Every Move You Make

by Deborah Bee

  ‘She did. Not about a locket, though. There’s no sign of a case, by the way, so we don’t really believe any of that.’

  ‘She said that underneath everything, in the case, was this old tin box, and it had an American passport in it, in a different name, not his, she couldn’t remember what, and other stuff, like the cutting from the paper, from when she handed the cheque thing over to the cancer charity, and she didn’t know he had that either, and this gold locket, wrapped up in cotton wool, and she took it, and she hid it in the hem of her dressing gown, sewed it in.’

  ‘How come she’s kept that to herself? Something as important as that?’

  ‘Well, A, she doesn’t trust you, and B, she didn’t realise there was an inscription. I would have thought she would have told you that today.’

  ‘She didn’t string two words together today.’

  ‘Because she was scared, that’s why.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Sal. Emotional manipulation. Classic.’

  ‘I’ve seen it.’

  ‘You’ve seen the locket?’

  ‘Yes, I’ve seen it. It’s gold. Dunno if it’s real gold, and it’s a proper locket on a chain. I found the engraved bit.’

  ‘If that’s true, why hasn’t anybody told us?’

  ‘I haven’t even spoken to you, not until now. And I only found out about it last night so stop giving me a hard time.’

  ‘The inscription. It said his name. It’s Gareth Marlon, born 1981.’

  ‘And you didn’t mention it at the beginning of this phone call because . . .?’

  ‘I’m telling you now.’

  ‘Goodbye.’

  ‘Goodbye. Call me back . . .’

  ‘Goodbye.’

  CLICK

  *

  I’ve just sat down by the back window when my phone vibrates again.

  ‘Have you found him?’ I whisper. ‘Admit it, I’m a genius.’

  ‘What?’ says a man’s voice.

  ‘Who’s this?’ I say, knowing it’s not Terry, that’s for sure; he doesn’t sound anything like this.

  ‘Sally, I need my money back,’ says the voice. ‘Meet me out the front.’

  ‘What the fuck, Barney, are you kidding me?’ I say. ‘It’s the middle of the night. Where’d you get my number from?’

  ‘Meet me out front. I’m desperate!’ He’s starting to shout, and his voice is echoing around my sitting room.

  ‘No, Barn. I can’t. It’s too dangerous. I’ll get caught,’ I hiss. ‘You do realise, if I get caught giving you money it’ll look like something else. Besides, I can’t get out, you’ve seen the security here,’ I say, and jab the phone off.

  Soon as I put the phone on the table it starts vibrating again. I switch it to silent, pick up my mug and go to the window. I can see Barney’s coat huddled into the bush of a house opposite.

  The phone lights up again; I see Sue’s name flash across the screen.

  ‘Marlon?’ she goes. ‘Who calls their kid Marlon?’

  ‘Marlon Brando’s mum?’

  ‘Apart from Marlon Brando’s mum.’

  CLICK

  It’s past 2 a.m.

  I’d forgotten about Barney for a second. You see, the trouble with people like Barney, well junkies, really, is that they lie. And because they’ve fried their brains they forget what they’ve lied about. They are so busy not telling you something that they tell you it.

  So if you had lost your dog, say, and there was this junkie who had stolen your dog, sold it and used the money to buy a wrap – not a chicken and mayo wrap like you get from Marks, you understand, but a wrap of drugs, that sort of wrap – and you didn’t know he had stolen your dog, and you went over to him to ask him if he’d maybe seen your dog? Before you’d even said anything, even opened your mouth, he’d say to you, ‘I promise I didn’t steal your dog.’ And if they were really off their heads, they’d say to you, ‘I promise I didn’t steal your dog, sell your dog then use the money to buy a wrap.’

  My phone buzzes. Sue.

  ‘What now?’ I say.

  ‘There was a Gareth Marlon Sullivan born in Delaware in 1981,’ she says.

  ‘Great!’

  ‘But he disappeared in 2009. Believed to be dead. I’ve left a message with Pennsylvania State Police department.’

  ‘Right,’ I say.

  ‘Another dead end,’ she says.

  ‘You could wait until the Pennsylvania State Police department call back.’

  ‘Sal. You’re going to have to come to terms with some things.’

  ‘Oh, get off yer stage, Sue,’ I say.

