The Catch Page 8

  Jason sat back and crossed his arms over his chest, his head cocked to the side. ‘Right, I’ve got an idea,’ he said. ‘For sorting out your problem.’

  ‘I’m all ears,’ I said.

  He leaned forward, elbows on the beer-sticky table. ‘We go old-school, right?’ he said, lowering his voice. ‘Picture the scene: this Ryan fella wakes up in the dead of night with you and me at the end of his bed, baseball bats and balaclavas on, Milk Tray-man style. We truss him up, put him in the boot of my car, drive him out to the woods.’

  ‘I don’t think the Milk Tray man ever carried a baseball bat.’

  ‘Whatever,’ my friend said, warming to his subject. ‘So we take him to the woods, make him dig his own grave. Put the fear of God into him, tell him to sod off back to Manchester or wherever he’s from.’

  I raised an eyebrow. ‘Possibly a tiny bit extreme?’

  ‘That would be the last you’d ever see of him. Guaranteed.’

  ‘Last I’d ever see of Abbie too, probably.’

  ‘But you’d be shot of the bloke, and she’d forgive you eventually.’

  ‘Not sure about that.’ I thought back to Claire’s words, which I realised now had been a coded warning. She really, really likes this guy. ‘I need to tread carefully.’

  ‘What do you reckon to my plan, though? Maybe needs a little bit of finessing, filing off the rough edges, but it would definitely do the business.’

  ‘It’s certainly direct, Jason. Do you have any . . . other ideas?’

  ‘You don’t like that one?’

  I was about to give him a flippant reply, but checked myself. Jason had probably watched too many action movies but his heart was in the right place. ‘You’re actually serious?’ I said. ‘About taking him out to the woods?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘Because I don’t want to get done for kidnapping and false imprisonment. Plus, he’s a young, fit guy and we’re both the wrong side of forty-five.’

  ‘She’s worth it though, isn’t she? Abbie?’

  ‘Of course. But Ryan would figure it out in a heartbeat as soon as he heard my voice. As soon as he heard what we were telling him to do.’

  ‘You could be the silent partner, let me do the talking. Maybe we could make it about something else: blackmail about him being a drug user? Or we could set a whatchacallit, a honeytrap, get compromising pictures, use them to make him back off.’

  I took a sip of my drink, the ale hoppy and sweet.

  ‘Don’t think he’d fancy either of us, Jason.’

  ‘Not us, bonehead, we hire some hot bird to make a move on him. Catch him in the act, pictures, the lot.’

  ‘I don’t know, mate. Balaclavas and honeytraps and blackmail . . . it’s all a bit mad, isn’t it? I mean there’s a lot that could go wrong. No offence.’

  Jason raised a hand. ‘None taken. You don’t want to play the fear card, or the blackmail card – I get it, I understand. In which case, you have to go down the other route.’

  ‘Meaning?’

  ‘Find more dirt, more evidence.’

  ‘I’m working on that.’

  ‘But you haven’t done the most obvious thing yet.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  Jason shrugged. ‘You need to get a look inside his house.’

  17

  Claire

  MONDAY

  Twenty-eight days until the wedding

  Claire watched as Ryan carefully pushed the wheelchair up the ramp into the main ceremony room at Bridgford Hall, the imposing Georgian manor house where he would be marrying her daughter in four weeks’ time. He was very cautious, she noticed, very watchful to make sure Joyce didn’t get any unexpected bumps or knocks as he pushed her gently along. He had met them in the car park below, his arms laden with presents – a bracelet for Claire, earrings for Abbie and a huge bouquet of flowers for Joyce – and then insisted on pushing Joyce as they did a circuit of the grounds before being taken inside for a closer look at the main room on the second floor.

  The ceremony room was light and airy, with ranks of high-backed chairs covered in white fabric arrayed down both sides and tall sash windows giving a view out onto the park. The registrar, an enthusiastic woman in a charcoal skirt suit, had explained the formalities of the wedding ceremony and was giving them the lowdown on the venue.

  ‘The hall dates back to 1768,’ she said proudly, ‘and has a very rich history. It was a stately home for many years and was refurbished recently in conjunction with English Heritage to restore the building to its original magnificent state.’

