A Bitter Feast

by Deborah Crombie

  “Doug.”

  He gasped and stood, just catching the laptop before it crashed to the floor. His eyes looked enormous behind the round lenses of his glasses. “Melody! What the— You scared the crap—” He stopped, and she saw his Adam’s apple move as he swallowed hard. Clutching the laptop to his chest, he said, “Listen, Melody, I want to talk to you—”

  “Not now, Doug.” She took a step farther in. “Something’s happened. I’ve got to ring Duncan, and then I need your help.”

  The bird park in Bourton-on-the-Water turned out to be much more enjoyable than Gemma had anticipated. It was well-planned and in a lovely setting, along the River Windrush and within walking distance of the village center. All three children enjoyed the exhibits, especially the penguins and the dinosaur trail, although Charlotte had got a bit whiny by the end. To keep the peace, Gemma bought her a stuffed flamingo in the gift shop, as well as books and puzzles for the boys.

  Afterwards, they walked back along the Windrush to the town center, where Addie chose a café on the river called the Rose Tree for their lunch. After Addie had a friendly word with the hostess, they were given a table in the front window, with a view of the riverside.

  “Go on, have a glass of wine, Gemma,” Addie encouraged when they placed their orders. “You’re not driving, and you’ve had quite the weekend.”

  “You’ve been too generous, looking after us all,” Gemma responded, but she took Addie’s advice and ordered a glass of white wine to go with the grilled aubergine salad Addie had recommended. The menu had a special gin section, and reading through it had made Gemma think of Jack Doyle with a pang, remembering the Cotswolds Dry Gin he’d insisted she try.

  “Have you heard from Duncan?” Addie asked. The children were occupied, Toby reading aloud to Charlotte from the book on penguins Gemma had bought him, Kit engrossed in something on his mobile even though electronics at the table were against their usual family rules.

  Gemma had repeatedly checked for messages while they’d been at the bird park, and again just as they’d walked in. “No, nothing,” she said.

  “I’m sure he’s fine. I have every confidence in Dr. Saunders.”

  “Yes, and Duncan did seem a bit brighter this morning. But—” Gemma struggled to put her worries into words. “I think he somehow feels responsible for what happened—not at fault, just responsible. A sort of debt, because he lived and they didn’t, Nell and Fergus O’Reilly. I hate for him to go home with that weighing on him.”

  “Are the police no further forward? With either matter,” Addie added circumspectly, with a glance at the children.

  “I’ve not heard anything, but then I’m not exactly in the loop.”

  When their food arrived, it was as good as Addie had promised, and Gemma was soon busy with making sure the younger two children minded their manners.

  “Can we look at the ducks, Mummy?” Charlotte asked when the children had finished.

  “If Kit goes with you,” Gemma said, lingering over her last sip of wine while Addie signaled for the check—which she refused to let Gemma pay. “Addie, really,” Gemma protested, “that’s too much, after everything you’ve done.”

  “I’ve enjoyed every bit of it,” Addie told her firmly. “It’s been too long since we’ve had children in the house—or a houseful at all—and I’m glad we’ve had a chance to get to know you and your family.” With a sigh, she slipped her bank card back into her purse. “Melody never brings anyone home, you know. She thinks we disapprove of her job, but that’s not true at all. We were afraid she was putting herself in an untenable position, because of her connection with the paper. What we didn’t expect”—Addie stopped, a frown barely crinkling the corners of her blue eyes—“was the young man who turned up at the house yesterday. I recognized him, you know. He was there at St. Pancras, when the bomb went off. We’ve watched the videos from that day, over and over. But I had no idea he and Melody were—whatever they are. Why didn’t she tell us?” The slightest catch in Addie’s voice betrayed, for once, her polished exterior.

  “Oh, you know Melody,” Gemma said, perhaps too breezily. “She’s very good at compartmentalizing things. It’s only the past few months that she’s even had any of us round to her flat. I think that was a big step for her—she’s been so determined to separate work from her personal life.”

  Addie was not to be deflected. “Is she serious about him?”

