The Other Woman (32 page)

‘He could just have done it. He sees her, finds out that she's told Melissa all about it, kills her in a rage, then carries on with what he was going to do – people have done that before.'

They had. But perhaps with a touch more time at their disposal. And Lloyd didn't believe that Whitworth had killed her. Whitworth's illusions were being shattered even as Lloyd had watched; he hadn't found out all about Sharon on Friday night.

‘And perhaps he
was
at the football match,' she said. ‘Perhaps that's why she hung on to the key to the changing room.'

Lloyd shook his head. ‘If you ask me, the Whitworths' sexual liaisons have nothing to do with this. I want the result of Drummond's blood test.' He tried to usher her upstairs.

Judy frowned. ‘You think he was with her?' she asked.

‘Yes. After Melissa had left her stranded. He knew Sharon all right – that's why he followed her. He's her possessive boyfriend.'

Judy wasn't instantly giving him The Look. He put his predicament out of his mind, and carried on with his scenario.

‘He was with her in the changing rooms. And he may not have killed her, but he saw who did. That's what made him take off like that. That's why he got beaten up – to make sure he kept the knowledge to himself. And Jake Parker knows who killed her too, only he wants to deal with the matter himself. That's why
he
sent us on a wild-goose chase,' he added. ‘Or hadn't you noticed?'

Judy shook her head obstinately. ‘I don't believe the police are involved in this,' she said.

Fine. Lloyd put his arm round her, and headed for the flat and its plumbing. ‘Well,' he said. ‘Let's do what you said, and sleep on it. Well see what it looks like in the morning.'

Jake got back into the car, starting the engine, and pushing in the cigar lighter as he shook a cigarette from the pack.

His heart had all but stopped when the headlights that had loomed out of the fog, and which he had expected to sweep past him as all the others had done, had suddenly been glaring into the car. He had thrown himself across the front seat, and waited until he heard the murmur of voices that meant that the Whitworths' visitors had been admitted.

Then he had recognised the car that had sat in his own driveway a couple of hours ago. Lloyd. God Almighty, did the man never knock off for the day? He had left the car then, and stood in the shadow of the trees that lined the road, until at last Lloyd and Inspector Hill had emerged.

Lloyd had had a good look at the car; he had doubtless taken the number. It was Dennis's car – Jake's Mercedes was too flamboyant to park anywhere unobtrusively, and Dennis's car had a surprising turn of speed for what looked like an old banger.

If Lloyd made inquiries, he'd find Dennis's name on the log-book. And that would mean nothing to him at all.

The lighter popped out, and Jake applied the glow to his cigarette, inhaling deeply before easing off the handbrake and driving off into the fog.

Colin had never had to abort a mission before. He had been an inch from discovery; a millisecond from launching himself at her, when Lloyd had appeared, and he had had to stand still, unbreathing, not daring even to think, until they had shut the door.

He had hardly been able to get to the bike, his legs quivering, his heart pounding at the near-miss. Swooping down on the target only to have to bank away from a barrage of anti-aircraft fire, and return to base.

He sat on the bike, breathing hard. Then he removed the mask, stuffing it back in his pocket, wrapped round the knife. He pulled on his helmet, then pushed the bike on to Riverside, and started her up. He cruised at first, hoping to find another one; fog lay along the river, obscuring the view of the far side where they sometimes took short cuts on their own through the wood. It was a perfect night for it, and he wanted one badly.

But that might, he supposed, be pushing his luck. So he swung the bike round, and took the road to the airfield, to do the runs in the dark.

