Liars: A gripping psychological thriller with a shocking twist

by Frances Vick

  It was only after his father’s death had propelled him back into hospital, and after his mother’s diagnosis had propelled him out again, that he put it up in his old bedroom, and spent long hours gazing at it, hoping desperately for her, praying that they would meet, properly, soon. That they would be together, for ever, at last.

  She wanted that too. Of course she did. But, she reminded him that things were complicated, he just had to be patient, that’s all. Sometimes he almost fought back. Why? Why does Freddie take precedence over me? Why can’t your mother have people around the house? You can’t be that busy – too busy to even meet, when we’re only a mile apart? Then he’d hear the silence on her end of the phone, a frozen, sometimes tearful pause:

  ‘You think I’m… lying?’

  ‘No! No, of course—’

  ‘I don’t do that, David. You’re the one who does that.’

  ‘Not any more – I don’t any more.’

  ‘Sometimes I wonder if that’s true.’ And her voice was so hurt, distant, and sometimes she wouldn’t answer calls, pick up messages, and David hated hated hated himself for demanding too much, was joyfully relieved when she forgave him and they started speaking again.

  And when she asked for small favours, he was more than happy to oblige her; it was the least he could do. It was only money, after all, and he had lots of money. And as for the last favour he’d done for her, well, it made him feel warm every time he thought of it.

  49

  Jenny. The Day After Freddie’s Death

  ‘Cheryl, I’m sorry!’ Jenny stood quivering in the doorway. ‘I didn’t know where else to go! ’

  Cheryl was uncharacteristically flustered. Her hennaed hair showed grey at the roots and her signature silver nail polish was chipped. ‘What’s happened?’ She made Jenny come in, sit down and accept a glass of wine.

  Jenny sat tense on the edge of an armchair. ‘I can only stay for a minute. I need to get away.’

  Cheryl wrinkled her brow. ‘Escape is always a short-term answer, what say we—’

  ‘No, Cheryl, please listen.’ Jenny hunched forward. ‘I’m sorry. I’ve been lying to you and to Freddie and everyone. It’s my fault – everything that’s happened is my fault—’

  ‘What’s happened though? If we talk, maybe we’ll discover that it isn’t that bad after—’

  ‘Freddie’s dead.’

  ‘Oh my god!’ Cheryl sagged back against the cushions. ‘How?’

  Jenny closed her eyes. ‘He was attacked, stabbed. I think’ – she forced the words out – ‘I think David did it.’

  Cheryl, rarely silent, was silent as she struggled to comprehend Jenny’s words. Her make-up free face was pale and pockmarked as an ancient moon ‘Surely – I mean, the police? You have to call the police—’

  ‘I did. I’ve just come from there.’ Jenny took a sip of wine. ‘I told them everything. They’re going to arrest David, but I don’t want to be there when it happens. Freddie – he was always suspicious of David; he never liked him. I thought he was just… jealous. I even told him that. Then Freddie found all these things that David had kept – he’d been spying on me – stalking me for years. Freddie tried to warn me, but I thought that if I just talked to David… But David, he went crazy. Violent.’ She moved her hair further away from her face, to show her bruises. ‘He even hit me. Locked me in a room.’

  Cheryl’s eyes widened. ‘Has he hit you before?’

  Jenny fingered her cheek, hesitated, nodded. ‘A few times. Never before this last week though But, he’s ill, Cheryl. I always knew he was… anxious, but I didn’t think he was dangerous. I did what everyone does – I forgave him. I thought that I’d provoked it. And he was always so sorry, always so guilty that… Stupid… I thought I could help him, but…’

  ‘You’re staying here,’ Cheryl said stoutly. ‘And I’m calling the police. We have to make sure they’ve got him—’

  ‘No. Listen, I’m not making that mistake again. I’ve decided to go away somewhere where he can’t find me. Just in case he somehow… I mean, he won’t… but just in case he gets away from the police. He’s clever. He doesn’t know much about you, where you live, your full name, and I told him we fell out a few weeks ago.’

  ‘Why?’ Cheryl was puzzled.

