if Simon ever thought about her these days – the subject, like so many others, was well and truly embargoed – but she knew as surely as she knew her own name that if Alice had been murdered, Simon would start to obsess about her again.
Charlie could feel her brain struggling to fight off the intense heat and the red wine. Something didn’t add up. Something fairly obvious, once you thought about it. ‘If you haven’t spoken to Sam, how do you . . .’ She stopped, unable to find the missing words as the answer hit her like a lead ball in the chest. How many men had Liv had time to meet, since Friday? ‘New Sex Man,’ she said, as neutrally as possible. ‘Who is he, Liv?’
‘Don’t be angry,’ Liv sounded terrified.
‘He’s Chris Gibbs, isn’t he?’
‘I didn’t plan it. I didn’t mean for—’
‘End it.’
‘Oh, God, don’t say that! You’ve no idea how—’
‘End. It. That’s not a suggestion, it’s a fucking order. You stupid fuck!’
Charlie dropped the phone on the table, ran out into the hot night, and collided with Domingo. She’d completely forgotten about him. She might forget him again, one day, but she would never forget his wooden hut, his phone, his splintery picnic-basket chair with its red and blue blanket. She would think of all those things whenever she thought about betrayal, from now on. And she thought about betrayal a lot.
‘Sister okay?’ Domingo asked.
‘No, she’s not,’ Charlie told him. ‘She’s a stupid cunt.’
Chapter 13
Tuesday 20 July 2010
‘Tell them,’ I say to Kit. ‘Forget about my feelings, forget about trying not to hurt me. Say what you really think. How can you stand to sit there and listen to me tell lies about you, if that’s what I’m doing?’
We’re at Parkside police station in Cambridge, in a room with yellow walls, a blue linoleum floor and one large square window that’s covered with some kind of chicken-wire grid. So that no one can throw themselves out. Sam Kombothekra is sitting on our side of the table, between Kit and me. That surprised me; I thought he’d sit opposite, with DC Grint. Is a detective from Spilling still a detective when he’s in Cambridge? Does Sam have any power in this room, or is he here today only as our chauffeur, our silent chaperone?
Kit looks at Grint. ‘I’ve never been to Bentley Grove – never walked there, never driven there, never parked there.’ He shrugs. ‘What else can I say? Plenty of people drive black saloon cars.’ There are two red grooves on his neck where he cut himself shaving this morning, and blue-ish shadows under his eyes; neither of us slept last night, knowing we had this ordeal to get through today. Neither of us combed our hair before leaving for Cambridge. What must Grint think of us? He did his best not to react when I explained about my bruises and the lump above my eye, but I can tell he finds me disgusting, and he can’t have much respect for Kit. What kind of idiot would marry a woman who blacks out and bangs her head on library tables? I feel defensive on behalf of us both; I want to tell Grint that we’re better people than he thinks we are.
I want it to be true.
You don’t remember knocking your head on that table. What else don’t you remember?
‘The pink blur in the black car on Street View isn’t the same pink as Connie’s coat,’ says Kit. ‘It’s deeper – more like red.’
‘Connie says it’s the same pink,’ Grint counters.
Kit nods. He heard me say it.
‘Why are you nodding?’ I snap at him. ‘You don’t think it’s the same pink. Why don’t you argue?’
‘What’s the point?’ Kit keeps his eyes on Grint. ‘Aren’t there things you can do to the Street View picture to unblur the car registration? That’s the only way to prove if it’s my car or not. Maybe you could see who’s driving it.’
‘He means me,’ I say.
‘Time and money,’ says Grint. ‘If you were a suspect in a serious crime, if we needed to prove your car had been parked on Bentley Grove, we’d look into enhancing the image. Has a crime been committed, Mr Bowskill? To your knowledge?’
‘Not . . . No.’ Kit lowers his eyes.
I can’t stand this any more. ‘He was going to say, “Not by me.” Weren’t you? I don’t know why you won’t admit it! I know what you’re thinking.’