Sellers was about to ask what she’d meant, when Paddy called upstairs: ‘Lottie? Suzanne’s looking for you. Can you come down? Now?’ He didn’t sound to Sellers like a man who expected to be obeyed or was even convinced that he wanted to be.
‘Saved,’ Lottie said under her breath as she left the room.
Sellers knew he hadn’t caught her parting remark by accident. She’d wanted him to hear it.
Gibbs had eaten too much of Suzanne Lacy’s lasagne, and had already loosened his belt once. He might have to do it again in a second; his stomach seemed to be still expanding, though they’d finished eating an hour ago. He consoled himself with the thought that his waistline wasn’t the only casualty. Sellers’s veganism had also gone for a Burton. ‘You’re a dead man if you breathe a word to Sondra,’ Sellers had threatened him, and Gibbs had felt a pang of nostalgia for the old days, when protecting his friend from consequences had involved lying about more exciting things than eating prohibited pasta dishes.
‘You wanted to ask me something?’ Suzanne appeared in the doorway just as Gibbs was wondering if he ought to start clearing the kitchen table while he waited for her. She was still wearing the blue and white striped apron of Marianne’s that Lottie had found for her in the pantry. ‘Christ, look at the mess,’ she muttered. The debris of the meal was evenly distributed around the room: countertops, table, kitchen island.
‘I’m not wasting any more time trying to make Lottie go to sleep. Losing battle! So.’ Suzanne pulled a chair back from the table and sat down opposite Gibbs. ‘I’m all yours if you want me. Sorry, I didn’t mean that to sound … I’m not after your body. I’m not after anyone’s body, actually, though I am recruiting for a new husband – but I’m prioritising the intellectual connection over the physical this time round.’
Gibbs had no interest in her love life, and feared she was the sort who’d provide endless, tedious detail if given the chance. ‘I want to know more about Jemma and this Oliver Mayo,’ he said. ‘Some background. They stopped seeing each other in 2006, you said?’
‘Yes.’ Suzanne was focused and serious again. ‘They were briefly in touch again in 2010, then didn’t see each other again until July this year, when Jemma went to see him in Cambridge.’
‘But from what you said before about the Wordle thing, it sounds like you think he and Marianne might have been in touch earlier this year.’
Suzanne nodded.
‘Tell me about 2010,’ said Gibbs. ‘The “briefly in touch” you mentioned.’
‘One-night stand.’ She stood up. ‘Fancy a cup of tea? I’m dying for one.’
‘If you’re making, yeah. Thanks.’
She made her way over to the kettle, pulling the apron off over her head as she went. ‘How about this: I’ll give you the lowdown on the never-ending love triangle, and in return, you keep digging for the truth about Ollie. When your colleagues tell you he’s got alibis coming out of his ears, don’t believe them. I just … think he did it, and I don’t want my best friend, my goddaughter’s mother, to end up married to a murderer if there’s anything I can do to—’
‘Hang on a second,’ Gibbs cut her off. Had he missed something? ‘Jemma’s married to Paddy.’
‘Yeah. For the time being.’ Suzanne sighed. ‘I need to give you the background. Let’s start with Jemma and Paddy, because they met first. We were at primary school together, all three of us. Paddy’s parents and Jemma’s became close friends. Nancy, Jemma’s mum, was a piano teacher. At some point Paddy went to her for lessons, though I think he gave them up pretty swiftly. No surprise there! I’ve never met a bigger giver-up-on-things than Paddy. Thank God he passed his driving test first time, I always think. He’d never have tried again, and with Jemma never learning and them insisting on living in the middle of rural nowhere instead of in a proper place … How would Lottie have got to school? And since Paddy has no career, no hobby he’s passionate about, no entrepreneurial drive whatsoever, I’m bloody glad he at least does the driving – that’s pretty much the only contribution he makes. You know that thing about whether it’s better to be Socrates dissatisfied or a pig satisfied? Paddy’s a pig who’s not really sure if he’s satisfied or not – won’t commit either way. Ugh.’
It occurred to Gibbs that either he or Suzanne should probably walk over to the door and close it before anyone overheard anything sensitive. He couldn’t be arsed; it was too far away. The kitchen at Devey House was the approximate size of a small train station, with a high ceiling and windows taller than Gibbs’s whole body. Suzanne didn’t seem worried about Paddy walking in or overhearing, so maybe this was nothing she hadn’t said before to his face.
‘When Jemma’s mum died, Paddy’s parents were the main ones who looked after Gareth,’ Suzanne said. ‘They’re very looky-after people, a bit too much so. Explains a lot, if you ask me. And Gareth’s one of those men who couldn’t functionon his own – you must know the type. Marianne soon sorted that out. Jemma reckons she was counting down Nancy’s last days, waiting to slot into the new wife role soon as she could. Anyway, Paddy’s parents started socialising with Gareth and Marianne, which meant Paddy and Jemma saw each other out of school quite a lot. Fast-forward seven or eight years, they decided they fancied each other, and then every time the Stellings and the Uptons got together, Jemma and Paddy snuck off somewhere for a snogging sesh.’
