Because She Loves Me (28 page)

I could understand. Not because he was thinking with his penis – though that was probably part of it. I could understand how you could get trapped in a bubble, the intensity and excitement addictive, this twisted version of love providing rush after rush. It was the opposite of boredom. It was being alive.

I had tasted that with Charlie too. But I wasn’t like Fraser, the poor sap. I was in control now. I had told Charlie she needed to seek help for her jealousy. I wouldn’t let her control me. I understood the draw of the dark side of love, knew how seductive the stormy waves could be, but I was strong enough to resist.

Wasn’t I?

‘I asked her to get help,’ Fraser said. ‘To see a counsellor about her jealousy, and she told me she was going to see one, but she lied.’

I swallowed. There were barbs in my throat.

‘Then,’ he said, ‘it all changed. Suddenly. She went out one day and came back announcing that she had a new job, a contract at Moorfields. She told me I should get one too, get out of my pit, as she said. It was so sudden, like she’d simply got bored and decided she wasn’t interested any more. She stopped wanting to have sex with me. I tried to talk to her and she said that I was being pathetic, that I shouldn’t expect it to last forever. But I couldn’t suddenly change the way I felt about her.’

I looked at him, at this shell of a man. Chewed up and spat out. Was this my future?

‘That’s when she met you,’ he said. ‘I followed her that night, I admit. I watched you both. I saw her kiss you goodbye. I texted her straight away, telling her that I was going to talk to you, tell you what she was really like, put you off, if she didn’t come home with me. We spent the rest of that week here, talking. Fucking. I called you at one point, but chickened out and hung up. I hid Charlie’s phone, which made her go mad. And at the end of that week, I was worn out. I knew I couldn’t cling on anymore, that I had to let her go. We agreed that she would stay here for a little while, and she moved her stuff into the spare room. This room. And that was it – she went. Leaving me like this.’

It was raining outside now. In the silence that followed his words, I heard it beating against the window.

‘What about other people?’ I said. ‘Did anything . . . happen to any of your friends while you were with her?’

He stared at me like he didn’t understand the words. ‘What?’

‘Your friends. Especially female friends. Ex-girlfriends. Did anything weird happen to any of them?’

‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘But as soon as I let Charlie in, I broke contact with everyone, like I told you. I didn’t have any female friends left. And Charlie was my first proper girlfriend.’

I let this sink in. So there had been no one to threaten the relationship from the outside.

‘Do you promise you haven’t been following me or Charlie around?’ I said.

He nodded, but I wasn’t sure if I believed him. I still didn’t trust him.

‘I’d better go,’ I said.

I walked past him into the hallway, my legs unsteady. My injured knee throbbed and there were spots dancing before my eyes. I had an almost irresistible urge to go home and put the duvet over my head, blot the world out. Stay there forever.

‘There are probably others,’ Fraser said, as I opened the door.

I turned back. ‘Others?’

‘Like me. Other men, from her past. I bet she’s left a trail of fucked-up blokes and squashed hearts. And you’ll be next.’ He pointed a shaky finger at me. ‘Think of me, when she decides to leave you.’

‘I bet you’re hoping she will,’ I said. ‘Because you’d have her back, wouldn’t you? You’d want her back, anyway.’

He shook his head. But I knew he would. He’d have her back in a heartbeat.

Thirty-two

I leaned my head against the window of the bus, welcoming the vibrations into my skull. The man in the seat in front was talking earnestly to his companion about how Jesus had come to him in a dream and told him that the world would end on April 1st. ‘And it won’t be no April Fool’s joke!’

I had found out nothing to prove that Charlie was either innocent or guilty of murdering Karen. But I had been given a terrifying glimpse into what life with Charlie might be like. Did I still want to prove her innocence? Maybe I should go to the police now, tell them my suspicions. Explode everything. Go back to being alone.

But even as I thought this, a text arrived on my phone.

Hi handsome. What are up to? Feeling REALLY rough this
morning
. Can’t concentrate. Why the hell do they have to do training at the weekend? Call me later – maybe we can Skype? Finish what we started yesterday. Love and miss you. xxx PS Can’t wait to live with you :) Exciting! xxx

I sighed. How could any of it be true? How did I know Fraser wasn’t lying or exaggerating? He didn’t seem like the most stable person on earth, and the more I thought about it the more
convinced
I was that he was lying about following me. Even if a lot of what he’d said was true, that had been
his
relationship with Charlie, not mine. He was weak. He had caved in to all her demands, pathetically grateful that she was his girlfriend. The dynamics in their relationship were all wrong; they created bad weather. I would never allow anything like that to happen. Knowing that Charlie was prone to jealousy, possessiveness, even obsessive behaviour, didn’t put me off her. I didn’t want a boring girlfriend and as long as it didn’t get out of control, it would be worth it. I suppose there was also part of me that relished the challenge, that wanted to be the one who rescued her, an atavistic urge that lay deep within my psyche, the need that we men feel to be the gallant prince, the hero, the only man able to tame the wild woman. I wasn’t proud of this. It was just the way it was.