  Claire smiled at her daughter and future son-in-law, holding hands as they listened. She’d tried to explain to Ed – to little effect – that she was just as curious as he was about this handsome stranger who had come into their lives. She wanted to know all about him too. She just had a different way of going about it.

  The tour over, they took the lift back to the ground floor, moving from the entrance into a ceremonial garden, a fine, bright day marking the start of June. Tiny paper horseshoes of colourful confetti littered the ground, leftover from a weekend wedding.

  Abbie put her hand on Ryan’s shoulder. ‘Your arms must be getting tired by now.’

  ‘I’m happy to push,’ he smiled. ‘I don’t mind.’

  ‘My turn,’ Abbie said, heading off with the wheelchair. ‘Come on Nana, Ryan’s booked us a nice restaurant on the Avenue for lunch.’

  Claire watched them go. Ryan turned and took some pictures of the hall with his phone, portrait and landscape, before they followed the path Abbie and Joyce had taken.

  ‘So, Ryan,’ Claire said, ‘tell me a bit about who you’ve invited. Do you think your friends and family will want to stay locally? I can’t wait to meet them.’

  ‘I’m probably just going to have some friends from work here on the day. I have a cousin in New Zealand who should be able to make it to the party next year, but the ceremony here is a bit short notice for him. And Mum . . . well, I would have loved for her to be here but . . .’ he shrugged, his smooth baritone faltering. ‘My dad, I haven’t seen since I was a teenager. I’ve a couple of great aunts in Fife and a second cousin somewhere down south but I’m not particularly close to any of them.’

  ‘No brothers or sisters?’

  ‘I’m an only one, I’m afraid.’

  ‘Well it would be lovely to meet your friends, then. Get to know them a little bit. Perhaps we could get them to a Panthers’ ice hockey match at the arena when the season starts again?’

  ‘I’m sure they’d love that.’ Ryan reached into his jacket pocket and produced a small gift-wrapped box. ‘Claire, I wonder if you could do me a favour, give this to Ed for me?’

  ‘Oh, Ryan, you really didn’t need to buy us all presents. But it’s very generous, thank you, of course I’ll pass it on.’

  ‘It’s just a hip flask, nothing fancy. Abbie said he had one a while back but he lost it, so I thought he’d appreciate a new one.’

  ‘I’m sure he’ll absolutely love it,’ Claire said. ‘Thank you, I know he’ll be really touched.’

  Ryan nodded and gave her an uncertain smile. ‘It’s kind of you to say that, but . . .’

  ‘But what?’

  He stopped walking, hands thrust deep into his pockets. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Tell me.’

  ‘Can I be totally honest with you, Claire?’

  ‘Of course.’

  Ryan looked nervous. ‘I feel like I haven’t really hit it off with your husband.’

  ‘I’ll let you into a little secret, Ryan.’ She lowered her voice. ‘I’m struggling to think of any of Abbie’s boyfriends that my husband has hit it off with, at least initially. Apart from George perhaps, but he ended up going a bit strange when they split up. What I mean is, Ed just needs a little bit of time, that’s all.’

  ‘The thing is, Claire, I get the impression he just doesn’t like me very much.’

  ‘Of course he does
,’ Claire said. ‘He just . . . it’s complicated. He’s got a lot on his mind at the moment but I’m sure he’ll warm to you once he knows more about you.’

  ‘I really hope so. It’s such a shame he couldn’t have joined us for the tour today.’

  ‘He wanted to,’ she held up her mobile, ‘but there was some sort of last-minute work crisis he had to sort out.’

  ‘Can he meet us for lunch?’

  As if on cue, Claire’s phone chimed with another text message.

  Sorry this work thing’s dragging on. Hope all good with venue. Have lunch without me. x

  ‘Apparently not,’ Claire said, typing a quick reply. ‘Come on, let’s catch up with the others. I’m starving.’

  18

  I read Claire’s reply and slid the phone back into my pocket.

