Author: Amanda Robson
Category: Thriller
Go to read content：https://onlinereadfreenovel.com/amanda-robson/page,7,560635-my_darling.html
‘So you just have to wait until my mother is hurt?’
DS Simpson looked sadder than sad. ‘To arrest and charge your father, yes. But if she would only come and talk to us, we could advise her. There are charities that help women like your mother.’
‘Can I contact them?’
‘No. She needs to do it herself. They won’t be able to help her without her permission, otherwise it’s an invasion of her privacy.’ Frustration welled in my stomach. ‘But I can give you a leaflet for her,’ DS Simpson continued.
She handed me the leaflet and I accepted it.
‘Thank you,’ I said limply, crushed with disappointment. As if a leaflet was going to protect her.
‘What about you?’ DS Simpson asked.
I frowned. ‘Me?’
‘Yes.’ She paused. ‘Has he hurt you?’
‘Not physically.’
‘Never?’
‘Never. He shouts. He frightens me. He minimises me. Tells me I’ll never succeed.’
DS Simpson leant across the table of the interview room and put her hand on my arm. ‘If he ever hurts you, you must come and see us immediately.’
‘I’ve told you, it’s not me he hurts, it’s my mother.’
47
Jade
Home at last, after my incarceration in the Red Lion. But the DS with the sultry face is here again. She comes every day. Watching me like a hawk.
‘Can I get you a cup of tea?’ I ask, stretching my cheeks into a forced smile.
‘Yes, please.’
Her eyes dart around my kitchen, resting too long on the wall calendar. What is she looking for?
‘Do you mind if I pop to the loo?’ she asks.
Oh. The usual trick. Go to the loo and snoop around the bathroom. Or if the toilet is upstairs, snoop around the bedroom too. Hard luck, Miranda Jupiter. Our downstairs cloakroom is compact and minimalistic. No evidence there.
‘Step into the hallway. It’s the second door on the right.’ Another stretched smile.
‘Thanks.’
She is gone a while. I make the tea and lay a few biscuits on a plate. When she returns her eyes are more doleful than ever.
I hand her the tea and we sit opposite one another at the kitchen table.
‘Have you remembered anything more about the day of the murder?’ she asks as she takes a sip of tea and helps herself to a custard cream.
‘No. I keep running it back – how awful it was finding my husband so … so … dead, his body so badly damaged. I can’t get the sight of it out of my head.’ I pause. I wipe my eyes. ‘It was terrible when I came home when he wasn’t expecting me and I caught him with Emma Stockton, having sex in our bed.’ I shake my head. ‘That was bad enough at the time. But nothing to the pain of losing him.’
DS Miranda Jupiter sits drinking her tea. ‘Have you changed the bedsheets since you saw Emma here?’ she asks.
I frown. ‘No. I haven’t been finding it easy to do normal chores like washing. You know … what with everything.’ I pause. ‘I haven’t even been sleeping in our bedroom, since Tomas died. I can’t bear being in it without him.’
‘I’m sure it must have all been very difficult.’ There is a pause. ‘I’m sending a police constable around with evidence bags to collect the bedding later today. We need to take a look at it.’
I smile inside. I so wanted her to organise that.
48
Emma
I drive to the police station, nose streaming from a cold I’ve caught from one of my patients. I’m not feeling well. Why on earth do they want to see me, and at short notice?
I check in at the reception counter, and am asked to sit and wait by a young PC with a stern face. After what seems a long time, DS Miranda Jupiter puts her head around the door.
‘Thanks for coming in, Ms Stockton.’ There is a pause. ‘Do come here and follow me to the interview room.’
I pad across the waiting area, following DS Jupiter along a thin winding corridor until we reach the interview room. We sit down opposite one another.
‘I asked you in today because we would like to take a swab of your DNA, if you don’t mind.’
My stomach knots. ‘I’ve nothing to hide. Why would I mind?’ I force myself to smile. Anything to disguise the tumult inside.
‘Good. Good.’
