Chapter 13
SAM
Like Jemma Stelling, Tulloch seemed entirely unaware that he was likely to be facing a conspiracy to murder charge.
Some people were unbelievably out of touch, Sam thought.
He’d naively assumed the average man and woman on the street knew basic facts like these.
Evidently not: this stupid man in front of him seemed to believe he was in the clear as long as he hadn’t physically plunged a knife into anyone. Jemma too. Fools.
‘I told Jemma I’d do it if she wanted me to, but …
I don’t think she really did.’ Tulloch shrugged.
He reminded Sam of a gnome: short, pot belly, brown hair and a long fuzzy beard that jutted out into mid-air beneath his chin.
‘All she kept telling me was not to do anything yet, make sure not to go anywhere near Marianne unless she gave me the go-ahead. She seemed quite happy to start paying me while telling me to do nothing. Fine by me.’
‘She’d already paid me some of the fee, yeah,’ said Tulloch. ‘Plan was to disguise it as payments for house-sitting. She and Paddy went away in August, I “house-sat”’ – he made air quotes with his fingers – ‘so she gave me the first instalment.’
‘This August just gone?’ said Sam.
Tulloch nodded.
‘I see. Do you mind if I ask why you were so willing to accept this particular commission?’
‘Do you mean the … Not the house-sitting? The murder. Right. Look, I told you: I didn’t want to do it.
’ Tulloch picked up his bottle of beer from the floor and took a swig.
‘But I messed things up with Jemma and Paddy years ago, and I wanted to get back in their good books. I’ve been living here now nearly eighteen months – in this shithole. Don’t tell Lucas I said that.’
Lucas, the older of the two Tulloch brothers, both looked and smelled as if he needed a bath.
His hair was the stiff kind of unwashed, and gave the impression of having been carved from a solid block of some dark, unsavoury substance.
Sam had met him when he’d first arrived, before Lucas had tactfully removed himself to the kitchen.
Tom was definitely the cleaner of the siblings, so that was one thing in his favour.
‘I was hoping I could stay with Jemma and Paddy for a while,’ Tom said.
‘Their place is a lot nicer than this – I knew it would be before I’d even seen it.
I’d been feeling bad about the way things had gone between us, so I got in touch.
And Jemma was all right about it – paid me to house-sit for them last year, to help me out.
This was long before any murders got mentioned.
I’d told her I was up against it financially, so she sorted me out, and then we kind of stayed in touch – just the odd text here and there.
Things weren’t back to how they were before or anything, but we were on speaking terms again.
And then …’ He took another sip of his beer.
‘Sure you don’t want one?’ he said, lifting his bottle in the air.
‘No, thanks,’ said Sam, who feared he might catch a stomach bug if he ingested anything in this house.
‘Give me a shout if you change your mind,’ said Tulloch.
‘So, yeah, then this summer, Jemma decided … well, she had a massive problem with Marianne, didn’t she?
And she knew I was still in dire need of money, so.
You know the rest. It sounds daft, but I felt like I owed her one.
Well, her and Paddy, but mainly Jemma. I knew she was the one who’d have minded most when I buggered off, all those years ago.
Paddy wouldn’t have taken it as hard as she did.
I don’t think he’s got strong views about how friends should and shouldn’t behave the way Jemma has.
She’d have had that ball-crusher Suzanne Lacy in her ear too, telling her I was scum and not to bother with me any more. ’
‘Why did the friendship end?’ Sam asked, curious to see if Tulloch’s account would be different from Jemma’s.
It wasn’t, though Tulloch offered a fuller version: his exgirlfriend had been jealous of his close friendship with Jemma and Paddy, but particularly Jemma.
She kept accusing him of preferring Jemma to her, and secretly wishing he was with Jemma – even though Jemma was married, had a baby by this point and had no romantic interest in Tulloch whatsoever.
Eventually the girlfriend had made him choose: either the friendship with Jemma and Paddy had to end or she was off.
Tulloch had submitted to her pressure and cut off contact with Jemma, Paddy and Lottie.
‘It was a shitty thing to do,’ he told Sam.
‘Especially since I was Lottie’s godfather.
Well, still am, I suppose, though I haven’t acted like it.
I was scared, I suppose. Scared of ending up on my own.
Stupid, really – I was, what, twenty-five years old?
I mean, I’m scared of ending up on my own now, when I really am past it, at thirty-eight, but then?
I didn’t realise how much life I still had ahead of me.
Anyway, last year she ditched me – my ex.
Since then, I’ve had no girlfriend, no friends …
just Lucas, my no-mark brother, for company, and this shithole for a home.
’ Tulloch twisted the end of his wiry beard around his fingers.
‘Probably no more than I deserve, you must be thinking.’
Sam was. He smiled politely. Past it at thirty-eight?
What a ridiculous thing to say. Since Dooper had turned everything upside down at work, Sam had been busy trying to persuade himself that he was about to start a whole new exciting chapter of his life in Lincolnshire, aged fifty.
The last thing he needed was some no-mark whinger suggesting it was too late for him.
‘I suppose I was gambling on Jemma never making me do the actual kill,’ Tulloch said.
‘I was hoping that, by declaring myself willing, I’d be able to prove to her I was capable of loyalty.
To be honest, I kind of thought that might be the only reason she’d asked me – like, maybe it was more about testing me than wanting Marianne dead. ’
‘You wouldn’t have minded having to give back the first instalment of the murder fee?’ Sam asked him.
‘Wouldn’t necessarily have had to,’ said Tulloch.
‘The house-sitting happened. I definitely did that.’ He seemed to be considering the question seriously.
‘I don’t think Jemma would have asked for the money back,’ he said eventually.
‘She’d have known I didn’t have it to give her.
I’ve got debt coming out of my eyeballs. ’
‘Do you have a job?’
Tulloch shook his head. ‘I’ve not been doing so well since Janice kicked me out,’ he said. ‘Can’t really … settle to anything, you know?’
‘Where were you between 5.20 and 5.30 today?’ said Sam.
‘I was here with Lucas till Paddy texted me. That was about 5.30. Then I went over to his, to mind Lottie. He’d offered me ￡100 to do it.’
‘So you have an alibi for when Marianne Upton was murdered and that alibi is your brother,’ said Sam. ‘Just like in your and Jemma’s plan.’
‘Hey.’ Tulloch looked offended. ‘It was her plan, not mine. And if you’re thinking Lucas’d lie for me, you can ask the Domino’s driver who dropped off a pizza here just as I was walking out the door. Cold by the time I got back – Sod’s law.’
‘From which Domino’s?’ Sam asked.
‘The one on Kessin Road in Rawndesley.’
Sam made a note of it. ‘If you’ve got nothing to hide, why weren’t you answering your phone?’ he asked Tulloch. ‘When people act like they don’t want to be contacted or found, that tends to arouse suspicion.’
‘Right, but I wasn’t trying to avoid suspicion, was I?
’Cause I had no idea Marianne had been murdered or that anyone might be thinking I did it.
And if it’s a phone number I don’t know, I never answer.
I’ve had trouble in the past with girls I’ve met on Tinder.
They’ve rung from different numbers to try and track me down – ones they know I won’t link to them.
’ Tulloch’s sheepish smile was one of kinship and commiseration, as if he assumed Sam must be familiar with the problem.
‘There are some disturbed people out there,’ he said.