Chapter 2 Miles
Miles
Miles no longer sits; he paces around the small space. He’s asked to be alone, and he won’t see another soul until it’s time to go back into court.
It all comes down to this. What’s about to follow is both the beginning and the end.
But exactly what is about to begin and what will end is yet to be decided.
If it goes his way, the curtain will fall on the grim drama his life has become this last year.
If it goes against him, it will be . . .
well, Miles has been advised not to dwell on that.
Because it’s unthinkable. Or at least it would’ve been, a year ago.
The thing awaiting him on the flipside of this binary split of fate – the unthinkable – carries so much weight it could drag him down to depths he’d have never thought possible.
It’s a life sentence. Literally. In prison.
Not a metaphorical one, like the way people describe their office job or marriage.
An actual prison, with iron bars and paedophiles and plastic plates.
The institution that most people don’t give any serious thought to because it’s so far off, so foreign and abstract.
That’s the thing with the unthinkable. It takes a seismic change to your mindset and a lot of time to break through the impossibility of it.
But eleven months is a long time when there’s a murder charge hanging over you.
And there’s something about the words you are hereby charged that gives the brain the jolt it needs to start grappling with a new reality.
Once you’ve started thinking about the unthinkable, it becomes very thinkable indeed, to the point where you’ll barely think about anything else.
And Miles has been given a heck of a long time to think.
Once again, his mind travels back to the week last year when everything changed.
It was last December – nearly a year ago.
Life was normal, then. Better than normal, even.
It was an exciting time: he’d just been booked for the biggest job of his career so far, and he was planning a trip to New Zealand – somewhere he’d always dreamed of visiting.
And, more fateful than that, he had a date lined up.
One night, that’s all it was – one night that changed everything.
Before that date, he’d never met Caira Kennedy, hardly knew anything about her.
And now his name and hers will be inextricably linked in the most awful way, not only in people’s minds but also as a matter of public record and the subject of internet speculation.
It was one of those sliding doors moments; there were so many tiny twists of fate that combined to set off a chain reaction and blew his entire existence to pieces.
It left him to ponder all the what-ifs. What if he’d made different plans that night?
What if he’d set the age range on Hinge a bit younger?
What if he’d swiped left when Caira’s image appeared on his phone screen?
What if he’d cancelled on her at the last minute?
What if he hadn’t offered to walk her home?
He’s gone over it plenty of times in his mind and concluded that his date with Caira was always likely to happen, whatever he did.
Almost like it was preordained. Miles was free and single, and once she swiped right on him, he was always going to reciprocate.
She was gorgeous and looked like a lot of fun.
Her profile picture – the same image that was later used with many articles about her murder – was candid: she was at a restaurant table, in half-profile, smiling broadly, probably laughing with someone out of shot to her left.
She looked almost exactly as she did on the night they met: her face framed by a mass of blonde curls, the smoky eyes, large hoop earrings.
She gave him her address, which was unusual, and told him to pick her up.
This left him wondering if he should arrive with a bouquet like they were in some American rom-com.
In the end, he opted for a single rose. And it was just before seven on a cold winter’s evening when he arrived at her street under a dark and cloudless sky.
He’d driven there, and found a parking spot on Caira’s road, about a hundred yards from her address.
He didn’t need the car after that – the restaurant Caira had chosen was only a few minutes’ walk away.
His memory of what happened is a little hazy.
The date went well; that might seem an odd way of summarising it, given the aftermath, but it was true.
All of Miles’s dates went well. If you’re fresh-faced and well spoken, and follow a few simple rules – mirror their body language, ask lots of questions, make no mention of politics – then there is no reason for any date to go badly.
Caira liked him – there was no doubt about it.
They were seated at a small table in a busy bistro, conversation rumbling all around.
Her eyes shimmered and she spoke with animated energy when he asked about her life.
She had a keen thirst for wine, and they put away two bottles: a Crémant and a C?tes du Rh?ne, as would later be coldly reported in court.
As a result of the wine, Miles can’t remember their conversation verbatim, but Caira spoke about her job with an intensity that was unforgettable.
Social work was no cakewalk, she said. Some days were hard; many days were hard.
The domestic worlds lived in by some were so private, so messed up, and people really had no idea what was going on behind locked doors and perma-drawn curtains, or what it was like to be a child for whom that situation was the norm.
Some days Caira came home from work and spent the evening in tears.
But it was all worth it, she said. To make a real difference in someone’s life.
And safeguarding vulnerable children from harm: what could be more important and satisfying than that?
The longer she went on about the vital and impactful nature of her work, the more aware he became of the triviality of his own.
He felt faintly winded by the shame of it by the time she paused for breath and flipped the conversation with the inevitable follow-up question: and what do you do?
They discussed his work, and then, somehow, the conversation switched to where they had gone to school.
Caira’s eyes widened when he said Holvine College.
She had questions about Holvine, and about the investigation published in The Times a few months earlier.
Was it true, what the whistleblowers had said?
That there was systemic abuse? Had he heard anything?
Miles told her as much as he knew; there were rumours about certain teachers, but they might be unfounded.
Miles had never been a boarder – that side of school life, what went on after lessons ended, wasn’t really known to him.
After the meal, they went to a pub across the road for more drinks – double gin and tonics that cost eight quid a piece, according to the receipts that were taken in evidence – and stayed until it closed at midnight.
And then he walked her home. The temperature outside had dropped further, and their breath smoked on the December air.
When they reached her apartment, he jammed his hands hard into the pockets of his coat and tensed his body, attempting to disguise his shivering.
She must have noticed anyway, because she asked him if he wanted to come in and warm up while he waited for his Uber.
Naturally, he said yes. As for what happened next .
. . well, there’s only one living person who knows the truth about that.
That’s why it’s been argued in court for the last month.
It was the day after the date when everything started to move fast. Miles was still mildly hungover when the police turned up in the early evening.
And then began the impossible – the unthinkable – series of events: a chain of sickening experiences that no person should ever have to go through.
It started with what the police described as a chat, that progressed to interviews and legal advice and no-comment answers.
There were swabs inserted, fingerprints taken, accusations levelled.
You are hereby charged. There was a court appearance, the ceremonious removal of his anonymity, the media reports.
There was a committal hearing, a plea hearing, a pre-trial hearing, and months of barely bearable waiting, and it all led here, all built up to a three-week trial that will decide the course of his future.
Any minute now, he will go back into the courtroom. Hopefully, for the last time. Once again, everyone will be focused on Miles. Once again, they will all stare at him, weighing it up, wondering whether he did it, whether he murdered her. Only, this time, the jury will give them an answer.
Throughout the trial, the seven men and five women on the jury have all appeared to have doubts about his innocence.
Even his family have doubts, he is sure of it.
It might be just the faintest hairline in an otherwise solid wall of belief and support, but the crack has still showed.
There is only one person in that room who knows for sure – with one hundred per cent certainty – whether he did it, and that is Miles.
There’s a light tap on the door, and Miles stops his pacing. He waits for a moment, tries to slow his breathing, then opens it.
In the doorway is David, wearing another of those patronising half-smiles. Miles never wants to see another of those as long as he lives. ‘Okay, Miles, are you ready? It’s time to go back into court.’