The Last Lie

by Alex Lake

  Claire shook her head. ‘No. You told me you were a musician on CDs of kids’ music. That’s not exactly the way a killer would go about their murderous business. They’d pretend to be a hedge fund manager or an international business superstar.’

  Or a kids’ musician, Alfie thought, if they knew that was the kind of unthreatening man the woman wanted. Henry Bryant would have been proud of him. He’d seen the opportunity, and taken it. He’d had to lie, had to get hold of some kids’ songs and play them to her, claiming he was on the recording, and after he did she’d laughed at him, the condescending bitch.

  He remembered it well. She’d laughed, and then caught herself and said she didn’t think it was funny, she thought it was unusual and she really, really liked it, but she had laughed at him.

  Which was, much as he hated it, what he’d wanted. What he’d needed.

  ‘You’re right,’ he said. ‘Most people would never admit to being the guitarist on “The Wheels on the Bus”, far less make it up. They might pretend to be a lawyer, though.’

  ‘Exactly my point.’

  ‘Jodie better watch out.’

  ‘Don’t say that!’ Claire groaned. ‘Now I’m worried.’

  ‘Why don’t you invite them over for dinner this weekend?’ Alfie said. ‘That way, if he is up to no good, we’ll have met him. It’ll be much harder for him to strangle her and throw her in a quarry if we’ve actually seen him in person.’

  ‘God,’ Claire said. ‘What a horrible thought. I wasn’t thinking of inviting them because of that.’

  ‘Saturday evening? I’ll cook.’ Alfie kissed her. ‘By the way, what happened with her friend? Is she still living with her?’

  ‘Pippa? No. Jodie’s not heard from her. She thinks she’s got back together with the guy she was seeing, but she hasn’t tried to get in touch in case she moves back in.’

  ‘Oh,’ Alfie said. ‘Good. I’m glad that all worked out.’

  Claire

  Claire looked at the profile.

  Danny Bond.

  Balding, slightly overweight, standing on a beach somewhere holding a bottle of beer. From his posts he seemed to be into football, motor racing and videos of people playing dangerous pranks on each other. He also had two daughters and a wife called Kellie.

  Danny Bond, the only name Alfie had ever mentioned as a friend from his childhood.

  It wasn’t like she could look on Alfie’s Facebook account for any others. He wasn’t on Facebook. A while back Claire had suggested he sign up, but he had shaken his head.

  Not my kind of thing, he said. I can see it’s useful, but it’s not for me.

  There was very little of him online. When they’d met she’d googled him – Alfie Daniels as well as Alfie Daniels, Luton, the town he said he was from. There was more or less nothing: no Facebook, no Twitter, no local news articles. His name cropped up in relation to the band who’d been playing at the wedding, but that was it. It was almost as though he’d tried to keep his online presence to a minimum. She’d said as much to Jodie, who’d claimed it was a red flag – What’s he hiding? she’d said – but now she knew it was just Alfie. He wasn’t hiding anything; he was low key.

  She wondered whether there was some trauma in his past, something more than the death of his parents. They’d died a year apart, his dad of a heart attack, his mum of breast cancer, and not long after that he’d left Luton for good.

  He never spoke about them, but she knew their names – Martha and Ian – because she’d found his birth certificate in a filing box he’d brought to the house when they’d moved in. The box contained the only records she’d seen from his past, and there wasn’t much there. Along with the birth certificate there were a couple of baby photos, a certificate from a spelling competition when he was eight, a handful of school reports and a newspaper cutting about an act of vandalism at a school in Luton in which some dogs had been killed and left to rot in the school over the summer. She’d wanted to ask why he had that cutting, but she didn’t want him to know she’d been snooping, so it remained a mystery.

  Which left Danny Bond. He’d told a couple of stories about him and Danny; she assumed that when he’d left Luton days after his mum died he’d lost touch with him.

  Claire thought he might like to see him again, especially if he became a dad. Whoever Danny was, he was part of Alfie’s past and Alfie might want to share that with his child. She’d been thinking about it for a while, searching for something she could do for him that wasn’t a fancy watch or new car or other material gift.

