'This is a different story to the one you told us yesterday,' says Detective Inspector Barnes.
The lawyer in the room with me is called Sue Lawrence and apparently she's the best criminal lawyer in the world. She's also gorgeous. I don't think the detectives could quite believe their luck when she walked in. She sat down and crossed her legs over and I thought poor Detective Barnes might go tumbling off his chair. It's not so much that her skirt's short as her legs are incredibly long, slim, and shapely. I'm so glad she's on my side.
'I'd like a word with my client, please,' she says, with a batting of her eyelashes and a smile playing on her glossy lips.
Away from the guys she asks me why I didn't tell them about the carpenter yesterday.
'I was just so embarrassed in front of Rufus,' I repeat. 'I'm not normally the jealous type but I went all through his stuff while he was in LA, checking to see whether there were any clues that he was having an affair or anything and, when I couldn't get into one drawer, I smashed my way in. I had to get a carpenter to repair it. I never told Rufus. It's got nothing to do with Elody's murder or anything.'
'You don't know that. Your job is just to tell the truth and they'll work out what's relevant. If you don't tell them the complete truth at all times, you'll get yourself in more trouble,' she says with great pomposity. I don't feel like I'm in any position to complain though. This woman, right now, appears to be the only person in my corner. To be frank, the only person who gives a shit.
'Was there anything in the drawer?' she asks.
'A bracelet which matches the necklace that Elody always wears.'
'Say that again.'
'In the drawer that I broke into there was a bracelet which I think belongs to Elody. It was hidden right at the back. I don't know why and I haven't had chance to discuss it with Rufus. It's pretty fucking scary though, and I'd rather not be discussing it with the police.'
'So you think that Elody was having an affair with Rufus?'
My lawyer looks absolutely horrified. Really, she looks quite scared.
'Yes,' I say, which just compounds everything. Her pretty petal-like face looks as if it's about to completely crumble away. 'I mean no. I mean I don't know. It's just all weird. Why would her bracelet be in there if they weren't? But then he came back from LA and proposed to me and he seems to love me. I don't know.'
'You know it was her bracelet, do you?'
'No, I don't know anything. It matched her necklace exactly, though. What are the chances of it not being her bracelet, really?'
'Who have you mentioned this to?' she asks.
'My flatmates,' I say. 'Mandy and Sophie.'
'Fuck.'
'So, well done to Chelsea. Now, back to our main story of the day. Police have confirmed that the woman arrested in connection with the murder of Elody Elloissie is Kelly Monsoon, the girlfriend of film star Rufus George. More on that story as and when we get it and in a change to the TV listings, tonight's Panorama programme will now feature famous female killers. Newsnight also has a change of subject. Jeremy Paxman will be hosting a panel discussion called: "Why do women kill?" and will be talking to friends and colleagues of Kelly Monsoon, including Lord and Lady Simpkins, the theatre impresarios who became close friends with the woman now accused of brutal murder. For now, though, it's over to the regional news teams to find out what's happening in your area.'
I'm back in with the police, and the questioning is relentless.
'So what time did the carpenter arrive?' they ask . . . again . . .
'It was around midday.'
'And Elody was outside at the time.'
'Yes.'
'How did you know she was outside?'
'The carpenter told me someone was there so I went to the window and looked out.'
'Did she see you looking?'
'No. I don't think so.'
'How did Elody get through the security gates to be sitting within sight of the window?'
'She's known to security and Henry was driving her. He's Rufus's driver. He would have been allowed straight through.'
'Why was Henry driving her? How often does Henry drive her? Did you not say earlier that you asked Henry not to drive her? Do she and Henry get on? Have you ever seen them arguing? Does Henry seem like a man who is capable of murder?'
The questions keep coming; some things I'm asked to repeat and other things I'm asked for the first time. Now I've decided to just tell them everything that happened, I'm much happier. I'm not very good at lying. I was only doing it to protect Rufus. There are some little secrets we have that I just don't like to reveal, and some things I did (like smashing up the desk) that I don't want to have written about in the papers when they're nothing to do with Elody's murder, and will just be embarrassing for Rufus.