  ‘You don’t need to feel embarrassed. Psychopaths are very accomplished at gaining people’s trust.’

  ‘Psychopaths don’t become so emotional that they pass out.’

  ‘No, but they can hold their breath, Sal, long enough to look like they’re passing out.’

  ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’

  ‘Sal, you sound ridiculous, defending her when she’s obviously guilty as fuck.’

  I don’t say anything.

  ‘I’m not embarrassed,’ I say.

  ‘No,’ she says.

  ‘I’m not ridiculous either,’ I say.

  ‘No,’ she says.

  ‘I’m sorry, Sal,’ she says. ‘I’m going to bed.’

  CLICK

  The phone lights up again, immediately.

  ‘I thought you’d gone to bed,’ I say

  ‘What was it you wanted to tell me about Terry?’

  ‘What if he knows where I live?’

  ‘What makes you think he might?’

  ‘Nothing . . . It was something Kitty said.’

  ‘Well, I wouldn’t worry about her. She’s not right in the head.’

  ‘It’s just that . . .’

  ‘Now listen. Chapman told me Barney was outside the refuge the other day, when she dropped you off.’

  ‘I’m worried, Sue.’

  ‘Okay, well, if you’re worried, I’m worried. You can’t trust junkies. Stay away from the windows. We’ll get some extra security down there.’

  ‘I—’

  ‘Talk to you in the morning,’ she says as the call clicks off.

  Forty-Eight

  DS Clarke

  Despite not having slept, Detective Sergeant DS Clarke gets into work early.

  PC Chapman is already sitting at her desk, predicting a shit storm.

  ‘Chapman!’ snaps DS Clarke. ‘Meeting, now, bring your coffee. Number one, check how PC Hall is getting on outside the refuge. I sent him up there last night. Sal got spooked.’ She hangs her coat on the back of her office door, closing it behind her.

  PC Chapman starts stabbing numbers into her phone.

  ‘Not yet!’ says DS Clarke. ‘Number two, get Emma Tudor down here. I need to go over what happened with Clare yesterday. We need to decide if we’ve got enough to section her.’

  PC Chapman nods and writes it down. Not the day to argue.

  ‘She could be lying through her teeth,’ says DS Clarke.

  ‘You think?’

  ‘You don’t?’

  ‘No, actually, I don’t.’

  ‘If you’re so sure she’s innocent, find some fucking evidence to support her,’ says DS Clarke, flipping open her laptop. ‘Go,’ she snaps again.

  ‘What are you not telling me about, Sal?’

  ‘I’m not not telling you anything,’ she shouts back through the door.

  *

  DS Clarke scans through her emails. Nothing from the Pennsylvania State Police department.

  PC Chapman pokes her head back around the door.

  ‘That was quick!’ says DS Clarke, without looking up.

  ‘I haven’t spoken to her yet, but I just got this off Joanna,’ says PC Chapman.

  ‘What is it?’ says DS Clarke, looking up.

  ‘It’s an incident log from Transport for London, for Clare’s car. Taken in January this year.’

  ‘And? Read it to me.’
/>
  ‘Mr Kalid Abbasi, Parking Officer, made a complaint, about a Lexus IS, registration blah, blah, blah. In Clare’s name. Insured only for Clare.’

  ‘What’s the complaint?’

  ‘Enforcement Officer Notes.

  ‘Lexus IS registration WR14 JGD

  ‘At approximately 14.05, I was attempting to issue a penalty charge notice (PCN) to the above vehicle parked illegally in a residential permit area on Wimpole Mews, W1. There was a female seated in the front passenger seat of the car, but no driver was present in the vehicle, so I went ahead and issued the PCN, placing it under the wiper blades on the driver’s side.

  ‘At approximately 14.08 an unidentified male came up behind me as I was issuing a ticket for a car further up the road, and attacked me by kicking me in the thigh. He called me a “Paki bastard”. He had what I believe to be an American or Canadian accent.

  ‘I asked the male attacker to “back off”, which he did. The attacker was very angry. When the attacker opened the driver door to the car, I then asked him to give me his full name in order to process an official report. He slammed the door of the car and walked towards me in a threatening manner, telling me to “Fuck off home to Paki land.” I believed he was going to kick me again so told him again to “back off”.