  Me and Danny used to hang around together, he’d said. We thought about starting a band once, but he gave up playing guitar.

  Maybe it was time for them to get the band back together. Alfie never complained about it, but Claire thought he needed a close friend. He had no one to share things with in the way she could with Jodie. It might not be a problem now, but in the future he might need it.

  She wanted to show him she cared about him, that she listened to what he said and thought about how to make his life as good as it could be.

  And maybe Danny Bond was the answer.

  Claire imagined him and Alfie meeting up, introducing their kids to each other, sharing a drink. Alfie glad to see him, grateful to his wife for arranging it.

  Or unhappy with her. Angry that she was meddling. She wasn’t sure what to do. She wasn’t even sure this was the right Danny Bond.

  Well, that could be easily fixed. She could send him a friend request and ask him. He might tell her he and Alfie hadn’t been friends, really. Or he might tell her he didn’t want to see Alfie.

  Either way, she wouldn’t be committing to anything. All she’d be doing was finding out whether this was even an option, and there was no harm in that.

  She tapped on her phone, and started to write an introduction.

  Alfie

  Alfie walked, head down, along a quiet street. A faint odour of sewage mingled with the smell of fast food. It was safe to say that this part of East London had not yet felt the gentrifying effects of the wealth sloshing around the City.

  Which was precisely why Alfie was there.

  He paused outside a shop window. It was dirty, the items on display barely visible, but he could make out a series of outdated electronic goods: televisions, DVD players, computers. That wasn’t why he was there, though. He and Claire had a state-of-the-art B&O entertainment system with individually zoned and controlled speakers in each room.

  He was there because they sold phones. Specifically, pay-as-you-go smartphones, full of credit, sold for cash with no questions asked and up and running in minutes. There was no CCTV on this street, and although the shop owner no doubt had his own for the sake of security, he was the kind of small business owner who had a strong aversion – an allergy, almost – to the forces of law and order. If asked whether a man answering to Alfie Daniels’ description had bought a phone from him, he could be counted on, out of sheer hatred for the police, to say No such man ever entered my premises, Officer. Cross my heart and hope to die.

  Not that the cops would ever show up there. They had no way to link Alfie or Henry to this shop, and in any case, this phone wasn’t for either of them.

  It was for Claire.

  After their first meeting – at least, after the meeting that their messages suggested had happened earlier in the week – Henry had sent a message via the dating website.

  Claire, that was amazing. Good food, better conversation, and then simply fantastic sex. I’d love to do it again, whenever suits you. But here’s an idea – if you want to meet then let’s stop using this website to communicate. You don’t want to have it on a laptop your husband might see. You should get a phone. Go to a shop and buy a pay-as-you-go smartphone. Once you have it running, text me. We can keep in touch that way from now on.

  So now Alfie was getting the phone. He could have gone to Boots or Asda or somewhere else –which was what Claire would have done, if she was actually doing this – but he di
dn’t want to set up an account. He needed – in the event it was ever discovered – the phone to be traceless.

  He pushed the door open and walked inside. A squat man with a shaven skull glanced up at him. He studied him for a second, and then, nodded, apparently happy that Alfie did not represent a threat he couldn’t deal with.

  ‘All right, mate,’ he said. ‘What can I do you for?’

  ‘Phone,’ Alfie said. ‘Simplest you have. I need it to do text and email.’

  The man reached behind his head for a plastic case. ‘This should do it.’

  ‘No,’ Alfie said. ‘I want one that’s already set up.’

  The man nodded slowly. ‘What for?’

  ‘Some business.’ Alfie put his hand in his pocket and took out five twenty-pound notes. He put them on the counter. ‘I need one that costs about this much. You got anything like that?’

  ‘I might have.’

  ‘Maybe you know someone who does?’

  ‘You’re not a cop, are you?’

  Alfie shook his head and met the man’s gaze. ‘No. I’m not a cop.’