'And you're sure that you went from your home in Richmond to visit your friends in Twickenham at 4 pm?'
'Yes.'
'And Henry drove you all the way there?'
'Yes.'
'What happened then?'
'I knocked on the door but no one was in so I hung around until they got back.'
'You told us yesterday that you went straight in.'
'Yes, I know. I got confused by everything.'
'We came back and asked you again, and you still insisted on the same story.'
'Yes, as I said – I was very confused by everything.'
'You lied to us. You told us you had an alibi and you don't.'
I sit there silently, not knowing what to say.
'Where did you "hang around"?'
'Just in Twickenham.'
'Where in Twickenham?'
'I don't know, just around the coffee shops and stuff.'
'Which coffee shop?'
'Starbucks.'
'So you're saying that between the hours of 4 pm and 6 pm you were sitting in Starbucks in Twickenham.'
'Yes.'
'On your own?'
'Yes.'
'So you have no alibi for the time when Elody was murdered?'
'No. I just sat and had coffee.'
'What sort of coffee?'
'Skinny cappuccino.'
'Where is the coffee shop?'
'It's on the High Street.'
'Where on the High Street? Describe how you got there from the flat.'
'I walked to the traffic lights and turned right into the High Street and there it was, on the right.'
'And you walked in and sat down.'
'Yes I did.'
For God's sake, what does he think I did – disco-danced across the tables?
'Welcome to London Tonight where we are asking the question: what happens when best friends turn on one another? Everyone's seen the wall-to-wall coverage of the Elody Elloissie murder case this week, and the fact that Kelly Monsoon, Elody's best friend, has been arrested for her murder. Could you murder your best friend? Do you ever feel like murdering her? What happens when best friends turn on one another? Can best friends get so close that love turns to hate? Why do women have best friends and what happens when it all goes wrong?'
Chapter 23
The cell is not as horrific as I feared it might be; not that I spend a lot of time thinking about police cells, you understand, but when I was done for drink-driving I thought they'd throw me into a cell and I imagined it being cold and dark and packed full of brightly painted, vulgar hookers and terrifying drug dealers waiting to corrupt me. I always had this vision, based entirely on my experiences of watching bad cop shows on TV, that the cells were where you really suffered for your crime, at the hands of faceless thugs who'd committed offences so much worse than anything you could ever dream of doing.
This cell's not bad though. It's got pale-pink walls because the colour is supposed to make people feel calmer and I'm in an all-female section. Apparently there are ten cells for women and forty-two for men. I haven't seen anyone else though. There's a plastic mattress in the far corner of the room in the kind of royal blue favoured by the makers of school
uniforms. The colour reminds me of gym knickers.
The bed lies beneath a long, thin window too high for me to look through, but big enough to cast natural light into what is otherwise a rather inhospitable and unnatural place. There's fluorescent lighting everywhere. That's the thing I noticed most when I walked in here. Light floods the long cream corridor, forcing brightness into every hidden corner of the cell. The place has the feel of a hospital ward. It reminds me of where Dad went for an operation years ago. All very clean and sterile, but characterless. Desperately soulless.
There's a stainless-steel toilet in the corner of my room and the door is the same deep blue as the barred gate that we came in through on our way in to the courtyard. The huge, metal cell door is the worst thing about the place; it's big and sturdy and when it clanks shut with that horrible metal slam, I feel myself shiver all over. It has a kind of heavy metal cat flap in it through which they look in every hour to make sure I'm OK.
The police come to the cell in the morning to wake me and feed me, but I'm already wide awake, as I guess they knew I would be. I don't suppose that many people locked up for murder sleep soundly on their first night behind bars. I'm not hungry either; strangely I seem to have lost my appetite. It's like Elody's controlling me from beyond the grave.
