Before We Met: A Novel (30 page)

‘He must have been here,’ she said. ‘He must have come to the house. What if I’d been in? Through the glass I would have thought it was you, that you’d forgotten your keys or something.’

Mark dropped the poker on to the hearth with a clatter and stood up. He couldn’t sit still – he’d been sitting then standing then sitting again every two minutes. ‘I’ve got to warn Hermione.’ His coat was slung over the arm of the sofa; he got his phone from the pocket and brought up her number, fingers fumbling on the touchscreen. With the phone pressed to his ear, he crossed to the window, pulled the curtain aside and looked out.

‘Herm,’ he said, ‘it’s Mark.’ He paused and for a moment Hannah thought he’d got through. ‘Look, I don’t want to panic you but Nick’s been here in Parsons Green this evening. I didn’t see him; Hannah did, my wife – I think you’ve met.’ Despite everything, there was a hint of humour in his tone at that. ‘Call me when you get this. He’s obviously come out all guns blazing so . . . Anyway, I thought I should let you know in case you wanted to organise some company for tonight or stay with someone. You’re welcome to stay with us, too, obviously – give me a ring or just get in a cab and come over. We’ll be here all night.’ He hung up but held on to the phone, gripping it tightly.

‘Does Nick know where she lives?’ Hannah said.

‘I don’t know. She’s moved since it happened – she was still junior then, she lived in residences at the hospital – but if he wants to know, he’ll find out.’ Mark went back to the window then turned to look at her again. ‘He doesn’t even need to know where she lives.’

For a moment she didn’t understand.

‘
You
found her, didn’t you?’

He was right. All Nick had to do was go to the hospital.

Mark went out into the hall and she heard the rattle of the door handle as he checked the lock for the third time. A few seconds later, the kitchen light snapped on and she heard the clink of bottles. When she went in, he was pouring an enormous measure of whisky. She watched as he drank half of it in a single swallow.

Hearing her, he turned. For a second or two he looked at her then he put the glass down and came towards her, arms out. The force with which he hugged her was enough to knock her off balance and by instinct she held on to him tighter to stop herself stumbling. To her surprise, he half lifted, half pushed her backwards against the wall. Her head bumped off the plaster but before the small cry had left her mouth, he was kissing her, his face crushed against hers, his tongue pushing itself between her lips. His left hand was on the wall, his forearm creating a barrier, and now she felt his right hand fumbling with the button of her jeans. ‘Mark . . .’ She twisted her head away, trying to free her mouth to speak, but he followed her, kissing her harder. His fingers popped the button and found the zipper. His chest was heaving, his breath hot and fast, whisky-scented.

‘Mark!’ She put her hands on his shoulders and pushed him away. He took a big step backwards.

For a second or two they stared at each other but then he seemed to come to himself again. The intent dropped from his face and he looked first blank then embarrassed. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, touching his lip with his fingers in disbelief. ‘I don’t know what came over me. I—’

‘It doesn’t matter,’ she said. ‘I just couldn’t – not tonight.’

‘I know. I know. I’m so sorry, Han.’ He swallowed hard. ‘I don’t want to be the kind of person who . . . God, I just feel so . . . messed up. When you rang and said you’d seen him, he was here, I was terrified. If anything happened to you – if he hurt you – I couldn’t live with it.’

Chapter Twenty

The knocking tore through the house like the rattle of gunfire,
rat-tat-tat-tat
, ripping the peace of the morning wide open. Hannah jerked awake just as Mark reared up in bed next to her. They stared at each other. For a few seconds the knocking stopped, leaving a silence that rang with echoes, but then it started again, louder still. In a moment he was across the room, pulling a T-shirt over his head.

‘Stay here,’ he said but she was already out of bed, too, grabbing yesterday’s clothes from the back of the chair, nearly falling as she caught her foot in the leg of her jeans. He took the stairs at a run but then, as he neared the bottom, she heard him slow down. When she came out on to the landing, he was standing on the bottom step, looking at the front door.

‘Leave it, Mark. Don’t open it.’

