Dirty Secrets

by JANICE FROST

  “But won’t that make it seem like you were involved too?”

  “Not if you tell them otherwise. Come on, Ruthie. It’s no big deal. Dana was into drugs, that’s no lie. She agreed to hide the stuff in her room for cash and a share of the coke.”

  Ruth considered this. It seemed like an ill-conceived plan to her. And she didn’t want any part in sullying Dana’s reputation. But Hector had power over her. “Alright, I’ll do it. On one condition. You don’t involve Fin.”

  “Can’t think what you see in that nerdy intellectual, Ruthie. No, Fin has to be involved. Like I said, he can tell the police he recognised the signs in Dana because he used to deal himself. It will give a flavour of authenticity to the story.”

  Ruth pondered what to do.

  “You can do this little favour for me, Ruthie.” Hector leaned back in his chair. “Alternatively, I can have a little chat with—”

  “Shut up!” Ruth’s eyes darted around the empty room. As if in a dream, she found herself complying with Hector’s request.

  * * *

  Ava put her head around the door to Neal’s office. “Ruth Marsh just called to say she has some information about Dana Schell that might be useful. She’s on her way now. Okay to put her in interview room one?”

  Neal merely nodded. Then he smiled.

  “Shall I take PJ?” Was he even listening? Another nod. And, miraculously, another smile. He seemed almost happy. Was it Myrna’s influence? Ava wondered, surprised at how much this mattered to her.

  “Okay.” Ava risked a question. “Is everything okay, sir?”

  “Fine, considering we have two murder investigations underway and we don’t seem to making much progress,” Neal said.

  Not what she’d been after, but if Neal wanted to keep his affairs close to his chest, that was up to him.

  Ava and PJ went to the interview room. Ruth arrived five minutes later, out of breath and flustered. She had Cam with her in his pushchair. “Sorry, no one to watch him at the moment,” she explained.

  “Family room?” PJ asked. Ava nodded.

  They all trooped out. In the family room, Cam made for a big toy box and began strewing the contents over the floor.

  “You have some information for us? About Dana Schell?” Ava asked.

  Ruth nodded. “Yes. I don’t know if it’s relevant, but the more I think about it the more certain I am that it might be.”

  Ava gave her an encouraging nod.

  “You know my father’s business partner, Paul Cornish?” Ava said nothing. “You know he has a son called Hector?” She paused. “Well, Hector was in the same year as me at school.”

  Cam had found a tambourine and began banging it against the leg of the nearest chair. PJ slid to the floor beside the child and redirected his attention to some colourful plastic building bricks. Ruth looked surprised.

  “You’re probably wondering why I’m telling you about Hector.” Ruth gave a nervous laugh. Not really. Ava had a hunch it was going to be something about the drugs found in Dana’s room.

  “Hector was sort of seeing Dana for a while. I mean, it wasn’t anything serious. Just, well, just sex really.”

  Why else would a rich boy like Hector bother with a pretty but penniless girl like Dana? Sometimes Ava wondered if Jim Neal’s political views were rubbing off on her.

  “She came to stay with him in Cambridge sometimes. I saw them together a couple of times at the market, and around and about.”

  “Go on,” Ava said.

  “One day, my partner Fin and I bumped into them in the Grafton shopping centre.” Ruth stared at Cam and PJ for a moment, as if gathering her thoughts. She looks a bit like her father, Ava thought. Or how he’d looked prior to having his head practically blown off. Ava had seen pictures. They had the same deep-set eyes.

  “Fin and I, we don’t know many other couples in Cambridge. Not socially, anyway. So I invited them round for dinner.” Ruth looked down. “This is kind of embarrassing. Did my mum tell you that my dad and I weren’t talking? Like for ages before . . . before . . . you know?”

  “Your Aunt Lizzie told us about that. It was because your father disapproved of Cam’s dad, wasn’t it?” Ava said.

  “Yes. Dad hired a private detective to look into Fin’s background. I was furious. It seemed like such a big deal at the time. Now I . . .”

