by Sue Nicholls
After cleaning his hands with white spirit, he searched the folds of his jacket for the phone. A missed call from Kitty. He visualised Kitty’s face, delicate of bone but steely of eye, impatient that he had not answered. This was the girl he loved, but who did not, as far as he knew, return his feelings. Her message was terse.
‘Call me.’
Typical. No frills; no clues. He did as commanded and she picked up quickly, saying, ‘Hello. You took your time.’
‘Hi, how are you doing?’
‘Good. Good.’ She paused, ‘thanks.’
Sam smirked. She was no good at small talk - her father’s daughter in almost every way. He ran damp fingers through his wild brown curls. ‘You rang me?’
‘Yes. I’ve got a job for you.’
‘A job?’
‘Uh huh. It’s a long story.’
12 KITTY
Jim Thoroughgood, editor of the publication that provided the bulk of Kitty’s income, was in a Celtic strop. His broad Glaswegian accent boomed in the cubicle he referred to as his office. ‘So glad you’ve decided to put in an appearance.’
‘Well, you don’t seem that glad.’ Kitty reached over and patted Jim’s cheek. ‘In fact, you look positively furious.’
Jim grunted. ‘I don’t appreciate getting calls from your nearest and dearest because you’ve disappeared wi’out telling anyone.’ His angry expression melted, and he sighed and flopped back into his seat. ‘I was worried. But here you are, daein’ fine, and no explanation.’
‘Give me a chance, I’ve just walked in.’ Kitty dumped herself in a worn, black office chair opposite Jim and held onto the edge of his desk to stop it scooting backwards. Jim was her greatest ally in the world of journalism. He had supported her through crises of every hue, trusted her when she said she had a story worth printing and even, occasionally, advanced her money. In return, she produced startling and emotive local stories that had helped the digital newspaper hold its head up among larger publications. As Jim pressed his lips together, Kitty leant forwards and interlocked her fingers under the desk. ‘I’m investigating something exciting. Something that could expose an injustice, or at worst, will be the intimate profile of a murderer. Either way, it’ll make a great piece.’ She watched Jim’s face for the tell-tale twitch of his left eyebrow. And there it was. Confident now, she continued, ‘There’s a load of stuff to cover. I’d like to take on an assistant.’
Canny Jim narrowed his eyes and demanded to hear more, but Kitty held up her hands.
‘You need to trust me on this one, Jim. It’s close to home for me, but I promise it’ll be a hot story.’ They both knew the editor would capitulate and advance her the money she needed.
As Kitty left the building, she was dialing Sam’s number.
13 SAM
‘Woah.’ Kitty halted inside Sam’s door and gaped at his new decor. ‘Woah and wow. That’s amazing.’
‘Thank you,’ Sam muttered staring at his toes, ‘Would you like a cup of tea?’
Yes please, but don’t put that disgusting honey in it.’
‘Honey’s good for you.’
‘Maybe, but not in tea. Not in my tea anyway.’ She was still admiring in the ceiling. ‘How long did this take you?’
Sam filled the kettle and turned over two mugs on the draining board. ‘Oh, a week, about.’
Kitty collapsed into an armchair and rested her head on its back to get a proper view. ‘You can sure paint, but I wouldn’t want this lot staring down at me every evening.’
‘You said you had a job for me.’
‘Yep.’
He dropped a tea bag into each mug and waited to hear his fate.
‘I need help with an investigation. Something big.’ Kitty hesitated, and Sam’s curiosity was piqued. Kitty was not in the habit of reticence. She went on, ‘I wondered if you would help with some research.’
‘Research into what?’
‘Well…’
Sam discharged steaming water onto their tea bags. ‘Milk?’
‘Please; a splash.’
A few months ago, Sam would have leapt at the opportunity to work alongside his beloved Kitty. But since painting the high-profile commission for the mayor, he was in demand. ‘How long would you need me for?’
Kitty shrugged, ‘No idea, maybe a few days, maybe weeks - even months.’
