All Things Nice

by Sheila Bugler

‘I do understand,’ Abby said. ‘I lost my brother a few years ago. It’s not something you ever get over, I don’t think.’

  ‘I heard he was stabbed,’ Bethan said quietly. ‘Is that right?’

  These poor kids, Abby thought. What a thing to have to deal with so early in their lives.

  ‘That’s right,’ she said.

  Bethan blinked and turned her face sideways, like she didn’t want anyone to see her. A girl called Cazzie – tall and pretty – started to cry.

  ‘I don’t know why you’re pretending to be so upset, Bethan,’ she said. ‘You couldn’t stand him when he was alive. You have no right to pretend to be so upset.’

  Bethan wiped her face.

  ‘We weren’t friends,’ she told Abby. ‘Cazzie’s right about that. But that’s not why I’m upset. I knew him, you know? I sat beside him in lectures and argued with him about stuff and even though I didn’t like him, he was alive, you know? And to think of someone killing him, it’s just so horrible. I can’t stop thinking about it. Imagining how awful it must have been for him.’ She sniffed. ‘No matter what he was like, he didn’t deserve that.’

  ‘Well maybe you should have been a bit nicer to him then,’ Cazzie said.

  ‘Was there any reason you didn’t like him?’ Abby asked Bethan.

  ‘We’re just … we were very different people,’ she said. ‘Kieran thought I was some posh airhead, just because I’m from Reading and my dad’s a surgeon. He … well, it doesn’t matter.’

  ‘Everything matters,’ Abby said.

  Bethan sighed. ‘He had a bit of a funny thing about people with money. You know, like a class thing?’

  Cazzie, who had stopped crying, rolled her eyes.

  ‘That is so not true! Kieran was a complete sweetie. And he was really funny too, yeah? Really perceptive about other people and stuff like that.’

  Abby remembered what the professor had said about Kieran earlier and she guessed ‘perceptive’ could possibly mean ‘bitchy’.

  ‘He liked Cazzie coz she’s pretty,’ Marina said. ‘He was a bit, he only hung out with the cool, pretty kids?’

  Cazzie shook her head, her mouth set in a sulky pout.

  ‘Did any of you ever meet Freya?’ Abby asked.

  The only response she got was eight blank stares.

  ‘His girlfriend?’ Abby tried.

  ‘No way!’ Bethan put her hand over her mouth, eyes wide with shock.

  ‘He wasn’t like that,’ Cazzie said.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Abby asked.

  ‘You know, boyfriend and girlfriend and monogamy and all that. It so wasn’t Kieran’s thing. He was freer than that, yeah? This so-called girlfriend? She’s probably someone he slept with a few times? I mean, it’s not like there’s anything wrong with that. If you’re upfront about it, then everyone knows where they stand and no one gets hurt, yeah?’

  Abby guessed Cazzie was reciting Kieran’s words. She was getting a sense of the sort of person Kieran was. Not someone she would have liked.

  A petite oriental girl called Hisako put her hand up.

  ‘Please?’ she whispered.

  Abby smiled encouragingly. ‘Yes, Hisako?’

  ‘I met them together,’ she said. ‘She works in a wine bar, I think?’

  ‘Just because they were together,’ Cazzie said, ‘it doesn’t mean they were together, Hissy.’

  Hisako frowned.

  ‘She said she was his girlfriend. That is what she told me.’

  Cazzie sighed and shook her head. Obviously thinking no one understood her lovely Kieran like she did.

  ‘If he was properly with someone, don’t you think I’d have known about her? He was my friend, Hissy.’

  ‘She not a friendly person,’ Hisako said. ‘I was in wine bar with my friends and I go to say hello to Kieran when I see him but it is like she doesn’t want me to be there.’

  ‘Maybe she’ll turn up tomorrow,’ Bethan said.

  ‘Why tomorrow?’ Abby asked.

  Bethan flushed and looked to Jed.

  ‘Apparently his friends have organised some kind of, like, memorial thing. Jed told me about it.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Jed nodded. ‘It’s on Kieran’s Facebook page. It’s this guy Mac? He’s one of Kieran’s mates. Him and a group of others are doing some sort of service by the river tomorrow morning.’

  Abby got the details and asked the students if there was anything else she should know.

  ‘Have you spoken to Cosima?’ one of the boys said. A sweet kid with long dark hair and a cute smile. ‘He had a bit of a thing for her, I think.’

  ‘That was nothing,’ Cazzie said quickly.

  The boy shrugged. ‘Maybe not. But it’s like she said.’ He nodded at Abby. ‘Everything is important, right?’

  ‘Absolutely.’ Abby beamed at him. ‘Cosima is Cosima Cooper?’

  ‘Yeah.’ The boy nodded. ‘I’m not saying it was serious or anything. It’s like Cazzie said, he wasn’t really into all that serious stuff. But he liked her for a bit.’

  ‘It was nothing,’ Cazzie said. ‘He thought she was pretty. Big deal. He thought lots of people were pretty.’

  ‘If it was nothing,’ the boy said, ‘why did she get her dad to scare him off, then?’

  Connections coming together, Abby could feel it. That sizzle in your brain, like lighting a trail of gun powder.

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘I only ever got Kieran’s side of the story,’ the boy said. ‘According to him, Cosima’s old man threatened him. Pushed him around a bit and said there’d be more of that if Kieran ever went near his daughter. I think her dad’s a bit of a nutter.’

  Abby asked a few more questions but when she got nothing else, she finished the session. Before she left, she handed out her card and asked each of them to contact her if there was anything else they could think of.

