Three Little Lies Page 21

  Bryant hangs up, reassuring me that they are still doing everything they can. I step out of the doorway and cross the road. Outside the station, I stop. Sasha was here. She must have gone to see Alice, who won’t tell the police anything. I have to try again.

  I retrace my steps. The street is quiet now, and I rehearse what I’m going to say in my head. The police said… No, better not mention them. Somebody saw Sasha… I’m so busy planning my opening gambit that I’m already reaching up to ring the bell before I notice that the front door is ajar. I ring anyway. No answer. I knock.

  ‘Alice? It’s Ellen, again, Sasha’s friend,’ I quaver in the silence.

  I push the door open and take a cautious step into the hallway.

  ‘Hello?’

  Still nothing, save the beating of my own heart. Slowly, I push the door open into the flat. I stop, my hand to my mouth. The place is in utter disarray. The kitchenette cupboards are open and there is broken glass and china on the floor; the coffee table is missing a leg and is upended on the floor; someone has punched a hole in the wall. I stare around, aghast. There’s a noise from the street outside, a man’s voice, and I stand very still, praying he’s not coming in here. It fades, he is passing down the street, but that’s enough to make me scurry out and run back to the safety of the tube station, my lungs burning, sweat running down my back.

  As I sit on the tube, my breathing slowly returning to normal, all I can see is Alice’s eyes, so like Sasha’s. I’m exhausted, but I’ve got one more call to pay.

  Café Crème, despite the continental name, looks like the bar of a cheap hotel, the sort of place low-grade business travellers stay on their way to a meeting in Peterborough. It’s a stupid long shot, but Sasha was in here the day she disappeared and maybe I’ll learn something.

  I stand at the bar with my phone in my hand, feeling utterly foolish. The sole bartender is a young man in a white shirt and black waistcoat, and he comes straight over in the absence of any other customers.

  ‘What can I get you?’

  ‘Small glass of white wine, please.’ As he bends to open the fridge, I force myself to say in a rush, ‘There was something else too, actually.’

  ‘Sure.’ He takes a glass down and begins to pour.

  ‘This is going to sound odd, but do you recognise this woman?’ I hold my phone out with a recent picture of Sasha, full face and smiling. He puts my wine down on the bar.

  ‘That’s four pound fifty, please. Let’s see.’ He takes the phone. ‘Oh yes, I know her. She works upstairs, doesn’t she? There’s a group of them, come in after work a lot. Is… everything OK?’

  ‘She’s gone missing. I’m trying to find her.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ He doesn’t sound that interested. ‘I don’t know anything about that.’

  ‘No, of course not. It’s just… was she in here last Friday, can you remember?’

  ‘No idea, sorry. She might have been.’

  ‘She might have been meeting someone… Would you mind having a look at some other photos?’

  He sighs. ‘All right, it’ll have to be quick, though; people will be coming in for lunch soon and I’m on my own.’

  ‘Of course. Here.’ I show him Leo and Jackson’s Facebook pages, and Nicholas’s LinkedIn picture. I couldn’t find anything recent of Daniel, but he and Nicholas are alike enough that I thought it might spark a memory.

  ‘No, sorry, I don’t recognise any of them,’ he says. A group of men in suits comes jostling through the door into the pub, shuffling off the morning’s work like snakes shedding their skin. The barman looks past me expectantly, ready to serve them.

  ‘Sorry, just quickly…’ I say in desperation. ‘Did you ever see her with an older woman? Very skinny, blonde hair.’

  ‘No, sorry. Oh, hang on, she was with a woman one day, but it wasn’t last Friday, it was longer ago than that. A couple of weeks ago – the Friday before, maybe?’ That’s the night Sasha came home in such a strange mood, shut herself away in her room. ‘They looked like they were having a very intense conversation. I remember wondering what they were talking about.’

  ‘This other woman – was she late fifties, a bit… rough-looking?’ I can’t be bothered to prevaricate.

  ‘Oh no, not that old. About the same age as you and her.’ He gestures to my phone. ‘Quite a big girl, pale skin, mousey brown hair, thick-rimmed glasses.’

  My heart skips a beat. It could be one of many people, of course, but I know without a shadow of a doubt that he is describing Karina Barton.

  Ellen

  September 2006

  Sasha only got back the day before school started. It had been two weeks since I walked out of the party at the Monktons’. I hadn’t been back to the house or seen any of them since. Leo had texted about an hour after I’d left, asking me where I was. I told him I’d felt really drunk and gone home. Which was the truth, although maybe not the whole truth. He came round in the morning to see if I was OK. Mum was delighted by his interest. I think she had feared I would fall for one of the Monkton boys, and then she really would have lost me to them. He’d agreed with me that there had been a weird atmosphere that night, although he’d stayed on anyway, sleeping over in Daniel’s room. He’d started on the floor, but about four in the morning he’d woken to find Daniel still not there, so he’d climbed into his bed and spent the rest of the night there. He’d found Daniel curled in a ball on the sofa in the morning, and had left without speaking to anyone.

