Chapter One

CHAPTER ONE

Monday, 29 September

Present Day

Catching a sudden movement from the corner of her eye, Claire Ryan slammed her foot on the brake. The screech pierced the chilly night air as her car shuddered to a halt. In the glare of the headlights, a woman stood scowling at her. A rush of heat rose to Claire’s face. Surely, she hadn’t been that distracted. A cluster of white houses behind the woman, with their jettied upper stories and square-leaded windows, leaned forward like inquisitive crones eager to see how this scene would unfold.

Before Claire could react, the woman touched the car bonnet with her bony hand. Her lips, deep red against the wrinkled pallor of her skin, moved as though reciting something. Transfixed, Claire held her breath. The words streamed out, but strain as she might, she couldn’t catch their meaning. With a final withering glance, the woman turned and proceeded along the narrow sidewalk. Claire lost sight of her as it curved round.

She exhaled. From behind, a horn honked its annoyance. She moved off in the same direction as the woman but this time at a slower pace. She glanced left to right, but the path was empty. Relieved, Claire reached the intersection and turned onto the main road.

Ignoring the lengthening line of cars behind her, she replayed the incident in her mind. If she’d gone the usual way to Marianne’s place, none of the last few minutes would have happened. It was like those weird things that occurred before, and after, the death of her parents.

But she didn’t want to think of that right now. She needed a distraction. Like the woman and her ridiculous wig. A bright red, bouffant helmet—talk about hair with attitude—it certainly seemed to fit her character.

As St. Albans receded to a picture postcard in her rearview mirror and she reached the edges of Detford, her spirits flagged once more. Night’s gauze could not soften the town’s hard lines, with its glut of concrete and glass boxes, their façades blank or scarred by graffiti. Given the lousy week she’d had so far, she struggled to hold back her rising anxiety. Breathe deeply, clear her mind; she knew the drill but the familiar gnawing had started in the pit of her stomach. She pulled up outside Marianne’s flat, her temporary lodgings. An ugly block that matched the bland construction of the area; its only selling point the low rent.

Claire rested her forehead on the steering wheel, eyes shut. What she needed now was coffee, extra strong with a bit of sympathy. She wouldn’t get it sitting there, so she pulled out a bunch of keys and quickly negotiated the various locks designed—albeit unsuccessfully—to keep the block secure.

She opened the final door to the usual smell of air-freshener and bleach. Marianne’s buxom frame bustled into view from the kitchenette.

“Are you okay?”

Claire nodded. She dropped her bag and jacket on the top of four suitcases piled in the living room, before lowering herself onto the sofa’s sagging cushions. Marianne perched on the edge of the solitary armchair. Claire recounted the incident and they laughed at her description of the woman’s wig.

Marianne gave her a knowing look and rose to her feet. “Fancy a coffee?”

Claire gazed up at her. “I thought you’d never ask.”

Marianne disappeared back into the kitchenette. While she waited, Claire checked her messages, only bothering to read her boyfriend Alex’s, asking if she’d arrived home safely. She smiled to herself and replied. As she added some sloppy emojis and kisses, she sensed Marianne peering over her shoulder.

“Don’t you two ever stop?” she asked with an exaggerated sigh.

Marianne placed two mugs on the carefully positioned coasters on the coffee table and pulled out the large envelope tucked under her arm.

“For you,” she said. “Looks like property information. You didn’t waste any time.”

“But I haven’t had the chance to do anything yet.” Her new state of homelessness was due to her landlord being made an offer he couldn’t refuse with the unexpected outcome of her tenancy not being renewed.

Claire glanced at her name printed on the outside, thinking junk mail after a week must be some kind of record. She opened it and removed a glossy brochure with an impressive front cover. She leafed through the pages and smiled.

“Anything interesting?”

“Sounds very grand, and very me.”

“And this place isn’t?” Marianne asked in mock puzzlement as her eyes swept the room—a dismal throwback to the seventies. “Okay, let’s hear it.”

Claire cleared her throat and read aloud. “A select development of one, two, and three-bedroom apartments by Charterhouse Properties. Set in thirty acres of parkland, the restoration of the former Belle Vue Manor Estate combines the elegance and exquisite proportion of its Victorian heritage with the convenience and comforts expected in the modern age.”

After scanning the rest of the page, Claire added, “I can’t believe this. It’s fantastic. The price is right. It’s close to college. Lots of character and the kitchen is a dream.”

After several seconds of silence, she caught Marianne’s look of disapproval. “Is something wrong?”

“I wasn’t sure you’d want to live somewhere that used to be an asylum. You hate hospitals at the best of times. Imagine living in one.”

“A loony bin? They don’t say anything about that here.” Claire flicked through the brochure and shook her head.

“Well, they wouldn’t, would they? ‘Flats in ex-mental institution for sale’ doesn’t have the same ring to it.” Marianne said.

“You’re probably right, but it sounds perfect. Who cares what it used to be.”

Marianne looked like she wanted to say something, but her full lips were now corseted tight. Claire sensed her friend’s silence hid more below the surface, but from the moment she saw the photos of Belle Vue, it drew her in. She needed to find a place fast and here was one falling right into her lap.

She glanced at Marianne. “Come with me tomorrow. No lectures, so I’m free first thing. Are you?”

A slight hesitation. “You don’t need to rush, Claire. There are loads of flats to choose from.”

“Oh, come on, Marianne. We’re like sardines in here and we’re only going to look at it. Are you coming?”

“Yeah.”

Given that she sounded like a volunteer for fingernail pulling, Claire wondered whether Marianne might be jealous. No, not her style. She reached over and jiggled Marianne’s knee.

