Scarlet Wakefield 03 - Kiss In The Dark Read online

  But they’re interrupted by someone sitting in the waiting area, who jumps up on hearing this exchange.

  “I’m Jase’s mum!” she says frantically to the solicitor. “What’s going on? They said Jase was arrested, but no one’s told me what’s going on. I’ve been worried out of my mind!”

  “Let me talk to my client first, Mrs. Barnes,” Ms. Ramu says briskly. She’s small, with slicked-back hair, thick and black as a crow’s wing, and dark coral lipstick that matches her silk shirt. Her smart appearance is reassuring—she looks as though she could take on the whole jury by herself. “Then I’ll have a better idea of what’s going on, and I can fill you in.”

  “But I want to see him,” Dawn wails. “I’m so worried!”

  Her thin body seems to crumple in on itself. Hugging herself around her waist, she looks pitifully fragile, the bulky parka that she’s wearing hanging off her bones as if from a wire hanger. Her face is a mass of creases. She looks very small and frail. No wonder I didn’t recognize her before, bundled up in that big jacket, its hood half covering her face.

  “We’ll have him out on bail before you know it, Mrs. Barnes,” says the solicitor, patting her hand.

  “Bail?” I say quickly, thinking that though my grandmother might be willing to pay for a lawyer for Jase, she’ll be much less keen to have him released from custody so he and I can see each other. “I have a big trust fund. I can put up money for bail if you need it.”

  Both the sergeant and the solicitor grin at this, identical sardonic smiles.

  “American police shows have a lot to answer for,” DS Landon sighs, and Jas Ramu says more kindly:

  “You must be Scarlett Wakefield, right? We don’t do that whole bail bondsman thing in the UK. Though you’re not the first to think so. Bail here just means that the suspect is released before trial, okay? No money involved. It’s very straightforward.”

  She nods at both of us and walks down the corridor after DS Landon.

  Dawn and I are left standing there, staring after them, both of us yearning to follow to see Jase. She lifts her head to look at me, and again, it’s a visceral shock to see Jase’s golden eyes in her small, dark, lined face.

  “You seem like a nice girl,” she says sadly. “You were friendly, and you listened to me. But then I realized who you were. I should have seen it straightaway. Of all the girls he could have picked. Jase could have his choice of anyone. But a Wakefield? As if we haven’t all seen where that could lead.”

  I turn away. Thoughts of what DS Landon just said to me are spinning in my brain, keeping most of Dawn’s words from sinking in. In less confusing circumstances, I would produce the pendant her son gave to me and ask her where she got it; right now, I’m too overwhelmed to open that can of worms and heap its contents on top of all the other mess I have to deal with.

  Without a word, I walk outside to get some fresh air, and the door bangs behind me. Then it opens again, and Dawn patters out in my wake.

  “I didn’t mean to upset you,” she says. “I’m sorry, I’m all over the place, I don’t know what I’m saying. Oh God, I need a fag.”

  I look around to see her patting the pockets of her parka hopelessly.

  “You don’t smoke, do you?” she asks.

  I shake my head.

  “I’ve got some in the van,” she mutters, crossing to the dented old van drawn up wonkily off to the side of the parking lot, taking up two spaces. “I know I shouldn’t smoke, okay? Jase is always going on at me. But it calms my nerves. I try to stop, but it never lasts.”

  She’s twice my age, and here she is acting as if I’m the adult and she’s the child. It’s definitely weird. I find myself walking by her side, almost as if I’m protecting her, but from what I have no idea.

  Maybe from herself.

  Dawn hasn’t even locked the van, but I can’t say I blame her. Stealing a vehicle from outside a police station would be idiotic, but anyone who chose this scratched, beaten-up old banger would be clinically insane. When the door swings open, a bit of pipe falls out at our feet, and as I jump to avoid it Dawn says:

  “Things just keep dropping off the bottom, it’s that old. I pick them up and save them, just in case they’re important. But it’s still running, so it can’t be that bad, can it? Makes a terrible racket, but they all do that after a while, don’t they?”

