Joanie emits an exasperated tut, though whether this is directed at me for being thrown by his presence or at Robbie for leaping about like an overgrown puppy is hard to tell.
“Hi, Livy—God, it’s fantastic to see you,” Robbie gushes.
“Er, you too,” I say, feeling my cheeks burn.
“Mum said you might pop by,” Robbie goes on, sailing past his mother to plant two huge kisses on either side of my face. “What brings you to Bridport? I came up to see Mum yesterday. I’ve taken a few days off from the hotel. If I’d known you were coming, I’d have offered you a lift.”
He bustles me past Joanie and into the living room while I repeat my “old friend in the neighborhood” cover story. A quick look around the furnishings, all rather stiff and formal, reminds me of how much older than my own mother Joanie is. Almost a different generation. The lawn through the French windows is mown in careful stripes. A charred patch in the corner—presumably from a recent bonfire, though it’s an odd time of year to be having one—makes a sharp contrast with the manicured rose beds. Unlike our overgrown garden at home, there’s not a weed in sight.
“Would you like a cup of tea? Coffee?” Robbie hovers over me as I sit at one end of the couch.
Joanie perches on the armchair opposite. Up close, I can see the strain in her eyes.
“Nothing, thanks.”
Robbie nods and takes the seat beside me. He’s sitting too close. I shift away. Back off, Dickweasel. That’s what Julia would say.
But I am not Julia.
“How’s Wendy?” I ask.
“She’s fine,” Robbie says, smoothing his fingers through the hair that creeps over his shirt collar at the back of his neck. I wonder idly why he can’t see that keeping it long at the back just accentuates how bald he’s going on top. “Wendy’s at home right now with the kids. I’ve been helping Mum go through some of Julia’s things.”
“That must be hard.” I hesitate. “Er, perhaps I could help?”
“No need.” Joanie purses her lips. “We’re actually rather busy,” she says pointedly.
“Right.” I gulp. I’m clearly going to have to be more direct, though Joanie certainly isn’t making it easy. “I’m sorry to barge in on you. I … I’ve been so upset about Julia. I am so upset—”
“We all are.” Joanie speaks with feeling.
“Of course.” I pause. “The thing is, there are some things—unanswered questions, really—that have been puzzling me.”
Joanie raises her eyebrows. I can feel Robbie’s presence, still too close. He is watching me intently. I have a sudden flashback to the day I met him. He didn’t go to university himself but came to Exeter on a regular basis—mostly, as far as I could see, to muscle in on Julia’s social life. We met one evening when he was out with Julia and Kara. I didn’t take to him much on that first occasion; he seemed nervous around his own sister—who teased him mercilessly—and strangely overawed by mine. And he didn’t know how to talk to me, veering between shyness and swagger. For a while I wondered if he might be secretly gay—he seemed so uncomfortable around women. It strikes me now that, with a mother like Joanie, it would have been surprising if he’d behaved any other way.
“Unanswered questions?” Joanie’s voice is like steel. “Is this related to your … your outburst at the funeral?”
“Sort of.” I launch into my prepared story, explaining how Shannon ran away from me when I met her in Aces High. Not wanting to reveal that I found the details of her meeting with Julia in a diary in Julia’s flat, I say vaguely that Julia had mentioned she was planning to see Shannon and that it was important for some reason. “Shannon was waiting at the bar. She didn’t know Julia was dead, and, when I told her, she looked terrified.”
“That must have been terribly upsetting for you,” Robbie says. His voice is overly sympathetic.
I nod, not wanting to meet his gaze. A black cat wanders in through the open door as Joanie stares at me. I stroke her back, then watch as the cat slinks across the carpet and rubs herself against Joanie’s legs.
Joanie gives the cat a pat and I remember Julia telling me how Joanie showed way more affection to her bloody pets than to us when we were growing up … always a cat on the go, never dogs, they need real love.
“So Julia told you that she was planning to see this girl, but not why she was meeting her?” Joanie raises an eyebrow, and for a second I get a glimpse of Julia: coolly sardonic and nobody’s fool.
Beside me, Robbie sits back. He’s still watching me intently. His gaze is unsettling. Between his overt interest and Joanie’s naked contempt, I’m rapidly losing my handle on our conversation.