  ‘The attacker then opened the passenger door of his car, shouted at the woman to move over, pushed her, and sat in the passenger seat himself. The woman was young, possibly twenty. She switched on the engine and manoeuvred out of the space, with great caution. I then saw the male punch her in the side of the head. She braked hard, so the car lurched. Then the engine revved. I ran towards the car shouting “Get off her” but as I came alongside the car she drove off at speed. As she reached the turning into New Cavendish Street, I saw the attacker strike her on the left side of her head again, and her head banged against the driver’s window.’

  DS Clarke stares at PC Chapman

  ‘Well, you’d better follow up with Mr Abussi.’

  ‘Abbasi.’

  ‘Yes, him.’

  ‘Oh, hang on, hang on.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘‘Supporting Evidence: the officer’s bodycam shows a male attempting to kick the officer but not actually making physical contact. Hence the offence was not followed up. The footage was archived.’

  ‘Put Walker on it. We may actually have something.’

  ‘Sarge.’

  ‘This could finally make her story stand up. Chapman, call Walker. Oh, and call Mrs Henry. Make sure they’re on alert.’ DS Clarke calls after her.

  Forty-Nine

  Clare

  There’s the clank of bottles and a rustling of bags, then a sigh, before someone bounces onto my bed.

  ‘You look like shit, but I need to find some good angles for my pictures.’

  Kitty is in my room, AGAIN.

  ‘How did you get in? Have you actually got another key?’

  ‘You left my old one on the side the other day. I took it for safekeeping.’ Like she’s done me a favour. ‘I’ve got you orange juice. And coffee.’

  ‘What time is it?’ I say, beginning to remember all the shit from yesterday. DS Clarke treating me like I’m the nut job. Feeling like a nut job.

  ‘Seven,’ she says. ‘Ish.’

  ‘What’s ish mean?’

  ‘Six.’

  ‘Why’d you get up so early?’ I say.

  ‘S’not that early. McDonald’s opens at five. I think this angle is nice,’ she says, taking a picture of me, with a pillow half over my face.

  ‘Don’t take photos of me, Kitty.’

  ‘Why not?’ she says. The phone is clicking, over and over.

  ‘Because I say so.’

  ‘Because why?’ she says.

  ‘I don’t need a reason,’ I say, lashing out and whipping the phone out of her hand.

  ‘And that’s what I mean,’ she says. ‘Highly aggressive assault.’

  I’ve had enough of her.

  ‘If I was going to assault you, Kitty,’ I say, kicking her off the bed, and landing on the floor next to her. Her head hits the skirting board and I put my hand around her neck.

  ‘If I was going to assault you, Kitty,’ I say again, ‘highly aggressively. You’d be fucking dead, kid.’ And I squeeze her throat between my fingers.

  ‘Clare!’ shouts Sally from the door.

  ‘She’s a fucking headcase,’ I shout back, and jump back in bed.

  ‘Psycho, I just want some pics,’ Kitty whispers. She’s staring in the mirror. Rubbing her neck. Looking at the red marks carefully, one by one, like they’re trophies.

  ‘Sally will do them, won’t you, Sally?’ I say.

  ‘How’re you feeling, Clare?’ says Sally.

  ‘Like shit.’

  ‘They sedated you. You’ll feel like shit for a while,’ she says.

  ‘Clare, if you’d just take some pictures, I’ll go,’ Kitty says, picking herself up. ‘She was only play-fighting.’ She grins at Sally. A fake grin.

  ‘Yeah, I was only play-fighting,’ I say, rolling my eyes at Sally, thinking I do actually want to kill her . . .

  ‘Careful, Clare,’ Sally says, like she’s thinking something.

  Then she turns to Kitty.

  ‘That’s not what you’ll tell Mrs H, though, is it? In about, what, seven minutes . . .?’ says Sally, looking at an imaginary watch on her wrist and turning on her heel. ‘Try and shut up. Both of you. Some of us are trying to sleep. I haven’t had a wink all night.’

  She wraps a cardigan around her shoulders and peers out of the window to the street below. Then she checks her phone and disappears back into her own room.

  ‘Jesus Christ, Kitty,’ I say. ‘OK. Stand in front of the wall. Then go away.’

