The Girlfriend: A Josie Cloverfield Detective Novel

by Jack Carteret

  “Yes, good point.” My heart sank.

  If I asked Liam, I would also have to tell him about the possibility that Hannah had cheated on him. The thought gave me a horrible feeling. Liam and I always tried to protect one another from life’s hurts; now I was going to be the one bringing it right to his door.

  “Are you alright, Josie?”

  “Yeah, sorry, I was miles away. I just thought of another name in the diary. I don’t suppose Hannah knew anybody called Trixie?”

  “Trixie? That sounds like something an old lady would call her Pomeranian.” Richard looked thoughtfully into the distance as I stifled a laugh. He really did have no idea that he was funny. “No, I never heard of a Trixie. I’m not actually a lot of help, am I?”

  “Actually, you have been. If I didn’t soon tell someone about taking that diary, I would have evaporated from pure guilt. You’ve made me feel better, if nothing else.”

  “Glad to have been of service.” Richard looked at his watch and suddenly had the air of a man who should really be somewhere else. “If you need anything, just call me. I think it’s great that you’re trying to find Hannah and help Liam, you know. I’d like to help if I can.”

  “Thanks, that’s really kind of you.”

  “I’ve got to go. Are you going to the vigil tonight?”

  “The what-now?” I was so far on the back foot I didn’t know how to get back.

  “Oh, you haven’t heard. Fliss has arranged a candlelight vigil on the campus quad tonight. She’ll be handing out missing persons’ flyers and what-have-you. Her new friends seem keen to be involved, but….” He tailed off.

  “But what?”

  “Look, I think flyers are a great idea. I daresay she’s even got the press interested. But there’s just something kind of, well, icky about her motives. I mean, I know this is going to make me sound cynical, but I think Fliss is enjoying this a bit. I think she’s playing a part and it’s making me a bit sick.”

  “Richard, I’m already there. Don’t beat yourself up. There is such a thing as healthy cynicism, you know.” I smiled at him.

  Poor old Richard. He definitely needed to re-think his Christmas card list; his current friends were utterly crap.

  “Are you going?” I looked up at him as he put his coat on.

  “No, I think I’ll give it a miss. I want to keep out of Fliss’ way, in any case.”

  “I totally understand.”

  As I watched him leave, I thought about the vigil. I knew I would have to go, of course. If the telly was to be believed, the person responsible might very well turn up there. You know, like arsonists watching firemen put out the very blaze they had started. Ok, it was on the lame side, but I had to follow it.

  Chapter Six

  “A vigil? You’ve got to be kidding. I can’t go to that, Dude. Everyone really will think I’ve done something to Hannah if I show up there!” Liam was sitting on his bed with a big open pizza box next to him.

  “I wasn’t expecting you to go, Liam, I was just keeping you in the loop, my friend. Anyway, I’m going to go. I want to get a good look at who turns up and what sort of performance they put on.” I’d been perched on the bed telling Liam about my exploits with the police search, the diary, the terrifying intruder, Emjay, and the visit from DI Thorn.

  I hadn’t quite got to the whole business of the nakedness which I’d seen in Hannah’s own handwriting. I just couldn’t find the right moment.

  “Are you sure about this whole detective thing, Dude? I mean, you could get yourself into real trouble. That Thorn bloke probably hates you.”

  “Well, I suppose he’s not too keen on me.” I laughed.

  “No, Dude. He hates you. I’ve met him. That guy’s harsh.”

  “Oh, give over, Liam.” Liam was on one of his silly segues and I wanted to hold his concentration.

  “You gave him one of your big, pompous dressing-downs. And now he hates you. Hates your guts.” Liam lifted another big, greasy slice of pizza out of the box.

  “Oh Liam! Shut up will you!” I kicked off my plimsolls and tucked my feet underneath me on the bed. “Those pizzas are ridiculously expensive. You’d be much better off buying your own and cooking it. You could get, like, four pizzas for the price of that one.”

  “Or you could get about twenty-five from the Euro-Saver. Yum-yum.” Liam pulled a daft face and started licking his lips like a dog.