  “I’d have thought so, yes. He’s a nice bloke, Andy. I hope she hasn’t—” Gemma realized her tongue was running away with her. She gave Addie an apologetic smile and reached for her handbag. A glance out the window told her that Toby was leaning too far over the water. “Well, anyway, we should probably be going before Toby falls in with the ducks.”

  As they left the restaurant, Addie took a phone call while Gemma went to join the children. The wind had risen, lifting Charlotte’s hair into a dandelion puff, and the sky had gone milkily opaque. Gemma shivered.

  Having shooed the little ones back from the river’s edge, Kit came over to stand beside her. “Weather’s changing,” Gemma said. “I’m glad we had a nice morning.” When Kit didn’t respond, she looked at him more closely. “What is it, love? If you’re worried about your dad, I’m su—”

  “No. I mean, yes, of course, I hope he’s okay, but that’s not what— I was wondering what was going to happen to Bella.”

  “The collie?”

  Kit nodded. “Grace was texting me. I gave her my mobile number. I mean, she’s nice, but she keeps asking me all these weird questions.”

  “What sort of weird questions?”

  Scuffing his shoe against the verdant green of the riverside grass, Kit looked into the middle distance. “Like, what it’s like, living in London.”

  “I don’t think that’s so weird.”

  “Yeah, but she wanted to know if I knew Dad before my mom—before I came to live with him. And she kept trying to prove something with the dog. It was like she had to make Bella love her more than she loved the lady who died, Nell, and that’s just”—he shrugged his thin shoulders—“well, wrong. It’s not fair to Bella.”

  Gemma considered this. “But that’s understandable, don’t you think? Grace is still a child after all.” An oddly self-centered child, Gemma had to admit.

  “Yes, but—” Kit turned to her, serious and intent. “I like Viv,” he went on. “I think she’s really cool. And nice, you know, a nice person. But Grace keeps saying her mother is mean to her, like deliberately. That her mum hates her and doesn’t want her to be happy.”

  “But all kids go throu—”

  Kit was shaking his head. “This isn’t like griping ’cause you’re grounded or you’ve lost your mobile privileges. This is like she really believes this stuff and it’s just . . . weird. She seems to think her mum deliberately kept her from seeing her dad.”

  Gemma slipped her arm round his shoulders in a quick hug. “I’ll have a word with Viv, okay? See if I can sort out what’s going on.” She gave him what she meant to be a reassuring smile. Kit might be overly sensitive, but she’d learned to trust his instincts. Something was not right between Viv Holland and her daughter.

  Back in the surgery car park, Kincaid had just begun to explain to Booth about his conversation with Dr. Saunders when Melody rang. He listened, alarm growing, as Melody filled him in on what she’d learned from Joe about Roz Dunning. “Wait, wait, slow down,” he told her. “He’s sure this was three weeks ago? Why didn’t he tell us this before now?”

  “I don’t believe anyone asked him, for starters,” Melody responded with a hint of sarcasm. “And . . . he, well, she was holding something over him, but I don’t think it has any bearing on this.”

  Kincaid decided to pursue this point later. “Is Doug with you?” When she said he was, he said, “Can you keep an eye on Dunning until we get there? Assuming she’s at home. But don’t approach her, understood?”

  “Yes, sir.”

  He and Booth had stopp
ed, by chance, beside Dr. Greene’s white Mercedes. Booth ran a hand over its bonnet rather covetously as he listened to Kincaid’s side of the conversation. “How long will it take us to get to Upper Slaughter?” Kincaid asked him.

  “Not long.” With a wicked grin, Booth popped the door locks on his Volvo. “You can tell me what this is all about on the way.”

  Kincaid should have known from Booth’s smile that he’d be gripping the Volvo’s door handle the entire way. He recognized nothing as the rolling blue-tinted hills sped by, punctuated only by the occasional glimpse of a few houses clustered in a hamlet, and a few sheep. “Where the hell are we?”

  “Back roads,” Booth answered, gearing up again as the car zoomed out of a hollow, climbing steadily. Kincaid’s stomach lurched. “Almost there,” Booth added, with another grin.

