The Forever Home by Sue Watson

Chapter Thirty-One

I woke late the next morning, and Ryan was already up. I could hear him on the phone downstairs. I heard anger in the tone of his voice, like he was arguing with someone. Then I remembered Erin was missing, and everything else went from my head.

So I called Lara, who surprisingly picked up.

‘I know you said not to call you – but, Lara, is there any more news?’

‘He’s still at the station, as far as I know,’ she sounded so absent, so defeated.

‘Can I do anything?’ I asked, but she’d already put down the phone.

I felt numb, barely aware I’d even dressed myself as I walked downstairs and into the kitchen.

‘Oh, you spoiled it,’ Ryan said, standing in the kitchen; the comforting smell of coffee and toast filled the air.

‘What?’

‘I was going to make your breakfast, I thought… well, you seem so stressed.’

‘Yes, of course I am. Erin’s missing, Mark’s been arrested, and the last person to apparently see her was me… Oh, and Lara’s just put the phone down on me, again.’

‘Carly, I didn’t mean…’ I saw a flash of anger; it was probably justified.

I sighed. ‘It’s okay, Ryan. I wasn’t having a go at you, I’m just worried. I have this horrible feeling that Erin has done something bad. You know, hurt herself… or something?’

‘It’s fine,’ he said, but I saw his jaw tighten.

I picked at the plate of toast he’d just put in front of me, as he wiped down the counter. ‘Who was that on the phone before?’ I asked. ‘Sounded like you were having a row?’

‘Oh… it was Max.’

‘Were you arguing?’

‘Yeah.’

‘What about?’

‘About… about him being a total dickhead. Do you want your eggs soft-boiled?’

‘Yes please.’

He clearly didn’t want to talk about the conversation with his brother, and I couldn’t think of a way to press him on it. Perhaps that was all it was, one brother telling the other what a dickhead he was. But his reaction, and my instinct told me there was more to it.

Later that day, DS Sally Barker arrived without DS Harefield, but with several other officers, and announced they had a warrant to search my house and garden.

I almost collapsed, but how could I say no? It would make me look like I was hiding something. So I agreed and invited her inside, while the officers searched.

‘How do you put up with that lot?’ she asked, as she walked in, nodding behind in the direction of a group of photographers and reporters, who were still camped out at the end of my drive. My personal press pack.

‘Oh that.’ I rolled my eyes. ‘Fortunately, the drive’s long. The guy who’s working on my house put up a No Trespassing sign yesterday, and they’re okay, so far they seem to be sticking to the rules.’

‘Well, let me know if you get any trouble,’ she said, as we walked down the hall. ‘I’ll be happy to send a couple of lads over to scare them off.’

‘Thanks,’ I said, with a smile.

She seemed nicer on her own, without DS Harefield, or perhaps it was just an act to lull me into a false sense of security?’

We walked into the sitting area, and looking through the windows I could see Ryan standing around, unable to work with several men moving plant pots and checking every bloody grain of soil.

‘Quite a search party you’ve got here,’ I said, hoping the officers who’d gone upstairs weren’t seeing Ryan’s clothes in my bedroom and putting two and two together.

‘Like I say, it’s a high-profile case. And you know,’ she shook her head slowly, ‘it seems the more we look, the less we know. None of it makes any sense, we just can’t find her – even if she isn’t… alive.’

‘I just want to clear a couple of things up,’ I started, once I’d made her a cup of tea and we were sitting down on opposite sofas. I leaned forward and spoke quietly. ‘I’ll be honest… Sally, I’m worried that as I was the last to see Erin, I should have been more… proactive?’

‘Do you think you could have been more proactive?’ she asked, taking a sip of tea.

‘Well, I don’t know. She just disappeared, and I assumed she’d gone home, but could I have done more?’

‘Do you feel you could have done more, Carly?’

This was starting to feel like a therapy session.

‘I don’t know – perhaps? But it’s complicated. As I explained, my friendship with Lara has been non-existent since Mark and Erin… So when she didn’t get back to me, I didn’t keep calling her to tell her that Erin had run off. Nor did I feel that Erin was my responsibility. But now I wish I’d done something, you know.’

‘Do you think she might have been running away from you?’ Sally’s head was to one side, waiting for my answer.

‘No, definitely not! We were having a conversation… Erin has always been a bit frosty, but we kind of opened up a bit… I thought…’

‘That reminds me,’ she said, like she hadn’t heard me. ‘I wanted to show you something.’ She opened up her satchel and produced a file, laid it carefully on the coffee table, opened it and then flicked through agonisingly slowly. What the hell was she going to show me? I had to put my coffee cup down on the table for fear she might see me shaking. ‘This.’ She finally lifted her head from the file and, looking straight into my face, laid a photograph down on the table.

I put on my reading glasses, held my breath, and picked up the photo. It was a picture of a blush pink knitted throw. I looked at Sally, puzzled. ‘It’s… it’s a throw.’

