by Peter James
‘Do you mind if I smoke?’ she asked.
‘Go ahead.’
She pulled a packet of Marlboro Lites from her handbag, took out a cigarette and lit it.
‘Everyone loves Jim,’ she said. ‘He is that kind of man.’
‘So in all his time as a private eye he never made an enemy?’
‘It’s possible. I keep thinking about all his old clients. Yes, he might have upset someone, but he’s been out of that game for a decade.’
‘Could it be someone he put inside who’s just been released?’
‘He didn’t put people in prison. He was more – you know – following unfaithful spouses around, doing a bit of industrial espionage. He just snooped around, followed people, that sort of thing.’
Glenn made another note. Then he asked, ‘I presume Jim has a mobile phone?’
‘Yes.’
‘It’s not here?’
‘No, he always has it with him.’
‘Could I have the number?’
She reeled it off from memory and he wrote it down.
‘Who is the provider?’
‘O2.’
‘When was the last time you spoke to him?’
‘About quarter past five on Friday. He’d just picked up the boat from the police diving unit and was back in his berth. He said he was going to tidy her up and then he’d be home.’
‘That was the last conversation you had?’
‘Yes.’
She started sobbing.
Glenn sipped his coffee and waited patiently. When she had quietened down he asked, ‘Presumably you’ve tried ringing him?’
‘About every five minutes. Nothing happens. It just goes straight to voicemail.’
Glenn noted that down. He looked up at Janet Towers and his heart went out to her.
Then he thought again about the man who had answered the phone at his home. The man who was babysitting his son and his daughter.
The man he had never met, but at this moment hated more than he had ever believed it was possible to hate anyone.
If you are sleeping with Ari, he thought, then God help you. I’ll rip your testicles out of your scrotum with my bare fingers.
He forced a smile at Janet Towers and handed her his card.
‘Call me if you hear anything. We’ll find your husband,’ he said. ‘Don’t worry about it. We’ll find him.’
Through her sobs her voice suddenly turned to anger. ‘Yes, well, I hope to hell you find him before I do, that’s all I can say.’ She began sobbing again.
59
Roy Grace, holding tightly on to the most expensive bottle of champagne he had ever bought in his life, slipped his key into the front door lock of Cleo’s gated townhouse.
As he did so his phone rang.
Cursing, he dug it out of his pocket and answered it. ‘Detective Superintendent Grace.’
It was ACC Alison Vosper. Just the person he did not want to speak to at this moment. And to cap it, she sounded in a characteristically sour mood.
‘Where are you?’ she asked.
‘I just got home,’ he said, hoping she might be impressed that it was after nine o’clock.
‘I want to see you first thing in the morning. The chief’s been talking with the Chief Executive of Brighton and Hove Council about all the bad press Brighton is getting over your case.’
‘Sure,’ he said, doing his best to mask the reluctance in his voice.
‘Seven o’clock.’
Inwardly he groaned. ‘Fine!’ he said.
‘I hope you have some progress to report,’ she added before hanging up.
Have a nice evening, he mouthed. Then he opened the door.
Cleo, in a man’s shirt over ripped jeans, was on her hands and knees on the wooden floor, playing who owns the sock with Humphrey. The dog was snarling, growling, whining, tugging away at the sock as if his life depended on it.
‘Hi, darling!’ he said.
She looked up at him, without stopping her tug-of-war and without noticing the bottle he was brandishing.
‘Hi! Look, Humphrey, look who’s here. It’s Detective Superintendent Roy Grace!’
He knelt and kissed her.
She gave him a quick peck, but her concentration was on the dog. ‘Champagne!’ she said. ‘How nice!’ Then, squinting at the black ball of yapping fluff, she said, ‘What do you think of that, Humphrey? Detective Superintendent Roy Grace has brought us champagne! Do you think it’s a peace offering?’
‘Sorry I’m late – got held up after the briefing meeting.’
