The Bad Things Read online

  Alex clenched her fists, tried to breathe evenly, not wanting to shout at Jackie Wood, not wanting to shake the truth out of her. She knew she had to be careful, treat her as though she were normal and that she thought she had a point. After what seemed like minutes but was probably only seconds, she got her breathing under control.

  ‘Jackie,’ she began gently, ‘signs of the twins were found both in Jessop’s flat and in yours. Items of their clothing were found in the rubbish bin. So much evidence.’ She wanted to pick up her coffee cup but knew her hands would be shaking.

  ‘I was acquitted.’

  Alex thought she saw a sly look flash across Jackie Wood’s face, then it was gone.

  ‘The particles of dirt didn’t add up,’ she went on. ‘Professor Gordon Higgs was discredited.’ Professor Gordon Higgs. Such a competent name. One you would trust, don’t you think? But he was wrong. Or lying.’ She leaned forward. ‘I wasn’t involved.’

  ‘Jessop was.’

  ‘Jessop was what?’

  ‘Involved,’ said Alex, the lightness in her head threatening to come back.

  Jackie Wood shook her head. ‘I told you. He had an alibi.’

  ‘No, the evidence was too strong.’

  She shrugged. Silence opened up. ‘He kept a diary, you know.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘A diary.’

  Alex tried to look uninterested, as if her words hadn’t made her heart beat faster, the palms of her hands sweat. ‘Oh?’ She hoped she’d hit a casual note. ‘And what happened to it?’

  Another shrug. ‘Dunno.’

  She was lying. Alex knew she was lying, she could feel it in her bones. ‘Why did he keep it?’

  ‘Said he’d always kept a diary, right from when he was young. Always told the truth in it, he said.’

  ‘So,’ said Alex, measuring her words, ‘it might contain details of where he buried Millie.’

  She shook her head. ‘We didn’t kill them.’ She put two fingers either side of her temples and pressed hard. ‘At least, I didn’t kill them. Can you go now? Come back another time.’

  Alex stared at her. She wanted to shout at her. Demand to know what Martin Jessop did, how he did it. Why did he put Harry into the suitcase – what was the point of that? Why they let Harry be found but not Millie. She wanted to grab Jackie Wood around her neck and shake the answers out of her. Shake the whereabouts of Millie right out of that horrible, thin, lying mouth.

  But she didn’t do any of that. She merely leaned forward and pressed the off button on the recorder, trying to stop her hand from shaking. She was going to have to be patient. ‘So who do you think did kill them?’ she asked quietly.

  Jackie Wood leaned back, eyes closed, fingers still on her temples. ‘I don’t know. I don’t know anything anymore. Sometimes I wonder what’s real and what I’ve imagined.’ She opened her eyes, looked into Alex’s. ‘But it’s a long time. Fifteen years. You know?’

  Depression washed over Alex. Was she ever going to get anywhere? Any nearer to finding out about Millie?

  ‘I understand,’ she said, getting up and putting her coat on. ‘I’ll come about the same time tomorrow, is that all right?’

  ‘Yes. It’s been good talking to you, actually. Cathartic. Maybe,’ Jackie Wood hesitated, ‘maybe we could go out tomorrow as well, have a coffee or something? There’s a really good pastry shop in the town. They do lovely doughnuts and things. At least, they look nice in the window. I haven’t dared go in. You know.’ She sounded pathetic. ‘Do you know, I don’t even know how to use a smartphone?’

  For a second Alex got an insight into what her life must be like. Not being able to do, or being used to doing, the things she took for granted. Just simple things like having a coffee. How the world had passed her by. ‘Do you worry that people will recognize you?’

  Her mouth twisted. ‘You don’t think the hair dye does much, then? You think people would know who I am?’

  ‘Why did you come here?’ asked Alex. ‘Why not Scotland or somewhere really far away?’

  Jackie Wood shrugged. ‘Why not? It’s where I grew up. I don’t know anywhere else. Besides, I’m innocent aren’t I? I haven’t got anything to fear.’

  ‘And the caravan?’