‘No,’ he said, glancing up. ‘It’s not . . .’ The knocking started again, just as insistent. ‘Okay, okay, I’m coming.’ The heavy
thunk
of the deadlock, the brush of the door against the mat. Hannah gripped the banister.

‘Morning, sir.’ A deep male voice with a Liverpool accent. ‘Mark Reilly? Detective Inspector Wells, DS Andrews. Can we come in?’

Police
? Hannah let go of the banister. She went to the top of the stairs and saw them just as they looked up and saw her. The man was in his late forties, Mark’s height but bulky, wearing a dark waxed jacket. With him was a woman her own age in a black trouser suit and short wool coat, her sandy-blonde hair cut in a shoulder-length bob. Mark opened the door wider and they stepped inside, the male officer standing back to let the woman go ahead of him. As Hannah came downstairs, Mark turned to look at her, his eyes full of uncertainty.

The police waited for her then indicated the sitting-room door. ‘Can we?’

‘Please,’ said Mark.

Inside they positioned themselves in front of the mantelpiece, side by side. The air held the thick, ashy smell of the dead fire. Like every other room in the house, the sitting room was large but even so, the detective – Wells, was that what he’d said? – seemed disproportionate to it, a looming presence. ‘Perhaps you’d like to sit down, sir – Mrs Reilly?’

Mark stayed standing. ‘What’s going on? What’s happened?’ His voice was loud. Hannah reached out and put her hand on his arm.

‘Do you know a woman called Hermione Alleyn, sir?’

‘Yes. We don’t see each other much now, but yes. We were at university together, at Cambridge.’

Wells nodded slightly. ‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this but she’s dead. Her body was found late last night.’

Hannah’s heart gave a single great thump.
Dead
. The word fell like a drumbeat, the reverberations fanning out after it, vibrating in the air.

‘Dead?’ She heard Mark say in disbelief. ‘Do you mean . . . killed?’

‘I’m afraid so, yes.’

He turned to face Hannah, giving her a wild look. ‘How?’

‘We won’t know for sure until after the post-mortem,’ said the woman officer, speaking for the first time, ‘but mostly likely it was from head injuries – blunt-force trauma to the skull.’

Mark slumped on to the arm of the sofa, his hand over his mouth. His eyes were wide with horror.

‘When?’ Hannah asked.

‘Again, we’re waiting for the post-mortem to establish that more exactly but some time in the late afternoon. She left the hospital just after four.’

Mark moved his hands over his face and rocked forward. The woman gave him a moment then spoke again. ‘Mr Reilly, we found Ms Alleyn’s phone with her body. You left a message for her last night, at quarter to nine.’

‘Yes,’ he said, through his fingers. ‘I rang her but I didn’t get through. I wanted to tell her . . .’

‘We’ve listened to it. You seemed to be warning her, suggesting she might not want to be alone last night. Can you tell us more about that?’

He raised his head. ‘I wanted to warn her about my brother,’ he said. ‘Nick. He got out of prison yesterday. There was history between them – they used to go out, she testified against him at his trial, and he’d been in touch with her before he was released, threatening her. She’d been ringing me, to talk. I knew she was frightened and—’

‘What was he threatening?’

‘She told me he said it was “payback time”.’

‘Payback?’

‘Nick thought it was her testimony that got him convicted. He blamed her.’ Mark’s hands squeezed into fists on his knees. ‘Where was she? Who found her?’

‘Your brother was convicted of manslaughter, Mr Reilly,’ said Wells.

Manslaughter
. The word hung in the air, and Hannah heard its fading echo:
slaughter, slaughter, slaughter
.

‘Yes,’ Mark said quietly.

‘She was found in Spitalfields,’ Wells said, ‘about ten minutes’ walk from the hospital, in the yard at the back of a pub. The landlord went out just after closing time to check the gate was padlocked. He didn’t see her first off but his dog ran out ahead of him and started barking, wouldn’t come away.’

Mark rocked forward again. Hannah felt the room start to ebb and flow around her, the carpet undulating under her feet. Dead, left behind a pub with the empty barrels and the bins.

