by Beevis, Keri
And yet again he realised she had distracted him from thinking about what Ruby might say.
Because you’re thinking about what’s under that dress.
He dismissed the goading little voice in his head, concentrated on the road, reminding himself yet again that things with Lila were platonic and should stay that way.
The car park to the service area off Holdingham roundabout was busy and as Jack drove slowly up and down the lanes looking for a space, he glanced at the KFC restaurant where Ruby and her brother were supposed to be meeting them. On the back seat, Cooper stirred, sitting up straight and yawning. He let out a woof of excitement, tail thumping furiously as Jack pulled into a space and killed the engine.
‘You ready?’ Lila asked.
Jack nodded. ‘As I’ll ever be.’
‘I’m right here with you, Jack.’
Knowing that she was, glad he had brought her along, he got out of the car, ready to face whatever Ruby Howard had to say.
19
The KFC restaurant had outside seating, which meant they didn’t have an issue about what to do with Cooper. Lila sat down at one of the tables, keeping a firm grip on the dog lead, while Jack went inside. Cooper initially whined a little as he tried to go after him, before giving up and settling down under the table. Despite the fact it was a bright warm day, there was no-one else sitting outside and only a handful of people were in the restaurant from what she could see. Her view was partially blocked by a missing poster in the window of the restaurant. It looked several weeks old and Lila knew that Phoebe Kendall and Shona McNamara still hadn’t been found, that the missing person’s enquiry had since turned into a murder investigation, centring around one of the girl’s uncles.
Lila had studied Ruby’s picture before they had left and was fairly certain she wasn’t there yet; that Lila would have recognised her if she was.
She was glad she had come, was grateful for the distraction. If Jack had gone without her, she would have stayed home in the flat, kept replaying that horrible moment where her eyes had fluttered open and she had seen the hooded figure standing over her bed. It was still in her head, she saw the image every time she allowed her mind to wander, but the banter in the car with Jack, learning more about him and his life, had mostly kept her occupied, made her feel normal again.
Still, there was a dread that later that night she would have to go back to the flat, would have to try to sleep in her bedroom again. Jack had fixed the window, but it hadn’t been broken before the intruder got in. And that made her feel vulnerable, knowing that he could return. She kept that dread quashed down, figured she would deal with it when she returned home.
For now it was about Jack and finding out what Ruby might know about Stephanie, and Lila sensed he needed her as much as she had needed him the previous night.
He returned with two coffees, set them down on the table then briefly disappeared again, coming back with a bowl of water for Cooper.
‘They’re not here yet.’
As he sat, Lila noticed lines of strain on his face. She glanced at her watch. They had already been ten minutes late when they arrived, but Ruby knew how important this was. She didn’t believe they would have left already. ‘We’re meeting a teenage girl,’ she downplayed. ‘They don’t run on time. I know I didn’t.’
Jack gave a half-smile, though didn’t look convinced.
Cooper, who had looked disinterested when Jack set down the water bowl, decided to slurp from it. Jack glanced down at him, ruffling the fur behind his ears, and Lila could feel the anxiety rolling off him.
‘It’s okay, Jack.’ She reached across, caught his free hand.
He didn’t react, other than to look at her with those clear blue eyes, his expression unreadable.
Remembering he had a girlfriend, Lila let go.
Last night he did more than hold your hand.
The previous night had been different she reminded herself, but still it niggled her how apparently understanding Tiff was to let her boyfriend spend so much time with another woman.
Maybe she doesn’t know.
Lila shrugged the thought away.
‘I think this is them.’
Jack was glancing over her shoulder and Lila turned, spotting a young couple heading towards the restaurant. Jack was already on his feet.
The girl looked nervous, hands stuffed in her jacket pockets, while the boy with her appeared more confident, though still seemed wary.
‘Ruby Howard?’
Lila recognised her from her picture: slim, petite with long straight brown hair.
‘Jack Foley?’ That was from Ruby’s brother. He glanced briefly at Lila. ‘You’re Joe’s friend.’
It wasn’t a question.
As far as meetings went, this one was awkward. Ruby and her brother, who introduced himself as Matthew, took a seat at the bench, both declining Jack’s offer of a drink. Ruby made a fuss of Cooper, who lapped up the attention, and she seemed uncomfortable with meeting Jack’s eyes.
‘You knew my sister, Steph?’
‘We went to school together.’ Still no eye contact, as Ruby continued to focus on the dog. ‘I haven’t seen her since last year.’
‘I was sorry to hear about what happened,’ Matthew offered.
Jack ignored him, focussing on Ruby. ‘You stayed in touch with her?’
‘Just through Facebook and text.’
‘But you were in touch enough to know someone was bothering her.’
This time Ruby looked up, hesitantly met his eyes.
‘I saw what you wrote on Facebook. At least that creep can’t get to you anymore.’
When she didn’t answer, instead exchanged a look with her brother, Jack pressed on. ‘I need to know what you meant, who you meant.’
Ruby must have given this some thought before coming there, must have known what Jack was going to ask, but still she seemed reluctant to answer.
‘Who was the creep, Ruby? Who was harassing my sister?’ Jack’s tone was heated, his frustration clear, and Lila could see Ruby shrinking away.
