Let Me Lie

  “Do you mind if I stay here?” She saw Murray’s face and lifted her chin. “I don’t need babysitting, if that’s what you’re thinking. I’m not going to top myself.”

  Murray tried not to react to the casual reminder of all the times she had indeed attempted suicide. “I wasn’t thinking that.” But he had been. Of course he had been. “I’ll do it another time.”

  “What do you need?”

  “Sean from High Tech Crime just rang. The handset used for the 999 call reporting Tom Johnson’s suicide was bought at Fones4All in Brighton.”

  “Do you think they’ll have a record of who bought it?”

  “That’s what I’m hoping.”

  “Go!” Sarah waved a fully loaded fork in the air. “Just think: you could have this all wrapped up before CID even know it’s happened.”

  Murray laughed, although the same thought had crossed his mind. Not that he could make an arrest, of course, but he could line everything up, and then . . . Then what? Look into another cold case? Interfere with someone else’s investigation?

  When Murray’s thirty years were up, he hadn’t been ready to retire. He hadn’t been ready to leave his police family, to step away from the satisfaction that comes from doing a job that makes a difference. But he couldn’t stay forever. At some point he would have to step down, and was he really going to wait until he was old or infirm before he did so? Until he was too decrepit to enjoy the last few years of his life?

  Murray looked at Sarah and, in that instant, he knew exactly what he was going to do once the Johnson case was concluded. He was going to retire. Properly, this time.

  Sarah had good days and bad days. Murray didn’t want to miss any more of the good ones.

  “Are you sure you’ll be okay?”

  “I’ll be okay.”

  “I’ll ring you every half hour.”

  “Go.”

  Murray went.

  * * *

  • • •

  In the mobile phone shop, a giant sign suspended from the ceiling advertised the latest Bluetooth speaker, and shoppers pored over stands, perplexed looks on their faces as they tried to establish the differences between models. Murray walked straight through the middle of the shop and stood next to a rack of the latest—and most expensive—iPhone, knowing this to be the most effective way of summoning assistance. Sure enough, within seconds a lad barely old enough to leave school appeared at his side. His pale blue suit was too wide at the shoulders, the trousers creasing into shallow folds above his trainers. His shiny gold name badge read Dylan.

  “Nice, aren’t they?” He nodded toward the iPhone stand. “Five-point-five-inch screen, wireless charging, OLED display, fully waterproof.”

  Murray was momentarily distracted by the only feature that mattered to someone who had twice let his—far less expensive, but nevertheless vital—phone fall out of his back pocket into the loo. He made himself focus, showing Dylan his police ID.

  “Could I speak to the manager, please?”

  “That’s me.”

  Murray turned his “oh!” of surprise into one of enthusiasm. “Great! Right. Well, I’m investigating a purchase made in this store at some point prior to the eighteenth of May 2016.” He looked up, where two prominent cameras pointed at the queue of customers. Another two cameras focused on the entrance to the shop. “How long do you retain CCTV footage?”

  “Three months. Some of your lot came in a couple of weeks ago, with a load of stolen phones. We could prove they were taken from here, but they were nicked six months ago so there was no CCTV.”

  “Pity. Can you trace this purchase on the tills, to see how the suspect paid?”

  Dylan did little to conceal his lack of enthusiasm for this task. “We’re very busy.” He looked at the tills. “It’s the Christmas holidays,” he added, as if this might be news to Murray.

  Murray leaned forward, doing his best impression of a TV cop. “It’s in connection with a murder inquiry. You find me this transaction, Dylan, and we could crack the whole case.”

  Dylan’s eyes widened. He straightened his tightly knotted tie, glancing around as though there was a risk the murderer might be standing right beside them. “You’d better come through to my office.”

  Dylan’s “office” was a cupboard into which someone had shoehorned an Ikea desk and a broken swivel chair, its back leaning drunkenly to one side. Several certificates for Employee of the Month were tacked to a bulletin board above the computer.