“Like I say, there are unanswered questions,” I press on. “I know Damian—Julia’s boyfriend—has been in touch and he’s also, er, concerned. He believes Julia was investigating something from—”
“Stop.” Joanie raises her hand, palm toward me. “Livy, I’ve always liked you. I know you and Julia were good friends. But you’re presuming too much.” She hesitates, lowering her hand. “In fact, I’m sorry about this, but I have to ask you something.”
“No, Mum.” Robbie sits forward, suddenly anxious.
“What is it?” I press my lips together. My emotions right now feel so turbulent, I could just as easily shout as weep—possibly both.
“I need to ask you if you’ve been to Julia’s flat since … that terrible day?…”
My cheeks burn. What was it that gave my illicit visit away? I look into Joanie’s cold, judgmental eyes, and a shudder runs through my body. I see no warmth and no concern, just hostility. No wonder Julia described her mother as an emotional vampire.
“Livy?”
I clear my throat. “I did go back, just the once. I had keys, you know, Julia and I kept each other’s keys.”
Joanie nods. “Ah, I thought that must be the case. Which means these must be yours.” She fishes in her handbag and hands me my own spare keys, presumably taken from Julia’s silver Tiffany fob.
“Yes, er, thank you.”
“I’d like Julia’s set back now, please.”
My fingers tremble as I remove Julia’s keys from my key ring. Just like at the funeral, I feel as if I’m losing her in some small yet significant way. I hand the keys over.
“So what did you take?” Joanie’s question is so direct, I almost gasp a second time.
“What? Nothing.”
Joanie purses her lips. It’s obvious she doesn’t believe me. Then I remember how Julia’s computer and TV and a few pictures, vintage bags, and bits of jewelry were missing.
“I didn’t take anything,” I insist. “The TV and her Mac and things in her bedroom … they were already gone when I got there. I … I thought you took them.”
“That’s right, we did.” Robbie smiles, clearly trying to ease the tension. “Mum and I took away some of the more valuable items as soon as the police allowed us.”
Joanie raises an irritated eyebrow. “Obviously we did that for security reasons. Julia left no will, you see, but the more significant pieces of jewelry were itemized on her insurance.”
“No will?” Is she serious? I can’t believe organized, efficient Julia didn’t make a will. Okay, so she had no dependents, no pressing reason to make sure her affairs were in order, but Julia would have considered it messy not to tie up any loose ends. She owned two properties, after all—not to mention all the designer outfits and the jewelry.
“We checked all the expensive things,” Joanie goes on. “Everything is accounted for except one item: a diamond and emerald ring valued at just over eight thousand pounds.” She glares at me with cold eyes. “I would have had no objection to you taking a memento or two, but that really wasn’t acceptable.”
My jaw drops. Joanie thinks I stole the ring?
I glance at Robbie. He is looking away, unable to meet my eyes. My dickweasel brother is such a coward. Julia’s voice sounds in my head. Robbie might still like me, but clearly not enough to defend me to his m
other.
“I didn’t … I wouldn’t…,” I stammer.
Silence.
A memory shoots through me, hard and painful as a spear. There was missing jewelry when Kara died too, a silver locket that Julia had bought her as a Christmas present from a market. It was a pretty little thing, worth far more than Julia had paid for it, with a curly K inscribed on the front. Kara had loved it. I remember her showing off the gift. Kara had put a picture of herself and Julia inside the locket—smiling heads from some photo booth. Kara had been delighted and wore it around her neck constantly. It was discovered missing after her death. Julia insisted Kara had been wearing it the night she died. If that was true, then either her killer took it, presumably for its cash value or, more likely, it was ripped off and fell into the canal when he dragged her under the bridge. Either way, the locket never turned up. And now Julia’s ring has disappeared. Is that coincidence? Or is it a sign of something more sinister?
I glance up at Joanie. She’s still watching me, hooded eyes icy and aloof. Robbie is watching me too. He mouths the words I’m sorry at me. At least he doesn’t think I’m a thief.
“I didn’t take Julia’s ring,” I say.
