by Sue Fortin
‘In here? That’s an odd place to find her earring.’
‘That’s what I thought, especially as I found it first thing in the morning after the cleaners had been in last thing the night before.’
Harry met his mother’s gaze. No words were needed. Harry understood the implication perfectly. ‘What have you done with the earring?’
‘I’ve given it back to her.’ She continued to hold his gaze. ‘Maybe Dominic has got reason to dislike her.’
The idea troubled Harry as much as it irritated him. ‘Dominic doesn’t know what he’s talking about. He needs to calm himself down.’
‘He’s only looking out for you.’
‘No, he’s not minding his own business,’ snapped Harry. ‘And you wonder why I moved to France.’
He regretted the words as soon as they had left his lips and he saw the hurt in his mother’s eyes that followed.
‘I don’t want to argue,’ she said.
‘Neither do I. I’m sorry,’ said Harry. She smiled and patted his arm in a conciliatory way, which made him feel a complete shit.
‘Let’s not, then,’ said Pru. ‘Life’s too short for petty squabbles.’
Her words knocked the air from him. Such a loaded expression. ‘Are you OK?’ he asked, wanting not only to change the subject but also to try to coax his mother into telling him about her health.
‘Me? Yes. Couldn’t be better. I was just heading up to bed,’ she said. ‘Not that I’m tired; I was watching the news, but it’s all doom and gloom – far too depressing for me.’
He put his arm around his mother’s shoulders and shepherded her out of the office and into the hall. ‘Do you want me to take you to your room?’
She gave a tut and a small chuckle. ‘I’m not that old and frail yet,’ she said. ‘Next you’ll be bringing me cocoa and a shawl for my shoulders.’ She gave him a peck on the cheek. ‘I’m fine. I’m going to read my book for a while, and I have the girls to keep me company.’
Harry looked at the three bichon frises which had appeared from the living room to find their mistress. ‘Fair enough. Sleep well.’ He watched as the dogs trotted off up the stairs and reflected on how the outside world didn’t matter to his mother. As long as everything in her own Conmere House world was all right, she was happy.
Chapter Thirty-Five
Kendalton, Thursday, 16 May, 3.10 p.m.
From the very beginning of the day, the usual oppressive atmosphere which weighed heavily in and around Conmere House seemed to have intensified with every passing minute. When it came to three o’clock and her shift had ended, all Steph wanted was to get as far away from the place as possible. She hadn’t seen Harry at all that morning, but had now and again seen Dominic from across the hall, and Pru had crossed paths with her as she had gone to stock up the laundry station at the pool house.
‘Nice to see the earrings are back where they should be,’ she had said as she passed Steph, on her way for a swim. A perfectly innocent comment but one that still managed to send a shiver down Steph’s spine.
Having gone up to her room after her shift and changed out of her uniform, Steph was now in her battered car, speeding away from Conmere. As she drove out of the gates, she could feel the tension ease from her body.
With no particular destination in mind, Steph was surprised to find herself in Kendalton, and for a reason she couldn’t explain she drove to her mother’s house and parked on the driveway. She wasn’t sure why she’d come here, and acknowledged it was an odd thing to do. She never normally came unannounced but Wendy hadn’t been in touch as she’d said she would, and there was something about the call that had left Steph unsettled with a nagging feeling she couldn’t quite get a hold of.
Wendy’s car was on the drive and the upstairs bedroom window was open, so Steph knew her mother must be in. Wendy would never leave the house without first making sure all the windows were securely shut. Still, Steph had to ring the bell twice, the second time more insistently, and then rap on the door with her knuckles.
Puzzled at Wendy still not appearing, Steph crouched down and called through the letterbox.
‘Mum! You there? It’s me, Steph!’
She was convinced she could hear voices and peered through the letterbox. She was able to look right through to the kitchen at the end of the hall and could see the bottom half of Wendy, but there was someone else with her. The back of the kitchen chair was just visible and, although her view of the other person was partly blocked by her mother, Steph saw them move to Wendy’s right. She couldn’t see who it was but could see they were wearing a waxed cotton Barbour jacket or coat. Steph had only caught sight of them for a second but she heard the back door close and saw Wendy rest her hands on the kitchen table for a moment.
