Lasting Damage Read Online Free PDF Page B

wrong.
    ‘He didn’t mention your name in his voicemail message – only the phone number,’ I say. ‘I thought it might be some kind of out-of-hours service, like doctors have.’
    ‘Don’t worry about it. Really. It made a nice change to get an emergency call that wasn’t from Simon’s mother.’
    ‘Is she all right?’ I ask. I sense it’s expected of me.
    ‘That depends on your point of view.’ Sam K smiles. ‘She’s phoned me twice since Simon set off yesterday, crying and saying she needs to speak to him. He warned her that he and Charlie weren’t going to be taking their mobiles, but I don’t think she believed him. And now she doesn’t believe me when I say I don’t know where he is, which I don’t.’
    I wonder if the Charlie sharing Simon Waterhouse’s honeymoon is a man or a woman. Not that it makes any difference to anything.
    Kit comes in with the tea things and a plate of chocolate biscuits on a wooden tray. ‘Help yourself,’ he says to Sam K. ‘Where are we up to?’ He wants progress, solutions. He wants to hear that this expert has cured his wife of her lunacy during the ten minutes that he was in the kitchen.
    Sam K straightens up. ‘I was waiting for you, and then I was going to explain . . .’ He turns from Kit to me. ‘I’m happy to help as much as I can, and I can put you in touch with the right person if you decide to take this further, but . . . it’s not something I can deal with directly. Simon Waterhouse couldn’t deal with it either, even if he wasn’t on his honeymoon, and even if . . .’ He runs out of words, bites his lip.
    Even if it weren’t the most far-fetched story I’ve ever heard, and bound to be a load of rubbish . That’s what he stopped himself from saying.
    ‘If there’s a woman lying injured or dead in a house in Cambridge, then it’s Cambridgeshire Police you need to speak to,’ he says.
    ‘She wasn’t injured,’ I tell him. ‘She was dead. That amount of blood can’t come out of a person and them not be dead. And I’m willing to speak to whoever I need to – tell me a name and where I can find them, and I will.’
    Did Kit sigh, or did I imagine it?
    ‘All right.’ Having poured himself a cup of tea, Sam K gets out a notebook and a pen. ‘Why don’t we go over a few details? The house in question is 11 Bentley Grove, correct?’
    ‘11 Bentley Grove, Cambridge. CB2 9AW.’ You see, Kit? I even know the postcode by heart .
    ‘Tell me exactly what happened, Connie. In your own words.’
    Who else’s am I likely to use? ‘I was looking on a property website, Roundthehouses.’
    ‘What time was this?’
    ‘Late. Quarter past one.’
    ‘Do you mind if I ask why so late?’
    ‘Sometimes I have difficulty sleeping.’
    A sneer contorts Kit’s face for a second; only I notice its fleeting presence. He’s thinking that, if it’s true, it’s my own fault for giving in to my paranoia: I’ve chosen to torment myself with imaginary problems. He is sane and normal, therefore he sleeps well.
    How can I know him well enough to read his thoughts, and, at the same time, fear that I don’t know him at all? If I looked at an X-ray of his personality, would I see only the bits I know are there – his conviction that tea tastes better from a teapot and if you put the milk into the cup first, his ambition and perfectionism, his surreal sense of humour – or would there be an unfamiliar black mass at the centre, malignant and terrifying?
    ‘Why a property website, and why Cambridge?’ Sam K asks me. ‘Are you thinking of moving there?’
    ‘Definitely not,’ says Kit with feeling. ‘We’ve only just put the finishing touches to this place, six years after buying it. I want to spend at least that long enjoying it. I’ve told Connie: if we have a baby in the next six years, it’ll have to bed down in a filing cabinet drawer.’ He grins and reaches for a biscuit. ‘I didn’t do all that work only to sell up and let someone else get