  I bend down and pick up the pipe, not knowing what to say. But as I slide it back along the floor of the cab, where it joins the other rust-stained debris knocking around in there, an awful thought strikes me.

  Mr. Barnes was hit across the leg with something just like this pipe.

  I back slowly away from the van, and as I do, I notice for the first time that, under the flaking navy paint, the van isn’t chipped down to the metal as I thought it was before. There are layers of old paint underneath. And the bottom layer looks very pale. I reach out and rub at one of the peeling patches, picking off another bit of the dark blue, uncovering what’s underneath.

  White. So dirty it’s almost colorless. But it’s definitely white paint.

  My parents’ deaths and Mr. Barnes’s recent demise flood together in a series of terrifying connections.

  Did Dawn drive the van that killed my parents? Is that how she got my mother’s necklace? And did she kill her husband, too?

  Is that why Jase won’t tell the police what really happened last night, why he won’t even tell me all his secrets? Is he covering up for his mother?

  Frantically, I process my ideas. I can just about see skinny, frail Dawn physically able to hit a drunk Mr. Barnes across the legs with a pipe; if she got up a good swing, the weight of the iron would do enough damage to knock him over. But there’s absolutely no way that Dawn’s birdlike frame is strong enough to have picked up burly, overweight Mr. Barnes, put him in a wheelbarrow, and dumped him by the lake.

  That must have been Jase. I face the fact squarely. DS Landon’s right, there’s no way around it. Jase must have been the one who dumped his father’s body.

  And since I refuse to believe that Jase had anything to do with his father’s death, he must be protecting someone. It would make total sense if that person were his mother.

  But what would Dawn have been doing at the cottage late at night? I remember Mr. Barnes, drunk, abusive, flailing around, as I watched the scene through the window. Dawn would remember all too well what her husband was like when he was drinking. She’d be very unlikely to go near him in the evenings, when he’d be at his worst. It’s possible that she had to see him for some reason that wouldn’t wait, and took a pipe from her van to protect herself … but that sounds so dramatic, like something from an action movie. It doesn’t seem to fit with Dawn. She’s not exactly a kick-ass heroine out for justice.

  Also, she’s showing absolutely no reaction to my having handled that bit of pipe. As she meets my eyes, all I see in them is shame, and concern for Jase.

  My instinct is telling me that Dawn wasn’t involved in her husband’s death.

  “Did this use to be yours?” I hear myself demanding urgently, wrenching the necklace Jase gave me out from under the neckline of my sweater.

  “Where did you get that?” she says, her eyes widening, the cigarette trembling in her hand.

  “Jase gave it to me,” I say, looking at her closely. “He said he found it in your room but you didn’t take it with you when you left. So he thought you didn’t want it.”

  “His father gave it to me, but there was something fishy about the whole thing. He told me not to show it round, to just wear it in private. And he never gave me presents at the best of times. I thought he’d nicked it, to be honest. Stolen goods. I didn’t want anything to do with it.”

  I start to ask her another question, but tears are welling up in her eyes.

  “I know I haven’t been much of a mother to Jase, but that doesn’t mean I don’t care. He’s everything to me. I gave birth to him, and though I’m sure you won’t believe me, I’d give my life for him, I
swear!” she wails, wrapping her arms around herself protectively, the half-smoked cigarette falling to the concrete.

  I must have been mad to think she could have killed anyone. This pathetic creature couldn’t harm a fly. I look at the white paint of the van, then down at my necklace, struggling desperately to put all the pieces together.

  And then I take in what she’s just said, how much she loves Jase. I hear her sobs, and I believe her completely. There’s no deception about Dawn, no cunning plan to take me in. She simply wouldn’t be capable of it.

  So if I believe her—which I do—she couldn’t have killed her husband. Because if Dawn saw Jase arrested for something she’d done, she wouldn’t be out here crying hysterically. She’d be marching into the police station to confess and clear his name.

  My brain’s spinning so fast I actually clamp my hands to my skull, holding it still. I can’t cope with a single further thought or speculation right now.