  Sasha texted me two days before we were due back at school to say she’d be home around lunchtime the next day and did I want to come over. My instinct, of course, was to text back immediately, effusively, saying yes of course. And I did want to, that was the stupid thing. She’d skipped off to France without telling me, and barely been in touch all summer. I ought to be furious with her, and part of me was, but a larger part of me, the part that had missed her badly, wanted to fall back into our friendship and have everything be exactly as it was before. Plus I had lots to tell her, not least that I was now officially going out with Leo. For reasons I couldn’t fully articulate, even to myself, I didn’t want to see her at the Monktons’, so I forced myself to wait a couple of hours, then sent her a message suggesting we meet at a coffee place on the local high street.

  I was deliberately late, but still there before her. I sat in the window with a cup of tea and watched her running through the drizzle in denim cut-offs and a white T-shirt, her skin the colour of toffee, turning heads as ever. She came through the door and shook her hair as if she were a dog, garnering more admiring looks from male customers and staff. She walked over and hugged me, disarming me straight away by apologising.

  ‘Sorry I’ve been so shit at keeping in touch. There was hardly any signal in the place where I was staying, and I had no money, so I ended up picking apples and pears on this farm. Oh my God, it was fucking exhausting. When I bumped into Will and Eloise in London, I thought it seemed like such a fun idea, taking off, but I got the wrong end of the stick, thought they had a villa. I didn’t realise they were going out there to work. So if I wanted to stay in the place they were staying, I had to work there too. Nightmare.’

  I wanted to ask why she hadn’t come back if it was so bloody awful, but I wasn’t sure I wanted to know. Instead, I steeled myself to tell her about Leo. I knew she’d never fancied him, but he’d made it very clear he liked her when she first moved here, and I suspected she’d enjoyed his adulation even if she didn’t want to reciprocate. I poured myself another unwanted cup of tea and added too much milk, turning it grey and watery.

  ‘Something happened while you were away.’

  ‘What?’ She seemed to pale under her tan.

  ‘Me and Leo, we’re going out with each other.’ I sipped my lukewarm cup of dishwater.

  ‘Oh, that!’ She sat back in her chair. ‘Yeah, I know, Nicholas told me this morning.’

  ‘Oh. So… are you OK with it?’

  ‘Why wouldn’t I be?’ She loo
ked at me as if I’d lost my mind.

  ‘Because Leo used to like you, I thought it might be a bit weird for you.’

  ‘God, no. I was never interested in him, was I? It was all him. More likely to be weird for you, if anyone.’ She looked at me slyly. ‘What if he still likes me?’

  This, of course, was my greatest fear. I’d tried to talk to Karina about it the other day when we went shopping, but she’d been distant and uncommunicative. I had thought that with Sasha away we might have regained some of our previous closeness, but if anything she’d felt further away from me than ever.

  Sasha must have seen the horror on my face and her smile dropped. ‘Oh, Ellen, I was only joking. Sorry. It was a stupid thing to say. How did it happen? Tell me all about it.’

  I relented, the pleasure of telling the story of me and Leo to an appreciative audience too tempting to pass up. She asked all the right questions, wanting to know exactly what he’d said, how he’d kissed me, how far we’d gone. I was glad to have someone to talk to on this last point, as we hadn’t yet gone as far as Leo would have liked. He wasn’t putting any pressure on me, but I felt it nonetheless.

  Once we’d exhausted everything that had happened while she’d been away, I asked her how things were at home. I knew relations between her and Olivia hadn’t been the same since the conversation about the missing money back in March.

  ‘Did you ever tell her you thought someone had been in your room?’ I asked.

  ‘No. Like I said, there’s no point. Actually…’ She fiddled with her teaspoon, twisting it over and over.

  ‘What?’

  She looked scared – and something else. Ashamed?

  ‘I think someone’s been in there again. While I was away.’

  ‘Oh, Nicholas and Daniel had a party. I think they let someone sleep in there. I’m sure Olivia will have changed the sheets. Your things probably got moved around a bit.’

  ‘It’s not stuff being moved. Some things have… gone missing.’

  ‘What things?’ I asked.

  ‘A pair of my knickers,’ she said quietly, glancing over at the elderly women at the next table.

  ‘What? Are you sure? Maybe they’ve got mixed in with someone else’s washing?’

  ‘No, they haven’t. I’ve never worn them since I’ve been living there. They’ve never been in the wash. They’re part of a matching set and the bra’s quite uncomfortable, so I don’t wear either of them.’

  ‘Shit, Sasha.’

  ‘I know.’

  I was going to say more but she changed the subject, and I knew from experience that once she had done so, there was no diverting her. We sat there for another hour, ordering more tea and chatting, pretending everything was the same, but it wasn’t. Before she left for France, Sasha and I had been best friends, but there was a barrier between us now. I had no idea if anything she had told me about her trip was true; despite his protestations that he had no interest in her, I was frightened about what would happen between Leo and me now Sasha was back; and somebody had stolen Sasha’s underwear and was keeping it for God knows what purpose.