  Jenny gestured impatiently. ‘He’s been acting strangely for a long time. He was very jealous of you. I wanted to protect you, make sure he wouldn’t, I don’t know, show up at your office and cause a scene. So I lied and told him that he’d been right all along and you were this awful charlatan and I never wanted to see you again.’

  Cheryl’s expression was an odd mixture of dazed and peevish. ‘You haven’t said anything about this before.’

  ‘Cheryl, there’s so much I haven’t told you, OK? I haven’t told anyone everything. Freddie knew more than anyone else, and look what happened to him? I can’t let anything happen to you too.’ She closed her eyes, took a breath. ‘I came to give you this.’ She handed Cheryl an A4 envelope full of paper. ‘I’ve made a kind of diary, written down some of the things he’s been doing. He looks at my computer and my phone, so writing was safer. Some of it might not make a lot of sense, some of it might sound crazy, but it’s the truth and I need you to keep it all safe. When I’m sure they’ve got him, I’ll come back, and give it all to the police.’ She hesitated. ‘And, if anything happens to me, take it to them yourself? OK?’ Her phone buzzed then, both women paled; Jenny peered at her phone. ‘No, it’s OK, it’s just the taxi saying they’re here.’

  ‘Where are you going?’

  Jenny shrugged on her coat. ‘I’m not going to tell you, just in case. But I’ll call you when I get there, I promise. Be careful!’

  ‘You too!’ Cheryl replied weakly. She watched the younger woman hurry out of the door and into the waiting car. Then she bolted the door, poured herself a brandy, and sat down to read Jenny’s notes.

  50

  Jenny had found the police difficult to read. When she ran through the doors and began panting her story to the man on the desk, she’d seen his expression move from flat boredom, through sudden sharp interest, to something else. Something that might be dark amusement, tinged with disbelief, and she’d said: ‘I know it all sounds insane, I know that, but please, it’s true!’ and watched his expression crawl back behind the wall of professional indulgence. She had no idea if he believed her or not. She just had to hope he did.

  In the safety of an interview room, she told another officer the whole story. David was violent, obsessive. He’d been stalking her – her friend had the proof, but now her friend was dead. ‘I should have come to you then, I know I should, but I thought that if I talked to David I could get him to admit things?’

  ‘And you saw these items – the hat, the knife – yourself did you?’

  ‘No,’ Jenny admitted. ‘Freddie took some photos of them on his phone and showed them to me. They’ll still be on his phone? All you have to do is look on his phone and—’

  ‘We haven’t recovered Mr Lees-Hill’s phone yet.’ The officer leaned towards her tiredly. ‘So you say you only saw… photographs of photographs of you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Not the original photographs?’

  ‘No, but—’

  ‘And what else? A hat?’

  She nodded. ‘A red Nike baseball cap. It had bloodstains on it. Marc wore it all the time.’

  The officer nodded slowly. ‘A lot of red baseball caps around.’

  Jenny’s face hardened. ‘It was his hat. I know it was his hat.’

  ‘How could you tell it was bloodstained from only seeing a photograph? Blood on red—’

  Jenny clenched her fists, tried to keep her voice calm. ‘You don’t believe me.’

  The officer smiled patronisingly. ‘I’m not saying that, what I am saying is that we’d need more to—’

  ‘Look, he’s sick. David. He has mental problems; he’s been hospitalised.’ She let herself cry then, and her eyes wide,
pleading, met those of the officer. ‘Look at my face! Look at what he did to me!’ She watched the policeman’s face as he looked at her eye. Maybe it wasn’t bruised enough? She hadn’t looked at it since… ‘He has a history of violence, look him up! He’s been in psychiatric hospitals! He killed my friend, I know he did! I know it was David!’ Still that hooded scepticism. Jenny felt tears of rage. One hand clenched the other, hard until her knuckles turned white. ‘Look, he’s in the hospital with his mother, right now. There’s no way he’d leave her there, even to find me. If you go now, there’s a chance you could get him.’

  The officer didn’t reply, but looked heavily at her. His expression was smooth, unreadable, and it made her nervous. Eventually, he said that he had to have a word with his colleague, led Jenny back to the reception, and placed her on the hard bench below the noticeboard. He disappeared into the back office behind the reception desk.

