Shilpa switched the light on and crept down the stairs, not wanting to wake Brijesh. She knew something was wrong when she reached the bathroom. There was a small pool of water outside the door. She immediately looked up to see if there had been a leak. She couldn’t see a damp patch on the ceiling. Brijesh wasn’t a perfect lodger, but being untidy in the bathroom was not one of his faults. If anything he was more pedantic than she was when it came to leaving the bathroom orderly. She opened the door to the bathroom and saw blood in the sink. Her hand flew to her mouth and she shut the door again.
She shouted her housemate’s name.
No answer.
Shilpa looked towards the living room. Something was amiss. Immediately her thoughts took her back to last summer, when someone had been accessing her house unbeknownst to her. She took a step towards the living room, and her thoughts began to race.
Could someone have known what Caroline had just shared with her hours ago? If Roy was murdered and the culprit knew she had been asking around, then would they come for her too? Instinctively, she realised she needed to get out of the house, because it was likely that if someone wanted to harm her, they would try to lock her in. She was about to make a run for the front door, but then she heard the breaking of glass from outside the bifold doors.
She took a breath and steadied her nerves. She wasn’t going to run away from her own home. She was going to defend it. She crept into the kitchen, picking up the largest knife from the wooden block that stood proud on the countertop. She returned to the living room and stood silently at the door that led down to the garden. She couldn’t hear anything apart from her heart hammering in her chest. Shilpa opened the door. She padded across the wooden decking of the balcony and down the steps towards the garden where the noise had come from. There was silence. With her phone in one hand and the knife in the other, she put her phone light on and shone it around the garden.
‘What the?’ she yelped when she saw the two figures.
‘Sorry,’ Brijesh said. He had a bandage around his hand and was holding a broken glass. Shilpa turned to his guest. Tanvi grinned.
‘Why is it whenever I come to stay you’re so on edge?’ Tanvi said, standing up.
Shilpa made a face. ‘So, you two are back on then?’
Brijesh and Tanvi grinned at her like teenagers. ‘I hear you’ve made a friend too,’ Tanvi said.
Shilpa gave Brijesh a look.
‘So you were with him,’ Brijesh said. ‘I had my suspicions when I gave you his number. You’re never out so late unless you’re working.’
‘I didn’t call him,’ Shilpa said. ‘I happened to pass his house and we got chatting.’
‘And drinking?’ Tanvi asked.
‘Join us for a drink,’ Brijesh said. ‘And put that knife down.’
Shilpa dropped the knife to her side. She had forgotten she was holding it. She wanted to be cross at her friends for scaring her, but it was so good to see Tanvi, and Brijesh’s mood had considerably improved.
‘Mind the glass,’ Brijesh said. ‘I’m accident prone today. First, I cut my hand making a sandwich and now this.’
‘That explains the blood in the sink,’ Shilpa said.
‘Sorry. I meant to clean that up, but I got the most wonderful surprise.’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ Shilpa said. ‘I’ll do it now.’
‘No, stay,’ Tanvi said, stooping to pick up the broken glass. ‘Brij was just about to get another glass, so he can get two.’ Brijesh was already on his feet. She reached out and gave Shilpa a hug. ‘Spill,’ she said, once Brijesh had disappeared back into the house.
‘There’s nothing to say,’ she said, heat rising to her cheeks.
‘Just the investigation then?’ Tanvi said with a wry smile. ‘I want to know everything.’
Shilpa sat down with Tanvi and started to talk.
Christian pulled his tie off and dropped his keys into a bowl in the hallway. He could hear Gill in the kitchen. He went to join her, but then turned. She hadn’t seen him; she wouldn’t know.
Back in his study, he pulled out an old photograph album he had tucked away in the bottom of his desk drawer. He opened it and looked through the photos, stopping at one of Gill. The photo had been taken a long time ago, before digital cameras, when they had their whole lives in front of them. He and Gill were getting ready for a party, a party at the university nightclub. They were drinking in a friend’s house, something cheap, no doubt. They didn’t care, not back then. If they could have looked into the future, would they have seen what was to come? A perfect wedding and ten years of happiness. Only ten years. That was nothing. It had all soured when Gill failed to get pregnant. Round after round of fertility treatments. Gill was a wreck. So was he. He didn’t show it at the time, but he took it hard. He had always seen children in his future, otherwise what was the point of working every day? Yes, the holidays and the chartered yachts were nice and the achievements gave him the ego boost he needed, but he wanted more than that, and the older he got, the more he wanted what he couldn’t have. He approached the subject of adoption with Gill, but she wasn’t keen. Instead, she had turned to gin. By the time he told her about the surrogacy place he had found in India, she had gone off the idea of having children altogether.
‘Why ruin all this?’ she had said, and he wasn’t sure whether or not she was being sarcastic. She had found solace in drink and shopping, friends and the theatre. She hadn’t taken any lovers, but he had. Several, until Annabel. Then he ruined the one relationship he said he never would. Roy had been a good friend to him over the years, a mentor as well. Christian had managed to betray him personally and professionally. He didn’t often dwell on what he had done, but when he did, he felt sick to his stomach. It was worth it, he had kept telling himself, and she was, wasn’t she? Only lately Annabel had been avoiding his calls. Telling him to keep a low profile. She couldn’t keep treating him like this. Not after what he had done. Without him she wouldn’t be living the life of Riley in Arden Copse. He wasn’t stupid. He knew what she was doing. If Annabel Arden thought she was going to slip away from him so easily, she had another thing coming.
Christian rubbed his thumb over the picture of Gill. His wife was so young then, so beautiful, and he supposed she still was. Except he couldn’t see that now he only had eyes for Annabel. She was the mother of the child he had so badly wanted. He was hers now and she was his. Of that he was certain.