  “You realise he was just looking out for you, being overprotective. Dads tend to do that. He would have forgiven you,” PJ said from the floor.

  Ava smiled inwardly. So like her friend to provide emotional support. PJ would probably have found some way of reconciling everyone without the whole family breaking up. They would have talked it over. Ava was sure she would have reacted exactly as Ruth had.

  “Fin had already told me he had a past. Dad’s PI didn’t find out anything I didn’t already know.”

  “The PI found out that Fin had been involved with drugs when he was a teenager? Your aunt told us that too.”

  “Oh, trust Aunt Lizzie. So you know already?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, Fin caught Dana doing drugs in our bathroom. He walked in on her doing a line of coke. He knew what she was doing because . . . because of his own experience. Anyway, he had a quiet word with Hector about it and Hector swore he didn’t know that Dana was using. He . . . he was really angry with her for . . . for abusing our hospitality.”

  Ruth seemed to falter. She watched in a detached sort of way as PJ hugged a succession of soft toys handed to her by a giggling Cam.

  “Later, Hector told me he’d found out Dana was doing a bit of dealing. He didn’t want anything to do with her after that. And he threatened to tell his dad if she didn’t stop.” Ruth’s words tumbled out as though she needed to get them said quickly, like a child repeating a lesson learned by heart.

  “I . . . just thought you should know, in case . . . in case drugs had something to do with Dana’s death?” She looked from Ava to PJ for reassurance and gave another nervous laugh.

  Ava thought of the shortbread tin and what it contained. Could Ruth have heard about it from a member of the Cornish household? From Hector, to be precise? Highly likely.

  “It was thoughtful of you to volunteer this information, Ms Marsh,” Ava said. “We were already aware of a possible drug connection, but you did the right thing in coming forward.”

  Ruth stood up. “Th-that’s okay.” She looked own at PJ. “Thank you for playing with Cam. He can be a handful.”

  “My pleasure. He’s a little sweetheart,” PJ said, getting to her feet and brushing at her trousers.

  “So people keep telling me,” Ruth said. She sounded resentful.

  They escorted Ruth back to the front door with Cam in his pushchair and watched her walk away. “What did you make of that?” Ava said. “Were you able to hear down there with all the noise that kid was making?”

  “Cam. His name’s Cam. And yes, I heard most of it. Strange, isn’t it, how these two families keep getting intertangled.”

  “Think you’ve just invented a new word, Peej, but I know what you mean. It’s exactly what I was thinking. One thing I did notice, though. Ruth didn’t make eye contact with me much. Her eyes kept sliding to you and Cam.”

  “Not that odd, she is a mum. They’re always watchful.”

  “You’re probably right. Still, I thought there was something not quite right about that whole interview. She was way too nervous for one thing, and I had a feeling she didn’t believe her own story.”

  “I agree,” PJ said. “It was almost as if she didn’t believe that we’d believe what she was saying. Do you think someone put her up to it? Hector Cornish perhaps?

  “To deflect our attention from himself, maybe? I wouldn’t be surprised. But maybe that’s just my prejudice talking. You know, bored rich kid with more money than he knows what to do with. To tell the truth, we know very little about Dana or her background. For all we know, she could be Stromford’s answer to Walter White. ”

&
nbsp; As they made their way back to the office, PJ blurted out, “Steve’s ultrasound’s the day after tomorrow. He got a cancellation.”

  Ava put a hand on her arm. “That’s good. You did talk to the chief about having time off to go to the hospital, didn’t you?”

  “Yes, it’s all sorted. Oh, Ava, I’m so worried I don’t know what to do with myself.”

  Ava squeezed the arm. ”I wish I could say everything’s going to be alright.”

  “That’s the worst thing about being a grown-up, isn’t it?” PJ said, quietly. “No longer being able to believe someone when they tell you that.”

  “At least you’ll know. For better or worse.”

  In the end, all Ava could offer was a cliché.

