Wrong Place

by Michelle Davies

  Gillian straddled Della’s body and pinned her arms down with her knees so she couldn’t move. Then she grabbed Della’s chin and squeezed it tightly with her right hand so Della’s mouth was forced wide open. With her left hand Gillian unscrewed the cap from the gin bottle and began to pour. Della tried to scream as the alcohol burned a path down her throat but the rapid flow of liquid rendered her speechless and within seconds she had started to choke.

  She coughed and spluttered and her face turned puce but the gin continued to flow until, with one last futile gulp for air, everything went black.

  63

  Lou sat on the edge of Maggie’s double bed and reread the text her sister had moments ago sent to say she was stuck in Trenton with work and hadn’t had a chance to ring Craig yet but would later. Lou felt a stab of annoyance that Maggie hadn’t made the call a priority. She wouldn’t be able to relax until she knew exactly what she was up against and she didn’t want to have to wait all weekend to find out.

  If she had Craig’s number she could call him herself. They’d met when he was dating Maggie and had got on well, and Lou was fairly confident he’d be fine with her approaching him. She’d always thought it was such a shame Maggie had dumped him and secretly believed her sister’s ridiculously high standards when it came to relationships meant she was probably doomed to be single for a long time. Lou hated being on her own and could never fathom why Maggie seemed to prefer it. Her sister’s rule of not allowing herself to fancy anyone who was already attached was especially mystifying; most of Lou’s relationships had begun with an overlap and she never felt guilty about it. It was just one of those things.

  She still hadn’t heard from Arturs since the fire and knew she wouldn’t unless she called him first. Part of her wanted to speak to him to make sure he kept quiet about her being in the pub when the fire broke out, yet she also knew his silence was already assured because he wouldn’t want to be dragged into any police investigation. His actions on the night of the fire proved that, when he did a runner and left her and the kids to it, the coward.

  She flopped back against the pillows on Maggie’s bed. If she could only unscramble her thoughts long enough to think straight, she’d find a way out of this mess. Between the fire investigation and the contents insurance not paying out, her life was in the shittiest state it had ever been and that was saying something considering what she went through after Jerome was killed. Back then though she only had Jude to think about; now there were three children counting on her to put things right and make life easy again. She hadn’t a fucking clue where to start.

  There was a tap at the door and her mum entered with a cup of tea and a plate of biscuits. Lou suppressed a smile. Jeanette Neville was never very vocal in a crisis, always leaving the talking to their dad; instead she showed she cared by keeping up a steady stream of refreshments. For Jerome’s wake she had personally baked all the quiches and sausage rolls and buttered and assembled every single sandwich to feed the 200 mourners, even though Jerome’s parents were happy to pay for a caterer to save them all the effort. Jeanette wouldn’t hear of it though – those sandwiches were as meaningful to her as the wreaths that covered Jerome’s coffin in the back of the hearse.

  ‘I thought you might like a brew,’ Jeanette said, putting the cup and plate down on the bedside cabinet. ‘Dad’s bathing Mae while the boys do a bit of homework.’

  ‘But their teachers haven’t given them any. When I spoke to both their schools this morning to tell them what happened neither mentioned it.’

  ‘I know, but your dad thought they should do something so he’s making them write a short story based on football.’

  ‘I’m glad he’s taking an interest at last.’

  Jeanette sank down on the bed next to Lou with a sigh.

  ‘Don’t be too hard on him. He knows he’s been silly.’

  ‘But why did he treat them differently for so long? Was it because their dads were both black?’

  ‘I don’t think it’s that,’ said Jeanette carefully. ‘I just think your dad had your life planned out in his head to be very different to how it’s turned out. It’s what parents do. You have expectations.’

  ‘That’s not the boys’ fault though,’ said Lou hotly. ‘My life is down to my choices, not theirs. They didn’t deserve to be ignored.’

