out but through the windscreen he could see that the interior was pristine, especially considering it was Snow White’s carriage. Julia’s car was an object lesson in chaos – dog biscuits and crumbs, discarded clothing, sunglasses, stray trainers belonging to Nathan, newspapers, Collier scripts covered in coffee stains, half-read books. She called it her ‘sluttery’, which was an old word, apparently. (‘Old words are the best,’ she said. Like ‘wife’, Jackson thought.)
It wasn’t the interior of Crystal Holroyd’s car that interested Jackson though so much as the outside, where something had been tucked behind one of the windscreen wipers. Not a parking ticket but a white envelope with a name written on it. Tina.
Jackson gently prised it free. (‘You know what killed the cat, don’t you?’ Julia said. Yeah, Jackson thought, but it had eight more lives left, didn’t it? Did he? He’d fallen off a cliff, been attacked by a mad dog, almost died in a train crash, nearly drowned, been crushed in a bin lorry, blown up – his house had been, anyway – and that wasn’t counting a couple of near misses when serving in the police and the Army. His life had been a litany of disasters. What if he was already on his ninth life? The last go round. Perhaps he should be more cautious.)
The envelope wasn’t sealed and he was able to slip the contents out. Not a note or a letter, but a photograph of Snow White – in a different princess costume, a blue dress. It was a candid snap of her on a swing somewhere. A long lens, by the look of it. Who took photos of kids in parks with long lenses? Perverts, stalkers, private detectives, that was who. He turned the photo over. On the back someone had written, Keep your mouth shut, Christina. Interesting. Until he looked at the back of the photo he had thought that perhaps it was innocent – someone Crystal knew who wanted her to have a photo they’d taken of her daughter. But there was nothing innocent about Keep your mouth shut, was there? Whoever had written the message hadn’t bothered to add or else at the end. They didn’t need to.
And Tina and Christina – were they both Crystal? Three women in one. A holy trinity. Or an unholy one?
There were always more questions than answers. Always. Perhaps when you died all the questions were answered and you were finally given the gift of that clichéd thing ‘closure’. Perhaps he would finally find out who murdered his sister, but then it would be too late to get justice for her and that would be almost as frustrating as not knowing who killed her. (‘Let it go, Jackson,’ Julia said. But how could he?)
He replaced the photograph, returned the envelope to the windscreen and hustled back to his car before Crystal could catch sight of him. He glanced around. If someone was following her – and, given the photo, it seemed more likely now – then they would have seen him looking at it. Had he just made a rookie mistake or would it give whoever was after Crystal Holroyd pause for thought? Whether he liked it or not, she was under his protection now. Whether she liked it or not, as well.
He watched Crystal as she approached her car, holding Candy by the hand, the two of them chatting away to each other. She stopped short at the sight of the envelope and then plucked it warily from behind the windscreen wiper, opened it even more warily. She looked at the photo and then turned it over and read the message on the back. It was difficult from this distance to discern the exact expression on her face, but her body language was talking loudly. She went rigid, a statuesque statue, staring at the message as if trying to decipher a foreign language. Then she hoisted Candy up in her arms as if she might not be safe on the ground. A Madonna and child, although Jackson supposed Our Lady had never sported pink heels like Crystal Holroyd. Jackson’s mother had dragged him to Mass every Sunday in a vain attempt to instil religion into him. A Madonna who looked like Crystal Holroyd might have made it more likely.
Crystal snapped back into life. She put Candy in the child seat in the back of the Evoque and within seconds was driving off at speed like a woman on a mission.