The Housemate

by Claudia Pattison

Genres: Psychological Thrillers; Suspense

Synopsis

The housemate. She's here to stay....

You've let a stranger into your home. You don't know her secrets. You don't know what she wants.

Megan and Chloe have found the perfect house. And when they meet Sammi, she seems like the perfect housemate to share it with. It could be the beginning of a brilliant friendship.

But Megan isn't so sure about this new girl. She knows they need to be careful about whom they invite in. Because once she's in, she's here to stay....

A brilliant and gripping psychological thriller — perfect for fans of Louise Jensen, Jane Corry and Friend Request.

Publisher: Headline

Print pages: 384

Sample

I saw it first. The small, cream-coloured postcard, bottom row, second from the left. There was nothing remotely attention-grabbing about it, the characters hastily formed, the descriptors spare, the punctuation lacking – the work, it seemed to me, of someone in a hurry. Easy enough to overlook among the many and varied enticements in the convenience store window: bicycles for sale, childminding services, an unplanned litter of guinea pigs, free to a good home.

I rubbed the smeared glass with my elbow and leaned forward for a closer look. As I read the words on the postcard, I felt a rush of light-headedness that made my palms tingle and my heart beat faster. I knew we’d been right to set our sights high, to hold out for something that ticked every box on our wish list. Now, at last, it seemed our patience had been rewarded.

Eager to share the good news with Chloe, I went to the open door of the shop and looked around until I spotted her, standing at the till. As she half-turned to hook her bulging canvas tote over her shoulder, I waved to catch her eye and made a beckoning gesture with my hand.

‘I think our prayers have been answered,’ I said, as she walked towards me. Without further explanation, I took her by the arm and led her to the window. ‘Read that,’ I said, rapping on the glass with a knuckle.

She leaned forward, letting her shopping bag slide down her arm to the ground. ‘Bellevue Rise?’ she said, arching her eyebrows. ‘That’s up by the cemetery, isn’t it?’

I nodded. ‘Yep.’

‘Didn’t we agree it had to be a ten-minute walk to the nearest station, max?’

‘It’s sixteen minutes to the overground,’ I replied. ‘Fourteen if you’re walking briskly. Hardly a deal-breaker.’

Chloe stuck out her bottom lip and exhaled a puff of air as she tried to dislodge the strands of honey-coloured hair that had fallen into her eyes. ‘No, I don’t suppose it is,’ she admitted. She turned back to the postcard and continued reading. ‘Shit,’ she muttered under her breath a moment later.

‘What?’ I asked, unable to keep the impatience out of my voice.

‘This place is fully furnished. I thought we were sick of living with other people’s dodgy taste in interior design.’

‘Let’s not judge it before we’ve even seen it. For all we know, it could be straight out of the pages of Ideal Home.’

She made a face. ‘Unlikely.’

Sensing her reluctance, I clasped my hands pleadingly. ‘Come on, Chloe, it’s a whole house, with a garden and an eat-in kitchen and two double bedrooms. It’ll be a million times better than those pokey flats we’ve been looking at.’

Her eyes slid wistfully back to the shop window. ‘It would be lovely to have a proper house and I could probably put up with the walk to the station. But aren’t we both ignoring the elephant in the room here?’

I looked down at the pavement and nudged an ancient piece of chewing gum with the toe of my shoe. ‘I assume you’re talking about the rent?’

Chloe rolled her eyes. ‘Of course I’m talking about the rent; it’s way more than we can afford, especially when you factor in the cost of commuting.’

‘I bet I can get the price down,’ I said confidently. ‘Remember those gorgeous handwoven throws I bought in Marrakesh? Seventy-five per cent discount, thank you very much.’

Chloe smiled, remembering the two weeks we’d spent in Morocco – just one of many fun holidays we’d had together. ‘Yeah, but that was less to do with your negotiating skills and more to do with the fact the stallholder fancied you,’ she beamed. ‘And anyway, they expect you to haggle. That’s why everything in that souk was vastly overpriced to begin with.’

