Bleed For Me (joseph o'loughlin)
Page 14
‘I saw you with Sienna last Tuesday. Where did you go?’
‘We drove around for a while, then I dropped her off.’
‘What time was that?’
‘Seven.’
‘Where did you drop her?’
‘In town.’
He names a street corner on Lower Bristol Road.
‘Why did she want to go there?’
Danny shrugs. ‘That’s where she told me to drop her. She had the address on a piece of paper.’
‘And you just drove away?’
‘Yep.’ One of his feet is jiggling up and down.
‘Where did you go?’
‘A mate’s place.’
‘For how long?’
‘I kipped on his sofa. I was there all night.’
‘What’s your mate’s name?’
Danny reacts as though scalded. ‘What difference does that make? He’s just a mate.’
Something about the response borders on panic. Danny’s eyes have clouded over and his hands are pressed to the top of his thighs. There is something slightly effeminate about the pose. In that instant I suddenly see him clearly. I pull my chair closer and tell him to relax.
‘I don’t want to know your friend’s name, Danny. It’s not important.’
He visibly relaxes.
‘Sienna is a pretty girl,’ I say. ‘Did you tell your mates you were doing her?’
Danny doesn’t answer.
‘It’s important to have a girlfriend, isn’t it? Otherwise your mates might think you’re not interested in girls.’
He blinks at me.
‘I mean, it must be tough - being a mechanic. All those girlie calendars in the workshop, the wolf whistles, the banter about Page Three girls; it’s a job for blokes.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Your mates think you’re doing her, don’t they? They’re in awe of you. Lucky bugger, they say, but I think Sienna just pretends to be your girlfriend.’
Excuses clot in the back of Danny’s throat.
‘I think you arrange to pick her up and she’s all over you, putting on a good show for your mates. That’s when you tell them you need some privacy.’
‘I don’t know what you’re on about.’
‘Sure you do. You’re both trying to hide something. You have a boyfriend . . . and so does Sienna.’
Danny leaps to his feet. His chair crashes to the floor. ‘I’M NOT QUEER! IT’S A LIE! YOU TAKE THAT BACK!’
He’s pleading with me, his face twisting in suffering. I pick up the chair and tell him to sit down. He slumps over his knees, staring at the floor.
‘Listen, Danny, I don’t care how many boyfriends you have. Just tell me about Sienna.’
Pressing his lips tightly together, he contemplates what to do. He can hear his mother laughing in the front room. He glances sidelong at the door.
‘She was seeing someone else,’ he mutters.
Who?’
‘I don’t know. I just dropped her off.’
‘Did you always drop her at the same place?’
‘No, it was different each time.’
‘And then what happened?’
‘I drove away.’
‘You’re lying.’
‘Piss off!’
‘You were curious. It’s human nature. You didn’t just leave her. You wanted to know who she was seeing.’
Danny chews the inside of his cheek. ‘Yeah, well, maybe once.’
‘What happened?’
‘I hung around; parked up behind some trees. I saw a car pull up and Sienna got inside.’
‘Who was driving?’
‘An old dude.’
‘Who was he?’
‘Fuck knows!’
‘But you saw him.’
‘Not up close. He was mid-thirties, maybe older.’
Ancient.
‘What sort of car was he driving?’
‘A Ford Focus. The five-door two-litre estate. Silver.’
‘You remember the number?’
‘Yeah, I tattooed it on my foreskin so I wouldn’t forget.’
Danny laughs and decides he’s going to remember the line and use it on his mates in the workshop.
‘Would you recognise the driver again?’
‘I’d recognise the car. I’m good with cars.’
No longer anxious, Danny picks up a butter knife and begins scraping a speck of dirt from beneath his thumbnail. He has a habit of nodding his head as though he’s agreeing with himself.
‘This day you watched and waited, what happened?’
‘The old dude made Sienna duck down. I figured he wanted a blowjob, you know, but they just drove off.’
‘What about last Tuesday - did you see his car?’
‘Nah. I just dropped her.’
‘So you didn’t see the guy who picked her up?’
Danny shakes his head.
‘What were you doing at Sienna’s house next morning?’
Danny hesitates for a beat too long. I don’t give him time to make excuses.
‘Listen very carefully to me, Danny. I’m happy to let your secret life stay secret, but not if you lie to me.’
He looks at me sheepishly.
‘I tried to call Sienna, but she wasn’t answering. I was driving home from my mate’s place and I went by Sienna’s house - hoping I might see her. Place was crawling with coppers.
‘Why did you run?’
His shoulders rise and fall. ‘I didn’t want to get involved.’
The age-old story.
Danny lets out a low, whistling breath. ‘They said her old man had his throat cut. Never seen a dead body - not one like that. What did he look like?’
Outside: darkness. The wind has freshened and a beech tree groans in protest from a corner of the garden where the moon is hiding in the branches.
Monk leans on the car. ‘Get what you wanted?’
‘Sienna was seeing someone else. Somebody older. There must be evidence: emails, text messages, letters . . . we have to search Sienna’s room.’
‘It’s been searched,’ says Monk.