Sam passed over a mug, and Kitty put it beside her on the bare floor. He sat on a metal camping seat and studied her. She was hiding something. ‘Sounds like quite a project.’
‘Yes.’ Kitty averted her eyes. ‘It’s about Max Rutherford.’
It took a moment to comprehend. Max Rutherford, the man who ruined all their lives, who murdered his mother, an event that sent his father, Maurice, into such a state of depression that he refused to leave the house for months. ‘Why would you want anything to do with that?’
Without a word, Kitty handed him the letter.
~~~
Water streamed from Sam’s hood and into his eyes blurring his view of the ground, but he marched on, sure-footed on the familiar pathway. Below and to his right, just visible through low cloud, lay the town of Chelterton. On his left, the Lymeshire Downs faded into a grey mist. As he stomped over the uneven ground, his mind roiled. It was unthinkable that Max Rutherford should be on the streets again. And Kitty wanted to re-investigate his case? What purpose would that serve?
His recall of family life when his father and mother lived together was as cloudy as the surrounding scenery. When he was five, he, Mum and his brother Josh moved in with Fee and little Kitty at their house in Crispin Road. After that, family life changed, and his father, Maurice, became more involved in Sam’s life. Maurice did not have a clue how to look after children because grim-faced Granny did most of his housework and laundry. Although she was not unkind to the boys, she was not a grandmother who would get out the Monopoly or take them to jump in puddles.
Later, after falling out with her husband, Mick, a third friend, Millie, brought her children, Lucas and Olivia, to also live with them at Crispin Road. Soon, Millie was following her heart by opening the restaurant she named Feast. One morning, Millie entered the premises early and switched on the light. It ignited a massive gas leak that blew the roof off the building, taking Millie with it. That was Sam’s first experience of death.
When Sam was eight, his mother disappeared. The sudden change caused by her absence resulted in confusion and worry for Sam and Josh. Maurice was hopeless; pretending everything was fine when it was not, and Sam tried to reassure Josh and help him with things that Mum usually did. After weeks, or perhaps it was months, Mum’s body turned up in Little Calum Lake.
As he marched over the hill, Sam grew furious at Kitty for awakening these memories. To purge his thoughts, he drove himself onward, striding over dewy tussocks of spiny grass and white humps of clay and scree. After half an hour, gasping for breath, his face clammy inside the hood, he halted for a rest. But the minute he stopped; the recollections poured back.
Their mums all died - a concatenation of funerals and tears. Sam did not doubt that that man, Max Rutherford, or whatever other names he had used, murdered Fee. He had tricked her into loving him, and they married in a surprise ceremony in Mauritius. On their honeymoon in the same place, Max pushed Fee to her death from a clifftop. At first, the police suspected Kitty’s dad, Paul, who had flown to the island to protect Fee, but when surprise evidence against Max came out in court, Paul was discharged, and a second trial convicted Max of the murders of two women: Fee, and Sam’s own mother, Twitch.
Sam descended from the ridge into the town, and his heavy walking boots clomped under the hazy streetlights of the High Street. Some way ahead, near the church, stood Millie’s rebuilt restaurant; now run by her son, Lucas and Mick, his father.
Officially, Millie’s death remained accidental. No evidence suggested Max had killed her, but Sam was unconvinced. The guy was a murderer and a conman, and now he had duped Kitty. As he left the town
and walked past Kitty’s place on his way home, Sam realised he must take up her job offer. She needed his protection.
14 KITTY
Kitty accepted half a bitter and raised it to Sam. ‘Cheers.’
‘Cheers.’
They banged their glasses down.
It was a Friday night, ‘Pint Night,’ as Kitty called it. She glanced at the entrance to the barn of a pub.
Sam asked, ‘What time did you tell them?’
‘Eight.’ Kitty checked her phone. She had not seen Luc and Livvie or Sam’s brother Josh, for two or three years. As children, they had been close - they still were, up to a point - but nowadays they struggled to find time to meet. Life had kept them apart: university, job hunting, careers - well apart from Josh, who seemed to have inherited from his father, Maurice, a certain lack of what Nanny Gloria would have called oomph.