I scowled melodramatically. ‘Rain on my parade, why don’t you?’ Reaching into my jacket pocket, I pulled out my mobile phone and waved it in front of her face. ‘So what do you reckon? Shall I contact the landlord and arrange a viewing asap? This one isn’t going to hang around for long.’

Chloe shrugged. ‘Why not . . . what have we got to lose?’

It had been six weeks since Chloe and I had embarked on our quest for the perfect property. We met twelve years ago at an Argentine tango taster class in our first week at university. The tango soon fell by the wayside, but we formed an unshakeable friendship that had outlasted numerous boyfriends, Chloe’s year abroad in Prague, my six-month Southeast Asia trip, and more changes of address than either of us cared to remember. Even though we’d lived at least a hundred miles apart for most of our friendship, we’d been there for each other through good times and bad. When I was unexpectedly crippled by a violent bout of gastroenteritis, Chloe made the four-hour round trip by public transport to my sickbed, armed with essential oils, homemade lemonade and her Netflix password. And when she discovered her boyfriend of three years was cheating on her with his financial advisor, I organised a surprise spa weekend for us. Not only did this provide my best friend with a much-needed distraction, I also used the time to talk her out of reporting her boyfriend’s hook-up to the FCA for professional misconduct, thus saving her a lot of time, energy and potential embarrassment.

It’s strange, really, because, on the face of it, we’re polar opposites. Chloe’s a stage designer for an up-and-coming theatre company in London. She’s creative, spontaneous and highly sensitive; she wears her heart on her sleeve and always sees the best in people. My background’s in science. I’m a pharmacist; I’m calmer than Chloe and more circumspect. I love being organised and the reassurance of a perfectly-put-together plan. Our friendship shouldn’t work, but for some inexplicable reason, it does. The Japanese have a special word for it – kenzoku. Literally translated, it means ‘family’. It’s the deepest sort of connection there is, deeper than soulmates even – almost like you’ve known each other in a past life.

Until recently, I was based on the south coast, locuming at various GP surgeries . . . fairly tedious stuff, but the money was good. I’d wanted to move to London for a while – not just for my career, but also to be closer to Chloe, and three months ago, I landed a job at one of the top London teaching hospitals. Since then, I had been living in temporary hospital accommodation, but with the tenancy on Chloe’s flat share coming to an end, we’d decided to get a place together, just the two of us. Unfortunately, the task was proving rather more difficult than we’d anticipated. We’d both spent hour upon hour scouring the internet for suitable prospects, but the rental market in London was brutal and, with so many tenants bidding for a limited number of properties, we had suffered numerous disappointments. It really would be an incredible stroke of luck if a humble card in a shop window turned out to be our saviour.

The sun was setting by the time we arrived at Bellevue Rise. A last faint gauze of light hung over number 46 – a Victorian end-of-terrace in a street that seemed narrower than it actually was because of the cars parked nose-to-tail along its length. We came straight from work, both of us swapping our heels for sensible flats in anticipation of the walk from the station, which, as Megan had predicted, took sixteen minutes precisely. When we arrived, we stood on the pavement for a few moments, looking up at the red-brick property, with its handsome bay windows, each assembling our own first impressions. There was a small front garden, surrounded on three sides by a low box hedge badly in need of pruning. Flanking the central path were two large rose bushes in full bloom, their petals a pretty, faded pink.

Before we had a chance to ring the bell, the front door swung open and a stale smell of old dinners gusted out from the interior, reminding me of the nursing home where I’d worked for less-than-minimum wage the summer I took my A levels. The landlord looked to be in his mid-sixties; his face was long and stern and there were deep furrows bracketing his mouth. He didn’t introduce himself, and simply offered a firm hand to each of us in turn, his demeanor suggesting he had more important things to do. Without preamble, he led us into a narrow hall, its walls lined with a haphazard collection of botanical prints.

