23

THE SECOND MURDER was textbook.

Murder for Dummies.

A twenty-five-year-old woman named Jody Reeves put out her thumb and thought, a little tipsily, ‘Mum would kill me if she saw me doing this.’

She wouldn’t have done it at all, except that she’d had a row with her boyfriend at the pub, made a bit of a scene and stomped off.

Her mother had always told her, never ever hitchhike. And she never ever would have… if only it hadn’t kept raining and if only the buses hadn’t stopped running, and if only two miles wasn’t such a long way in those stupid heels that lengthened her legs while they shortened her stride.

Jody was blonde but she wasn’t dumb; she knew all about the dangers. But she also knew what a weirdo-slash-mad-axeman looked like – and how to say Thanks, but no thanks and to wait for a woman, or a family, or someone she knew.

She heard a car approaching from behind and turned to look over her shoulder.

Jody Reeves wasn’t about to take any chances, but with a bit of luck she’d be home in five minutes, her boyfriend would still be worrying about her, and her mother would never know a thing.

Ann Reeves was watching You’ve Been Framed when her daughter called her for the very last time. Children hitting each other at weddings seemed to be the theme of the show, because all the little girl combatants were in party dresses, and all the little boys wore cummerbunds. Ann had had two glasses of red wine during the course of the evening, which made toddlers pushing each other down church steps even more hilarious.

So she was still laughing when she answered the phone to Jody.

‘Hi, darling! It’s You’ve Been Framed and these little kids are knocking seven bells out of – oh!’ she chortled. ‘Right in the eye! What, darling? I can’t hear you.’

Ann reached for the mute button. The room was suddenly very quiet.

‘Say again, sweetie?’ She smiled.

‘What do you mean?’ she said, turning to look at the photo of her daughter that sat on top of the piano. Not a grand piano – just an old upright her mother had left her. She’d learned by ear and Jody had the same talent, right from when she was little. Sometimes they still sat there together and played ‘Heart And Soul’ or ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’.

‘What do you mean, Jo? I don’t understand…’ Ann frowned at the photo as if it could translate for her, from the muffled, sobbing, cracked voice that the caller ID claimed to be her daughter’s.

‘Mummy. He’s going to kill me.’

Ann Reeves stood with the phone to her ear and felt real life drop away from her like a silk cape sliding from her shoulders.

She walked on without it.

Crumpled in her wake, she left behind her the night Jody was born; the smell of her head, the childhood illnesses, the pink eyes, the clammy hair, the spots – each with a dab of camomile lotion crusted around it – the mumps, the colds, the tonsillitis ice cream; the first day at school in an Alice band and long white socks; the sports-day beanbags; the homework tears; tadpoles in a jar and bringing home the hamster for the holidays. The first disco, first date, first period, first teenage row.

I hate you!

I hate you too!

It was all behind her now.

Ann flinched at a new voice on the phone, then slowly put it back to her ear and whispered, ‘Who are you and what do you want?’

She listened to the answers without the life left inside her even to beg. She was defenceless, but she had nothing left to defend anyway.

The sounds of a struggle flowed into her head, grunting and harsh.

‘Mummy! Help me!

Ann dropped the phone. Horror ran amok in her with no outlet. She couldn’t scream. She couldn’t cry. She couldn’t move. She was a closed circuit – a super-collider where the only conscious thought particle whirring endlessly in her head was, There’s nothing I can do.

When Jody needed her most. The only time it really counted. She couldn’t do a thing to help her.

Bile boiled in her throat and she turned her head as it sprayed from her mouth and nose – across the sideboard, the fruit bowl, the scented candle.

It was a vent. A breach.

A release.

For a long, clouded moment she stood and watched pink-tinged bile drip off an apple. Golden Delicious – Jody’s favourite.

Ann had fallen in love with Jody the very first moment she’d seen her. Heart and soul. The thought of Jody being frightened and hurt and alone was unbearable. Unbearable.

Then she knew that there was something she could do.

Ann Reeves breathed.

She bent.

Her numb fingers found the phone and finally managed to pick it up and put it to her ear. The struggle was still going on. Her little girl was still fighting for her life.

Ann croaked and stopped. Then she cleared her throat and said loudly and clearly, ‘I’m here, Jody.’

‘Mummy! Mummy!

Ann swayed. She put out a hand and held on to the sideboard for support. ‘I’m right here, Jody. Don’t worry about anything. I won’t leave you. I won’t ever leave you.’

There was a small shriek, an angry grunt, the sound of something heavy hitting the ground.

‘Mummy! I love you!’

‘I love you too, my beautiful baby girl.’

Ann Reeves let go of the sideboard.

Then she stood up straight on her own two feet – pinned there by love alone – and stayed with her daughter while she died.

At the end of the day, only one car had slowed down beside Jody Reeves.

That was the one she’d climbed into.

That was the one that had driven her to her death – and from there to a place where no human being would ever find her.

Textbook.

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