Lie to Me: A gripping psychological thriller with a shocking twist

by Jess Ryder

  But as the afternoon makes its slow, weary way to 5 p.m. – the earliest we can all leave for the pub – my thoughts wander back to Eliot. Vague, Rioja-fuelled feelings of lust rise within me, making me hot and restless. I try to imagine him having sex with someone else to test my lack of desire, but it keeps turning into memories of being with him. It was good, I remember. The sex. It was always good, from our very first night together.

  We fell in love really quickly, moved in together after only three months; found a tiny one-bedroomed flat above a greengrocer’s, damp and dark in the winter, stinking of rotting vegetables in the summer and outrageously expensive all year round. We went to IKEA and bought throws and blinds and lamps, carried home flat-packed bookshelves on the bus. Dad gave me his old dining table, Eliot’s parents a set of wine glasses and a fancy grater for Parmesan cheese. He was working on the PC Response Team then – 999 calls all hours of the day and night, burglaries, robberies, car crime; it was exhausting. But we still made love several times a week and all through the weekend. For the first six months or so, anyway.

  Inevitably, things slowed down – that didn’t worry me; I mean, nobody can keep up that kind of pace. The sex was never the problem. It was Eliot’s job. The long, awkward shifts, the cancelled leave, the lack of social life, the physical and emotional strain. Eliot brought his work home every night – and not only in his briefcase. He couldn’t stop talking about the victims, as if he felt responsible for them. I know it was stupid, but I started to feel jealous. And I wasn’t allowed to complain about my work or our relationship – or anything – because there were all these poor women out there who were really suffering. And that just made me feel worse. Selfish. Guilty. Resentful. He was off-loading all his stress onto me and then criticising me for not coping. It started off as lightweight bickering, with the occasional row. Then we started screaming at each other. We weren’t special, we were disappointingly normal. The divorce rate amongst police officers is extremely high, but we never even made it down the aisle.

  Looking back, it was amazing that we stuck it out for four years. We loved each other, that’s why. I didn’t want us to split up, but I also knew I couldn’t be a policeman’s wife. And there was no way he would give up his career. I remember those last months when the relationship was dying – all that talking, talking, talking through the midnight hours, lying in bed in the darkness, him exhausted and me refusing to let him sleep, going on and on about how I didn’t know what I felt any more, not just about our relationship but my whole life. I know I wore him out. But even after awful, no-going-back things were said and we’d both wept and begged forgiveness, we still made love; a desperate, clinging kind of sex, both thinking maybe this was the last time, maybe we’d never do it again, not with each other, not with anyone.

  Then one lazy Saturday morning we had an early-morning cuddle that turned into something more, desire creeping up on us unawares. Warm, affectionate lovemaking, not like those mad, sad fucks of previous weeks, and I remember feeling that we’d turned a corner. Afterwards I got up and made tea and Scotch pancakes to have in bed, but when I got back he was already dressed, told me he was moving out, that he couldn’t go on like this. I’ll never forgive him for making love to me without telling me it was the last time.

  My mobile rings and his photo comes up on the screen, making me jump, as if he’s been eavesdropping on my thoughts. I take a deep breath and answer as casually as I can.

  ‘Eliot! How’s it going?’

  ‘Fine… Can you talk?’

  ‘Hang on,’ I say, getting up from my desk and going into the corridor. My hands feel clammy around the phone. He’s found something. He wouldn’t have rung if he hadn’t found something. ‘So? Any luck?’

  ‘Sort of… You were born in Birmingham, right?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Trust him to remember. ‘We moved to Essex when I was about six.’

  ‘Hmm, that makes sense. Local murder case, lots of stuff on the news.’ He sounds pleased with himself.

  ‘So there was an actual murder?’

  ‘Cara Travers was a young actress, stabbed to death at a local beauty spot in August 1984. The case was never solved.’

  ‘She was a real person…’ I feel a shiver run right through me. ‘And what about the other one? Christopher Jay?’

  ‘Don’t know. It was before computerisation, so there’s no detail on the original case on HOLMES, just a couple of case reviews that got nowhere.’

  ‘And this was in Birmingham?’

