Mary-Jane Riley - The Bad Things - A gripping crime thriller full of twists and turns

‘Bugger,’ she said, stepping back from the window before they saw her, heart thumping, ‘I thought they wouldn’t find us.’

‘Come on, Mum, you know you can find anyone these days through the internet.’

Irritation crawled up her spine. She knew that. She damn well knew that, so why hadn’t she given it a thought? ‘They’ll go away as soon as they realize we’re not giving them anything. Or until they get cold or tired or hungry, or all three.’ She half drew the curtain.

‘How’s Aunty Sasha?’

It was her turn to shrug. ‘You know, coping.’

‘Badly?’

She nodded. ‘Yes. I’ve just got to support her through this.’

‘We will, Mum. We will.’

Alex looked at her little boy. Taller than her with wisps of facial hair and that deep voice. ‘Thank you, sweetheart.’ She resisted the urge to lean over and kiss his cheek.

‘So are you going to do anything about her?’

‘Her?’

‘Jackie Wood?’

‘I—’ No. She wasn’t going to tell him. ‘Look, there’s nothing we can do. She’ll be whisked to some safe house somewhere until the furore’s died down and then she might change her identity and find somewhere new to live. The best thing we can do is to help Sasha through this.’

‘Mum?’

‘Yes?’

‘What can you remember about that day?’

Alex drew him back into her arms and hugged him close to her, resting her chin on the top of his head. ‘Oh, love, it’s difficult to describe.’

‘Try. Please.’

She closed her eyes. ‘I remember the police coming round, making lots of notes. Everyone going to look for them. Not finding them.’

‘They were taken from our garden, weren’t they?’

A spear of pain lanced Alex and the guilt threatened to overwhelm her. ‘Yes. Yes they were.’

She was responsible.

Kate shoved the pills to the back of the bathroom cupboard and closed the door. Her head was pounding; the picture on the health centre’s telly of Jackie Wood on the steps of the High Court, smiling, going round and round in her head. The smug lawyer. The sentence quashed. A murderer’s accomplice set free.

She thought back to when the judge had sentenced Wood and Jessop to life imprisonment for the murders of Harry and Millie Clements, and how she’d felt as though she could breathe again. Although she’d been the one to find Harry’s little body all squashed up in the suitcase, abandoned behind a bin in a shitty lay-by as if he was just a piece of rubbish, she hadn’t had anything more to do with the investigation, apart from celebrating in the pub when they arrested Wood and Jessop.

She’d had her day in court, of course, when she stood in the witness box and told the judge exactly what had happened the morning she had found the little boy, reliving it in her head as she kept her voice even and unemotional. She’d glared across at the pair of them in the dock; wanted them to look her in the eye so she could stare them down. But they didn’t give her the satisfaction; just kept examining their hands, Wood occasionally dabbing at her eyes with a white handkerchief edged with blue. Funny how she could remember the little things. And then she’d been in the public gallery when the professor of dirt and stones or whatever he was delivered his damning evidence. The unusual type of soil and gravel found in the corridor of the flats in Sole Bay matched that found inside the suitcase that had contained the body – that was the gist of it, and the jury bought it, every single damning word. So did they all, to be fair.

And now, fifteen years on, the great professor had been discredited. The evidence he had given in another trial had been called into question five years previously. After that, the convictions tumbled, and it was only a matter of time before the Jessop–Wood trial was scrutinized. And yes, the evidence was called into question. Unsafe conviction. The gravel and soil could have come from several places in Sole Bay. So Wood was now out in the community.

Kate found herself obsessed with Wood. She didn’t believe for one moment that Jessop and Wood were not guilty, and she knew her colleagues would be of a like mind. There was no question of it being opened as a cold case, and it wouldn’t be too long before the force would trot out the line: ‘We’re not looking for anyone else in this matter.’ Subtext: they did it, and Jackie Wood has got away with it.

She turned on the cold tap and splashed her face, remembering too late the make-up she had put on earlier that morning. Bloody hell, she’d have panda eyes now. Opening up the cupboard again she took out her make-up remover wipes and began to clean her face so she could redo her mask.

‘Is that you Kate?’

A door slammed as Chris’s voice floated up the stairs. Her hand stopped its cleaning. Damn. What was he doing home? She thought he’d gone to source more wood for the table and chairs he was making.

‘Kate?’

She put down the make-up remover wipes and gripped the basin, head bowed. Then she dragged in a deep breath and pasted a smile on her face. If she made herself smile, it would sound in her voice.

‘Hallo sweetie,’ she said, emerging from the bathroom and going downstairs. ‘I thought you’d be out for most of the day.’

Chris enveloped her in a hug. With her nose pressed into his thick woollen jumper she breathed in the familiar smells of freshly-cut wood and linseed oil. There was a prickling in the back of her nose. ‘Hah. So your secret lover could come and go with impunity.’

‘Something like that,’ she mumbled, not wanting to think about the visit to the doctor. ‘What about the wood?’

‘Bloke I needed to see won’t be back until this afternoon. Bit of a wasted journey.’

She lifted her head up. ‘Didn’t you check he was going to be there?’

‘No. I had some other stuff to do and I fancied a drive so took a chance.’ He smiled down at her, his cornflower blue eyes wrinkling at the corners. ‘Is that okay?’

‘’Course it is.’

Typical of Chris. Freewheeling; not worried about what other people thought; always able to go with the flow. Which was probably why she married him – a good contrast to her tendency to be uptight.

‘Anyway, what are you doing home?’

‘Meeting my lover, what else?’ She laughed lightly. ‘Have you had anything to eat? Do you fancy some toast?’

He grabbed her by the shoulders and planted a kiss on her lips. ‘Toast sounds good. Unless you fancy something else…’ He looked up the stairs and then back at her. Cocked his head to one side.

She thought of the pills she had got from the doctor and the pill she took every day, both shoved in the back of the cupboard, and felt guilty and irritated at the same time. She pushed him away. ‘No time for that. I must eat and get going. So, toast?’ She tried to make her voice sound bright.

Chris held up his hands. ‘Whoa. Sorry. Just a thought. Toast would be great.’

Kate kept her head down – she couldn’t bear to see the hurt look on his face. Instead, she went to the bread bin and took the loaf out, trying to undo the red plastic tape. ‘Bugger, bugger, why do they wrap bloody bread like this.’ She took a knife out of the drawer and started to hack at the tape.

‘Careful, don’t hurt yourself.’

‘I won’t,’ she snapped, taking a couple of slices from the now open packet. ‘See? It’s done. But the sodding bread’s mouldy.’

Chris was beside her, taking the bread out of her hands. ‘It’s only a bit of green along the edges. It’ll be fine when I’ve got peanut butter and jam on the top.’

‘Up to you.’ Kate reached up into a cupboard and took down the pack of muesli, shaking some into a bowl, looking crossly at the dried fruit, seeds, and oats. ‘Urgh, why can’t I like this stuff?’