  Dylan magnanimously offered Murray the chair, perched himself on a stock box half the height, and reached to enter his password on a grubby keyboard. Murray politely looked away. On the wall was a photograph of six men and two women, all smartly dressed and grinning enthusiastically for the camera. Dylan was second from the left, wearing the same light blue suit he had on today. The cardboard mount read Fones4All Manager Course 2017.

  “What’s the IMEI?”

  Murray read out the fifteen-digit serial code that Sean had given to him.

  “Cash.” With one word, Dylan brought Murray’s investigation to a devastating halt. He looked anxiously at Murray. “Does that mean we can’t catch the perp?”

  Murray allowed himself a wry smile at the youngster’s jargon, gleaned directly from American cop shows. He shrugged. “Not this way, I’m afraid.”

  Dylan looked as though he’d been dealt a personal blow. He sighed, then stared at Murray, his mouth slightly open as something had occurred to him. “Unless . . .” He turned back to the screen and tapped deftly on the keyboard, then reached for the mouse and scrolled through the screen. Murray watched, his mind on Sean and whether there was anything else the tech team could do to trace the transaction. Without the identity of the caller, he had little to go on.

  “Yes!” Dylan gave an entirely unself-conscious air punch, then swiped his open palm through the air toward Murray. “Go us!” he prompted, and Murray raised his own and high-fived Fones4All’s most enthusiastic manager.

  “Loyalty card,” Dylan explained, grinning so widely Murray could see his fillings. “Every manager is judged on how many sign-ups they get in store each month—the winner gets a Samsung Galaxy S8. I’ve won three times because I give the prize to the person on my team who flogged the most loyalty cards.”

  “That’s nice of you.”

  “Shit phones, Samsungs. Anyway, my team are competitive, right? Don’t let anyone walk away without signing up. And your guy”—he jabbed at the screen—“was no exception.”

  “We’ve got a name?”

  “And an address.” Dylan presented the information with the flourish of a magician confident of applause.

  “So, who is it?” Murray leaned forward to read the screen. Dylan got there first.

  “Anna Johnson.”

  He must have misheard. Anna Johnson?

  Murray read the details for himself: Anna Johnson, Oak View, Cleveland Avenue, Eastbourne.

  “Is that our murderer, then?”

  Murray opened his mouth, about to say that, no, that wasn’t their man, that was the victim’s daughter; but however helpful Dylan had been, he was still a member of the public and as such would need to be kept in the dark a little longer.

  “Could you print this off for me? You’ve been very helpful.” He made a mental note to write to Dylan’s boss when all this was over. Perhaps they’d send him something other than a Samsung Galaxy S8.

  The printout seemed to burn in his pocket as he made his way, faster this time, through the shopping center and out toward the Lanes.

  Anna Johnson?

  Anna Johnson bought the phone used to make the witness call confirming her father’s suicide.

  Murray was getting more and more confused. Nothing about this case added up.

  Had Tom Johnson borrowed his daughter’s phone for some reason? Sean’s digging h
ad confirmed that the fake witness call purporting to be from Diane Brent-Taylor was the first time the handset had been used. Was it credible that Anna had bought the phone for an innocent reason and that Tom had taken it that same day, hours before his death?

  Murray walked back to his car, oblivious to the crowds now.

  If Tom Johnson didn’t go to Beachy Head to commit suicide, why did he go there? To meet someone? Someone who was secretly planning to kill him?

  Murray played out scenarios in his head as he drove home. A clandestine affair uncovered by a jealous husband; a struggle that resulted in Tom going over the cliff edge. Had the killer used the phone Tom had borrowed from his daughter to make false calls to the police? The lover? Why choose Diane Brent-Taylor as an alias?

  Murray shook his head impatiently. The killer wouldn’t have had a spare SIM card unless Tom’s murder was premeditated. And if it was premeditated, the murderer would have acquired his own burner phone, not happened upon a spare one in his victim’s pocket. None of it made sense. It was all so . . . Murray struggled to pinpoint the word.

  Staged. That was it.

