The Night Caller: An utterly gripping crime thriller Page 9

  Emma considered Carrie, her straight gaze, her clear expression. Maybe I should trust her.

  Paul put the car into gear and Carrie said, ‘Tell me about his lifestyle, where he hung out, who with? What did he enjoy doing?’ Carrie fixed her eyes on Emma. ‘Did he have any enemies, anyone who might have wanted to hurt him?’

  Carrie’s gaze was too square on, like she could see everything inside Emma. Emma hung her head. ‘I don’t know why anyone would want to do this.’

  Thoughts flashed through Emma’s head and she met Carrie’s stare again. ‘The Pusher, he picks his victims, doesn’t he? I mean, I know he targeted gay men, but Jordan wasn’t gay.’

  Carrie shook her head. ‘We need to establish if this was a crime, or an accident. An insight into Jordan’s life might help with that.’

  But it won’t bring him back, will it? thought Emma.

  She laid her head against the seat back, staring out of the window as Carrie pushed on with questions that Emma didn’t even hear.

  * * *

  ‘Perhaps we can come in, make sure you’re going to be all right, talk a little more about Jordan?’

  Carrie looked hopeful. Behind her, Paul stood silent.

  Emma shook her head. ‘I need to be alone for a while.’

  ‘What about Dina?’ Carrie’s voice bordered on desperation now. ‘Maybe we can get her to come round…’

  Emma closed the door gently.

  In the darkened lounge she felt anger flickering. They shouldn’t have made her come back here. If she wanted to look for her son, she could; she was his mother for goodness’ sake. She half stood, thinking about heading back out, even if it were just along the Salford canals. I need to keep it together, she thought, so I can find Jordan.

  The sudden shrill of the doorbell was terribly loud in the silent house.

  Emma flinched. Who is it? she thought, almost fearfully, knowing that Jade would have come round the garden way and let herself in.

  Police, a little red siren blared out inside her head. Police, police, police, police. But they had only just left. Were they back again, had they never left, had they summoned damn Dina to watch over her for the night?

  But heartbreakingly, at the same time, his name, Jordan, and the possibility that it could be him was like an itch that she didn’t dare scratch.

  ‘Stop it,’ she told herself out loud, sternly, ‘stop doing that.’

  She pulled open the door, looked at the rain-soaked figure on the doorstep; a man, an unknown one. A reporter? They had been pretty good up until now, although Dina had chased some away on the first day.

  He stood in utter darkness. Belatedly she realised it was late, so late the streetlamps had gone off. With the hand that wasn’t holding the door she reached out, flicked on the porch light to illuminate the stranger. And it was a stranger, she didn’t know this man, and he was too old to be one of Jordan’s well-meaning friends come to call. A reporter then, definitely.

  ‘I have nothing to say, nothing for you to print in your newspaper,’ she said, remembering both Dina and Carrie’s words of warning about what she should say if she were approached.

  ‘Emma,’ he said, leaning forward, his tall frame stooping so he could look her in the face. ‘Emma, it’s me, it’s Martin.’

  The hand holding the door slipped down to hang uselessly at her side. It took a great effort to jolt herself back to the present and she grabbed the handle, her first instinct to slam the door, lock it, chain it, bolt it. As if sensing this he moved forward, cleverly placing his foot just inside. With a growing panic Emma stared at the foot, knew she couldn’t move it even if she closed the door on it with all of her strength.

  He edged forward again, leaning over, coming right up close, looming.

  ‘What the hell, Emma?’ he said, still coming forward, still talking, still with his eyes burning into hers. ‘Why didn’t you ever tell me about Jordan? Why did you never tell me I had a son?’

  Fourteen

  DAY THREE

  Despite the late hour, Jade had been unable to go to bed, not liking the thought of Emma being somewhere other than safe in her own home. She had been relieved when Emma returned, dragging her overnight bag out of the police car and making her way through the rain back to her home. The officers had not gone in with her, but stood and talked for a moment before leaving themselves.

