My heart starts to thud painfully in my chest and suddenly the only thing I can think about is getting her out, getting thembothout, off my property, away from here. The idea of strangers being here makes the small hairs stand up on my bare arms.
There’s a real multiplier effect when you have two suspects working together.
“Nearly finished in here,” she says breezily. “Your wife asked me to take the dog for a walk around the block as well. Coco, isn’t it? She seems very friendly.”
“You have a key from Jess, do you?”
“Yes.” She is completely calm. “Back door.”
Of course. I kick myself for not thinking of it sooner. She’s had access to the house since before the weekend—that’s why I’d never heard a break-in on Saturday night.
“Listen, I’m really sorry but there’s been a bit of a… misunderstanding,” I say. “I’m going to need your key back until we can get some more sets cut.”
“Oh?”
“I need to give a set to my brother-in-law and we just don’t have enough to go around just yet. Sorry.” I hold my hand out. “Do you mind?”
She reaches into a pocket and drops the key into my outstretched palm.
Quietly, she says: “I was glad to hear your wife was OK, after last night.”
There is a sudden chill at the back of my neck, as if cold fingertips are resting there.
“Thank you. She’s a tough one.”
“Sounds like she was lucky,” she says. “Thank goodness.”
Is there the ghost of a smile at the corner of her lips, or am I just making her nervous?
“You know what?” I say. “It’s actually not a good time right now; the kids are back from school soon, and Daisy’s still not really settled in yet. She gets very anxious around strangers so I wonder if you could just finish up now? Obviously we’ll pay you the full amount.”
She gives me an odd look but doesn’t argue, pulling off the rubber gloves with a shrug and heading downstairs to find her cousin.
As their battered Toyota is crunching up the gravel drive, Jess’s car appears on the street. She waits for the pickup to indicate and pull out onto Regency Place before turning in and parking up behind my Nissan.
She gets out and goes to the rear door to unstrap Daisy from her car seat.
“Hey, what’s up with Helena and her cousin?” she calls over to me. “Just saw them leaving but they were supposed to be doing three till five today.”
“I sent them away.”
She frowns, as if she’s misheard me. “You did what?”
“It’s not a good idea to have lots of strangers in the house right now. Lots of people we don’t really know.”
“They’re not strangers. She came recommended on that WhatsApp group, the Park Estate neighborhood chat.” Her voice is laced with disbelief. “You didn’tactuallytell them to go, did you?”
“I didn’t know you’d given her a key.”
She helps Daisy to climb down from the back seat onto the drive while Callum clambers out the other side, swinging his school backpack from one strap.
“Quite difficult for her to do the job without a key,” she says. “So you’re going to pick up where she left off, are you?”
“I don’t trust her,” I say. “Or him.”
“This has gone far enough, Adam.” She slams the car door with a little more force than is needed. “I’m worried about the effect this is having on you, as well as the head injury. You’re not being rational and you need to stop; thisallneeds to stop so the police can deal with it.”
“The police aren’t interested.”
