Leanne skulked past Mal’s office in the hope that he wouldn’t notice her arrival. She had submitted her copy, or to be more precise, she had cobbled together the required wordage.
‘What’s wrong with Mal?’
Frankie looked up from her screen. ‘Nothing that I know of.’
‘Ah, so it’s just me he’s got it in for,’ Leanne said, hoping it was only her missed deadline that had riled him.
Her friend grimaced. ‘I’d say we’re about to find out.’
‘When did you get back?’ Mal asked before Leanne had a chance to turn around fully.
‘Just now.’ She made a point of sliding off her jacket. ‘I was going to make a hot drink. Can I get you one?’
‘That can wait.’
Mal lumbered back to his office, taking it for granted that Leanne would follow. She did, and when he came to an unexpected halt, she almost walked into him. ‘Actually, Frankie, I might need you too.’
By the time Frankie had closed the door, Mal was back in his chair with his hands behind his head. His bloodshot eyes bored into Leanne. ‘I can only presume your exposé on Claudia Rothwell has gathered pace considering you’ve let the ball drop on all your other assignments.’
Leanne sat down on the battered sofa. ‘I suppose it has taken some interesting turns,’ she said, and was about to give Mal the edited highlights containing all of the highs and none of the lows, but he was ahead of her.
‘Why don’t you start by explaining why you felt it necessary to pay Phillipa Montgomery a visit?’
Leanne made sure not to glance at Frankie, who had joined her on the sofa. Her colleague wouldn’t have been the one to tell Mal, and Leanne didn’t want Mal to know she had been aware of the plan.
‘Has she been in touch?’ she asked.
‘Not directly, no, but I had an interesting chat with Evelyn,’ he said, referring to one of the Courier’s owners, who was a particularly close friend of Phillipa’s. ‘She wondered if we could do a feature on Phillipa, something that might seed a change in attitude, revert perceptions back to the pre-disaster era so she can leave Sedgefield with her head held high.’
Mal didn’t need to explain that when Evelyn made a suggestion, it was a direct order.
‘Evelyn seems to think you would be the best person to write it,’ Mal continued. ‘She’s under the impression that Phillipa trusts you.’
‘Technically, it shouldn’t matter if Phillipa trusts Leanne or not,’ Frankie chipped in. ‘Assuming you want her to write an honest observation and not a piece of propaganda.’
Frankie had tensed. She was squaring up for a fight to protect Leanne from doing something that her conscience wouldn’t allow.
Mal rubbed a hand over his face as he straightened up. ‘Anyone else want a drink?’ he asked, opening a drawer. He picked up a half-empty bottle of whisky and added a splash to his stained coffee cup.
‘It’s not a problem,’ said Leanne, surprising them both. ‘I’ll write a piece about her.’
Mal knocked back his whisky and topped up his cup before putting away the bottle. ‘Evelyn would especially like you to focus on the strength of the Montgomerys’ marriage. Something about how they have been a constant in each other’s lives, blah, blah, blah.’ He was testing her. ‘Apparently there was a rumour about an affair with Declan Gallagher. Heard anything?’
‘Bits,’ Leanne said vaguely. ‘But there was nothing to it.’
‘Are you sure you want to do this?’ asked Frankie.
‘Look, I know I’ve spent a year using Phillipa as target practice, but it turns out she’s not all bad. I’d go as far as to say the events of the past year have left her ever so slightly humbled.’
Frankie tutted. ‘Not enough to stop her pulling strings and grabbing some self-promotion.’
‘She likes power,’ Leanne said. ‘Would we be so critical if she were a man?’
‘Yes,’ Frankie said quickly.
‘I don’t think she’s doing this simply for her own benefit. She’s accepted that her position in Sedgefield is untenable,’ explained Leanne, as shocked as her colleagues that she should be defending Phillipa.
‘So why bother?’ asked Frankie.
‘She wants to put one particular person in her place, and I don’t see why that can’t work to our advantage too.’
‘Have we come full circle back to Claudia?’ Mal guessed. ‘Do you want to fill us in?’
‘I’ve been putting together a detailed plan of who was sitting where at the theatre, all in my own time,’ she said, for her editor’s benefit. ‘And guess what? Two, as yet unidentified, women were in the seats allocated to Claudia.’
‘Then where was she?’ asked Mal.
‘That is a very good question, and one I put to her this morning,’ Leanne said, enjoying the change in atmosphere she was creating. The tension had left the room, replaced by growing anticipation. ‘She claims there was a mix-up with the tickets.’
‘And was there?’
‘Not that she’s ever mentioned before. Her latest story is that she managed to find an empty seat nearby, but she was very evasive about where, and I’m not surprised. The stalls were packed that night.’