‘We’ll start in here,’ he said, thrusting open a panelled door. Megan followed him in, but I lingered on the threshold, taking in the scene that lay before me. It was a sitting room, high ceilinged and generously proportioned. All around it pieces of furniture stood in elegant poses, high-backed chairs with elaborately curved legs, rickety side tables, a louche chaise longue, baring its faded striped chest to the ceiling. A handsome fireplace yawned from the far wall, a shrunken arrangement of dried flowers clamped between its cast-iron jaws.

‘This is a nice big room,’ Megan remarked.

‘It was two rooms originally, but they’ve been knocked through,’ the landlord explained.

I stepped into the room, noting the absence of any personal items – books, coffee cups, remote controls. ‘Have the previous tenants moved out already?’ I enquired.

‘There were no previous tenants,’ the landlord replied. ‘This was my sister’s house. She died last year, probate has only just gone through.’ He ran a hand through his silvery hair. ‘My wife thinks I should sell it, but the property market’s pretty flat at the moment, so I’ve decided to hang on to it, at least for a year or two.’

Megan prodded the arm of a wingback chair. ‘There’s rather a lot of furniture in here,’ she said, getting straight to the point, like she always did. ‘Would you consider putting some of the larger pieces into storage?’

The landlord shook his head. ‘I haven’t got time for all that. You either take it as seen, or not at all.’

‘I think it’s wonderful,’ I said, my gaze drawn to the grandfather clock that loomed at the far end of the room, its throaty tick punctuating the silence. ‘I feel as if I’m on a film set.’

The landlord smiled thinly and turned towards the door, drawing the sitting room inspection to an abrupt close. We followed him down the hallway to a modest kitchen with dated wall units and a scuffed slate floor. There was just room at one end for a farmhouse table with painted legs and five mismatching dining chairs.

‘I know it doesn’t look much, but you’ve got everything you need,’ he said, as he moved around the room, pulling open doors. ‘Combination boiler, fridge-freezer, washing machine, dishwasher . . .’ He went over to the back door, jangling coins in his trouser pockets, as he peered out through the glass into the gathering dusk. ‘As you can see, the garden’s a decent size and there’s a perfectly serviceable mower in the shed. It’s electric, not petrol, easy enough to use. There’s a nice little patio just outside the door here. I’ve had it pressure washed; the sandstone paving’s come up really nicely.’

‘I like the pergola,’ Megan said, pointing towards the sturdy timber structure that sat on an elevated platform at the far end of the garden. It was smothered in plant life, the exact species indistinguishable in the diminishing light.

‘Yes, it’s beautiful in the spring; the clematis is spectacular. My sister used to love sitting out there.’ He gave a strangled smile and jerked his head ceilingwards. ‘The bedrooms are upstairs if you want to take a look. I’ll stay down here if you don’t mind. The stairs are quite steep and I’m waiting for a knee replacement.’

The master bedroom, with its grand bay overlooking the street, was less extravagantly furnished than the sitting room directly beneath it. Centre stage was a large brass bedstead and Megan immediately flung herself down on the mattress and spread her arms wide.

‘What’s it like?’ I asked her.

‘Not bad; it’s a bit on the firm side, but nothing a memory foam topper won’t fix.’

I went over to a whitewashed armoire, tracing its delicate curlicued edges with a fingertip. ‘This is really pretty; the landlord’s sister certainly had a good eye.’

‘Hmm, it’s a bit fussy for my taste,’ Megan said, rising from the mattress. ‘Come on, let’s check out the other room.’

The second bedroom didn’t have the elegant feel of the first, or the ornate original ceiling rose, but to me it felt much cosier. In one corner, a mahogany wardrobe sheltered an army of arthritic wire hangers and next to it sat a dressing table and a chintz-skirted stool. A newish double divan was pushed up against the opposite wall, where a William Morris paper of golden lilies appeared to be losing its grip.

‘You can have the bigger bedroom, if you like,’ I said, taking in the view of the back garden from the sash window. ‘I much prefer this one.’