  ‘Yup. It was known as the Darkwater Murder. As it happens, my boss used to work at Heartlands – DI Gerrard, remember her?’ Of course I remember Siobhan Gerrard; I used to be jealous of her. An Irish Brummie with flaming-red hair and a large bosom, brain the size of a department store, ten years older than Eliot and happily married, but otherwise a perfect match for him – another cop, someone who understood the life.

  ‘Did she work on it, then?’ I say.

  ‘No,’ he laughs, ‘way before her time. But her boss back then worked on the case as a young DC, so she knew a bit about it. Anyway, I showed her the DVD – hope you don’t mind – and she immediately sent it on to this guy in Birmingham.’ He lowers his voice conspiratorially. ‘Turns out he’s now the chief constable! How crazy is that?’

  He showed her the video. Why did he do that? ‘It’s not a public document, Eliot,’ I say, stiffly. ‘It’s not like I put it on Facebook.’

  ‘I thought you wanted me to investigate.’

  ‘I did, but…’

  ‘Chief Constable Durley came straight back to Siobhan, really interested. He wants to talk to you about it. Off the record.’

  ‘What? But I don’t know anything.’

  ‘He wants to see us both tomorrow afternoon, at his place. It sounds important.’

  ‘We’ve got to go all the way to Birmingham?’

  ‘It’s not that far; there are loads of trains.’

  ‘But why? I don’t understand. Anyway, I don’t think I’m free… I… I’m,’ I stammer, desperately trying to think of a reason to get out of it.

  ‘Look, Meri. When a chief constable asks to see you, you jump. We can’t refuse to go.’

  ‘But why does it have to be off the record?’

  ‘I don’t know… I guess we’ll find out.’

  Chapter Six

  Cara

  February 1984

  Isobel’s list of things to do was extensive, with actions grouped into headings – Creative, Admin, Transport, Finance, Publicity, Miscellaneous – and a separate column denoting who was going to take responsibility for what. As Cara had recent clerical experience, her initials featured strongly in the Admin and Finance sections, while Isobel put herself down for Transport and Publicity. Tasks under Creative were allotted to both of them jointly – this was, after all, what Purple Blaze was all about.

  After hours of animated discussion, it was unanimously decided that their first production would be a one-hour original play, devised through improvisation and then scripted by Isobel, which would be toured to community venues in the Midlands area. As for what the play would be about, they didn’t yet know. The nuclear threat, Margaret Thatcher, whales and glue-sniffing were themes under consideration, but so far no clear front-runner had emerged. Until they knew what their first show was about, there was little they could do on any other front, but Isobel would not be rushed into creative decisions. It was all very well for her, thought Cara, she had her inheritance money to live off, some ten thousand pounds. In contrast, Cara had used up her meagre savings and was signing on.

  While waiting for creative inspiration to strike, Cara busied herself organising the dining room as the company admin office. With Isobel’s money, they bought a grey metal filing cabinet from the junk shop in Redborne High Street and dragged it all the way down the hill. At the moment, all it housed were two reams of Purple Blaze letterhead and a hundred matching envelopes, but there was enormous potential for alphabetically ordered suspension fil
es and colour-coded labels.

  A month had quickly passed and Cara was sticking the calendar to the chimney breast with Blu-Tack when she heard a loud beeping sound outside. Somebody was clearly trying to attract attention. She ignored it at first, thinking it must be a taxi for one of the neighbours, but when it didn’t stop, she finally went to look out of the living-room window.

  The sound was coming from a battered old Bedford van, parked right outside the house, and Isobel was sitting in the driver’s seat. Cara ran into the hallway, threw open the front door and rushed out.

  Isobel wound down the window and the strains of a pop song wafted out. ‘Fifty quid! And it’s taxed and MOT’d for nine months.’ She waited for Cara to respond. ‘Well, what do you think?’

  The first phrase that came into Cara’s head was one of her father’s favourites – ‘throwing good money after bad’ – but Isobel’s face was shining so brightly, she didn’t dare say it. Instead, she laughed and said, ‘Well, I guess that’s Transport ticked.’

