The Fall (32 page)

The prosecution had a whole row of lawyers, all suits and designer glasses. All Dan had was Kylie, five foot nothing and ink all over her hands. Surely it was meant to be the other way round? The evil defendant with all the money, and the plucky prosecution bringing them down?

‘And Officer Hegarty, what’s the story there?’ Kylie had said, tapping her pen on her blotter.

It was like she could read minds, Charlotte thought. ‘Nothing! He’s been nice to me. I’ve been struggling.’ She looked down at her bare hand, avoiding the eyes of the suited men in the room. ‘It was meant to be my wedding day, you know, just after.’

‘Yeah. And you said he met you in Singapore for an exotic holiday?’

Charlotte’s mouth fell open. ‘I . . . no! I was there to meet you, actually, and he was just passing through. I didn’t think it was wrong to meet up for a drink. Was it?’

‘The arresting officer on your fiancé’s case? Bit strange, maybe. Anything happen?’

‘Of course not.’ Blushing, she looked away from the men. But she was remembering waiting for him on the pier, all dressed up and perfumed, and how her heart had hammered every time she saw a tall man walking towards her. And then that time when he’d chased her down the street in the rain and held her while she cried, shivering in his thin wet shirt. When he’d let go his eyes had locked into hers and he’d said, ‘You need seeing home?’

That was it, she knew. That could have been the moment when she moved on with her life. When she did what everyone was telling her to do, even Dan himself, and forgot her fiancé, gave it up as a bad job. But she’d held on this far. She’d pulled away from DC Hegarty, the air chill after the heat of his body. No, she’d shaken her head. No. And she’d trudged home alone through the puddles collecting on Prince of Wales Road.

‘OK.’ Kylie suddenly moved on. ‘Let’s talk about your first statement . . .’

Afterwards Charlotte slumped on the bus, replaying it. At the end of her interview she’d stood up, late for her waitressing job. The men in suits had left the room and Kylie was shoving papers randomly into a Tesco’s carrier bag. ‘I never thought of him in that way.’ She’d felt the need to explain to Kylie. ‘DC Hegarty, I mean. I didn’t.’

‘Oh?’ Kylie was cracking a pen lid in her mouth. ‘Maybe you should start. I’m pretty sure he does.’

And she remembered seeing him before she went in, and how she’d watched him walk out until Kylie had to touch her arm to get her attention. ‘He’s just a friend,’ she’d said again.

‘R-i-i-ght.’

Charlotte had other problems. When the news came about Chris Dean’s arrest, she’d girded her loins and called Dan’s parents again, the first time in months, since she’d given up on them ever helping.

The phone rang for a long time, and when Dan’s father answered it was in the wavering voice of an old man. ‘He . . . llooo?’

‘Mr Stockbridge? It’s Charlotte. Er . . . Dan’s Charlotte?’

‘Is something the matter?’

Of course it was, his son was in prison. ‘Well, the thing is, I’ve found some more evidence in Dan’s case.’

He was silent. ‘I don’t think we can help.’

‘Listen, please! It’s not what you think.’

‘What are you saying, dear? We can’t cope with much more of this.’

‘I’m saying he didn’t do it.’ She enunciated clearly; no way would he ‘pardon’ her on this occasion. ‘I think it was a MISCARRIAGE OF JUSTICE.’

Like a lab rat, she could almost hear Justice Stockbridge’s ears prick up at the words. ‘Do you honestly believe that?’ he said after a while.

‘I have proof,’ she said, stretching the truth just a little. ‘We think someone else did it. It wasn’t Dan.’ There was a long scuffling in the background, whispers, the phone dropped. ‘Ex-CUSE me?’ she said loudly, with a small stab of satisfaction.

‘Yes,’ said Edward Stockbridge. ‘I’d like to know a bit more about this, dear.’

‘I’ve got a lawyer, a good one. Will you please let her explain it? Just talk to her?’

She could only imagine what the Stockbridges would make of Antipodean Kylie in her flip-flops, but it seemed to have worked. Now they were on their way, and she had to meet their train and escort them to a hotel. It had always annoyed her how Dan, the only child of old parents, treated them like they might keel over if they had to so much as hail a taxi. London wasn’t the jungle, for God’s sake. Even her own flapping mother could probably use the tube, if she’d written down the colours of the lines first. Still, at least they were on board now and willing to help with the legal fees. Something about that niggled at Charlotte. Why would they suddenly believe what Kylie said, while Charlotte herself had been fighting for months with no one to help? She was so sick of it, all the different angles, the million different impressions from that one night, those ten minutes inside the club and then outside, the man pushing past . . . Well. It would all be over soon.

