Page 148 of No Safe Place

‘Yeah, actually, I will—’ Penny hesitated. ‘Help yourselves to tea, I’m just going to—’

The chair scraped against the tiles and she left the room. Simon followed her into the hallway and closed the kitchen door.

Field sagged against the dining chair and suppressed a yawn.

‘Are you going to tell her?’ Wilson asked quietly. ‘What Ruby thought David had done?’

Zara poured the tea, passing them each a cup.

Field sighed. Penny would have to know, eventually. There would be a trial, and from the brief conversation Maxwell had managed to have with her this morning, Ruby was still convinced that the whole thing was a true account.

‘I’d tell her,’ Zara Ayres said in a low voice. ‘She wants to understand, and she’s going to be frustrated if she thinks you’re holding something back.’

‘Okay,’ Field said.

It was ten minutes before Penny and Simon re-entered. Her eyes were red, but she looked composed.

‘Shall we sit in the garden?’ she asked, hovering by the door. ‘David’s wildflowers have bloomed. He’d want us to enjoy them.’

They took their tea to the walled garden, and Field explained how Ruby found the playscript among Sam’s things, when she was packing up the house. How she believed David had abused her sister, when she was admitted onto his ward. Taking the play as truth, Ruby assumed the other four knew about the abuse, or at least suspected it.

A faint breeze ruffled the vines climbing the brick walls.

‘I’ve read it, by the way. It was calledDisorder,’ Simon said, quietly. ‘David used extracts from the play as a teaching aid, for a time,’ Simon said, clearing his throat. ‘Along with an early draft ofDarlings, Obsessed.Paige and Callum gave him permission. He’d get students studying CBT to read it. To give them a real-life insight into the complexities of OCD.’

Riley topped up Penny’s glass of water from the jug on the iron table and Penny nodded her thanks.

Silence settled on the garden.

‘Before we could make the arrest,’ Field said, carefully. ‘Ruby also attacked two other patients from the study. Callum Mulligan and Lily Stewart.’

Penny sat up. ‘Are they okay?’

‘Callum is doing well. He’s stable. Lily is still in critical condition, and she’ll be undergoing a major operation this afternoon. The blood loss was severe and—’

Field felt Wilson’s and Riley’s eyes on her, and knew she had to tell the truth. No sugar-coating; that’s what she always told people. ‘It’s a very risky procedure. The doctors say she might not make it.’

The four officers waited in silence while Penny sat, eyes closed, hands in her lap. Finally, Penny stood up from the table.

‘Why?’ she demanded. ‘If Ruby thought – she thought David could dothatto a patient, I understand attacking him. But why the others?’

Field hadn’t fully wrapped her head around that herself yet. She let Riley answer.

‘She thought they must have all known, and helped cover it up to protect David,’ Riley said. ‘As you know, Paige Jacobs died in a traffic accident. It seems Ruby always suspected it was deliberate – a suicide. After she found the playscript, she took it to be, well, evidence.’

No one spoke.

The tiny courtyard garden could have been suspended in time.

Finally, Penny spoke. ‘David loved those kids, you know? Even though he worked with hundreds of children later, they were always special to him.

‘I know David and I weren’t – we weren’t together when he died. But I loved him. He was a good person, to his core, and he’d be—’ her voice caught ‘—be devastated by all this.’

‘We’re so sorry, Penny,’ Zara said, taking Penny’s hand across the table. ‘So sorry for your loss.’

Penny squeezed it.

‘I don’t know if I told you this,’ Field said quietly. ‘But as well as wearing his wedding ring, David was carrying a photo of you in his wallet.’