  Seriously, even when there’s trouble all around him, the six-year-old Liam I met all those years ago is never really far from the surface. “Want some?”

  “Yes please.” I leaned over and lifted out one of the smaller slices.

  “Total hypocrite, Dude.”

  “No, I’m not.” I mumbled, trying to keep the copious amount of sweetcorn from dropping out as I spoke.

  “Totally! You were just telling me about what a waste of money it was!”

  “To you, yes. To me, this is simply a free slice of pizza. Even the Euro-Saver doesn’t have those!” I laughed, savouring the true magnificence of the ready-made take-away pizza. Dee-licious!

  “So, what are you going to do with this diary? Or photocopy, at any rate?” Liam’s sudden seriousness kind of caught me off guard.

  “You know, I don’t think I’m going to hand it over to DI Thorn.”

  “Because he’ll have you hung by you heels from a lamppost outside the magistrate’s court?”

  “No, it’s not that.” The time was coming to be completely honest with Liam.

  “Well, why then?” Liam pointed at the last slice of pizza and raised his eyes in a you want it? way.

  I knew better. If I’d reached for that last slice, Liam would have shut the pizza box lid down on my fingers and called me a cheeky git.

  “No thanks.” I shook my head. My stomach had started doing a kind of flippy thing anyway, so another slice wouldn’t have gone down too well. “Liam, there was something else in that diary that I haven’t told you about yet.” I had never, ever been nervous with Liam before in my life. Once again, I found myself wishing that Hannah Davenport had never come into our lives.

  “Come on, Dude. Just out with it, ok? You’ve been weird since you got here and you’re starting to freak me out a bit.”

  “Have I?”

  “Yeah, seriously, poker would not be your game. Stop dithering about and just tell me.”

  “Liam, there was more to the Emjay thing than just the name. Hannah had written something about this person which kind of makes it look as if she might have cheated on you. But that’s just my interpretation. I mean, it could be anything really, but I’m not sure. And I didn’t know whether or not I should tell you but also I didn’t want to…….”

  “Steady on, Dude. Take a breath.”

  “Ok. I’ve said it now. I’m sorry.” My hands felt kind of shaky and I was horrified to feel tears in my eyes.

  Sometimes, tears can be blinked away, like without anyone knowing. Then there’s other times where the tears are just too fat and you daren’t even blink because you’ll displace them and they’ll just fly right down your face.

  Well, in this instance, the latter applied. As a result, I sat with my eyes wide open like a Madame Tussaude’s wax work.

  “Hey, Dude. Dude?” Liam closed the pizza box and reached out to slide it on top of the chest of drawers.

  He shuffled down the bed just at the very moment I was forced to blink and the two big whoppers rolled down my cheeks.

  “Dude, don’t cry. It’s alright.” Liam parked up right next to me and gave me a really big hug.

  I’ll openly admit to a little bit of sobbing. Well, mini-sobbing, really. I think it was the relief that Liam hadn’t dissolved when I told him about the Emjay thing.

  “Is it really alright? I mean, it’s not the best thing to find out after only five weeks.” I dried my eyes on my sleeve.

  It would be truly pointless to ask Liam if he had any tissues.

  “Well, yeah, I guess I’m fine, really. I mean, after f
ive years, maybe it would sting a bit, but, you know, I didn’t….well….I didn’t…..” Liam was totally stuck for words.

  “What?”

  “Dude, I could not say this to anyone but you. I mean, I don’t even know what you’re gonna think of me, but, well, I wasn’t exactly that into Hannah. I mean, she was alright, and I’m really, really worried about her. But only in the way I’d be worried about anyone I knew who’d gone missing. If I’m really honest, I’m probably more worried about myself. If she doesn’t show up soon, I think I’ll end up in prison or something. I know how bad that makes me sound. And I really am worried about her. It totally makes me feel sick to think of her out there, especially if she’s been hurt. I mean, I can’t even think about it. But whether she did or didn’t cheat on me, well, I won’t lose any sleep over that, Dude.”