  ‘I know that, and your dad realizes that now, and I’m sorry it’s taken him so long. I can’t tell you how overjoyed I am. It’s been very hard for me not being more involved in their lives. I can’t wait for them to come and stay with us in the holidays. We could even take them away ourselves.’ Her mum paused. ‘In fact, your dad and I have been talking and we thought you might want to consider moving closer to us, so we can help out more. I know Maggie does what she can, but she’s always so busy with work.’

  ‘Hang on, one minute Dad can’t bear to be in the same room as my kids and the next he wants us to live next door?’

  ‘It’s only an idea,’ said Jeanette hurriedly. ‘But one you should think about. After all, you don’t know when you’ll get the house sorted and it’s very cramped here for you all. You could come and stay with us for a bit, get a feel for the area.’

  ‘But what about the boys’ schools?’

  Jeanette chuckled. ‘We have schools where we live too you know, very good ones in fact. Look, we’re halfway through November and the boys will be breaking up for Christmas in a few weeks. We might be able to get them places in new schools for the start of the January term.’

  ‘Whoa, slow down, Mum! Leaving Mansell is a massive decision to make. I don’t know how the boys would feel about leaving their schools and their friends. There’s Maggie to consider too. How is she going to feel if we move away?’

  An odd look flitted across Jeanette’s face. ‘It might be a good thing for her too.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Maggie doesn’t have much of a life beyond you and the children and her work.’

  Lou rippled with anger. ‘That’s my fault, is it?’

  ‘Of course not, but I worry the reason she hasn’t settled down is because it would mean cutting back on time she could spend with you and she won’t do that. A bit of distance between you might force her to get out a bit more.’

  Lou shook her head despairingly. ‘This is too much to land on me now, Mum. I’ve got enough on my plate as it is.’

  Jeanette got to her feet and smoothed down her grey woollen skirt, which she wore with a navy jumper, flesh-coloured tights and the fluffy blue slippers she’d grabbed at the last minute when she and her husband rushed from their home in the middle of the night. She looked a bit put out, but tried to hide it with a smile.

  ‘Let’s leave it for now then. I’ll go and see how your dad is getting on with Mae’s bath. We don’t want him flooding the flat downstairs.’

  Lou’s mind whirled as her mum left the room. Moving closer to her parents would make her life easier with all the practical help they could give her and a fresh start was very appealing right now. With Mae’s dad, Rob, moving to Majorca, they might even be able to help her financially when his maintenance payments inevitably dried up. But could she really pack up and leave Mansell? She shook her head to answer her own question. It was ridiculous for her to even consider it with the investigation into the fire hanging over her. If social services got involved, she and the kids wouldn’t be going anywhere.

  She swung her legs off the bed and perched on the edge of it next to the bedside cabinet. All she needed was Craig’s number or even an address. Luckily for her, Maggie was a hoarder so there was a good chance that somewhere she’d find either of them written down. She didn’t think her sister would mind her searching through her things because she never put anything away in the first place.

  Lou pulled open the door to the cabinet and began rummaging through the contents, which included ear plugs, some ornate necklaces she’d never seen Maggie wear, a pack of playing cards out of their box and discarded chocolate bar wrappers. G
od, her sister was slovenly.

  She reached her hand towards the back and pulled out an envelope with her sister’s name on. As she held it in her hands, her face curled into a frown. The handwriting was very, very familiar. Inside the envelope was a greeting card; when Lou carefully eased it out she saw it was in fact a Valentine’s card.

  On the front were two teddy bears embracing and one was holding a heart-shaped balloon. The words printed on the balloon said, ‘To the One I Love’, but someone had added in the word ‘Really’ between ‘I’ and ‘Love’ and underlined it five times.

  Before she could open the card a photograph tucked inside it fell into her lap. Lou picked it up, her heart racing. It was a picture she had a copy of herself at home, of her, Maggie and Jerome, taken a few months before he died. The three of them were in the back garden of her parents’ old house in Mansell, Jerome standing in the middle with his arms slung round each sister. Lou sat still for a few moments, trying to rationalize why Maggie had a copy of it. Had she given it to her? She couldn’t remember. So much of that time after Jerome’s death was a blur.