  ‘Worried the taxpayers are footing the bill? Don’t be. My parents died some years ago, one after the other. I think the shame got to them in the end. They’d bought this caravan so they could stay in it when they visited me. They loved this town. After they sold their house to pay for my legal bills they had to live in it. When they died it came to me. It was all they had left to show for forty years of marriage. They wanted me to have the best, but the best wasn’t good enough, was it?’ Alex could almost reach out and curl her hand around the bitterness in Jackie Wood’s voice. ‘They were hounded every day by people wanting to talk to them about me, about Martin.’

  ‘That’s the trouble though, isn’t it? The families always suffer.’

  She looked at Alex, obviously trying to gauge if she was being made fun of. But Alex was deadly serious and sidled along the bench, standing and putting on her coat. Jackie Wood sat very still, looking at her.

  ‘I could tell you things.’

  Alex stopped, mid shrug. ‘Oh?’

  This time the look on Jackie Wood’s face was sly. Mercurial; she had changed from someone pathetic to a woman with a secret.

  ‘What things?’ Alex’s heart was beating fast. ‘What things?’ Her voice was louder.

  A quick smile and Alex saw in her face the reason she had survived prison for all those years. She had a shell; a toughness to her.

  She rubbed her scar with her finger, up and down, up and down. At that moment Alex hated her so much that she wanted to slap her, hit her, rake her nails down her face; make her bleed. She had to clench her jaw and her fists to stop herself from launching at her across the bench.

  ‘Things that might make you change your mind about me. Things that happened that you know nothing about.’

  ‘The diary? Is it in the diary?’

  ‘Come tomorrow,’ she said, ‘and maybe I’ll tell you more then.’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ echoed Alex. How could she wait a whole twenty-four hours?

  ‘My scar,’ said Jackie Wood suddenly. ‘Do you know how I got it?’ That slow blinking again. She traced it with her finger. ‘Someone took a shank to me a couple of years ago.’ She shrugged. ‘Probably one of the worst things that happened. I had the usual spit or piss in my tea. Punches here and there. Things stolen. People not talking to me. Even when you’re on Rule 45 other prisoners try to get on it purely to do you. They don’t like child killers in prison. Even ones who are innocent.’ She smiled. ‘Goodbye, Alex.’

  Jackie Wood was in control; Alex had no option but to go.

  She felt weightless, dizzy with Jackie Wood’s words. She tied her scarf around her neck and opened the door. Breathed in the cold fresh air that smelled like freedom. Tomorrow.

  But Jackie Wood wasn’t finished. Alex heard her clear her throat behind her. Then she spoke.

  ‘By the way—’

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘All those years ago, what were you doing with Martin Jessop?’

  Alex pretended not to hear.

  9

  He’d held her hand a little longer than necessary when they first met, but Alex hadn’t minded that. He was tall, with dirty blond hair just touching his collar. The sleeves of his white shirt were rolled up to his elbows, showing strong, tanned forearms.

  They met, about six months before the murders, at a talk being given by a couple of well-known authors at the college in Ipswich. She asked a question – she couldn’t for the life of her now remember what it was – but it must have ignited a spark of interest because at the toe-curling have-a-glass-of-warm-Chardonnay-and-meet-the-author event after the talk, he approached her.

  ‘My name’s Martin,’ he said.

  They chatted for a while, he asked her to go for a drink with him and she did,
realizing that the attraction was mutual. He was clever and witty, and made her laugh. The drink led to dinner, dinner led to a hotel and a clandestine relationship. Oh, she knew there was a wife somewhere but she fell for the classic ‘my wife doesn’t understand me’ line and that there was a ‘messy divorce’ going on, which was why he’d prefer to keep their relationship quiet for a while. It was Alex who found him the flat in Sole Bay, who was careful not to be seen when she visited, and was convinced no one knew about the two of them.

  When she looked back and wondered why she had been drawn in, she realized it was because she’d been lonely. She was struggling to get her freelance career off the ground and look after a lively baby boy on her own. She was young, and having a clandestine lover made her life more exciting, which was why she never questioned Martin closely about his personal life.

