Although the students had been sent home, the Head had negotiated that staff could work in the main building for the rest of that day, as long as they didn’t go near the field. After lunch, Claire Quick checked on the last of the tutor group waiting to be interviewed and realised that Jamie wasn’t coming back to school that day. When she checked the signing-out book she saw that Miles Westlake had signed out sick at 1.13 p.m., and that Jamie had indeed just disappeared. His name was not in the book.
Claire asked Marcia Penrose to contact Jamie’s mum to explain what had happened and arrange for him to give his interview at home.
Then she tried to raise Miles on her mobile. She was worried about him. He’d looked terrible in the staff briefing that morning, and he was never the most robust of people. It was one of the reasons they had split up, that he was too soft, with all his emotions on the outside. She’d been delighted when he fell for her old friend Sophie, and they seemed happy together.
There was no answer on his mobile. She considered ringing Sophie who she assumed would be at home with the baby, but thought better of it. Miles would need to tell Sophie what had happened to Carly in his own way. She had to think hard to remember that last time they’d all been out together as friends. Claire had been seeing the trainee doctor - a relationship doomed to fail under the weight of his working hours - and they’d all gone for a curry and a drink in town. She realised it had been back before Emily was born. Months ago. Some friend she was.
She slung her laptop bag over her shoulder and headed for the staffroom. She would call round to see Miles after school.
Claire parked outside the Victorian terrace. Although it was gone five o’clock, and time for people to be arriving home, it was quiet at this end of the street. Miles’s car was parked outside, but the curtains were pulled roughly across, and she was surprised to see how dilapidated the place looked. She supposed having a baby changed your priorities. She banged on the door but no one answered.
Claire bent down and put her mouth to the letterbox. ‘Miles, Sophie?’ she yelled. ‘It’s Claire. Can I come in? I just want to see how you are. I won’t stay long, promise.’ She could hear music coming from the living room, like heavy metal played low, and what sounded like an argument, again low but furious in tone. Both noises stopped abruptly. She tried again: ‘Miles, please, I just want to make sure you’re OK. Is Sophie there? Can I speak to her?’ A germ of unease ate at her stomach.
She stood back as she heard footsteps coming down the hallway. Miles opened the door but leant against the door-frame, blocking her path into the house. Claire’s uneasy feeling grew.
‘Aren’t you going to let me in? I only want to talk to you about today.’
With reluctance he backed off and opened the door wide enough for Claire to follow him down the hall and into the kitchen. Soft music was playing in the sitting room again, but the door was closed.
‘Claire,’ Miles began, but he stopped when he saw the expression on her face.
‘Look at the state of this place!’ she cried, horrified at the mess in the kitchen. It looked like he had spent weeks living on takeaways, and she was amazed at the quantity of bottles and cans left on every surface, and the sink piled high with dirty dishes.
‘Where’s Sophie, Miles? Where’s Emily?’
Westlake didn’t answer. He collapsed against the sink and sobbed, shoulders heaving. Claire let him carry on for a few minutes, trying to take in the chaos in the once pristine kitchen. Then she opened every drawer until she found a clean tea towel and passed it to him.
‘You’d better dry your eyes and tell me what’s happening. Shall we go and sit down in the other room?’
The look of alarm on his face alerted her that there was something wrong. She turned, strode down to the sitting room and pushed open the door. Jamie May was sitting there, smoking what looked like a joint and drinking beer from a can.
Jamie shot to his feet when he saw his English teacher. He dropped the joint into the can and sputtered, ‘Miss, what are you doing here?’
Claire stared at him. Things were not making sense. She struggled to keep her shock under control. If pushed, she would have agreed that she screeched her next point.
‘What am I doing here? I don’t have to answer to you, Jamie May! But I definitely want to know what you’re doing in a teacher’s house, drinking beer and smoking weed. I’ve been worried sick about you all day. Your mum’s probably been on to the police saying you haven’t gone home by now. Everyone will be looking for you. Carly’s dead, for goodness’ sake. Anything could have happened to you.’ Her voice cracked as she released some of the distress she had been holding onto since early that morning. She leaned back against the door, hands on hips. ‘I’m waiting.’
Jamie shifted on his feet and thrust his hands into the pockets of his trousers, threatening to bring them down. She could see tears forming at the sides of his eyes, but he rubbed them away on his sleeve.
‘I just came to see sir, to see how he is,’ he tried, but the look on Claire’s face stopped him mid-sentence.
‘And he just happened to have drugs and beer in the house so you could have a little party? How convenient.’ Sarcasm was probably not going to get her very far but she was so angry, and it was easier to be angry with a kid she taught, than to confront the colleague who was now pushing at the door behind her and trying to get into the room. She couldn’t begin to understand what had been going on here, but it felt bad, very bad.
‘Claire,’ Miles shouted through the door, ‘let me in. I can explain.’
Jamie backed away to sit in the chair by the window. He leant down and and turned off the music and sat, hunching his shoulders in a parody of a naughty child expecting a slap round the head. Claire moved over to stand with her back to the fireplace. She could not have explained why, but it felt better to be facing out into the room from a position where nobody else could spring any more surprises on her.
Miles came in. He slumped onto the sofa looking up at her with what she could only describe as the expression of a beaten dog, ever hopeful of mercy but ever anticipating further pain.
‘Sophie has left me,’ Miles said.