At the same time Kylie was also meeting Dan at the prison. Charlotte had expected a fight over this, but there was none. ‘So he saw you? He was OK?’

Kylie was surprised by the question. ‘Yeah, think so. He’s not in great shape, but OK once I got him going. Had a good natter, we did.’

This was the same Dan who’d refused to see his own fiancée for months. ‘Did he look all right? Different?’

‘I never saw him before, Charlie.’

‘Did he show an interest, like, does he actually want to win?’

‘Course he does!’ On the phone, Charlotte had heard her shuffling papers. ‘We’re gonna, too. No worries.’

So she’d have to wait, it seemed, till she faced him across a courtroom like any other member of the public. Charlotte felt very, very tired. With his parents as intermediaries, Dan had signed the papers, and the flat was going on the market in the next few weeks. Then it would just be a matter of time before everything changed for ever. The last link to the old life gone. She’d fought for him so long, through all she’d lost – friends, job, home, life – and he would still talk to this loud-voiced Australian over her. A thought crept in like tumbleweed: if she’d sold her ring, was she even engaged any more? Or was she single?

But before picking up the dreaded in-laws, or nearly-in-laws, or whatever they were, she had one even worse thing to do. Charlotte left the police station and took the Northern Line back to Tottenham Court Road. From there it was a short walk down the back streets of Soho, and to her old office building.

From the moment she stepped into the lift it all felt wrong. In the reflected metal she could see her face, flushed from the hot tube. She didn’t look like she belonged here at all, not any more. In fact, Kelly the receptionist didn’t recognise her at first. She gave her a sneering up-and-down look that was usually reserved for couriers. ‘Can I help you?’

‘It’s me. Charlotte.’ She made herself smile, and actually it was sort of funny how surprised Kelly was to see glossy Charlotte Miller with the ghosts of bean stains on her shirt.

‘Oh! Are you back, then?’

‘Just to see Simon. And no, I don’t have an appointment, before you ask.’

Kelly’s mouth was a lipglossed ‘o’. ‘Right . . . would you like to take a seat?’

‘Not really.’ Charlotte was kind of enjoying this, in a way.

Sure enough, Simon was out there in seconds after Kelly’s muttered call. He too looked surprised and even a bit scared. ‘Hello, darling! What a surprise!’

‘Just in the area. Do you have a moment?’

‘Well, it’s a bit last-minute, love.’

‘It’s urgent.’ She started walking and after a worried look at Kelly, Simon followed.

‘Meeting room?’ She nodded towards it. Ah, the same office smell of toner and slightly rotted fruit. Odd how you forgot it, the air you had breathed. She kept her eyes fixed forward – last thing she needed now was Chloe or Fliss to come over all gushy and insincere.

Simon shut the door into the airless meeting room, sealing them off. He had on his grey cardigan and skinny tie, and he was carrying the coffee mug he’d had in his hand at Reception. ‘Listen, Charlotte, you can’t really just turn up like this.’

She sat down. ‘I need you to help me. Please, would you sit down?’

He sat grudgingly. ‘You want to sort your contract, is that it? Well, I didn’t want it to come to this, but I do have certain rights, if you go down that route—’

She cut him off. ‘I said I needed you to help me. I need PR help.’

‘What?’

She sat back, trying to remember the speech she’d been rehearsing on the tube. ‘As you know, my fiancé is going on trial soon, for murder.’ Simon looked pale. ‘I believe he didn’t do it. Since I left here I’ve found out quite a lot, actually, that makes me think I’m right.’

‘What, you think he’s
innocent
?’

‘That’s right. I think they got it wrong – it does happen. So I need you to PR him. Get me some interviews, exposés, whatever. I know you can do it.’

Simon now looked furious. ‘Look, I’ve tried to be understanding, but even if that’s true, I’m not a bloody charity. PR for a murderer, for Christ’s sake.’

Blood was thundering in her ears. ‘But you know people, you could help.’

‘But why the hell would I? I like you and all, love, but come on.’

This was it. She licked her dry mouth. ‘Because – I was thinking, you sort of owe me.’

‘What?’

‘Because, because . . . you used to like me a lot, at first. Remember?’

‘I don’t know what you—’ He was half-laughing at her cheek.

She cut him off. ‘That bar. Q. My first week? You forget? I haven’t.’ Her voice wavered and it was all flashing round and round her mind, waking up and smelling straight away that she wasn’t in her own bed. The fear –
Oh God, what happened to me?
The terrible fear.