It's 7 am when I'm taken to wash and prepare myself for the rather gruelling day ahead. The grimy sinks and plastic mirrors mark a bitter contrast between my life before the death of Elody and life afterwards. Funny how I always thought the sumptuous bathrooms in Rufus's magnificent house acted as a symbol of how far I'd come in life when compared to the tiny brown and rotten bathroom that I'd endured while living in the flat. What I'd give for a brown bathroom now.
How peculiar life's waves are, lifting me out of the bright blue sea on a foam-topped crest before dumping me aggressively against the cold, grey rocks.
I'm taken back up to the interview room when I've finished washing, and instructed to sit face to face with my detective friends. This time there's a real frostiness in the air. If I thought the guys were miserable yesterday, I was mistaken. Today there's real grade-one freeze going on. The two detectives are pacing the room when I walk in. My solicitor sits quietly in the corner.
'Would you like to tell us again what you did on the afternoon of Thursday 3 December?'
Again, I explain about the visit to Starbucks.
'We have been through CCTV footage taken at Starbucks on that day and you were not seen going in or out of the building in the time period. Don't you think that's a bit strange?'
My solicitor touches my knee and tells me not to say anything.
'So you don't think it's strange then?'
'Well, it might have been a different coffee shop,' I say, despite Sue Lawrence's request for me to remain silent.
'You described to us in some detail yesterday the precise situation of the coffee shop you went into. Are you now saying that you didn't go into that coffee shop after all?'
'I just get confused.'
'Let me help you,' says Detective Barnes, leaning in so close to me that I think his nose is going to touch mine. 'I think you're lying to us. I don't think you went to a coffee shop at all but went to Richmond to confront Elody about the fact that you had found jewellery that you think belonged to her in your fiancé's drawer. We know you're capable of aggression because of the way you smashed up that desk and fought with Elody on the driveway to your home, resulting in the large bruises now present on your right thigh.
'We know very well that you're capable of lying because you've been doing that to us since we first came to talk to you about the crime. We know you and Elody had a huge fight and we know that you told several people that you were having real problems with Elody. Henry, Mr George's driver, admits that during a conversation you told him you hated Elody and "I could kill her". We have a message on Elody's phone in which you are hurling accusations at her and express deep dislike for her.
'We know that you did not stay in Twickenham because we have CCTV from outside Suga Daddys nightclub of you getting into a black cab. Your flatmates describe you as being "freezing cold" when they met you. You weren't in a coffee shop, Kelly. You took that cab to Richmond didn't you, Kelly? When you were in Richmond you murdered Elody Elloissie. Come on, Kelly. We know. You murdered her.'
'I'd like a word with my client NOW,' screams Sue Lawrence.
'I bet you would,' says Barnes. 'I bet you fucking would.'
Sue Lawrence is looking at me as one might look at a naughty child who has just spray-painted the Mona Lisa orange. She's annunciating every word as if talking to a three-year-old. 'You must tell the absolute truth,' she says. 'The absolute truth. No lies. Do. You. Understand? Do you?'
'Yes, I understand, and of course I know I have to tell the truth,' I say, rather too dismissively.
'No. No, Kelly you don't seem to "know" anything of the sort.' She's raising her voice again now. 'You don't seem to understand that if you tell one more little lie for whatever reason, you will be charged with murder and there is every chance that you will go to prison for a very long time. Now, I don't believe you murdered Elody, and I suspect that these policemen don't think you murdered Elody, but, if you keep lying, you will end up in jail. I don't know how to make this clear for you, Kelly.'
'It is clear,' I say. 'I understand. It's just that there are things that I don't think should be said.'
'You need to stop deciding what should and shouldn't be said, and start answering the questions honestly.'
'But Rufus always said that anything I say will, at some stage, find its way into the papers.'
'Kelly, you need to forget about all that. If you don't stop lying to the police, the fact that you are in the papers will be the very least of your concerns. I don't care how petty some of the questions seem, answer them honestly. If you're worried, don't say anything at all, just don't lie. Whatever you do, don't lie.'