Steph stood up and pounded the door again. ‘Mum! Open the door!’ She held her finger on the doorbell and could hear the persistent sound of the buzzer from inside the house.
It seemed an age before Wendy finally opened the door. ‘Stephanie, what are you doing here?’
Under normal circumstances Steph would have inwardly sighed at her mother’s greeting. She’d always fantasised that one day Wendy would open the door, smile broadly, open her arms and exclaim what a lovely surprise it was to see her. Today, however, she didn’t have time to indulge in such fantasy.
‘You took ages to answer the door – is everything all right?’ Steph looked over her mother’s shoulder and down the hallway. Wendy didn’t move.
‘Of course. Why wouldn’t it be?’
‘Because I’ve been ringing the bell, knocking on the door and shouting through the letterbox. Have you got visitors? I can come back if it’s inconvenient.’
‘I was upstairs in the bathroom, if you must know,’ said Wendy. Her eyes weren’t looking at Steph, though, but at something behind Steph in the street.
Automatically, Steph turned to look back over her left shoulder to see what had attracted Wendy’s attention. She heard the noise of a car as it passed and quickly looked in the other direction. A black 4x4 accelerated down the road.
‘Who was that?’ demanded Steph.
Wendy’s face was a picture of confusion. ‘How do I know? Anyway, why are you here?’
Steph gave another look down the road, but the 4x4 had disappeared out of sight now, and she turned to face her mother again. ‘I just thought I’d call in. You seemed worried about me the other day. Can I come in or have I got to stand on the doorstep all afternoon?’
Wendy barely supressed her sigh and opened the door to allow her daughter in. ‘Do you want a cup of tea?’
‘Yes, please.’ Steph trailed Wendy into the kitchen and discreetly cast her gaze around the room. She didn’t know what she was looking for, just something that would give her a clue as to who had been here. There was nothing, but as she casually moved towards the back door with the pretence of looking out of the window at the rear garden she got the tiniest whiff of either perfume or aftershave. She couldn’t work out which, but it smelt familiar. She tried to pin down the smell and where she’d come across it before, but the memory was too far out of reach.
‘Are you going to sit down?’ Wendy placed a cup of tea on the kitchen table and a cup of black coffee for herself on the opposite side. A symbolic gesture, even if an unconscious one, thought Steph as she sat down facing her mother. There was no mistaking the chill in the air despite the warmth of the sun shining in through the window. ‘When are you going back to Brighton?’ asked Wendy.
‘Not sure yet. Maybe at the weekend.’
‘If it’s money stopping you going home, then I can give you petrol money and some extra cash to keep you going.’
Steph almost choked on the mouthful of tea she was in the middle of swallowing. She gulped it down and disguised her surprise with a cough. ‘Went down the wrong way.’
‘Yeah, of course it did.’ Wendy eyed Steph across the table. ‘I’ve got enough cash in my purse for petrol. I can send the rest by bank transfer. If
you leave in the next couple of hours, you’ll be home before midnight.’
Steph put her cup on the table firmly to underline what she was about to say. ‘I’m not leaving today.’ She met her mother’s gaze with equal intensity. ‘I have money to get home, but I’m not leaving yet.’
‘I think you should.’
‘I know.’
The clouds had shifted in the sky and the sun was hidden, casting a shadow across Wendy’s face, which darkened with her mood. ‘I want you to go. Today.’
‘I don’t know why you don’t want me here,’ said Steph. Wasn’t it just the other day her mother was phoning to see how she was and suggesting they go for lunch? Now it was as if that had never happened and they were back to square one with each other. ‘I can’t make up my mind if it’s because you’re frightened of what I might discover or if you just really can’t bear being in my company for too long.’ She rose from the table. ‘Your call wasn’t because you were concerned about me. It was because you wanted to see if I had left. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you, and I’m sorry I cause you so much discomfort and displeasure.’ She waited for Wendy to say something, to deny her accusations, to ask her to stay, but she did nothing. She remained in her seat and continued staring straight ahead. ‘I’ll text you when I leave, just to reassure you that I’ve gone.’ Steph’s words were bitter, maybe more so than she had intended, but it was that or break down and cry in front of her mother, which was the last thing she wanted to do. She wasn’t going to give that woman the satisfaction.