Joanie tilts her head skeptically to one side. “I do understand that Julia meant a lot to you, Livy. As I say, if you had asked me directly for a keepsake, I would happily have given—”
“I didn’t take it. I didn’t take anything and I don’t want anything.” A lump lodges in my throat. Emotions swirl about my head, the injustice of Joanie’s accusation but also the pressing thought that an expensive ring might give a new slant to Julia’s death. “Suppose whoever killed Julia took the ring?” I blurt out.
“For goodness’ sake.”
“Livy, don’t,” Robbie adds.
“Please, I just want the truth about her death.”
“The truth?” Joanie snaps. “The truth is that Julia was willful and selfish. She saw a therapist for several years in her twenties—as you know—and while she hadn’t done so recently, she was still unstable.”
“No,” I protest. It’s true that Julia saw a therapist after leaving university for a year or so. She didn’t speak much about the experience, though she told me it had helped her come to terms with Kara’s death.
“I’m sorry, Livy, but it’s the truth,” Robbie says.
“Quite.” Joanie sits back, clenching her hands over the arms of her chair. Her knuckles are white, her jaw rigid.
“No,” I repeat.
“Enough, Livy,” Joanie insists. “I understand that you’re upset and I know that Damian is upset too. I think you both feel guilty that you weren’t enough to stop Julia from killing herself. God knows, I do. But we all have to be strong. We have to accept reality, not indulge in fantastical conjectures.”
“I think there’s more to it than th—”
“I said stop.” Joanie raises her voice. She stands up and paces across the room to look out through the French windows. “This is hard enough, Livy. I’m really disappointed that you are denying taking that ring.”
I turn to Robbie helplessly.
“We’re not accusing you,” he says.
“Yes, you are.”
“Yes, we are,” Joanie snaps. “As far as I can work out, no one else had keys to the flat. Damian didn’t. None of her other friends. Just you. And there was no break-in, so…”
I don’t know what to say to convince her I’m not the thief. “Perhaps if you let me look on Julia’s computer or in her papers, I’ll be able to find something that helps prove what I’m saying.”
Joanie turns to look at me. Her eyes are like chips of ice. She points to the burnt patch of ground outside. “We destroyed the papers. The computer too. It had little resale value, and Robbie felt it would only upset me to have it here in the house.”
I stare from her to Robbie, too shocked to speak. Robbie nods, confirming his mother’s words. He looks uncomfortable.
“You burned her papers?”
Joanie nods.
“And her computer?”
“Yes, well, the hard drive, anyway. There was nothing important on it, a few work articles, old invoices, that sort of thing. It seemed more secure than just throwing it away. Same with all the paperwork.”
“But they could have been important.” I’m on my feet, facing her now. “There could have been stuff that meant something to Julia in there.…” Maybe information about meeting Shannon and the identity of Kara’s killer. I don’t say that last thought out loud.
Joanie shakes her head. “I think we’ve talked about this enough, Livy. Thank you for the keys to Julia’s flat. I’ll be handing them over to the estate agent next week. I don’t think there’s—”
“Estate agent?”
“Yes, we’re selling the apartment as soon as all the legal forms are sorted. And that cottage of hers in Lympstone. It shouldn’t take too long. As I was saying, I think it’s probably best if you leave now.”
A hollow feeling swells inside me that has nothing to do with Kara’s death years ago or the idea that Julia might have met a violent end herself. It’s the terrible sense that just as her story was rewritten to make her a victim, now Julia’s entire past is being wiped out. Soon I will be left with no tangible trace of my best friend. And there’s nothing I can do about it.
“You’re putting the flat on the market next week?” I whisper.
Joanie offers a curt nod. She walks to the living room door. She’s wearing proper shoes indoors, I notice, with mid heels. In a daze, I let myself be shown out of the house. Robbie, who hasn’t spoken since his mother mentioned burning Julia’s things, gives me a big hug while Joanie opens the front door.
“See you soon,” he whispers, his breath hot against my ear, his voice too low for Joanie to catch. For a second I want to snap at him, Julia-style, for not defending me better to his mother, but of course I don’t. Instead I turn to Joanie, feeling more dazed. She pecks me on the cheek—her lips are cold and hard—and I stumble down the front path toward my car.