His speed and the fog made him almost miss the turn-off for the airfield, causing him to skid on the damp road. He righted the bike, steadying his speed, then slowed, and stopped at the single track road which led on to the old RAF station. He took off the helmet and carried it, half-riding, half-walking the bike on to the old runway, where he laid the helmet down, switched off the headlight, and roared away from a standing start into pitch darkness, the wind on his face, in his hair, wind that he was creating as he hurtled forwards through the still air

The bike's front wheel flew up as it struck a join in the paving; he rode it on the back wheel, bumping down, wheeling round, revving the engine as he made the return pass, going further each time before he leant into the turn, so that he was moving faster. Faster, faster, smelling hot rubber, jumping with the bike as it met the hidden obstacles, landing, accelerating away again, his jacket billowing out. Wheeling round, head down, the engine screaming in protest, into the pall of exhaust fumes hanging in the motionless air. But it seemed to fuel the anger, and increase his frustration; he stopped before he damaged the bike.

He was on his way home when he saw one of them, all on her own, walking home through Malworth's empty streets. He drove a long way past, bumped the bike into an alley and stopped. He removed his crash helmet, smoothed down his hair, pulled on the mask, and waited.

She didn't make a sound once she saw the knife, and he told her who he was.

Simon watched the stars appear in the pre-dawn sky through the office window as he sat in the darkness at his desk, as he had all night. He had slept fitfully in his swivel chair, waking up at every creak of the old building, every night sound. The fog had gone, moved on by the same wind that was sending clouds to hide the stars almost as soon as they had appeared.

Six months, since he had first regarded this desk as his. Six months since they had come to Stansfield, in response to Lionel's advertisement for a partner. Simon had spent his working life in big partnerships in big cities, where his presence or absence from his desk had been of no concern whatever to his clients. They had simply seen another partner.

The first big city had been where he had met Melissa; he had been dragged to a party at the university, and had taken her to be a student, only to find that she was a lecturer. The youngest lecturer since God knows when. She had of course had a sparkling academic record, unlike him. He had asked her out, once a couple of drinks had made him brave enough to take the rejection, but to his surprise she had agreed, even sounded enthusiastic about it.

They had seen quite a lot of one another; he never lost the faint feeling of surprise. The first time they spent the night together, he had expected to be the last; she was clearly better versed in such things than he. The first time she went home to visit her parents, he expected never to see her again. But back she came, turning up at his flat as though she really wanted to be with him. She had been writing the odd article then, doing the odd book review. His circle of acquaintances had included university professors and literary editors, with whom he had always felt a little awkward, because they had expected him to be as bright and expressive as Melissa.

She had been offered a job on a literary magazine, then, and had switched careers effortlessly, while he had still worked doggedly to improve his lot in his. They had married not long after that, he just a little surprised that she turned up. Then, he had found himself at literary lunches and book launches, chatting to editors and publishers and authors that he had to pretend to know, sometimes even to have read. Then a glossy women's magazine had come head-hunting her. It had meant a move to London; she had asked him how he felt about that, but working in a big practice in a big city was the same job, wherever the city; they had moved to London.

Her brief had altered; then it had been best-selling authors and marketing junkets, trips to Wimbledon and Grand Prix races. He had rather liked that; he had been able to escape from the suffocating hospitality tent and watch the sport. Then she had moved into more general journalism, and he had found himself accompanying her to parties where everyone was a household name.

And still he had been a minor partner in a major partnership. The only difference that Simon had been able to detect had been that the legal work was almost exclusively on inner city development, and even more boring than before.

When he had seen Lionel's advertisement, he had had to read it twice to make certain. Here was someone who wanted
him
– his expertise, his field, his line of country. Until that time, he hadn't really thought of himself as having one. And Melissa hadn't thought twice; she had given up her job at the magazine, and offered her services to the local paper in Stansfield, who were bowled over to have her, as they should be.

He had finally achieved something. He was Whitworth of Evans and Whitworth, not Whitworth in the Conveyancing Department. He had something concrete to offer Lionel, and he hadn't even had to put money into the business. Melissa enjoyed working for
The Chronicle
more than she had the other magazines, because she was the features editor, and could instigate projects, and because she met real people, not packaged celebrities.

