She’s got a point, but East Grinstead is the last place I want to be right now. I’m just about clinging on for dear life, managing to keep a rein on my emotions. I don’t want those reminders, those flashbacks to the mainly happy times we spent there. I don’t want to smell the home-cooked meals and the scent of her shampoo. I have no other option, though.
‘Do I need it? I’ve been to France on the train before and didn’t need it.’
‘They do spot checks,’ she says. ‘Be a bit stupid if we get stopped by an overzealous customs officer. Besides, if we get there quickly enough, your name won’t be on any watch lists.’
‘Watch lists?’ I ask.
‘Yeah. When they find Lisa’s body and can’t find you, they’ll put you on a watch list at the ports and airports. So you don’t leave the country. Which is why we’ve got to get out before they find her.’ She says this like it’s the most normal thing in the world.
Without saying anything, I tap the route into my satnav: from here to East Grinstead, then back over to Folkestone. ‘Nearly three hours,’ I say. ‘It’s about a hundred and forty-odd miles.’
Jessica just looks at me. ‘We’d better get going, then, hadn’t we?’
10
I’ll have about 280 miles of fuel left by the time we reach Folkestone, according to my calculations. They should be right, too, because I’ve done them over and over, about twenty times since we left Herne Bay. I know that if I don’t keep doing the calculations, my brain is going to try to think of other things, and I can’t handle that right now. The thoughts going round and round in my head are making me feel sick, and I’m struggling to cope.
I don’t know France that well, but 280 miles has got to get us somewhere over towards the German border, from what I know with my limited geography. We could fill up with more fuel, but there’d be number plate recognition cameras at the petrol stations. Thinking about it, there’d probably be cameras all over the place: on the motorways, at the side of the road, on the edge of buildings. Whichever way you look at it, cameras are going to pick us up. And that’s why I know we need to get as far away as possible as quickly as possible, so they’ve got a much longer trail to have to trace by the time they realise one exists at all.
I don’t know where in France this contact of Jessica’s lives, and I don’t want to ask. I want to know as little as possible. What I don’t know can’t hurt me. As long as we’re able to get there, get some help and put as much space between us and the police – not to mention Lisa’s killer – as possible, that’s about all we can hope for right now.
The drive over to East Grinstead seems to take an age. They say a drive always seems longer when you’re heading home, but East Grinstead already feels alien, like a location from another part of my life. From history.
It’s not helped by the fact that we’re now in rush hour – the time when everyone’s trying to get home from work. Being very much in the commuter belt, that makes a huge difference to the traffic. It’s not too bad heading over the Kent Downs, but once we’re on the M20 motorway things seem to grind to a walking pace. I can feel the time ticking away as everything in the universe counts down towards the moment that cleaner walks into my hotel room in Herne Bay tomorrow morning and discovers my wife’s dead body in the bath. She doesn’t know it yet, but tomorrow morning her life will be changed forever, and I don’t even know her name.
Even that poor cleaner will have her day, her week, probably her life, turned upside down because someone wanted not only to kill my wife but to frame me for it. That’s something that takes some doing to get my head around, and I’m still not quite sure I’ve come to terms with it. Secretly, deep down, I don’t think I want to.
The M20 merges onto the M26, which merges onto the M25. If I thought the M20 was slow, this is something else. I look at the clock for the hundredth time since we got in the car. It’s nearly six o’clock. Finally, we get off the M25 and make the relatively short drive down the (congested, naturally) A22 to East Grinstead.
My heart is in my throat as I pull up in my road, a good few houses further down from mine, the hedges and the curve in the road hiding the direct line of sight between the car and my house. I don’t particularly want the neighbours seeing Jess sitting in the passenger seat, nor do I want her seeing where I live. I’ve no idea why; I’ll probably never come back here again after tonight, so what does it matter?
Fumbling with my key in the lock, I finally manage to get the door open and make my way up the stairs to the bedroom. I don’t turn any lights on, and instead feel my way up the staircase and around the corners of the landing. My passport’s tucked away in my underwear drawer, where it always is. I take it, close the drawer and make my way back down the stairs again, stepping carefully in the darkness.
Once I’m back outside, something tells me not to lock the door. It’s almost as if I’m looking to lay a false trail of clues. What possible significance could an unlocked front door have when the police inevitably turn up tomorrow morning? I don’t know, but I’m pretty sure it’s not going to do me any harm. Even better, a burglary would complicate matters further for the police. Whatever I do, I need to give myself a head start.
In my mind, right now, this all makes sense.
I try to keep my feet firmly on the flagstones as I hopscotch my way back up the driveway, trying to avoid the crunching gravel underfoot. As I get to the end of the drive there’s a cat sat there, looking at me. Two thoughts cross my mind: firstly, the ridiculous notion that this cat is a witness to the fact I’ve been back home; secondly, that I’m really pleased right now we don’t have any pets or children. That would make this whole situation so much worse. I couldn’t just up and leave if I had those sorts of ties. But what ties do I have? A wife who’s been murdered and a house that I wouldn’t be allowed – or want – to go back into anyway.
Before long, I’m back at the car.
‘Got it?’ Jessica says, as if I’ve just popped home to grab something innocuous I forgot. There’s a charming innocence about her, as if no situation could ever faze her. To avoid letting that thought play on my mind, I start the car up again and head for the A22.
11