Liar Read online

  ‘That doesn’t make sense!’ she said, bewildered.

  ‘It does, if you think about it. By putting it in your name, he avoids any awkward questions from the mortgage company. You feel secure, and grateful you’ve got a lovely home. But a little further down the line when things turn nasty, as they inevitably would, I expect he intended to order you to make the house over to him, which you would do.’

  ‘But why? It sounds pointless, unless of course he just wanted to freak me out.’

  ‘Not pointless at all. Think about it! What he’s done is launder the money he got illegally. He had you sussed, Amelia. You aren’t the kind to cling to a house to spite him, or for your own security. He’s a devious man, and extremely jealous, and that is a recipe for a dangerous person.’

  ‘But I didn’t sense any of this when I first met him.’

  Amelia had laid the table, and Sam brought over the plates of food. ‘In the police we hear what you’ve just said all the time from women who have been beaten or conned. They say how charming, kind and generous he was. But I suppose men like that can only keep a lid on their explosive side for a time. Then, whoosh, something triggers it. I suspect he imagined your enthusiasm for finding a connection between the three murdered girls would fade quickly. When it didn’t, and you were talking to more powerful, intelligent people, like the woman in Kew and Henry Lark, he was afraid they’d bring up something that would alert you to him.’

  ‘But Henry Lark turned out to be a snake too.’

  Sam’s mouth was full of food so he waited until he’d swallowed it to reply. ‘You’d be amazed how many of those we find in any investigation.’

  ‘This room seemed so safe and secure once,’ she said sadly. ‘I don’t think it ever will again.’

  ‘I’ll be outside all night,’ he said. ‘No one will get past me.’

  ‘But you can’t be here for ever.’

  He smiled, his lovely blue eyes twinkling. ‘No, I suppose not, as much as I’d like to be.’

  Amelia was touched by what he’d said, but unable to react.

  ‘Not the right time to be admitting my feelings?’ he said, the twinkle leaving his eyes. ‘I should know better, especially as we’re forbidden to have relationships with witnesses or victims. But when this is all over might there be any chance?’

  Part of Amelia’s head and heart wanted to say, ‘Yes, every chance,’ but she’d shown such a serious misjudgement with Max she was ashamed.

  ‘I can’t possibly say, Sam, not now.’

  ‘I understand,’ he said. ‘But I’ll leave you my address at the section house, and even if you just want a chat with a friend, drop me a line. But for now, let’s finish up this food.’

  At nearly eleven Sam said he must get into the car for the rest of his shift. Amelia wanted to beg him to stay, and not just for his company. Had it not been that her face and stomach felt as if they were on fire, it would have been a lovely evening. Sam hadn’t sulked when she couldn’t agree there might be a chance for him. He had made her laugh, and she wanted him to stay purely because she couldn’t bear the thought of him being out in the cold.

  ‘I’m due to be relieved at two,’ he said, as he left. ‘So don’t panic if you hear me drive away. Someone else will be out there. Mind you, if Max is the killer there’s nothing more to worry about.’

  Amelia got into bed. The house felt too quiet, and she was afraid to turn off her bedside light for fear that all the events of the day would crowd in on her. Henry grabbing her had been bad enough: she’d trusted him, never thinking for a second that he wanted anything more than to talk to her.

  But Max! She’d been with him for months, totally in his thrall, believing everything he said, trusting him, loving him. Now she realized she didn’t know him at all – even his real name: Brian, not Max. It was hard to believe anyone could be as misguided as she had been. Why was she such a bad judge of character?

  She thought of their lovemaking in this bed, which still had his smell on the sheets and pillow. How could he have been so loving and passionate if he’d felt nothing for her?

  15

  PC Sam Hamilton lowered the back of his car seat a little and got comfortable. Three hours of waiting and watching were incredibly tedious, but it was bearable because he was protecting someone he liked. On several previous witness-protection jobs he’d been guarding people he despised and then it had seemed a thankless task.