  Chapter Nine

  Gail Cornish stood at her jetty looking at their neat little river cruiser. She and Paul had bought it soon after they moved to Crystal Lakes. It had been their anniversary present to each other. It was a status symbol, like the house they lived in and their cars. An emblem of their wealth and success. But not their happiness. They’d bought the boat a month after Gail confessed to her fling with Russ Marsh, when their marriage was hanging by a thread.

  Paul had been angrier about the affair than he let on, Gail knew. Angry at Russ’s betrayal as much as hers. Gail would have bet her life that Paul and Russ’s friendship, their partnership, everything, would have fallen apart, but somehow, against all the odds, the centre had held.

  There had been the inevitable outburst of violence when Paul learned the truth. He’d broken Russ’s nose. Afterwards, Paul had talked of building bridges, of not throwing away nearly thirty years of friendship. But Gail knew from experience that her husband was not a particularly forgiving man.

  Paul had once told her that he’d agreed to go into business with Russ because Russ was good at assessing risk. As such, he was a useful business partner. Gail knew that Paul also found Russ easy to manipulate, as he did most people, and believed he could count on his loyalty. The affair had been a betrayal by those he trusted most.

  Gail knew that her husband liked, no, needed to be the one in control. She’d long suspected him of being a sociopath. Paul hid it well under a patina of charisma, moving effortlessly through his life, attracting admiration and attention. He hid it so well, in fact, that even she had only slowly, over the course of many years, worked out what kind of man he really was.

  Paul conducted himself impeccably in all aspects of his life, business, social and family. His clients liked him and were loyal, his friends considered themselves fortunate to be included in his circle. His children, with the possible exception of Hector, adored him. But in Hector’s case, it was only because of the harsh penalties Paul had imposed to curb his son’s gambling addiction.

  Paul seldom revealed his true nature. There was just the odd occasion when she’d observed his smile die in his eyes before it left his lips. Or, the way he looked when he thought he wasn’t being observed. Cold. Without a drop of empathy. But most of all it was because she never really sensed any emotional connection between them. It was like living with one of those lifelike robots you saw in science fiction films. Human in appearance but underneath, no beating heart. If it hadn’t been for Russ, Gail would never have realised that a relationship could be otherwise. She hadn’t been lonely when she was with Russ.

  Gail went back indoors. She was alone at home. Not unusual these days, now that the kids were spreading their wings. Dana had been an almost continual presence but now she was gone too. Dead. It hardly seemed real.

  She climbed the stairs to Dana’s room and stripped the bed. The police forensics team had been in, turned everything upside down and put it back together again. Gail had watched them go about their work, wondering what else they might find. Surely there couldn’t be anything more than what they’d already discovered in that tin under Dana’s bed? But Gail knew that there was. Much more.

  Hiring Dana had been a big mistake. Paul had denied it in front of those police officers but he’d been screwing Dana. Gail had known from the very first day it happened. She’d returned from town one afternoon to find Dana, feet up on the kitchen table, drinking coffee and reading a magazine instead of preparing the vegetables for dinner. The relationship between them had changed. Dana was no longer just the help.

  And then there was Hector. So like his father. Was her son responsible for what was in that tin? It wouldn’t take the police long to figure out that he’d been in some sort of relationship with Dana. Or that he’d needed a way to make money.

  She and Paul had hoped that cutting Hector’s allowance would curb their son’s gambling excesses. Had Hector turned to drug dealing as a source of income? Gail bitterly regretted asking Russ to help Hector out with a loan that time.

  After stripping Dana’s bed, Gail began collecting her things together to pack into boxes. Her brother was travelling up to collect them sometime in the next week. As she worked, she thought of Val Marsh going through this same process with Russ’s things. Deciding what to keep and what to throw away. She ought to go and see Val and offer her condolences, but the affair with Russ had soured their relationship.

  There wasn’t much to pack. At a loss for what to do next, Gail went back downstairs, and made some coffee. It tasted bitter.

  Every time Gail looked at her husband, she felt more certain that he had killed Russ. Perhaps he’d killed Dana too. She’d given him an alibi, even though it was a lie. Paul had expected it of her, and she couldn’t have refused without making him suspicious. He had no alibi either, for the evening Dana died.