Mal had his cup halfway to his mouth. ‘Are we saying Claudia was never at the theatre?’
‘I don’t think anyone can argue that she wasn’t there. She suffered the effects of smoke inhalation, and Beth McCulloch saw her turn around at the exit, which implies she was there to begin with,’ Leanne said, but she didn’t feel as comfortable with this assertion as once she had.
Frankie sensed it too. ‘Did she actually see Claudia turn around? That suggests one quick movement, but if you look at the comments online since the anniversary, quite a few people mention seeing Claudia standing for a while by the fire doors.’
‘Let me check.’
Leanne’s cheeks burnt with a mixture of humiliation and fury as she realised her mistake. She had seen the comments too, but had dismissed them because they appeared to support the argument that Claudia had been helping people. She searched her phone for the recording of Beth’s interview.
‘Here it is,’ she said, after a few false starts to find the right place. She pressed play.
Above the rush of wind against the microphone, they listened to Beth explain: ‘She was encouraging everyone to get out, reassuring us that the fire crews were on their way, and then she pushed her way back inside.’
‘I can’t believe I missed it,’ Leanne said.
‘You missed nothing,’ Frankie told her. ‘None of us ever considered the possibility that Claudia, or anyone for that matter, would have the gall to lie the way she has.’
‘We’ve all been taken in by her,’ Mal said. ‘Unless … If we’re not disputing that she did go inside at some point, couldn’t she still be Amelia’s hero?’
‘No!’ Leanne and Frankie said in unison.
‘Look,’ Leanne continued. ‘We have to forget every assumption we’ve ever made about Claudia. She’s a compulsive liar who creates new versions of herself to combat her insecurities. She had a tough upbringing, and it was probably a defence mechanism she learnt early on. When she married Justin, she cut herself off from her old life, smoothed over her accent, and did her best to assimilate, but she would have felt every slight. She wanted to break into Phillipa’s inner circle, and it must have stung when she was given complimentary tickets to an amateur performance, knowing it was probably because no one else wanted them. Of course she didn’t go.’
‘Then where was she before the fire?’ asked Mal.
‘Not at home,’ Leanne said. ‘I’m sure Justin isn’t in on her lies. He wouldn’t have known she was skipping the show, which means she would have gone someplace where she wouldn’t be spotted.’
‘It would need to have been close if she heard the alarm and got to the theatre before the emergency services cordoned off the area,’ Frankie added.
Leanne smiled. Her investigation had gathered momentum, much like the drops of condensation running down the windscreen earlier. ‘Or she was with someone who had a text alert.’
Mal leant forward. ‘Where are you going with this, Leanne?’
‘Claudia became defensive earlier when I tackled her about the rumours of Phillipa and Declan’s affair, and I’m not sure, but I think she slipped up. She talked about Declan having a track record with women.’
Frankie shrugged. ‘I’d say that’s common knowledge.’
With her overdue article and the drive to Chester, Leanne hadn’t had time to figure it all out, but having now established that Claudia was missing when the fire started, the pieces fitted together with surprising ease. ‘But how many people know that when he cheated on his wife, it was with her sister?’
‘Is that true?’ Mal asked Frankie. She had been the one to interview Declan’s ex-wife.
‘If it is, I’m pretty sure his ex doesn’t know about it. So how the hell did Claudia find out?’
Both Mal and Frankie were looking to Leanne to say what they were all thinking. ‘Bryony Sutherland was the first to mention the rumours of an affair to me, and I’m convinced Claudia threw Phillipa’s name into the mix as a decoy. It was Claudia who was involved with Declan,’ Leanne said, shocked to hear the revelation spoken aloud. She had thought Claudia and Justin were the perfect couple, but it was all smoke and mirrors, much like the rest of Claudia’s life.
‘But if Claudia was with Declan, why wasn’t she in the CCTV footage of him running to the theatre?’ asked Mal. ‘He was caught on two cameras on the high street, and he was definitely alone.’
‘I don’t know the answer to that,’ Leanne admitted, ‘but I do know Claudia is devious enough to have made the extra effort to avoid detection if she were having an affair. And let’s face it, there’s a hell of a lot of other questions left to be answered, like why she went inside at all, risking the life of her unborn child.’
‘She might have gone in after the baby’s father?’ asked Frankie.
Mal didn’t blink. ‘Unbelievable.’
‘Are you still questioning my judgement?’
‘No, Leanne. I’d say you’re doing a fine job despite your interfering editor.’
Mal sat back in his chair and, the longer he looked at her, the more colour returned to his cheeks. He was fighting a smile. They all were.