  He had liked Amelia just from reading her article about Lucy Whelan. He sensed her deep understanding of people and her powers of observation. When he had met her in the flesh he was astounded to find she was younger than him, pretty and a bit shy. He had expected her to be the exact opposite.

  Each time he’d talked to her, she’d revealed more of herself, albeit accidentally as she said little about her life. He guessed at a miserable childhood, with a bullying father, and a couple of police checks proved him right. He even knew that social services had found that room for her, and why. But he didn’t look any further than that because by then he liked her so much he felt bad probing into her past as if she were a criminal.

  She was plucky, caring, warm and intelligent. She’d made her bedsitter a bright, interesting haven, which he loved. He could imagine how grim it had been when she moved in. Since joining the police force, he’d seen so many horrible bedsitters and flats that he was glad he lived in the section house. He had been saving for a deposit on a house for the last two years: once he had passed the sergeants’ exam and knew where he would be stationed, he would look for a place of his own.

  When he told his father his plan, he laughed at him. ‘A mortgage is a millstone around your neck,’ he claimed.

  Sam could understand his father’s reasoning. After the war he’d been demobbed from the army to come home to a damp, cold basement flat in Lewisham. The only amenities it could boast were an indoor lavatory and all the windows still in place: most of the others in the street had been blown out by bombs and covered with timber or cardboard. Glass was hard to come by.

  Sam was four that year, his baby brother Tom two, and their mother was pregnant again. The only work open to his father, Sydney, was labouring on a building site. They lived hand-to-mouth, and Sam remembered in the bitter winter of 1947 walking with his father and the old pram out to Eltham to gather wood for their fire.

  It was a friend Sydney had made in the army who led him into the licensed trade, first as a barman in a pub the man owned in Lewisham. He worked there four evenings a week, which helped the family budget. A year later he was offered the job of manager at a bigger pub on Lewisham High Street, which came with living accommodation.

  Sam remembered his parents’ excitement at leaving the flat. The premises above the pub had a proper bathroom, three bedrooms, and were close to a school in Rushey Green. And his mother would be able to work in the bar in the evenings when the children were in bed.

  It was a good move for all of them. Sam recalled how happy his father was to have a job he enjoyed and his family close to him. Sam liked his school, and a year later Tom was there too. Later Ellen, their baby sister, would join them. Ladywell swimming baths was close by, plus the library and Lewisham Hospital. Even more pleasing to Sam and Tom, Mountsfield Park was just a short walk away.

  Sam could think of nothing about his childhood that was bad. He liked being in bed and hearing his father’s booming voice wafting up the stairs from the bar, along with the chink of glasses, cigarette smoke and the smell of beer. To him it was a somewhat mysterious masculine world, and his father was like the ringmaster controlling everything.

  He also loved seeing his mother all dressed up to work downstairs. He sensed how glad she was to have some laughs and conversation with other adults. After school it was good to be allowed a glass of lemonade and a packet of crisps to tide him over till teatime. His school friends thought he was lucky to live over a pub.

  He didn’t pass his eleven plus, but he still did well at his secondary school, made good frien
ds and excelled at athletics and football. He was almost sixteen when he announced he wanted to be a policeman.

  His father was against it. ‘Policemen never have any friends,’ he said. ‘Join me in the licensed trade, and one day you’ll get a pub of your own.’

  Sam took his O levels and said no more about the police because his father was offered a new pub to run in Staines, near the river. It had a far more spacious and comfortable flat above it, and a garden. Tom, Ellen and his mother were all delighted with it. Sam liked it too, and he was accepted at a college in Kingston to study for A levels.

  They had been at the Waterman for just six months when his mother was diagnosed with cervical cancer. Without symptoms, she was diagnosed too late and died after just four months.

  Sam was glad they’d made the move to Staines, because at least for the last year of his mother’s life she’d had central heating and an attractive home. Just before she died, she told him to ignore what his father had said and join the police force. ‘I’m just sad I won’t see you in uniform,’ she added. He was amazed she’d remembered that had been, still was, his dream – he’d kept it quiet since that talk with his father.

