Emily is right. They’re using that old photo of Charley they used to print all the time. She was eighteen or nineteen, walking along a high street in London in a tight green dress that doesn’t look like her at all. As well as those photos of her at the funeral, this is how the nation knows her. Green dress Charlotte: the slightly slutty Willis daughter who isn’t the wild child.
Has the Willis Curse Struck Again?
I stare at the headline for a few moments. The sentence makes sense, the words all in the right order, and yet… I can’t quite believe they’ve written it. This is exactly why Charley was so wary of people she didn’t know, why she didn’t like cameras. It’s probably why she asked Emily to photograph our wedding. With anyone else, she’d have worried about someone leaking a picture.
The photo at the top of the actual story leaves me open-mouthed. The three stages of Charley. The eight-year-old in a staged magazine shoot with her parents; the thirteen-year-old at her Mum and Dad’s funeral, the late-teen on the streets of London. The most recent picture is at least nine years out of date. A spectre of the past. This isn’t my Charley. This is a stranger.
I can’t read it, not properly, but I find myself scanning the page.
‘…Charlotte thought she’d found happiness with local vet, Seth Chambers…’
* * *
‘…Charlotte left the spotlight to move closer to her parents’ old house…’
* * *
‘…The latest mystery follows in the footsteps of what some have dubbed, “The Willis Curse”…’
* * *
‘…The killer of Paul and Annie Willis has never been found…’
* * *
‘…The Willis family misery was compounded four years ago, when…’
There are a few instances of ‘sources said’, but no actual names. Most of it is speculation; some of it an outright lie. I know for a fact Charley didn’t move here to be closer to her parents’ old house in Langton. She did so to attend a catering management course outside London.
I perhaps wouldn’t mind so much if the article had been written as an attempt to find out what happened – but the fact Charley is missing is only mentioned once near the top. It says she ‘disappeared shortly after her wedding to Mr Chambers’. No number to call in case somebody sees her, no appeal for her to contact home, hardly anything other than going over events that happened more than a decade ago.
My hand is actually trembling as I click away from the page. If Charley sees this, it’s going to break her. She’s built a life in this town, trying to escape what happened to her as a teenager, and now this.
I make it missed call numbers (104) and (105) but there is no answer.
Who could have leaked it? Not Emily and not Alice. It wouldn’t be Mason, he has more than enough on his own plate with Daisy and Dillon – plus it’s not the type of thing he’d do. So Raj? Would he really do that for a few quid? I’ve known him for twenty years. We first became friends because we ended up sitting together for registration at school. In the period between, we’ve been close and not so much. We went our separate ways to university and then started playing Wednesday-night football together when we moved back. I can’t believe it’s him. Rafi? Maybe – but the piece is so uninformed it’s hard to shoulder the fact it could be anyone I know.
It must be the police. Perhaps not even the officers who visited the house, someone who works at the station who noticed Charley’s name and thought he or she could make a few quid.
My phone is in my hand when it starts to ring, making me jump. It’s quarter past five in the morning. The number is unknown – but it starts with 07, so must be a mobile.
I allow myself to believe it is Charley on a borrowed phone. She’s stranded somewhere and needs help. Or she’s seen the story and is calling to let me know how and why this is all a misunderstanding.
It’s a man’s voice: ‘Mr Chambers…?’
‘Who is this?’
‘My name’s Richard Kingston and I’m a freelance journalist. I figured I’d get in before the big boys to ask if you fancy telling your side of the story…?’
It might be the hour of the day but it takes me a moment to take it all in.
‘What side?’ I ask.
‘I gather your wife disappeared on Saturday evening. The whole Willis Curse thing.’
‘Stop calling it that.’
There is a short pause, a gulp perhaps. ‘I’m sorry, Mr Chambers. No offence intended, but I thought perhaps—’
I hang up. Stare at the screen until it goes dark. I think about turning it off – but what if Charley actually does call? I could try only answering numbers I recognise, but what happens if Charley is in trouble and calls from somebody else’s number?
The phone starts to ring again, the same number. I cancel the call and then click through the options to block the number. That’s one thing, at least. I can leave my phone on and block anyone I want.
The sun is on its way up and I slept with the curtains open, meaning the living room is now doused with a foggy orange. Day two of no Charley.
Is this what it’s going to be like? You hear people saying it’s the not knowing that really affects a person. If there’s a death, you can start the process of grieving; without that, you’re left hoping – and it’s the hope that gets you in the end.
Not a death. I push the thought away. She isn’t dead.
A flicker of movement from the far end of the front garden has me on my feet. A pair of cars are parked on the road directly outside in a spot that would usually be clear. Two blokes are shuffling around, both wearing shirts and ties. Another man in a jacket clinks open my gate and heads along the path towards my front door.
I freeze, waiting… and then the bell rings. Whoever it is knocks at the same time. I’m barely in the hallway when the letter box is opened from the outside and a voice calls through.
‘Hello? Mr Chambers? I saw you from the road and figured I’d introduce myself.’