  The van had been resprayed but the name of its previous owner – the Birmingham Evening Mail – was still visible under the patchy white paint. Isobel slid open the door and then moved across so that Cara could climb inside and sit on the torn mustard leatherette seat. The cab stank of stale tobacco and male sweat, and Cara immediately imagined the ghosts of two overweight men with cheerful Brummie accents hauling bundles of papers onto damp pavements, dodging through the rush-hour traffic, parking up on kerbs, reversing into bollards.

  ‘Let’s call her Bertha,’ said Isobel. ‘Bertha the Bedford.’ She slapped her hand on the dashboard and the cover of the glove compartment fell off. ‘Only sixty thousand miles; amazing, eh?’

  ‘Hmm…’ Cara frowned. ‘It must have gone round the clock. At least once.’

  ‘Oh, don’t be so negative! What do you expect for fifty quid?’

  ‘We should have it – I mean her – sprayed purple, with the company logo on the side,’ replied Cara, trying to make up for the previous remark.

  ‘That’s a brilliant idea… Come on, out you get.’ Cara climbed out, then Isobel heaved the door shut and locked it, dropping the keys into the front pocket of her skirt. ‘Let’s go inside and celebrate – I’ve got teacakes.’

  Teacakes. Cara knew what that meant: Isobel had been worried about her purchase, so she’d bought a peace offering in advance. Teacakes were special; they played an important, symbolic role in their friendship. It had begun shortly after Cara left her student accommodation and moved in to share with Isobel. About ten people lived in the house – allegedly; the landlord rented by the room, each secured with its own padlock. The two girls were never really sure who their housemates were, rarely meeting the same person twice on their way to the grimy shared bathroom. There was a hole in the roof so large that when it snowed just before Christmas, a shaft of snowflakes fell spectacularly onto the upstairs landing, and the very top bedroom had been taken over by pigeons. The oven didn’t work and they’d found mice in the cutlery drawer, so they only ever ventured into the tiny galley kitchen to fill the kettle. Cooking was impossible, but Isobel discovered that if you sliced a teacake down the middle you could just about shove the two halves into the rusty old toaster they kept in their room. Cara would watch anxiously as Isobel poked about with a knife, saying, ‘Turn it off at the socket, you’ll electrocute yourself!’ and Isobel would laugh and tell her she liked living dangerously.

  Now Cara followed Isobel into the house and put the kettle on. The teacakes were sliced and placed in the toaster and soon the kitchen was smelling sweetly of melted butter and burnt raisins.

  ‘Now we’ve got the transport sorted, I suppose we can start hiring actors,’ said Isobel casually, as she poured the tea.

  ‘It’s too early, isn’t it? I mean, we don’t know what the show’s about yet.’ Cara felt instantly miffed. She was enjoying their life here, just the two of them, buying stationery and rearranging furniture – playing at theatre companies as she’d once played schools or hospitals with her dolls.

  ‘Plays with only two people in are so dull.’ Isobel bit into a teacake, letting the melted butter dribble down her chin. ‘And it would be better if I just directed.’

  ‘But actors will need paying.’ Cara heard her voice rising with desperation. ‘I don’t want you spending any more of your inheritance, it’s not fair.’

  ‘We’ll do it as a profit share. I’ve already written the advert and sent it to The Stage. It’ll be in this Thursday.’ Isobel leaned across and planted a kiss on Cara’s head. ‘It’s all sorted,’ she said.

  ‘We ought to go through all these CVs,’ said Isobel, a week later. They were sitting on the rug in the beautiful sitting room, trays of Chinese takeaway littering the highly polished coffee table. My treat, Isobel had insisted. ‘Decide on a shortlist, then we can run auditions next week. Sooner the better really. Don’t want the good ones getting other jobs.’

  ‘They won’t…’ Cara stabbed a piece of fried chicken with a plastic chopstick. She felt strangely aggressive towards the torrent of applications that had poured through the letter box over the past few days. They were piled on the dining table in the office, reeking of desperation. It wasn’t a nice feeling, being on the other side of the process – suddenly an employer instead of an applicant – and she felt like a fraud. Actors, it seemed, were easily duped. All you needed was a logo, a company name and an advert the size of a postage stamp.