‘Easy, Jack, give her a moment,’ Lila urged, finding a smile for the girl when she looked her way. ‘I know it can’t be easy for you coming here today. Stephanie was your friend.’
‘She was.’
‘How long had you known each other? Since you were both little, I bet.’
Jack opened his mouth to cut in; shut it again when Lila shot him a warning look.
‘We were in primary school together. She was my oldest friend.’ Ruby twisted a chunky silver ring on her middle finger. ‘I missed her so much after we moved away. We kept in touch through messenger and text, but it wasn’t the same.’
‘She confided in you.’
‘We confided in each other.’
‘Did you know someone was upsetting her before you moved away?’
‘No.’ Ruby twisted the ring harder. ‘Something happened at Christmas. She wouldn’t tell me what, but she was in a bad way. She texted me on Boxing Day, said she needed to talk, that something had happened and she didn’t know what to do, who to tell. I was away with my family and didn’t have a good enough signal. I didn’t get her text until a couple of days later and when I tried to call her, she didn’t answer. I texted her loads, I was so worried about her, but it was over a week before she got back to me, and by then she was brushing it off, pretending it had been nothing and she had overreacted.’
‘Did she ever tell you what had happened?’ Lila asked gently.
‘No. But I knew something was wrong. She seemed different after that and it was like she didn’t want to know me.’
Lila was making headway, but she was aware of Jack looking agitated, knew he had been waiting for answers. He was going to have to be patient for a little longer.
‘Did she confide in you again?’ she pressed.
‘A few weeks before she…’ Ruby glanced guiltily at Jack. ‘Before she… you know. Before it happened.’
‘What did
she tell you, Ruby?’ Lila silently urged the girl to focus.
‘She was struggling at school and she was panicking because she wasn’t ready for her exams. Steph had always been smart and she worked hard, but whatever had happened at Christmas had thrown her and I think it was eating away at her. She told me she had been drinking, stealing from her dad’s drinks cabinet. She admitted she was out of control. Told me she was worried she was going to fail her exams.’
‘What happened next?’
‘She said there was someone who could help her pass. She’d heard about him from one of the other students. He was very selective with who he helped and he charged a lot of money, but he had a copy of the test answers and could guarantee she would pass her A levels.’
‘The money she wanted to borrow.’
Lila glanced at Jack; saw the distraught look on his face.
‘She told me it was for an after-exam holiday with her friends,’ Jack explained. ‘Henry was being a tight ass and wouldn’t lend it to her, so she came to me.’
‘Did you give it to her?’
Jack shook his head. ‘I was going to. She never got back to me.’
‘She didn’t need the money.’ Ruby was looking at them both, midnight blue eyes wide in her pale face. ‘This man who had the test answers, he agreed to help her, but he didn’t want her money.’
‘What did he want?’ Lila barely dared ask the question, suspecting she wasn’t going to like the answer.
Ruby shot another brief look at Jack before studying her hands intently, twisting her ring again. ‘She told me he wanted sex.’
‘What?’ Jack’s tone was thunderously low.
‘She said no of course. Steph wasn’t like that. But this man, he told her if she didn’t go along with it, he would expose her, that he would leak their conversations to her dad and the headmistress at her school, that everyone would know she had tried to cheat.’ Ruby let out a shaky sigh. ‘That’s why she got in touch with me. She was in a panic and didn’t know what to do.’
‘Who was it?’
Ruby looked at Jack, her eyes widening even further. ‘I… I don’t know.’
‘She never gave you a name? She didn’t tell you anything about him or who he was?’
‘No.’
‘Fuck!’ Jack got up without warning, skulked away from the table and into the car park. Cooper was on his feet staring after him and tried to pull on his lead, whining when he realised he couldn’t follow.
Lila couldn’t begin to imagine what it was all doing to Jack. She wasn’t sure what she had expected Ruby to say, but it certainly wasn’t this.
Matthew was watching him warily, while Ruby continued to twist her ring, looking as if she would rather be anywhere but there.
‘What happened next?’ Lila tried her best to keep her tone soft, patient, knowing she had to get the rest of the details out of the girl before she bolted. ‘Can you tell me?’
Ruby watched Jack pacing for a moment then refocussed on Lila. ‘We only spoke one more time after that. It was the night before she died. I had told her to go to her dad, admit the truth, but she said the situation was in hand, that she knew what she was doing.’
‘Do you know what she meant by that?’
‘I don’t. I suspect, but she never actually confirmed it.’ Ruby lowered her voice to a whisper. ‘I think she was planning on going through with it.’
20
Jack barely spoke on the drive home. Lila attempted to talk to him a couple of times before giving up, knowing that he was trying to process what he had learnt. She remembered he had told her that Stephanie had contacted him before she died, that she had wanted to come and stay, but he had been out of town, and Lila knew Jack well enough to know that it would be eating him up, wondering if it would have made a difference if he had been home, that it would be killing him that he hadn’t been able to protect his baby sister.
Lila didn’t tell him the last thing that Ruby had said; that she suspected Stephanie had planned to have sex with her blackmailer, fearing it would push Jack over the edge.