‘You’ve decided you want to move in already?’ Megan said, her voice swerving upwards in surprise. ‘Don’t you need some time to think about it?’

I shook my head emphatically. ‘What’s there to think about? We won’t find anything better than this. OK, the furniture’s not what we would’ve chosen and the location’s a bit further out than we wanted, but it’s still the best thing we’ve seen by a mile.’

‘Yessss!’ Megan said, punching the air triumphantly. ‘I just knew Bellevue Rise was going to be the one.’

I couldn’t help smiling. Megan was right to have a good feeling about this place; I often think she’s more intuitive than she gives herself credit for. I tilted my head towards the door. ‘Let’s have a quick look at the bathroom, shall we? Then we can go downstairs and start turning the thumbscrews on the landlord.’

The bathroom held few surprises. There was a modern over-bath shower, but everything else was old and tired. A tarnished mirror hung above the watermarked sink and the black and white lino floor was curling at the edges.

‘At least it’s got an upstairs bathroom,’ I remarked as we went back out on to the landing. ‘So many of these Victorian houses don’t.’

Just then, I spotted a stripped pine door to my left that I hadn’t noticed before. It didn’t match the other doors and it was set at an unusual angle, as though it wasn’t an original feature, but merely an afterthought. ‘I wonder what’s in here,’ I murmured.

‘Probably just the airing cupboard,’ said Megan, who was already halfway down the stairs, keen to kick-start negotiations.

Curious, I twisted the ceramic doorknob. The door opened with a loud creak. ‘Wow,’ I said, exhaling a loud breath when I saw what lay on the other side. ‘I wasn’t expecting this.’

Megan stopped and looked over her shoulder. ‘What is it?’

‘Come and see for yourself.’ I took a couple of steps into the room. It was small, little more than a box room, and contained an old-fashioned bureau with a drop-down leaf lined in green leather, a battered Lloyd Loom chair and a single low bookcase. The walls were tongue-and-groove beneath a low dado rail and painted a soothing shade of green.

Megan appeared at my side. ‘I don’t remember it saying anything about a study in the advert,’ she said, looking around the room in wonderment.

‘No, but what a fantastic bonus,’ I said, imagining the possibilities. ‘Just think, we’ll be able to use this when we’re working from home, instead of cluttering up the kitchen table with our laptops.’

‘But I never work from home,’ Megan pointed out, not unreasonably.

‘Oh well, you can always come in here when you’re doing your online dating. I’m sure you could use some privacy while you’re sending your topless selfies,’ I said, nudging her playfully in the ribs.

‘Cheeky mare,’ she retorted.

‘Only teasing, hon,’ I said, hooking an arm around her neck. ’You know I love you really.’ I dropped my voice to a whisper. ‘Seriously, Meg, we have to knock the landlord down on the rent; I think I’ll die if we don’t get this house.’

Megan nodded in agreement. ‘Leave it to me.’

We found the landlord still in the kitchen, fiddling with something under the sink.

‘Had a good look, have you?’ he said, pushing down hard on his thighs as he eased himself up.

‘Yes,’ Megan said. ‘And we’d like to make an offer.’

The landlord held up his hands like a policeman directing traffic. ‘Oh no, I’m not accepting any offers. I’ve done my research, I know what places go for round here and I think the rent is more than reasonable.’

I felt a childish stab of disappointment.

‘Um, OK,’ said Megan, her confidence clearly wavering. ‘The rent might be reasonable, but unfortunately we just can’t afford it. Surely there’s a little bit of wiggle room?’

The landlord sighed wearily. ‘Sorry, the answer’s still no. You’re not the only people interested. I’ve got two more viewings booked for tomorrow.’

I gave an audible groan. ‘But we’d be model tenants. We’ve both got good jobs and can provide you with excellent references.’

‘That’s all very well, but references aren’t going to pay the mortgage.’

I caught my bottom lip in my teeth and flashed a panicky look at Megan.

‘Please,’ said Megan. ‘We really love this place.’

