by Beevis, Keri
He saw her bottom lip wobble.
‘He is a twat,’ she agreed.
‘A slimy lowlife twat,’ Jack cupped her chin in his hand, looked into her eyes, knew her resolve was weakening. ‘Come home with me, Lila. Cooper’s in the car and he’s going to be devastated if you don’t come back with us; he’s already bonded with you, is used to having you around.’
‘You’re trying to blackmail me with a dog?’
‘Is it working?’
The corner of her mouth twitched. ‘Maybe.’
27
Jack updated her on his visit to the family home on the ride back to Burnham, telling her about the boxes hidden in Stephanie’s wardrobe and that he had taken her tablet.
Lila knew he felt guilty about taking it, tried to reassure him he had done it for the right reasons, knew as well as he did that if Stephanie had left any clues they would likely find them there.
The whole Giles incident still rankled her and although she knew Jack wasn’t to blame, she couldn’t help but sulk a little over it. She had been shocked when it had first happened, but as the afternoon wore on she was plain pissed off.
Still she was thinking clearly enough when Jack revealed his intention to drop her and Cooper off at the house then head straight over to Aylsham, knew he was currently too hot-headed to act rationally in a confrontation. She managed to talk him down – actually threatened him that she would go back to her flat if he left the house – persuading him that Giles could wait. Jack wasn’t happy about it, though seemed more worried she might actually act on her threat if he left her alone, so he reluctantly agreed to stay put.
While she had stopped him from leaving the house, Lila couldn’t prevent him using his phone and within five minutes of arriving back at the house, after being unable to get hold of Giles, he had called Alyssa, taking all of his rage out on her.
Lila tried to keep her head down, letting Cooper out of the French doors, staying in the kitchen to make a cup of tea, wincing a little at the side of the conversation she could hear. Jack was furious and his poor sister was getting it both barrels. In fairness to Alyssa, she sounded like she was holding her own, seemed as fiery as her older brother, and the conversation ended with Jack hanging up on her, throwing his phone on the sofa in frustration.
Mad as she was at Giles, Lila hated that she was coming between them. She reminded herself that it wasn’t her fault and it was Giles who had caused this, but still she felt guilty.
‘Do you feel better for that?’ she asked, making her way through from the kitchen.
Jack shot a glance in her direction. ‘No.’
‘I didn’t think so.’
She watched him pace for a moment before he picked up Stephanie’s tablet. He dropped onto the sofa, spent a few frustrated minutes trying to work out the passcode.
‘Date of birth?’
‘Tried it.’
‘Pin number?’
‘Only she would have known it.’
‘Another memorable date?’
‘None I can think of. And before you ask I’ve tried all the obvious one, two, three, four bullshit.’
‘I didn’t,’ Lila bristled.
He glanced up at her again, looking contrite. ‘Sorry.’
Putting the tablet down, he got up. ‘I’m gonna take Cooper out, work off some energy since you won’t let me go beat the shit out of my sister’s slimeball boyfriend.’ The last few words were said with a part smirk, telling her his anger was ebbing. He paused beside her and hooked his hand around her waist, giving her a quick kiss on the lips. ‘Thank you.’
‘For what?’
‘For coming back here with me and for stopping me going over there tonight.’
Lila smiled tightly. Although she was still riled by what had happened, under the annoyance, guilt bubbled. Giles was right that she did have a history, one she was embarrassed of and had worked hard to keep buried. She hated that the odious man was forcing it to the surface. Jack may say he didn’t care about her past, but still she was ashamed in keeping it from him.
‘Go take Cooper out,’ she told him lightly. ‘We’ll talk when you get back.’
While they were gone, she settled down onto the sofa and read her Kindle for a while. Finding it difficult to concentrate, the day’s events still weighing heavily, she switched off her book after a couple of chapters, logged into Facebook, glancing through her newsfeed, liking a handful of posts then clicking on to her photography page. There were a number of new notifications, most of them likes for the various archive sunset pictures she had been trying to share daily. She had three new private messages. One was from a man enquiring where he could purchase her work; the other two were wedding enquiries.
She replied to the first, telling the man who was interested in her photography he could either purchase from one of the bespoke shops that stocked her work or she could sort something for him directly, before replying to the two wedding e-mails, one directly from a bride, and the other from a mother of the bride. Lila already had a handful of weddings in the diary for the following year, but she desperately needed more work. The accident had set her back and she’d had to tighten her purse strings to make allowances, which scared the hell out of her. Natalie had tried to help her out with sick pay, but there was a limit to how much she could do.
She had responses back almost immediately from the man wanting to buy her work, asking if he could deal with her directly, while the mother of the bride wanted to know about dates. Replying to the man first, Lila asked him if there was a specific picture he was interested in, before confirming to the mother of the bride she was free on the date the woman was looking for. She was logging off her iPad when Jack and Cooper returned.
She looked up, couldn’t resist a smile as Cooper circled Jack, entranced by the ball in his hand. Jack put it to one side, bent down to rub the dog behind the ears, equally engrossed in Cooper as he spoke to him, fed him a few treats he’d stashed away in the pocket of his jeans, and Lila’s heart flipped. He really did love his dog.