  If she’d just fuck off with her stupid pictures, I could go back to bed. I’ve got the headache from hell. I’ve got a policewoman trying to stitch me up. I’ve got so much shit . . .

  She stands where she’d stood before, next to the bed. The light is clean and bright.

  This time her face is bare – she does look better without makeup, but she looks about twelve.

  ‘He says I look better with no makeup,’ she says.

  ‘He’s right,’ I say.

  Click.

  ‘Like a blank canvas waiting for someone to turn me into a masterpiece,’ she says, checking her pout in my mirror.

  Click.

  ‘Said I’d be open to interpretation without makeup. Mario likes to see the real girl,’ she says.

  Click.

  ‘Which agency?’ I say, thinking it all sounds like the usual fashion bullshit.

  ‘Storm,’ she says. ‘He asked me if I have a passport. If I like to travel. If I’m happy travelling. I said I do, and I am. It’s easy to get a passport, right? I mean, like, I can get one tomorrow. He says he can get me out to Milan, tomorrow. Says he has this friend who owes him a favour, and he’ll help me because I’m really special. He said that. That I’m really special. Asked me if I speak Italian. I said I do.’

  ‘Do you?’

  ‘Of course. I have a friend who’s Italian.’

  ‘But do you speak it?’ I say, flicking a piece of blonde hair out of her face.

  ‘Not fluently, but nearly fluently. I mean, it can’t be that hard. Stefano is one of the stupidest friends I’ve got. What’s that on your chest?’ she says, changing the subject.

  ‘It’s just a scratch,’ I say, covering it with my T-shirt.

  ‘Is that one of the burns?’ she says.

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say, conscious of the fact that my lower legs are uncovered.

  ‘What about that bruise?’ she says. ‘How did you do that again?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ I say, ‘just clumsy, I guess.’

  ‘Haven’t you gone yet?’ says Sally, coming out of the bathroom.

  ‘Everyone here says you did all that to yourself,’ says Kitty.

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, wondering who everyone is
, in Kitty world.

  ‘Yeah, like you deliberately burned yourself just to get in here.’

  ‘Right,’ I say.

  ‘And that you killed your husband.’

  Sally pushes open the bedroom door.

  ‘I heard that you fucked half of Manchester then cried rape!’ says Sally. ‘So why don’t you fuck off.’

  Nice one, Sally.

  ‘Hey, Kitty, let me ask you one thing,’ I say, as she’s trying to pick up all her stuff with Sally pushing her out the door. ‘When you go and get your McDonald’s in the morning, do you get a sausage and egg McMuffin and then plant the wrapper in the bin and say it’s Sarah’s?’

  ‘Yeah,’ she says. ‘So?’ she says.

  ‘So that whole story about Sarah getting McDonald’s every morning was just you making it up.’

  ‘So?’ she says again. ‘She’s fat, ain’t she? Must be shoving something down her throat.’

  ‘You’re weird,’ I shout as she leaves.

  From behind the front door of the flat, I hear her shout, ‘Yeah, but I didn’t kill my husband then set myself on fucking fire, did I?’

  Sally’s bedroom door slams. I wonder if she’s cross with me because Kitty woke her up.

  I try to go back to sleep but all I can think about is all the things I’d wished I’d said to Susan.

  Like how she was underestimating Gareth.

  Psychos are clever.

  They’ve entirely deluded themselves – makes it easier to delude everyone else.

  *

  It’s well after lunch when I surface again.

  The sedative is wearing off.

  Sally is in the bathroom.

  I would have had a shower but I can wait.

  ‘You want a pizza?’ I shout through the door.

  ‘Thank God you didn’t suggest Pot Noodles,’ she says. ‘And how about we get a couple of salads as well, or we could go down to Marks.’

  ‘What about Gareth?’ I say.

  ‘Or Terry?’ she says.

  She thinks I’m only thinking of myself. ‘Sorry, Sally. I didn’t mean to be selfish,’ I say. ‘It was all so shit yesterday. I don’t even know what happened . . .’

  ‘I’m starving,’ she says. ‘Let’s get a pizza and a tomato salad and a spinach salad.’

  ‘And some dough balls,’ I say, ‘with garlic butter.’

  *

  We sit at the back of the dining room because it’s sunny.