We stood in silence, nobody willing to break the deadlock. Then the landlord tucked his chin in to his neck, as if he was gathering his thoughts. ‘There is another option,’ he said.

I looked at him expectantly. ‘Yes?’

‘The study,’ he went on. ‘I know it’s small – most of it was sacrificed when my sister put in the upstairs bathroom – but it could be converted to a third bedroom. I’d be happy to remove the existing furniture and put in a single bed and a chest of drawers. I might even be able to squeeze in a wardrobe.’

Megan frowned, as if she didn’t understand where he was going with this. ‘And then what?’

He threw his hands in the air in an impatient gesture. ‘And then you’d have to find a third person to share with you. Given the size of the room, they’d have to pay less rent than you two, that’s only fair.’

Relief surfed through me but then, to my dismay, Megan started shaking her head.

‘I’m sorry, but that’s not going to work,’ she said. ‘We’ve both had a gut full of sharing with other people. We want—’

She stopped mid-sentence, silenced by the arm I’d just flung across her sternum.

‘I think that sounds like an excellent idea,’ I said smartly. Ignoring Megan’s sharp intake of breath, I offered my hand to the landlord. ‘We’ve got a deal; when can we sign the contract?’

It was two weeks since we’d moved in to Bellevue Rise and the place was already beginning to feel like home. Before we turned our attention to looking for a housemate, we decided to spend a little time getting Number 46 just the way we wanted it, even if it did mean we had to cover the entire rent in the meantime. The gloomy hallway was practically unrecognisable. The botanical prints had been replaced by a series of cheerful abstracts that Chloe had liberated from the theatre’s props room, along with an Oriental carpet runner and a pair of matching Art Deco-style lampshades. The sitting room had been brought to life with brand-new cushions, over-sized table lamps and my beautiful Moroccan throws, and upstairs, the dreary brocade curtains in the bedrooms had been swapped for pretty voiles we bought at a knockdown price in the market down the road. True to his word, the landlord had remodelled the old study and, while there was no escaping its challenging dimensions, it was now a neat and functional single bedroom with a modicum of storage.

A few days ago we’d posted an advert on a ‘spare room’ website. Thanks to the comparatively low rent we were asking, we’d received a healthy number of enquiries – which, after much animated discussion, Chloe and I had whittled down to a shortlist of six. We interviewed the first candidate yesterday and I can sum up the experience in one word: awkward. She wasn’t unpleasant exactly; it’s just that we had absolutely nothing in common. Chloe and I aren’t fussy; we’re not expecting to find a friend for life. We just want someone with similar interests, someone who’s sociable and easy to live with. Someone normal. Needless to say, both of us were hoping today’s candidate would be an improvement.

‘What’s her name again?’ Chloe asked as we tidied up the sitting room in advance of her arrival.

I refolded a throw and draped it over the arm of the sofa. ‘Samantha Charlesworth; she’s thirty-two and self-employed. Her email didn’t give much else away.’

Chloe glanced at the grandfather clock. ‘She’s due in fifteen minutes, just time to stick the kettle on.’

I winced, recalling yesterday’s torturous encounter. ‘Is it too early for something stronger?’

Chloe gave a mild shrug. ‘Quarter to six; nearly G and T time.’

‘Perfect,’ I said. ‘Make mine a large one. Plenty of ice, please.’

*

I was surprised when, a mere five minutes later, the doorbell’s weedy chimes sounded. Tossing down the cushion I was plumping, I hurried out into the hall. When I opened the front door, standing on the doorstep was a tall, slender woman with a strong nose and a big mouth that was slightly parted to reveal an attractive overbite. She was stylishly dressed in black cigarette trousers, skyscraper wedges and a coral-coloured poncho.

‘Sorry, I know I’m early,’ the woman said, running a hand through her hair, causing the eclectic row of silver bracelets on her wrist to jangle. ‘I had no idea the trains south of the river were so efficient; I thought it would take me a lot longer to get here.’. . .