  “Liam, nobody’s expecting you to be head over heels in love after five weeks.”

  “Yeah, but I wouldn’t have been head over heels in love after five months. Or ever, really. And I think it was the same for Hannah. We were never built to last. It was just a thing. So, do you think I’m a complete tool now?”

  “No, I don’t. Just don’t be that honest when you’re talking to the cops.”

  “Too late, I’m afraid.” Liam spread his arms wide, kind of oops fashion.

  “I take it back. You are a total tool.”

  “I know that now. DI Thorn said that it made sense for me to try to distance myself from Hannah. You know, make it seem as if there was nothing serious between us, especially if I was looking to deny any crimes of passion.”

  “Oh my God. That man is such an idiot.”

  “Well, with me he was kind of in good company I suppose.”

  “Well, that’s true.”

  “Oi, Dude!” Liam punched my arm and laughed.

  “So, you see why I can’t hand in that photocopy, can’t you? The moment he saw the whole Emjay business, he’d really think you’d committed a crime of passion.”

  “Yeah, I do see.” Liam set off for his own end of the bed again, leaning into his pillows and making himself comfortable. “And thanks, Dude. I mean, you’re pretty much risking your own neck for me.”

  “You’d do the same for me.”

  “I have done. Many times. Many, many times!” Liam was smiling, despite the fact that he was rubbing his temples like he had a big, serious headache coming.

  “Oh please! There’s a limit to how many times you can use the colouring book story, my friend.”

  “No there isn’t. That story’s got a bit of everything! Bravery, poignancy, six-year-old kid covered in snot saves the day. It’s a winner every time, and you know it is.”

  “God, you’re such a fool.”

  “So, what’s your next move, Detective Dude?”

  “The vigil. I’m going to go along to that tonight and see what I can see. After that, I’m going to have to do some kind of research to find someone named Emjay.”

  “Well, I can do some googling and Facebook searches and stuff, if that helps?”

  “Yes, that would help, actually.” Another thought struck me as I sat staring into space and chewing my bottom lip. “Actually, can you look through Hannah’s Facebook page and make a list of all of her friends. Just separate them into people you know and people you don’t.”

  “Oh, shrewd move Dude.”

  “Oh please, Liam, you’re slipping into verse now.”

  “Just shut up while I’m trying to be impressed with you.”

  “Well, I’d better get cracking. I’m just going to go straight back to uni, this vigil will be starting soon.” I got up off the bed and put my duffle coat back on. “No doubt Queen Fliss will be all done up like a sherry trifle for the cameras.”

  “Ha, I’ll bet.” Liam got up too. “Look, I’ll grab some crisps and biscuits and stuff from the kitchen on the way out for your rucksack.

  “Thanks Pal.”

  Chapter Seven

  With my rucksack full of the kind of tasty treats which could easily render a person a type-two diabetic overnight, I headed out of Moss Park and back towards the University. Stepping onto the first of two busses, I thanked God for my bus pass.

  It was nearly six o’clock and, as the bus trundled slowly along through the evening traffic, I wondered what time the vigil was due to start. Pulling my phone from my bag, I performed a few rather obvious searches on Facebook to see if anything had been posted. Not entirely to my surprise there was not only a post or two about Hannah’s disappearance and the upcoming vigil, but an entire page had been set up, rather mawkishly titled Hannah Come Home.

  I winced when I saw it; it sounded like the title of some God-awful musical. It certainly had a certain ring of artistic self-indulgence to it. It had clearly been dreamt up by someone who couldn’t see that their smart-arse creation rather made it sound as if Hannah had trotted off of her own accord, leaving those who remained at home with nothing else to do but call whimsically after her, before bursting into song for the final number.

  I checked through the page set-up and could see that Felicity Hardcastle was clearly the administrator. Already it was packed with photos of Hannah, most of which seemed, rather fortuitously, to have Fliss in them too.

  Even more fortuitous was the fact that every shot of Fliss was truly picture-perfect! Not a blemish anywhere, not a hair out of place, and definitely no embarrassing nostril-shots. The same could not be said for Hannah Davenport who, whilst very obviously pretty in most of the photos, was less so in others.