  The smell of the place was the first thing that had hit me: polish and bleach and air freshener, a powerful concoction that made my nose itch. I stood there in the small hallway for a moment, listening to the stillness of an empty house. The only sounds were the insistent ticking of a clock and beneath that, the low electric hum from a fridge or freezer through a doorway to my right. No other sounds from downstairs or up. But then I knew Ryan wouldn’t be here in Beeston, because he was five miles away, about to sit down to lunch with my wife, daughter and mother-in-law.

  He could never find out that I had been in his house.

  In my other pocket, my hand brushed against the key Abbie had given me to help move her stuff in. I ran a finger over the sharp edges of the newly-cut metal, feeling it bite against my skin. Despite the key, it still felt like trespassing – as if I had just pushed open the door to a stranger’s house and wandered in. But then I supposed that was pretty much what I had done.

  So I’m here. Now what?

  I obviously couldn’t ransack the place; I had to take a more subtle approach. Observe. Gather clues. There was a flight of stairs directly in front of me, curving at the top. The house was a small mid-terrace so I guessed there would be two bedrooms up there, front and back, with a bathroom alongside the smaller one.

  Downstairs first.

  Behind the front door there was a rack of pegs against the wall, a mixture of jackets and coats. Mostly men’s, with one leather jacket I recognised as Abbie’s. Shoes were lined up under a radiator in pairs, all the same size: trainers, Chelsea boots, shining black brogues and, at the end, a heavy pair of well-worn walking boots.

  I checked the soles of my own shoes for mud and walked cautiously into the lounge. The curtains were open to the street but I decided closing them against prying eyes would be more suspicious, so I left them. It was better just to be quick. The lounge had been knocked through into a small dining area at the back so most of the downstairs was just one open-plan room occupied by an unremarkable beige three-piece suite, a huge TV in the corner, a bookcase, acoustic guitar on a stand, a mantelpiece of framed photos and more pictures on the walls. The biggest was over the fireplace, a big framed photograph of an English landscape, green and brown moorland rolling away into the distance beneath a pure blue summer sky. It looked like the Lake District or Exmoor, or maybe Derbyshire; a tiny digital date stamp from two years ago in the bottom corner. A picture Ryan had taken himself, presumably.

  Most of the framed photos on the mantelpiece seemed to be of Ryan with friends or family members at various stages of his life. A couple of them featured an older woman who I assumed was his mother. One family picture with his father too. I snapped pictures of them on my phone. At the far end of the room a window looked out onto a neat back garden, and on the wall above a small round dining table there were two silver-framed certificates, side by side. The first had a medal at its centre, an engraved silver cross hanging from white and purple ribbon.

  For an act of exemplary gallantry during active operations against the enemy

  The Military Cross is awarded to

  Lieutenant Ryan Wilson

  2nd Battalion, Royal Anglian Regiment

  Helmand Province, Afghanistan, May 2012

  Ryan had mentioned his time in the army, but neither he nor Abbie had mentioned he’d been decorated for bravery. And I didn’t think the Military Cross was a medal they gave out to people for just turning up and doing their job – this was one of the big ones, only a few levels below a Victoria Cross, the highest you could get. I was impressed. Was it real? It certainly looked real.

  The other frame held Ryan’s degree certificate from the University of Manchester.

  Ryan Wilson is hereby awarded the degree of

  Bachelor of Science, Psychology

  1st class

  At the top of the page was the purple and yellow crest of the university and its motto, Cognitio, sapienta, humanitas. I thought back to my own graduation day, so hot and hungover in the thirty-degree heat that as I walked across the stage at Whitworth Hall to shake the VC’s hand, I was nearly sick. It felt like someone else’s life. It was such a weird coincidence that both Ryan and I had been to Manchester. If he actually had been there.

  I got my phone out again and took pictures of both the medal and degree certificate, making a mental note to chase up the reference requests I’d made last week.