‘Wait!’ Wendy rose from her seat.
Steph stood still. ‘What?’
Wendy motioned for Steph to sit back down and, in what was possibly their first act of synchronisation in anything, both women lowered themselves onto their chairs in unison.
Wendy laid her hands flat out on the table in front of her as if bracing herself and then uncharacteristically fiddled with her wedding ring. ‘You’re more like me than perhaps I realised or you’d like to admit,’ she began. ‘Stubborn. Determined. Unflinching.’
Steph had never considered herself anything like her mother, but put like that, she couldn’t really deny it. ‘So it would seem.’
‘What I’m about to tell you is strictly off the record. I could still get into a lot of trouble for telling you this but … I’m going to because I’m concerned about you.’ She couldn’t quite meet Steph’s gaze and focused on her wedding band again. ‘When I began investigating Elizabeth’s death, I asked questions that the Sinclair family didn’t like. I didn’t take it at face value that her death was an accident; I wouldn’t have been doing my job properly if I didn’t look at all possibilities.’
‘What was your gut feeling?’
This time Wendy looked her daughter straight in the eye. ‘My gut feeling? It wasn’t as straightforward as the Sinclairs were making out. They were hiding something, but I didn’t know what. I didn’t know if it was directly related to Elizabeth’s death or something else.’ Wendy paused before speaking again. ‘I was called before my bosses and told in no uncertain terms that my findings were to conclude it was an accident.’
‘But I thought you were asked to leave because you handled it wrong?’
‘I was set up. I was being squeezed from all sides. Basically, I was a pain in the arse and they wanted rid of me.’
‘But why are you so insistent that I don’t stir anything up? I’m not doing anything illegal. The police can’t arrest me.’
‘I think the Sinclairs put pressure on my bosses. I’ve said before they are very influential, but it’s not just that. They’re dangerous as well. Everyone at Conmere was under suspicion, especially the husband.’
‘Harry?’
‘You’re on first-name terms with him already, but don’t be fooled by him or any of them. Blood is thicker than water, as they say, and it certainly applies to that lot. Basically, they closed ranks and put up this wall of silence which was impregnable. And still is.’
‘Wow, so Sonia Lomas is right to be suspicious.’ Steph sat back in her chair as she digested what her mum had told her. It sat uneasily with her that Harry was essentially the main suspect, but she tried to offset her disquiet with the notion that it didn’t fit with the Harry she knew. She just couldn’t see him murdering his wife.
‘Do you know anything about a video recording that Elizabeth might have made?’
Wendy couldn’t hide the surprise on her face. ‘How do you know about that?’
Steph shrugged. ‘It doesn’t matter, but you’ve answered my question anyway.’
‘Don’t waste your time looking for any recording,’ said Wendy, pre-empting Steph’s next question. ‘All I can say is, if there was a recording, it was probably destroyed. I’m sure the Sinclairs wouldn’t have left anything like that lying around.’
Steph felt deflated. The one thing that she was sure held the key to the truth no longer existed. ‘Are you just saying that?’
‘No. I know for a fact. You’re living in cloud cuckoo land if you think you’ll find anything.’
Steph stopped and looked at her mother as a sudden bolt of realisation hit her. She jumped up from her chair. ‘Thank you, Mum,’ she said, a broad grin spreading across her face.
‘Thank me for what?’
‘Cloud cuckoo land – you’re a genius.’
Wendy shook her head. ‘What are you talking about?’
‘I’ve got to go. I need to check something out.’ She could barely contain her excitement. There was still a chance of finding that recording.
Conmere, Thursday, 16 May, 4.15 p.m.
