Secret Sins: A Callie Anson (20 page)

When they came out of the courtroom, the press were
waiting
, cameras at the ready. Neville should have been expecting it—after all, this was the first access they’d had to the bereaved, pregnant widow. And the morning papers had printed the blurry still of the CCTV footage which the police had supplied to them, showing the bloke in the hoodie, so the story was still on the boil as far as the press were concerned. Automatically Neville stepped in front of Rachel to shield her from the cameras.

‘Mrs. Norton!’ shouted a reporter. ‘Do you have anything to say about your husband’s murder? About the yob who killed him?’

‘Mrs. Norton is too upset to speak to you,’ Neville stated firmly. ‘I’m sure you understand.’

‘Inspector Stewart, have there been any further breaks in the case?’ someone else asked. ‘Now that you have a picture of the killer?’

Thinking quickly, Neville decided to take advantage of the opportunity; he hoped that while he was talking to the press, Yolanda and Sid could get Rachel out of there and away from them.

‘Well,’ he said deliberately, ‘we have asked the public for their help in identifying the man in the photo, of course. And we are planning to stage a re-enactment of the crime on Friday morning. A week after the murder.’

The distraction worked; they asked him a few more
questions
, he spun out his answers as long as he could, and when he finally left the building with the press on his heels, Yolanda and Rachel had gone.

Cowley, though, was waiting for him outside, with the
inevitable
cigarette. ‘They got a taxi,’ he said. ‘Rachel was pretty shook up.’

‘I’m not surprised.’

‘I was afraid she was going to have the kid right on the spot.’ Cowley shook his head. ‘God, she’s bloody huge. When my sister had her baby—’

Not
that
again. Neville cut him off. ‘Yes, Sid. I’ve heard all about your sister’s baby,’ he reminded him. ‘More than once.’

‘Okay. Okay.’

Additional distraction seemed called for. ‘Is there anything else I need to know? About the case?’

Cowley studied the glowing tip of his cigarette before
answering
. ‘The computer boffins have finished with Trevor’s machine. Danny Duffy stopped by to see me yesterday afternoon. After you’d gone home.’

Was that meant to be some sort of veiled criticism, Sid’s way of getting even after being prevented from re-hashing the details of his sister’s pregnancy and labour? Neville decided to let it go. ‘And what did he say?’

‘He said that they hadn’t found anything. Just business stuff, like Rachel said. Accounts, proposals, project management,
emails
to clients. That sort of rubbish. No girlfriend on the side or nothing. At least not that he sent e-mails to.’

‘But,’ said Neville, ‘it’s all moot at this point anyway. Since the CCTV footage turned up. You were right about it being a random crime. About the iPod.’

‘Yeah, Guv. Seems I was right.’ Cowley took a long drag on his cigarette, smiling in satisfaction.

‘But you can wipe that smirk off your face, Sid. Until we’ve found the bloke in the hoodie. Preferably clutching the iPod in his hot little hand.’

They didn’t, Neville reflected, seem any nearer to doing that than they’d been at the start.

Mark had really enjoyed his evening out with Callie the night before. He’d taken her to a nice Italian restaurant off Piccadilly, where they’d had a good meal.

Just not as good, he thought ruefully, as they would have had at La Venezia. Callie would love Mamma’s ravioli.

It was silly that he couldn’t take her there. And high time that he did something about it.

Determined to talk to his sister, he left work a bit early and, instead of going back to his flat, took a detour to her house. Serena was almost always at home at that time of the day, between the end of lunch and the beginning of dinner at the restaurant; Mark knew that she liked to be there when Chiara came in from school. After all, Chiara was only twelve, and though quite capable of looking after herself, she was rather young to be left on her own.

It was Chiara who opened the door to him. ‘Uncle Marco!’ she squealed in a most undignified way, and threw herself into his arms, knocking the breath out of him and nearly bowling him over.

‘Hey. Hey.’ He hugged the compact little body to him. She had grown taller of late, but she still seemed a child to him.

Eventually she let go of him and stepped aside to let him into the house. ‘Is Mum expecting you?’ she asked. ‘Cause she’s not here.’

‘Not here?’ Marco automatically went through to the kitchen, almost as though he would find that Chiara was mistaken and Serena would be there presiding over the coffee pot.

‘No. When I got home from school, she wasn’t here.’ There was a slight worried note in her voice.

‘Did she leave a note?’

‘Oh, yes.’ Chiara picked it up from the kitchen table and handed it to him. ‘It just says that she had to go out. And that she’d left sandwiches for my tea.’

This seemed most uncharacteristic, but hardly alarming.

‘I haven’t eaten them yet. Want one?’ Chiara went to the refrigerator and brought out a plate of sandwiches. ‘There’s plenty here, Uncle Marco. Mozzarella and tomato.’

Mark put the kettle on, then settled down with her at the table, where they quickly devoured the sandwiches.

‘I’m glad you’ve come, Uncle Marco,’ Chiara said candidly. ‘Did Mum ask you to call round? To keep an eye on me or something?’

‘No, it was just good luck. I was hoping to have a word with your mum. About…something.’

Unconsciously she played with a strand of her long black hair, twisting it round her finger. Mark had known her all her life, and knew that Chiara only fiddled with her hair when she was upset or unsettled. Maybe it was the pressure of the school nativity play that had her wound up. ‘Is everything going okay?’ he asked. ‘With the play and everything?’

‘Oh, the play is fine,’ she said dismissively. ‘I’ve learned my lines. All of them.’

‘Even the soliloquy?’

‘Even that.’ Chiara shrugged. ‘It will be fine.’ She was still twisting her hair.

Maybe, then, it was the uncertainty over Angelina—the new boyfriend, the fact that she might not make it home in time for the play. ‘How’s Angelina doing?’ he asked.