  The man looked him up and down, once, then twice. ‘You don’t look like one. Too well dressed.’ He sniffed and tapped his nose. ‘And I don’t smell bacon. I got a good nose for bacon.’ He put his hand on the pile of twenties. ‘Twice that,’ he said. ‘Bargain. About the price of them shoes you’re wearing.’

  Alfie took another five twenties from his pocket. He knew better than to get out his wallet.

  ‘OK,’ he said. ‘But that’s it.’

  The man nodded and took the cash. He turned and walked through a door behind him. Alfie listened as a metal drawer opened, then shut. The man appeared in the doorway. He was holding two phones. He put them on the counter.

  ‘Take your pick,’ he said. ‘Fifty quid credit on each. When it’s gone, the phone’s useless.’

  Alfie took one. He didn’t care which. He wouldn’t need it for long. He switched it on and the screen lit up.

  ‘It works,’ the man said. ‘Comes with my standard warranty.’ He grinned. He was missing both his front teeth. ‘Zero days’ cover and don’t ever show up again.’

  Alfie waited until he was sure the phone was working, then nodded.

  ‘Thanks,’ he said, and left the shop.

  He had parked nearby. When he was back in his car, he glanced at his watch. It was midday. He’d have to hurry; he was on the hook to cook dinner that night and he was supposed to be out buying the ingredients. He was planning to drop off the car and the phones at the office and then head to Borough Market to get scallops, oysters and venison, which was what he always cooked. He’d told her he was a good chef when they met – it was a lie, but it was useful as it confirmed her opinion that he was the kind of guy who she could trust, unlike the hedge fund types who were used to being cooked and cleaned for.

  The problem was that he could barely boil water, so he’d told her he was one of those cooks who did a few things well, which allowed him to perfect one recipe before he cooked for her. He’d chosen things that people didn’t have often – like venison – so they wouldn’t really know what to expect, and things where the ingredients spoke for themselves and all you had to do was not ruin them, like oysters and scallops.

  Before he went, though, there was something he needed to do. He took out the new phone and tapped out a message.

  Henry, it’s Claire. Let’s meet asap. I have a dinner on Saturday night, but could get away on Sunday afternoon? A is going to play golf.

  Golf. It was a very useful sport. It was the perfect excuse to disappear for a few hours so he could get away from Claire and get up to no good. Now it turned out that it gave her the opportunity to do the same thing.

  He hit send, and in his pocket another phone buzzed.

  Henry Bryant had a message.

  Claire

  When Claire and Jodie were younger they had developed a set of secret signals, which they used to communicate when they were out in bars and clubs and men were chatting them up. There was the brush of the left eyebrow, which meant This guy’s bugging me so say you need the loo, and I’ll come with you, there was the brush of the right eyebrow which meant Let’s get them to buy us a drink and then we’ll get rid of them, and there was the tug on an earlobe which meant He’s hot.

  As they finished the venison Alfie had made – it was so great to have a husband who cooked, such a relief that he didn’t think it was the ‘woman’s place’, like so many of her friends’ husbands did, despite their claims to be modern men – Claire looked at her friend over the dinner table and reached up to pull on her earlobe. Josh King was a great guy. Jodie gave a slight nod.

  I know.

  Claire was glad that her friend’s relationship was going well. Josh was relaxed and at ease with her and had a constant smile on his lips. They kept looking at each other, their gazes holding a fraction longer than necessary, as though they didn’t want to break away. Claire had the impression that, if she and Alfie hadn’t been there, Jodie and Josh wouldn’t have bothered with dinner, at least not until they’d satisfied a more urgent hunger.

  It reminded her of when she’d first met Alfie. They hadn’t been able to keep their hands off each other. Sometimes they had spent entire weekends in bed, waking up late on a Saturday morning and finding no good reason to do anything other than lie there and have sex and talk and have more sex and eat and talk and have more sex, before going to sleep and repeating the following day. When Monday came the intrusion of the real world was a shock. They resented having to get out of bed and put on clothes and go and spend valuable hours in the office, hours which were mostly occupied with thinking about how soon they could get back to each other.