She tugged the sock, hard. Humphrey slithered towards her, his paws failing to get traction on the polished oak boards. His jaws released the sock, then snapped back on it. Cleo looked up at Roy. ‘I’ve made you the best martini of your life! A fantastic new vodka I’ve discovered – Kalashnikov. It’s in the fridge.’ Then she added, ‘Lucky bastard, you’ll have to drink it for both of us!’
She turned back to the dog. ‘He’s lucky, isn’t he, Humphrey? He gets here an hour later than he promised and he still gets a nice drink. And you and I have to drink water. What do you think of that?’
Grace felt awkward suddenly. She seemed in a slightly distant mood.
‘It’ll go down nicely while I’m waiting for the champagne to chill!’ he said, trying to placate her.
He showed her the bottle.
Examining the label while continuing to tease Humphrey, she said, ‘Detective Superintendent, do you have wicked designs on me tonight?’
‘Very wicked!’ he said.
‘You know I shouldn’t drink.’
‘I checked on the Internet. The new thinking is that the occasional glass doesn’t do pregnant women any harm.’
‘And two?’
‘Two would be even better. One for you, one for the Bump.’
She grinned, then looked down and patted her stomach. ‘What a thoughtful daddy!’ she said, mocking.
Grace slung his jacket and his tie on to a sofa, then put the bottle into the freezer and opened the fridge door. A martini glass, filled to the brim, with an olive on a stick, sat there. He took it out, carried it through into the living room and drank some, then sat down on the edge of a sofa. The alcohol hit him like rocket fuel, giving him an instant lift.
Humphrey let go of the sock and bounded towards him in a series of short hops.
‘Hey, you!’ He knelt and stroked the dog, which immediately responded by biting his hand playfully. ‘Ouch!’ He withdrew it.
Humphrey looked at him, then jumped up and bit him again.
Holding his martini clear, he said, ‘Fellow, you’ve got sharp teeth! You’re hurting me!’
‘Do you know what my father says about martinis?’ Cleo said.
Humphrey ran back to the sock, tore it free from Cleo and began shaking it furiously, as if he was trying to kill it.
‘No. What?’
‘Ladies, beware of the dry martini, have two at the very most. For with three you will be under the table – and with four, you will be under your host!’
Grace grinned. ‘So what does he say about vintage champagne?’
‘Nothing – he’s usually off his face with martinis before he gets to the champagne!’
‘I’m looking forward to meeting him.’
‘You’ll like him.’
‘I’m sure,’ Grace said, not at all sure how her posh father would take to a humble copper.
He sipped again, and now the sharp, dry alcohol was really kicking off inside his head. Then his phone rang, again. Nodding an apology to her, he tugged it from his jacket.
‘Roy Grace,’ he answered.
‘Yo, old-timer!’
It was Glenn Branson.
‘Hi,’ he said. ‘What do you want?’
‘Is this a good moment?’
‘No,’ he said. ‘What’s up?’
‘It’s OK,’ the DS said. ‘Just wanted to talk to you, about Ari.’
‘Can it wait until the morning?�
�
‘Yeah, tomorrow. No worries.’
‘Are you sure?’
‘Tomorrow’s good,’ Glenn said, sounding terrible.
‘Tell me?’
‘Nah, tomorrow’s fine. Have a good one!’
‘I can talk.’
‘No. No, you can’t. Tomorrow’s good.’
‘Listen, mate, what is it?’
The line went dead.
Grace tried to phone his friend back, but got straight through to voicemail. He tried his own home number, in case he was there, but that went to the answering machine after eight rings. He jammed his phone into his trouser pocket, then knelt down.
For several minutes Cleo continued playing with Humphrey, again barely acknowledging his existence. Then, after a while, tiring of the game, she let go of the sock. Humphrey dragged it over to the beanbag that was his bed and continued to wrestle with it, snarling and yapping, as if he was fighting a dead rat.
‘Want to eat something?’ Cleo asked. ‘I made one of your favourite meals. Just in case you deigned to turn up.’
She had chosen almost exactly the same words as Sandy. Sandy used to get angry at the hours he worked, and especially on the occasions when he was called out in the middle of a meal with her.
