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‘Why don’t you start by telling us about your relationship with Hannah Jennings?’ says Jennie. The slight movement of the floor beneath her feet is a bit disconcerting, it’s years since she’s been on any kind of boat.
‘Erm, sure,’ says Simon, slightly wrongfooted, perhaps because he’d expected Jennie to just go on what she knew of the relationship. ‘I started dating Hannah when we were kids really, seventeen years old and no clue about life. We’d known each other since we were small. It started off at junior school with me pulling her pigtails and her thinking boys were gross, then we became mates at the academy, and it ended up with us becoming an item in sixth form. But you know that bit.’
Jennie nods, acknowledging that she did know that. She glances at Martin but the reference seems to have gone over his head. ‘Obviously we were both in the last year of sixth form together, but it’s important we get your perspective on what happened around the time Hannah went missing. Can you talk us through what you were doing the day she disappeared?’
‘Sure,’ says Simon. His voice sounds a little strained now. His face turning slightly paler beneath his tan. ‘Hannah said she needed to study for her drama exam later in the week, so we agreed we’d get together after that. I was at home most of the day, I slept until just after lunch, did a bit of studying for my chemistry exam, then did my usual workout at the gym around three o’clock for an hour or so. After that I went to work. I worked the night shift, packing in the warehouse at EDT Logistics, and got home just before eight in the morning and went to bed.’
What Simon is saying matches the statement he gave the police back in 1994, but there’s no evidence in the file that his alibi had been checked and confirmed. Jennie tries not to let her irritation show. What else did they forget to do back then? She keeps her voice even; it’s not Simon’s fault the first investigation was so sloppy. ‘So, just to clarify, you didn’t see Hannah at any point that day or night?’
‘No.’
‘But things were good between you? Any arguments?’ asks Jennie.
‘We were good,’ says Simon, sadly. ‘She was the love of my life. I bloody worshipped her. You know, she was super focused on becoming a model, and I was totally behind her doing it. There was a lot of talk in the papers back when she disappeared about how she was going to move to London and all that rubbish, but she wasn’t. We’d talked about it and she was going to stay in White Cross and commute. Nothing was going to come between us.’
Simon’s deluded, thinks Jennie. Even if she hadn’t said exactly when she was leaving, Hannah had made no secret of the fact she wanted to leave White Cross and move to London. Had he really believed she wouldn’t go, or was this a self-protection mechanism, allowing him to pretend their relationship had been more important to Hannah than he knew it really had been? Jennie knows she needs to explore this. ‘Did you know about the rumours that Hannah was seeing a teacher?’
‘Of course I’d heard those bloody rumours, they were all over school,’ says Simon, his upper lip curling into a snarl. ‘Mr Edwards was always perving over Hannah – it was disgusting. It was totally obvious why there were rumours. The bloke was a complete lech.’
‘Was there any truth in them?’ asks Jennie.
‘No,’ says Simon, quickly. ‘Hannah wouldn’t touch that pervy bastard.’
‘So the rumours saying she was sleeping with him were wrong?’ says Martin.
‘Totally, mate,’ says Simon. ‘The only person she was shagging was me.’
Interested in the more casual way he replies to her DS, Jennie nods as if agreeing with Simon. Thinking it might encourage him to open up more, she glances at Martin and gives a small nod, staying silent to let him ask the next question.
Martin consults his scratchpad. ‘Can you tell us what happened in your life after Hannah disappeared?’
‘It screwed me up, mate.’ Simon runs his hand through his thinning blond hair, looking troubled. ‘Her just being gone like that, it messed with my head. I buggered up my exams and dropped out of the football team, and just couldn’t get my shit together. It was the not knowing, yeah? The wondering where she was and when would she come back. It made me angry, adrift, and I kind of lost the plot.’
‘In what way?’ asks Martin.
‘Grief and rage got the better of me. I turned to drink, drugs – anything that’d numb the feeling of helplessness.’ Simon shakes his head. ‘It was bad, mate. I did a lot of things I’m not proud of – I was done for GBH, theft … But I got lucky inside – was given help and got clean. In a weird way, prison was the best thing that could’ve happened to me. It helped me get my shit together. When I came out, I trained as a counsellor. Now I run my charity and help young offenders who’ve lost their way like I did.’
‘Very admirable,’ says Martin, smiling.
‘Lucky, I’d say,’ says Simon. ‘I could easily have gone another way, but the help I got saved me. Now I’m just trying to pay it forward.’
Jennie resists getting sucked into the love-in that seems to be developing between Simon and Martin. ‘What about the payments Elliott Naylor makes to you? A thousand pounds every month since he started work after university?’
Simon looks shifty. ‘Look, I’d rather not say if that’s okay? It’s Elliott’s story to tell.’
‘But I’m asking you,’ says Jennie, narrowing her gaze. ‘Are you blackmailing him?’
‘Dear God, no, far from it,’ says Simon, looking horrified.
‘It’d be good if you could tell us what the money is for,’ says Martin, conversationally. ‘Just so we can eliminate you as a suspect.’
‘A suspect? Really?’ Simon looks shocked but recovers quickly. ‘Okay, fine. If you really have to know, I guess you’d call it a gratitude payment.’
‘For what?’ asks Jennie.
‘Because I saved his life.’ Simon looks torn, as if he doesn’t really want to tell them more. ‘Look, okay, some stuff happened earlier in the year before Hannah disappeared. Elliott had a thing for this guy. He never told him, but the guy found out and beat the shit out of him. Elliott hit a real low and tried to take his own life. It was awful. I found him passed out on pills, covered in vomit, and I thought he was dead … I was really bloody shit-scared. Totally panicked. But I managed to call an ambulance and get him help.’ He pauses. Takes a breath. Then looks back at Jennie. ‘When I was coming out of the worst time in my life, things were going well for Elliott and he wanted to help me out, like I’d helped him. So he started donating a monthly amount into my account. He’s never wanted to stop.’
Again, Jennie feels the pang of sadness that Elliott hadn’t felt he could confide in her. She thought they’d been close, but it seems even Simon, who Elliott had seemed to tolerate rather than like when they were at school, knew more personal things about him than she had. Why did none of her friends tell her? Why didn’t Hannah?
