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Day one, we stay at the back of the house, watching movies on Matt’s laptop, avoiding the press. My finger hovers over Farnham’s number, but I don’t call. My mother offers to come down, as she did when Abi went missing, but I tell her to stay put. This is too tough to watch. And there is nothing she can do. Once we know, I will call her.
In the evening, when the coast is clear of journalists, we order takeaway curry, to tempt ourselves. Most of it goes in the bin. We eat crisps, ice cream. We drink red wine to mute the world.
Day two, stir crazy and in need of air, we head out super-early to avoid the journalists. In Bushy Park we sit on a bench in the gated, secluded water gardens, away from everyone and everything. The weather is still warm enough to sit out in sweaters and jeans. We take sandwiches.
‘We should eat,’ we say to one another.
‘Half each?’
We make bargains. A glass of wine later if you eat half a round. We nibble at the corners. We drink coffee from a flask. We have not dared risk a local café.
‘You need to eat for Fred,’ Matt says.
‘Emotional blackmail is cheating,’ I reply, and the smile we share feels like a small miracle.
We demolish a large bar of milk chocolate.
In the early evening, Farnham returns to talk to us, pushing past the press without comment and stepping swiftly into our home. We make her a cup of tea without asking how she takes it and sit in the kitchen, on the high stools around the breakfast bar. She pauses, with that slow drama of hers.
‘We got the results from forensics,’ she begins. ‘From the paint.’
I inhale. Matt straightens his back. The clock on the mantelpiece chimes a soft quarter past.
‘It was a dark orange colour,’ she says. ‘Like a burnt orange, you might say.’
My head throbs. Heat fills me. Farnham asks if I’m all right.
‘Cayenne pepper,’ I half gasp.
Farnham frowns. ‘Sorry?’
‘Porsche Cayenne,’ I say, everything I have known falling backwards, rewinding, rejoining, like an explosion in reverse. ‘The Porsche Cayenne, like cayenne pepper. Johnnie Lovegood’s car.’
Farnham nods, her expression quizzical. ‘Spot on. Lava orange is the shade officially. It’s compatible with Porsches manufactured between 2013 and 2019 – this year. You’ll find it on the 911, the Boxster.’ She lists them on her fingers. ‘The 718 Boxster, the 718 Cayman and the Cayenne.’
Matt exhales heavily. ‘Oh my God.’
‘We took the car in,’ she continues. ‘As well as your neighbour obviously. There was a small scratch on the front underside that had been patched up. A trawl through his bank statements established that he’d purchased a touch-up kit from an online retailer on the Tuesday following Abi’s death, so he wasn’t taking any chances. When faced with evidence of the paint, the scratch on his car, his bank statement, the injuries consistent with his vehicle, his own daughter putting them at the house at the same time Abi could have wandered out – well, you know all this – Mr Lovegood eventually confessed. Even then, he was keen to pin it on you guys, for leaving your front door open.’
‘I can’t take it in,’ I say.
‘It’s a lot, I’m sorry.’
‘Johnnie Lovegood killed her with his car,’ Matt says, almost to himself.
‘He killed her,’ Farnham says. ‘But not with his car.’
Forty-Six
Johnnie
Jasmine is fussing – something to do with her shoes. Johnnie feels his blood pressure rising, the blunt stab of pain in his oesophagus.
‘I’ll bring the car out,’ he says, leaving Jen to it. She’s better at handling that sort of thing. And they’re late – well, they’re going to be late if Jasmine doesn’t calm down – and he has a client in Sunbury at ten for whom he hasn’t yet completed the drawings. It’s going to require some smooth talking and sleight of hand; the Armani jacket should do it.
In the bathroom he pops two omeprazole, then dips his head and glugs water from the tap. A quick glance in the mirror.You’ll be fine, Johnnie Boy; you’ll be fine. You work better off the cuff. Downstairs, a soft clank from the utility tells him Neil’s here bright and early as usual. But he doesn’t have time to catch up with him now. The RSJs are in – that’s the most stressful part over. And after the embarrassing fuck-up with the measurements on Friday, the rather unpleasant argument that followed, Johnnie prefers to avoid him if he can.
He heads out and clicks on the remote. The garage door lifts. A little before eight and the street is quiet. He jumps into the Cayenne, starts the engine. The DAB blasts into life, the surround sound wrapping itself around him. Radio 6 Music. A grime artist, he thinks, turning it up. The name is on the tip of his tongue, but it’ll come up on the digital reader in a second. He checks his hair in the rear-view and pushes it back, pulls one curl forward and runs his tongue over his teeth. Wonders about tooth-whitening toothpaste, whether he should tell Jen to put some on the Ocado order. He pulls forward, watching the display for the name of the artist. He can drop it into conversation later in front of the young graphic designer who shares the office space; he can casually—