He had met a real person too. He had met Sharon, who had at first been a little shy of him, then opened out a little as she realised that she had to show him the ropes. He felt tears prick his eyes. Why would they all lie? Melissa, the police … but they couldn't all be lying.

She had seemed so … so innocent. So honest. She had never read a piece of literary criticism in her life; she hadn't been so much as on nodding terms with anyone remotely distinguished or famous. She had thought that he was clever and knowledgeable, and he had had the sheer luxury of not having to run just to keep up with her.

He supposed she had massaged his ego, but he couldn't believe that she had employed deliberate guile in so doing. He had fallen in love with her, and she with him. She hadn't liked the deception; she had begged him to tell Melissa and get it over with. Perhaps she had despaired of his ever doing that; perhaps that was why she had done what he had to believe she had done.

Though that hardly explained the things she was supposed to have said, and what the chief inspector had said about her having been with some man half an hour before she died. He wouldn't lie about a thing like that.

He had been taken in. But why?

Mac lay fully clothed on the bed as the sun, obscured by cloud, rose invisibly in the sky, casting a grey light into his room. He hadn't slept; he had smoked all his cigarettes. He had heard the rain come just after it got light; it was drizzling miserably against his unshaded window.

It had meant nothing to her, nothing at all. And he had lied for her right from the start. He had lied, first for her reputation, and then for her freedom. He had wiped that tape, he had been arrested, he had been interviewed by the police every day since it had happened. He believed that she had killed Sharon Smith, and it made no difference at all to how he felt about her.

He had been born again somewhere in the few brief hours he had spent with Melissa; he had seen hope steal over the dark horizon; he had thought, just for a moment, that he could hear someone cheering him on, that he had emerged from the desperate obscurity and become Mad Mac McDonald again. But that could never be. He had a past, but he had no future; Mac had already been down that road, and he was damned if he was going down it again.

He grabbed his jacket, rattled downstairs, and slammed the door before his landlady had time to get out of bed to see what he was up to.

Lionel pulled up outside the office. It was very early; he didn't know how soon the fraud squad went about the business of freezing accounts and descending on suspicious solicitors.

Frances had been … well, she had been strong. And she had been supportive. She hadn't just behaved as though he was telling her that he'd bumped the car, which he had been afraid of. She hadn't packed her bags to get out before the disgrace, which he'd have understood. She hadn't asked him how he could have done such a thing to her. She had listened, and she had said that Lionel must know who the best man was to defend him. He ought to put that in motion, she said, as soon as possible.

She had told him to go to the office early. She had advised against any more creative accounting in an attempt to absolve himself from blame; she thought he should simply tell them the truth. That he had been tempted, and had done what Parker had suggested. But she did think that he might want to take anything private, anything he didn't really want policemen or anyone else picking up.

So that was why he was here. He was about to be charged with attempted fraud and embezzlement and goodness knows what all; Parker would probably get off scot free. Lionel would go to prison, almost certainly. And would be struck off without any doubt. His career, his life, was in ruins.

And yet he felt more at peace with himself than he had for the last twenty years. He frowned as he inserted his key in the door; it was already unlocked. Well, if they had done some sort of dawn raid in his absence, he would at least be able to challenge all their evidence.

But there was no sign of policemen. Burglars? Surely not. Lionel walked quietly through the office, checking each room; he literally jumped off the ground when Simon's door opened.

He looked like death. Unshaven, crumpled, bags under his eyes.

‘What are you doing here?' Lionel asked.

Simon looked at his watch. ‘What are you?' he asked, and went back into his office, dragging himself back to the desk.

This hardly seemed the moment to tell him, but he might not get another chance.

Judy and Lloyd slept late; the rain had stopped the sun performing its wake-up service, and they had forgotten to set the alarm. Lloyd was always impossible when he was behind schedule in the morning; his routine for waking up was disturbed, and as a consequence it was as well to ignore him as much as possible.