‘He’s probably forgotten his keys,’ muttered Angelica, and made her way to the hall.
It left Sasha to pick up the last of the nuts and shovel them into the pockets of her cheeks as fast as possible. She heard the door open, and crunched on them hurriedly. By the time her mother returned, there was nothing on her plate that would spark a stand-up row. Then again, the figure that followed her into the kitchen wasn’t her father.
‘From the gas,’ said the man with the ID necklace when Sasha looked up from the table. ‘Sorry to disturb. I’ll just take a reading and be gone.’
Vernon English wasn’t exactly a master of disguise. He had a whole bundle of fake identities to call upon. It’s just he looked the same whichever one he chose to wear: a little out of shape, with tangled, receding hair that was just begging to be hidden under his beloved cap. Arriving in the kitchen behind Angelica Savage, he tried hard not to show too much of an interest in his surroundings. The girl looked surprised to see him, but not suspicious, while the toddler in the high chair shrieked in delight and threw out her arms.
‘Hello, little one!’ Vernon reached out to ruffle her hair, only to remind himself that this might be deemed inappropriate behaviour for a representative of the power company. The last thing he needed was an official complaint, mostly because the ID around his neck was totally fake. ‘Cute kid,’ he said instead, and turned to find Angelica watching him with her arms folded.
‘The meter is over there,’ she said, and gestured at a cupboard in a recess beside the French windows.
‘As good as done,’ said Vernon, and got on with the task at hand.
Some months earlier, the private investigator had picked up a job lot of radio bugs on eBay. This was the first time he’d put one into use. Although highly illegal for the task he had in mind, in his opinion it was a fast track to nailing Titus Savage. Not just for his business dealings but his possible involvement in the death of Lulabelle Hart. The device was the size of a watch battery, and stuck snugly onto the side of the gas meter as he jotted down the numbers on a clipboard he’d brought with him. ‘That’s me done,’ he said, rising to his feet. He turned to address Angelica once more, only to find the man of the house at the kitchen door.
‘Something smells good,’ said Titus, as Vernon suddenly pretended to look busy with his clipboard. ‘What’s for supper?’
‘It’s served and ready to go,’ said Angelica, before raising one eyebrow at the man in the corner.
‘Oh, don’t let me stop you.’ Vernon kept his head down on making his way to the door. Sometimes making face to face contact with his target was unavoidable, but it couldn’t happen more than once. Not without attracting suspicion. ‘Bon appetit!’
As he left, both Titus and Angelica exchanged a puzzled look.
‘Since when did the gas man ever sound so cheery?’ he asked.
‘The guy seemed a bit too interested in little Kat,’ said Sasha, who by now had cleared her plate. ‘Most probably a paedo.’
Titus turned to peer into the hall. By then, the man was gone. He faced back at the three girls in his life, and dismissed their concerns with a chuckle.
‘So the gas man is a nice guy. That doesn’t make him dodgy. Though I have to say it seems like only yesterday that I paid the last bill.’ Titus sighed, and then smiled fondly at the little one straining to escape from her high chair so that she could reach her father. Carefully, he lifted her out and held her up. ‘And how are you, my little beauty!’
‘Never better,’ said Angelica, and began to bring the plates across to the table. ‘She bit Sasha’s finger just now. Almost drew blood.’
‘Did she?’ Titus looked around, still holding the little girl aloft, and then brought her down for a cuddle. ‘Then, you know what this means?’
‘I do indeed,’ said Angelica.
‘Who would have thought?’ said Titus. ‘The last of my children is set to join us in the family way.’
‘It’s quite an achievement,’ Angelica agreed, as Sasha took her empty plate to the dishwasher. ‘Have you had enough to eat?’ she asked her.
‘I’m good thanks.’ Sasha headed for the door, and willed herself not to look at the plates on the table. No matter how she tried to sell it to herself, mash, peas and nuts just didn’t feel like a complete meal. ‘I’ll be in my room,’ she said, and glanced at her mother. ‘Got to revise this month.’
‘Can you tell Grandpa that I’ll blend his supper as soon as it’s cooled. And send Ivan down now. You know how those two like their pork. There’s even extra in the pan.’
Sasha reminded herself not to react. Despite the dig from her mother, there was no way that her dad could find out about her pledge. Heading out of the kitchen, she caught his eye, and saw only pride in his expression.
‘I admire your commitment,’ said Titus, and jiggled his youngest daughter in his arms. ‘It’s a shame you won’t be eating with us, but all the more reason to look forward to a feast. One that none of us will ever forget!’
15
Angelica had never imagined that she would marry a man like Titus. As a young woman, she was fiercely independent, while Titus was clearly looking to settle down and start a family. What seduced Angelica was his sense of chivalry and sensitivity towards her. Looking back, it could be said that Titus waited for her to fall in love with him, before striking with his secret. By then, it was too late. Angelica was smitten. She would do anything for him, knowing that he would do likewise for her.
‘We are what we eat,’ he once told her. ‘That makes you and me so very special as a couple.’
With a baby on the way, while Titus forged his career in the city, Angelica quickly found her feet as a homemaker. She surprised herself at how much pride she took in making things look as perfect as possible. The house was run down when they bought it, which presented Angelica with a much-needed challenge.
Back then, the renovation, decoration and furnishing of each room served as a means for her to forget about the one aspect of their lives that should’ve disgusted her. Having found a way to cope with the horror, Angelica even discovered that she enjoyed the preparation and consumption of human flesh, as well as all the cuts that your average cannibal might discard. It was a waste, they both agreed, and a lost opportunity. Through their eyes, the carcass of a once healthy human being was a banquet waiting to happen. Drawing upon the skills handed down to Titus by his father, she learned to extract the thymus gland from the chest cavity, just below the neck. Raw, it was just a spongy lump. Soaked in vinegar and then flash fried, it became the most glorious of sweetmeats, and the perfect appetiser before the serious business of eating began. And unlike any other food she had tasted in her life, Angelica found that often it was perfectly possible to finish off an entire body between two. At times, in fact, the feasting could transform into a frenzy. It would begin soon after the starters, with the central dishes stuffed away at an unnatural rate, before things finally slowed with dessert, when a profound sense of peace and satisfaction set in.
‘It’s like a drug,’ Titus once explained. ‘If everyone knew that feasting on human flesh sent such signals to the brain, we would eat ourselves out of existence!’
It took a decade of married life for Angelica to come to terms with what she had become. In that time, she tried to reason with herself that it wasn’t something they did frequently. It was Titus who decided when the time felt right, and that amounted to no more than half a dozen times a year. They weren’t like addicts or anything. Everything was under control.