The One You Love (7 page)

‘Worth the risk though,’ Lizzy ventured. ‘After all, what she told the police could get Dan sent to jail.’

‘I know,’ Emma acknowledged. ‘You’re right. But it’ll have to wait. Come on,’ she said, heading for the stairs, ‘let’s get this over with.’

‘You sure you want to play detective?’ Lizzy asked, as they stood in front of Emma’s apartment door. ‘We can let the police get on with the investigation – they’re used to dealing with things like this.’

‘I’ll be okay,’ Emma replied, bringing the key up to the lock.

But she didn’t feel okay – she felt terrified.

‘You don’t know that. Who knows how you’ll react to going back in there so soon after… well, after everything. I’m scared, Em, and I’m not as personally involved as you. You don’t have to pretend that you’re not afraid.’

Emma turned to her friend.

‘I am scared, Lizzy. But I still have to do this.’

She turned the key and went to push the door, but was stopped as Lizzy grabbed at her top.

‘I’ll be right with you,’ Lizzy said. ‘Promise me that if it gets too much, you’ll tell me, and we’ll be out of there right away.’

‘Okay,’ Emma said. ‘I promise.’

Lizzy released her grip and Emma stepped into the apartment, feeling like she was crossing some forbidden threshold. The first thing that struck her was the temperature in the flat – despite it being warm outside, the flat was cool, almost cold. Emma didn’t believe in ghosts, but as she moved into the hallway the thought struck her that this place now had a sinister feel. She could sense unease from Lizzy too – she was sure she was holding her breath. Emma flipped on the hall light switch and glanced down towards the kitchen, which was shrouded in darkness.

‘You okay?’ Emma said, turning around to Lizzy.

Lizzy nodded, but she looked anything but okay.

They moved towards the lounge, passing the closed bathroom door.

‘We won’t go in there,’ Emma said.

‘Fine by me.’ Lizzy’s voice was cracking with nerves. ‘If I need to go to the toilet I’ll pee in the sink.’

As they walked past the door, Emma thought for a moment that she heard a scratching sound from behind – maybe someone clawing at the wood, lying stricken on the floor. But it was just her mind playing cruel tricks, and she tried to push away the irrational thought that Richard was still in there, waiting for someone to save his life.

The place didn’t feel like her home anymore – it was tainted, and for the first time Emma wondered if she would ever live there again.

She moved into the lounge, half-expecting to see Dan on the sofa, watching the football, or laughing manically at a repeat of
Friends
.

But the sofa was unmanned, the television off. She looked around the room, but it was difficult to see – the only light was leaking through the curtains, which the police must have drawn after they had concluded their investigations.

‘Looking for anything in particular?’ Lizzy asked.

‘Just checking to see if anything’s missing – something I might have missed when we first spoke to the police.’

‘You still think it might have been a burglary?’

‘I know I’m clutching at straws,’ Emma said, turning to her friend, ‘but if I do find that something is missing, then it might help to explain what happened.’

She moved across to the window and threw back the curtains, letting light flood in. The room looked a whole lot better. Again, she scanned the room. All the expensive equipment was where it belonged – the television, DVD, stereo system, video recorder. There was even a crisp ten-pound note on the window ledge, where Emma had left it on Thursday evening. Satisfied, but disappointed that nothing was missing from the flat, Emma went to the bedroom to pack some extra clothes. Lizzy put the kettle on for a cup of tea, having discovered that there was still some milk in the fridge.

‘Here you go,’ Lizzy said, handing her a cup of tea. ‘The milk is just about okay, but you might want to drink it quickly.’

‘Thanks.’

‘That’s a nice photograph,’ Lizzy noted. ‘He looks young there.’

‘He is,’ Emma said, admiring the photo she’d taken down from the window ledge. ‘It was when he was at university. I don’t know why I always liked it so much – I didn’t even know him then. Maybe that’s it though – it shows me what things were like before we met.’

Lizzy watched Emma stare into the photograph as if she was looking at some faraway object. ‘You won’t just have those memories. You’ve both got a great future.’

‘I hope so,’ Emma replied. ‘But who knows.’

Lizzy put an arm around her.

‘You and Dan will be fine.’

‘I just need an explanation, Lizzy. I can’t take not knowing.’

‘I know.’

Emma looked up towards the television, and that’s when she realised that something was missing.

It was a framed photo of her and Dan, which they had taken on a recent holiday to Rome. They were stood in St Peter’s Square, with the famous basilica rising in the background. Usually the photo was on top of the television. She got up and searched behind the set, to see if it had fallen down the back, but it wasn’t there.

It couldn’t be him again, could it?

Emma moved out of the lounge and hurried down the hall towards the bedroom, the terrible thought nagging at the back of her mind.

‘You okay, Emma?’ asked Lizzy, following her.

‘Just checking something,’ she shouted, not slowing her pace.

This time she knew what she was looking for. She surveyed the bedside cabinet and the wall opposite the bed. Her suspicions were confirmed. She’d been focussing so much on the expensive items that she’d missed it completely.

‘They’re all gone,’ she said, as Lizzy entered the bedroom. ‘All the photos of Dan and me. They’re gone.’

11

‘Why would someone take those photos?’ Lizzy asked, as they were sitting on the sofa in Emma’s flat.

‘I don’t know. But I do know that the police will see it as more evidence that it was Dan who did that to Richard.’

‘You think?’

‘I can just imagine what they’d say now,’ Emma said, thinking back to how the detective had announced that Mrs Henderson had seen Dan running from the apartment. ‘They’ll say he took a couple of reminders of me and him, before running away.’

‘They might not,’ Lizzy offered.

‘They will, Lizzy. You saw for yourself – they’re convinced Dan did it.’

‘But what if he is guilty?’

