up at Christian and his new girlfriend, Ellie – See, I don’t care, I’ve got a new life. Christian and Ellie would be glad she was gone. They could carry on their perfect lives without the anxiety of running into Julia at unexpected moments, prodding their consciences, a reminder of their lies and broken promises.
It was Saturday night and Julia was alone, in a house and in a town where she knew no one. She was the only one suffering for her choice. Tears bubbled up and she couldn’t stop herself sobbing. What on earth had possessed her to come to this place? She wished she’d gone back with Audrey. She wished she’d gone home.
Better get your story straight.
The caller has been careless and left their number, a mobile. I could ring it back. Not from my phone and not from Garrick’s phone – I don’t want to provide any link between it and me. I consider the payphone on St John’s Way. It’s a bit of a walk and it’s dark and if I am being followed … Part of me doesn’t want to know who this is. Can it be the same person who’s sending the texts, and are they warning or threatening me? I shouldn’t have started drinking. I need a clear head. I try to think of a scenario in which the texts are the result of some hideous coincidence but there’s no wriggle room. Someone knows. The best thing to do is nothing, to wait and see, though that hardly constitutes a plan.
I feel so alone, even my husband would be a comfort. I remember now why I married him.
Upstairs, I go through the motions of going to bed: wash my face, clean my teeth, comb my hair. I put on Radio 4, hoping to find friendly, familiar voices to soothe me. Tonight, all voices serve as an irritant and I switch it off. I look at Garrick’s phone again. A new article has appeared. The investigation has moved on. Hayley Walsh has turned up in France with her schoolteacher. Suitably lurid headlines accompany this discovery, which is of more shock value than the corpse. Given the state the body must be in, the police can’t have believed it was a recent death. And despite knowing little about forensic science, I’m pretty sure it couldn’t have been mistaken for a fifteen-year-old girl, even on a superficial examination.
I scroll down the other search results – more mentions of Hayley – then I see it in a local Surrey paper, Speculation Growing About Body on the Downs. The first mention of a name.
The opening paragraphs tell me what I already know, and the article is padded out by an interview with the student whose soil sample resulted in the body’s discovery. Althea Gregory says she ‘couldn’t believe it’, and there’s a picture of her looking pleased with herself and her fifteen minutes of fame.
Only the latter part contains anything of interest.
Speculation is growing that the body is that of missing backpacker Brandon Wells, last seen in August 1994. Sources within the investigation have confirmed that this is a viable line of inquiry and they are currently in touch with police in his home country of New Zealand.
I scroll down to see further results. BBC South East has a clip.
The same journalist as before stands on the same spot on the Downs. Behind him, the ridge of the hill glows yellow. The shot pans down to a small copse. Yellow tape flutters at the edge of the trees and, just visible through the trunks, is a white tent.
Police have refused to rule out that the body found is that of missing backpacker Brandon Wells, last seen in 1994. Locals may remember his parents coming over from New Zealand and putting pressure on the police to launch an investigation. However, it must be emphasised that these are early stages in the investigation and DNA tests will be required before continuing this line of inquiry.
I put down the phone.
Nineteen ninety-four. Twenty-three years ago. Brandon Wells. Guildford.
It won’t be long now.
It’s him. Better get your story straight.
Julia spent the entire weekend in Guildford, alone. Genevieve had disappeared with a man, whom she briefly introduced to Julia as Edward. The elusive Alan was yet to return, and Lucy would be working in the Netherlands for the next fortnight.
Monday morning’s seven o’clock alarm came as a blessing. Julia was better suited to work than solitude.
With only one cup of coffee inside her and wearing a new suit and crisply pressed blouse, Julia headed out of the house, her desire for company overcoming her first-day nerves.
‘A word please, Julia,’ Genevieve called, as she was halfway through the front door.
Dressed in emerald silk pyjamas and with a full face of make-up, she struck an incongruous figure in the grey morning light.
‘It’s my first day, Genevieve. I don’t want to be late.’
‘I shan’t keep you a moment,’ she said. ‘I don’t mind today, but in future could you use the side door – the silver key on the fob I gave you. It takes you through the garage and into the kitchen. The hallway gets so mucky with all you young people coming in and out.’
‘You want me to use the tradesmen’s entrance?’
‘The side door,’ Genevieve said. ‘Alan and Lucy don’t mind.’
She gave a little tinkling laugh, which sounded false and forced. Was she drunk? It was eight in the morning. Julia remembered Lucy’s wry smile when she’d said, ‘She’s fond of—’ Booze, was that what she had been going to say? Audrey had accused Genevieve of being a pothead, but it seemed she was just a common or garden lush. Julia didn’t have the time to argue.
‘Fine. I’ll use the side door,’ she said.
Genevieve came out onto the step as Julia walked up the drive.
‘Do enjoy your day,’ she said brightly.
The position at Morgan Boyd Consulting had been a sideways move. Julia had more experience than her manager expected, and she handled her workload with ease. The other two graduates, Bee and Fraser, asked her advice on several points, and later invited her out for drinks at a wine bar in the town centre, where they shared a meat platter, downed a couple of bottles of wine and filled her in on the office gossip.
Fraser then started mimicking their boss Jim’s obscenity-ridden outbursts. To the office in general, ‘What did I fucking do to deserve having to work with such a bunch of fucking incompetent fucks?’ To his PA, Penelope, when she forgot his wife’s birthday, ‘I should just sack you and get some useless tart from Office Angels – at least she’d be easy on the eye.’
‘How does she put up with it?’ Julia
