Cath Staincliffe - Dead To Me

‘What did Christopher say?’ Andy asked.

‘Gobsmacked,’ Gill said. ‘She’d not let anything slip to him, just kept on about how difficult Lisa was, how Sean had ruined her.’

‘She’d have let him take the fall,’ said Pete, ‘if we’d charged him.’

‘Could be,’ Gill replied. ‘Shifting the blame: “If he hadn’t been feeding her the drugs, I wouldn’t have got into a barney with her.” Justification. Was the row about drugs?’ Gill asked Rachel.

‘She didn’t say, just that Lisa said evil things about her and Nathan.’

‘Who was also on drugs before he killed himself,’ Mitch said.

‘Families, eh? Who’d have ’em? Right, we’re aiming for five p.m. for interview, and I’m not issuing a press release as yet, so no blabbing about it to all and sundry. Get cracking.’

‘Grab a bite?’ Janet asked Rachel as she stood up.

Rachel hesitated.

‘Don’t sulk,’ Janet chided her. ‘It’ll give you frown lines.’

‘Like I care.’

‘Grapes in ten?’

They were doing Christmas dinner on offer. Two for nine ninety-nine.

‘It’s what we do as a team that counts,’ Janet said, ‘we’re not in competition.’

‘Yes, I know,’ Rachel said. ‘It’s just… I got nowhere with Raleigh.’

‘Not true; you established his involvement with the victim and eliminated him from the inquiry.’

‘But Rosie-’

‘I know,’ Janet said. ‘We don’t always win, Rachel.’

It’s just not fair. ‘And she’s so bossy,’ Rachel added, ‘she really gets on my tits.’

‘She’s the boss, it’s her job to be bossy,’ Janet said.

‘Nothing ever gets to you, does it?’ Rachel said. ‘All water off a duck’s back. How do you do that?’

‘Underneath I’m paddling like buggery. Besides – our little car crash? I lost it then, you forgotten already?’

Rachel let her have it. She looked across for the waitress, starving now. Thought of Denise, carrying the knife home on the bus, sitting in and waiting for the police to come knocking. ‘Why do you think she did it?’

Janet shrugged. ‘Don’t know, but I’m aiming to find out.’

‘YOU UNDERSTAND THE allegation against you?’ Janet began, having done all the preliminaries for the video recording.

‘Yes,’ Denise said. Her fingers were knotted. She was shivering occasionally, though the room was an even temperature.

‘Will you tell me what happened?’ Janet asked. Leaving the territory wide open for her.

Denise took a breath and released it. She held her head in her hands. Janet guessed that the enormity of the story, the task of telling it, defeated her. She didn’t know where to start.

‘You rang Lisa on Monday the thirteenth, at lunchtime,’ Janet prompted.

‘Yes,’ Denise said with a sigh. ‘I wanted to ask her if she’d done anything about getting into rehab, but she bit my head off.’

Janet imagined it: Lisa in the cab, almost home, craving a fix, having scored the drugs she needed, and expecting a visit from James Raleigh. She lied to Sean, needing to keep the coast clear, and next thing her mother’s on the phone. ‘What did she say?’

‘She went off on one, didn’t want me telling her what to do, sick of me interfering. I wasn’t interfering.’ She raised her eyes to meet Janet’s. ‘I wanted to help her. I wanted her to get help.’

Janet nodded slowly, giving her the space to continue.

‘She said she didn’t want to see me any more, that was it, she didn’t want me in her life.’ Denise closed her eyes briefly. ‘I was in a state, really upset. She’s all I have-’ She broke off. ‘I tried to put it… to forget… in my head… thinking of Nathan… I’d done… and she…’ Denise was almost incoherent until she said, ‘She was always pushing me away. I wasn’t going to sit back and let her ruin her life. Find her dead from an overdose, or sent to prison. She was all I had left-’ She broke off again, coughed and cleared her throat. ‘I couldn’t settle. I had a drink, a couple, but it didn’t touch me. In the end I went round there.’

How? On foot? On the bus? In a taxi? Janet knew her questions would wait. The fine-grain detail would come later. For now, Denise needed to tell her story without interruption or qualification. Janet trusted Rachel would be making notes of any gaps in the narrative or any inconsistencies. There would be plenty of time to return to them later.

Denise was picking at her nails, her face drawn with misery and fatigue. ‘She was off her head,’ she said, ‘swanning around with just this scrap of a negligee thing on. She wouldn’t listen. Soon as she saw me, she’s effing and blinding, telling me I’m crap this and crap that.’ Her face crumpled, and Janet saw tears in her eyes. ‘I did love her,’ she said, appealing to Janet. ‘I always loved her, even when…’ Unable to continue, she stopped, covering her eyes with her hand.

‘You all right to carry on?’ Janet said softly.

Denise sniffed, reached for a tissue from the box on the low table and wiped at her face. ‘So, she was shouting and screaming because I told her to sort herself out, that Sean was a loser, that he was dragging her down with him. And her brother-’ Again she halted, as if a switch had been thrown, cutting the supply of words. Her hand to her mouth, a fist stopping her lips.

‘Take your time,’ Janet said. She could feel Denise’s anxiety, taut as cheese-wire in the atmosphere. She could hear the sound of the machines, the tape recorder, the camcorder, the high-pitched hum of the central heating, the breathing of the people in the room. Her mouth was dry.

When Denise began speaking again, it was almost a whisper: ‘I said, look at Nathan, look at what the drugs did to him,’ she gulped. ‘She said, she screamed at me, “It wasn’t the drugs, it was you, you’re the reason he fucking killed himself. It’s your fault he was a junkie, ’cos you never gave a shit for him or for me.” ’ Denise was weeping as she spoke, her words choppy, her breathing laboured and uneven, her chest rising and falling as if she was having an asthma attack. ‘She grabbed at her chain and said, “You can have this, I don’t want anything from you,” and she yanked it off and threw it at me. It landed in the kitchen and I went to pick it up. I was going to go then. She was off her head. When she got like that there was no dealing with her.’ Denise gave a shuddering breath, ‘But then she said, “Why do you think Nathan strung himself up outside your house? Because he wanted you to know it was your fault.” ’

Oh, God. Janet could imagine how that would have cut Denise to the core.

Denise glanced at Janet. Her lips were chapped, Janet could see a tiny thread of red blood in one of the cracks. ‘I just wanted to shut her up,’ Denise said, ‘stop her saying those lies, those evil things.’ Denise fell quiet, only the rattle of her breath accompanying the play of her emotions.

Janet heard Rachel clear her throat.

‘The knife,’ Denise said, ‘the knife.’ She swallowed, hit at her temples with the heels of her hands, a swift and violent gesture that made Janet flinch, though she restricted her reaction to a blink. ‘The knife was on the sink. I just wanted to stop her saying those things. I never-’ she broke off, distressed.

‘Yes,’ Janet said. She had pain in her stomach now, deep and twisting.

Denise was sweating around her hairline, little beads of liquid visible. ‘I can’t-’ she said.

‘Have a drink of water,’ Janet suggested. It was vital not to break the interview now, so close to a full confession. Denise didn’t want to tell her what she had done, did not want to admit the awful truth of it. Janet could tell she was finding the pressure of the situation intolerable, but it was her job to keep her here, keep her talking, build her story to its climax.