  She waited for ten long minutes and, from behind the frosted glass, she heard dull mutterings and one sharp laugh. She waited for five more minutes, feeling anger and fear build… were they laughing about her? No, they weren’t. Of course they weren’t. They were though… she could feel it. She wasn’t believed. She wasn’t bruised enough to believe. Her silenced phone buzzed with calls from David. How long did she have? How long did she have before he found her? She turned off her phone and went to the toilet, gritted her teeth, and hit herself in the eye a few more times. Then she smoothed her hair, dabbed her eyes, and walked back to the reception area, ripped down a ‘Hang Up on Fraudsters!’ poster and wrote David’s address on the back of it, along with a tearful note:

  PLEASE ARREST THIS MAN! HE’S DANGEROUS!

  She left it on the reception desk, and walked out of the building, and took a cab to Cheryl’s, gave her the notes, then took another cab to the station. She had a long journey ahead of her. It would take two trains and a bus to get where she needed to go.

  On the first train, she tried to write. On the second she tried to read, but on the final few miles, shaking on the back seat of the clattering bus, gave herself over to silent thought, as her present looped neatly into the past, pulling her into the heart of Scarborough.

  The Windsor Castle was under new ownership, and she doubted if the slightly pitiful hipster couple that ran it now had ever heard of the names Granville, Kathleen or Sal. The shabby fleur-de-lis carpet on the stairs had been taken up; the boards still squeaked. The foyer had been jazzed up with a few forlorn-looking taxidermied animals, mismatched chairs and kitschy mirrors. The hipster decor spread over the whole place, but stopped dead at the boundary of the bar area. Here, it was like stepping back in time. The same creaky stools clustered around the same walnut curve of the bar. Jenny almost expected to see an eight-year-old version of herself, spinning on her stool, kicking the shabby veneer with scuffed shoes, eating crisps, while Sal and Kathleen drank, laughed, sang along to Dusty Springfield on the jukebox, loud enough for Granville to tell them to ‘Keep it down – sounds like two cats in a blender!’ and both women would stop, mock offended, then carry on, louder than before.

  On the cusp of the bar, adult Jenny closed her eyes, smiled, almost hearing the rough affection in Granville’s voice, the shy pride. Because they didn’t sound like cats in a blender at all – they both had lovely, strong, smoky voices. Beautiful voices.

  Jenny hadn’t expected to feel… anything really. She’d come up here because it was far away, and she’d checked into The Windsor Castle because it was familiar, that was all. She hadn’t expected it to be this affecting. She hadn’t… wow. She shook her head in a dazed sort of way. The man behind the bar asked if she was OK.

  ‘Yes. Just… I used to come here when I was little, that’s all.’

  ‘Has it changed much?’

  ‘This bit hasn’t.’

  The barman nodded. ‘I think they thought it was cheesy enough in here as it was. They didn’t need to do anything to it.’ He smiled ironically. ‘London. Rob and Jemma? The owners? London.’ He nodded again with grim satisfaction. ‘Thought they could bring a little bit of Shoreditch to Scarborough.’

  ‘Is it not doing well then?’

  The man smiled again. ‘Well, put it this way – twelve rooms, twelve vacancies. Eleven now that you’re here. What can I get you?’

  ‘Gin and tonic.’

  He rolled his eyes. ‘We’ve got this elderflower infused one, and some sloe gin somewhere, and—’

  ‘Have you got any just normal gin? Gordon’s or something?’ She sat on a bar stool gingerly. ‘And not served up in a test tube or something?’

  He winked, dug out a bottle of something called Juniper Flavoured Spirit. ‘This is the most bog-standard they’ve got.’ He poured it into a normal, un-ironic glass, while the jukebox played the unrepentantly uncool Elton John.

  ‘Hope you don’t mind me asking.’ He was awkward. She knew what was coming. ‘Your eye?’

  She touched it with a gentle finger, as if she’d forgotten what it looked like. ‘Oh God, is it awful?’

  ‘It’s… colourful.’

  ‘Let’s just say I… got on the wrong side of someone.’ She allowed a brave, sad smile to spread.