  Even though Jade knew Emma was next door, sleep still eluded her. Then, as she perched on the windowsill, looking out at the deserted street, a taxi pulled up.

  The man who got out and went to Emma’s house wasn’t someone Jade knew. He was tall, older than Emma, fifties, early sixties even, with a shock of black hair. So, not the police, unlikely to be the press at this late hour. A relative? But no, like Jade, Emma had no family, not really.

  Tina.

  With a start Jade remembered the long-lost friend who had been in her lounge only that morning. Was this the well-to-do Tina’s husband, coming to confront Emma about her slapping his wife? Jade’s grip tightened on the curtain. Should she go round? See if Emma was okay?

  Grabbing the baby monitor off the table, Jade made a decision.

  * * *

  Closing the front door softly behind her, Jade glanced over at Emma’s house. The door was open, the man was there, leaning in now, trying to keep out of the rain. In the silence of the night, his voice was loud and bullying.

  ‘What’s happened, why am I only finding out all this now?’ On and on he went, and Jade hurried down the path, along the fence of flowers, hesitating when she reached Emma’s gate.

  Now she could see Emma, holding on to the door, looking like a rabbit caught in headlights as the man talked incessantly. He paused for breath before speaking again, his next words shocking Jade to her core.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me I had a son, Emma? Why didn’t you tell me Jordan was mine?’

  Jade gasped, and to her own ears it sounded theatrical and stupid, and she coughed to try to cover it up, managing instead to make her presence known.

  They both looked at her. Jade hesitated, her hand on the fence. Underneath her palm she felt the plastic wrapping of one of the flower bouquets.

  ‘Are you all right, Emma?’ she called.

  Silence, and then a tiny nod of Emma’s head. Jade looked at the man.

  ‘I’m just here to talk to her,’ he said to Jade, hands up, as though to profess he wasn’t here to do harm.

  ‘Emma?’ Jade turned back to her friend.

  ‘I’m okay, go home, I’ll… let you know if I need you.’

  Uneasy, Jade nodded and moved up to her door. ‘I’m not going to bed yet, so call me if you need anything.’

  She shot one more glance at the man, hoping she conveyed in her look that she was only yards away, that she could hear, would hear, should anything untoward happen next door. As if he heard all her unspoken thoughts he nodded at her.

  As she returned reluctantly to her own home and closed the door, she caught a glimpse of a net curtain moving across the road. Jade allowed herself a small smile. If anything happened, Mrs Oberman would be all over it.

  Once inside, she sat in the chair nearest to the wall that joined her house to Emma’s. There was silence on the other side of the thin wall, but Jade stayed where she was. She would keep her promise to Emma, she wouldn’t go to bed until Jordan’s father had left.

  Jordan’s father! She hadn’t had a chance to process it.

  It was crazy, mused Jade, the amount of people she hadn’t seen over the years who now crawled out of the woodwork. Where were they all when Emma needed them, when Jordan was a baby and Emma was working all those jobs just to keep them afloat?

  And another thought struck her, their relationship had been based on a mutual single mother deal, she and Emma had never talked about their babies’ dads. Emma had asked once, in a roundabout way, about Nia’s father. Jade had shaken her head, her lips clenched tightly together. And even though Emma had asked, Jade had still not felt she coul
d ask about Jordan’s own father. Emma gave nothing away, and Jade had always thought she didn’t have the right to ask.

  It was a sign of how their friendship had been, that Emma could ask anything, but Jade’s own questions were off limits. Or maybe it was simply a sign of Jade’s more self-effacing personality; that she dared not ask the questions which seemed to come so naturally to Emma.

  Back then, Emma had gripped Jade’s hand, and told her it didn’t matter, that she understood, that they didn’t need any men.

  Jade had smiled gratefully, happy to let Emma think that Nia’s dad was a bum or a loser or a one-night stand.

  It was much easier than trying to explain the truth to her best friend.

  Emma stepped back into her house. Martin took it as an invitation to come in, and Emma didn’t try to stop him.

