Wink Murder

by Ali Knight

  CONTENTS

  Wink Murder

  Copyright

  Dedication

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Chapter 19

  Chapter 20

  Chapter 21

  Chapter 22

  Chapter 23

  Chapter 24

  Chapter 25

  Chapter 26

  Chapter 27

  Chapter 28

  Chapter 29

  Chapter 30

  Chapter 31

  Chapter 32

  Chapter 33

  Chapter 34

  Chapter 35

  Chapter 36

  Chapter 37

  Chapter 38

  Chapter 39

  Chapter 40

  Chapter 41

  Chapter 42

  Epilogue

  Acknowledgements

  About the Author

  First published in Great Britain in 2011 by Hodder and Stoughton

  An Hachette UK company

  Copyright © Ali Knight 2011

  The right of Ali Knight to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

  Epub ISBN: 9781444715347

  Book ISBN: 9781444715323

  Hodder and Stoughton Ltd

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.hodder.co.uk

  To Stephen, with love

  1

  I snap my eyes open in the dark, sensing something is not right. The room is instantly familiar, coming into focus with the help of the city light that sneaks past the roman blinds. Tasteful prints hang on the wall, armchairs guard the fireplace opposite, one has Paul’s clothes piled on it in a disordered mountain, the other cradles my dressing gown, neatly folded. I’m in our bedroom, a place of safety, a haven from life. The other side of the king-size is empty, the pillow fluffed. Paul is not home. I hold my breath because there is the noise again, a shuffly scraping that’s coming from everywhere and nowhere. My heart pounds in my ears. The clock clicks to 3.32 a.m. as I hear a crash downstairs. It might wake the children and this thought alone forces me out from under the comforting warmth of the duvet. I am a mother; point one on the job description is to protect them, at all costs. My movements are slow and deliberate as I try to steel myself for what I’m about to do. I pick up my mobile and turn the handle on the bedroom door hard to ensure it opens without a sound. Someone is groaning in the hallway and it doesn’t sound like Paul.

  I have mentally rehearsed what happens next quite often because Paul is away for work a lot at the moment and I think it’s important to know how I would fight for the only thing that really matters to me – my family. I like to be prepared. So, as if I’m a fire warden at work, I’m putting it all into action. I take a deep breath, punch 999 into the keypad but don’t press the green button, turn on the light and run for the stairs, shouting as loudly as I can into the night silence ‘Get out of my house!’, phone aloft like a burning spear.

  I thump loudly down the stairs and use my gathering momentum to swing round the swirly circle at the bottom of the banister as a shape heaves itself across the kitchen at the end of the hall. ‘Get out, get out! The police are outside!’ I flood my world with light at the flick of a switch as the dark bundle clatters to the floor with a chair. I pull a cricket bat from the coat stand and feel its comforting weight in my palm and am in the kitchen in a second, the weapon close to my chest. ‘Get out of my house!’ He has his face on my kitchen tiles but as I raise the bat the shape turns to me and I see my husband, staring up at me from the floor.

  It is my husband, but not as I have ever seen him before. He is crying, taking great gulps of air, snot running down to his mouth. I toss the phone on the table and drop the bat to the floor. ‘Paul, what on earth’s the matter?’

  He doesn’t answer, because he can’t. He looks up at me and my former fear for myself is replaced by a more acute worry for him. I try to pull him upright but he is like a dead weight in my arms; he’s folded over and crushed, his demeanour transformed. That was why I didn’t recognise him from behind, he is not the man he used to be. ‘What’s happened?’

  Paul smashes his fist into the side of his head and groans again. ‘Kate, Kate—’

  ‘Oh my God, what’s going on?’

  He gets to his knees, shaking, leaving the car key on the floor. Paul is a big man; he’s tall, with wide palms, and shoulders you can fall asleep on, it was one of the many things about him that I fell in love with all those years ago. He made me feel protected. ‘Kate, oh help me—’

  His hands are caked with blood.