  It didn’t feel real.

  If he took the witness call out of the equation, what did he have? A missing person. A suicide text from Tom’s phone, which anyone could have written. Hardly evidence of murder.

  Hardly evidence of suicide . . .

  And Caroline’s death: was that any more substantial? Everything pointed toward suicide, but no one had seen her. The chaplain—poor man—had guided her back to safety. Who was to say she hadn’t stayed there? A dog walker had found her bag and phone on the cliff edge, conveniently in the spot where the chaplain had found a distressed Caroline. Circumstantial evidence, sure, but hardly conclusive. And like her husband’s disappearance, somehow too staged. Real deaths were messy. There were loose ends, pieces that didn’t fit. The Johnson suicides were far too tidy.

  By the time Murray pulled up on his driveway, he was certain.

  There was no witness to Tom’s death. There was no murder. There were no suicides.

  Tom and Caroline Johnson were still alive.

  And Anna Johnson knew it.

  CHAPTER

  FORTY-FOUR

  ANNA

  It is strange to see Mum back in Oak View. Strange and wonderful. She’s nervous, but whether it’s due to fear of detection by Mark or by Dad, I couldn’t say. Either way, she jumps at the slightest sound from outside and offers little contribution to the conversation unless asked directly. Rita shadows her wherever she goes, and I wonder how she will be affected when Mum leaves again.

  Because that’s the deal. Three more days as a family—albeit a family filled with secrets—and then it’s over.

  “You don’t have to go.” We’re in the garden, my words turning to mist as they leave my mouth. It’s dry today, but so cold it hurts my face. Ella is in her bouncy chair in the kitchen, facing the window so I can keep an eye on her.

  “I do.” Mum begged to come out into her beloved garden. It’s overlooked on only one side—the high hedges on the other two sides protecting us from curious glances—but even so my heart is in my mouth. Mum’s tackling her roses—not the expert pruning that will need doing in spring, but cutting them by a third, so the winter winds don’t snap the stems. I have neglected the garden—Mum’s pride and joy—and the roses are leggy and unbalanced. “Someone will see me if I stay. It’s too big a risk.”

  She glances continually at Robert’s house, the only place from which we can be seen, despite the fact that we saw him drive away this morning, loaded with late Christmas presents for relatives up north. Mum is wearing Mark’s gardening coat and a woolly hat pulled low over her ears.

  “You should have cut these buddleias back last month. And the bay tree needs fleecing.” She shakes her head at the fence between our garden and Robert’s, at the climbing roses and the sprawl of clematis I should have cut back after it flowered.

  It’s looking better already, although I hear Mum tut from time to time, and suspect my lack of attention has left some plants too far gone to save.

  “There’s a book in the kitchen—it tells you what needs doing each month.”

  “I’ll look at it—I promise.” A lump forms in my throat. She’s serious about leaving. About not coming back.

  I read somewhere that the first year of loss is the hardest. The first Christmas, the first anniversary. A full set of seasons to endure alone, before a new year brings fresh hope. It’s true it was hard. I wanted to tell my parents about Ella, to share pregnancy stories with my mother and send Mark and my dad to the pub to wet the baby’s head. I wanted to cry for no reason, while Mum folded tiny onesies and told me everyone got the baby blues.

  The first year was hard, but I know there are harder times ahead. The finality of death is inarguable, but my parents are not dead. How will I come to terms with that? My mother will leave me of her own free will, because she is too scared to be here where my father will find her; too scared to be where she may be recognized and her crimes exposed. I will no longer be an orphan, yet I will still be without parents, and the grief that I feel is every bit as raw as if I were truly bereaved.

  “Robert’s paying for the garden to be landscaped, once his building work has been done. Will the plants against the fence survive being moved?” Too late, I realize I shouldn’t have mentioned the extension.

  “Have you lodged an objection? You must. It’ll make the kitchen incredibly dark, and you’ll have no privacy on the patio.” She begins to list the reasons why Robert’s extension is a travesty, her voice an octave higher than it was, and I want to ask why she cares when she has made it clear she won’t come back here again. But then I think of the way she is carefully tending roses she won’t see bloom. We are programmed to care long after we need to.