  Everything had changed, and I couldn’t suppress the feeling that things were only going to get worse.

  Karina

  October 2006

  He turned up outside school yesterday. I came out of the gates and he was there, staring at me from across the street. I hurried over, said I thought it was meant to be a secret, what if somebody sees? He said it didn’t matter any more.

  Sometimes when we’re doing it, he gets a funny, faraway look, and I can tell he’s not there with me, not really. I want to ask him afterwards what he was thinking about, but he doesn’t usually want to talk. I wonder if other blokes are the same, or if some of them want to cuddle up and whisper together like I do. I haven’t got anyone to ask.

  I’m used to sharing everything with Ellen – all the milestones. We went shopping for our first bras together, with our mums. They took us for hot chocolate and toasted teacakes afterwards, and I remember looking at the bags hanging from the backs of our chairs and wondering if anyone in the café guessed what was in them. Plain white triangles of soft fabric, with a complicated hook and eye system at the back that I thought I’d never get to grips with.

  We almost started our periods together – her one month and me the next. We’d been waiting for ages. Our mums had bought us the same book: Have You Started Yet? We’d pored over it together, both hopeful and horrified at the prospect.

  We even had our first kiss the same night, at Tamara Gregg’s party. She was first. I saw her with this boy, all acne and greasy hair coaxed into peaks. They were chatting for ages and I didn’t want to interrupt, so I went to the kitchen to get a drink. When I got back, he had her pushed up against the wall, her whole face practically inside his mouth. I watched as he slid one hand up her side towards her boob, but she pushed it down again. He did it again and again, waiting a couple of minutes between tries, but every time her hand would force his down again. That was the only reason I got off with Andrew. I didn’t want to be left behind. But when his hands snaked up, I closed my eyes and let them. I remember how she squealed when I told her that night as she lay on a blow-up mattress on my bedroom floor. I wish I could talk to her about this. She feels so far away at the moment.

  The other weird thing is he keeps asking me about Sasha. What she’s like at school, who her friends are, if there are any boys she’s interested in. I keep telling him I don’t know her that well, that Ellen’s better friends with her than I am, but he keeps on asking anyway.

  I need to try harder to find a way to keep him interested in me. I don’t want this to end.

  Ellen

  September 2017

  My phone rings just after 6 p.m. I’m on my way out for a late shift at the station and am tempted to ignore it, but of course I don’t, can’t.

  ‘Ellen? It’s Nick. Nicholas Monkton.’ He sounds hesitant, apologetic. ‘Sorry to bother you.’

  ‘That’s OK.’

  There’s a silence, which he seems to be waiting for me to break, as if it were me that had called him. What I should say is that I’m terribly sorry, I’m on my way out and could we speak later. I’m not sure if my inability to do so is due to the fact that he is a Monkton, and therefore sacred in my absurd world view, or simply my natural feebleness, an aversion to confrontation.

  ‘So?’ Of course I ask him.

  ‘You were right,’ he says. ‘Daniel’s back. Mum told me.’

  ‘I know. I went to see your dad.’

  ‘I can’t believe they’ve been seeing him.’ His voice rises and I hear him take a breath. ‘After everything he’s put them through.’

  ‘Did they tell you what he’s doing here? Is he back here to live?’

  ‘I don’t think so. He’s come back because of Dad being ill… you know…’

  ‘Yes, he told me. I’m so sorry.’

  We are quiet for a moment. I stand in the hall, looking at the pictures of Sasha on the wall.

  ‘Are you going to see Daniel?’ I ask tentatively.

  ‘No!’ The violence of his reply seems to surprise him as much as me. ‘No,’ he repeats more quietly. ‘I’ve got nothing whatsoever to say to him. Have you heard anything about Sasha?’

  ‘No,’ I say uncertainly.

  ‘What is it? Have you heard from her?’

  ‘No, nothing like that.’

  ‘But there is something?’

  ‘I went to see her mother today.’

  ‘Wow, really? What was she like?’ There’s fascination in the question and I can tell that Alice North is a mythical creature to him, like a mermaid or the evil stepmother in Snow White.

  ‘What you would imagine, I suppose. She wouldn’t tell me anything. After I left, I got a call from the police saying they’d picked Sasha up on CCTV near Alice’s flat on the day she disappeared. I went back, but Alice had gone, cleared out. The flat was all messed up; looked like someone had smashed the place up in a r
age.’

  ‘Shit. You should be careful, Ellen.’

  He’s right. What do I think I’m doing?

  ‘So Karina was right about Daniel. She did see him,’ Nicholas says. ‘Have you spoken to her again?’

  ‘No, not yet.’ I consider telling him what the barman in Café Crème said, but something stops me. ‘I’m going to her birthday party tomorrow.’

  ‘Are you? I didn’t think you two had been in touch for years.’

  ‘We haven’t. Dilys invited me when I was there on Monday.’

  ‘God, what’s that going to be like?’ I thought I detected a jeering note.