No Place Like Home Jane Renshaw (best books to read for beginners TXT) 📖

his side, gripping his hand, whispering one word – ‘Don’t’ – before going to Max and taking him in her arms, and saying to the policemen, ‘I suppose he’s allowed to get dressed?’

When they nodded, she hustled him back up the stairs to his room.

23

After Kirsty had called David to break the news that Max had been arrested, Bram said, ‘We have to tell the police what really happened. We have to tell them what I did. We can’t let Max take the blame for it.’

‘That’s not what we’re doing.’ Kirsty leant back against the front door wearily. ‘There can’t be any evidence against Max, because he didn’t do it. That’s what I told him. I told him to tell the truth, but not to say anything about the “patrol” he was on that night with Dad and Fraser – that would just confuse the issue.’

‘But Max–’ Oh Jesus. ‘They’re going to question him. Browbeat him!’ He must be so scared.

‘It’ll be fine. Scott will look after him. They’ll have to release him within twenty-four hours or charge him, and they don’t have enough – they can’t have enough – to do that. How much worse is it going to be for Max if we’re convicted of this? We have to hold our nerve.’

‘You mean we’re the real suspects, and Max has been arrested to push us to confess?’

‘It’s possible, isn’t it? But there’s no need to panic. Hopefully the tarp will have prevented any forensic evidence from Finn being transferred to the car, but even if they do find something, Max was in that fight with Finn. Any of Finn’s blood inside the car could be explained by that. His blood getting on Max’s top, and Max chucking the top into the boot. Or even just onto his hands. Max opens the boot, grabs something, transfers the blood…’

‘But there might be other evidence. Something from the car, fibres or whatever, transferred to Finn’s body.’

‘He was completely wrapped in the tarp.’ Kirsty frowned. ‘And we’ve destroyed all the cameras–’ She broke off as her phone buzzed. ‘Oh, hi, Dad. Yes… No, not yet, but I suppose we… Okay. Okay. Thanks.’ She ended the call. ‘Dad’s going to organise a lawyer for Max. I couldn’t really refuse, but I don’t think it’s in Max’s interests to go No comment as a lawyer would probably advise him. He just needs to tell the truth.’

Bram nodded. ‘But hopefully Max will heed your advice and do that, lawyer or no lawyer. If he–’

‘Bertie-cam!’ Kirsty interrupted. ‘Phoebe’s so obsessive about it, I bet she made Bertie wear it that night, when he was out on patrol.’

‘She did – I saw her attach it. But that’s okay. Bertie was nowhere near us. If he had been, he’d have come up to greet us. Chances are he was with David and Max all night.’

‘Exactly,’ said Kirsty, a smile curving her mouth. ‘And if that’s the case, the footage might prove that Max couldn’t have killed Finn. It’ll show Max on patrol, and then us coming to get him… And you can say you sat up on watch all night and Max didn’t leave the house again. Max just has to tell them about the patrol, and we’ll produce the Bertie-cam footage…’

‘Okay.’ This could work! ‘Okay, yes, but what about Fraser? The footage might exonerate David and Max, but Fraser was off on his own.’

‘Let’s just concentrate on Max for now, Bram.’

Phoebe’s room was in darkness. Bram opened the curtains and Kirsty sat on the bed and gently touched Phoebe’s sleeping face. ‘Phoebe? Darling?’

‘Mm?’ she opened one eye.

‘Where do you keep Bertie-cam? Is it somewhere in here?’

‘In my treasure box,’ she said, suddenly awake, sitting up in bed and looking past Kirsty to the door. ‘Is Bertie here?’

‘No. We just need to take a look at what’s on the camera.’

‘Can I look?’

‘You can get dressed and then have your breakfast. Then we’ll see.’

Phoebe kept her ‘treasure box’, a little oak box they’d picked up at an antiques fair, on top of her chest of drawers. It contained her favourite hair slides and some pottery animals and a misshapen, mutant sweet she had become too fond of to eat. And Bertie-cam.

‘What on earth are we going to tell her about Max?’ Kirsty hissed as they headed back downstairs.

‘We can just say Max has gone with the police to answer some questions.’

Bram sat down at the kitchen table and removed the SD card from the camera. He plugged it into his laptop and they began going through the footage. The early stuff was just Bertie plodding about the house hoovering up crumbs. Then he was running about outside. The camera was a fish-eye one that gave a wide-angled view of Bertie’s world, and there was audio, and they couldn’t help smiling at the sweet snuffling sounds he made as he went about his business.

Then Bertie was back in the kitchen, presumably just after Phoebe had attached the camera on that fateful night.

‘Come on, then, boy,’ said David’s voice.

Now David and Fraser were in shot in the Walton Room, and Kirsty, telling them to be careful and not confront anyone. Each person’s knees came into close-up one after the other as Bertie went around the room getting petted: David, Fraser, Phoebe and Kirsty. Then he was following David and Fraser out onto the verandah, and off out into the dark, at which point the view changed to infrared, David and Fraser’s outlines glowing white and yellow and orange.

They fast-forwarded through the patrol of the paddock and then the wood. And then a third figure appeared – Max – and they switched to real speed. The image juddered as Bertie bounded over to greet him.

‘Hi, Bertie!’ said Max. ‘I’ve come to help with the patrol,’ he added to the men.

‘Good lad!’ said David. ‘More the merrier.’

Kirsty clicked fast-forward again. Bertie, as they’d hoped, stayed close to Max and David throughout – they didn’t let him run off on his own. Fraser