‘Get arrested? No.’ Dom is keen to rule this out as an option.
I’d willingly spend a night in a cell if it would get me the answers I want.
‘How about contacting the Braids in Florida?’ Zannah suggests. ‘If they used to work with Kevin Cater, and he bought their house, there’s a chance they’ve kept in touch with him. If he’s got kids with the same names as their oldest two, they might know.’
‘That’s not a bad idea,’ I say. The Caters might be on Flora’s Christmas card list – the same one we were removed from after the photograph incident. ‘But … I’d have to explain how I came to know about the Caters in the first place.’
‘The Caterscannothave kids with the same names as the Braidsandlive in the same house,andlook the same,’ Zannah says. ‘That just can’t happen. It’s like something out of a horror film. I mean … one name the same, maybe, but two?’
‘Zannah’s right, Dom. We need to make contact with Lewis in Florida.’
‘I wouldn’t say we need to, but—’
‘Dad!’
One of my husband’s best qualities is that he knows when he’s lost an argument.
‘All right. If I have a spare minute tomorrow, I’ll—’
‘I’ll do it,’ I say. ‘And not tomorrow. Now. Right now.’
6
An hour later, thanks to my son, I have an Instagram account. He’s put it on my phone, too – a little pink and orange camera icon – so that I can correspond with Lewis Braid more easily.
If he replies.
I’d have preferred to contact Flora directly, but I’ve searched the whole house and can’t find the old address book where I wrote down her number. I probably threw it away years ago.
So far I’ve sent Lewis one message: ‘Hi Lewis, Beth Leeson here! Could you send me a phone number where I can contact you? It’s fairly urgent.’
Zannah was watching over my shoulder as I typed. ‘Is that … Oh, my God! Ben! She’s using punctuation.’
‘Lewis Braid uses punctuation on Instagram too,’ I said as both my children laughed at me.
Then I pressed send. Ever since, I’ve been picking up my phone approximately every ten seconds, and using the other nine of each cycle to prepare dinner.
‘Beth,’ says Dominic from the kitchen table.
‘Mm?’
‘You know it might be hours before—’
‘I know.’
‘Then stop looking.’
‘I can’t.’
‘Can you come and sit down for a minute? I want to talk to you, while the kids aren’t around.’
‘I can talk while I chop peppers.’
‘I know, but I’d like to …’
I listen to the silence as he reworks his plan and decides it doesn’t matter if I sit down or not. It’s lucky we’re not both equally stubborn; we’d have had to get divorced long ago.
‘All right. I get why you want to try and understand what you saw yesterday. Anyone would want to. But … have you considered the possibility that you’ll never know for sure?’
