And he hadn’t asked too much, because he hadn’t really wanted to know. The next night he’d gone round to Clara and Luke’s flat, and while Luke had cooked them dinner, he’d sat with Clara, listening as she talked about the holiday they were saving up for, how wonderful it was now that they were living together. The next morning he had phoned Hannah. ‘OK,’ he’d said. ‘I’m in.’
It had begun to go horribly, terrifyingly wrong, very quickly. After Luke went missing, Hannah seemed to change overnight. Gone was the hurt and vulnerable woman he thought he knew and in her place was someone very different. After the second day he had phoned her. ‘Is he OK? Are you going to let him go tomorrow like you said? Rose and Oliver are beside themselves, job done, so you can let him go now, right?’
In a new, harsh voice, completely unlike her usual one she’d said, ‘No, don’t be stupid. I need you to do something for me. I need you to tell me everything you know about Rose and Oliver’s movements from now on.’
‘What? How am I supposed to do that?’
‘Find out. Ask Clara. Every time Clara speaks to Rose, every time Rose phones Clara, or the police speak to Rose, or Oliver and Rose come to London, or whatever, you tell me. Got that? Everything, every detail, you tell me.’
‘What if I don’t?’
She’d sighed irritably. ‘Look I’m pretty close to stabbing this whining prick in the face anyway. Jesus Christ but he never lets up. You give me the slightest reason to lose my temper, and I’ll do it. If you want to see him again, I suggest you do as you’re told.’
He’d had no choice. ‘OK, OK, relax, I’ll do it.’
‘Good. Does Luke have any photos of his sister Emily in his flat?’
‘Emily? What’s she got to do with this?’
‘Just answer the question.’
‘Erm, yeah, he mentioned them to me once when he was drunk, said he keeps them in his office at home, but I’ve never seen them. He told me he never looks at them, still too cut up about it, I guess.’
‘OK. You need to go round there and take them.’
‘What? Why?’
‘Just do it. I’ll give you Luke’s keys.’
When he’d tried and failed to find them her fury had been terrifying. ‘Christ you’re useless,’ she’d spat. ‘I’ll find them myself. By the way, are you any good at doctoring photos? Photoshop, that sort of thing, I have some old pictures Emily gave me years ago of her with her family. I want you to replace her face with mine.’
‘Emily?’ he’d said, his unease deepening. ‘You didn’t say you’d met Emily … When? I don’t understand.’
‘Can you do it?’
‘Well yes, but …’
‘Good. Then I’ve got another job for you.’
And things had gone from bad to worse, as he’d realized that what Hannah had passed off as a little trick to scare Oliver, to make her presence known, was far more twisted and sadistic. When she started to meet Clara, he’d almost lost his mind. ‘You need to stop, now,’ he said. ‘You need to stop or I’ll go to the police.’
‘Why? I need to keep up with what the police are doing, and anyway it’s fun hearing about what a mess my father’s in.’
His threats were useless. Every one he made countered by her promise that Luke would die if he didn’t keep quiet. He believed her. Even worse, she might hurt Clara. He was trapped.
In desperation, he’d followed Hannah from her meeting with Clara and taken the photograph of her. It was the only thing he could think of to hold as currency over her, a way of warning her, if he needed to, that he could go to the Lawsons and the police whenever he wanted. She’d looked up at the last moment and seen him. He’d run, then, jumping on to a train just before it left the station. Back at his flat he’d downloaded the photograph to his laptop for safekeeping, then dropped it in to Mehmet in the kebab shop below. ‘Can you hold on to this for me?’ he’d asked.
‘Not a problem, my friend.’
He had been right to fear that Hannah would come looking for it, and though she’d taken his camera with the photo on it, she hadn’t, of course, been able to find its copy on the laptop. He knew he had to tell Clara the truth, yet every time he opened his mouth, he couldn’t find the words, terrified that she would hate him for what he’d done. It had been a desperate, spur-of-the-moment decision to show her and Tom the picture, leading them to finally work out the truth without him having to implicate himself.
But it would never be over, he knew that now. He had expected Hannah to expose him during her trial, had been terrified that she would reveal the part he’d played in it all. But to his surprise she’d kept quiet. For weeks hope had flickered in his heart. It looked, for a time, as though he might get away with it. But then the phone calls had started. She seemed to have become even crazier while on remand, more vengeful and hate-fuelled than ever, and he realized now why she hadn’t implicated him in court: it was to have something to hold over him. She told him she’d thought of new ways to punish the Lawsons, and that it was down to him to help her. ‘You know what’ll happen if you don’t,’ she’d said, moments before he’d cut her off. ‘I’ll make sure Clara knows you were in on it from the start.’
He looked up now as Clara walked towards him, and as he watched her a warmth of emotion came to him. The love he felt for her was the one certainty in all of this; despite all that had happened, all the wrong he had done, it was still the one, undeniable truth: Clara belonged to him. Over the past five months as they’d waited for the case to go to trial, he’d fallen more deeply in love with her than he’d ever thought possible.
‘Are you OK?’ Clara asked, putting her hand on his arm. Such a friendly, affectionate gesture. It didn’t mean anything, he knew; she didn’t feel about him as he did about her. But maybe one day she would. Her love for Luke was finished, that was clear. Maybe the friendship she felt for him would develop into something more.
He swallowed back his fear and regret and forced himself to smile. Perhaps she’d never find out, perhaps it would all be OK. ‘Come on,’ he said, putting his arm around her. ‘Let’s get out of here, shall we?’
35
London, 2017
Hannah slammed the payphone receiver down and allowed the waiting officer to lead her back to her unit. How fucking dare Mac hang up on her like that? Spineless. He was utterly spineless.
She had been on remand for months now, though the trial was finally nearing its end. She would be found guilty of course, and her sentence would be a long one, but she didn’t particularly care. She was neither more nor less happy in prison – it made little difference to her. And in the meantime she had plenty to occupy her mind. Plans to make. It wasn’t over between the Lawsons and her, not by a long shot, she had big things in store for them. And not just the Lawsons, but Clara, too.
The way she’d ingratiated herself with Oliver and Rose – ‘like a daughter to them,’ Mac had told her once. The Lawsons were her family, and always would be; Oliver didn’t need another daughter, he had one right here. Then there was the way she’d stuck her nose in where it wasn’t wanted, tricking her way into her flat, laying it on thick in court while the jury lapped it all up. There’s no way she was getting away with that.
The door banged shut behind her and as the lock turned she took a seat on the narrow bed and smiled. It wasn’t so very bad here. After all, it gave her plenty of time to think. They didn’t have much on her: assault, kidnapping, stalking, blackmail. It could have been worse. It was supposed to have been worse. But even if she got ten years or more, it really didn’t matter; the Lawsons, Mac, Clara, they’d all get what they deserved in the end.
Acknowledgements