Suzanne put Gibbs’s cup of tea down in front of him on the table. ‘By the time they’re eighteen, the snogging has escalated to where these things usually escalate to, and they’ve also started arranging to meet up on their own. They’re seeing each other, basically – though Paddy won’t call it that. He won’t call it anything.’ Suzanne’s mouth twitched as if she’d noticed she’d just swallowed something unpleasant. ‘Jemma’s madly in love with Paddy by this point. I mean, there’s no denying he’s an extremely good-looking guy, so we can only assume she didn’t notice … you know, his entire personality. But there’s a problem: he’s about to head off to uni and wants to be single while he’s there. Still wants to hook up with Jemma whenever he can while they’re at their separate universities, he tells her, but definitely not with any kind of commitment or expectation of fidelity involved. University will be full of other girls, and how could he be expected, at his tender age, to confine himself to one?’
Despite Suzanne’s outraged tone, it sounded reasonable to Gibbs. Eighteen was way too young to pick one person and stay with them and only them forever.Bit like fifty-two, then, eh?Determinedly, Gibbs steered his attention away from his own mess of a love life. It wasn’t really a mess, anyway. It worked for him, even if it had involved, for the last twelve years, a girlfriend about whom his wife knew nothing.
‘For the next two years, Jemma and Paddy had what the Gen Z-ers would call “a situationship”,’ said Suzanne. ‘Every few months Paddy would summon Jemma for a sesh, and she’d go running. And, no, by “sesh”, I don’t mean just sex – not any more. By this point, it was a lot more than that. Paddy was dropping hints all the time about how much Jemma meant to him, how she was his favourite, the fittest, all of that. If and when he everdidfeel ready for a committed relationship, she’d be his first choice. Oh, and he thought he definitely would at some point, so there was hope on the horizon!’ Suzanne’s voice dripped with sarcasm. ‘Maybe when he was, like, thirty, if Jemma was lucky. All of this kept her nicely reeled in.’ She paused her narration to take a sip of her tea. ‘But, listen, we can’t just blame Paddy – not exclusively.’
Gibbs wasn’t blaming him at all. He was Team Paddy all the way. Thirty was a good age to settle down. Anything before that …
‘Jemma spent most of their shit-show, situationship, whatever, pretending to be cool with it all, though it was hellish for her. It was only once it had been going on for about two years that she admitted to me how miserable and lonely it was making her feel. She was seeing other people too, because she knew Paddy was, but she didn’t really want to be. She was in love with him. He was all she wanted. So I said, “Then tell him that, you idiot!” I probably said it more sensitively than that, though maybe not.’ Suzanne smiled. ‘Jemma agreed she couldn’t bear to let the on-again-off-again horror show drag on any longer. If Paddy wasn’t ready to choose her and only her, then she wanted to call it quits, get him out of her system once and for all and move on.’
Gibbs could remember, at least once, wishing a woman he was involved with would say that to him, give him a chance to opt out.
‘She gave him an all-or-nothing ultimatum. They were both, like, twenty, twenty-one by this point. Guess what? He chose nothing.’ Suzanne laughed, shaking her head. ‘Still wasn’t ready, he said. Bear in mind, no one was talking about marriage or living together or anything. All Jemma wanted was a normal boyfriend-girlfriend relationship and not to have to keep hearing about all the other women he was screwing. But Paddy felt way too young, free and single to become a boring old boyfriend, he told her. At least he was honest. I’ll give him that: he never lied. Andthen …’Suzanne slapped the table with the palms of her hands. ‘Along came Ollie Mayo: every bit as gorgeous as Paddy, except tall and dark instead of short and blonde. And … well, basically perfect. A firefighter. Like, he saved people’s lives for a living: dragged them out of burning buildings. Hero, right?’ Suzanne sounded anything but convinced. ‘Fell for Jemma straight away, told her he’d marry her and have babies with her tomorrow if she’d let him—’
‘That sounds weird. Depending on how soon he said it after they met,’ Gibbs qualified, as his suspicions in relation to Mayo shot up a level. Murderers that weren’t of the standard scrote variety were often obsessive.
‘I generally admire people who know what they want and just go for it,’ said Suzanne. ‘But I mean, Ollie waskeen, and I slightly worried that … I mean, I’m sure I’m being unfair …’ She seemed to make up her mind. ‘Put it this way: if he didn’t kill Marianne, or try to in 2012, then I’ve got nothing against the man. But as I’ve said, I think he did. I’ve hadsucha bad feeling about him ever since the Wordle thing.’
‘That happened recently, though,’ said Gibbs. ‘And you’re saying you weren’t sure about him from the start. Was that just because of how desperate he was to be with Jemma?’
‘Oh, it never came across as desperation. I think he honestlydid fall in love with her and knew, or decided, that she was the one for him. I just worried that maybe it wasn’tonlyher he wanted. I think the whole package was appealing to him: this house; rich, loving parents who always pick up the bill wherever you go; the whole family-and-home structure. I mean, Jemma didn’t think of Marianne either as loving or as her parent, but that’s how Ollie would have seen it. He’d have noticed how much she wanted and tried to be a mum to Jemma, in stark contrast to his own mother, and he wouldn’t have picked up on the undercurrent of coercive emotional blackmail that went with it. And who wouldn’t want to be swept up into all this?’ Suzanne gestured around the room. ‘I mean, it’s grim to be here now, today, but it would have felt very different to Ollie in 2005, 2006. Let’s face it, it would have felt a bit like hitting the jackpot. Especially to him, given his family history.’
‘Which was?’ asked Gibbs.
