said again, leaning forward, turning his face to look into hers, ‘And she’s lying.’

Beyond the pub the river slid by, dark green and slow, weed streaming in it like hair. She sat in the cramped car park under a dripping tree, Ben asleep in the back. Four months, two, he’d be sitting up, he’d be crawling, he’d be asking questions.
Did you kill my daddy?

Close to, the Angel in the Fields did still look like an ordinary pub, a little bit shabby, maybe, the low roof mossy, the crates of alcopop empties uncollected. The sandwich board chalked up with specials: you’d have to walk around it to see
Sunday Night Drag Race
,
Valentine’s Special
, and a pair of pouting red lips drawn on.

The car cooled quickly and she closed her eyes, thinking of the woods where they’d found Rob’s car. Thinking of Rob, his big raw hands, Nathan’s oldest friend. Was it grief that had sent him up there, into the dark? Or had someone lured him there? She put both hands on the steering wheel and tried to think. All she could think of was his voice when she’d called to tell him, when he’d picked up the phone up there on that mountain and said Nathan’s name, cheery, expectant, and she’d had to tell him, Nathan was dead. The silence. Like he knew.

Would Nathan have told Rob about the will? She opened her eyes again and took out her mobile, held it in both hands. She wrote a message, five words, sent it, deleted it.

The woods, the airbase, that was where they’d found Rob’s car. This wasn’t her territory, this was theirs. Rob and Nathan and Bez – and whoever had taken that photograph of them, at Black Barn.

The airfield, ringed with fencing. The trees. Then she sat up, she knew what else there was up there, beyond the woods. The flooded quarry where they’d used to swim. The picture that sprang up in her head thrummed, urgent. The expanse of black water, the spidery willows clumped on the dykes. The car’s temperature gauge said minus two: you would die in that water, wouldn’t you? In minutes. Even someone fit and healthy. Rob ran marathons; she grasped at straws. Not Rob.

Behind her Ben stirred and wearily she climbed out and got in the back with him. She sat and began to feed him, cocooned in his wadded suit. A man in a tatty ski jacket with a shaven head came out of the back door of the pub and lit up a cigarette, standing with his back to her and staring at the water.

A message buzzed. Bringing one hand free from around Ben she looked down, read it, answered with a thumb,
All right, all right
. Moved the thumb to
delete conversation
.

It occurred to Fran, numbly, that she wouldn’t be alone for much longer; she had a sister-in-law who was coming to help. Her sister-in-law, Miranda, who would about now be boarding a plane, she’d be landing in Dubai in a smart suit and heels, desert heat and luxury hotels.

All she knew about Miranda was a photograph in a frame of the two of them, she and Nathan side by side in a swingboat, a serious chubby girl with a straight black fringe. And the message on Nathan’s phone, the day they got married. As she remembered that a tiny pulse set up. There were things Miranda would be able to tell her. Their childhood, their parents, that summer, him and Rob and Bez, and then nothing, then cutting ties, leaving it all behind till now. Just like Miranda had done herself.

Ben detached himself, straining backwards and turning his head away, already saying no. The man in the ski jacket had gone back inside. Fran climbed out of the car with Ben at her shoulder, and followed him.

The ceilings were low and it was fusty and dim but Fran registered that they weren’t open, the place was empty and the tables in disorder. As her eyes adjusted she saw a garland of tinsel over the bar, a big red heart of padded and frilled velvet hanging askew against a black curtain behind a podium. Still in his ski jacket the man she’d seen smoking was halfway up a stepladder on the other end of the heart in the far corner. He eyed her but said nothing, his mouth full of tacks. He turned back and finished what he was doing and then stepped off the ladder.

‘Can’t bring a kid in here,’ he said, frowning, but not hostile. He wore a black shirt under the jacket, he was skinny, clean-shaven, about Carswell’s age but nothing like Carswell.

‘You’re not open for customers though, are you?’ she pleaded, shifting Ben to one side. He strained to reach for some tinsel and the man sighed.

‘What then?’ he said, turning to go behind the bar. She followed, standing there. Ben tugged at a beer cloth and she tried to pull it out of his hand.

‘Let him,’ said the barman. ‘What’s his name?’ He took off his jacket, hung it up and held out a hand to Ben. ‘I’m Eric,’ he said. ‘Shake, mate.’

‘I’m here about my husband,’ she said and Eric paused mid-handshake. ‘Oh, yeah,’ he said. ‘One of those. Haven’t seen him, haven’t shagged him, seen nothing, done nothing, don’t know nothing.’

‘He’s dead. He died.’

Eric looked down, extracted his hand from Ben’s, leaned down and began to lift steaming glasses from a dishwasher behind the counter. ‘Right,’ he said flatly. ‘It was Al, was it?’ He reached for a cloth.

‘I called him Nathan.’