She produces a paper package from a cupboard behind her and unwraps it, withdrawing a thin test-tube with a cotton bud in it. She unscrews the top and pulls it out. ‘Open wide,’ she instructs.
Slowly, gently, she uses it to scrape the inside of my cheek. She puts the swab back in the tube and closes the lid.
‘Why are you taking this?’ I sniff. I blow my nose. ‘Am I a suspect?’
‘Everyone is a suspect in a case like this.’
‘But I hardly knew him.’
‘Well, you’ve got nothing to worry about then.’
49
Alastair
It’s the murder team’s morning briefing. There’s the usual interested buzz, tinged with excitement. Revelling in death as if it is a mere puzzle to solve. DS Jupiter standing at the front, back arched, like a cat about to preen herself. DI Hamilton is on secondment today and she is in charge.
‘Good morning, team.’ She smiles and nods her head. An ice-queen bowing to her subjects. ‘Yesterday Jade Covington told me she came home unexpectedly and caught Tomas and Emma in the Covingtons’ marital bed, together.’
My stomach flips. My heart races. Emma. Tomas. Emma, how could you betray me? I’m bleeding inside. I cannot keep a woman faithful to me.
‘The sheets may not have been changed since then, so we have removed them and put them into evidence bags.’ DS Jupiter looks across at me. ‘Alastair, will you analyse them as soon as possible?’
And then I will know who to believe; whether I have been betrayed again.
Seething inside. ‘Of course. As soon as the briefing is over,’ I say with a tight smile.
‘We now have swabs of DNA from Jade and Emma, so that will help clarify anything we find,’ DS Jupiter continues.
DNA.
Emma is a suspect. I need to tell the team I know her. I should have told them as soon as it happened. My mind rotates. Will another twenty-four hours make any difference? If I hang on a bit longer I can find out if she is honest. I will not speak out yet. I want to know the truth first hand. Sometimes doing the right thing is not the most important priority.
Feeling low, feeling confused, contorted, I change into my scrubs and pad to the evidence store to collect the sheets. Heart pulsating, I step into the sterile area and put on my forensic suit. Then I enter my lab and start work. Jade’s sheets are king-sized and pale gold. The same colour as Emma’s. They look like Emma’s, but then a lot of people have pale-gold sheets. I busy myself putting swab after swab into the machine. DNA. Fragments of tissue. Strong white hairs. They look like Casper’s. I pick one up and look at it through a magnifying glass. It’s obviously not human hair.
My heart stops. Has Jade got hold of your sheets to set you up? We need to see if these hairs are Casper’s, because Casper never leaves your house. He always sleeps by your pillow. Exactly where I have found this nest of hair. I turn my mind in on itself and concentrate. The more I think, the more I figure that there is no other possible explanation. Jade must have swapped the sheets. You are faithful to me, my darling, my love.
My mind fragments. But if she swapped the sheets, wouldn’t my DNA be on it, too? That would stop her little plan from working. I push and push. Not if she changed them midweek. Emma always changes the bedding on Monday. She has a thing about airing bedding to dry it, hanging it out on the line. Emma and Jade’s houses are so close, Jade would know that.
I step outside the lab, and pick one of Casper’s hairs off my jacket. I return and place it on a slide next to one from the bedsheet. I put them under the microscope. Magnified, they look as if they are the same type of hair. They are the same. They must be. My body is electric w
ith happiness because you are not dishonest. Jade has set you up. My beautiful Emma. My true love. The Clusterfuck has set you up. My heart trembles with love. My body trembles with anger.
I come out of the lab and peel off my sterilised clothing. I walk to my boss Sarah Dickinson’s office. She is sitting at her desk, staring at her computer screen.
‘Please can I have a word?’
She looks up. ‘Of course. What is it?’
Trying to keep my voice calm, I say, ‘I’ve found what look like cat hairs on the bedsheets. I’m puzzled as I wasn’t sure whether Jade and Tomas had a cat? I want authorisation to send them for analysis.’
‘Look Alastair, you know the difficulty with pet hair analysis. We have to send samples abroad and that’s expensive. Even then they are not that accurate. But go and talk to Miranda. If she thinks it’s a good idea we might get the budget for it.’