  Of course, had Hannah herself been able to choose, she most certainly would have left some of them out, however pouty and adorable her alleged best-friend looked in them.

  I scanned through all the relevant data with the nimble fingers of a seasoned social media pro. It was odd, really, that I was so good at that stuff, especially since my list of Facebook “friends” was exactly seven.

  It included Liam, two of his jail-bird brothers, and four really odd guys off my engineering course, three of whom had never actually spoken to me, and one of whom really struggled with English and tried to communicate via mathematical formulae, which he was actually very good at. The problem is, I have that same dreadful responsibility towards politeness as most of the inhabitants of the British Isles….

  You have a friend request from David Montgomery!

  Who the hell is David Montgomery?

  Accept or decline?

  David Montgomery….. Oh, is he the guy with the perpetually runny nose who sits seven rows behind me in fluid mechanics and has never even looked my way, never mind spoken to me?

  Accept or decline?

  Oh Lordy, I’d better accept, or I’ll hurt his feelings and, if he ever had actually spoken to me, he sure as hell would stop if I decline his friend request.

  Congratulations! You and David Montgomery are now friends!

  Yippee! Followed by a quick shifty look at his profile to discover that David Montgomery has somewhere in the region of seven-million friends, all of whom he picked at random, just like he did you, Josie Cloverfield….

  Ok, I’m exaggerating, but you get the picture.

  Anyway, whilst I might not be the friendliest person in the world, I’m not above a bit of nosy-parker behaviour. Judge me by all means, I know you do it too.

  To be honest, I’d scanned through the lot; Hannah, Fliss, Amelia, and even Rich Richard. Still, that had been in the early days when I had thought it best to know thine enemy. All I’d actually discovered was that Hannah was a rather spoiled princess, Fliss was a narcissist who would probably need some kind of physical therapy for repetitive strain injury from taking two-thousand selfies too many, Amelia was a notably non-descript disciple of Fliss, and Rich Richard was an odd ball who re-posted curious-humour stuff such as the hunt for a missing giant ball of edam cheese…. I’m being serious.

  So, my scan through the relevant data gave me a start time of seven o’clock, and that the event was definitely going to be held on the
pristine lawns of the Grantstone University Quad.

  I looked at my watch; it was twenty past six already, and I still had one more bus to go. However, I guessed I would probably make it in plenty of time to see the start of things at the vigil.

  With any luck, there would be enough time for me to hot-foot it to my rented locker. Yes, rented locker! I realise that this seems like an extravagance, but I tended to only take home the books I needed for the evening.

  I had many library books and other text books which I had paid for out of the meagre earnings from my job at the dry-cleaners, and did not want to find that any of them had been sold, stolen, burnt for warmth, or simply destroyed for the hell of it by either my mum, or one of her unsavoury acquaintances.

  Anyway, I wanted to stow away the photocopy of Hannah’s diary. I had been carrying it all day and it was starting to feel as if it was getting heavier and heavier; I could feel myself developing some kind of a stoop.

  The charity shop duffle coat was bad enough. I didn’t need to add a Quasimodo-style walk to my already questionable sense of style.

  Bus number two was bang on time and the driver wasn’t one of the kind who gives way ever, or waits for old ladies to finish crossing the road before he roars towards them. At any other time, despicable; at that moment, much appreciated.

  I leapt off the bus outside the uni with twenty minutes to spare and made my way quickly over to the locker room.

  Once the photocopy had been offloaded, I felt like a whole new woman. I’d also found the woollen scarf I had been looking for since the temperatures had dropped to ear-freezing levels, which was a total bonus as far as I was concerned.

  Wrapping the scarf about my neck, I headed for the Quad. At only ten minutes to seven, Fliss was already there directing operations. The problem was that, at that time, there were very few others in attendance, so I could not feasibly watch what was going on without being seen.

  For me to brazenly walk over and offer my new-found enemy some kind of assistance would look truly suspicious, so I plumped for finding a decent hiding place from which to spy.