No Escape (2 page)

The journalist, knowing about Jack’s condition, would probably have assumed that Lizzie was thinking of that. But Lizzie had not spoken the words, neither to that person nor to any other.
Not even to Angela Piper, her mother, nor to Gilly Spence, who helped with Jack and the other children and some of the housework – making Gilly another blessing.

Work keeps me sane.

None of them would have truly understood that statement. All of them would have believed that if Lizzie’s emotional strength did occasionally teeter a bit, it had to be because of Jack and
the constant strain of balancing priorities – and even then, taking all that into account, they would still silently have added a waiver to their very real empathy:
Easier for Lizzie than
most.

Because all her family, friends and colleagues, and anyone who’d read about her in women’s magazines or tabloids, felt much the same way about one pivotal aspect of her life; that
Lizzie’s greatest, head-and-shoulders-above-the-rest, blessing (especially, some privately thought, since though she was a nice enough-looking blue-eyed blonde, she was no great beauty) was
that she had Christopher for her husband.

Christopher Edward Julian Wade.

The gifted, renowned, attractive plastic surgeon who regularly donated his services to the needy in European and Third World countries, as well as being the founder and lynchpin of HANDS, a
charitable institution dedicated to the physical and psychological aid of disfigured men, women and children.

Dubbed ‘Saint Christopher’ by several tabloids.

The Wades divided their family life between a large, early Victorian, stucco-fronted house on the Thames near Marlow in Buckinghamshire, and a garden flat in London’s Holland Park; both
homes having been virtually gutted and reconstructed some years back in order to be able to accommodate Jack’s special needs – ramps, a stairlift in the house, widened doorways,
modified bathrooms – as they arose, as his strength and abilities gradually waned, and both also possessing working kitchens for Lizzie and studies for her and Christopher.

Add the blessing of wealth.

Lizzie had long ago lost count of how many fans had written to tell her how much they envied her – not so much because of her bestselling books and regular appearances as Lizzie Piper in
cookery slots on
This Morning
and on the Food and Drink Channel, but because of her life with the fabulous Christopher.

Because none of them knew the truth about him.

They all knew only what Lizzie
wished
them to know, for knowing more would serve no purpose. She would not – could not – contemplate leaving Christopher, no matter what,
because of her children. Because of Jack. Because, flawed as her husband was, he was also the most genuinely tender father imaginable.

And because Jack worshipped him.

So, for at least as long as Jack lived (and although Lizzie knew the statistics, knew that despite the hopes for gene and other therapies of the future, her beloved son might still be lucky to
survive past his teens or early twenties, she seldom permitted herself to contemplate his death), Lizzie would tell no one. Would allow her family and the world beyond to go on believing,
wholeheartedly, in the semi-myth of ‘Saint Christopher’ Wade.

For Jack.

Some people found it hard to trust Robin Allbeury.

A prosperous, successful, Labour-supporting solicitor with offices in Bedford Row and a sumptuous penthouse home in Shad Tower, a sleek building on Bermondsey Riverside near St Saviour’s
Dock and Butler’s Wharf on the south-east side of Tower Bridge, Allbeury was, on the whole, a contented man.

An elegant bachelor of forty-two, not handsome but undeniably attractive, with dark hair threading nicely with silver, and warm brown eyes, he supported the arts but, in his personal taste
rankings, placed cinema above theatre, thrillers above literature, jazz above opera. Silence above jazz. Quiet dinners above parties. Friendships with women above men. And his single status above
marriage.

‘You don’t know what you’re missing,’ David Lerman, one of his partners, blissfully happy with his second wife, had told him more than once. ‘Julia’s
transformed my life.’

‘Julia’s wonderful,’ Allbeury had agreed, ‘but you were a miserable sod before you met her, whereas I’m a happy man.’

‘So you claim.’ Lerman had remained dubious.

‘I do.’ Allbeury had smiled.

His speciality in law was matrimony, though these days, as head of his own firm, he tended to be highly selective about which cases he took on, leaving either Lerman or one of their associates
to deal with the bulk of marital matters, while he supervised and allowed himself time for his ‘other’ work.