Simon sneered, ‘You think I should help you because, what, you were drunk one time, and . . .’ He tailed off.

Charlotte gulped. ‘I think you should help me because it’s the right thing to do.’

‘But I can’t guarantee anything, it’s PR, for Christ’s sake, not advertising. And the case is
sub judice
, or don’t you understand that?’

She had to laugh at that, a gasping dry laugh. ‘I did work here for six years, Simon. I know how it goes. You can get me some interviews, can’t you?’

He picked at the lettering on his Oxford mug, sulky. ‘I suppose I could talk to some people.’

She sagged with relief. ‘OK.’ She forced herself not to thank him. He didn’t deserve it. ‘And I think you ought to pay me some redundancy money, you know. If you want me to quietly disappear.’

‘Whatever.’ He slumped in his chair, pissed off. ‘You know you can’t prove . . . Oh, what the hell. Fine.’

‘Bye then.’ She exited the office in a flash, to avoid seeing anyone she would once have counted a friend. They weren’t her friends any more. Maybe they never were.

Once Simon was on board, it was easier to sway Sarah and her editor into printing a story.

‘This had better be true,’ her step-sister kept saying, all the way in the taxi to the photo-shoot. ‘I’m going to be really pissed off if he’s convicted after all. My reputation’ll be shot.’

‘It won’t be.’ Charlotte didn’t say that she too, and not to mention Dan, would be more than a little pissed off if he went to prison.

Sarah tapped at the driver through the glass partition. ‘Here, thanks.’ She turned back to Charlotte. ‘Now, you’ve approved the copy I sent over? I had to be very careful not to say anything about the case details.’

‘I suppose.’ The article was very sentimental, all about Charlotte’s pain waiting for her lost love, but Sarah worked for a paper that valued sentiment far above legal process. ‘Do you need to have all that stuff about the police being crap? I don’t know if it’s fair.’

Sarah rolled her eyes. ‘Didn’t you work in PR? It needed to have an angle. The police being crap is what our readers want to hear.’

‘But I think they did their best – I mean, the evidence did look bad. Couldn’t you just stick to that stuff about how bad the banks are, driving people to stress?’

Sarah just sighed. ‘God, you’re naïve. We’re getting out here.’

Charlotte spent the next hour standing on the grimy pavement opposite the walls of Pentonville Prison, in front of a fried chicken shop. Sarah had said to dress in her poshest clothes, so the readers could see she was safe, middle-class. It was a dry, windy sort of London day, blowing grit and pollen into her eyes until they watered.

‘That’s good.’ Sarah pounced on the photographer. ‘Did you get that? Looked like tears.’

‘I got it.’ The photographer was a patient, cynical East End geezer used to hanging round nightclubs waiting for
Hollyoaks
actresses to fall out. He gave Charlotte such a sardonic look behind Sarah’s back that she started giggling, and had trouble afterwards rearranging her face into a suitably sad expression. She had to make herself think of Dan behind those walls, alone and ill, to look heartbroken enough for Sarah.

‘For God’s sake, you’re meant to look sad! Your wedding got cancelled!’

‘I know.’ Charlotte giggled again. ‘Sorry.’

Much, much later, it was finally done.

‘That’s the one,’ Gary said, showing her a shot on the digital camera. She was standing by an overflowing bin in a gust of wind that swirled her hair and Burberry mac. Her eyes looked wet and sorrowful, as she gazed over at the prison. In her hand – a fake engagement ring on it – was a picture of her and Dan on holiday in Turkey, tanned and smiling, colourful drinks in front of them.

‘Gorgeous,’ said Gary, matter-of-factly. He was packing his gear with tattooed arms. ‘You should use that one.’

‘I’ll decide, said Sarah snootily. ‘It is good, though.’

‘Picture Editor’ll decide,’ Gary said, but Sarah wasn’t listening. ‘I might get an award for this, if he’s acquitted.’ She glared at Charlotte as if she would be personally responsible for the trial outcome. ‘Anyway, got to run, bye.’ She bustled off to hail a cab, already on her phone.

‘Hope he appreciates all this.’ Gary was lugging his gear to his car. ‘Not every girl’d do that for her fella.’

That was a good point, Charlotte thought, trudging off to the tube. She leaned on a lamppost to swap her high heels for trainers. Did Dan appreciate how much she’d fought, and lost, and given up for him? She’d even gone to Simon, for God’s sake. Not that Dan knew what had happened with Simon. Because he’d never noticed, had he? Not noticed she’d stayed out all night and couldn’t meet his eyes for weeks.