  In the light Emma looked at him properly. He was older, that was clear to see, but his hair, that jet black hair that Jordan had inherited, that hadn’t changed. No grey for him, unlike her, who had to pluck the occasional white strands from her brown hair. Nineteen years had passed since she last saw him. She wouldn’t have recognised him. Not because he looked so different, simply because she had done her very best to erase him from her mind, her thoughts, her life.

  Thoughts she’d worked hard to ignore chased themselves around her head: back then he had been thirty-five to her sixteen. She imagined what she would think, say and do if she knew of a sixteen-year-old going with a much older man. She wondered what he made of it all, now that he was old, now he probably had kids of his own – grandchildren, even. Her thoughts tripped over themselves and she braced herself against the wall. Why was he here? How did he even know where she lived?

  ‘How did you find out?’ she asked, accusatory, fierce, suddenly afraid. ‘Did-did you see him? Does Jordan know about you?’

  She put a hand to her face, imagined the scene, Jordan, somehow discovering who his dad was, turning up on this man’s doorstep. She could see it now, clear as day, Martin, casting anxious eyes behind him, wanting to protect his wife and children from the knowledge of the mistake he had made years ago, a mistake that would create carnage in his no doubt safe and neat family world.

  ‘Did you—’ she broke off, both hands on her cheeks now which she knew had drained of all colour. ‘Did you… hurt my son?’

  He reared back, and all she saw were his arms raised, hands coming towards her. She batted him away, moved at speed into the living room, still shouting at him even as she retreated. ‘Did you meet with Jordan?’

  ‘No!’ he snapped, still coming at her. ‘I don’t know… I mean, I didn’t know, I only just found out.’

  She narrowed her eyes at his words. I didn’t know. What didn’t he know? Didn’t know if he had hurt him?

  ‘Martin,’ she moaned. ‘Please, please, you have to tell me, you have to do the right thing, I won’t be angry, but please…’

  He grabbed her shoulders, his fingers digging painfully in.

  ‘I saw him – you – in the newspaper, I worked it out, the age, I mean, his age, I came here.’

  She pulled away, spinning again into the room, not believing him. ‘How did you know where we live?’ she spat.

  ‘It mentioned this neighbourhood, the article, and with all the flowers outside…’

  She stilled her breathing, hand on her chest; his explanation made sense, but it was too neat, too much of a coincidence.

  ‘Emma?’

  She thought quickly. If she could get him to talk, to confess… but she had to get him onside, keep him close until she worked out what to do. If he had something to do with Jordan’s disappearance…it didn’t mean Martin had killed her boy. Jordan could be captive somewhere, unable to leave.

  She stared at the man she had all but cast from her mind. How well did she know him, really? How far would he go to protect his family from the truth of their long-ago affair? She had to make him see how important Jordan was; if he could see and feel her pain, he might break. She imagined it, his confession tumbling from his lips and with that thought she made a decision.

  ‘I’m going out. You can come with me, if you like.’

  He paused, his large hands holding the zip on his coat halfway down. ‘Out?’ he said, ‘at this time of night?’

  She breathed in, slowly, heard the inhalation rattle her chest. ‘I haven’t yet checked the canals today, I need to go out, I go out there every day, every morning, every night.’

  ‘The canals?’ he looked genuinely confused. ‘Check the canals, for what?’

  She didn’t reply, simply held his gaze. His eyes closed for a brief moment.

  ‘For him?’ The hand holding the zip shook, ever so slightly, and he let it go, moved his hand up to rub at his jaw. ‘I’ll come with you,’ he said.

  Instead of replying she pulled her coat off the banister and shrugged it on, wound Jordan’s scarf around her neck. Her talisman, her little part of him.

  Seeing it, spotting the childish monstrosity that was an in-joke that he didn’t know about, he reached a long finger forward, touched the lime green wool.

  ‘What—’

  She lurched away, out of his reach. ‘Don’t,’ she said, quietly.

  His hand fell to his side and he lowered his eyes.