  ‘You’re bleeding!’

  He looks down at them in disgust. He staggers to his feet and I pull limply at his coat, he must be cut somewhere under the thick wool. ‘Are you hurt?’

  I . . . I, oh God, it’s come to this.’

  ‘What?’ He closes his eyes and sniffs, swaying. ‘What has happened?’ He shakes his head and drags himself into the downstairs toilet and starts washing his hands, flakes of blood and brown water swirling away down the plughole. ‘Paul!’

  He wipes his face on his shoulder and nods his head. ‘I killed her . . .’

  He shakes the water off his hands and I slap him, hard. ‘Tell me what is going on!’

  My husband looks at me, his arresting brown eyes bloodshot from his tears. ‘What a mess, what a stupid load of . . .’ He sighs from deep within. ‘Oh fuck, Kate, I love you so much.’ And with that he falls right past me on to the hallway floor in a faint no manner of prods, shoves and screams will wake him from.

  Something at least becomes clear to me: Paul is pissed. He must be completely rat-arsed. There are probably many things I should do at this moment but first I must pee. I sit on the toilet and stare at the long body of my husband passed out on the floor, his feet turned inwards, his palms up as if he’s indulging in a spot of yoga. I am shivering with anger that he could get in a car and drive home in such a state. I shake his shoulders but he doesn’t move. I am not a spontaneous person, I need to plan things, to think; I have never imagined a situation like this before and I am at a loss, paralysed in the face of so much that needs to be discovered. After a lot of pushing and heaving I manage to turn Paul over on to his back and pull his coat apart checking everywhere for a wound. When I find nothing I am pathetically thankful – blood makes me faint. I sit back on my heels and stare. The hard planes of his handsome face have dissolved into a puffy mess, his strong jaw has receded into his neck. Paul is snoring, his chest rising and falling. The house is silent, my children slumber on unaware. The kitchen clock accompanies him with its staccato beat. The fridge hums and a window rattles. The house settles back into its night-time rhythm. At 3.50 a.m. I ge
t to my feet, tiredness moving over me in waves. I can think of nothing better to do than go to bed. He’ll wake up in the end.

  2

  What seems like a second later a small hand pokes me in the stomach. ‘Ava! Stop that!’ My daughter is squirming over me in bed.

  ‘Mummy, let me get in,’ she pleads, letting blasts of cold air into the warm fug under the covers. Normally my four-year-old wriggling in for an early-morning cuddle is one of my greatest pleasures, her soft, flawless skin so close, cold little feet pressing into my back, but it’s 7.10 a.m., my head is pounding, my eyes scratchy. Paul is not here and the flashing memory of last night pulls me sharply upright, my heart banging in my chest. ‘Mummy, I’m cold, Mummy . . .’ I cannot believe I slept, that I could leave my husband in such a state on the floor. Horrible images of his dead body being casually stepped over by Josh on his way to turn on the cartoons hurry me out of bed. ‘. . . Daddy’s on the sofa hiding under a blanky.’

  I stumble from bed, pulling on my dressing gown. Ava scratches her blonde head. ‘Mummy, can Phoebe come and play?’ I ignore her as I busy towards the bedroom door. It’s time to get the truth about last night.

  Paul isn’t in the front room. I find him in the kitchen leaning against the counter, a cup of tea in one hand and a slice of toast in the other. He is dressed and shaved and talking at Josh, who’s bent over a cereal bowl. My husband looks completely normal. ‘Here, I made you one.’ He holds up a steaming cup and smiles. I don’t smile back but cross my arms in a “try me” gesture. He puts the tea down, packs his grin away.

  ‘What happened last—?’

  ‘Nothing.’

  ‘That was nothing?’

  ‘I got drunk and maudlin, that’s all.’ He shrugs as if trying to make light of it.