‘But the one … the one the coppers came about?’ A twisted sad little smile, as slowly he began polishing a glass. ‘Nice-looking pair. I think they liked it here.’ He reached up and hung the glass from its rack, leaned down for another.

‘So he was a regular? They were telling the truth.’

‘For once,’ said Eric, regarding Ben. ‘Christ. What a fuck-up.’ He hung the next glass, then started on another.

‘The police said you wouldn’t tell them about his … partners. What he got up to.’

‘And you want to know? What he got up to?’

She frowned. ‘I’ve got no choice,’ she said, flatly.

He nodded. ‘Listen, love. It’s not as unusual as you think, it’s all sorts, you see all sorts. Some of them too scared to come out, some of them say they love their wives, some of them are in it for the kink. Their secret life. It’s a big world out there, live and let live, is what I say.’

‘He’s dead, though.’

And Eric’s smile twisted again, kinder this time. ‘What do you want to know?’ he said, with a sigh. She got out the photograph and laid it on the table; he peered down. ‘That’s a while ago, isn’t it?’ he said, but he put a finger to Nathan’s face. ‘Can still see it, though. Looked after himself.’ And the finger moved along, to Bez, he frowned. ‘Where is that?’ he said, leaning closer.

‘They squatted at a place. Their last summer after school finished. Nineteen ninety-five, something like that.’

Eric was hunched over the picture. ‘Summer of love,’ he said. ‘That sort of deal, was it?’ He looked up. ‘I’d have been not much bigger than him then.’ He nodded to Ben then looked back at the photograph. ‘A lot of E in the system, those days.’ He sounded wistful. ‘All-nighters, shiny happy people. Stuff got nastier, didn’t it? Getting out of your head got hardcore. Ketamine an’ that.’ He straightened. ‘Looks like Black Barn, out that way.’

‘Where is that?’ she said, breathless. Eric squinted back down at the photograph, his head tilted. ‘Out Chatteris way, this side of the reservoir?’ The oily dark surface of the water swam in front of her eyes in the gloom. ‘There were stories about what went on there, kids and that, they closed it down. Something happened, someone died. Ten a penny, OD deaths round here, you want to spend a night in Casualty now and again.’

‘Drugs? Did the police ask you about it, when they came about my husband?’

He snorted. ‘They just wanted to know who he was shagging.’ He looked back at the picture almost tenderly, as if it told him something about himself.

‘Did he come in here with either of them?’

The barman ran a hand over his shaven head, puffed out his cheeks. ‘Jeez, I dunno if I’d even have recognised Al from that photo.’ He shook his head. ‘Not sure, is the answer.’

‘Did Nathan … did Al come in here with anyone in particular?’ Fran said quietly, and he shrugged, uneasy.

‘No, he always came in alone. As for who he talked to, who he left with, well…’ His shoulders were eloquent. ‘Gets busy. Gets a bit full-on.’ He frowned. ‘And he always sat in the snug,’ he nodded towards another room, where the corner of a booth was just visible, ‘you know. A bit more private. There’s one booth just behind a pillar, Al liked that best. Maybe because you couldn’t see what he was up to.’ He gave her a sheepish look. ‘Sorry.’ He looked back down at the photograph.

‘Sort of familiar, that one.’ His finger was back on Bez in the photograph, the lean shoulders, the head thrown back. ‘Something about him.’

‘He’s called Bez,’ and Eric said, ‘Never. Fuck.’ He began to shake his head. ‘Warning to stay off the booze if ever there was one.’

‘You know him?’

‘I seen Thorney talking to him, once or twice. He’s down the war memorial sometimes with the other boozers, not lately though, come to think of it.’ He pushed the photograph back towards her and she stowed it quickly as Ben reached out a pudgy hand to grab. ‘Never came in here, he’d be a four-pack of Kestrel and a Thunderbird chaser, no money for pub prices.’

‘Who’s Thorney? Did the police talk to him?’

‘Ray Thornton. Older guy. Collects glasses, cleans the toilets. Yeah, they talked to him, being as he’s the only one sees what they’re up to in the glory hole. Man of few words though, especially where the police are concerned. And he’s a drinker.’

She shivered suddenly – it was cold in the gloomy low-ceilinged room, and Eric said, ‘It cheers up of an evening, you wouldn’t believe. Put the heating on and everything. Tomorrow night it’ll be like Vegas in here.’

‘Tomorrow?’

‘Long as the snow holds off,’ he said dubiously, leaning to peer towards the window, where the outside world showed grey. A shadow passed it, the crunch of tyres as the beer truck moved off. ‘Valentine’s, Ray’s back on then, if you want to talk to him. Catch him before he’s pissed though. I’ll put in a word, if you like.’

‘Get my showgirl outfit ready, shall I?’ she said. Eric cracked a proper smile at last, and the gloom retreated, just fractionally.