  She moved forward, reached for the door. He stepped back, let her go first before stepping out and joining her.

  * * *

  She kept her hands in her pockets as she walked the now familiar steps towards the canals.

  She sneaked a sideways look at him, wondered if he had ever thought of her over the years. Had he speculated on why she left so suddenly, why she cut all contact? Or had she never crossed his mind until their son turned up on his doorstep? And then what happened? Had Martin felt cornered, hemmed in, could see no way out except—

  ‘Did he come to see you?’ she demanded.

  ‘I looked for you, Emma,’ he said, suddenly.

  Thrown by the change in subject, by his lack of protestation, she stared at him. Over his shoulder, something caught her eye.

  ‘Emma?’

  She put out an arm, blindly connecting somewhere in his middle. He followed her gaze.

  ‘Who is that?’

  It was the first time she had seen anybody looking at the flowers left for Jordan beside the St Peter Basin. It was a man, a young man, a black coat, black hair peeking over the collar. He had his hands to his face, his shoulders shook.

  ‘It’s Jordan!’ Her words were whisper thin, but Martin caught them on the wind.

  ‘What?’ he said, more of a bark.

  And she was gone, running harder than she’d ever run in her life, towards the son she’d thought was lost to her forever.

  Fifteen

  DAY THREE

  Her hand was still on Martin, and she used him to push off as if he were a starting block, faster and faster towards him, towards Jordan. A terrible thought caught her on her approach, that he would jump, he was so close to the water. This time he was here to finish it, do the job properly, which was such an odd thought because hadn’t he been pushed? She stretched out her arms, bowled into him, grabbing fistfuls of his coat before both of them fell sideways.

  She was lying on him, he was gasping, winded, and she clutched at the material and pulled both of them to a sitting position, pushed back his hood. Her hands were on his face, she smoothed back his hair, desperately wanting to look at that face, those eyes, that familiar—

  She fell back, actually scooted backwards on her hands and feet, away from this young man, this boy, this stranger.

  The boy leapt up, but instead of running away he moved cautiously towards her.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  She stared at him. What did he think had happened? Did he think she was a drunk who had crashed into him on unsteady feet? Or did he know who she was, was that why he looked at her with such sorrow in his eyes?

  She couldn’t speak. She managed to raise a hand, a gesture meaning for him to
go away.

  ‘Excuse me?’ He was still there, his voice so gentle.

  She recalled the fisherman earlier, offering to share his flask of tea with her. Such a simple kindness that had brought tears to her eyes.

  ‘You’re not Jordan,’ she said finally. ‘Who are you?’ she asked. ‘Do you… did you know my son?’

  A single tear tracked its way down the smooth, tanned skin of his cheek. Emma’s breath caught in her throat, her own sadness forgotten for a moment. Who was this boy? Why was he crying? Did he know her son?

  But he backed away, the hood of his coat concealing his face. Lost to her now, receding into the mist. She would never find out if he knew Jordan. She reached out a hand, tried to call him back, but words were lost to her now, too.

  Martin appeared. Knees creaking, he crouched beside her, arms out to lift her. She batted him away.

  ‘Get him,’ she cried hoarsely. ‘I think he knew Jordan.’

  Martin hesitated before planting a hand on the ground and pushing himself upright. His slow gait moved off in the direction the boy had gone.

  Emma remained where she was. Black surrounded her. What did it matter who the boy was, or if he knew Jordan? Her son was gone; this lad’s knowledge of him or friendship wouldn’t bring him back.

  The ground was cold; she knew that because it was white, but she didn’t feel it.

  The sound of gently lapping water against the side of the canal wall reached her ears. She stretched out along the path in front of her, the gravel scraping her fingertips as she pulled herself forward. Moving like a sloth, inching along, the water getting closer, the darkness enveloping her now, a blanket of misery.

  When her hands touched the concrete curve of the edge of the canal she felt something, a tiny spark that urged her on.

  Do it, she told herself. Because you can’t live like this, without him, thinking every young black-haired boy is him. Do it. End it. Join him.