What he did in that spare, private time, was to help rescue women trapped in deeply unhappy marriages; women who, either for financial or other reasons, saw no way out. They seldom came to him.
It was usually Allbeury who, learning of their circumstances in any number of ways, volunteered his services to them.

He had built up a grapevine of trusted informants over the years, a disparate bunch spread over Greater London. A telephone operator working for the emergency services, a disillusioned social
worker, a probation officer, a police constable, a paramedic, a publican and one west London vicar.

‘Anyone finds out I’ve passed this on to you,’ the social worker had agitated at one of his early meetings with Allbeury, ‘and I’m fucked.’

‘No one’s going to find out from me,’ Allbeury had told him.

The case in question had concerned a woman suffering from her husband’s extreme mental cruelty. Social services had been alerted by neighbours because of the wife’s constant loud
sobbing, but with no visible bruises or blood, and in the face of her refusal to make any complaint, the social worker had had little choice but to withdraw.

‘I feel I’ve abandoned someone in darkest despair.’

‘No chance of her leaving?’ Allbeury asked.

‘She’s sunk too deep to even try,’ the young man had said. ‘He’s a complete control freak. Won’t let her cash a cheque without his signature, won’t let
her have an ATM card, tells her who she can or can’t see.’

‘Suicide risk, do you think?’ Allbeury asked.

‘I’d say it’s a distinct likelihood.’

Allbeury had been quiet for a moment.

‘Tell me all you know.’

He generally worked that way, extracted whatever his informant could offer, then used his own methods to verify the woman’s circumstances, after which, if he felt he might be able to help,
he made contact via a third party to arrange a first meeting, usually in a public place outside their own environment. Some of the women shied away in alarm, but often they were sufficiently
intrigued and bleak enough to take at least that first step.

They tended, in general, to like and to have faith in Allbeury, who was a gentle, diplomatic interrogator, though some were suspicious, especially when he told them there was no need to concern
themselves about money.

‘I can’t pay you any other way either,’ more than one had said.

‘Nor do I expect you to.’

All he was offering, he told them, was a way out. An escape. An end to their marriage, if that was what they decided they ultimately wanted. An end to intimidation or raw vulnerability or actual
fear.

‘But
why
?’ one distrustful wife had asked. ‘If you say you don’t want money, and I won’t risk applying for Legal Aid, why on earth do you want to
help?’

He had smiled. ‘Call it my missionary complex.’

‘Missionaries convert people, don’t they?’

‘The only thing I want to convert you to,’ Robin Allbeury had told her, ‘is freedom.’

Mike Novak, a private investigator with a struggling agency operating out of a run-down former warehouse in New Smithfield, a grungy undeveloped cul-de-sac off Dock Street near
the old Royal Mint, had first hooked up with Robin Allbeury five years ago after Allen Keith, at that time a junior partner in the Bedford Row practice, had hired Novak to check out the allegedly
adulterous wife of a wealthy client. Novak had learned that the shoe had been firmly on the other foot, and had reported as much. The client had been enraged and ordered Allen Keith to fire Novak
and withhold payment, but two days later senior partner Robin Allbeury had come to the agency to apologize.

‘I’d rather have my fee,’ Novak had told him.

The solicitor with the beautifully-cut hair and suit, and the younger man with rumpled fair hair, pugnacious nose and mouth and hostile blue eyes, had taken a good look at one another.

‘Your fee plus a bonus.’ Allbeury had smiled as he’d written out the cheque on the spot. ‘And my thanks for a job well done.’

‘Your client wouldn’t agree.’

‘Nevertheless,’ Allbeury had said.

When, some months later, Novak had read in the
Mirror
that the client’s divorce had been settled with particular fairness to the wife, he’d wondered if his report and,
perhaps, Robin Allbeury himself, might have played a part in the deal.

The following afternoon, a pair of heavies had jumped Novak near his flat in Lamb’s Conduit Street, advising him that he’d be smart in future to keep his reports in the interests of
those who paid his bills, then given him a kicking to ram home the point. Deciding later, nursing a stiff drink and his wounds, that the rather smoothly charming Robin Allbeury should be made aware
of the kind of people he was dealing with, Novak had phoned him, and within hours the solicitor had come to the flat.