I can only see his eyes, the door obscuring the rest of his features. His voice is muffled.
‘Can we talk?’ he adds. ‘Perhaps you can let me in? Or we can go out for coffee somewhere? Perhaps some breakfast? I saw this diner place on the way over…’
We look at each other for a moment or two and then I turn and close the door to the hallway, heading upstairs to the back bedroom and closing that door, too.
Charley’s pillow smells of her. I think about burying my face in it, but then realise I’m being ridiculous, a walking cliché. Give it a rest.
Whoever knocked on the door is still there, still calling through the letter box for me.
I sit up on the bed and wonder what he thinks is the best that can happen. I’ll be so impressed by him shouting through the small flap at the front of my house that I’ll let him take me on a first date to his ‘diner place’ and tell him everything about my life? Tell him whatever he wants to know about my missing wife? I can’t believe that’s how it works.
My phone rings again, a different 07 number this time, probably one of that lot outside. I press to answer: ‘Please stop calling,’ I say, ‘I need the line to be clear in case my wife calls.’
There’s a cough and then a nervous mumble. ‘Is that Seth?’
‘Who’s this?’
‘It’s Liam, Charley’s brother. We met a few months ago, if you remember?’
I’m so stunned that it takes me a second or two to gasp that I do remember.
‘I know it’s early,’ he adds, ‘but I saw the story online about Charlotte. I was hoping we could talk.’
Fourteen
12 Years Ago
Charley Willis, 16 years old
Martha is leaning on the door that separates the living room from the kitchen as she practically wrenches the landline phone cord out of the wall.
‘Tell David to talk to me now or I’m coming round.’ She stops for a second to let the other person speak and then growls: ‘No, you listen. Put him on right now.
I don’t care if he’s busy.’
Martha starts to say something else and then stops, taking the phone away from her ear and then staring at it.
‘That cow hung up,’ she mutters, before slamming the receiver back onto the cradle. A piece of plastic flies off across the floor, landing next to the leg of the stool on which I’m sitting.
She doesn’t seem to notice, stepping away from the door, breathing heavily, eyes blazing. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen her this angry. Her fists are balled, top lip snarled. She glances past me to the kitchen table and the Sunday magazine article that has prompted the outbreak of fury.
Uncle David is on the left-hand page, standing tall, side-on and breathing in to try to stop his belly sagging. The headline reads: ‘FAMILY FORTUNE’, with a picture of Mum and Dad underneath. Mum’s in her yoga outfit, probably how most people remember her, with Dad in a smart suit presenting some game show.
The pull-quotes are the kickers.
‘Everyone thinks they had the perfect marriage but it was a lie’
* * *
‘Paul and Annie weren’t what everyone thought’
Martha looks from the magazine to the phone and back again. She’s biting her tongue, the stud poking through her teeth.
‘Get your coat,’ she says firmly.
After three years of living together in her basement flat, I know there’s a time and a place to argue with my sister. I’ve proven a few times that this can be the place – but this is most definitely not the time.
I do as I’m told and, five minutes later, we’re in the car. There’s no map, but Martha knows where she’s going. She gets us out of London without a word, though each gear change sees the stick being thundered into place. Wham! Take that, third gear. Oof! Up yours, fourth.
Although she’s not talking directly to me, Martha is mumbling under her breath to herself.
The city becomes the suburbs becomes the country. Wide roads become narrower. Low walls become high, overgrown hedges. It’s been a while since we were out in the country. The city has become my home with its tall buildings and so many, many people. It’s easy to be anonymous among visitors from countries who have no idea who you are. Some might shy away from groups speaking foreign languages; I find myself mingling among them. Safety in numbers and all that.
Almost an hour has passed when Martha eases onto the brake and slaloms her car sideways into a parking space on the side of the road. We’re at the edge of a small village that is, for the most part, in the middle of nowhere. A typical one pub, one shop, one postbox place.
Uncle David’s house is an old stone cottage with crumbling dark tiles on top. It’s on the end of a long row of similar properties, all with neat gardens and hanging baskets at the front.
Martha doesn’t wait for me as she heaves the driver’s door open and barrels along the short path before hurling herself at Uncle David’s front door. She thumps it with the side of her fist, sending an echo spiralling along the deserted street.
She barely gives anyone a chance to answer before rattling her fist onto the wood once more. I’m out of the car, leaning against the gatepost at the end of the path, close enough to hear and see everything; far enough away to be out of the firing line.
It’s Uncle David who opens the door.
Aside from the photo in the magazine, this is the first time I’ve seen him since that day in the solicitor’s office. He looks like he’s spent most of that time eating, given how much weight he’s piled on. At one time, he looked a little like Dad, but not any more. He’s grown an extra chin and the skin on his cheeks are starting to overhang.
David tries to get the first word in but barely gets through: ‘Will you—’ before Martha shouts over him.
‘What right do you have?’ she says. ‘What right do you think you have to talk about our family like that?’