  All I know is that Dawn had nothing to do with her husband’s death. And I simply can’t believe she killed my parents, either.

  Then who did?

  God, no. No more. I turn away from Dawn and practically sprint toward the motorbike. If I don’t clear my head, I honestly think it will explode.

  twenty-one

  “LITTLE MISS NOSY”

  The bike skids sideways across the parking lot and slides to a halt by the side of the Barnes cottage in a maneuver that would be incredibly impressive if I’d planned it. Actually, I misjudged how much room I’d need to brake, and twisted the handlebars in last-minute panic to avoid crashing into the cottage wall. I still can’t get the kickstand down the way Jase does it, with one thrust of his booted foot before he swings himself off the bike, but that must be because I’m not tall enough. When I try it I almost lose my balance and fall off the bike.

  I clamber down and take off the helmet, propping it on the seat. I have to dash back to school briefly, which is really annoying, but it can’t be helped; there’s something I absolutely have to do. It barely takes ten minutes before I’m back at the cottage, walking up the steps, knocking on the front door with a steady rhythm that rattles the glass in the panes and doesn’t let up until I see Jase’s grandmother hobbling across the hallway. She does a double-take when she spots me, rearing back like a cobra, both hands planted on the top of her cane.

  “I told you to stay away from us,” she snaps, loud enough for me to hear her through the door.

  “Let me in,” I say firmly. It’s not a request but an order.

  Right now I feel strong enough to kick the door down if she doesn’t open it. And she can hear it in my voice, which is why she reaches out and flicks the lock open. She turns around as I enter, and in her haste to walk away from me, she moves a lot faster than before, no hobbling at all. She’s an old faker, Jase’s grandma.

  “What do you want?” she growls over her shoulder.

  “I’ve just come from the police station,” I say. “Jase has been arrested for his father’s death. Because the jury found him guilty. You know that, right? You were there at the inquest. You must have heard everything. Including the part where they found fibers of his dad’s clothes in the wheelbarrow that was used to take his body to the lake.”

  She lowers herself into an armchair with the help of her cane.

  “My grandmother hired a solicitor for Jase,” I continue. “The police just advised me that Jase should tell them everything that happened the night his father died. No one believed the story he told at the inquest, that he and you went to bed and didn’t see anything out of the ordinary.”

  Her mouth tightens up like a drawstring purse.

  “But I just don’t believe Jase had anything to do with his dad’s death.” I shove my hands into my pockets, fiddling with their contents. “Mainly because he wouldn’t have tried to cover it up if he had. Jase isn’t talking because he’s protecting someone. That seems really obvious to me.”

  I have to admire her self-control; she still doesn’t say a word.

  “I wondered whether it was his mother,” I say, and watch a small smile creep over her lips. “But then I realized it couldn’t be her. She loves Jase. There’s no way she’d stand by and see him arrested for something she did. She’s at the police station right now. Waiting to see him. Unlike you.”

  I stare at her as hard as I can. “There’s only one other person who could have killed Mr. Barnes who Jase would protect. One other person who couldn’t move the body on their own and could pressure Jase to help them. You.”

  Even now that I’m directly accusing her, she stays resolutely silent. Jase’s grandmother really is as tough as old boots.

  “The marks on Mr. Barnes’s face, and his legs.” I point to her cane. “That’s what caused them, isn’t it? You hit him and he fell down and cracked his head.”

  “How could I have done that?” she snaps, her eyes glittering in triumph. “My back’s locked up. I can’t even bend over to tie my own shoelaces! How could I have swiped Kevin on the legs? And even if I did, he’d just have got up and belted me. Maybe it was Jase! Did you think of that, Miss Clever Clogs? Maybe my grandson took my cane and hit his own father!”

  She’s right. No way could she have hit stocky Kevin Barnes hard enough to be sure that he would fall and knock himself out, rather than getting up again full of rage. It would have been much too risky. I turn my head away, frustration surging within me. I was so sure I was right. There was no one else Jase could have been protecting.