Yes, but her laptop was missing and her mobile was damaged in the river. We’ll need to retrieve her messages from the phone company database and her Internet server.
‘Sienna does some babysitting for her drama teacher, Gordon Ellis. According to Helen Hegarty, Ray saw this teacher kissing Sienna in his car when she was being dropped home. He made a complaint to the school.’
‘When was this?’
‘In the week before the murder. Ellis could be the person Ray Hegarty was arguing with outside his house. You should find out what sort of car he drives.’
Monk scratches his unshaven jaw with his knuckles. ‘The boss is going to say you’re muddying the water.’
Is that what I’m doing?
‘I’m trying to understand what happened.’
‘What if she’s guilty?’
‘What if she’s not?’
Monk seems to think carefully, as though taking a conscience vote. He’s a family man who worries about his own children. He’s also a realist and knows how the truth can be manipulated, ameliorated and negotiated away at every stage of an investigation and trial. That’s the reality of modern policing. Overworked, underpaid and unappreciated, investigators are forced to cut corners and paint over their mistakes. Usually, with a little luck, the facts fall into place and the right person goes down. And even if the system fails, detectives can normally sleep peacefully at night because the defendant was probably guilty of something equally terrible. Truly innocent people very rarely go to jail. That’s the theory. It’s normally the practice. Then someone like Sienna Hegarty comes along.
On the drive home I listen to PM on Radio 4, Eddie Mair analysing the events of the day.
Jury members broke down in tears today as they were shown photographs of a Ukrainian family including three young children who perished in a fire-bomb attack on a Bristol boarding house.
Neighbours told Bristol Crown Court of hearing windows breaking and seeing a white Ford transit van leaving the scene moments before flames were spotted on the ground floor of the building. A forensic expert also presented fingerprint evidence linking one of the three accused, Tony Scott, to a petrol container used in the attack . . .
I turn off the radio. Crack the window. The cold air helps me concentrate.
Parking the car outside the terrace, I walk down the hill to the cottage and sit outside on a stone wall in the shadows of low branches. The lights are on downstairs. A TV flickers behind the curtains.
Something pushes me up the path. My finger hovers over the doorbell.
Julianne opens the door a crack. ‘Hello?’
‘Hi.’
‘Is everything OK?’
‘Fine. I just thought I’d drop by. How are you?’
‘I’m good.’
There is a pause that stretches out in my mind, becoming embarrassing.
Julianne opens the door wider. ‘Do you want to come in?’
I step past her and wait for her to close the door. She’s been watching TV, but the sound is now turned down.
‘Where’s Charlie?’ I ask, glancing up the stairs.
‘Babysitting.’
‘Who is she looking after?’
‘A little boy in Emma’s class.’
Julianne curls up in an armchair by the fire. A book lies open on the armrest. A cup of tea is empty on the table next to her.
‘How was your date with Harry?’ I ask.
She holds up her hand and rocks her palm from side to side. ‘So-so. I discovered that he’s rather controlling.’
‘How?’
‘I asked for the dessert menu and he made such a fuss.’
I feel a stab of guilt. ‘That’s very odd.’
Julianne pushes hair back behind her ears. ‘I doubt you came here to talk about Harry.’ She smiles and effortlessly takes repossession of my heart.
‘Sienna was pregnant,’ I say, which is definitely a conversation starter.
Julianne blinks at me. ‘Who?’
‘I don’t know.’
We’re both thinking the same thing. What if it had been Charlie? What would we do?
Julianne grows pensive. ‘I walked past the Hegartys’ house today and I saw the curtains closed and I started thinking about Sienna. She was always here, Joe, staying for dinner, sleeping over, curled up on the sofa with Charlie.’ She takes a deep breath. ‘Then I started thinking about how angry I’ve been at you, and some of the things I said.’
She raises her eyes to mine, filling me with a sense that all her remembered anger, grief and impatience are gone.
‘We haven’t lost someone, Joe. We have two wonderful daughters. We’re very lucky.’
‘I know.’
Her ocean-grey eyes are shining. ‘I don’t know if I should tell you this.’
‘What?’
‘There are nights when I miss you so much I cry myself to sleep and other nights when I realise that loving you took every ounce of energy and more. I didn’t have enough . . . I’ll never have enough.’
‘I understand.’
‘Do you?’
‘Let me come back.’
She shakes her head. ‘I’m not strong enough to live with you, Joe. I’m barely strong enough to live without you.’
‘Why?’
‘Because you’re not always going to be here.’
A stray lock of hair falls from behind her ear. She tucks it back again. For a moment I think she might cry. The last time I saw her tears was two years ago, in her hospital room where rain streaked the windows and it felt as if the clouds were crying for me.
‘I don’t love you any more,’ Julianne told me blankly, coldly. ‘Not in the right way - not how I used to.’
‘There isn’t a right way. There’s just love,’ I said.
What do I know?
Now she’s smiling sadly at me. ‘You’re so good at analysing other people, Joe, but not yourself.’
‘Or you.’
‘I hate it when you analyse me.’
‘I try not to. I prefer you to be a magnificent enigma.’
Julianne laughs properly this time.