I leave the forensic area and walk across to Miranda’s desk, still dressed in my scrubs. She is reading through a thick file. ‘I need to talk to you,’ I say.
She looks up. ‘Fire away.’
I try to explain, but I’m not sure she is listening properly. Her eyes keep straying from my face back to the file she was reading.
She shakes her head. ‘What’s the point? I can check whether Jade has a cat. Even if she doesn’t a stray might get in. Why is it significant?’
‘This isn’t a small amount of hair from a random visit. And Jade’s a potential suspect. She might be setting Emma up.’
Miranda leans towards me. ‘Why would she?’
I shrug my shoulders. ‘To cover up her crime.’
‘What makes you think she committed this crime?’
‘She has motive. Envy. Jealousy. She said Tomas was a serial womaniser who always loved her, but she could easily have resented his infidelity far more than she has admitted.’ I shrug my shoulders. ‘I think that’s more likely than the angle you are pushing.’ I pause. ‘What makes you think she didn’t do it?’
Miranda Jupiter’s body stiffens. Her mouth turns down further than usual.
‘I’m the detective working on this, so you can leave this to me.’ She pauses. ‘I’ll talk to Jade and let you know if we need any more tests.’
I ache to say more. To tell her about your precious cat who is never allowed to leave the house. The cat that lives in your bedroom. If I tell her the cat shares your bed with me, I will be off the case. Now I fear you are being set up, I need to stay to protect you. For now, until I can distance myself, Miranda will have to work out the cat situation herself.
Memories
Fingers trembling as I dialled the police. The sound of my mother’s cries echoing in my head. Lying in bed, head beneath the covers, trying to block the sound in my ears. The repetitive sound of kicking and thumping that I heard when I went downstairs.
The doorbell rang. I crept onto the landing and held my breath, craning my neck to watch my mother hobbling across the hallway to answer it. Two officers on our doorstep. One male, one female.
‘Is everything OK?’ the female officer asked.
‘Yes.’
‘We had a call. A neighbour heard noises. Shouting, as if there was a fight,’ the female officer said, eyes darting into the hallway.
‘Everything is good here. We were watching a film. Maybe we had it on too loud.’
‘Are you sure? We can come inside if you want.’
‘No, honestly officer – I’m fine.’
50
Jade
DS Miranda Jupiter is standing on my doorstep. DS Miranda Jupiter is crossing my threshold, chestnut eyes searing through my hallway. Staring at my paintings, at my orchids. Frowning as she glances at my cowhide rugs.
‘Can I get you anything?’ I ask.
‘No thanks, I just came to ask you a few questions.’
What more does she need to know? She’s already taken a swab.
‘I just want to check that you didn’t see your husband when you came back from work on the evening he died. One of his colleagues thought he left work late afternoon. Which means, given the distance you had to travel, you should have had half an hour together – unless he was late, or delayed.’
‘He used to get back from work any time between six thirty and eight p.m. Maybe he caught a later train. Sometimes he went shopping before he came home.’
She purses her lips. ‘We’re checking the CCTV at Paddington Station. So we should be able to get to the bottom of this.’
Breathe. Breathe. CCTV can be unclear. One man in a City suit looks much like another. And half the time the cameras don’t work, or the cop on duty falls asleep watching the CCTV tapes as they are so very boring. Sifting for CCTV evidence is tedious in the extreme. Breathe. Breathe.
I confused time of death adequately. I’m sure I did.
51
Emma
DS Miranda Jupiter is sitting on my sofa. She leans back and crosses her slender legs.
‘I’ve got a few questions about your relationship with Tomas.’
‘What relationship?’ I snap.
‘He was your patient.’
‘Yes. As I have already told you, I had a patient–dentist relationship with him.’
‘Jade Covington says she found a receipt for some black ladies’ cashmere gloves, which he never gave to her.’ She pauses. ‘She thinks he may have given them to you.’
‘He did.’