  He still missed his mum so much, the way she always listened properly and gave sound advice, how she loved to make people comfortable, remembered everyone’s favourite meals and was never late. When he went back to the pub now to see Sydney he thought he could still smell Blue Grass, her perfume, and he remembered that just after she died he’d put some on a handkerchief and kept it under his pillow to smell it at night.

  Tom was a stockbroker in the City and shared a flat with a colleague. Ellen was a state-registered nurse and planned to marry next year. Sydney had a new wife, Susie, who was ten years younger than him, an attractive redhead with a bubbly personality. She made no attempt to be a new mother to Sam and his siblings, but took a keen interest in the three of them. Sam was pleased to see his father happy again; he’d known how hard he’d taken Judy’s death, and how he’d struggled to take care of Tom and Ellen, as well as run the pub.

  There was no doubt he’d done an excellent job, and he continued to be a loving and helpful father. He didn’t grumble or tease Sam when he joined the force, and said he was proud of him. He encouraged Tom and Ellen in their chosen fields too, and always found time for them all when they visited.

  Sydney had been wrong, of course, about a mortgage being a millstone around the neck, but he was right about most things, and he was the best of fathers.

  So what would Sydney suggest to entice Amelia? Sam smiled to himself at the thought. His dad was a bit of a caveman where women were concerned. His mum would have had more sensitive ideas, though. He could almost hear her saying, ‘Don’t be too soppy. Women don’t like that. Just state your case, then wait to see how she reacts.’

  Max attacking Amelia would make her distrust men again, he knew that. And if they couldn’t find enough evidence to charge him with murder, he’d be out on the streets again in twenty-four hours, almost certainly knocking on her door. Might she fall for a grovelling apology? Possibly. Women often did.

  Sam was determined to be there for her, though. After all, ‘Faint heart never won fair lady.’

  ‘What on earth!’ Jack exclaimed, when Amelia arrived at work the next morning. Her right eye was almost completely closed, her cheek purple and her lip swollen.

  All the staff looked up at her, their faces alight with interest.

  ‘Can we talk in private?’ Amelia said, aware she had to tell Jack the truth.

  ‘Sure,’ he said, and walked into his office, leaving her to follow. ‘You didn’t have that when I left you yesterday, so I’m assuming either Lark turned up at your place or it was your boyfriend.’

  ‘Max … or should I say Brian? He even lied about his name,’ she admitted, then went on to explain how it had come about, adding that Sam had come in to help and arrested him.

  ‘Stone the bloody crows!’ Jack exclaimed gleefully. ‘They suspect him of being the Creeper?’

  ‘Yes. But however horrible he was to me, I don’t believe that of him. And we can’t put any of that in the paper until he’s been charged.’

  Jack pulled a disappointed face. ‘We can say, “A man in his late twenties is helping the police with their enquiries.” But when they charge him with your assault, we can add he’s also a person of interest in the Creeper case.’

  ‘You aren’t going to mention my name,’ she said. ‘Any neighbours who saw him being taken away will be on the jungle drums immediately and half of West London will know in a few hours.’

  ‘They’ll look at your face and talk anyway.’

  ‘I’m sick of all this, Jack,’ she said. ‘My face is sore, so’s my stomach, I feel like I’m living in a goldfish bowl, and I’m hurting about Max. I really thought he was The One. What if he is the Creeper? What sort of gullible fool does that make me?’

  She was surprised when Jack put his arms around her to hug her. It was uncharacteristic, but nice. But, then, it seemed everyone in her life was behaving out of character right now.

  ‘You, my girl, must take it easy. I’d send you home on full pay until that black eye goes, but under the circumstances that would be a bad idea. You’d be lonely and cut off. So, unless you’ve got some friends or relations you can go and stay with, you’d better sit at your desk and sell advertising space. Something you do very well, I might add.’

  ‘I haven’t got anyone to stay with,’ she said, and at the thought of how pathetic that made her sound, she began to cry.

  ‘Sit down in that chair,’ he said, pointing to the comfortable seat by the window. ‘You can bunk down in here for now, read a magazine or a paper, have a cup of tea, and try to relax a bit. I’m going to see Henry Lark.’