  My eyes narrow in sceptical disbelief. ‘But you were saying you . . .’ We both look at Josh’s head to see if it’s moved. I don’t need to use the word. I’m not even sure I can say ‘killed’, it seems so bizarre and melodramatic with the sun shining in the window and talk of congestion on the M25 coming over the radio.

  ‘Don’t be daft.’

  ‘So what happened?’

  ‘Nothing!’

  ‘Who were you talking about?’ Josh begins to sense something different from the normal morning pattern and like a tortoise emerging from a long hibernation lifts his head from his bowl, blinking at his parents.

  Paul glares at me. ‘No one.’ I hold up my hands and wave them at him sarcastically. He knows I’m referring to the blood.

  ‘I ran over a dog.’

  ‘What’s “ran over”?’ Ava skips into the kitchen in a policeman’s hat.

  ‘I can’t believe you drove in that state!’

  ‘Kate, please! I’m contrite enough, I’ve got an awful hangover.’ We lock eyes.

  ‘Shreddies or toast, Ava?’ I ask crisply, moving to the cupboard.

  ‘Krispies. I want Krispies.’ I reach for a bowl and spoon.

  ‘A dog?’

  ‘Yeah. I felt I had to move it and I got covered in . . . you know.’

  Blood. Your hands had blood on them, Paul, is what I want to say, but I hold back. ‘What kind of dog?’

  ‘What?’

  ‘What kind of dog was it?’

  ‘Labrador cross, I think.’ He looks at his feet. ‘I had to drag it, I got upset.’

  I stare at my husband as he stands in the kitchen, the beating heart of our home, his progeny around him. I know him better than he knows himself. He often tells me that. And I know that when he looks at his feet he’s lying.

  ‘You know what breed, but you don’t know what sex.’ Paul looks blank. ‘Last night this dog was a “she”. This morning it’s an “it”.’

  He shrugs, his face revealing nothing. ‘It all seemed more real last night, I suppose. Dogs can seem like people when they’re hurt.’ He drains the last of his tea and brushes crumbs off his suit. ‘I’ve got to go.’ He moves towards me and gives me a long, tight hug, rocking me slowly from side to side and planting an affectionate kiss in the middle of my forehead. ‘Oh, Eggy, you’re always looking out for my welfare.’

  I have a high forehead, which I’ve always hated. Almost as soon as I started hanging out with Paul and his crowd, lovesick and in awe of him, to my severe mortification he made his friends laugh by calling me Egghead. But as the months went on and I started to dream that he was falling for me, I became Eggy, and of all his endearments it’s the one I love the most. He smiles weakly at me as we walk arm in arm to the front door. I help him into his coat as he hunts around for his scarf and work bag.

  ‘Mum, Ava’s spilled milk on my comic!’ There are screams and shouts from the kitchen.

  ‘You’d better go,’ Paul says, opening the door.

  ‘Are you OK?’ I cling on to him for a bit longer, trying to massage away the dissatisfaction from my unresolved questioning. He nods, pulling my arms away. ‘Are you sure?’

  ‘Never better,’ he says, but he looks sad as he walks down the path.

  ‘Mum!’ I wander into the living room, Ava’s scream rising through the octaves. I see a screwed-up blanket under which he spent the night, the indentations of his body are still visible in the cushions. He must have been up early to wash away the effects of last night. When we talked there was something I couldn’t bear to ask him, the lid on a box of emotions I was too scared to lift. What could have made him weep on our kitchen floor like that? Five years ago Paul’s father died of a sudden stroke. I never thought any man could show such grief as he had then – until last night.

  3

  My name is Kate Forman and I am very lucky. I have been told this often enough by friends and family and I truly believe it. My successes are many: I have been married for eight years to the most wonderful man on the planet, we have two beautiful, healthy children and a house far bigger and grander than I ever imagined I would live in. I’m thirty-seven years old, I don’t have to dye my hair and I can still wear the clothes I bought before Ava was born (though not Josh; motherhood takes it’s toll on us all, however much we pretend otherwise). Accident, design, hard work or chance, I don’t really care; I am happy and so is Paul, and that is all that counts.