  ‘We’ve got to get them down to a manageable number.’ Isobel slurped up her last noodle noisily. ‘What do you reckon? Twenty?’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘Great. Do you want to fetch them while I clear the decks?’ No, Cara didn’t want to fetch them. She wanted to put them in the bin and forget they’d ever arrived.

  Isobel climbed onto the tiny sofa and patted the cushion for Cara to join her. They spent the next hour reading through what turned out to be nearly two hundred submissions of varying quality, sharing dreadful photos of young would-be actors posing with their chin resting on a single pensive finger, or sitting glumly in a Woolworth’s Photo-Me booth because they couldn’t afford to pay for a professional photographer. Anyone not obviously left-wing went into the reject pile straight away. Nor was Isobel interested in anyone who said they loved musicals.

  ‘It’s so hard,’ said Cara, thinking of all the failed applications she’d made over the past months. ‘Who are we to judge?’

  Isobel sat up straight. ‘Have they started their own theatre company? Have they had the vision, the passion – the ambition to do something for themselves?’

  ‘Have they got a Bertha the Bedford?’ Cara parried, trying to warm things up with a touch of self-irony. There was a pause, then Isobel threw back her head and laughed. After that, she treated the submissions with more kindness. They discussed the candidates one by one, finally making a small pile of auditionees, who would be rung the next day and invited to attend ‘an informal devising workshop’.

  It was happening, whether Cara liked it or not.

  Chapter Seven

  Me

  ‘You okay?’ asks Eliot as the black cab pulls up outside Chief Constable Durley’s house.

  ‘Think so…’ A shiny black Mercedes is parked on the huge block-paved driveway. ‘Just not sure why I’m here. It all feels a bit too… official.’

  ‘You were the one who wanted to find out more.’ He gives me a reassuring smile.

  Durley must have heard the taxi because he opens the front door before we ring the bell. He’s tall and slim, a good head of salt-and-pepper hair cut square and short, clean-shaven, thick eyebrows plucked and trimmed, a pair of steel-rimmed glasses resting on his long, straight nose, his face set in a professional smile. He looks like one of those men who don’t do casual, not even when they’re gardening or mucking out the garage; I imagine him still wearing his uniform underneath the brown cords and green checked shirt and I want to giggle.

  ‘Thanks for coming,’ he says. ‘G
ood journey?’

  Both men do the niceties so well. Durley talks to Eliot mainly, asking after Siobhan Gerrard, whom he calls a smart cookie, reporting that he’s heard what a bright young thing Eliot is, a glittering future ahead of him and all that guff.

  ‘The country’s short of talented detectives, a lot of young people can’t hack it, aren’t prepared to put in the hours.’ He takes our coats and hangs them on a set of brass hooks. ‘The force needs to hold on to people like you.’

  The house is imposing and a little chilly – high decorative ceilings, a large tiled hallway with several heavy doors no doubt leading to well-proportioned reception rooms. Durley opens one, and sure enough, we’re in a large lounge overlooking a beautifully kept garden. My eyes wander over the pale pink three-piece-suite, the dark polished furniture, family portraits in silver frames jockeying for position on the sideboard, a modest-sized television in one alcove, a small bookcase in the other, an immaculate cream carpet protected by a large Chinese rug. The chief constable asks us about milk and sugar and then bustles off to make tea.

  There’s a large framed photo on the wall above the mantelpiece: Durley and a thin, frail woman, smiling from her wheelchair as she hands a bunch of flowers to the queen. ‘Is that his wife?’ I whisper, afraid to say anything out loud, as if the place might be bugged.

  ‘Think so. She died last year – bowel cancer. Durley does a lot of fund-raising for Macmillan Nurses, ran a marathon the other week.’

  I choose the middle seat of the sofa and sit down. ‘Impressive.’

  ‘Yup, he’s impressive all right…’ Eliot walks over to the large French windows and stares out at the patio with ornamental pond, a long green rectangle of lawn, neat shrubs and well-weeded flower beds. ‘Joined the local Heartlands force under the fast-track graduate scheme and made it to inspector in record time. Went to Mercia as assistant chief at forty, back at Heartlands as the dep at fifty, chief since 2008, honorary fellow of King’s College, Queen’s Police Medal, OBE, retiring at the end of the year.’