‘You two have fun out there? I’m beginning to feel like three’s a crowd.’
Jack grinned. ‘We had a good talk. Coop helped work me down.’
Lila nodded. ‘That’s good.’ She turned back to her iPad, saw she had another message from Veronica Crowther, the mother of the bride, and rolled her eyes. ‘Christ, lady, you’re keen.’ It was the fourth message she’d had in fifteen minutes and she really wasn’t in the mood.
‘Everything okay?’
‘Yes, I have a potential wedding booking and the mother of the bride keeps messaging me.’ Lila read the message asking to meet. It wasn’t an unusual request. Photography was a big part of the day and most brides wanted to meet beforehand to discuss details of the pre-wedding shoot that usually took place a month or two before the wedding. She wrote a message back as Jack sat down beside her, slipping his arm around her and pulling her close as he leant in to nibble on her neck. Distracted, she told Veronica she would check her diary and be in touch. ‘I’m always a little wary when the mother is running the show. They can be control freaks. Not my favourite kind of job.’
‘So turn it down,’ Jack murmured against her ear.
It was so easy for him; he never had to worry about money, about paying the bills. It must be nice to be able to pick and choose, not worry about having to pay the rent, or in his case, mortgage. Though did he even have one of those?
She pushed him away, annoyed. ‘Beggars can’t be choosers, Jack. Some of us are reliant on work and we have to take whatever jobs we can get.’
‘Whoa, hold up. You know I wasn’t trying to belittle what you do,’ he told her as she set her iPad down. ‘Things aren’t as easy for you, I get that, and I know you don’t have as many choices. I’m sorry.’
She drew in a breath, aware she had overreacted, knew it was because she was dreading what came next. ‘No, I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to throw that in your face.’
She was tired, irrita
ble and a little cranky because she had been looking forward to hot sex, and Giles Buchanan with his little piggy eyes and self-righteous attitude had ruined that.
‘Jack, I know you said you don’t want to know what happened before, but–’
‘I already told you I don’t give a shit about your past.’
‘But I do. I didn’t want to have this conversation, but now I realise it’s necessary. I’ll be blunt; you’re loaded, I’m broke. Hell, I’m so broke sometimes I have baked beans on toast for dinner.’
‘That’s a nutritious meal.’
Lila scowled, warning him she wasn’t in the mood for jokes. ‘Not if you’re eating it every night of the week. Okay, how about your bank account? Do you ever dread looking at it? I’ll bet you never even give it a second thought. I do, I’m scared to look at it every single day. Most of my clothes are second-hand, the only reason I have an iPad is because my brother was kind enough to give me his old one when he upgraded, I only buy wine when it’s on offer, can’t remember the last time I went on holiday, and every taxi ride, every meal out, every unexpected expense I have to budget for, I have to consider if it’s really necessary. Hell, I saved for over a year before I could buy my last camera.’
‘What’s your point, Lila? You want me to feel guilty because I have money and you don’t?’
‘No, of course not.’ She was getting flustered, wanting him to understand where she was coming from. ‘My point is I want to make you realise how different we are.’ Her voice cracked. ‘I’m no Tiffany, Jack.’
‘I don’t want Tiffany. Why the hell do you think I ended the relationship?’
That had Lila pausing. For some reason in her head, she had seen Tiffany as the one who had finished things. ‘You did that because of me?’ Lila whispered.
When he gave the slightest of nods, his eyes not leaving her face, her heart surged and she had to force herself to regroup and press on.
‘You paid for the alarm and I let that slide because I knew I couldn’t afford it and if you didn’t pay for it, Primrose would have to. You can’t do that though. I know it’s just money to you, but it’s a huge bloody deal to me.’
‘I need to know you’re safe. Trust me, Lila, I did it for me, not for you.’ His tone was a little heated and again she paused for thought.
‘Okay, so here’s the thing. You need to know this because it’s important. I was declared bankrupt five years ago.’ When he arched a brow, stared at her, she continued. ‘I had a business, I had a boyfriend, Charlie, and things went horribly wrong.’
‘I know.’
‘What?’ Incredulous, her jaw dropped.
‘Giles already told me. I told him to go to hell.’
‘You knew?’ Lila wasn’t sure if she wanted to punch Jack or kiss him.
‘You were bankrupt, your partner – I admit I didn’t realise he was your boyfriend – ended up in jail for money laundering.’
‘And you didn’t think it was relevant to tell me you knew this?’
‘No, because it wasn’t.’
Everything was so straightforward to him. ‘Why does this not matter to you? How do you know you can trust me, that I wasn’t involved?’
‘Were you?’
‘Of course not!’
‘So, it’s irrelevant.’
