Chapter 37
THIRTY-SEVEN
DAN
‘She wrote to me.’
‘Erin!’
I was at home – I know, I could barely believe it myself – in the middle of a sign-language tuition session with Fiona and the kids, when she called.
I have to say, her timing was as lousy as ever.
‘I’m so sorry,’ I give Leanne – the interpreter – and, perhaps more importantly, my wife, the best apologetic, overburdened, somebody-help-me-I’m-drowning-type face that I can muster as I stand, ‘but I really do have to take this call.’
‘Tilly Ward. She sent me an email.’
‘When?’
I head into the kitchen, hear my daughter, Juno, shouting out to me in the background in her adorable helium baby voice.
‘Come back, Pop-Pop…’
‘In a minute, Pip, Pop-Pop won’t be long.’
I close the door behind me, immediately start pacing up and down with all the excess adrenalin that’s trying to push through my skin.
‘Is this another bad time?’ she says. ‘Because I can always—’
‘There’s no such thing as a good time, Erin. I’ve got three kids, remember?’
‘Yes. I do. Tell me, Dan, what are their names? What’s your baby son’s name? I imagine you gave him a strong title, something classic that won’t date, something like George or Charles or William – am I right?’
‘I’m not going to tell you my children’s names, Erin…’
‘Why not?’ She sounds offended. ‘I was just trying to make conversation, only I can hear that maybe you don’t really want one of those right now, so I’ll just hang up and…’
‘… His name is Jude,’ I say quickly.
‘Hmmm, Juuuude.’ She rolls my son’s name from her tongue. ‘It’s a bit different, I suppose, a little obscure even. Was that the reason you gave him the name, after Thomas Hardy’s Jude the Obscure?’
‘My wife chose it,’ I say, not wanting to admit that it had nothing to do with any literary genius and everything to do with Fiona’s crush on the actor Jude Law.
I’m not exactly keen on being blackmailed into giving over my son’s name, but I have to try to get her to trust me again somehow – and more importantly, to keep her talking. But how does she know Tilly’s surname? Has it been leaked to the press? Did Tilly tell Erin herself?
I’ve no idea what Tilly’s playing at by contacting Erin.
Has she not yet seen her photo on social media, recognised who Erin is?
Did she send the message before Erin’s photo was made public?
She must’ve done. When I think about it though, if Erin really is Samantha Valentine, then wouldn’t she already know Tilly’s surname anyway?
Sweet Jesus, my head feels bent out of shape.
Is she just screwing with me, is this all just some crazy-making game?
I rub my temples with my spare thumb and forefinger, try to focus.
‘What did Tilly say in the message, Erin?’
I’ve got to keep her talking long enough to alert the incident room that she’s on the line. I’d given Erin my own personal phone number to use, but I have another, my force-issued phone. I hold my breath as I fire a text off to Davis from it.
She’s on the line.
‘I’m appreciating the most beautiful view right now, Dan,’ she says. ‘It feels like I’m on top of the world, looking down at it, or maybe not down, that makes me sound like a real Negative Nelly, doesn’t it? Maybe looking “out” is better. Anyway, you live in an incredible city.’
‘So you are in London?’
‘Not for much longer, Dan.’
I sit down at our kitchen table, on top of Custard, Jude’s soft cloth cat. He squeaks as I pull him out from underneath me and throw him on the floor.
Sorry, Custard.
‘So, then, tell me, Erin, what’s the plan?’
I try to keep my voice level and chatty, towards upbeat. I don’t want her to hear the anxiety that’s tightening my larynx and making my throat feel dry. I take a sip of juice from one of the kids’ beakers on the table. There’s only a mouthful left, and the second I swallow it, I need more.
‘We had a conversation over email. It was very cathartic, I think, for both of us. She sounds so nice, so innocent, so ordinary – Samantha’s dream victim, I should imagine.