  Despite having guessed at Paul’s true nature many years ago, it had never occurred to Gail until now that he might be capable of murder. She’d always believed that his sociopathic tendencies were satisfied by his success in business.

  Gail tipped her coffee away, noticing that her hand was shaking. She felt an unaccustomed tightness in her chest, a thin pain in her jaw and across her shoulder. She stood completely still until it passed. Anxiety, she thought, not wishing to call it fear. Funny how we choose our words to disguise the truths we are unable to acknowledge.

  * * *

  Paul Cornish stepped out of the lift into a carpeted corridor leading to the penthouse flat where his son Hector had been staying since his return from Cambridge. The penthouse belonged to Paul. He’d invested in the development company that built the luxury block of flats, Marton Tower, and got himself a very good deal.

  Paul knocked on the door to the flat. No answer. Paul knocked again, and after a delay of some minutes, he heard the key turn in the lock.

  “Dad?” Hector stood before him, dressed in a Spiderman onesie that Kitty had given him last Christmas. It emphasised his gangly thinness, made him look boyish. The sight of Hector calmed Paul’s fury. The years fell away. This was his son. His firstborn. Hector had worn Spiderman pyjamas just like this as a three-year-old.

  “Can I come in?” Paul asked. As if Hector would dare refuse him. He looked around with approval at the open-plan apartment with its expanse of floor space. It would fetch a tidy sum when the market perked up. Then he turned to Hector.

  “Did that little haul the police got from Dana’s room have anything to do with you? Don’t even think about lying to me, Hector.”

  “I’m not using,” Hector said.

  “So you’re dealing?”

  A shrug. “Not dealing. Selling to mates. A few select friends in Cambridge. People who’d have a lot to lose if word got around they were using, so they wouldn’t rat me out. I’ve been careful, Dad. Discreet.”

  “Was Dana involved?”

  “Dana was no angel, Dad. She was snorting coke at Kingfisher Lodge, under your very nose. Okay, the coke was mine. I hid it in my room and she must have stolen it from me and was intending to do a runner. The trouble is, Dad—”

  Paul raised his hand, cutting Hector off. He turned his back on him and walked over to the glazed sliding door that opened onto a balcony with views of the river
. He sensed his tightly controlled life unravelling, like the river below.

  “Don’t worry. I’ve made sure the police won’t be looking at me.” Hector had crept up behind him.

  Paul turned to face his son. “What have you done? Tell me you haven’t done anything stupid.”

  “I spoke with Ruth Marsh.”

  Paul stared at Hector in his ridiculous Spiderman onesie. The image of his sweet little three-year-old boy vanished.

  “Why in hell would you involve Ruth Marsh in this mess?”

  “Before you go off on one, Dad, hear me out. Dana stayed with me in Cambridge a couple of times. We were sort of seeing each other for a bit. Nothing serious.”

  “You and Dana?” Paul was unable to disguise his shock.

  Hector caught on immediately. “What? You too? You were fucking Dana too?” Hector gave a sardonic laugh. Not for the first time since Hector’s toddler days, Paul felt an urge to slap his son. Now, as then, he restrained himself.

  “You were telling me about Ruth Marsh.”

  “Her partner, Fin. You know about him, right? From Russ?” Paul nodded. Russ had told him about the private investigator he’d hired to vet Fin as a suitable partner for Ruth. Turned out Fin had been in trouble over drugs in his youth.

  “I asked Ruth to go to the police and tell them Dana was doing drugs one evening when we were at Ruth’s place in Cambridge. That Fin questioned her and figured out she was dealing, because of his own past experience with drugs. Dana’s not in a position to tell them otherwise now, is she?”

  It was worse than Paul thought. “And the police are just going to believe that you had nothing to do with it? That Dana saved enough money out of her minimum wage to buy a kilo of coke?”

  Hector gave a shrug. “She could have stolen the money. Plenty of dealers do.” His face brightened. “You could tell the police that Dana stole stuff from the house. Like some of Mum’s jewellery that she thought she’d lost?”