‘Mum?’
‘Vicky? It is Magda. I disturb you?’
‘No. What’s wrong?’
She wouldn’t call at this hour without a good reason. Perhaps Tom has gone out and left her with the kids. Odd, but not impossible.
‘I am not sure,’ Magda says. ‘I am worried.’
‘Are you at my house? Are the kids all right?’
‘No. I am babysitting for Mrs Boxer.’
‘Oh. Is there a problem with her boys?’ I have visions of them projectile vomiting over the dachshunds. ‘Only I’m at Jenny’s.’
‘Ah.’
‘What is it, Magda?’
‘She has been there one hour now. I thought you have come home, but you know I have feeling in my bones that you don’t yet. And I am right. You are not there.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Mrs Collins. I was in the sitting room watching telly and I hear something, so I open the curtains. I see Tom inviting her in. I do not wish to be involve but I worry for you and now you are not there I see I am right.’
I shiver. ‘Do you know for sure that she’s still in the house?’
‘I think yes because I do not hear door again, but the baby wake up so I have not been always looking.’
‘I’m on my way. Thank you.’
40
KATYA IS CONFUSED. She sits up and rubs her head. She must have blacked out and in the meantime night has fallen. She stands unsteadily, goes to the door and switches on the light, wincing at the brightness.
Tom is lying on the floor, on his side with his face pressed up against the base of the cupboard. She approaches him but stops abruptly when she sees the blood. She needs to think. She can see the handle of the knife sticking out, so she takes some kitchen towel and wipes it clean of her fingerprints. Then she washes up her glass and plate and puts them away. It doesn’t matter that every other surface has evidence of her presence in the house. It’s her home from home.
What else is there? She has to make it look like a break-in. She goes outside and round to the French windows that lead into the sitting room and inspects the door frame. The repair is invisible. She chooses a stone from the edge of the flower beds and uses it to break the glass, then listens in the darkness. Nothing. No sound. No windows or back doors opening. She feels for the key and turns it, but the doors don’t open because there are new deadbolts at the top and bottom. She considers her options and looks around for something to prise the whole thing open with, loses patience and kicks in the bottom panels. That should be enough space for a man’s head and shoulders. She runs back into the kitchen, slides the doors closed and locks them. She should steal something. Vicky’s jewellery will do. She knows where it’s hidden.
I pull on my clothes, run down to the hall and grab my bag off the hook. Jenny and Simon are in the kitchen, Simon stacking the dishwasher, Jenny leaning back in her chair chatting to him. Night owls, the pair of them.
‘Darling,’ Jenny says when she sees me hovering in the doorway. ‘You’re as white as a sheet. Did I hear your phone ringing? Was it Tom?’
‘Magda.’
‘Why was she calling you? Is it the children?’
I shake my head. ‘No. She saw Amber going into my house over an hour ago and she hasn’t left yet.’
I turn and look behind me, anxious to be on my way, and she leaps out of her chair and rushes over. Simon watches us, pausing in the act of scraping food into the bin.
‘Don’t go rushing in, Vicky,’ Jenny says. ‘Think about it. There could be any number of reasons.’
I’d love to believe that, but I remember how he looked at her when we were in Spain, how he stuck up for her, how he cared for her after she deliberately threw herself into the pool. With me out of the way, he won’t be able to resist. At the thought of them together I feel as though I am losing control of my limbs. I bite down hard on my lip.
Jenny’s voice is urgent, pleading. ‘Don’t do anything hasty. If you go charging in and they are together, you’re the one who’s going to be humiliated.’
‘What do I do?’ I remember Rose and Sophie and lower my voice. ‘Jenny, what do I do?’
‘You stay here,’ she says firmly. ‘And you talk to him in the morning. I very much doubt there is anything going on.’
‘But you don’t know that for sure, do you?’
I feel the impasse between us, the tension like a fishing line vibrating above the water, and I know that I cannot stay, even though common sense tells me she’s right. If it hadn’t been for the conversation with Mum I might have done as I was told, but everything has changed. Amber isn’t the woman I thought I knew and I have no idea what might trigger her. My children are in that house.
‘I agree with everything you say and I know I may live to regret this, but I have to go.’
With a brief hug, I plunge out into the night and start to run. By the time I reach the corner I have to stop to catch my breath and walk the rest of the way. In Coleridge Street all the lights at the front are out.
41
THERE’S NO SOUND coming from the downstairs rooms, nothing from upstairs. I stand in the middle of the hallway, puzzled. The silence is unnerving. I run upstairs but all three children are where they should be, tucked up in bed, sleeping peacefully. Polly is on her front, one arm under her head, the other cuddling her teddy bear. Emily always sleeps on her side. In his cot next door, Josh moves his mouth in his sleep and emits the occasional grunt.
On the floor below I glance into our bedroom. The bed is unmade, rumpled and tangled; the pillows crushed and out of place. The curtains are closed. A perfume that I associate with Amber lingers tantalizingly. She’s been in here. In my bed. I stumble out of the room, my hand pressed to my mouth, images of Tom and Amber writhing naked lodged in my mind.
I run downstairs, flicking switches as I go, no longer caring if they hear me or not. Why don’t they come out? Why would they hide from me? I sense something off. There’s a distinct change in the atmosphere, as if what was rock solid is now unstable, shifting.
The reason becomes obvious as soon as I enter the kitchen. Tom is slumped on the floor, leaning against the cupboard doors with his legs stretched out, his head wedged to one side and his eyes half open. His arms are wrapped around his stomach, a knife protruding, and he’s ashen. His shirt is soaked with blood that seeps through his fingers, trickles down through the dip between his hip and his ribcage and pools beside him. Didn’t I dream something like this?
‘Tom!’