’ There’s a pause. ‘Tilly told me that she’s hard of hearing, and it made me think of you, Dan, of your son.
Surely you can see that Samantha chose her because she’s vulnerable, just like I was, albeit in a different way perhaps…
’ Her voice trails off. ‘What Samantha does, what she did, to both Tilly and me…’ I hear the crack of emotion in her inflection.
‘… She has to be stopped, Dan, before she destroys another living soul.’
‘How did Tilly get your email address, Erin? Did you think to ask her, maybe?’
‘Ha!’ She snorts softly. ‘You’re the detective, Detective.
The message was sent to a very old account.
One I’d forgotten I even had. I’m sure, after your TV appearance yesterday, it probably wasn’t that hard to find.
You threw me under the bus, Dan. You went public with my identity, told everyone about my conviction’ – her voice drops behind her teeth – ‘and you showed everyone that hideous photograph of me. Why’d ya do it, Dan?
’ Suddenly, she switches into this strange, southern US accent, which is a little unexpected – and freaky.
‘Why’d ya have ta tell all, ta y’all? I’ve been practising,’ she explains.
‘Practising what?’
‘Different accents.’
‘Why?’
She pauses.
‘Just for fun, yah?’ Her attempt at London, however, definitely needs work. I suspect she’s stopped taking her medication. I really need to think hard on how best to play this.
‘Your DNA was found, Erin. It was found at Milo Harrison’s address, at the scene where he was murdered. Forensics found hairs on his body, on his chest, mixed in with his blood – your hairs, Erin.’
She doesn’t respond.
‘Did you know that Milo Harrison went to university in Leeds back in the early 2000s?’
‘Really?’ Her voice registers surprise. ‘No. I didn’t know that.’
‘Apparently, he lived less than half a mile from your old address during that time. Did the two of you ever meet, Erin, back then?’
She sighs. ‘Leeds is a big city, maybe not as big as London, but I wouldn’t want to do a head count, would you?’
‘So it’s just a coincidence then?’
She takes a breath.
‘As it would seem, yes. People come from all over the world to go to university there, over 40,000 people at any given time – only I wasn’t ever one of them.
I flunked my GCSEs and I’ve never even been on the campus grounds.
Besides, I spent most of that time of my life off my face on drugs and alcohol or house-ridden with agoraphobia and depression. ’
‘But you did have relationships with men back then? Boyfriends, partners? Friends with benefits?’
‘I may have been a substance abuser, Dan, but I think I’d remember if I’d had any kind of relationship with your dead man.
Look,’ she says, the frustration rising in her voice, ‘I don’t know him!
What is it with you lot? Why are you so determined to try and make me fit the role of perpetrator?
It’s history repeating itself again and again…
when will it end, Dan? When will you believe me? ’
She’s clearly agitated.
‘My job is to protect the public,’ I continue, ‘and to help bring people to justice, and to ensure they are neither a danger to themselves nor to others – which one are you, Erin, or are you both?’
More silence. I’ve overstepped the mark.
‘Erin? Please don’t hang up.’ I clench my fists and teeth simultaneously, raise my eyes to the ceiling and silently beg her not to cut the call. ‘We can talk, just between us. My job is to help you, and protect you too, Erin. I just want to—’
‘Were the hairs short?’
I stop talking. Why would she ask that?
‘The hairs found at the crime scene, on the body, were they more like clippings, perhaps?’
Forensics had said that the hairs were shorter than you’d expect to see if they had been pulled out from the head, or naturally shed.
These were more like ‘snippets’, the lady from the lab had said.
How would Erin Santos know that? Is it because she put them there?
Why would she place her own hair at a murder scene?
’ I’m not sure why I’m expecting things to make sense anymore.
Nothing in this case has made sense from the beginning.
‘Yes, they were short hairs, Erin. Your short hairs.’
‘I believe you, Dan.’ Her voice sounds level and calm. ‘Only I didn’t put them there. Samantha did.’