‘Fine, I suppose. I talked to her on Sunday night, when she rang. She’s got a boyfriend, did you know?’ Chiara grinned. ‘His name is Li. L - I, not L - E - E. He’s Chinese.’ She added, ‘I’m not sure whether that’s really his first name, or his surname. I think the Chinese do it the wrong way round for some reason.’

‘I don’t suppose your dad is very happy about that,’ Mark said, probing. ‘About the boyfriend, I mean.’

She shrugged again. ‘No. But then Dad wouldn’t like
any
boyfriend that Angelina brought home.’

That, thought Mark, was a very wise and insightful statement. Perhaps Chiara was more grown up than he was giving her credit for. ‘How about
you
?’ he asked. ‘Do you have a boyfriend yet?’

Chiara wrinkled her nose in distaste. ‘No way! Boys are gross.’

Not
that
grown up, then. ‘Gross?’

‘No offence,’ she added. ‘But then, you’re not a boy. Not any longer.’

No, he wasn’t a boy any longer. Mark might have given up at that point, had Chiara not done the one thing which indicated she was really agitated: she conveyed the bit of twisted hair to her mouth and started chewing on the end of it.

Mark abandoned subtlety; he leaned across the table and touched her arm. ‘Hey,
bambina
, is everything okay?’

Her face crumpled and she squeezed her eyes shut. ‘No,’ she said softly. ‘No, I don’t think it is.’

‘What’s wrong? Tell Uncle Marco.’

‘I’m not sure.’ Her voice was almost a whisper, which wasn’t like Chiara at all. ‘But I just have the feeling that something is…wrong. Really wrong.’

‘Because your mum isn’t here?’ he guessed.

‘Partly that. And last night there was something going on.’

‘Something? Like what?’ Mark asked sharply.

‘Like…a fight, I think. An argument.’ Chiara gulped, as though she were on the brink of tears. ‘It was late. I was in bed. Asleep. And it woke me up. They were yelling. Really yelling at each other.’

‘Your mum and dad?’

She nodded miserably. ‘Mum and Dad bicker sometimes. Like over Angelina’s boyfriend. But this was different, Uncle Marco. They were yelling.’

‘Did you hear what they were saying?’

‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘But it was loud. And…I think Mum was…crying.’ At that point Chiara lost it; her own tears overflowed.

Alex Hamilton didn’t just miss her mum and her best friend Kirsty: she also missed her Granny. She hadn’t seen Granny in weeks—only a couple of times since Granny had moved to London, and then for no more than a few minutes. When they’d lived in Gartenbridge, in those long-ago days when she hadn’t known how happy she was, she’d seen Granny nearly every day. During school holidays and on Saturdays, when
Mum was working in her bookshop, she’d practically lived at Granny and Granddad’s house. Granny had fed her, baked her favourite shortbread, read books to her, taught her to pick out some tunes on her piano, played board games with her, let her walk Macduff. She loved her Granny.

But whenever she mentioned her to Dad or Jilly, they shrugged. ‘Granny’s very busy,’ they’d say. ‘Now that she’s living in London, she doesn’t have much free time.’

It had only just occurred to her: she could ring Granny.

Yesterday, after school, she’d called Directory Enquiries and got her number. Excitedly she’d tried it, only to be disappointed by a recorded message on the other end. Not available. Leave a message.

She’d left a message. Granny hadn’t rung back.

Today she had an even more compelling reason to talk to her grandmother.

At school she’d had an encounter with her step-cousins, the odious Beatrice and Georgina. Usually she managed to avoid them, but today they’d caught her off her guard. She’d been
sitting
alone at a table in the dining hall, daydreaming about Jack, when they’d sneaked up behind her.

Their chosen taunts and torments had been as usual: all about her mother.

It upset Alex, and it made her feel guilty. She’d been so busy thinking about Jack that she hadn’t given that much thought to her mum and how much she missed her.

And could it be true, those horrible things they said about Mum? Was her mother dead? Alex had no positive proof that she wasn’t.

Granny, she’d said to herself. Granny will know. Granny will tell me the truth.

This time she was in luck: Granny answered the phone on the second ring.

‘Alex!’ said Granny, sounding delighted. ‘How are you, lovie? It’s been way too long since I’ve seen my wee lass.’

Alex couldn’t help herself. ‘I left a message yesterday. You didn’t ring me back.’

‘But I did! Jilly said you were too busy to come to the phone.’

Oh, the treachery of it! Alex was speechless for a few seconds, overwhelmed by hatred for Jilly and her whole horrible family. ‘She’s a liar! Jilly’s a rotten liar!’

Granny didn’t say anything, so Alex went on. ‘Granny, can I ask you something?’

‘Of course.’

‘My mum.’ The words came out almost on a sob. ‘Tell me the truth. Is my mum dead?’

‘Dead?’ Granny sounded shocked. ‘Oh, lassie. Of course she’s not.’

‘You’d tell me if she was?’

‘I’d tell you,’ promised Granny.

‘Then why,’ Alex demanded, ‘hasn’t she written to me? Or e-mailed me? Or come to see me? Or anything? My mum loves me. If she was alive, how could she just…ignore me like that? If she’s not dead, then where is she?’

‘Oh, Alex, lassie.’ There was a long silence, then Granny spoke slowly, as if she were choosing her words with special care. ‘Your mother is alive. But she’s…not well.’

‘She’s dying?’ It came out as an anguished cry.

‘No, no. She isn’t well…in her head.’ Granny took a deep breath. ‘You and your dad—well, you were her whole life. She loves you both so much. And when she lost you…she just…couldn’t cope.’

‘Are you saying that Mum is crazy?’ Alex asked baldly.