Paparazzi, Jo Fenton [books under 200 pages .txt] 📗

so fifty or thereabouts. She looks more like sixty; her hair is still black, but now streaked with grey. She’s too thin, and lines cross her face, marring the beautiful features that I remember. There’s a wariness in her expression too, though perhaps that’s from her sudden intrusion on an acquaintance whom she’s not seen for nearly thirty years.

“How did you find me?” I ask the most important question first, my heart hammering loudly as I wait for the crucial answer. I’ve done my best this year to wipe away any traces of my existence.

“With difficulty. You didn’t make it easy, hen. You’re not on Facebook or Twitter or LinkedIn. I found Dan, but he said he couldn’t give me your contact details. I wasn’t sure if he meant couldn’t or wouldn’t, but I sensed I wasn’t going to have any success with him. I finally tracked down your brother, Ian, through your dad’s business. I remember you telling me about them, and I was desperate. Ian took pity on me, but he did warn me it was for my use only.” She looks faintly guilty, but it’s not her fault. Ian was always a soft touch. I need to remind him of the importance of keeping my secrets.

“Okay. You’ve found me now. I’ll explain properly one day, but you need to understand. Anonymity is crucial round here. We’ve changed the family name, returning to my maiden name. Perhaps that was a mistake, but then Ian wouldn’t have differentiated between whether you’d called me Becky White, or Becky Wiseman. I was never big on social media, but it was handy for keeping in touch with the likes of Dan and Sanj. I’ve lost touch with everyone else from Uni.” I fall quiet, and silence reigns until Cheryl walks in with a tray of tea and biscuits.

“I forgot to ask, are you okay with tea?” she asks Joanna anxiously.

“Yes, sure. Thanks so much.” Joanna smiles at her, and she retreats out of the room.

Bless her. She’s not used to visitors other than her own or her sister’s friends.

“How old is she? And how old is your eldest?” Joanna accepts the cup of tea I hand to her, but declines a biscuit.

“Cheryl’s fourteen. Alison is just nineteen and is at University in Nottingham. She wants to be a pharmacist like her dad. He’s at work now, but he’ll be back soon.” I glance at the window where the rain continues to beat down. It’s nearly dark, as expected for late January in Manchester.

Matt will be home at five, when he finishes his shift at the supermarket Pharmacy where he’s providing cover for someone with norovirus. He works at the local hospital during the week, but is almost always on call for extra cover in the area – particularly at the moment. While I’m not working, we need to get money somehow. Uni’s not cheap, and the girls always need clothes.

I rouse myself to ask Joanna, “Do you have kids?”

“One son. Will. Grown up now. He’s twenty-six and has a little one of his own. Although he doesn’t see his daughter very often. Her mum ran off with another man while she was pregnant with Chloë. Bitch.”

“What about your husband?” I ask tentatively. I suspect all is not well, but if Joanna’s going to stay here, she needs to be open about what’s going on. There’s a limit to the number of secrets that one house can hold.

“He ran off when I was diagnosed with breast cancer.”

I can’t hide the shock from my face. But it helps to explain the shortness of her hair and that pinched, unhealthy look.

“I’m okay now. All surgery, chemo and radiotherapy are done. But I had a falling-out with my landlord and needed to get away.”

“What about your house? You had a house, didn’t you, from your dad? Don’t tell me the witch got it in the end?”

“My stepmother? God no. Do you know, I’d almost rather she had. Instead, I married the prick who fathered Will. I put up with him through his gambling and alcohol addictions, and his many affairs with blonde bimbos. The bastard gambled away all our money, until we had to sell the house to pay his debts, and to live. Six months after that, I got my diagnosis, and he buggered off.” She grimaces. “At least the bastard got his comeuppance. I heard he’s in prison now. Locked up for debt, and GBH – he beat up the bailiffs when they came round to his new girlfriend’s house. Git!”

I’m speechless. I can’t help feeling sorry for her. Impossible not to. But how long will she want to stay?

“What made you decide to come to Manchester and find me?”

“I want us to set up a detective agency together,” she says with a grin. “You’re the only detective I know.”

My head fills with images, flashing and intense. They creep in any time of the day or night. A warehouse. Gunfire. A colleague dead on the ground.

I wipe my sweaty palms on my jeans and glance at Joanna.

“I can’t do it.”

Chapter Three

“What do you mean, you can’t? Why not?” Joanna looks at me in shock.

“Why would you want to set up a detective agency? Last time I saw you, weren’t you working as a teaching assistant or something?”

“I used to, but then I did a degree with the Open University, and got into lab work. I dabbled a bit with Forensic Science, but the head of the department near where I lived was a dick, and wouldn’t employ me. I moved into medical research instead, and I did that for about fifteen years until I got diagnosed. Then, what with all the time off, and feeling so rough, then having to sell the house to pay off all the bastard’s debts, well, the job didn’t seem to hold any interest for me any more.”

“But why a detective agency?” I dunk a biscuit into my tea, hoping Joanna doesn’t notice my hand trembling again.

“I’ve always