'OK,' I say, suitably chastised. It's not like I'm lying to cover up anything terrible. I just don't see why the public has to hear how awful Elody could be when the woman's body is lying on a slab, and I don't want to ruin our favourite place by telling everyone that's where I was.
'Hello, welcome to Breakfast Chat with me, Lucy Love-shaw. Well, there's only one thing being talked about at the moment and that's the shock news that Kelly Monsoon, the pretty young girl who stole the heart of film star Rufus George, has been arrested for the murder of top fashion stylist and her best friend, Elody Elloissie. The story is causing excitement across the nation because it's so unusual . . . most killers are men. So today we ask: Why do women kill?
'I'm joined in the studio by a panel of experts including our very own Breakfast Chat agony aunt Gillian O'Connor. Next to Gill is Mandy Mitchell, whose mother was jailed for murder, Lady Helen Simpkins, one of the few people who spotted Kelly's potential as a murderer before the gruesome act, and Petra Moon from Women Against Violence. Gillian, let's start with you. This was a particularly brutal murder, wasn't it? Has it surprised you to hear that a woman would murder another woman in this way, and what do you believe is the motivation behind it?'
'So now you're saying that you didn't go to a coffee shop in Twickenham? Sorry if we're being a bit slow keeping up with all of this, but your story is changing a lot.'
'Yes,' I say, sobbing uncontrollably.
'Yes what?' asks the detective with the mad, staring blue eyes.
'Yes, I'm saying that I didn't go to a coffee shop in Twickenham.'
'Where did you go then?'
'I went to Hampton Court Palace.'
'Very nice. Why did you go there?'
'Rufus and I have a special place we like; it's called the Rose Garden. It's beautiful. We love it; it's so quiet. We can be ourselves and no one hassles us or annoys us. There's this gardener there called Frank. You can ask him. I talk to him every time I go there. He saw me. We always have a cup of tea and a chat. He's lovely. The place is lovely and I promised Rufus that I would never,
ever mention to anyone where our special place was, so I didn't want to say.'
'OK.' The detective runs his hands through his short, thinning hair. He looks exasperated. I hate the fact that I'm being such a pain but if it gets out that Rufus and I love it in the Rose Garden, the place will be full of his fans and we'll never be able to go there again. 'So, tell me what really happened, from the moment you got into Henry's car to go to your friends' flat until you met your boyfriend at Heathrow airport later that night. The truth, Kelly. I need you to tell me the truth.'
'Excuse me. Can I have a word please, sir?' A tall, incredibly slim man has entered the room and stands just inside the door.
'DC Paul Campell has just entered the room,' says Detective Swann. When the police first started doing that – mentioning everyone coming in and out for the benefit of the tape – I thought they were saying it for my benefit. I even went to stand up and introduced myself back on one occasion, but Sue urged me to sit down and suggested that introductions weren't really necessary. 'They all know who you are,' she said.
Detective Barnes stands up and walks towards DC Campbell. They exchange a couple of words and both men leave the room.
'Are you OK?' asks my lawyer.
I nod and look down at my hands. Sue starts to talk to me about breathing deeply and turning to her for help if I feel worried when the door opens and a different detective comes in, accompanied by the tall thin guy. The only good news so far today is that the terrible Barnes guy has disappeared for a while.
'I am showing Kelly Monsoon exhibit A,' says the detective, pushing a plastic bag towards me containing Rufus's dagger, the jewel-covered one that he was given after winning the Oscar.
'Do you recognise this?' asks the detective.
'Yes!' I say. 'It belongs to Rufus.'
'You are saying that this dagger belongs to your boyfriend?'
'Yes,' I repeat. 'Where did you find it?'
'In Elody Elloissie's body,' replies the detective with a sanctimonious sneer. 'It had gone through her ribcage and into her heart. Furthermore, the DNA left on the dagger has been analysed and it's your DNA. Your blood, Kelly.'
Celebrity Bride Page 23