  A signpost for Upper Slaughter appeared and was gone in a blink. Then Booth slowed and made a sharp downhill left turn into what appeared to be a driveway, but was, Kincaid realized, a lane. Tucked into the side of the hill, the village had been invisible from the road. Slowing to a sedate ten miles per hour, Booth checked the sat nav for the address Melody had given Kincaid. “It should be just to the left here, near the church.”

  A few cars were parked on one side of the tiny triangle of a green. Among them was Melody’s blue Clio, but Booth carried on a bit farther until they spotted the name of the cottage. The silver Mercedes SUV Melody had described was parked in front.

  As Booth pulled up, Melody and Doug emerged from behind a parked van. “Is she still inside?” Kincaid asked quietly as he climbed from the car.

  “As far as we can tell without announcing ourselves.” Melody still sounded out of sorts.

  Booth was examining the gleaming paintwork on the SUV. “You could eat off this thing.” He bent over to scrutinize the front bumper. “No visible damage here.”

  “What the hell do you think you’re doing?” Roz Dunning stood in the open door to her cottage. In jeans and a flax-colored baggy jumper that fell off one shoulder, she looked nothing like the polished and efficient personal assistant Kincaid remembered from Saturday. Her hair was loose and unbrushed and her mouth was tight with anger.

  Kincaid sensed Melody take a breath, but before she could speak, Booth stepped in front of her and held out his warrant card. “Mrs. Dunning, we’d like a word.”

  Roz had admitted them with ill grace and an uneasy glance at Melody.

  The cottage, which had been gutted and renovated as open plan, was a study in expensive neutrals unbroken by color—rather, Kincaid thought, like its owner. She didn’t invite them to sit, but stood with her back to the kitchen island, so that she seemed to be presiding from in front of the bench.

  “Yes, I knew Fergus,” she said in response to Booth’s question. “I met him when he came to the house trying to cadge a ticket for the luncheon. But I didn’t see that it was anyone else’s business. There was no official inquiry.”

  “He came to the house and you slept with him in my parents’ bed,” Melody blurted out, as if she couldn’t restrain herself.

  “And what little bird told you that?” Roz gave her a sly glance. If she was surprised, she didn’t show it. “Joe? He was jealous, you know, so I wouldn’t put too much stock in what he says. And even if it was true, it’s not a crime.”

  Melody gaped at her, turning pink, and Kincaid stepped in. “This was three weeks ago, that O’Reilly first came to the house?”

  “Something like that,” Roz admitted with a nonchalant shrug.

  “Did he see anyone else on that visit?”

  Roz appeared to give the question consideration. “I think he meant to talk to Viv. But he must have changed his mind, because he asked me not to tell anyone that he’d been here.”

  “Not that you would have mentioned it, under the circumstances,” said Melody, and Kincaid shot her a quelling look.

  “I’d merely have told Addie that the quite delicious chef turned up, hoping his celebrity would get him a ticket to the sold-out luncheon. Anything else that passed between us was, as I said, no one else’s business. We were both single and certainly consenting adults.”

  Kincaid was trying to fill in a time line. “That Monday, O’Reilly checked into the manor house and then came to Beck House.”

  “And what if he did?” Roz said in the same dismissive tone.

  “And the next day?”

  “He said he had to see to some things. Late in the afternoon, he came here and I ran him to the station in Moreton.”

  “He didn’t tell you what he’d been doing?”

  “No. But he was, I don’t know, preoccupied. Less charming.” She shrugged again, but she might, Kincaid thought, have been a little offended. “I didn’t think I’d see him again until he rang me the night before he died. I said I’d meet him in the hotel bar for a drink, but he was still being secretive.”

  “So he met you in the manor gardens instead?” Kincaid hadn’t thought of her as a blonde when he’d seen her on Saturday, but now, with her hair loose, he could see how she might give that impression if caught in a certain light.

  Roz looked surprised, but nodded. “I gave him a lift up here. But he was a bit disappointing, if you must know,” she added, with a look that intimated she was assessing the three men in the room as potential replacements.

  This was a woman to be avoided like the plague, but there was a certain rawness to the unfettered side of her that appealed to baser instincts. “And then?” Kincaid asked.