If they had an identity for this man it would be different and Lila would happily accompany Jack and cheer him on while he beat the shit out of the lowlife piece of scum. Without a target for his fists though, the rage would be building up inside of him. She couldn’t add to that, especially when Ruby was speculating and didn’t know for sure.
They had not long crossed the Norfolk border when Jack pulled off the road into a pub car park.
‘It’s getting late,’ he told Lila when she looked at him. ‘We haven’t eaten.’
He was right, they hadn’t, and her belly was grumbling. ‘Cooper?’
Jack switched off the ignition. ‘It’s dog friendly.’
She tried to keep pace as she stumbled after him across the car park, dog in tow. The evening was still light, the sky a pretty colour of oranges and yellows as the sun started to set, and it was still warm out. Through a slatted fence, she could see the beer garden was full. She followed Jack into the pub as he grabbed a couple of menus, headed for a corner table, and they perused in silence for a couple of minutes, while Cooper settled himself down on the floor, before a waitress came over, took their orders. Although hungry, Lila wasn’t sure how much food she could stomach. She opted for a chicken, bacon and avocado salad, while Jack went for a burger, and ordered a bowl of sausages from the “doggy section” for Cooper.
‘Are we going to talk about what Ruby said?’ she asked quietly, as the waitress left.
‘I’m not sure what you want me to say?’ Jack huffed out a sigh that sounded both exasperated and defeated.
‘It’s a lot to take in, I get that, I really do. We have to find him though.’
‘And how do you propose we do that?’ He arched a brow. ‘Ruby couldn’t even give us his name.’
‘We’ll figure it out.’
‘Ever the optimist.’ His words were laced with sarcasm.
Lila chose to ignore the comment, knew he was lashing out.
They ate mostly in silence, the limited conversation between them banal, neither of them mentioning Ruby again.
As they returned to the car, the sick feeling resumed as Lila realised she would soon have to conquer her demons and go back to her flat alone.
Jack wouldn’t stay with her that night. She had felt him withdrawing ever since Ruby’s revelation, knew it was understandable, but hating that it hurt all the same.
It was getting dark as he pulled onto the road and Lila let her tired eyes drop shut, aware this could be the last chance of sleep she had that night.
When she reopened them they were on a narrow country lane and she had no idea where she was.
She blinked and refocussed, spotting a sign ahead for Burnham Market, realised they were heading in the wrong direction.
‘Where are you going? You’ve missed the turn off for Norwich.’
Jack was quiet for a moment. ‘We’re not going back to Norwich.’
Lila was now wide awake. ‘What do you mean we’re not going back?’
Silence.
‘Jack?’
He looked at her then, face immersed in shadows. ‘We’re going to my place. I’m tired and I really can’t be arsed with all the driving. You can stay with me tonight.’
‘You’re telling me this now?’
‘I am. You have a problem with that?’
Yes she had a problem with it. He couldn’t spring it on her without any warning. She had no overnight bag and couldn’t remember if she’d left Clyde locked in her flat. She was sure he had been snoozing in her bedroom when they left.
‘Yes. For starters I have nothing with me.’
‘You can cope for tonight. I managed last night.’
The gibe hit its target, reminding her that he had dropped everything to stay with her.
‘And I think Clyde, my landlady’s cat, might be locked in my flat.’
‘So why don’t you text Primrose? She’ll have a key to your place. S
he can nip downstairs and get him.’
‘Primrose?’ Lila’s jaw gaped. She had never mentioned the name to him. ‘How do you know my landlady, Jack?’
There was another moment of silence. ‘We talked this morning.’
‘About?’
‘I told her about your break-in. Recommended getting some security for the house.’
‘You did what?’
Jack shot her a cool look. ‘She actually agreed with me. The second I told her what had happened, she wanted to step up the security, install an alarm system. I might have recommended someone.’
Lila wanted to be angry with him for going to Primrose behind her back, though a nagging voice reminded her he had done it with the best of intentions. And it seemed he had an answer for all of her excuses, which when peeled away, left the real reason why she was in a panic about going to his house.
She was going to have to meet Tiff. The thought filled Lila with nearly as much fear as going home to her flat and trying to spend the night there alone.
‘You had no right to go to Primrose behind my back,’ Lila grumbled, aware how ungrateful she must sound after everything Jack had done for her, but wishing to hell he wasn’t putting her in this uncomfortable position.
When he ignored her and continued driving, his jaw stubbornly set, making her realise that he wasn’t going to change his mind, she knew she was going to have to come clean about why she really didn’t want to go back with him.
She tried to find a diplomatic way to broach the subject, decided there wasn’t one.
‘How’s your girlfriend going to feel about this? Is she really going to welcome having me in the house?’
Lila waited for a reaction, her face on fire. Tiffany had been a strictly taboo subject since Friday night. Jack didn’t answer her, but she noticed a muscle clench in his cheek.
‘I’m not comfortable with this, Jack,’ Lila pressed. ‘I don’t want to meet her.’
There, she had been brutally honest with him, bared her soul and lost a little bit of her dignity in the process. Hopefully though he would understand why she had such an issue about going home with him.