‘Hey!’ he said. ‘What do you mean by that? In case I deigned to turn up!’
‘You’re the boss man,’ Cleo said. ‘You could be home on time if you really wanted to, couldn’t you?’
‘You know I can’t. Come on, let’s not have an argument about it. I’ve got three young murdered teenagers and a lot of people wanting answers. You’ve seen the kids – I want to find out who did this, and fast, before it happens again. And I have a ton of people on my back wanting answers before Christmas. Me included. I have to give it all I’ve got.’
‘I get people brought into the mortuary every day, and I give them and their relatives all I’ve got. But I manage to keep a separate compartment for my life. You don’t do that, Roy. Your work is your life.’
Feeling that he was pedalling in a vast, dark void, Grace said, ‘When you’re on call, you have to go out – sometimes 24/7 – don’t you?’
‘That’s different.’ She shrugged and gave him an odd stare.
Grace felt a sudden stab of panic. He took a long sip on his drink, but the alcohol had stopped working. For the first time since they had started dating, she seemed a stranger, and he was scared that he might be losing her.
‘It’s always going to be like this, isn’t it, Roy?’
‘Like what?’
‘Hanging around, waiting for you. You’re in love with your work.’
‘I’m in love with you,’ he said.
‘I’m in love with you too. And I’m not stupid enough to think that I can change you. I wouldn’t want to change you. You’re a good man. But . . .’ She shrugged. ‘I feel very proud to be carrying your – our – child. But I worry about what kind of a father you might be.’
‘My father was a police officer,’ Grace said. ‘He was a terrific dad to me. I was always very proud of him.’
‘But he was a sergeant, wasn’t he?’
‘What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Shit, I need a drink. How long before we can open that bottle?’
‘Maybe another ten minutes?’
‘I’ll get supper ready. Can you take Humphrey out on to the patio? He needs to do a pee and a dump.’
Grace dutifully took the dog up on to the roof garden and walked him around in circles for ten minutes, during which Humphrey did nothing except nip his hand several more times. Then, when he let him back indoors, the dog trotted down the stairs, peed on the living-room floor, then squatted and proudly delivered a massive turd on a white rug.
By the time he had cleaned up the mess, the Roederer Cristal was perfectly chilled. Two bowls of prawns, diced avocado and rocket salad were laid out on the small kitchen table. He pulled two crystal flutes from a cabinet, opened the bottle as carefully as if he was tending to a baby, then poured it.
They clinked glasses.
Cleo, seated at the table, looked stunning. So beautiful, so vulnerable. It was utterly incredible to him that she was carrying their baby. She took a tentative sip, then closed her eyes for a moment. When they opened again, they were sparkling, like the drink.
‘Wow! That is amazing!’
He stared into her eyes. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I know I haven’t yet met your father, and there are protocols that need to be observed in your world – but – Cleo – will you marry me?’
There was a long, agonizing silence, during which she just stared back at him with an unreadable expression. Finally she took another long sip, then said, ‘Roy, my darling. I don’t want this to sound –’ she hesitated – ‘sort of weird or anything, OK?’
He shrugged, having no idea what was coming next.
She twisted the glass in her hand. ‘I just thought to myself that if you proposed to me, one day, because I was pregnant, I would never marry you.’ She gave him a helpless, lost-child look. ‘That’s not the kind of life I want – for either of us.’
There was an even longer silence. Then he said, ‘Your being pregnant has nothing to do with this. That’s just a very big bonus. I love you, Cleo. You are the most beautiful person, inside and out, that I’ve ever been lucky enough to meet in my life. I love you with all my heart and soul. I will love you to the ends of the earth and back. And more. I want to spend the rest of my life with you.’
Cleo smiled, then nodded pensively. ‘That’s not bad,’ she said. Then she gave a rolling motion with her hand. ‘More?’
‘I love your nose. Your eyes. I love your humour. I love the way you look at the world. I love your mind. I love your kindness to people.’
‘So it’s not about me being a good shag?’ she said, in mock disappointment.
‘Yep, that too.’