  Roz shifted restlessly and the loose top slid a little farther down her shoulder. “Then, nothing. He left after a coffee the next morning. I never saw him again. I was as shocked as anyone when the police came on Saturday and said he was dead.”

  “He didn’t tell you what else he meant to do that day?”

  “No.” Absently, Roz pulled her hair back into a knot. “But . . . he got a text, early. And I’d say that after that, he had an . . . agenda.”

  Booth asked if she could account for her movements on Friday.

  “I was with Addie all day at Beck House. I only came home just before the Talbots’ guests arrived.”

  “And you didn’t see O’Reilly after that?”

  “No. I told you, I didn’t see him again after that morning.”

  “Did he ever say anything to you about Nell Greene?” Kincaid put in.

  “No. As I said, he only mentioned knowing Viv, because they’d worked together. That was his whole thing, supposedly, with the luncheon ticket, to surprise his old friend.” Roz straightened. “Now, really, are we quite fin —”

  Booth interrupted her. “What about Saturday night, Mrs. Dunning? Can you account for your movements then?”

  She frowned at him. “Why should I?”

  “Because we’re looking into the circumstances of Jack Doyle’s death.”

  “What?” Roz gaped at him in what appeared to be genuine astonishment. “What has that to do with me? I didn’t even know the man.”

  “You must have had drinks at the pub.”

  “Well, yes, but that doesn’t mean I knew him. And he certainly wasn’t my type.”

  “Then you won’t mind telling us what you were doing on Saturday night.”

  “I do mind, actually,” she snapped, folding her arms. “I will tell you that it had nothing whatsoever to do with that bartender, and that’s all I’m going to say.”

  It was almost a challenge. If Booth had been prepared to take it, he was interrupted by a phone call. He excused himself, and when he returned a few moments later, he thanked Roz for her time.

  “Don’t worry, Detective Inspector,” she said, with a tight little smile. “I’m not planning to abscond to South America. Although”—she directed this at Melody—“I was planning to resign from your lady mother’s employ, so you needn’t worry your little head about my corrupt morals.”

  Before Melody could respond, Booth motioned them all outside.

  “That was forensics,” Booth said.
“They’ve managed to unlock O’Reilly’s mobile.”

  December 2007

  Viv had managed to hold her tongue through the remainder of service, but as soon as the door closed behind the last of the staff, she turned on Fergus. “How could you? How could you do that to Ibby? Danny was his friend.”

  Fergus didn’t raise his eyes from the griddle he was scrubbing. “How could I do what?”

  “For God’s sake, Fergus. How could you be so bloody callous?” Viv found she was shaking with exhaustion and outrage. Not only had she had to cover Ibby’s station, the tension in the kitchen and in front of house had made the rest of the evening a nightmare. She was surprised they’d made it all the way through service without a disaster—although she couldn’t imagine worse than what had already happened.

  “What did you expect me to do?” asked Fergus, finally glancing up at her, his expression cold. “Close down the kitchen and hold a prayer service? Danny was a fecking bomb waiting to go off and Ibby was the only one who couldn’t see it.”

  “If you knew he was using last night, why didn’t you do something?” Viv had given up any pretense of working and stood with her fists clenched as tightly as Ibby’s had been.

  For a few weeks after the Michelin star, she’d thought things might go back to the way they’d been in the summer between her and Fergus. But the attention and the notoriety had been siren songs to him, and soon there were more nights spent partying and fewer and fewer with her. The last few weeks she had barely seen him outside the kitchen.

  “What is it you think I should have done? Sent him home to his mam?”

  His mockery made her even more furious. “You are such a shit, Fergus. You should have done what any friend would do—looked after him. We’re more than friends here, we’re family. You know that. You have a responsibility.” She took a gulping breath and tried to bring her voice down from a shriek. “And not only were you cruel to Ibby, you’ve left us a cook short and I can’t manage—” The nausea hit her suddenly, twisting her gut without warning. Clamping a hand to her mouth, she ran for the staff toilet and vomited nothing but bile. The sickness had been so persistent the last few days that she hadn’t been able to keep anything down. She’d managed to wipe her mouth, flush, and take a shaky seat on the toilet lid when Fergus appeared in the doorway, looming over her.