She nodded. ‘Recognise it?’

I lifted my head very slowly to meet her gaze. ‘It looks like mine.’

She sat back in her seat, without blinking, and the bonhomie from seconds before burst like a bubble above our heads. ‘Is it yours?’

I looked down again at the photo. ‘I have two of them, they’re on the sofas,’ I said, looking across both sofas, and with a jolt, seeing only one. How had I not noticed this before? But then so much had been going on I hadn’t even thought to look.

‘I gave it to Erin, she was cold.’ I hoped, if nothing else, this would prove that I wasn’t nasty to her, that I didn’t try to hurt her.

But Sally seemed unconvinced. ‘Okay…’

‘Where did you find it?’ I asked, dreading her answer.

‘We found it down on the beach, just a few hundred yards from here.’

‘So did she go down on the beach, did it fall…’ I couldn’t look at her, just kept staring at the remaining throw on the arm of the sofa, and wishing there were still two. My insides were churning; this didn’t look good for Erin. Or for me. ‘I don’t understand.’

‘Yes,’ she said, looking into my face, ‘it’s been puzzling us too. Especially as it has bloodstains on it…’ And before I could ask, she added, ‘It’s Erin’s blood.’

My hand rushed to my mouth, then I remembered watching a TV programme where a police psychologist said that’s what people do when they are lying, trying to stop the lies coming out. Thinking of this, I moved my hand away, aware Sally seemed to be watching my every move.

‘So… it looks like Erin might have… fallen, from the cliffs?’ I asked, horrified, and finding it hard to say the words. All I could think of was Lara, and how devastated she would be.

‘Well, it’s too early in the investigation to say. There are a lot of theories flying around. Your husband, for example…’

‘Yes, I heard he was under arrest.’

‘Not any more. We released him,’ she looked at her watch, ‘about an hour ago.’

‘Oh, so, he isn’t a suspect?’ I couldn’t help the disappointment; after all, if he wasn’t under suspicion, that made it point all the more to me.

Sally shrugged again. ‘Well, he had an alibi,and, as he pointed out, it isn’t in his interests for anything to happen to Erin.He says her disappearance will have a negative impact on his new TV programme in America.’ She began putting the photo into the file, then stopped. ‘Will it have any impact on you, Carly?’

‘What?’ I asked.

‘If the programme doesn’t go ahead?’

I suddenly saw a way of proving I hadn’t done anything to Erin. ‘Actually yes, it isn’t in my interests either for Erin to be missing – because if the programme’s cancelled, then I won’t be getting the percentage of money I’m owed.’

‘Oh, I see. Thing is, we’ve now viewed the video Mrs Matthews… Erin’s mother, sent to us.’

‘Oh. Okay.’

‘And Mr Anderson seems to think you made the video to try and stop him from leaving you.’

‘I made that video more than ten years ago!’

‘Yes and according to Mr Anderson, it was around then he wanted to separate, and that’s why you made the video. He says none of what you say in the recording is true.’

‘Well, he would say that wouldn’t he? It isn’t lies – I made the recording because he hurt me and I wanted him to stop.’

She nodded, but I wasn’t sure she believed me. I was one half of the golden couple, and who would ever believe that Mark Anderson the perfect husband and father, could do something like that? She looked back at her notes. ‘He says… you once kidnapped the children?’

‘Kidnapped?’ I was horrified.

She looked at me apologetically. ‘Yeah. He says you hid the children in a rental cottage, and wouldn’t tell anyone where they were.’

‘Whoa. It wasn’t like that. I was staying away from him… I wanted a divorce, I was desperately unhappy…’

‘But you went back to him?’

‘Yes, I went back home with him.’ What was Mark doing to me? And why was he doing it now?

I couldn’t tell her about the hold he had over me; and if he could make me leaving with my children sound like kidnap, he could easily convince them I was a murderer. He once told me it would be easy to convince the police that I benefited financially from my mother’s death. Just thinking about this made me start to cry, and I reached for a tissue to wipe my eyes.

‘You told us previously that you’d had a nasty note, a rat delivered, and someone’s face was pressed against the window.’ She continued, listing this in monotone, making it sound far-fetched even to me.

I nodded, listlessly; how could I deny it?

‘Carly, tell me, are you upset about the fact that Mark and his new girlfriend are about to come into some big money? If it were me, I’d be furious,’ she said, pulling what I can only assume was a ‘furious’ face.

‘No! I’m not,’ this was all getting a bit scary, what did they think had happened?

‘Mr Anderson also seemed to be of the opinion that you are still angry about their affair,’ she looked back down at her notes, ‘and about them having money you felt was owed to you?’

‘Yes. It was… it is owed to me,’ I stressed. Why was he playing games? The money in our bank was half mine, and he knew it.

‘So you are angry? Jealous even?’