I look back as I reach the sidewalk, but Joanie has already shut the door. I take a deep breath, tears pricking at my eyes. Joanie’s wheelie bins stare accusingly at me. The things of Julia’s that Joanie and Robbie have burned must be inside these trash bins. My pulse suddenly races. I glance up at the house again. There’s no sign of either of them.
Without stopping to think, I flip open the first trash can. The stench of cat pee, presumably from a litter tray, is overpowering, but underneath I catch the scent of burnt paper. I reach in and take out two white garbage bags. Leaving them on the sidewalk, I turn to the second barrel. This one contains a single large black bag. And a definite burnt smell. I whip it out, then carry all three bags to my car. I shove them on the backseat, then get in quickly. A final glance back at the house, but neither Joanie nor Robbie are looking out.
I start the engine and maneuver the car onto the road. As I drive away, I imagine the shocked look on Julia’s face if she could see me now: Livy Small does it all, she’d say, her eyes wide with wonder. Housewife. Mother. Thief.
CHAPTER EIGHT
It’s almost time to pick Zack up from school, and Damian and I are still sifting through Joanie’s junk in my back garden.
I called Damian on my way home. Whatever his motives, there was no one else I could turn to, and as I expected, he was eager to help. If he was shocked at my theft of Joanie’s trash bags, he didn’t show it, just got straight down to examining their contents, looking for anything that might lead us to Julia’s investigation into Kara’s killer. An hour and a half in, and we’ve still found nothing.
It’s painstaking work—after a dry, sunny start, it has turned into one of those horrid overcast, humid summer days, and we’re both filthy and sweating. Damian takes a break for a cigarette. It’s the second he’s smoked since he got here. I’m surprised. Since giving up the vice herself, Julia was vehemently anti-smoking. None of her previous boyfriends would have dared light up in he
r presence. I point this out to Damian. He grins and tells me they argued about it. I get the impression Damian won the argument, and that Julia loved him standing up to her. A welcome breeze dances across our faces as we talk, sharing our reminiscences. Damian laughs—a huge, warm belly laugh—when I tell him how Julia bought the kids a board game they’d wanted last Christmas, but forgot it needed batteries. After a long look at Zack’s disappointed face and a quick and fruitless search of her kitchen drawers, Julia’s eyes had lit up. “She said she knew where there were some,” I explain. “So I followed her into her bedroom and found her removing the double As from her vibrator.”
“Only Julia.” Damian shakes his head, still grinning, though I can hear the sense of loss in his voice.
I smile back. I am warming to him more and more. He speaks of Julia with such affection, and again, I feel comforted, no longer so alone with my grief.
I gaze back at the contents of the three trash bags that now litter our overgrown lawn. Most of it is ashes. I watch the curls and wisps tumbling over the grass and think of Julia. Morbid, I know, but I completely forgot to ask Joanie what she is planning to do with Julia’s ashes. Will I even be invited to be part of whatever she decides?
My thoughts drift to the only other comparable ceremony I have ever been part of. Julia herself wasn’t there when we scattered Kara’s ashes the autumn after her death. Mum and Dad wanted it to be just the three of us. It didn’t occur to me at the time that Julia might have felt left out by our decision. It hurts that I can now neither find out, nor make it up to her.
We’d picked the Botanical Gardens, near our house in Bath. I walked between my parents, our arms linked as we reminisced about previous, happier visits. We’d gone there often while Kara and I were growing up. I used to love exploring the nooks and crannies of the rock garden while Kara—who always carried life more lightly than I did—ran about on the grass and exclaimed at how pretty the flame-colored maple trees were.
We scattered Kara’s ashes in the Great Dell. Mum kept looking around, worried because ash-scattering wasn’t officially allowed. Dad was irritated by her anxiety, her need to follow the rules. He used to be a conventional, rule-following kind of man himself, but the rules hadn’t saved his beautiful, beloved girl, and her loss left him unanchored, his worldview as shattered as his heart. I can still see him now, face creased with pain, refusing to allow himself the release of the tears shed freely by Mum and me.
You Can Trust Me Page 11
