Emily Barr - The Sleeper

I shrugged.

‘Ask Sam, if you like.’

‘He did say there was someone with him that day. It could have been you.’

‘You know, I wish I had done that tabloid interview I was offered a million times over. Then I could show you the evidence.’

‘Oh, tell me about it.’

She took her keys out of her handbag, then visibly thought better of it. I was fiddling with my phone, glad I had upgraded it recently.

‘I’ll show you,’ I said, and there was my name, in a newspaper report. I was mentioned as a friend of the family who had been waiting with the tragic husband. ‘Look. That’s my name. I can show you ID.’

She looked at the phone for a long time, then back at me, and nodded, and her face changed. She went from grey to a mournful pale green.

‘Look. This is horrific. We all know that. Every time the phone rings … I can’t believe she did what they’re saying she did, but at the same time I can’t see what else … Our dad’s drinking, and Mum’s up to the eyeballs on tranquillisers. If you know Lara, you’ll know about my relationship with her. Do you know that stuff?’

‘You didn’t get on. At all. She lived here with you for a while and then moved out.’

‘Let’s go for a drink.’

‘Sure.’

‘A soft drink on my part. I would love a small glass of wine, but not in public, not when there’s a chance of someone from the press lurking with a camera. And not at the pub down there. Everyone would be listening.’

She set off back up the street without waiting for an answer, and I had to do my fastest walking to catch her up.

The bar was big and clattery and completely anonymous. I could see why Olivia had chosen it. It was populated with a mixture of people in work clothes knocking back drinks with serious levels of concentration, and tourists being happier and more leisurely about it.

I bought her a freshly squeezed orange juice, and without intending to, added a glass of white wine for myself.

‘Oh, you lucky sod,’ she said with a small smile, eyeing up my drink. ‘What is that?’

‘Sauvignon Blanc. I don’t often drink, actually, and when I do it’s red wine, but there was a woman at the bar buying this and it looked nice, so I decided to have one too.’

‘When Lara first turned up at my flat, she had a bottle of Sauvignon with her. I hadn’t realised how nervous she was, but she knocked it back. It was being on my territory, I suppose. She normally drank red too. Look. Iris. Let’s get straight to the point. What do you think’s happened?’

A man pushed past my chair, so close that I could smell the meat he had just eaten. I leaned towards Olivia.

‘Well.’ I saw a woman holding herself together by a thread. ‘I just don’t think she killed him, like I said. I really don’t.’

‘Of course she didn’t kill him.’ Olivia was leaning forward too. ‘The police interviewed me for hours and hours. It was awful, like you’ve suddenly stepped into a TV drama or something. You kind of think you know the script, except that it’s all about your sister and whether or not she murdered her lover. Not in a million years. I kept saying that. Lara and I are not close, but I’ll defend her to the death on this one. She didn’t do it. Cheat on Sam, yes, of course – wouldn’t you? Murder someone? Well – no. That’s just ludicrous. Unthinkable.’

‘I agree with you.’

‘Someone’s set her up.’

‘What did the police say about that?’

She shrugged. ‘That she wanted Guy to leave his wife and he wouldn’t and she cracked up and stabbed him. She would never have carried a knife, so where did that come from? The trouble is, I know I’m right, but when I hear myself saying it, and look at their sceptical faces, I can see that, to them, I’m like one of those people who lives next door to a serial killer and says “but he was so quiet and polite”. They feel sorry for me and they think I don’t have a clue.’ She sighed. ‘Can I have a sip of your wine?’

I pushed it towards her. ‘Thanks. Lara and I hated one another, and that’s actually not too strong a word. Right from when we were children. She was perfect – I could never match up. We’d compete endlessly in everything and she’d always beat me. She was the good girl, so I had to be the bad one. All of that. It was complicated and I’m not proud of certain things. After university she went away travelling and she was in Asia for ages, and that was the only time I ever felt I had the space to be myself. But she came back and reinvented herself as the high-flying professional, and I was in second place again. She had the perfect wedding, while my love life was one long car crash. And then she didn’t get pregnant and I did, without meaning to, and my own parents were insanely furious with me for upsetting her. Neither of them was remotely pleased about the baby, not even for half a second. It was just another bitchy thing I’d done, as far as they were concerned.

‘I knew she was seeing Guy, because I ran into them in a bar that night – the night she vanished. They were having a beer round the corner. I could see at a glance that she adored him, and I knew her well enough to know that she’d want to leave Sam rather than have a long-term affair. We’re sisters. No matter what baggage there is, we’re still sisters. And she would never, ever have hurt that man, even though the press is going wild for the “good girl turned monster” thing.’

‘So where do you think she is?’

Olivia leaned back in her chair and stroked the bump of her baby.

‘I think,’ she said. ‘No one else wants to hear this. But I think something terrible has happened to her. Whoever killed Guy has done the same to her. Wherever she is, Iris, I’m absolutely certain that she’s dead. But I have no idea who could have done it. A random lunatic is the only option, but that makes no sense. That doesn’t really happen, or if it does they get caught straight away. So then I wonder, could it be someone she knows? I can’t think of anyone.’

She paused.

‘But look. I know for sure that something dramatic happened to her when she was in Thailand. She was up to something. She had a boyfriend, Jake, and then suddenly she was back home and subdued and in her room all the time. That’s the only time Lara was ever different. Mysterious. I’ve been going through her boxes of stuff in the parents’ attic, because you never know. I’m clutching at straws, but there could be something there, couldn’t there? I can’t think what else to do. Jake, with no surname, from, what, nearly fifteen years ago?’

I nodded. ‘If you find anything,’ I said. It seemed presumptuous to ask, so I didn’t finish the sentence.

‘It’s nice that you believe in her,’ she said. ‘Makes me feel less alone. Sure. Let’s swap numbers, and if I find anything I’ll give you a call. You do the same.’

I opened my mouth to tell her about the passport, then stopped. It seemed too ridiculous, and I could not bear to get her hopes up and then dash them. I put a hand on hers and passed her my wine glass.

‘Of course I will,’ I told her.

chapter nineteen

Lara and Guy’s hotel was a functional place for business people, opposite St Paul’s Cathedral. I could see why she wanted to stay here: it was not outrageously expensive (in the central London hotel world, at least), you could check in by machine, and nobody bothered you. The little foyer was filled with men and women, mainly men, in work outfits, bustling around in bubbles of their own importance.

I looked at a few of them, but they seemed interchangeable. I wished I could let them know how easily their bubbles were popped. As well as the ‘work trip to London’ brigade, there were the obligatory tourists carting enormous suitcases in and out of lifts.