‘I’m annoyed about the money. But jealous? No. I was upset when I found out about the affair, who wouldn’t be? He’d been having a relationship with Erin behind my back, and she was pregnant. She was like a daughter to us.’ I heard my voice crack. I kept thinking about the blood on the throw; I couldn’t get it out of my head.

Sally pulled a face, suggesting that she sympathised. ‘Of course, I can see why you’d feel weird about that.’

‘I don’t feel weird… exactly, just let down, by both of them.’ I was scared to say anything now. Mark had apparently painted me as the jealous, greedy ex-wife and with his alibi in place, the police had obviously turned their attention to me.

Sally moved in her seat, like she was making herself comfy to chat with a friend. ‘I’m a bit confused, Carly. You see, Mr Anderson said you were the one who left him. And I seem to remember reading in the paper that in fact you left him ages before he met Erin, because you were looking for yourself or something?’ She said this like it was the most ridiculous thing she’d ever heard. It was. Because it was all lies. All part of Mark and Estelle’s narrative.

‘Finding myself,’ I corrected gently, ‘though God knows why, because that wasn’t what I was doing, that was what Mark and his agent told me I was doing. And I did say that – but the truth was that Mark was having an affair with Erin, and she was pregnant. Thing is, we didn’t always tell the press the truth. And it was decided in this case it would be best for all of us to pretend it was me who wanted to end the marriage.’ I was aware how this showbiz arrangement might sound to Sally, and in truth I felt foolish for going along with it. But because I told him about Mum’s death, he always had that hold over me, and as long as he lived he would keep that hold over me.

‘Men are bastards,’ she sighed, shaking her head. ‘My ex ran off with a younger woman, a few years ago now, but I remember how it felt – and, between you and me, I could have killed her.’ She looked at me, waiting for my response.

I feigned surprise.

‘Yes – me – a detective, I’d have killed,’ she said, ‘and I’m not proud of it – just being honest with you, as I know you’re being with me.’

‘Yes,’ I heard myself croak.

‘It was bad enough for me, but for you… well, you had a lot more to lose than I did. I wouldn’t blame you for anything you did.’ She looked at me questioningly, sympathetically, seemingly waiting for me to admit something.

‘I didn’t—’

‘I mean, here you are struggling, trying to keep this place going. Jarvis & Co aren’t cheap either – he must be charging you way more than you earn at that shop?’

I could feel myself blush. I didn’t know they knew where I worked. And did Sally know about me and Ryan? Not that it was relevant, but it might make things awkward.

‘And all the worry of making ends meet, while Erin Matthews is sitting pretty with your husband’s millions, the millions you worked for? That he’s now telling you, you can’t even have a little slice of? I know what I’d do if it were me – and I tell you,’ she looked around, and leaned forward, before saying under her breath, ‘honestly, I couldn’t guarantee she’d come out alive.’

Now she was playing me, she wanted me to nod and confess, but it wasn’t like that.

‘I don’t… don’t resent her. And I don’t want his money, I just want what’s mine,’ I said, desperately trying to keep the irritation out of my voice.

She looked disappointed. ‘Fair enough. Well, you’re a better woman than me, Carly.’ She smiled. ‘Now, just one more thing.’ She took out a tablet and clicked it on. ‘Thanks for sending us your CCTV footage. I presume you checked this yourself?’

‘Yes, there was no sign of Erin.’

‘No, but we have the technology,’ she said in an American accent. I humoured her, and smiled, while cringing at her attempt at humour.

She placed the tablet on the coffee table in front of me.

’We’ve got this CCTV wizard in our department,’ she started. ‘She really is a genius, and she’s cleaned up the footage, and you’re right, there’s no sign of Erin, but take a look at this.’ She pushed the tablet towards me, and as my eyes focused on a black and white image of the front of my house, she pointed at the large rhododendron bush at the end of the drive. ‘Can you see? There’s someone there,’ she said, her finger still pointing.

I leaned in to try and focus, and suddenly became aware of slight movement, and yes, someone was pacing outside.

‘If we look at the time Erin arrived,’ she was saying, looking at a sheet of paper with timings on, ‘and the time this person turned up – they appeared straight after Erin went inside your house.’

The consequences of this may not have been good for Erin, but it might mean they’d found the real suspect, before they’d started digging up my bloody garden.

I almost hugged her with relief. ‘So someone was waiting for her?’ I asked, feeling a prickle of hope. They knew I had nothing to do with it now, didn’t they?

‘Looks like it, but he seems to disappear down the side of the house, towards the back garden, see… now watch,’ she said, and zoomed in. ‘Do you recognise that man?’

It was still slightly blurry, and dark, but as she zoomed in, it became clearer, and the more I looked, the more I didn’t believe what I saw. My heart began thudding; my mouth was dry.

‘It looks like Ryan…’ I said. ‘Ryan Jarvis.’