  I make vaguely supportive noises and don’t mention the money Mark negotiated in compensation for the inconvenience of the construction.

  “Help me move this.” Mum has finished fleecing the bay tree. It stands in a vast terra-cotta pot on top of a manhole cover. “It needs to be somewhere more sheltered.” She tugs at the pot, but it doesn’t shift even an inch. I walk over to help her. Robert’s builders will move it when they dig up the sewers for his foundations, but I don’t want to set Mum off again. Together, we drag the pot across the patio to the opposite side of the garden.

  “There. That’s a good morning’s work.”

  I tuck my arm through Mum’s and she squeezes hard, locking me in place.

  “Don’t go.” I have managed without crying, up to now, but my voice cracks and I know it’s a losing battle.

  “I have to.”

  “Can we come and see you? Ella and me? If you won’t come here, can we visit you?”

  A moment of silence tells me the answer isn’t one I want to hear.

  “It wouldn’t be safe.”

  “I wouldn’t tell a soul.”

  “You’d slip up.”

  “I wouldn’t!” I pull my arm away, hot tears of frustration stinging my eyes.

  Mum looks at me and sighs. “If the police find out Tom and I are really alive, and that you knew it—that you concealed our crimes, harbored me—you’ll be arrested. You could go to prison.”

  “I don’t care!”

  Mum speaks slowly and quietly, her gaze locked on mine. “Tom isn’t going to let this lie, Anna. In his mind, I’ve double-crossed him. Made a fool of him. He won’t rest until he knows where I am, and it’s you he’ll use to find me.” She waits, letting her words sink in.

  The tears come, falling silently down cheeks numb with cold. For as long as I know where Mum is, I’m at risk. Mark and Ella, too. I look back at the house, to where Ella has fallen asleep in her bouncy chair. I can’t let her suffer.

  “It’s the only way.”

  I make myself nod. It’s the on
ly way. But it’s a hard way. For all of us.

  CHAPTER

  FORTY-FIVE

  MURRAY

  “Do you think she was involved from the start?” Nish scratched at a mark on the knee of her jeans. She was sitting at Murray’s kitchen table, a mug of tea beside the pile of paperwork Murray had accumulated.

  “Her statement says she was at a conference the night Tom supposedly ‘went missing.’” Murray made quote marks in the air. “The organizers confirm she was there for registration, but can’t say if or when she left.”

  “So her alibi’s shaky.”

  “She didn’t fake their deaths.”

  Nish and Murray looked at Sarah, who—up until now—had been silent, listening to the two colleagues go over the case.

  “What makes you so certain?” Nish asked.

  “Because she asked you to reopen the case. It doesn’t make sense.”

  Nish picked up her mug to drink and then put it down again as a theory took shape. “Unless someone sent her the card to let her know they were onto her. And her husband saw it, so she brought it to us because that’s what an innocent person would do.”

  “He was at work. He didn’t see it till later.”

  Nish flapped a hand at Murray, as though the point were immaterial. “Or the postman. A neighbor. The point is, the police report was a double bluff.”

  Murray shook his head. “I don’t buy it. It’s a massive risk.”

  “When did she tell you to back off?” Sarah said.

  “Boxing Day.” Murray looked at Nish, who hadn’t been privy to this piece of the puzzle. “She hung up on me. Twice.”

  “Then she found out sometime between the twenty-first and the twenty-sixth.” Sarah shrugged. “S’obvious.”

  Murray grinned. “Thanks, Columbo.”

  “So, what now?” Nish said.

  “I need hard evidence. A phone purchase isn’t enough—especially when, as it stands, Anna Johnson was miles away from Eastbourne at the time of the offense. I can’t start claiming two dead people are alive, or storming down to Cleveland Avenue to arrest Anna, without proof the Johnsons are alive and well, and that she knew about it.”