‘You can’t mean that,’ Emma replied, shocked at the suggestion. ‘You can’t think Dan could be capable of doing that.’

Lizzy turned away somewhat apologetically. ‘I’m sorry, Emma, but we just don’t know, do we?’

‘I don’t believe you. I thought you of all people would support me – and Dan.’

‘I do.’

‘Then don’t give up on Dan, please.’

But as they sat in an uncomfortable silence, it was getting harder and harder for Emma to ignore the voice in her head: the voice suggesting that Dan was guilty.

‘Look, Emma,’ Lizzy said, after almost a minute of silence. ‘I’m sorry. I want to believe that Dan is innocent, and I do believe it really. But there is a chance, no matter how much we don’t think it, that Dan did do that to Richard. We just don’t know what happened, do we?’

Emma couldn’t find the words. To admit that she did agree with Lizzy would feel like a terrible betrayal. And in a strange way she felt that to even entertain the possibility that Dan was guilty would make it more likely to be true.

‘Maybe Dan had a really good reason for doing what he did,’ Lizzy continued. ‘Maybe he did it in self-defence. What if Richard came round to the flat and for some reason they started to fight – I don’t know why – and as they fought Dan hit Richard just that bit too hard?’

Emma shook her head.

‘No.’

‘I read a story last year about a man who got into a drunken fight in a nightclub – the argument was about nothing important. He banged into the back of his girlfriend and the guy took offence. The man threw one punch and the other guy fell and hit his head on the floor – fractured his skull. He died on the spot and the other guy was charged with manslaughter. It can be as easy as that. A trivial thing, but you catch a person in a wrong place, or they fall and bang their head in a certain way, and they end up in hospital or dead. What if that happened, for whatever reason, and Dan just panicked? You wouldn’t blame him, would you? And maybe now he’s hiding out, knowing that he should give himself in, but scared of what might happen to him. It would be completely understandable, and it wouldn’t make Dan a bad person.’

Lizzy waited nervously for a response, while Emma mulled over what Lizzy had just said. Part of her hated Lizzy for even suggesting that Dan might be responsible, while another part loved her friend for daring to risk their relationship by exploring all the options, no matter how painful.

‘I can see where you’re coming from,’ Emma acknowledged, picking up the photo of Dan from the coffee table. ‘And if we’d been talking about anyone else except Richard then I might believe it could be true. But,’ she said, looking across to Lizzy, ‘I just can’t believe that Dan would ever fight with his brother. Not after what he’s told me about their relationship – and not after what I’ve seen when they’re together. They’re not just brothers, Lizzy, they’re best friends.’

‘Even best friends can fall out,’ Lizzy responded.

‘Yes,’ Emma said. ‘But not those two – Dan told me once how when they were on a family holiday – Dan was about eight and Richard was six – Richard got taken to hospital with viral meningitis. Dan was so upset that he wouldn’t leave the hospital – he stayed and slept at his bedside for about two days solid. I know that was a long time ago, Lizzy, but I don’t think things have changed – Dan would be the same now as then. That’s one reason why I need to go to see Richard as much as possible. Because I know that Dan would be there day and night if he could be.’

‘But doesn’t the fact that the photos are missing put any doubt in your mind?’

‘It makes me more convinced that it wasn’t him. Okay, say Dan did attack Richard, and he decided to run away. Why would he take the trouble to grab the photos above anything else? I’ve looked around the flat, and he hasn’t taken anything else of his – clothes, bags. But of anything, those are the things that he would need if he were going on the run – not a couple of photos. Whatever way you look at it, it doesn’t make sense for him to have done that.’

‘Okay,’ Lizzy smiled, holding her hands up, ‘I’m convinced. I just think you need to explore all the options.’

‘I know, Lizzy, and I do appreciate it. I don’t want to just delude myself, but on this I’m so sure.’

‘So we still have the mystery of the missing photos,’ Lizzy announced. ‘Are you going to tell the police about them?’

‘I will. But not right now.’

Again there was a silence, this time interrupted by Lizzy’s mobile phone. As Lizzy answered the call, wandering into the hall clutching the phone to her ear, Emma climbed off the sofa and moved across to the window. She looked down at the busy high street below – business people strode past at London pace, while tourists ambled by, moving in and out of shop fronts. Then, for a horrible second, she thought she saw him, peering up at her from across the road, a camera dangling from his neck.

It couldn’t be him, could it?

Instinctively she twisted out of view. And for a few seconds she just stood there, flattened against the wall, her heart racing. She could hear Lizzy talking in the kitchen but it seemed so far away. Thoughts ran through her head, of a time when she’d never felt safe, of a time that she’d tried her best to forget. But then she scolded herself for being so silly. Breathless, she edged out from behind the wall and gazed out of the window. Where she thought he’d been standing was a middle-aged man in a smart suit reading a newspaper.

It was just her imagination, playing tricks again.

Then she did see someone she recognised. Mr Henderson had exited the apartment and was walking off down the street pulling a shopping trolley. She watched him as he paused at a bus stop, just seconds before a double-decker arrived. By the time the bus had left, Mr Henderson had gone, probably on his way into the centre.

‘Emma,’ Lizzy said, approaching from behind.

Emma jumped; her body was really on edge.

‘Hi,’ she said, turning away from the window and forcing a smile.

‘You okay?’ Lizzy asked.

‘Fine.’

‘Emma, that was the theatre on the phone. One of the leading ladies in the play has had to pull out of the show because of a family illness, and they want me to take her place.’

‘That’s great news,’ Emma said, ‘but the performance is only a week away, isn’t it?’

‘I know. That’s why they called. They want me to go over there now and start rehearsing.’

‘You’d better get over there then. What are you waiting for?’

‘I’m not leaving you here on your own. I told them I wasn’t sure I could do it.’