‘We found a packet of cigarettes at the scene,’ the woman said. ‘Whether there was a struggle and he dropped them . . .’

‘Your brother’s fingerprints were on them,’ said Wells.

Mark closed his eyes. For several seconds he was silent but then he jerked upright. ‘This is my fault,’ he said. He coughed, half-choked. ‘I should have done something. I knew Hermione was worried, I knew about the threats and I . . .’ He coughed again and swiped a hand roughly across his eyes. ‘I wanted her to go away for a while, or come and stay here. I offered last night but . . .’ He looked up at the female officer. ‘Oh my God, her mother?’

‘She’s been notified.’

‘Hermione was her only child,’ he said, turning to Hannah. ‘She’s a widow – brought Herm up on her own.’

‘In your message, Mr Reilly, you said Nick had been here. It was you who saw him, Mrs Reilly, is that right?’ The detective turned to Hannah.

‘Yes. But not here at the house – it was just up the road, at the delicatessen. He was standing outside. They have flowers – he was standing looking at them.’

‘Did you talk to him?’

‘No. I saw him and ran.’

‘But you’re sure it was him?

‘Yes, sure. I’ve never met him before – Mark and I have only been married since April, Nick’s been in prison all that time – but they – he and Mark – look so similar, I actually thought it was Mark until he turned round properly. I’ve seen photographs of Nick.’
Online.
‘When he saw me, it was obvious he knew who I was, too, or guessed.’

‘Did he approach you? Did he try to say anything?’

Hannah shook her head. ‘Like I said, I ran. I thought he’d come after me, I was terrified, but . . . I’ve thought about it, why he didn’t, and all I can think was that he didn’t want to draw attention to himself. There were other people around. One of the guys who works there was wrapping up a bouquet for a customer.’

‘Why were you so terrified?’ asked the female detective.

‘The history – his conviction and . . .’ Hannah looked at Mark.

‘My brother and I have a difficult relationship,’ he said, ‘we always have had, and Nick’s angry about his time in prison. He blames me for that as well as Hermione. But the other issue at the moment is money. I owe him money.’

‘How much are we talking about?’ asked Wells.

‘One point eight million.’

Hannah watched the police officers exchange glances.

‘Nick owns a stake in my company, twelve per cent, and we had an agreement that he’d cash out the day he got out of prison. He was emphatic about it at the time he bought the shares – on the day, the actual day, the paperwork specifies that. And he wants the money – I went to see him in Wakefield last month – but I haven’t got it to give to him now. I’m in the process of selling the business, we’re meeting the potential purchaser next week, and if it goes through there’ll be no problem. But until then . . .’

‘And your brother knows this?’

‘No, that’s just it. I thought he’d be in touch. I’ve been waiting for him to ring me and,’ Mark held up his hands, ‘nothing. That’s why we’re so jumpy, Hannah and I. He’s playing games. Nick . . . it’s hard to explain. Sometimes in the past I’ve thought it’s like trying to deal with a wild animal. You can never predict what he’s going to do, and when Hannah rang and said she’d seen him . . . He’d obviously come to the house but we weren’t here so he decided to hang around and wait. He couldn’t have planned it, bumping into her like that, but he must have loved it when he saw how frightened she was.’

‘Mrs Reilly,’ said the woman, ‘what time was it when you saw him? Do you remember?’

‘I’m not sure. No, wait.’ Hannah remembered the clock at the top of the station stairs. ‘I went into town yesterday afternoon – shopping – and when I got back to Parsons Green it was ten past seven. I saw the clock on the platform. It’s a few minutes’ walk from there to the deli, three or four.’

‘So quarter past seven, give or take a minute or two?’

‘Yes.’

‘And tell us exactly what happened.’

‘Almost nothing, that was it. I was coming along the pavement and I saw a man who looked like my husband standing by the flowers. If I’d been thinking straight, I should have known it couldn’t be him – Mark was in a meeting, I’d just had a message to tell me he was going in – but the physical similarity . . . Anyway, I stopped. I think I might have started to say something, I’m not sure, but he turned round. We just looked at each other – neither of us said anything – and then I turned and ran.’