Safely in her room, with the door locked, Steph took out her laptop and switched it on. As soon as it sprang to life, she went onto the camera shop’s website and after a bit of searching found the link for their SpyCloud. She typed in Elizabeth’s email address from the information Sonia had given her when they’d first met. It then asked for the four-digit PIN. Steph checked the notebook and input the numbers written in red alongside the camera shop’s phone number – 2206. It made sense now: it was Elizabeth’s birthday, 22 June. Holding her breath, she pressed the enter key and waited. The egg timer appeared on the screen for a few seconds and then the screen went white and three movie icons appeared in front of her.
She was in.
They were labelled Diary Entry One, Diary Entry Two and Diary Entry Three, all in movie format. Steph clicked on the first one.
Straight away the screen was filled with Elizabeth settling back on her bed, having just started the recording. Steph was struck by the beauty of her, with her lovely blonde hair which fell in soft waves down to her shoulder. Even though it was only a half-body shot and Elizabeth was in casual clothes, she still looked stylish. Steph was sure she herself never looked so glamorous when she was in jeans and a T-shirt. She couldn’t help wondering what Harry had seen in her when he obviously had much more sophisticated tastes. It wasn’t without a little dip in her heart that she acknowledged she probably didn’t mean a great deal to him. She shook thoughts of Harry from her mind as Elizabeth began to speak.
‘My name is Elizabeth Sinclair. I’m making a series of recordings, as I’ve found out some things here at Conmere which are troubling and knowing these, I’m now in danger. I’m hoping no one ever has to see this recording and I’m being paranoid, but just in case I thought I’d do this.’
Her diction was clear and crisp, every syllable and every vowel pronounced with precision. Elizabeth paused to take a sip from the wine glass she held in her hand.
‘I’m married to Harry Sinclair, the middle Sinclair brother of Conmere Resort Centre. We’ve been married for two years and things haven’t exactly been great lately. I’m not trying to excuse my behaviour or anything, I’m just stating the facts. I’m very bored here at Conmere; there’s really nothing much to do and I haven’t made any friends. I’m not proud of the fact, but I’ve had one or two indiscretions – shall we say? – where men are concerned. Nothing serious, just a bit of f
un to alleviate the boredom. Harry spends all day working and leaving me alone with nothing to do except update their website or send out a few posts on social media! I’ve tried getting involved with the business but it’s such a closed shop, no one will let me, least of all my mother-in-law, Pru. Now, she’s a force to be reckoned with.
Wisely or not, I’ve been having a little affair with my brother-in-law, Dominic Sinclair. It’s been going on for a while, and during that time I’ve learnt some interesting things about him. One of them being, he’s a drug dealer. He stores the drugs here at Conmere up by the lake in the old boathouse.
You may wonder how I know … well, let’s just say, there’s a constant supply of cocaine and I may have partaken in some recreational use at one of the parties. Dominic supplied me with the stuff and told me about his little sideline. It seems I’m not the only Sinclair who likes to indulge. Owen is quite fond of it himself but, unfortunately, isn’t able to limit his use.
So, what’s the problem, you might ask? Why do I think I’m in danger? Well, Dominic wants to end our relationship and, if I’m honest, I don’t. I’m still having way too much fun and the thought of going back to Harry and his boring ways really doesn’t appeal to me, not yet anyway. Dominic has threatened to tell Harry about my other affairs if I don’t let him end our relationship. He’s got another thought coming if he thinks he can just use me whenever he wants and there are no strings attached. I’ve told him as much. I’ve told him if he thinks he can just fuck me and then fuck me off, I’m more than happy to pass on some incriminating evidence to the police. He has far more to lose than I do. I could walk away with a divorce settlement. What could he walk away with? A jail sentence, that’s what.
Needless to say, he’s not very happy about that and we are at a bit of a stalemate. But it was the look in his eye and the way he spoke which frightened me. Now I’m not sure if he is planning something else to shut me up for good. That’s why I’m recording everything here. If something does happen to me, then Dominic will be responsible. I guarantee it.’