‘Christ,’ Allbeury had said, appalled by his face.

‘You didn’t need to come.’

The other man had ignored the bolshiness. ‘May I come in?’ In his left hand, he held a bottle of Jameson’s. ‘Better than aspirin.’

Novak had hesitated, then let him in and shown him where the glasses were.

‘Straight to the point,’ Allbeury had said, pouring for them both. ‘Okay?’

‘Why not?’

‘You have my word,’ Allbeury said, ‘which I hope, in time, you’ll come to see is worth something, that my firm will, as of tomorrow, sever all links with the client in
question.’

‘Judging by this little lot—’ Novak felt his ribs gingerly ‘—he may not like it.’

‘Tough,’ Allbeury said.

‘What about Allen Keith?’

‘If Mr Keith has a problem with my decision, he can look for a partnership elsewhere.’

Novak had frowned. ‘You sound like you mean that.’

‘I never say things I don’t mean,’ Allbeury had said.

If those thugs had inadvertently helped to bring about the start of a long working relationship with Robin Allbeury, they had also introduced Mike Novak to the love of his
life.

Clare Killin had been a nurse on duty in A&E when he’d limped in on the afternoon of his beating to have the nastiest of the gashes on his forehead stitched up. It was one thing, Novak
had confessed to her, facing up to the odd angry fist or even boot, but needles were another matter altogether.

‘I’ll do my best,’ she’d assured him, her voice soft and Edinburgh-accented.

‘Aren’t you going to take the piss?’ he’d asked.

‘Would it help?’

‘Not a bit.’

‘Didn’t think so.’ She’d turned around. ‘Want to shut your eyes?’

Novak had checked out her calm hazel eyes, sweet mouth and curly red hair, tied off her face, a few stray hairs escaping. ‘Think I’ll keep them open,’ he’d said.
‘If you don’t mind.’

A fortnight after their first dinner together, Clare had moved into his flat, and three months later they had quietly, joyfully married. Neither had relatives in easy reach, Novak having lost
both his Czech-born father and English mother in a plane crash seven years before, and Clare’s widowed father, Malcolm Killin, living up in Scotland, but neither had felt any need for family
or for anyone else.

The nearest thing to tension Novak had experienced in those blissful early days had been the odd troublesome client or the ongoing challenge of trying to make Novak Investigations pay its way.
Clare’s stresses, on the other hand, had been on a vastly different level, witnessing, as she did almost daily, the kinds of pain and distress that Novak preferred not even to imagine. When
she had finally burned out because, according to a colleague at the hospital, she was too empathetic to survive long-term as an emergency care nurse, Novak feared that he might, in some way, have
failed her.

The agency was relegated to second place and business suffered accordingly as he became determined to help Clare back to full strength, but she never went back to A&E, and Novak had backed
her decision. The hospital, keen to help, had suggested the possibility of a transfer to another department, and Novak had mooted the idea that she might want to try her hand at private nursing,
but Clare had rejected both notions.

‘It’s A&E or nothing for me,’ she’d said. ‘The things that made me unwell are the things I loved.’ And then she’d looked at him, strangely,
searchingly.

‘What?’ Novak had found the look unsettling. ‘What is it, Clare?’

‘You must be very disappointed in me.’ It was a flat statement.

Dismay hit him hard. ‘For God’s sake, why would you think that?’

‘You married a nurse. A strong, capable woman who took care of people.’

‘I married a human being, Clare. A sensitive, caring woman.’

‘You still love me then?’

The flatness had gone, but the fragility was back, worrying him.

‘More than ever,’ he had told her, almost violently. ‘More than anything.’

He’d asked her, soon after that, if she might like to consider joining him at the agency, had been both surprised and delighted by her eagerness to agree and, as time
passed, greatly impressed by her contribution. Clare had turned out to be both a natural organizer and an ace at spotting flaws. In less than two weeks, she’d been confident enough to take
over most administrative and bookkeeping tasks, leaving Novak free to focus on persuading at least a few of his formerly regular clients – two divorce lawyers, one of the big agencies who
farmed out work, and Robin Allbeury – that he was back on track.