  Lou put the photograph to one side and held the card in her trembling hands. The teddy bears no longer seemed cute – it was like they were mocking her. Go on, we dare you to read what’s written inside.

  For a second she thought she shouldn’t open the card, that she should just shove it back in the cabinet and pretend she hadn’t seen it. But it was too late for that: even if she didn’t read it, there was no forgetting that it existed.

  Slowly Lou opened the card and read the message phrased in a text speak she was painfully familiar with. A split second later she began to sob, her hand clamped to her mouth to stifle the noise.

  To my sexy Maggie!

  I want to be with u (and in u! ha ha!) all the time.

  Soon it’ll just be u and me. Promise!

  It’s u I want, nobody else.

  I luv u

  Jerome xxxxx

  64

  The confirmation came as DI Green swung into the car park at Trenton’s Princess Alexandra hospital. She made a beeline for the space reserved for police vehicles as Maggie read out the email she’d just received that proved she was correct about Simon Bramwell.

  ‘It checks out? Jesus. I feel like we found a loose thread on a jumper, gave it a tug and now we’ve got a whole crap bag of wool to unravel,’ said Green.

  ‘Do you think Eleanor Bramwell knows?’

  ‘It’s not really a secret you can keep from the person you’re married to, is it?’

  Green sheered into the parking space and yanked on the handbrake.

  ‘I want you to do the talking. You know more about this than I do and it was you who got us this breakthrough. Don’t go hard on him though – he’s not done anything illegal and I don’t want him running screaming to the Chief Constable that we’re unduly harassing him.’

  ‘I’ll tread carefully.’

  ‘Like I said, it’s like a sodding big mess of wool and I don’t know about you but I hate knitting.’

  They climbed out of the car and walked briskly towards the hospital entrance. Maggie glanced across at Green and saw the determination blazing in her eyes. She was flattered the DI trusted her enough to let her lead the questioning but she knew she needed to stay focused. It didn’t matter that she had a million questions for Simon Bramwell about his past; this wasn’t the time to ask them.

  What mattered most was what happened next. What mattered was finding his wife before it was too late.

  65

  The rain was coming down at an angle now, vast sheets of water that soaked through Bea’s coat no matter how hard she pressed herself into the hedge outside Sadie Cardle’s house to shelter herself from it. Rivulets of rainwater dripped from her nose and chin and her muscles ached from the effort of trying to stop shivering.

  It hadn’t been too difficult for her to sneak out once she’d looked up the name of Sadie’s road on the Mansell Echo website, where it had been mentioned in numerous reports about the break-in. Bea had waited until it was nearly 8 p.m. then climbed out of bed, pulled on some clothes and crept downstairs. Her parents had shut themselves in the lounge to eat a takeaway in front of the television and share a bottle of wine and as they laughed loudly at whatever they were viewing, Bea snuck into the kitchen and let herself out of the back door, taking the spare key with her in case it was locked when she returned.

  It hadn’t taken her long to work out which house was Sadie’s. She’d been walking slowly along Frobisher Road, trying to peer in windows, when she saw a woman holding a bunch of flowers knock on a door, only for Della to open it and let her in. Whoever the woman was, Della looked pleased to see her. Grateful for the stroke of luck, Bea then tucked herself behind the hedge at the bottom of the garden and waited for the right moment to knock on the door herself.

  Twenty minutes later she was growing agitated. She bounced on the balls of her feet and the rubber soles of her trainers squelched against the wet concrete. How much longer should she give it?

  In her head she rehearsed what she planned to say to Della about the break-ins. She understood Della might feel obliged to report her to the police anyway, but hoped that if she explained what Sean was like and how he’d threatened her into going along with his plan, she might think twice about it, especially as Bea was going to promise that she would never do anything so awful again. Then she could tell Sean he had nothing to worry about and he would finally leave her and Esme alone.

  The front door of the neighbouring house opened and two elderly women came down the path, both sheltering under umbrellas. Bea moved again so she was concealed from view behind the hedge.

