Those Who Lie: the gripping new thriller you won’t be able to stop talking about. Diane Jeffrey
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Josephine Cavendish swings the car into the driveway of Emily’s Victorian home in leafy Summertown, narrowly avoiding the gatepost, Emily thinks that it’s a miracle she hasn’t been involved in another car crash on the way home. She realises she has been pressing her right foot down hard on the floor as though she has an emergency brake on the passenger’s side. The five-mile journey from the hospital seemed interminable.
Gently levering herself out of the car, she blanches as her broken ribs protest. She’ll take some more of her prescribed painkillers as soon as she’s inside the house, she decides. She tries to lift a bag from the boot of the car.
‘Go on inside,’ her mother says firmly. Peering at Emily over the top of her glasses, which have slipped down her nose, Josephine shoos her daughter away. Emily knows better than to argue with her mother. ‘I’ll carry these,’ Josephine says, hoisting the holdall onto her shoulder. Then she grabs the plastic bags containing clothes, which Amanda brought to the hospital for Emily, as well as the bunch of flowers and another one of grapes.
As Emily walks slowly up the drive, out of the corner of her eye she catches sight of her next-door neighbour. Mrs Wickens seems to be engrossed in her geraniums, but Emily suspects she’s burning with curiosity and ready to pounce on them. Anxious to avoid the elderly woman’s questions, Emily keeps her head down and escapes, but Josephine isn’t so lucky. Snippets of their conversation reach Emily’s ears as she takes her house keys from her handbag.
‘… a car accident … Mr Klein? … so sad … your elder daughter … she fed the cat …’
Entering the hallway, Emily lets the front door swing closed behind her, shutting out their voices. Mr Mistoffelees pads towards her, mewing. She tries to bend down to stroke the cat, but it’s too painful, so she stands still while he weaves himself in a figure of eight around her legs.
Looking around her, she spots several pairs of Greg’s shoes and his umbrella. A thought hits her like a punch in the stomach and hurts far more than her injuries: this is no longer their home, but only her home. Everything around her looks the same: the light grey walls, the mirror, the rug, Greg’s antique furniture incongruously juxtaposed with her own modern paintings. Something old, something new, Greg would often joke. And yet, despite the familiarity of her surroundings, Emily doesn’t feel at home. Everything looks the same, but everything has changed, she realises with a jolt. She has the strange impression that she has just stepped into someone else’s life.
She remembers Greg carrying her over the threshold when they came home after their honeymoon in Venice ten years ago. It had been so romantic, they were happy, and the unfortunate incident at their wedding had practically been forgotten. Emily hadn’t wanted to think about that, anyway. She’d needed to forgive Greg and build up trust in him again.
Greg spun her around in his arms – both of them giggling – and then set her down in the same spot she is standing in at this very moment. She imagines now that she can hear his laughter echoing in the hall. He’d always laughed louder and longer than everyone else; she’d found his enthusiasm contagious on many occasions. He’d been so full of life. It just doesn’t seem possible that he’s dead.
Oh, Greg. You can’t die. You can’t leave me. I didn’t mean to—
Emily’s thoughts are interrupted when Josephine opens the front door and hauls in the carrier bags, roses and fruit, not without some difficulty. The strap of the holdall has slid down from her shoulder to her elbow. She dumps everything on the rug.
‘Come into the kitchen, Emily. I’ll make some tea,’ her mother says, leading the way.
Emily kicks off her shoes and heads for the kitchen. ‘No, I’ll do it, Mum,’ she argues. ‘I need something to do.’
‘You’ll do no such thing. I’ve come to stay for a while, and I intend to take care of you until you’re feeling a bit stronger. Now sit down.’
Once again, Emily does as she is told. She notices the fridge is full when Josephine opens it to take out a carton of milk. She makes a mental note to thank her sister for her thoughtfulness. She studies her mother who is click-clacking her way clumsily around the kitchen in her high heels.
Having lost a lot of weight when she gave up drinking, Josephine is more discreet physically, but Emily finds her more sociable now, and less withdrawn. Her mother has always been slightly sharp-tongued, though, and this doesn’t appear to have changed. She keeps up an endless stream of chatter as she opens and closes the cupboard doors. Emily fixes her gaze on the kitchen table and tries to respond when it seems appropriate until her mother turns to face her and says something that catches her full attention.
‘If you need something to do, we could start clearing out Greg’s clothes and things.’
Emily is horrified at the suggestion. ‘Oh, no, I couldn’t do that, not yet.’
‘Well, I could do it for you.’
‘No! Don’t do that, Mum. I’m not ready. He…’
Emily had been about to say that Greg might still come back, but she closes her mouth as Josephine places a mug of tea in front of her. The tea looks as if it has been made without a single teabag. Emily blows gently across the steaming cup and sips at the hot drink. Her hands are unsteady, so she puts the mug down, making a face as she does so. The tea tastes as disgusting as it looks. She is staggered by her mind’s ability to think like this when she has just lost her husband. I’m a widow, she reminds herself, but it hasn’t sunk in yet.
‘That’s all right,’ Josephine says. ‘All in good time.’
Emily smiles weakly and asks her mother for some water to take her tablets. She holds the cool glass to her head for a while and closes her eyes. In her mind, she sees an image of herself as a patient, not in the John Radcliffe Hospital in Headington from which she has just been discharged, but in the hospital of her nightmares. The one she stayed in for just one week as a child. It was a long time ago, but the memory still haunts her. She opens her eyes again to make the image disappear.
Just then the phone rings, making Emily jump. Her mother rushes out to the hall, unsteady in her high heels. Then she teeters back into the kitchen with the handset pressed against her ear.
‘Well, I don’t know if she’s well enough to talk…’ Josephine’s voice trails off as Emily nods, holding out her hand for the telephone.
‘Hello? Emily Klein speaking.’
‘Sergeant Campbell, here.’ Emily immediately regrets taking the call. She has had a strong mistrust of the police ever since she was a teenager. And she has already taken a strong disliking to Campbell. ‘PC Constable and I would like to ask you a few more questions, if we may, about the crash,’ the sergeant continues, sounding almost friendly, much to Emily’s surprise.
‘Yes?’ she says expectantly. She starts to chew one of her nails.
‘Not now. Tomorrow. If you’re not feeling up to coming in to the station, we could come to your house. At three p.m.-ish?’
‘Fine,’ Emily hears herself agreeing while a knot of anxiety twists in her stomach. ‘What sort of questions?’
‘Just corroborating the statement of an eyewitness to the incident. It would be easier to do it in person. Tomorrow at three.’
‘OK. I’ll see you then.’ Emily tries to keep her voice even, but she can hear it quaver. Hopefully, Campbell can’t. ‘Do you need the address?’
But the sergeant, true to her original form, has already hung up. Emily becomes aware of the metallic taste of blood in her mouth and realises she has bitten her nail to the quick.
Why did Campbell say ‘incident’? Emily wonders disconcertedly. Surely she’d meant ‘accident’?
‘Was that the nasty ginger policewoman you told me about?’ Her mother doesn’t wait for an answer. ‘What did she want?’
Emily