  It wasn’t until after he’d been arrested that she found out he was spinning her one great lie. Several lies. There was a wife, but very much married to Martin (no ‘messy divorce’ in the foreground or background), and two teenage children living in a small village in Cambridgeshire. He stayed in Sole Bay two or three nights a week, sometimes weekends because of his job at the college. Not because of her. She didn’t figure at all. She read all the details in the papers and knew she had been well and truly duped. The classic woman who believed everything her cheating lover told her.

  At the time, it was all she could do not to fall apart. Something she had started for fun had been destroyed. She had brought a murderer into the family. The only reason she kept on living, kept herself together, was Gus. If it hadn’t been for him, she wouldn’t have been able to get out of bed in the morning. She also had to put on a show. No one had known about her affair with Martin and she wanted to keep it that way. How she managed to get through each day, putting one leaden foot in front of another, was now a blur. But she had done it.

  Alex saw Martin’s wife in court, not unexpectedly. Tall, blonde, always well turned out – well groomed, well dressed. She never said anything or displayed any emotion, not, that is, until Martin was sentenced to life in prison. Then Alex watched as a solitary tear rolled down her cheek. She didn’t wait for him to be taken down.

  The only emotion Alex felt when he was sentenced was thankfulness. He would be out of her life forever. Throughout the hearing she was terrified he would bring her into it, but he never did. Perhaps he thought she had suffered enough.

  The last thing she could do was confess to anybody that she knew Martin Jessop.

  But it was worse than that.

  She walked quickly out of the caravan park and went to sit on a bench overlooking the sea. In its seeming infinity, the water always made her feel as though nothing was as bad as it seemed. And she sat there, hunched over, watching the grey waters dash against the harbour wall and feeling the wind tug at her clothes while the salt air scrubbed her skin, making it sore.

  How did Jackie Wood know?

  The question gnawed at her. She must have seen them at some point. Same block of flats. But why didn’t she say anything at the trial? Why didn’t she stand up and shout, ‘the sister knew the murderer too!’

  Why?

  Alex arrived home to hear the grunting speak of teenage boys and the drone of the Playstation in the sitting room, and no sign of Malone.

  ‘Hi guys,’ she said as she took stock of the dirty plates and cups on the floor, magazines lying about, and the feral smell of male youth. It was good, though, she had to return to normal mode, forget about Jackie Wood and think about everyday life. To be honest, it was a relief. She didn’t want to wrestle with her conscience any more and she didn’t want to be going over and over in her mind what Jackie Wood might have meant by ‘things’ and what might have happened to Martin’s diary.

  ‘Hey, Alex. How’s tricks?’

  ‘Fine thanks, Jack,’ she said, resisting the urge to tidy up. ‘You?’

  ‘Great.’ He didn’t look up from his laptop perched on his knee, fingers flying over the keyboard. Jack, gangly and yet to grow into his cheekbones and aquiline nose and full mouth; was a little different to Gus’s other friends; into computers and gaming, though he did enjoy his sport. Alex liked him. He always said hi, and when Gus was going through his difficult phase (the difficult phase that nearly gave her a mental breakdown), he stuck by her son; helped him shake off the bad group of lads he’d been hanging about with. Probably something to do with them both being in the local youth football team and the fact that he didn’t go to Gus’s school.

  Gus stood. ‘Hey, Mum, hope you don’t mind a few of us hanging out here.’

  ‘Nope,’ she said, counting, as well as Jack, two boys she hadn’t seen before and, sitting with slim legs curled under her bottom in an armchair in the corner, flicking through a magazine, a girl. She almost did a double take. This was the first time she had ever known a girl penetrate the male circle of Gus’s friends.

  ‘Great. We might go to the cinema later.’

  ‘Okay.’ Alex hung on, hoping for some introductions, and trying not to stare at the girl who was gorgeous. Curvy figure, masses of auburn curls, brown doe-eyes which she turned on Alex now, her bee-sting lips curved in a smile. Her nose, slightly too large and a tad crooked gave her face character.

  ‘Thanks, Mum,’ Gus said in that dismissive voice, giving her a fierce look, which meant she was supposed to leave.