  The kitchen was small and square, worktops around two sides, a boiler cupboard and a half-glass back door with deadbolts top and bottom. A large box was propped next to the back door, a Bosch electric jigsaw still in its cellophane wrapping. But apart from that, everything seemed to be in its place. The worktops were spotless. Nothing was in the sink, not even a mug or a bowl from breakfast, everything washed up and laid out to dry. I picked up one of the mugs from the draining rack, recognising the University of Manchester coat of arms again. He certainly loved his old uni. My phone chirped in my pocket, the message alert hideously loud in the silent kitchen. I snatched it out, putting the mug back down quickly on the worktop, expecting another update from Claire. But it wasn’t her. The text was from my deputy at the office.

  Siobhan:

  Just a heads up, Julia on warpath for you. She thought you were media training with Cognos this morning but they say you didn’t show again? Where are you?

  I cursed and fired back a reply:

  Car trouble. Talk to you later, will explain. Thanks for the warning.

  It hit me then, like a blow to the chest. How reckless I had been to sack off work for a morning just because I knew Ryan would be occupied looking at the wedding venue. I had to take the opportunity to check his house but I also couldn’t afford to get on the wrong side of my boss, not now, not with the restructure pending.

  I pulled the front door of Ryan’s house shut behind me and turned to walk back to my car, just in time to see the net curtains twitch across the street.

  19

  ‘It’s a shame you missed it today,’ Claire said as I sat down at the kitchen table that evening.

  ‘I know,’ I couldn’t meet her gaze. ‘How did it go?’

  ‘Well, it’s a stunning venue, I think it’ll make a really nice setting.’ She had gone straight back to work after the lunch and was still wearing her dark blue trouser suit with the heels that made her almost as tall as our daughter. ‘And there’s a good spot for pictures in the garden at the back.’

  Abbie said, ‘I took loads of photos to show you, Dad.’

  ‘Sounds great,’ I said, mustering as much enthusiasm as possible. ‘I really wanted to join you but a client was kicking off over a big project. We’re already over the deadline and they wanted a massive re-write of the web content. It’s all a bit mad.’

  The lies were getting easier, I noticed. Practice makes perfect.

  ‘Mum seems better too, this last week or so,’ Claire said. ‘She’s so excited about the wedding. Let’s have her over to stay at the weekend again, shall we?’

  ‘Of course,’ I said. ‘I can pick her up on Friday evening.’

  Tilly was on my lap, kneading my trousers with her paws, purring as I scratched the velvety fur between her ears. Th
e new hip flask from Ryan lay unwrapped on the kitchen counter. I flicked through a stack of handmade cards from Abbie’s school children, carefully printed letters on thick green card adorned with lots of love hearts and kisses.

  She took another stack out of her work bag and laid them on the table. ‘My kids did them,’ she said, ‘when I told them the news. They’re very sweet. I’ve got such a lovely group this year.’

  Claire handed her a cup of peppermint tea. ‘Better not show them to Ryan,’ she smiled. ‘He might get jealous.’

  Abbie grinned. ‘I think he’ll be able to cope.’ She tucked her long dark hair behind her ear. ‘Hey, talking of jealous, it’s funny about George turning up the other day.’

  My ears pricked up.

  ‘Funny how?’ Claire said.

  ‘He’s been texting me and stuff since he wrote that letter, commenting on my posts on Instagram. It’s weird – I thought I’d still be angry with him but I feel like I’ve moved on from it now.’

  ‘I hope you’re ignoring him.’

  ‘I replied to a few of the messages, just the usual chit-chat, nothing heavy.’

  ‘You’re too nice.’

  ‘He sounds like he’s a bit more mature now. Maybe I should meet him for coffee, what do you think?’

  ‘You could tell him about Ryan?’ I tried to sound casual, as if the idea had only just occurred to me.

  Claire shook her head emphatically. ‘He had his chance, Abs. He blew it.’

  ‘Not for that, I mean – just to be friends.’

  ‘But he doesn’t want to be friends, does he?’ Claire said. ‘He wants a second chance to be your boyfriend, and I think Ryan might have something to say about that.’

  ‘Ryan’s fine with it, actually.’

  ‘You’ve told him?’ I said. ‘About George getting back in touch?’

  ‘I tell him everything. He’s mature, he can handle it.’

  ‘Oh, right.’ So much for putting George in play and waiting for sparks to fly. ‘That’s good.’