She drank some more, then putting her elbows on the table, held her glass in the fingers of both hands and peered at him over the top of it. ‘You know, you’re not a bad shag either.’
‘Slapper!’
She wrinkled her nose. ‘Horny bastard.’
‘You like it!’
Puffing herself up haughtily, she said, ‘No, I don’t. I only do it to please you.’
He grinned. ‘I don’t believe you.’
*
Later, Humphrey sat on the bedroom floor, barking and whining while they made love, until he got bored and went to sleep.
Lying in each other’s arms, Cleo kissed Roy on the nose, then on each eye, then on the lips. ‘You know, you’re an incredible lover. You are so amazingly unselfish.’
‘Are most men selfish?’
She nodded. Then she grinned. ‘Talking from experience, of course, all the hundreds of lovers I’ve had – not!’
‘I take that as a compliment, coming from an expert.’
She thumped him. Then she kissed him again. ‘There’s something else about you, Detective Superintendent – you make me feel safe.’
‘You make me feel horny.’
She slid her hands down his hard, muscular body. Then stopped. ‘Bloody hell, you want more?’
‘Did we just do it?’
‘About five minutes ago.’
‘Must be my premature Alzheimer’s kicking in. I thought that was just – you know – foreplay!’
She grinned. ‘You are the horniest man I ever met!’
‘You make me horny,’ he said, and kissed her lightly on the lips, and then on her neck, her shoulders and then on every inch of her arms, legs, ankles, toes. Then they made love again.
*
A long time later, in the flickering glow of an almost burnt-down candle, Cleo, wrapped around him and dripping with perspiration, said, ‘OK, I surrender. I’ll marry you.’
‘You will?’
‘Yes, I will. I want to, more than anything in the world. But isn’t there a complication?’
‘What?’
‘You a
lready have a wife.’
‘I’ve just started the process to have her declared dead, under the seven-year rule. My sister’s been trying to persuade me to do that for a long time.’
‘Cleo Grace,’ she murmured. ‘Mmm, that has a nice ring to it.’
She kissed him again, then, clinging tightly to him, fell asleep.
60
Glenn Branson sat in silence behind the wheel of the black Hyundai, staring wretchedly at his house. He had been here for five hours.
The small, 1960s semi was on a steep street in Saltdean, inland from the cliff top and a real wind trap. In the hooley that was blowing, the car rocked constantly and rain thwacked on to the body panels.
Tears streamed down his face. He was oblivious to the freezing cold, to his hunger, to his need to pee. He just stared across at the little house with its bright yellow front door that was his home. Stared at the front façade that was now like some kind of a Berlin Wall between himself and his life. It was all a sodding blur. His eyes blurred by his tears. The car windows blurred by the driving rain. His mind blurred by love, by anger and by pain.
He’d watched Ari arrive home shortly after ten and she hadn’t spotted him in this car. Then he’d waited for the male babysitter, whoever the arrogant bastard was, to leave. It was now twenty past two in the morning and he still had not left. Over two hours ago, the lights had gone off downstairs, then had come on in her bedroom. After a while, they had gone off there too. Which meant she was sleeping with this babysitter. Screwing him in their house.
Were Sammy and Remi going to run into the bedroom in the morning, as they always did, excitedly calling out, ‘Mummy! Daddy!’, only to find a strange man in the bed? Or had they stopped running in now? How much had changed in his home during these past few weeks?
The thought was like a knife twisting in his soul.
He looked at the car clock. 2.42. He looked at his watch, as if hoping the car clock was wrong. But his watch said 2.43.
A plastic dustbin lid rolled along the pavement. Then he saw a flurry of ice-blue splinters in his mirrors and moments later a police patrol car shot by, roof spinners on but siren off. He saw it turn right at the top of the road and disappear. It might be going to a domestic, or an accident, or a break-in – or anything. Reluctant to risk getting called away from here, he hesitated before phoning in. But he was using a police pool car and that obliged him to be on call. And, despite all that was happening in his private life, he was still grateful to the police force for giving him the chances in life it had.