‘I’m being serious,’ I say. ‘I don’t want to understand you. I don’t want to know what you’ll do next. I want to spend the rest of my life trying to solve the mystery.’
She sighs and shakes her head. ‘You’re a decent man, Joe, but . . .’
I stop her. No statement that begins that way is ever a harbinger for anything good. What if she’s clearing the decks before telling me that she’s going to marry Harry Veitch?
‘Tell me something honest,’ I say.
Julianne presses her lips into narrow unyielding lines. ‘Are you saying I tell lies?’
‘No, that’s not what I meant. I just want to talk about something important.’
‘This isn’t a necessary conversation, Joe.’
‘I like it when we talk about the girls. It makes me feel like we’re still a family.’
‘We can’t live it over again,’ she whispers sadly.
‘I know.’
‘Do you? Sometimes I wonder.’
18
On Tuesday afternoon I park the Volvo outside a house made of weathered stone with a slate roof. The small square front garden is divided by strips of grass between flowerbeds where gerberas are pushing through the loam searching for sunlight.
Grabbing my overcoat from the passenger seat, I walk up the front path and give the doorbell a short ring, putting on my friendliest professional demeanour. Nobody answers. Ringing the bell again, I press my ear to the wooden door. Canned TV laughter leaks from inside.
Retreating down the steps to the front window, I try to peer through a gap in the curtains into the murky twilight of a living room. The TV is a flickering square. I can just make out a blurred outline of someone sitting on the sofa. Perhaps they didn’t hear the doorbell.
This time I knock loudly and listen for footfalls or muffled voices or the sound of someone breathing on the other side of the door.
Nothing.
I’m about to leave when I hear a voice from the rear garden. Gordon Ellis appears from the side of the house. He’s dressed in tracksuit bottoms and a Harlequins rugby shirt. A fringe of chestnut hair falls across his forehead. He brushes it aside.
‘Hello.’
‘Hi. Were you waiting long? I was out back.’
‘No, not long.’
He looks at me closely. ‘Have we met?’
‘I’m Charlie O’Loughlin’s father.’
‘Of course you are.’ He offers his hand: a killer grip. ‘Call me Gordon.’
‘Joe.’
He’s carrying a hoe, which he rests against his shoulder. ‘Charlie is a great kid.’
‘Thank you.’
I glance at the front door. ‘I don’t want to interrupt . . . if you have a visitor.’
‘Nope, it’s just me. Natasha has gone shopping. I was just doing some chores. Almost finished. Do you mind if we talk out back?’
I follow him along the side path where a rusting bicycle is propped against the fence, alongside recycling bins. The long narrow garden has a sandbox with toys, a vegetable patch and a small greenhouse. At the far end there is an old stable block, now a garage, which backs on to a rear lane.
Through an open side door I notice a silver BMW convertible. Ellis follows my gaze.
‘You’re wondering how a teacher can afford a car like that?’
‘It did cross my mind.’
‘Natasha’s family is loaded. You could say I marr
ied well.’ He looks a little embarrassed. ‘We met at school. I didn’t know she was rich. Honest.’
He laughs and begins turning soil in the vegetable garden, swinging the hoe over his shoulder and driving the blade into the compacted earth.
‘I’m running late with this. I should have planted a month ago.’
Glancing at the house, it looks less welcoming from this angle with small, mean windows. From somewhere on the street-side I hear a door close. Ellis hears it too. His eyes meet mine.
‘What can I do for you, Joe?’
‘I want to ask you about Sienna Hegarty.’
He swings the hoe again. ‘A terrible business!’
‘You were close?’
‘She’s one of my students. She’s in the musical.’
‘I saw the dress rehearsal last Tuesday. You were very hard on her.’
‘Sienna was distracted. She forgot her lines. Her timing was off. I know what she’s capable of.’ He pauses and wipes his forearm across his forehead. ‘You didn’t come here to discuss the musical.’
‘No.’
‘Why are you here?’
‘I’m trying to help Sienna. I’m a psychologist. I’ve been asked to prepare a psych report for the court.’
‘How can I help?’
‘I talked to Sienna a few days ago. I asked her about school - general questions about her favourite subjects and teachers. When she listed her teachers she left you out.’
‘You make it sound like she failed an exam.’
‘She grew agitated when I mentioned your name. She didn’t want to talk about you. Can you think of a reason?’
‘No.’
‘Nothing occurs to you?’
The hoe is poised above his head with his fists gripping the handle. ‘Why are you really here, Mr O’Loughlin?’
First names have been dropped.
‘Miss Robinson the school counsellor said it was you who encouraged Sienna to come and see her. Did Sienna tell you what was troubling her?’
Ellis relaxes a little. He takes a small packet of tissues from his pocket and wipes the corner of his lips. Gazes past me at the treetops.
‘Sometimes you can tell when a child is struggling. Sienna was quiet. Anxious.’
‘You saw this?’
‘It was a day last summer. We’d just started back at school after the holidays. It was hot and nobody was wearing a sweater except Sienna, which I thought was odd. Then I noticed a smear of blood on her palms, which had run down from her wrist. She kept her arms folded so nobody would see. She’d cut herself and was still bleeding.’