Good morning, madam. A thousand apologies—good afternoon. My name’s Phillip, and I’m calling from Global Wealth Investors with a limited time offer…
Delete.
Bethie, I need to speak to you. Call me.
Short and not so sweet, as always. I hated calling my father. It only meant another lecture or possibly a browbeating. I’d need to psych myself up for that one.
Bethany? It’s Gemma. From the gallery? You always said I could call you if I needed to talk, and…I… It’s probably me being silly, but I just feel really uncomfortable, and— Shit, he’s coming. I’ll call you back.
All the hairs on the nape of my neck prickled. Not so much from Gemma’s words, which were worryingly vague, but from their tone. Gemma had sounded…not scared, exactly, but definitely nervous. When had she called? Two hours ago, according to the log. I tried to ring her, but it went straight to voicemail, her cheerful greeting a sharp contrast to the message she’d left earlier.
“Hey, it’s Beth. Sorry I missed your call. I’m about to ride Chaucer, but I’ll be around all afternoon if you want to talk. This evening too. Come over for dinner if you like.”
Chaucer spooked at a squirrel as we trotted through the woods, but apart from that, he was reasonably well-behaved. As I rode, it struck me that this would be the last time I saw him for a month, possibly two months depending on how long I needed to spend in America. I’d never been away from him for so long, but I had to do this for our future. If I didn’t take this job, who knew when another opportunity would come along, let alone one that paid double my previous salary.
“Don’t be naughty for Pinkey,” I told him. “And she’s under strict instructions not to give you too many treats.”
He tossed his head in response, which showed what he thought of those ideas.
I’d hoped Gemma might try to phone while I was out, but even after I’d untacked and given Chaucer his tea, my phone remained silent. I dialled again. Still no answer.
Was she okay? Should I call someone? I’d never met any of her family, which meant I’d need to speak to Henrietta or the police. Neither prospect appealed. Was I overreacting? After all, I’d gone radio silent for the entire morning and part of the afternoon today, and there I was, absolutely fine.
To hedge my bets, I tapped out a text message. Maybe she’d notice the screen light up?
Me: Hi, I’ll be home soon if you want to catch up. Let me know either way?
When Gemma hadn’t replied by the time I reached Chiswick, I began to worry more. Perhaps she was busy, out with friends, having a great time and just too busy to check her phone. Or perhaps she…wasn’t. I might not have known how to contact her family, but I did have her address. She’d been off sick for a few days soon after I started at the gallery, and I’d got the details from Hugo so I could send a Get Well Soon card from all of us. We’d gone halves—Henrietta said it was a waste of time and refused to chip in, but I liked to think well-wishes cheered people up.
Gemma lived in North Acton. It wasn’t the nicest of areas, but if I turned around now and the traffic gods were kind, I could be there in half an hour. Maybe she’d be at home watching Netflix? If she was, I could stop worrying, and I might actually get some sleep tonight.
Sod it. I’d go.
Anslow Place turned out to be a fifties-era concrete box, four storeys of stained grey walls, tiny windows, and terrible curtains without a balcony in sight. I wedged my car in between a skip and a BMW with no wheels on the other side of the street and prayed it would still be there when I got back. And also that I didn’t get murdered. Logically, I understood that many, many people survived living in Acton every day, but my parents had spent my entire childhood warning me that anyone who didn’t look like us and talk like us was bad news, and although I was trying to re-educate myself, sometimes my baser instincts took over. I hated myself for that.
I’d worried about getting into Gemma’s building if she didn’t answer the intercom because even if I met a Peggy, what on earth would I say to her? But then a lovely chap with dreadlocks held the outer door open and waved me through.
“The lift’s dodgy, love. Best to take the stairs.”
“Uh, thank you.”
It turned out the place wasn’t as unpleasant inside as I’d imagined, and I hurried up to the second floor, my footsteps echoing in the stairwell as my riding boots clomped on the tile. Now that I was out of my car, which still reeked of Shimmer even though I’d left the windows down overnight in Emmy’s garage, I realised I smelled a little too much like Chaucer for comfort. Perhaps I should have taken a shower first? Stinking out Gemma’s flat would hardly endear me, would it?
But I needn’t have worried, at least about the eau de cheval. Nobody answered my knock, and when I pressed my ear against the door, the flat was silent. Wait, was that a creak? Or—
“Reckon she’s out, hun.”
Oh, shit. Busted. Could I have looked any more guilty? Probably not, but Gemma’s next-door neighbour didn’t seem bothered, not while she was trying to fit a twin buggy out of her front door and also avoid the massive bag hung over her shoulder getting stuck on the frame.
“Here, let me help.”
I grabbed the bag and nearly tore my biceps off the bone. Wow. She sure didn’t need to go to the gym, not if she carried that around all day.
“Ta. It’s a nightmare when their dad’s out at work.”
“I’m not sure the lift’s working either.” The look of despair on her face made my heart lurch. “Maybe if I took the front of the buggy…?”
“Would ya mind? Bloody stuff’s always breaking around here. The management don’t do nothing. Gemma lends a hand, but like I said, she’s not there. When she’s in, she always has the telly on, and I can hear it through the wall.”
“When did you last hear her? I work with Gemma—used to work with her—and she left me a slightly odd voicemail message earlier. I just want to check she’s okay.”
“She was here this morning. I heard her hoovering right before the kids’ cartoons came on.”
“What time was that?”
“Just before ten, would’ve been. But the telly was on for mebbe an hour after that. What’d she say? In her message, I mean?”
“Not an awful lot, to be honest. Just that she was uncomfortable about something. Then she said he was coming, and she’d call me back. But she never did.”
“He? She probably meant Ryland. He’s a right tosser, that one. Or the bellend before him. Even after she dumped that loser, he kept texting.”
“Why would you say Ryland was a…” The word stuck in my throat. I cursed, yes, but mostly in my head and never that particular word. “A tosser?”
“He spends, like, an hour every morning on his hair, the vain prick. And when he’s not primping, he’s lifting weights. Or scoring steroids. No way he got those muscles without them. They met at the gym, did you know that?”
A muscle-bound hulk—that description certainly matched the man I’d seen waiting outside the gallery for Gemma.