  ‘Okay,’ she said again. ‘Enjoy yourselves, won’t you?’

  She backed out of the room, and, although she was sorry not to be introduced to the girl, she was pleased that the presence of Gus’s friends meant he wouldn’t be able to quiz her on how the interview with Jackie Wood had gone.

  She made herself a coffee and sat in the kitchen, sipping it slowly and watching the wind blow through the bare trees in the back garden. All that was needed was a bit of tumbleweed rolling on through. It was how she felt. Empty, spent.

  Come on.

  She needed to concentrate on the interview in the context of the article she would be writing; make herself forget about any personal connection between her and Jackie Wood.

  Okay, so she’d discovered the woman had a boyfriend. Who? Surely someone local; and it was odd that Jackie Wood hadn’t given up his name then or now. He might have been able to help her by providing some sort of character reference. Did he get cold feet? Not love her enough? Just wanted to have his name kept out of the whole mess, plain and simple? And she couldn’t say she blamed him. Or maybe he had something to hide. Or Jackie Wood did. But now? Well, if she’d told her about him now it might make her seem more human to the readers. Elicit some sympathy, maybe.

  Alex took her notebook out of her bag and started to write. It was the way she preferred to work, recording her first impressions on paper. Then she’d listen back to the interview. So what were they? She wrote. I felt sorry for her. Why? Her time in prison? That and her life as it is now. Compared to then, when she had a life. But she doesn’t deserve life now. Why not? Because she’s guilty? Is she? Before she realized what she was doing, she had underlined that last sentence twice. Her pencil had gone through the paper.

  She needed a drink. She was guilty. Definitely. Judge, jury, the media – had all found her guilty. There was no question, no question at all. And her mission was to find out where Millie was buried. Then they could give her a proper burial. And the other thing she had to do was to write the bloody article. And then there was the diary. A bloody diary. She slumped back in her chair.

  The front door opened. Voices. It slammed shut.

  ‘Hi.’ Malone came into the kitchen and kissed the nape of her neck, sending a delicious shiver down her spine. ‘Gus let me in,’ he said pointedly, before walking over to the fridge and taking out a can of beer. ‘Want one?’

  Alex shook her head. ‘Glass of wine, though?’

  He popped the can and took a deep swallow. ‘Okay,’ he said, wiping the foam moustache from his top lip, before going back to the fridge.

  Did she
mind how familiar he was around her house, treating it as his own? She supposed not, otherwise she wouldn’t have allowed it, but still…

  She was irritated. Her back itched and she wanted to squirm around on her chair. What did she really know about Malone? Damn all, really. Despite all the time she’d spent interviewing him she didn’t feel she had got to the bottom of what made him tick. She knew he was holding back. There had been the tales of derring-do and infiltrating gangs and all that. She knew he was in his forties and bloody good-looking. And he’d told her he’d been born and spent his early years in a town near Dublin, before moving to England. But what made him risk his life like that? And although he said he’d finished with that kind of life – could she trust him?

  And even if she didn’t trust him, what was she doing bringing him into Gus’s life?

  ‘Here you go.’

  He handed her a cold glass of something white. She took a gulp and immediately felt better. Not sure that was a good thing.

  ‘How was it then?’

  Alex froze, her glass halfway to her lips ready for a second swig. What did he know? She hadn’t said she was going to see Jackie Wood, so how had he found out? Gus? Surely—

  ‘Hey.’ There was laughter in his voice. ‘No need to look so worried.’

  ‘Worried?’

  ‘You look like a rabbit caught in headlights.’

  ‘Oh?’

  ‘Look. I don’t know where you’ve been, and I don’t particularly want to know. But my guess is that you’ve been somewhere interesting and spoken to someone important and I sort of thought it might be to do with your work.’

  Alex looked at him: calm, steady, strong. No, she didn’t know him that well, but she did know that he cared about her and that if she let it, their relationship could grow into something special. And she hadn’t had anyone to make her feel safe for so many years. She had built a wall around her and Gus and not let anyone breach it. Perhaps now was the time to let the cracks widen that had come with Malone.