  ‘I really think I should tell Della that I’m going to stay at your house for a day or two,’ said the shorter of the women.

  ‘After what she said to you? No, you shouldn’t. She was very rude by the sounds of it.’

  ‘She’s having a terrible time of it, Sheila. I don’t think you should be so hard on her.’

  Bea realized it was the Sheila who worked at the charity shop with her mum. The other woman must be her sister, Audrey.

  ‘Call her later if you’re that bothered. Now come on, I’m getting soaked.’

  The two women climbed into a car parked on the roadside and drove off. Sheila was driving while Audrey sat in the passenger seat with an overnight bag resting on her lap.

  The street suddenly felt very empty without them, Bea’s only company now being the lampposts emitting a weak orange glow blurred around the edges by the driving rain. As she pulled the hood of her coat further down her forehead to keep her face dry, she didn’t blame everyone else for staying indoors on such a dismal night. It had to be the reason why there had been no sign of Sean so far, despite how closely he’d been watching her that week. She’d been braced for him to sneak up on her as she left home but she hadn’t spotted him lurking in her street and nor had he popped up as she walked the forty-minute route to Frobisher Road. Or rather she hoped the rain had kept him indoors like everyone else – because the alternative was that he had followed Esme to Amelia’s and was outside there.

  The thought made Bea quiver with fear. She had to end this before Sean got his hands on her sister. She sent Esme a text to check she was okay and having a good time at Amelia’s and Esme pinged back a message within seconds confirming she was, on both counts. She’d signed it off with four heart emojis, which made Bea even more determined.

  But before she could make a move, the front door to Sadie’s house slowly opened and a blonde-haired woman, presumably the friend who had knocked for Della earlier, peered out into the gloom.

  The woman didn’t notice Bea pressed into the hedge as she slipped down the path and unlocked the boot of a red car parked nearest to the gate. It was only when the woman turned to go back up the path to the house that her face was illuminated under the lamppost and Bea got a clear look at her. She frowned. The woman looked weirdly familiar. Where had she seen her before?<
br />
  She thought the woman was getting ready to leave and the coast would be clear for her to speak to Della, so Bea followed her up the gravel-pitted path to the house, ready to say hello. When she reached the front door, which was ajar, she realized the house was shrouded in darkness – the living-room light had been switched off but the curtains were still open. It was the same upstairs: curtains open, the rooms in darkness. Even if Della and her friend were at the back of the house, Bea would still expect to see a bit of light shining through from somewhere. Why were they sitting in the dark, she wondered?

  ‘Hello?’ she called out, pushing the door open further. ‘Della?’

  She was inside the hallway now but it was as black as ink and her eyes struggled to focus.

  How strange. She’d been outside the whole time, so there was no way the woman and Della could’ve gone out without her noticing, unless they’d gone out the back door. But why would they leave the front one unlocked and open?

  ‘Are you in here, Della?’ she called out.

  The tremor in her voice betrayed how frightened she was becoming. The two women must be in the house still but why were they being so quiet?

  Every fibre of Bea’s being screamed at her to leave but she couldn’t go without knowing Della was okay. She had a really bad feeling about this.

  Trembling from head to foot, she tiptoed along the hallway until she reached another door. The handle turned easily and she eased the door open to step inside the kitchen. It appeared empty, but as she fumbled her way in the darkness she suddenly sensed someone behind her.

  Bea went to turn round but she was too slow. Something hard and heavy crashed into the back of her head and the pain was so agonizing that in the seconds before she collapsed she couldn’t muster even the smallest of screams.

  66

  Simon Bramwell was far more amenable to a visit from the police than his wife had been. He looked weak and washed-out but that did not diminish his obvious attractiveness. It was his eyes that drew Maggie in first, framed by long lashes that would’ve looked effeminate on other men but on him were alluring. He was broad in build, the arms exposed by his short-sleeved hospital gown impressively muscular, and he had the robust look of someone who regularly worked out and ate well.