The Siren (30 page)

Anita herself had stripped and varnished the wood, then had it reupholstered in a buttermilk damask, before putting it into the landing corner to stand there on its fat little scroll legs as a
robust piece of art. Something about it had attracted Kimberly so that, when she couldn’t sleep, she’d drag her duvet from her bedroom and sit in that chair to watch the night sky.

Anita wished Kimberly was here. Perhaps she’d feel calmer if she were able to discuss it. She stared at the chair, then asked herself whether it really mattered if she didn’t get a
reply, maybe the talking alone would help her clear her mind. She switched on the iron and, while she waited for it to heat up, tried a couple of tentative sentences. Her voice sounded unnatural,
hollow and self-conscious.

She never left the iron unattended whilst it was reaching temperature, but even that seemed oddly slow today. She began turning the smaller items of clothing the right way out, smoothing them
and straightening the sleeves. By the time she’d finished preparing the second shirt, her attention had strayed to the window.

It looked like rain but, aside from that, nothing seemed to have changed. ‘So, what’s different?’ she murmured. At the start of this she’d been adamant that her plan was
the safest. Where was that resolve now?

She tried to run through her logic once more but, now that the initial eureka moment had faded, she could see too many unmapped steps along the path. She turned back to the chair and, instead,
pictured Kimberly sitting in it. She tried again. ‘Nothing’s changed. The plan is fine. It
is
fine.’

The iron’s thermostat clicked and almost simultaneously the telephone rang. She picked up the hands-free from the windowsill, but it only gave a double beep and died. Shit, it had been
beside her bed all night, when it should have been put on charge again.

She knew the iron was still visible from the bottom of the stairs, so ran down and snatched up the handset there on the fourth or fifth ring.

‘Hello?’

There was a pause at the other end. Anita heard a sharp breath, then a woman’s voice apologized for dialling the wrong number. When the caller hung up, Anita dialled 1471 and was told
‘We do not have the number’.

She walked back up to start on her pile of laundry.

The voice had belonged to a young woman and Anita thought it sounded familiar, but she couldn’t dismiss the possibility that it was just her rising paranoia that led her to suspect
that.

She ironed the first T-shirt, then pressed too hard on the second and felt the hot metal of the iron begin to singe the soft jersey fabric.

Identifying voices had never been a talent of hers. She wondered if it had been Tamsin who’d just phoned? And what would it mean if she had? A stray jet of steam blew out and stung
Anita’s fingers. She pulled the iron’s plug out of the wall, deciding this wasn’t a good day for her to be in charge of a hot and heavy electrical implement.

She took the laundry basket and set it in front of the rosewood chair, smoothing and folding each item while she talked to an imaginary Kimberly.

‘I admit it, I didn’t have a plan to get us out at the end of it, but I’m not concerned about that. The first thing we need to do is get to the end. That’s still the
plan, right? Hold firm and get to the end.’

Kimberly made no argument.

‘Once we get that far, I could own up and say it was all my doing. I wouldn’t care as long as you’re both OK. Hang on, though.’ Anita raised her hand as if for silence,
and a news reporter’s voice reached her ear.
Still delayed
? She wasn’t sure what that implied, or even whether it lay in the ballpark of good or bad.

Her stomach gave a queasy shift, as if offering her the answer. She leant towards the banister stairs and looked over, wondering whether she’d heard something from downstairs too.

Her pulse quickened, but downstairs nothing moved.

‘It’s OK,’ she whispered at last. ‘It’s just us two.’ That didn’t stop her from creeping to each upstairs window in turn, and checking the ground
outside. The skyline of Cambridge city centre stood in the middle distance, and she paused to study it, trying to pick out familiar rooftops and work out exactly in which direction Kimberly might
be now.

Anita had been cooped up indoors for too long – they both had – but it wasn’t fair to ask Mikey to help them any more. She turned back to the nursing chair, but this time
stopped pretending it was Kimberly who was actually sitting there.

‘I love you.’

Riley looked up and held out his empty plate. ‘Gone.’

‘Good boy. D’you want some yogurt now?’

He nodded. ‘Where’s Mummy?’