I wanted to rewind time, just a few days, back before I had started to wonder about Charlie. Back when everything was straightforward.

Instead, I still needed to prove her innocence to myself.

I texted her back, still pretending everything was normal.

Hi gorgeous. Not up to much. Miss you too. Def Skype later. I’ll wa
it u
p. xxx

I sat back and tuned out the doom-mongering warnings of the guy in front. Being on the bus prompted thoughts of the bag Charlie claimed to have left on one just like this. I was now certain that she had been lying. I could picture her rifling through it, spying on my past, feeling sick as she discovered the old photos and letters from ex-girlfriends. Then, in a jealous rage, she had decided to destroy the bag. Dump it in a bin somewhere. She wouldn’t have been able to come up with a story to explain removing just the items relating to my exes; she’d needed to get rid of the whole thing. Then she made up the tale about losing it on a bus, pretended that she had been calling London Transport every day in a desperate bid to find it.

There was, of course, a big difference between the things I knew or strongly believed she’d done – cutting up my photography book, destroying my bag of mementoes – and killing someone. I now knew that she could be jealous, secretive, a liar. But those were things I could deal with, could talk to Charlie about. I didn’t expect her to be perfect. Nobody is.

The crux, I reminded myself, was whether she was jealous, secretive and duplicitous enough to be the one thing that I would never be able to forgive her for. A murderer.

I stared at the filthy streets as they rolled by. I knew where I needed to go next, who I had to talk to.

Harold’s expression changed from puzzlement to delight when he opened his door, his little dog, Dickens, bounding about at his feet.

‘You changed your mind?’ he said.

‘Can I come in?’

‘Yes, please, do. I was just making tea.’

I followed him into what I guessed he would call the sitting room. A fire burned in the hearth and Harold’s dog, Dickens, lay on the rug, chin on paws. The scene reminded me of going to see my grandparents, my mum’s parents, when I was little. They had outlived my parents – I remember them at the funeral, him stoic, her sobbing – but died a few years later within weeks of one another. Couples in my family die in pairs.

Harold came and sat in the armchair opposite mine, putting the tea tray on the table between us and tossing half a biscuit to Dickens, who snatched it up and swallowed it in one gulp.

‘How have you been?’ Harold asked, leaning forward and looking not only directly at me but at the air around me, his eyes roaming about my periphery. It was disconcerting.

‘Not bad.’ I didn’t want to give too much away. ‘I wanted to ask you a couple of questions – about Karen.’

He nodded very slowly. ‘That would be fine. But only if you agree to do something for me.’

I knew what he was going to ask.

‘Let me read your aura.’

What harm could it do? It wasn’t like I believed in any of his hokum. As long as I didn’t let what he said worm into my head, it would be fine.

‘All right.’

He rubbed his hands together. ‘Marvellous.’

‘Do I need to do anything to prepare?’ I asked.

‘Yes, please take off all your clothes, dear boy, and leave them on the chair.’ He smiled wickedly at my expression. ‘I jest. You don’t need to do anything except stand here, in front of the white wall, and relax.’

He stood before me and reached up, his hands hovering over my head, one on either side, then slowly moved them down so they were a couple of inches from my cheeks. I closed my eyes. Harold had terrible breath, like he had rotting meat trapped in his teeth, and I tried not to breathe through my nose. He made a low humming noise as he studied me. Despite the halitosis smell and my scepticism, I could feel my muscles unknotting like I was having a deep tissue massage. At the same time, I felt a prickle on my scalp; my stomach gurgled. My legs felt weak. I lost track of time, went deep inside my head, though when I emerged I couldn’t recall what I’d been thinking about.

I opened my eyes. Harold stood before me, a grave expression on his face. He sat down and picked up his teacup, took a sip, screwed up his face like it was bitter.

‘What did you see?’ I asked, returning to the seat opposite.