“You never know, some of the old lunatics might still haunt the place.” She was about to make a spooky ‘ooohing’ sound, but then caught sight of her friend’s face. “Hey, I was only joking.”

Marianne looked as if she’d bitten something unpleasant. Before Claire could say anything further, Marianne collected the mugs and picked up the envelope from the floor.

“I’m knackered. Tomorrow’s going to be worse, though. I’m doing an extra night shift at the hospital.”

Claire nodded, thankful she didn’t need to fit a part-time job into her full diary. She reached for her mobile.

“Thanks, Marianne. Belle Vue may not live up to its name, but it seems like the answer to all my prayers. A permanent place of my own.”

Marianne understood as they’d been writing, then emailing each other about it since primary school. Her life once consisted of moving from country to country as she and her mother accompanied her father to each new posting.

Claire twisted a strand of hair into a finger noose and drew in a breath. She willed herself to speak. “Even after my parents . . . died, I’ve been shunting back and forth, here and abroad, hotels and rentals.”

She pulled her hand down and the noose tightened. Marianne watched her closely as she’d done when Claire had come back from Hong Kong, still in shock, and fearful of things happening she couldn’t explain. And when Claire had her breakdown. She couldn’t let herself get like that again or expect Marianne to pick up the pieces as she’d done before. This time she had to be the strong one. For herself, and her future. Touchwood, Belle Vue would be a new start. Something twinged in Claire’s back. Damn sofa springs. She shifted to the armchair and tapped the speed dial on her mobile.

“G’night, Marianne. I’m going to see what Alex’s doing tomorrow then watch the late movie.”

Just five minutes more.

Ignoring the music in the other room, Alex Palmer typed the final sentence of his outline and sat back. He should be pleased, but he couldn’t hold down the niggling dissatisfaction with what he’d written.

His rear end numb, he stood and moved to the window. Holding onto the ledge, he executed a few tentative leg squats as he gazed out at the clear night sky. He focused on the top of the hill at St. Albans Cathedral in all its floodlit glory. In fact, that place of worship was the source of his discontent. Although he loved anything to do with history, he wasn’t convinced his choice of the cathedral in the Victorian years for his final year dissertation was the right one for him. Nothing much happened then, and he wanted a bit of excitement. It was local, though, the right period and so far, nothing else had come close.

Alex picked up his phone and scanned his messages. He tapped three kisses and a smiley in reply to Claire and pressed send. The rest he ignored.

As he joined his flatmates, Paul and Gary, in the lounge, he added his voice to their falsetto wailing that drowned out Bob Marley.

He picked up a can of beer from the coffee table and an unlit spliff. His meeting with Hamish, his dissertation supervisor, wasn’t until tomorrow afternoon so he planned to enjoy himself. Lectures—and hard work—began Wednesday.

As the bass throbbed through him, he lowered himself onto one of the armchairs and lit the joint.

“Man, I wanna be back on the beach, not here,” Paul said.

Gary, next to him on the couch, burped his agreement.

“Gaz, you remember that Jamaican woman at Earl’s Place?”

“Do I? My eyes are still watering.”

“She didn’t leave my side all night. Couldn’t get enough of me.”

Alex and Gary grinned. They looked at each other and back at Paul in his bright blue surfing shorts and a yellow T-shirt. Both stretched tight. The sound of hooting filled the room.

Tilting his chin with his finger, Gary simpered. “Don’t tell me, Mr. Stud-Muffin, she’d been searching for you all her life. She likes Greek slap heads with hairy butts, hey brudder?”

Catching the instant change in Paul’s expression, Alex groaned then stepped in quickly. “More than carrot tops with small willies.”

“I think the term is hung-like-a-stallion,” Gary said, in his broadest Aussie twang. “Here, let me show you.”

He unfolded his lanky frame from the sofa and started to unbutton his fly. In unison, Alex and Paul yelled at him to stop. Gary shrugged and flexed his biceps instead. He grinned and adopted ever more ludicrous poses before announcing, “Gotta take a crap. Back in a mo.”

A duet of “ughs” accompanied the music.

They spent the next few hours reminiscing about their summer vacation and seriously dented their supplies of booze, marijuana, and assorted snacks.

During a brief lull in the music, the sound of munching filled the void, but not enough to cover the ringing of Alex’s mobile. He jumped up. His head spun and he staggered to his room as though on a rolling boat. He picked up his phone from the desk and gave it a quick glance.

“Hey dere, sweetheart,” he said in a very bad West Indian accent, as he half-reggaed, half-tottered back into the lounge. “What choo up to?”

He turned the music down and listened carefully. Gary and Paul pretended to be asleep but kept nudging one another as if he wouldn’t notice.

Belle Vue. He’d forgotten about that place. A germ of an idea flitted into his consciousness, then slipped away. His head was doing a great impression of a ball of cotton wool. Belle Vue. Closed because of a scandal, he was sure. He’d love to see what they’d done with it, so he agreed to meet her there tomorrow at nine and mentally crossed his fingers that any hangover wouldn’t be too bad.

Before he could stop himself, he added, “Is Matron coming?”

“Of course, but don’t call Marianne that.”

He smothered a laugh and shook his head as Gary who’d first used the term, suddenly came to life and blew his cheeks out.

Claire continued, “And make sure those two morons keep their mouths shut, too.”

“Hey, how come you can insult my friends, but I can’t say anything about—?”

“I’m hanging up now, Lexi. Love you.”

“Love you, too.” He ignored Gary and Paul miming Claire’s favorite Titanic scene. When Gary started singing, he decided to call it a night.