Speak of the devil. Josh strode in, all jeans and muscles. His eyes scanned the room and settled on Kitty and Sam. He had filled out. He used to be such a feeble little chap but working on a building site had done him good, well his body at least. She waved, and he approached, grinning, dragging the winter air in his wake.
Sam rose, and the men hugged.
‘Hi mate.’ Josh slapped Sam on the arm and blew a kiss to Kitty.
‘Hi.’ Sam’s face was admiring, ‘Looking good, Fella. The outdoor life suits you.’
‘Yeah, well,’ Josh hunched his shoulders, ‘It’s a job. I’ve got some other ideas.’ He sat beside Kitty and hugged her, smelling of aftershave and cement.
Lucas and Livvie. Both slight and brown skinned with afro-textured hair, approached the table arm in arm.
‘What’s new?’ Livvie asked, sitting beside Josh, then without waiting for an answer, ‘How’s the job, Joshy.’
Josh scowled, ‘Don’t call me Joshy.’
‘Don’t be such a wuss, it’s your name.’ Livvie thumped his arm.
‘Ow!’ Josh rubbed the place. ‘Be kind.’
Livvie poked out her tongue, ‘I don’t have to be kind. You’re my siblish.’
It was their old pattern - the months and years slaked away as if they had met but yesterday.
Kitty waited until all had caught up with their news and become lubricated by alcohol before she said, ‘I’ve got something to tell you…’
Their faces morphed from curious to suspicious as she told them of Max’s release. She did not mention her investigation, or that she had already met with him. ‘I wondered if we could talk about that time. This has raised questions and,’ she hesitated, uncomfortable with the admission, ‘Some unexpected feelings. We’ve never talked about what happened, have we?’
‘I’m not keen on the idea.’ Lucas said. ‘It was a tough time, and we’ve all moved on.’
‘I was hoping you might help me come to terms with Max’s release.’ Kitty said.
The others looked astounded. Livvie leaned towards Kitty. ‘You want us to dredge up memories we’ve tried to suppress for years?’
Kitty nodded, meeting her eyes. ‘Yeah. Kind of group therapy. It might help when I’m talking to Max.’
‘You plan to talk to him?’ Livvie’s eyes widened.
‘Kitty nodded. ‘He’s still insisting he didn’t kill my mum.’
‘Bloody cheek,’ Josh looked at Sam. ‘You’re quiet, big brother. What do you think?’
Sam shrugged. ‘I want the best thing for Kitty. We’ve already talked about this, and I agree we should do it. To bury such painful memories can’t be healthy.’ He gave them a small smile. ‘Therapists cost a fortune you know, and the question is, would you trust one with your deepest thoughts after…?’
‘What if Max really is innocent, have you thought about that?’ Livvie sought Kitty’s eyes. ‘If Max didn’t kill your mum, then…’
Kitty gave her a look. ‘Max Rutherford is not innocent. My dad might be a bit of a head case sometimes, but he’s not a killer.’ She jacked up one corner of her mouth and added, ‘He’s going to be a father again, by the way.’
‘Oh my God!’ Josh threw himself back in his chair and they all grabbed their rocking drinks. ‘And you’re only just mentioning it?’
‘It’s a baby, not a sudden death.’ Kitty brushed away the comment with a flap of her hand. She was not yet sure of her feelings about this latest news, received only a few hours ago.
There was a pensive lull in the conversation then Lucas said, ‘You’re asking us all to discuss something that I for one have worked hard to put behind me.’ He searched the faces of his ‘brothers and sisters’, and they nodded.
‘Give us some time to think about it, Kit.’ Livvie said.
‘OK.’ Kitty sipped her beer, ‘I suppose I’ll have to. Anyone for another?’
When she returned with a swimming tray of drinks, the topic had moved to Paul and Cerys’s engagement party. Everyone had accepted their invitations.
