I swallow. She’s really scaring me now. With what’s happening back at Lakeview, I’m not sure how many more nasty surprises I can handle.
‘I thought I could make it go away,’ Paige says, her voice breaking. ‘But I couldn’t, see? It all ran away with me and now I can’t sleep at the house any more. I’ve gone back to my parents’.’
I stare at her, my mind racing to catch up. ‘What are you talking about? What do you mean about making it go away?’
She leans in, her voice barely audible. ‘Can you remember the new friend I told you about? The one I met at Pilates?’
I frown, thinking back. She’d mentioned getting friendly with a woman.
‘It turns out she wasn’t a real friend. She was only really interested in finding out about you and Dev.’
‘What?’ I whisper. ‘Was she a reporter? What did she want to know?’
‘She wasn’t a reporter,’ Paige says, her eyes wide and glassy. ‘I’m still not sure who she was, but … we got really friendly. Started going out to bars after the class … you know, like we used to do sometimes?’
I nod, forcing myself to stay quiet and let her speak.
‘One night I had far too much to drink. It had been a bad week at work and I’d failed an assignment at college and,anyway, it was just after those photos were posted online and I felt annoyed at what I thought was you bragging. My friend got me talking about you, and I told her about … I told her about Beth dying and how you won’t talk to anyone about it. Sorry.’ She bites her lip and looks at the wall. ‘I told her you had a secret even I didn’t know and you hadn’t told Dev about it.’
‘Oh, no.’ I cover my eyes with a hand.
‘I’m sorry, Merri. I was an idiot, I know that now. Thing is … I was pretty wasted. I can’t even remember some of what I told her about you and Dev.’
I look at her, fury burning in my eyes but when I see how wretched she looks, I bite back my response. ‘What was her name?’ I say, instead.
‘Pamela. Pamela Boreham.’
Pamela Boreham… It doesn’t ring a bell. What aboutPam? But no. Definitely nobody I can recall with that name. Maybe there’s nothing to it, just another nosy person out for info.
I shrug. ‘I don’t know anyone who goes by that name. You should’ve told me sooner! Is this what you tried to call me about? I wish you’d left a voicemail or sent a message, so I knew what you were dealing with.’ I reach out and place a hand over hers.
‘How could I? I know how private you are and … I trusted her. I admit I felt sort of dumped when you left so suddenly.’ She looks down at her hands. ‘I can see how petty I was now. I mean, of course you left to live in your beautiful new house. Who wouldn’t?’
‘But surely that’s not the reason you’ve moved out of the house?’ I frown. ‘It looked trashed when I walked in earlier.’
‘That’s just it. I didn’t do that. I came back from work one day and someone had been inside. Broken the glass in the kitchen door and turned the key to get in.’ She grimaces.‘The key you told me not to leave in the door for security reasons.’
‘My God! Did they take anything? Did you report it to the police?’
She shakes her head. ‘I got a text message saying, “Tell the police and you’re dead.”’
‘What?’ My hands fly up to my face. ‘But this is terrible, Paige! Who on earth would send something like that? It must be connected to that Pamela woman. I can’t believe you didn’t come to us for help!’
‘I didn’t want to seem ungrateful. You and Dev had been so kind, letting me stay there. I got the glass replaced and decided I’d move out and hope things would just blow over. I knew I only had until the end of your tenancy anyway, so Mum said I could move back home until then.’
I touch her hand, my anger replaced with concern. ‘I can see the toll this has taken on your health, Paige.’
‘I’ve been off sick since it happened, but I blame myself. After she got all the gory details off me, Pamela disappeared off the face of the earth. She stopped going to Pilates, her phone number became discontinued … That was when it occurred to me. What happened at the house could have been something to do with her.’
‘Just going back to the break-in, what did they take?’
‘Nothing. They were obviously looking for something, but I don’t know what.’ She sighs, hangs her head. ‘Pamela seemed so genuine. I still can’t believe she played me like that. If I ever see her again, I’ll –’
‘Paige!’ She looks alarmed at my interruption, but I just had a light-bulb moment that can’t wait. ‘Have you got a photograph of her? Of Pamela?’
Her face brightens slightly. ‘Yes, I have. I always thought it weird she never wanted me to post anything on Facebook,and claimed she didn’t do social media. I wonder now whether “Pamela” was even her real name.’
She takes her phone out of her handbag and swipes through the numerous thumbnails of photographs, her hands trembling slightly. ‘I managed to snap a selfie of us the night she got the information out of me. She told me to delete it as we left, but I didn’t. Here we go.’