Anita tried to sound cheerful: ‘We’ll see her soon.’ She lifted Riley on to her hip, holding him close. He had perfectly functioning little legs, so she was aware that the
cuddle was more for her own benefit than for his. She carried him into her bedroom. ‘Let’s turn off the television.’

‘Riley do it,’ he told her.

She swung him in the direction of the ‘off’ button. At the last moment, his pointing finger changed course and waved at the screen in excitement. ‘Look!’

The photograph that Kimberly had given the police flashed on to the screen. The voiceover announced ‘growing concern for the safety of two-year-old Riley Guyver’.

Riley beamed up at her. ‘Daddy.’

‘That’s right, sweetheart. You love that photo, don’t you?’ Anita smiled back at Riley, and the bleakest edges of her anxiety softened. As long as they were looking for a
child resembling a two-year-old Jay Andrews, Riley would remain hidden. And as long as Kimberly stayed with the police, they’d all be safe.

As soon as Jay’s photo disappeared from the screen, Riley happily turned off the set. Anita tickled him in the tummy and he giggled.

‘We should play in the garden. Would you like that?’

Riley nodded and wrapped his arms around her neck, gripping her tightly as they descended the stairs.

The second floor corridor was relatively short with the lift and stairs at one end and a fire exit at the other. Bev Dransfield had made it around the corner and into the
alcove housing the fire-door with no time to spare.

Despite the close proximity of the bedrooms, the building’s acoustics killed sound very efficiently, and by the time DI Marks and his sidekick left again Bev had discovered just two facts:
Kimberly Guyver was in room 37, and there were only fifteen minutes available for her to nail the story.

Bev pulled a small Dictaphone from her inside pocket. Sometimes just two facts were plenty.

Kimberly had always hated magicians: those satanically charming men whose relationship with the audience consisted of controlling their thoughts and receiving their
adulation.

And that same flock of people who were inexplicably happy to buy into the concept of a world where subjects could vanish and the mysterious appearance of the odd garish trinket warranted
amazement.

Magicians took their bows, facing the audience with a smug flourish and a superior glint in the eye. They were nothing more than tricksters, liars essentially, rewarded for practising trickery
until it was flawless. Kimberly was well aware that magic was a myth.

Maybe there was another way of looking at it, but if so she’d never worked out what it might be, and she had never understood the fun in being deceived.

In her young imagination, she’d played out a fantasy where she’d found the courage to speak up right before the climactic
ta-da
. But even then she’d been smart enough to
realize that she would be vilified for spoiling the fun, so instead she’d imagined an unassuming stranger, a man who stepped from the shadows and was content that the only public appreciation
he received for unmasking the con should come from her.

DI Marks had just revealed himself to be that man. But she’d been too stunned to even thank him.

The door closed behind him and DC Goodhew, and Kimberly sank on to the end of the bed.

Hope was an unfamiliar luxury, but here it was springing up in front of her and begging her to chase it. She knew she needed time to absorb all the implications, but time was one thing she
didn’t have. The situation had already developed too far.

She drew a deep and calming breath. In fifteen minutes she’d be escorted down to that conference room, and she knew she had to act before then. She just had no idea where to start.

Kimberly sat just feet from the dressing table, and it was an automatic reaction to stare at her own reflection. She was wearing a small amount of foundation, with brown mascara and neutral
lipstick. None of these were items of make-up she would have chosen, but they were what she’d been advised to wear, ‘in order to gain sympathy with viewers’. She had found that
laughable: did it mean that Riley’s life was worth less if she didn’t tick all the boxes of responsibility, modesty and respectability?

Clearly it did, for the next thing had been the arrival of a choice of two outfits, both her own, but from that forgotten section of the wardrobe reserved for interviews and funerals. She
hadn’t objected when she realized that someone had searched through her home; she guessed they must have asked her and she’d OK’d it, but she was beyond remembering. Neither did
she protest at the idea that she needed a make-over before she was fit to be seen.

She wondered whether everyone else spent their lives dancing to someone else’s tune.

Enough was enough.

A pack of cleansing wipes lay in front of the mirror. She pulled two out and started removing her make-up.

Maybe PC Wilkes had been watching her all along, for she reacted instantly. ‘Don’t do that. We’ll be going down in a minute.’