David has both hands up, trying to cool the situation, but when Martha’s raging, the last thing anyone should do is tell her to calm down. It’s like emptying a bucket of water onto a pan fire.
‘It’s my family, too,’ David replies, though his attempted defiance is belied by the hesitation in his voice.
‘She’s sixteen,’ Martha hisses. Her voice is calmer, but it’s steely calm, which, if anything, is scarier than when she shouts. ‘Sixteen. Do you know what she’s been through?’
‘I realise what—’
‘It happened three years ago – and here you are bringing everything back up again.’ She pauses. ‘How much did they pay you?’
‘That’s none of your business.’
‘It really is if it’s me and my family you’re going to be talking about.’
There’s a click and then some woman pokes her head around the front door of the adjacent house. She looks from me to Martha to Uncle David. ‘Everything all right?’ she asks.
‘Everything’s fine, Jean.’
The woman doesn’t seem convinced. She focuses back on me again, eyes widening with recognition. She waits for a moment, wondering if there’s any chance she can get a front row seat, before deciding there’s no way she can pull this off. Reluctantly, she closes her front door once more.
‘You’re causing a scene,’ David hisses.
‘You’re the one that sold us out,’ Martha replies.
Our uncle steps out of the house and looks both ways along the street. ‘Do you want to come in and talk about this?’
Martha shakes her head, smiles. ‘Oh, so now you want to do things in private?’
‘Will you stop?’ He looks both ways again. ‘This is my home, Martha. Do you really think this is what your father would want?’
‘Do you think he’d want you blabbing about our business to the papers?’
David throws both hands up. ‘There’s no talking to you, is there? I tried to tell you this back with that solicitor three years ago. My lawyer has been sending letters, but no one ever replies. You could’ve avoided all this if you only listened.’
Martha takes a step away the house, checking I’ve not moved. She’s nodding. ‘Oh, so it’s back to the will again, is it? This is how we know you and Dad were brothers – it all goes back to the money. What is it with the men in this family? Liam’s the same. Money-money-money.’
‘What about you?’ he replies sharply.
‘What about me?’
‘It’s not like you turned your share down. You’re a millionaire. Did you forget? And yet what have you done with your blessing? Nothing. You’re still living in some London hole, still drinking your Mum and Dad’s hard work.’ He points past Martha towards me. ‘Sixteen, you say? You sure?’
Martha takes another step towards me, away from the house. The implication is clear. ‘Didn’t I tell you what would happen if you ever pointed towards my sister again?’
Three years ago, I wasn’t sure what to say. It was all too much, all too soon. This time I step forward, cupping a hand onto Martha’s lower back. I don’t know what she might do.
‘Hey,’ I whisper. ‘Let’s go home.’
Martha turns to me and then back to our uncle. I can see the anger draining as she takes one more step back. There’s a gap of a metre or so between her and Uncle David now. No man’s land between the trenches.
‘This better not happen again,’ Martha says, with a hint of demented calm. ‘If I ever see your name in the media talking about my family, you’ll regret it.’
‘Go home, Martha.’
‘I know a few of your secrets, remember. That time in Soho with the red-haired woman. What was her name? Sasha? Just a friend, was she…?’
David’s eyebrows rocket up into his hairline and he spins to look behind. The door is most of the way closed and there’s no one there. He speaks through clenched teeth: ‘Don’t you dare come here and threaten me.’
‘You don’t scare me, old man. You’re a limp-dicked, bitter wet fart. The runt of a piss-poor litter. You think you’re important just because your brother used to be on TV.’
O
ne more step back. Her eyes are locked to David’s and this time it is Martha who’s pointing.
‘Go on,’ she says, ‘run to the papers. Tell them whatever you want and see what happens. You might be my father’s brother – but I’m my mother’s daughter and if you ever knew anything about our parents, you’ll know exactly what that means.’
Fifteen
Now
Seth
As the morning has progressed, the number of reporters on the path outside my house has steadily increased. The bloke who was shouting through my letter box has disappeared back among his colleagues and nobody else has bothered trying to do anything other than hang around.
That’s why it’s a surprise when, a little after ten, there’s another knock on the door. I’m at the back of the living room, in a spot where nobody outside can see me but where I still have a view of what’s going on. I wonder if they know something I don’t. It feels as if they’re waiting for something, either that or starting some sort of siege, hanging on until I cave and head outside.
‘It’s Emily,’ a voice shouts through the letter box.
I hurry to the front door and hide behind it as I unlock and swing it inwards. Emily blusters inside, laden with bags for life. It may be a time of crisis, but if you think mine is the sort of family that spends errant pennies on a plastic carrier bag then you have another think coming.
Emily bundles into the kitchen and then drops the bags, wringing her hands as I lock the front door.
‘I didn’t expect this,’ she says. ‘I was going to park out front like normal, but there’s a long row of cars. I had to double around, park over the back and then lumber everything here.’
The Wife’s Secret: A gripping psychological thriller with a heart-stopping twist Page 9
