Page 32 of After the Accident
Jin:Sometimes people speak the truth when they believe it is best for them. Other times it is because they think it is best for those they love.
Emma:I told him that Victor and Claire had had an argument and that Claire was on her way to the airport to fly home. He seemed largely uninterested in that and immediately came back with: ‘What about you and Daniel Dorsey?’
There wasn’t a lot I could say, other than that Daniel wasn’t my favourite person. Jin poked out his bottom lip and made a note or two. I figured I wasn’t telling him anything that he didn’t already know. That’s the thing about having a loud argument in public: people notice. While I thought Jin had been ignoring my calls, he would have been asking around the hotel. There was one clear thing that anyone in that restaurant knew – Daniel and I did not like one another.
I think that was the reason Mum became unsettled. After I’d answered, Jin turned back to her and asked if Dad and Daniel had any recent disagreements.
Even I was surprised when she started to nod.
Jin:I have the quote here: ‘There was a falling-out a couple of months ago. Daniel wanted to expand the business and buy some more properties. Geoff wanted to keep it the same, or go the other way by selling off some assets.’
Emma:It was the first I’d heard of any rift between Dad and Daniel. I also realised how clever Jin had been. He hadn’t called me down to reception to ask about Mum’s health – he’d done it because he wanted me sitting at his side. He wanted to unsettle me by making it clear he knew about my argument with Daniel. If it looked like there was some sort of rift, Mum would come to my defence by pointing out that it wasn’t only me with whom Daniel had a problem. If she had been talking to him on her own, she probably wouldn’t have said anything.
It was brilliant, really.
Jin:You British say I’m a botcher. You have the best police. The best laws. The best everything. Well then, let me ask you this: Where is Shergar? Where is Madeleine? Who killed Dando?
Emma:That was the entire reason for Jin to visit the hotel that day. He wanted to ask about Dad and Daniel – and everything else had been a smokescreen.
After Dad had been named as a suspect in Alan’s death, I thought Jin was a fraud. I’d believed those stories about a botched investigation, not because I thought Dad did anything – but because I thought Jin had used Dad as a scapegoat.
I spent nine years thinking that and then, in about thirty seconds, I totally changed my mind.
After Mum revealed the falling-out, Jin made a few more notes, closed his book and then said he’d be in contact if there was any more news. He flashed me the greatest eff-you smile I’ve ever seen – and then he let himself out.
Mum and me sat in silence for a few seconds. I wanted to ask if there were more details about the argument with Dad and Daniel, but it was clear she was having none of it. She’d been holding onto those cucumber slices the entire time and then hurried off to the kitchenette. She dumped them in the bin and then washed her hands for so long that it started to feel uncomfortable watching her.
Eventually the taps went off and she turned back to me. It wasn’t tiredness in her face at that point, there was a sort of stoniness… maybe an annoyance because Jin had got the better of her. I’m usually good at reading her – but not then.
She said she was going to get ready for dinner and that she wanted everyone to eat together again. I started to say that Claire had already left, but she snapped ‘I know!’ over the top of me.
It felt…
…
When that was coupled with finding the fake licence, I think that was the moment where I really started to believe that there was something going on that went far deeper than I was imagining. That going back to Galanikos wasn’t simply to give Mum a final holiday, or to celebrate an anniversary or birthday. That there was a reason that went far beyond those things.
Mum told me she’d see me at dinner, which was as close to ‘go away’ as she ever gets. There was no point in trying to press her any further, so I went back to my cottage.
It was a very strange feeling. You trust your parents, don’t you? They’re the people who bring you into the world and they’re the ones tasked to look after you. It’s unsettling when you begin to question those very foundations.
I did what I guess a lot of people do in situations that don’t feel quite right: I reached for my phone. The internet is a distraction or a comfort blanket if that’s what you want it to be. I wanted the comfort.
I’d left my phone charging when I got the call from reception on the cottage’s landline. After that, I had gone straight through to see Jin. So I went to the table next to the bed and reached for my phone… except that it wasn’t there.
Chapter Eighteen
THE FULL GIANT RADISH
Emma:I know people will be thinking that I put my phone somewhere else, or that it was under the bed – but it wasn’t. It was charging on the table at the side of the bed. When I went back for it, the cable was on the floor – but the phone was no longer attached.
I looked both under and in the bed. I checked the drawers – and then walked all around the apartment looking for it.
Someone came into the cottage and stole my phone.
Julius:Emma going on about how her phone had been stolen was the moment I genuinely thought she might be losing whatever plot I once thought she had.
Emma:I used the cottage phone to call front desk and ask them to put me through to Julius’s room. I didn’t know if he’d still be at the pool – but he picked up. I asked if I’d dropped my phone anywhere around the pool and he said he’d not seen it.