His face was covered with his hand, his fingers pinching the bridge of his nose. I had expected a full run-down of what he had seen, expected to see a theatrical report, but he looked exhausted, grumpy. Wiped out. His voice was reduced to a cracked mumble. ‘Your aura . . . It’s like a bruise surrounding you. Purples and browns and greys . . . Ropes of black and blood red.’

He looked up at me, his eyes watery, unfocused. ‘I don’t want to alarm you.’

‘Tell me.’ I wasn’t worried. I didn’t believe in it. I wasn’t sure why I was whispering. I knew I shouldn’t allow him to suck me in. This way madness lay.

‘Very well.’ He recovered his voice a little. ‘The mix of brown and grey and pink . . . That usually indicates terminal illness. Cancer or something equally dreadful.’

Now I was alarmed.

He waved his hand before I could speak. ‘But I don’t think that’s it . . . It’s more like . . . a cancer of the spirit. An emotional, spiritual sickness. There’s black there too, which shows that you’re experiencing great trauma, and grey, which indicates depression. It’s hooked into your chakras, here and here—’ He pointed to my chest and throat. ‘And here.’ This time he pointed at my groin.

‘This is a very generalised interpretation, you understand. I could go into far more detail.’

I shook my head. ‘Is it all negative?’

His mouth twitched. ‘No. Not all. There’s pink there too. The pale pink of love and the more vivid pink of sexual desire.’

I nodded.

‘But there’s something else . . . The spirit that has attached itself to you . . . It communicated with me. Showed me a vision. A woman, a woman who is obsessed with you, who believes what she feels to be love. The spirit is acting out her desires, causing havoc, what it sees as mischief.’

I studied him. I wasn’t sure if he believed all this stuff or if it was a deliberate con. If the latter, what was he trying to get out of me? I guessed he would offer me more sessions, help to deal with the negative energy and the dark spirit, at which point he would charge me. Such help wouldn’t come cheap. If it was a con, he was an excellent actor, because he appeared genuinely disturbed and shaken. So perhaps he was genuine, but anyone could have guessed my state of mind. We had met when I’d come here asking about a dead woman. This wasn’t rocket science. The very fact, though, that he had lasered in on my biggest concern, my current obsession, made me feel cold and uneasy.

‘There’s a cord hooked to your crown,’ Harold said, pointing towards the top of my head. ‘It’s draining your life force.’

‘What do you suggest I do?’ I asked, my voice still a whisper.

‘I should do a cord cutting. It’s not as alarming as it sounds.’

‘No.’ I really didn’t want to get involved in any of this. I felt like I was having to turn down a persistent salesman. ‘I don’t really believe in this stuff.’

He looked at my harshly. ‘Then all I can suggest is that you stay away from this woman.’

On the rug, the dog stretched and yawned, breaking the spell.

‘I need to go,’ I said.

He seemed terribly disappointed. As I headed for the door he said, ‘You came here to ask me something?’

In my eagerness to get out – away from the images he had, despite my efforts, implanted in my head – I had almost forgotten why I’d come here.

‘Oh, yes. Of course.’

I showed him my phone, a recent photo of Charlie on the screen, smiling at the camera.

‘Is this your girlfriend?’ Harold asked.

‘Yes. Have you ever seen her near here?’

‘I don’t know. Maybe.’ He squinted at the picture. Then, unexpectedly, he grabbed my arm. His fingers were sharp and dug into the bone of my arm. ‘But this woman . . . there’s a darkness about her aura too. It’s screaming at me, even through a photograph. Black and red. Blood red. She’s dangerous, Andrew.’ He hissed in my face, a noseful of halitosis. ‘
Dangerous
.’

I snatched my arm away, rubbed at it. I felt terribly claustrophobic, scared, desperate to get away.

‘Be careful,’ he said, as I yanked open the door. ‘Please. Be careful.’

There was one more place I needed to go before I went home. King’s College Hospital, which dominated Denmark Hill, not far from my flat. Charlie’s old workplace, where she’d met Fraser. I remembered reading in the newspaper reports about Kristi’s attack that she was being cared for there. It had been weeks ago but I guessed she would still be there, given the severity of her injuries.

As I entered the hospital, I had a growing sense of a clock ticking. I needed to resolve the swirling questions in my head before Charlie got back. Otherwise, how would I be able to act normal around her? So far, all I had were questions and doubts. Everything was ambiguous.

I wasn’t sure which ward she would be in but, after consulting the board in the lobby, I figured she would most likely be in the Brunel Ward, where patients undergoing facial surgery stayed. I would try there first.