‘Isn’t that a bit of an odd thing for a patient to do?’ There is a pause. ‘Give his dentist an expensive pair of gloves?’
‘Yes. It was a bit over-the-top. I treated him at the house out of hours when he had an infection in his wisdom teeth. I didn’t charge him. Then he had to come and see me at the surgery, later. We fitted him in at short notice, and he gave me the gloves to thank me. I was rather taken aback.’
‘Thank you for explaining,’ she says, mouth turning downwards. ‘And now I need to inform you, I have a search warrant for your house and garden. A team of officers are about to arrive.’
The doorbell rings almost immediately, before the news has sunk in. I must be a suspect. I can’t believe this. The police are here, wearing latex gloves, armed with piles of brown paper evidence bags. Three of them. Two men, one woman. Marching across my property as if they own it. Opening drawers and cupboards. Flicking through the contents. Rifling through my kitchen cupboards, my bin, my fridge. Ransacking my bathroom cabinet, my bedroom. Tromping across the garden. Rummaging through the tools in my shed. I don’t know what they’ll find in there. I haven’t been in it for months.
52
Alastair
It’s a full meeting today. Everyone assembled. DI Hamilton is standing shoulders wide, neck stretched. Miranda Jupiter’s lips are almost curved into a smile, faced tuned into DI Hamilton’s, as if she can’t wait for the meeting to start.
Silence descends. DI Hamilton steps forwards.
‘We’ve found the murder weapon in Emma Stockton’s shed. Pathology tells us that the wrench matches the trauma wound in Tomas Covington’s head,’ he says.
No. Not you Emma. My darling. My love. You wouldn’t do this. You couldn’t. You’re not even strong enough.
I dwell on the cat hairs. I know you are innocent, I know that Jade is setting you up. What did she do on that night you can’t remember? The night you went to hers for a drink. She is a conniving, heartless bitch. I need to stay on the case. I need to help you fight back. We need to box clever. We need to sort this. Even though you are now the main suspect we must keep our relationship quiet. I’ve had an idea. I can do something to help.
‘Alastair, please could you examine the wrench this morning; and send anything you find off for analysis?’ DI Hamilton asks.
I nod my head. ‘Yes sir, of course.’
Memories
‘No honestly, I’m fine.’
The words she said to the police, after I rang them, in the middle of one of my parents’ rows and they finally came. No honestly, I’m fine,
twists and turns in my head. Twists and turns into my memory of what happened next. After school the next day, visiting her in hospital. Leg in plaster. Two fractured vertebrae and a broken leg.
Her hand clasping mine. ‘I told you if you tried to do something about it, it would make things worse. Remember. Remember. I fell downstairs.’
53
Alastair
Another day, another meeting. All the usual. DI Hamilton standing up straight at the front of the room, looking smug. DS Jupiter, petulant and depressed. My boss Sarah Dickinson smiling and equivocal – I’m glad I report to her, not Miranda Jupiter.
DI Hamilton begins, ‘Congratulations team, we’re moving forwards well on this case.’ He looks across at Miranda. ‘Please update us on the time of death.’
She steps forwards, pursing her lips. ‘The pathologist has come back to us and says it was sometime between seven thirty and nine thirty. He can’t be more precise than that. Jade Covington has a strong alibi, she was at a meeting of the Henley book club. Ten people can vouch for her. Emma Stockton, however, was home alone watching Netflix. She had been out for a drink earlier but would have been back in time to kill Tomas.’
My heart sinks. Emma is definitely the lead suspect. All the evidence points to her. So definitely. So precisely. Too precisely. When will the police realise it’s a set-up? Murder investigations don’t normally progress as smoothly as this.
‘What about the wrench, Alastair?’ DI Hamilton asks.
I step forwards. ‘As well as a bit of Tomas’ blood and hair, it has female DNA on it. DNA not on the database yet. So we’re waiting to receive the results of the swabs from Jade and Emma – to see if either match.’
‘And the bedding?’
‘Same thing. We need to wait for the swab results.’
‘Taking their time, aren’t they? Phone the lab. Tell them to hurry up.’