Kimberly shook her head. ‘This isn’t right. I’m not going to be dressed up like some puppet.’ She scooped up the jeans and blouse that she’d removed earlier.
‘This is what I’m wearing. I’m good enough to be Riley’s mum without needing to change my clothes.’ She bit her lip and tears pricked her eyes, because it was the
first time she’d ever thought that. ‘I’ll be five minutes, OK?’

PC Wilkes nodded. ‘I do understand. Be quick, though.’

Kimberly grabbed her things and darted into the bathroom. She locked the door behind her and sank to the floor with her back resting against it. She pulled her mobile phone from the inside
pocket of her jeans and had begun to dial when she heard a loud banging on the outer door. She stopped short of pressing that ‘call’ button and tilted her head so she could listen.

PC Wilkes was smart enough to keep the door shut. ‘Yes?’

‘I’d like a word with Kimberly Guyver.’

‘Who are you?’

‘Can I speak to Miss Guyver, please?’

‘She’s not available. I’m a police officer. Please identify yourself.’

‘My name is Beverley Dransfield. I’m a reporter and I need to ask Miss Guyver a couple of questions.’

‘Please return to the press area.’

‘Why has Kimberly Guyver released the wrong photograph of her son?’

Kimberly froze.

‘Please return to the press area,’ Wilkes repeated.

‘What’s she hiding? Has she kidnapped her own child?’

‘I’m calling security now.’

Kimberly finally pressed the green button and, as the call connected, she whispered, ‘I need your help. I’ve got to get out of here.’

Outside, the reporter was still shouting. ‘Did you stage the whole thing, Kimberly? Come on, answer me. Have you killed your son? What is your true relationship with Stefan
Golinski?’

‘You can help, I know you can,’ Kimberly breathed into the phone. ‘I never killed Nick. Stefan did it.’

‘Kimberly,’ the reporter shouted, ‘I can ask you the same downstairs in front of the cameras.’

PC Wilkes had stopped trying to negotiate by now, and was using her radio to call for assistance. ‘Ms Dransfield, officers are on their way. Get away from the door.’

Kimberly felt the first beads of sweat breaking out on her forehead. She whispered into her phone, ‘Meet me – Blossom Street entrance to the cemetery.’

FORTY

Neither Marks nor Goodhew said a word as they returned to the ground floor. There could have been many things occupying Marks’ thoughts, but it was just a single moment
that filled Goodhew’s. When Kimberly had asked how Nick Lewton’s fatal head injury had occurred, her exact question had been ‘
In the crash?
’ Her tone hadn’t
been one of curiosity, but a stronger emotion than that. Shock? Disbelief? It was reasonable for her to feel both those things, but somehow he knew he’d heard the wrong kind of shock in her
voice.

He slowed his step, replaying the words and trying to replicate the precise intonation Kimberly had used.

Marks glanced back at him. ‘All right, Gary?’

‘Fine. I’ll catch you up.’

Marks gave a quick nod, and was gone. And so, too, for that moment at least, was any chance of pinning down the real emotion Kimberly had expressed.

His grandmother was always convinced that nothing was ever forgotten, but merely filed in an inaccessible corner of the memory. He had never been sure what the difference was between forgetting
and being unable to remember, but he decided to place his trust in her wisdom and left it to percolate in his subconscious.

Goodhew hurried on down the stairs and into the foyer. Gully was standing at the far end. She was heading towards Marks, then stopped when she spotted Goodhew.

DI Marks paused as if to speak to her, but she just shook her head and pointed in Goodhew’s direction.

She carried an envelope, holding it upright between her hands as if they were two brackets displaying an important landscape painting. He noticed she also looked pretty chuffed with herself.

Goodhew found it impossible not to smile. ‘What have you got there?’

She passed him the envelope. ‘Have a look.’ She bit her bottom lip like it was a struggle not to blurt out the exciting part. He immediately recognized that the contents was a phone
bill but, before he’d had a chance to spot who it belonged to, she grabbed it back again. She turned it to him face-on, then pointed to the number at the head of the sheet. ‘Mikey
Slater’s mobile, right?’