  It had been intoxicating. She had had boyfriends before, had thought she was in love with them, but whatever that feeling was it was a shadow of what she had with Alfie, and she had known it from the start. If you had asked her whether she would be interested in a slightly goofy musician who played in wedding bands and on kids’ CDs she would have said that was the last thing she was looking for. But then she’d met him and found out that that was exactly what she was looking for, and it had changed her life. It was almost as though he had been made for her.

  And now she saw the same thing happening for Jodie.

  Claire ate the last of the venison and looked at Alfie. ‘That was delicious,’ she said.

  ‘It was.’ Josh sipped his wine. ‘You’ve got a talent, Alfie.’

  ‘No,’ Alfie said. ‘I’m good at following recipes. And I always cook the same things, so I get better and better at them. Don’t ask me to bake a soufflé or clarify a consommé – I’d have no chance.’

  ‘You should try,’ Claire said. ‘You might surprise yourself. Discover a side you didn’t know you had.’

  ‘That’s what I’m scared of,’ Alfie said. ‘You might see me for who I really am.’

  ‘And what’s that?’ Jodie said.

  ‘A guy who’s trying to fake it till he makes it,’ Alfie said. ‘Right now you think I’m being modest, but if I served you some flaccid, tasteless soufflé you’d be thinking yeah, he really isn’t a chef. I don’t want to break the illusion. I’ve worked hard on building it up!’

  ‘It’s not modesty, Alfie,’ Claire said. ‘It’s false modesty. You just want us to say how great you are.’

  Alfie held up his hands. ‘You got me. I admit it.’

  ‘Either way,’ Josh said, ‘the meal was wonderful. Thank you.’ He picked up Jodie’s plate. ‘I’ll help clear the table.’

  Alfie picked up Claire’s. ‘I’ll join you. And I’ll grab another bottle of wine.’

  They walked towards the kitchen. As they left the room, Claire heard Josh ask Alfie where he had bought the venison.

  ‘Borough Market,’ Alfie said, and then started to explain which vendor he went to.

  ‘Well,’ Claire said. ‘He’s a nice guy. A lovely guy.’

  ‘He is,’ Jodie said. ‘Internet da
ting is a bit of a lottery but I got lucky.’

  ‘When did you meet him?’

  ‘Two weeks ago.’

  ‘You kept it quiet.’ Jodie normally filled Claire in on the details of her dates – most of them amusing, some downright disastrous – but she hadn’t mentioned Josh until a few days ago.

  ‘I know,’ she replied. ‘I had a feeling he might be more of a keeper than the others and I didn’t want to say anything in case I jinxed it.’

  ‘Well, it seems to have worked.’ Claire leaned forwards. ‘Have you guys – you know?’

  Jodie nodded. ‘We can’t stop. You’re lucky we got here on time. Put it this way – I didn’t have much time to get ready.’

  ‘I remember those days,’ Claire said. ‘They’re still here, a bit.’

  ‘You know something,’ Jodie said, ‘it might be a bit early to be saying this, but I have a feeling he might be the one. I don’t know what it is, but I can see it. I can picture us together, married, raising kids. I’ve never had that before.’

  ‘That’s how it was for me and Alfie,’ Claire said. ‘I knew from the start. I could see it all – marriage, kids, the whole thing – and it’s worked out that way. It’s not exactly happening on the baby front, but we’ll get there. And I can’t complain. Alfie’s great.’

  ‘It will happen.’ Jodie squeezed Claire’s hand. ‘Either with Alfie, or a donor, or by adopting, but it will happen.’

  ‘I hope so,’ Claire said. ‘And I hope it’s easier for you, when the time comes. I can’t wait to be mums together. Maybe Alfie and Josh’ll be friends, take the kids out for walks in the park.’

  ‘Can you imagine?’ Jodie said. ‘If that happens? If Josh was the father of my children?’

  They were interrupted by Alfie walking into the room.

  ‘Bit early for that, isn’t it?’ he said. ‘Don’t let Josh hear. It’ll scare him off.’

  ‘Just thinking out loud,’ Jodie said. ‘That’s all.’