The Guilty Friend. Joanne Sefton

       Chapter 1

       Karen

       2019

      The recipe book was well thumbed throughout, but there was one page that it naturally fell open to every time: Crespelle con Pollo. The Italian chicken pancake dish had been a family favourite for years. So much so, that Karen only really used the book out of habit – if needed, she could have made it blindfolded. The recipe took some time, granted, what with having to make the thin pancakes, cool them, and then stuff them with the chicken mixture, before pouring over the cream sauce and baking in the oven. She enjoyed cooking, though, and she particularly liked meals like this, which she could put together during the peaceful daytime hours. When the girls came back from school, she could focus on them, drinking her daughters in just as enthusiastically as they would inhale the tantalising, savoury aroma that would, by that point, be filling the kitchen.

      A glance at the wall planner told her that Tasha’s friend Claire would be coming over. Just as well she checked so she could bulk up the quantities a bit and make a generous salad and then Claire could stay if she wanted to. She probably would. Karen prided herself on the fact that both Tasha and Callie’s friends seemed to enjoy spending time in the house. Her eldest daughter, Evie, was at university now, but she would doubtless bring a whole new set of friends home come the holidays.

      Tasha and Claire would do their homework together and then probably hang out upstairs; their GCSEs were looming in a few months and they were both conscientious girls. Callie would get home around the same time as her older sister, but then would need a lift to her dance class after dinner. Karen frowned. There was little point in coming home during the class, and she always intended to kill the time by going for a run, but now, halfway through February, her January fitness resolution was fading fast, and she’d never really liked running in the dark.

      She always found herself getting impatient at this time of year. Although the days were creeping longer, it felt like they’d never actually get to spring. Perhaps she’d just take her book instead. The reception area was comfortable enough, and you could glimpse the girls through the glass door. It was sweet that Callie still liked to catch her watching and would happily break her drill to give Karen a cheery wave and a grin full of braces. Yes, that’s what she’d do.

      The TV on the wall wittered on as she collected the ingredients for the pancake batter. She didn’t listen really, but she liked something on in the background. She considered turning it off but checked the clock and realised it would be the lunchtime news in five minutes so decided to leave them be. Without really thinking, she whisked together her eggs and milk and methodically weighed the flour, adding a pinch of salt. The key was to add the liquid gradually and beat it well; that way you avoided lumps. As the opening notes of the news programme sounded, she picked the bowl up, nestling it in one arm while she whisked with the other, taking a few steps across the kitchen to catch the headlines.

      It was clear from the newsreader’s frown and sombre tone that something bad had happened.

      A bomb on a tube train.

      She put the bowl down for a moment, to notch up the volume, then picked it up again. She resumed her stirring automatically as she listened to the report.

       ‘… an incident was first reported on the Northern Line, between Highgate and East Finchley, at around half past nine this morning.’

      The presenter in the studio handed over to a windswept journalist standing in front of the station. An ‘East Finchley’ sign, with the distinctive, round London transport logo, was prominent in the background.

       ‘… several injured but no reports of fatalities on this quiet service, which was travelling out of central London. We can only speculate on how much more serious this incident could have been if the device had detonated earlier, on the train’s inbound journey, at the peak of rush hour. The police have made no comment yet, but there is clearly conjecture that we are dealing here with a terrorist incident, which has – thankfully – not gone according to plan. Nonetheless, we saw scenes of panic as the train was evacuated at East Finchley station earlier this morning. This footage and photography comes from public mobile phone recordings, so we apologise for the quality, but it gives a sense of the scale of the incident here earlier today …’

      The visuals cut again, this time to a jerky recording of people fleeing the station. The whole place was filled with smoke and debris, along with people running, seemingly in every direction. The phone had captured cries and shouts. Karen wondered who would pause to start recording in such a moment, but then there was always someone.

      Briefly, she set the bowl down to add a splash more milk, then picked it up again. In her head, she ran through whether anyone she knew would be on that train at that time. She didn’t think so. It made her shudder, nonetheless. The coverage went back to the studio now, where someone had taken the best of the amateur camera shots and turned them into slick backgrounds to head up the various aspects of the report. As the presenter commented on ‘The Emergency Response’, there was a picture of an ambulance crew arriving, one paramedic frozen in mid-air, jumping from the vehicle in his rush to get to the scene. The next segment was ‘The Injured’ and a different picture flashed up. This one showed a woman leaving the station building, a white burn mask covering her face and another paramedic guiding her by the shoulder. Karen took a sharp intake of breath at the scene; the bomb might have done less damage than those responsible had hoped for, but it didn’t look great for that poor soul.

      As the presenter continued to talk, striving to eke out a paucity of information into something that was meant to sound meaningful and authoritative, Karen squinted at the screen. There was someone else in the picture, just behind the woman in the burn mask. At first glance, this other figure, darkly clothed and covered in dust, almost merged with the background, but, as soon as Karen turned her attention away from the arresting image of that mask and really looked at the rest of the picture, the second woman jolted into focus.

      With a clatter, the glass mixing bowl dropped out of her hands, slopping creamy mixture down her dress and all over her suede slippers. For a long, frozen moment, Karen stared at the screen, ignoring the slow drips of batter sliding from her hem to the floor.

      The other woman in the picture was Alex.