  And then my gaze falls on the rickety wooden staircase in the center of the cottage, and I have a blinding flash of inspiration.

  “You did it when he was coming downstairs,” I say. “You stood in the hallway after he’d gone up to bed, and called him to come down. And when he did, you whacked him on the legs with your cane, and knocked him head over heels. He tried to fend you off, but you kept on hitting him. It was late and he’d had a lot to drink. He wouldn’t have been able to keep his balance. What did you do, hit him till he fell downstairs and broke his neck?”

  She stares at me with such malevolence that I’m very glad she’s not fifty years younger. I think if she were, I’d be fighting for my life right now.

  “You’ve got more than one cane, I imagine,” I say. “Jase fed the one you used through the wood chipper, didn’t he? Because it had his father’s blood on it.”

  “You Wakefields,” she says bitterly. “Kings and queens of the castle, coming in here and turning everyone else’s lives upside down. You think you know it all, don’t you? Well, you don’t!”

  “I’m right, though, aren’t I?” I challenge her.

  “All right,” she hisses. “I did it! I knocked my own son downstairs. And when Jase came home, I got him to carry Kevin outside and make it look like an accident.” She snorts. “He made a right mess of that, didn’t he? Make you happy, does it, Little Miss Nosy, now you’ve worked it all out? Kevin was a nasty, nasty drunk, and he was getting worse. He’d say all kinds of things when he was on the whisky, talk about things better left dead and buried. And he wouldn’t listen to me when I told him to keep his mouth shut.” Her hands, on the top of her cane, clench tight as claws. “It was all very well for him, but this is the only home I’ve got. He wasn’t going to bring me down with him and get us kicked out of here. No one’s going to put me in an old people’s home. I came here as a young bride and I’ll leave here in a coffin.”

  I furrow my brow, desperately trying to work out the deeper meaning of this confession. It’s like she’s talking in code, and it’s the most important thing in the world for me to be able to crack it.

  “My grandmother,” I say slowly. “She’s the only person who could make you leave.”

  “Pulling all the strings,” she says sourly. “Snapping her fingers and making everyone dance to her tune.”

  Just what she’d like to do, I realize. She’d love to have the power my grandmother has, and she’s eaten up with jealousy because she doesn’t.
/>   “But why would she kick you out of here, after all these years?” I ask, baffled. “I don’t understand.”

  “I’m not saying another word,” she says defiantly. “Not another word.”

  “But you have to!” I stride across the room and bend over her, close enough to be aware of her old-lady smell: mothballs and lavender-scented talcum powder. “You have to tell the police that it was you! That Jase is covering up for you!”

  She shrugs defiantly. And the eyes that gleam up at me through her wire-rimmed glasses are triumphant.

  “I don’t have to tell those coppers anything,” she says, almost conversationally. “Jason will just have to take care of himself.”

  She thinks she’s won. She thinks she’s got away with murder, and let her own grandson take the blame for it.

  “No good comes of mixing the races,” she mutters. “He looks more like that mother of his than any child of mine.”

  She’s a horrible, awful old woman. I don’t want to be cooped up in here with her for another second. I don’t know how Jase has borne it all these years.

  “And besides, this is all your fault, Scarlett Wakefield,” she adds nastily. “It was when Jason started running after you that he and his dad really started going at each other hammer and tongs. Kevin was jealous because his son was getting what he couldn’t.”

  “What on earth are you talking about?” I’m even more baffled.

  “He saw you and Jason and he couldn’t bear it. All those years, thinking about what might have happened if things had gone the way he wanted. And then his son mooning after the heir to Wakefield, the two of you all hearts and flowers. Made him sick to his stomach.”

  “You mean my mother?” I say, my hand rising to touch the necklace that was once hers. “Did he give this to my mother—this necklace?”

  Jase’s grandmother doesn’t answer me. She just smiles evilly, looking at the necklace, clearly recognizing it but refusing to comment. It’s all too obvious that she’s deliberately made those references to my mother and Jase’s father, thrown the cat among the pigeons to upset me as much as she can.