‘Are you OK about it?’ Livvie asked Kitty.
‘S’pose so.’ Kitty gave out the glasses. ‘Not much I can do about it, anyway.’
‘I know that, but are you happy for your dad?’
‘If he’s happy, that’s all that matters.’ Kitty sank into her seat and watched the fire. ‘I don’t trust the woman if I’m honest, but I might be wrong.’
‘It’s natural you should feel protective about your father.’ Livvie leaned across and squeezed Kitty’s hand, and Kitty slapped it away.
‘I’m fully aware of that.’
Josh, who had been quiet, piped up, ‘I think I would like to talk about the past. I’ve been thinking it over, and now you’ve opened the can; I need to look at the worms.’
‘Nicely put, Joshy,’ grinned Lucas.
‘Piss off Luc,’ Josh responded with a half-smile.
Kitty beamed at Josh. ‘Really? I’d be so grateful if you would. Can we try to piece together what happened?’
‘OK.’ Livvie sighed. She took a tissue from her handbag and put it under her wet glass, ‘I suppose we could get it out of the way.’ She frowned, ‘We were all so young. Sam, you’re the oldest, I bet you remember the most.’
‘I remember going swimming with Dad. It was a change of plan because they’d agreed that Mum would take us shopping. Dad was acting weird. Josh was too small to remember, I suppose.’ Sam looked at Josh.
‘I don’t remember the swimming. I remember you and Dad in the car somewhere. You were crying, and so was Dad. I suppose that was the time you found out Mum had disappeared. I knew something bad had happened.’ Josh looked accusing. ‘Nobody would ever tell me anything.’
‘It might have been the swimming day,’ Sam said. ‘On the way back from the pool Dad told me that Mum wasn’t away having a rest, she’d gone missing.’ He met Josh’s eyes. ‘I cried. Then you woke up and joined in.’
‘Poor Dad,’ Josh said, and Sam continued, ‘Things were normal for a while after that and I thought it was OK again. I can’t imagine why because Mum hadn’t come back.’
‘Do you mind if I put a few things down on paper?’ Kitty flapped open her notebook. ‘Could we put together a timeline of what happened first and next etcetera?’
The conversation ranged around with one person’s memory sparking another. Soon, Kitty had filled several pages. Not all their memories were awful; some were happy. Like the day they all visited Little Callun Hill to test a new go-kart that Paul had built.
‘It was massive, remember?’ said Kitty. ‘We all fitted on it at the same time.’
‘Who was there that day?’ asked Josh.
‘We all were, weren’t we?’ Kitty screwed up her face, trying to construct a mental picture. ‘Was your dad there, Luc?’
Luc shrugged. ‘Possibly not. I can’t visualise him. I bet he was working.’
Kitty noted that in her book. It was not important, but she had an urge to record every detail, to map out everyone’s movements.
‘I was gutted when someone stole that cart.’ Sam said.
The others agreed.
<
br /> ‘Remember the restaurant opening?’ asked Lucas, who now worked in the same building. After Millie’s death, Lucas and Olivia became owners of the heap of rubble that had been Feast. Because they were too young to understand, Mick used Millie’s insurance pay-out to rebuild the place in case one or both his kids wished to follow their parents’ careers and become chefs.
With the work completed, Mick leased the building to a local restaurant chain until Lucas and Olivia came of age. At twenty, Lucas took the plunge, paying his sister rent for her share of the building. People thought him crackers. Kitty, in her straightforward way, demanded, ‘Wouldn’t you rather get rid of it?’ But Lucas was doing it in memory of his mother. Despite, or even because of his sad childhood, he found comfort in being where Millie had been, knowing he was doing what she did, wondering if she could see him.
Mick opted to leave his high-powered hotel job and join his son in the enterprise. ‘I’ve had enough of travel and sales,’ he told Lucas. ‘I miss being hands on.’
Lucas hoped this was true and that Mick had not given up his successful career to support him.