  The barman shifted uncomfortably. ‘None of my business but, boyfriend?’

  Jenny nodded, looked down at the bar, let tears thicken her voice. ‘I ran away.’ Elton John’s inane lyrics were the only thing breaking the silence. She could almost feel the barman’s discomfort. She waited another minute or so before speaking again. ‘Bad man.’

  ‘You’ve… told the police then?’

  She nodded. ‘And came straight here.’ She took a sip of her gin. ‘Sorry. Don’t want to make you feel uncomfortable. It’s not a very happy topic of conversation, is it?’

  ‘Don’t worry about that, love,’ the barman said stoutly. ‘He sounds like a proper bastard. Sounds like you’re well out of it.’

  She nodded, smiled gratefully. ‘Got to keep yourself safe, haven’t you?’

  ‘Yup. Look after number one.’

  She finished her drink. ‘Listen, just in case someone… calls for me, comes round looking for me, please…?’

  ‘You’re safe here, love,’ he told her. ‘I’ll let Rob and Jemma know to look out for someone too, OK?’

  She smiled gratefully at him. Her bad eye was almost closed.

  51

  Later, in her densely decorated room, creepily aware that she was the only guest in the whole place, she went over the conversation, and was very grateful it had happened. Maybe it would have been a good idea to mention what happened to Freddie as well though? By way of backup? But it hurt too much to think about Freddie. Freddie couldn’t be moved into the ‘Practicalities’ folder of her brain just now. Maybe tomorrow, but not now. Anyway, it was more normal to tell a little bit of the truth at first, and the rest of it over intervals. People believed you more if you were reserved, especially about violent things… then she did what she’d been avoiding doing all night, and turned on her phone.

  No calls.

  No messages.

  Nothing new from David.

  That meant they’d got him. Didn’t it? It had to.

  Wouldn’t the police call you, though? To let you know?

  She shook her head at herself. I don’t know. I don’t know. They could be questioning him right now. They wouldn’t interrupt it to call her and tell her how they were doing, would they? She told this to herself a few times, hoping it would calm her down. Then she texted Cheryl to let her know she was safe, and after that she had nothing to do except lie on the musty pink eiderdown, tired, a little gin-dizzy, and try to sleep. But sleep wasn’t ready to come…

  52

  Jenny. Eight years earlier

  Marc and Mum rowed a lot, but it never lasted long. Sal would apologise, Marc would grudgingly accept the apology and then one or both of them would celebrate by buying a bottle of gin that they’d do their best to finish. Jenny had got so used to the pattern now that once she heard
the first rumblings of argument, she made plans to be out of the house – preferably all night. Nobody needs to hear their mum having embarrassingly loud make-up sex, after all. This time though, the last time, it didn’t follow the same pattern.

  Jenny came back from school to find that Sal was hurt. Marc had done more damage than usual. Her face was red and swollen, her left eye pinched shut, and her right eye bloodshot and rheumy. Her arm was sprained too, and three of her fingernails were ripped to the quick. Jenny almost didn’t comment on it. Too many times she’d asked what had happened, and Sal’s brisk, dismissive replies – ‘Oh don’t you worry, I gave as good as I got’; ‘It looks worse than it is’; ‘I just tripped’ – were just too dispiriting to take. But today, because it was that much worse, she said something, and Sal didn’t offer any depressing explanations. She didn’t change the subject when Jenny, hesitatingly, then more forcefully, told her it wasn’t right. He couldn’t do this. Rather, she nodded, her bruised face averted, a cigarette clutched between two scabbed fingers.

  This time, Sal asked Jenny to sleep with her in the big bed.

  Jenny waited until she had drifted off, and then tried to secure the house as best she could – double-locking both the doors, and piling up chairs against them; filling the sink with dishes that would fall, crash, wake them if Marc tried getting in through the kitchen window.

  At no point did she think of calling the police.

  But Marc stayed away all night.

  The next morning the house was filled with Marc’s sinister absence, and Sal didn’t want to be alone, asked Jenny to stay home from school. ‘Keep me company, will you? We’ll have a nice girly day together, yeah?’ Only one half of her face was able to smile, the other side was too tightly swollen. The mismatch was grotesque.