‘I might not have been involved, Jack, but I was gullible enough to trust him with my finances. I was starting out with my photography business when we began dating and I was doing okay, building up a reputation, particularly in the wedding market. I was never very good at dealing with the money side of things, couldn’t afford to pay an accountant. Charlie, he had some finance background, offered to take care of things for me. We had gotten serious and it was easy to let him take charge of that side while I concentrated on taking pictures. I trusted him. I didn’t know he was using my account to fund his little business on the side for his friends. They needed someone to stash their drug money and Charlie was more than happy to oblige for a fee. It was nearly two years before the police sussed out what was going on then another year of hell as Charlie tried to drag me down with him. They went through every one of my transactions, froze my accounts, trying to figure out if I had been in on it or if I had just been that stupid. Luckily for me they decided on the latter, but I lost everything. I had no money and had to declare myself bankrupt. I lost my business, my reputation, and of course I realised I had been duped, that Charlie had just used me for a means to an end. So yes, I may not have been guilty, but I sure as hell had mug written on my forehead.’
‘And that’s why you stopped dating.’
Lila gave a hollow laugh. ‘It’s true what they say, once bitten and all that. I wised up after Charlie went to jail, gradually got my life together and now I keep my circle close. I’ve learnt it pays to be shrewd. So, although Giles is a slimy piece of work and I quite like the idea of you punching him in the face, you can understand why he doesn’t trust me, might doubt my motives. Hell, if I were him, I know I would.’
‘Don’t make excuses for Giles, Lila. You weren’t guilty. You were the victim and the police cleared you of any wrongdoing.’
‘Maybe, but when you’ve been under suspicion, investigated, even after you are cleared, the stigma is still there. People wonder if deep down they can really trust you, whether perhaps the police got it wrong and you are guilty.’
‘I don’t think that and let’s be honest, mine is the only opinion that counts.’
‘Is that so?’ He was teasing her and despite herself, she smiled. She had been dreading this conversation, knew it had to happen and couldn’t believe how little a deal it was to him.
Beside her, she heard Cooper whine. While Lila had been getting serious with Jack, the spaniel had managed to work his ball off the worktop, sat with it in his mouth, tail thumping, as he urged her to throw it for him.
‘How did you get that?’
Tail thumping harder, Cooper dropped the ball, seemed as if he couldn’t decide whether he should be pleased with himself or worried.
‘Coop, you’re too smart for your own good.’ Jack got up from the sofa, picked up the slimy ball and with the dog following went over to the French doors, throwing the ball out onto the decking. Without a moment of hesitation, Cooper charged after it. ‘So if you’ve finished showing me your skeletons, I have something I want to show you.’
‘You do?’
He pulled his phone from his pocket, dropped down on the sofa beside her again. ‘I took pictures of the boxes I found in the back of Steph’s wardrobe.’
He handed over the phone and Lila studied the images. ‘Those are expensive gifts.’
‘I know. Steph had a boyfriend, but it was a while back and he wouldn’t have been able to afford this.’ Jack reached in his pocket again, pulled out a card. ‘This was in the box with the earrings. There were messages in all the boxes that just said “Our secret xxx”.’
‘Our secret,’ Lila repeated, reading the words aloud, feeling a little sick. ‘Jack, I know you don’t want to hear this, but the gifts, the fact it was a secret, it suggests she was having an–’
‘Affair. I know.’
‘Do you think that’s why she was in Filby that night?’
‘I honestly don’t know at this point. If you had asked me that question a week ago, I would have said no. Now though, I’m not sure of anything.’
It had to be so hard for him, finding out that Stephanie had kept secrets. Lila scooted in closer, leaning against his shoulder as she studied the pictures again.
‘These gifts look unused,’ she pointed out.
‘They are. That’s the one thing that’s keeping me sane. If they were wanted gifts they would be used.’
‘Agreed.’
‘She never even opened the perfume to smell it.’
Lila tilted her head to look up at him. ‘Do you think The Bishop sent them?’
‘I considered that.’ Jack frowned. ‘He was blackmailing her though. Why would he send her gifts? Besi
des, the first card referred to Christmas. She didn’t contact The Bishop until much later. She had never struggled at school before. Something happened at Christmas that made her lose focus and these gifts were part of it. I just wish we could figure out how to get into her tablet.’
‘Dave!’ Lila exclaimed, sitting up straight.
‘The passcode is four numbers, not four letters.’
‘No, you idiot, I mean Dave can help us.’
‘Who’s Dave?’
‘He’s a mate of Elliot’s, my brother, and a really lovely bloke. If anyone can help us, he can.’
‘Should I be jealous?’
‘He has a mullet and goes to Star Trek conventions and battle re-enactments. Do you think you should be jealous?’
Jack grinned. ‘Depends if that’s your thing.’
‘Seriously, Dave is a top bloke. He managed to recover the information on my sim card after the accident.’
‘And you think he could get us into Steph’s tablet?’
‘It’s worth asking. He’s been on holiday with Elliot, but they’re due back late tomorrow.’
‘Okay, we’ll speak to him.’
Jack put his phone down, pulled her close again, and she rested her head against his chest, finding the warmth of his body and the steady beat of his heart comforting as his fingertips traced a pattern on her bare arm.
They sat like that for a few minutes, neither of them talking, Lila’s mind still working overtime trying to figure out the puzzles of Stephanie’s life.
Jessica had told them she didn’t think The Bishop was part of Queen’s House School, that he had helped pupils at a school in Cambridge too. Was there a connection between the two places? She thought back to the meeting with Mrs Crawford. She had mentioned they were an elite group of schools, not school.