‘What? What do you mean, left you? When did she leave? Why? And why didn’t you tell anyone?’
‘Six weeks ago.’ He shrugged scrawny shoulders. ‘We haven’t been getting along too well since the baby came, and she said she wanted time to herself, so she’s at her mum’s with Emily.’
Claire stared at him, eyes narrowed in disbelief. ‘And it’s only taken you six weeks on your own to totally destroy the house? I don’t think so.’ Claire could feel her hands forming into fists. What had he done to make Sophie leave, and how did it tie in with Carly and Jamie? She suddenly felt scared. Scared for her friend and scared about what Miles might have done. ‘I don’t know what’s going on here, but you better tell me the truth, Miles, or I’m going to the police.’
Jamie launched himself off the chair fists raised towards Claire. ‘No police! No police!’
Frightened, Claire put her hands up to protect her face, but he stopped moving as quickly as he had started, dropped his arms and ran from the room. Seconds later she heard the front door bang. She turned in confusion to Miles. ‘What the hell is going on? You’d better tell me.’
Miles sat numb, staring at the carpet. ‘Party,’ he said, ‘on Saturday night. Haven’t cleaned up yet.’
‘Right, so who came to this party, then? I don’t recall anyone from school mentioning it.’
‘Not school friends; other friends. I have got other friends, you know.’
He was rallying a bit, but not enough. She was convinced she knew exactly who these other “friends” were, and it was making her feel sick. ‘Was this party for kids from school, Miles? For Carly?’
He looked up at her again, beseeching, but she stared back, a coldness gripping her heart. The idiot had ruined his marriage and it looked like he had done the same for his career. ‘You may as well tell me the rest, I’ve guessed most of it already.’
He coughed out the words. ‘It was Carly’s idea. She persuaded me to hold a party here as a celebration for the recording session. For the band and their mates. It just got a bit out of hand and I wasn’t up to cleaning up on Sunday. Hangover.’
‘So, you had a bunch of sixteen-year-olds in your house on Saturday night for a party, and you are drinking with them, and the next day one of them is killed? Bloody hell, Miles, no wonder you’re in a state.’ She sank down next to him on the sofa. The adrenaline leaving her body had made her muscles weak and her knees wobbled.
More questions crowded into her head. ‘What did DCI Gould have to say about all this? Why aren’t you a suspect? Why aren’t you already in custody, or giving evidence, or whatever it is?’
Westlake’s eyes shifted from hers.
‘You didn’t tell him, did you?’ She shook her head. ‘I can’t take in what’s happening.’ She clasped both hands to her mouth but she couldn’t stop the words pushing out. ‘What didn’t you tell him, Miles?’
Miles rocked his head from side to side and backed away from her into the corner of the sofa. ‘He doesn’t have to know, does he, Claire? It won’t have been any of her friends and it certainly wasn’t me that killed her.’ He paused. ‘I... I loved her.’
Claire recoiled to the other end of the sofa, sickened. But still she had to ask. ‘She was a child…’ She tried to get him to look at her, tugged at his arm, but he pulled away. ‘Please tell me nothing actually happened between you and her, Miles. Tell me that?’
His eyes filled up again and still he didn’t answer.
‘You are unbelievable,’ Claire said, anger giving her voice a rare, thick vitriol. ‘I don’t know who you are anymore, but you are a monster, Miles Westlake, a monster.’
‘What are you going to do?’ he asked, and looked past her as he heard the sitting room door softly open behind her.
But Claire couldn’t answer. Jamie lurched in and smashed her hard across the back of her head with an empty vodka bottle. The bottle fell to the ground. He looked at Westlake, his gaunt, red-eyed face a reflection of the teacher’s.
Miles bent down to catch Claire as she slid from the sofa. The shock made his voice shrill, ‘What the hell have you done, Jamie?’
On the sofa, Claire’s eyelids fluttered as she struggled to remain conscious. The back of her skull hurt like hell, and the pain was intense, like someone had stuck a needle in her head.
‘I had to do something,’ the boy replied.
Through one eye, Claire saw violent spasms shake his body. ‘You were going to tell her about Carly. I told Carly we should never have come here, but everybody always did exactly what she wanted, even you. Oh yeah, I know what you did. You’re sick in the head and I’m gonna see you go down for this.’
‘Shut up, Jamie,’ Miles yelled, ‘just shut up. I can’t listen to you anymore. Look at what you’ve done, you stupid little shit. You’ve hurt a teacher. How can we keep this quiet? Get out, get out now.’
Jamie didn’t move from the doorway. ‘I’m not going anywhere, mate. Neither’s she and neither are you, if you know what’s good for you. Who d’you think the police are gonna believe? Me, or a pervert?’
‘But we can’t just keep her here, you idiot.’
‘I’ve got a few things to do, then you can do what you like, and so can she.’ Jamie squared up to Westlake. ‘Just for tonight. That’s all. We’ll just keep her here for tonight, alright?’
Westlake lifted Claire’s legs onto the cushions and pushed past Jamie to get out of the room, but Claire realised he was trapped in this hell he had created, and so was she.
Her heart began to hammer. Had Jamie really hit her over the head? Why? She guessed she must have been getting close to what had happened at the weekend. Could these two have murdered Carly? And if they did, what did that mean for her? A few seconds later, she lost the battle to stay conscious and swam down into blackness.