  After a few minutes, Amelia pulled herself together. It wouldn’t do to let the other staff think she had special privileges. Making her way to her desk, everyone showed concern for her. She hadn’t realized that her colleagues, whom she’d always thought looked down on her – at least until she’d written the article about Lucy Whelan – were so kind.

  She forced herself to laugh about her black eye. ‘Wrong place, wrong time, wrong man,’ she said. ‘Anyway, it’s back to work now, but thank you.’

  Oddly Amelia had her best day ever selling advertising space. Maybe a black eye and a sore tummy were good for something. Also, being busy and involved stopped her thinking about what might be happening to Max at the police station.

  Jack came in at half past four. He signalled for her to come into his office; she hoped he wasn’t drunk.

  He’d had a couple, she could smell the booze on his breath, but he was sober. ‘Henry Lark is a despicable character, so full of himself that I nearly forgot my early training and wanted to say something cruel about his daughter,’ he blurted out. It was clear he’d been dwelling on it.

  Amelia didn’t know whether to feel proud of Jack for defending her, or tell him off for wanting to be nasty about a victim. ‘Was Henry repentant?’ she asked.

  ‘Not a bit. Denied everything, as I’d expected. But I said, “Those scratches on your cheek tell a different story.” He didn’t like that, tried to say his cat did it. I’m going to write something about his daughter, though, likening her to Carol Meadows.’

  ‘Did you find the Guide mistress?’

  ‘I’ve got her number and address, but I think it’s best if you see her. Apparently she’s quite frail, Parkinson’s, but the vicar said she has a good memory. I didn’t tell him what it was in connection with because I thought he’d refuse to give me her details. But you can say you’re doing a follow-up piece about Lucy and you wanted to know who the other two girls in the picture are.’

  ‘If I go looking like this, she won’t want to speak to me.’

  Jack looked at her intently. ‘In a few days you should be fine. But I’ll ask Peanut to go with you, and you can make up some fib about falling on some ice, or a car crash.’

  ‘You t
hink of everything,’ she said, with a grin. He amused her with his effortless ways of diluting the truth. ‘Just one thing, though. We should’ve passed that photograph to the police. They need to verify it’s of the three dead girls. It could be a vital piece of evidence.’

  ‘Perhaps, but it might let Max off the hook. I’d like to see him sweat a bit longer because of what he’s done to you, just as I hope the Guide woman might have some juicy scandal about Rosie Lark to share. They can hold Max for a maximum of forty-eight hours without charging him. With luck they might find something concrete to charge him with. But another week of us holding the photo won’t hurt either way.’

  Amelia walked back to her desk, suppressing a desire to laugh. She liked Jack’s style.

  As Amelia’s police guard dropped her home that evening, Kat was waiting by the steps of the house. ‘Wilf, who has a room at the front of my place, said he’d seen Max being taken away by the police yesterday evening,’ she said. ‘What he actually said was “Your mate, the pretty one! Well, that bloke she goes with got taken away by the pigs.”’

  Amelia sniggered. Kat had made her neighbour sound like a Cockney villain.

  ‘Is it true? I assume he did that to your face.’

  ‘Come in and have a cup of tea,’ Amelia suggested. ‘I’ll tell you all.’

  After her ordeal yesterday and having been in pain all day today, it was nice to sit with Kat, eat biscuits and drink tea. She told Kat what had happened, then moved the conversation on to Kat’s brown Chanel handbag. ‘Is it real?’ she asked in awe.

  ‘Yes, but I get a huge discount at work.’

  ‘You have some lovely clothes,’ Amelia said. The long black coat Kat wore was cashmere, and she had an Hermès scarf at her neck. ‘Lucky you. I get my stuff in Chelsea Girl.’

  ‘Well, you always look a million dollars,’ Kat said generously. ‘I love the way you’ve done this room up too. You have such flair. When I get my house you’ll have to come along and advise me. Or you could even come and share it.’