  I know that Paul is happy, because he admitted to me recently that he thought he loved me more than our children. He asked me if I thought that was wrong, and I laughed and shook my head. I sometimes think I don’t deserve Paul. His family is much grander than mine, he went to a top public school, his mum lives in a manor house in a nice bit of countryside, he grew up with a tennis court, lots of brothers and sisters, first editions on the shelves and paintings that may or may not be valuable, nobody seems to know or care. It’s all much more impressive and romantic than my mum and stepdad’s sterile box on a suburban estate, photos of mine and my sister Lynda’s graduation hung proudly on the lounge wall.

  I met Paul on my first day at university. I was Katy Brown then. In fact, he was the very first person I met after I’d left home. I arrived at the station with my bike; Mum was bringing my stuff up in the car and was meeting me on campus. Paul was the third-year student driving the van ferrying strays and cyclists to our accommodation. I was the only one he picked up on that run and I fell in love with him instantly. He was deeply tanned and ridiculously fit after a long summer break somewhere in Europe. He drove one-handed with his elbow jutting out of the rolled-down window, the late-summer heat bringing a pleasing other-worldliness to our journey. As we careered round huge roundabouts and sped down the dual carriageways of a big and unknown city, I felt an unadulterated joy at what life held, sensed excitements that have been hard to recapture since. He was two years older than me and teased me not unkindly for being a fresher. He was flirting and I lapped it up. He had big brown eyes and dark hair that sat up in tufts, which he would rub distractedly. He still has all his hair today. As he lifted my bike out of the back of the van I couldn’t believe that university would be so full of such gorgeous, exciting men. Needless to say, it
wasn’t. In the next few weeks I scanned the campus but caught only brief glimpses of him. He waved at me a couple of times through the crowd that surrounded him, and that’s as far as it went. I made new friends, threw myself into first-year university life, got distracted by other relationships. I came to London after graduation giving him barely a thought. Five years later my friend Jessie started dating Pug, and besides having a ridiculous name Pug hung out with Paul.

  Paul was married to Eloide then. At first I thought Paul must have said Eloise, but no, even her name had to be different – and difficult. She was a natural blonde. I’m not proud of what happened a year later, but they had no children, thank God, which made things cleaner. We just had a connection that couldn’t be denied. The first night we spent together was one of the most supreme moments of my life. It goes without saying that the sex we had was . . . I have no words to properly describe the intensity, the honesty of it. I got pregnant two months after his divorce came through.

  Our story doesn’t end there, it just gets better and better. Paul proposed on a weekend in Paris when I was seven months gone, we were married when Josh was one. Our baby looked so cute on our wedding, wriggling in his little white sailor suit with blue trim. My mum jiggled him all through the service in the pretty rural church. Afterwards she cried and told me I’d done very well.

  We’ve moved house three times since we’ve been together; from the flat to a pretty Victorian terrace to our imposing three-storey near the park. Paul runs a TV production company and has been very successful. We’ve traded up. If things stay as they are, who knows what we might acquire or how soon Paul can retire. I don’t work full-time any more. Before I met Paul I worked in market research analysing consumer behaviour – ‘poking our noses in and getting paid for it’ we used to say over the water cooler – but after I had Josh my interests dovetailed with Paul’s and I got my break as a TV researcher, which I’ve been doing ever since. I now work on Crime Time, a tabloid-style weekly show that relies heavily on CCTV footage and viewers’ mobile phone videos to catch criminals, from petty thieves to murderers. Even though I work three days a week, Paul still says that I’m ‘dabbling’. While sometimes that annoys me, it’s also fair to say that my sphere is the home, Paul’s is work, and we unite in the middle, like a neat Venn diagram.