  Back outside, a shy sun was trying to push its way through a cloak of clouds. Abby stood in the central courtyard, watching the students meander around her, moving slowly in groups, time and youth on their side. She pulled out her phone, punched in Ellen’s number, held the phone to her ear and willed Ellen to answer.

  Three

  Pete Cooper lived in a three-storey, detached house on the south side of the heath. Ellen walked up the wide, well-kept path to the house, passing a baby-blue Mercedes convertible and a rudely large 4x4, both parked in front of the house.

  The house had a big porch, with a daffodil-yellow front door framed on either side with plates of antique stained glass. Ellen couldn’t see a doorbell so she lifted the polished bronze, claw-shaped door knocker and banged it twice against the door.

  A short, blonde woman answered the door.

  ‘Yes?’

  ‘Cosima?’ Ellen said.

  The woman shook her head.

  ‘Who wants to see her, please?’

  Ellen showed her warrant card, watched the woman’s eyes widen as she looked at it.

  ‘One moment.’

  Ellen didn’t have to wait long before the woman was back, inviting Ellen to step inside. Ellen followed her through a cathedral-sized entrance hall into a large room with a bay window that overlooked the heath. Something about the room reminded Ellen of the living room in Nick Gleeson’s house. Similar elegant, expensive furniture, muted colours and discreet artwork on the off-white walls.

  There was a giant, overly ornate white marble fireplace that Ellen thought was ugly. A portrait of a young woman hung on the wall above it. Slender, with dark hair and a serene smile, the woman was very beautiful. Ellen wanted to walk across and take a closer look but the same woman in the painting was already here in the room, watching her.

  ‘Cosima Cooper.’ The girl walked over to Ellen and held her hand out. Ellen shook it, noted the damp palm but didn’t see anything in the girl’s face that indicated she was scared or nervous. In fact, there was nothing at all in the girl’s face. It was as expressionless as a mask.

  ‘Please.’ Cos
ima waved her arm around in a vague gesture. ‘Take a seat.’

  She waited until Ellen had settled on one of the larger sofas then chose a chair opposite. She sat very carefully, back straight and legs neatly together, her hands resting in her lap.

  ‘Nice portrait,’ Ellen said.

  ‘It’s my mum,’ Cosima said.

  ‘Oh.’ Ellen frowned. ‘Sorry.’

  ‘No big deal.’ Cosima shrugged. ‘Everyone makes that mistake. I guess I look just like her.’

  ‘It’s beautiful,’ Ellen said.

  Ellen remembered Raj telling her how Cosima’s mother had died. She looked at the portrait again, searching for some sign of distress that would drive the poor woman to throw herself off Beachy Head. The woman smiled down at her, serenely. Nothing to show she was depressed. Or scared. She looked happy, Ellen thought. And a lot more animated than her daughter did right now.

  ‘Are you here to ask me about Kieran?’ Cosima asked.

  Ellen nodded. ‘Is that okay?’

  ‘Sure. I’ve kind of been waiting for someone to come and speak to me about him.’

  ‘Why is that?’

  Cosima sighed. ‘He kind of had this thing for me. When I heard he’d died, I kind of figured you’d hear about it.’

  ‘We’re trying to speak to everyone who knew him,’ Ellen said. ‘It’s standard procedure, that’s all.’

  ‘Sure,’ Cosima said. ‘I get that. Oh God, where are my manners? Do you want something to drink? Like a coffee or something?’

  ‘Coffee would be good,’ Ellen said. ‘Thanks.’

  Cosima lifted the receiver of a black telephone on a table beside the cream sofa and spoke softly, requesting a pot of coffee and a selection of biscuits.

  She hung up and smiled.

  ‘Won’t be long.’

  Her smile was extraordinary. It lit up her whole face, enhancing her beauty. Ellen wondered how often she used that smile to get what she wanted from life.

  ‘I didn’t know Kieran very well,’ Cosima said. ‘I mean, I know he was into me for a bit but that was a while ago now. We didn’t hang around together or anything like that.’

  She had a soft, well-modulated voice with no trace of a south London accent. Like her posture, Ellen guessed a lot of money had gone into getting that voice.

  ‘How did you know he was into you?’ Ellen asked.

  Cosima frowned, like that was a stupid question.

  ‘He made it obvious, I guess? You know, if we were in the same lecture he’d make a point of sitting beside me. And he started calling by the house in the mornings so we could walk in together. He made out like he was just passing but it was more than that. He flirted. Really badly too.’ She shuddered. ‘Like I’d fall for that sort of “ooh there’s such a connection between us and I think our souls met in a previous life”. Seriously? Like I’m some stupid teenager with nothing going on up here.’

  She stabbed a finger into the side of her head. Her face flushed from the sudden emotion and Ellen was glad to see there was a real person underneath that cool façade.

  ‘You didn’t like him,’ Ellen said.

  Cosima was saved from answering by the well-timed appearance of the short, blonde woman pushing a trolley into the room. On top of the trolley sat a silver coffee pot and various other accoutrements, including a large white plate of chocolate biscuits.

  ‘Thank you, Miriam.’ Cosima dismissed the blonde with a wave of her hand and started dispensing coffee, playing the role of genial hostess to perfection.

  ‘I didn’t not like him,’ she said, when she’d finished serving the drinks. ‘I just thought he was a bit immature.’

  ‘And nothing happened between you?’

  ‘God, no,’ Cosima said. ‘Never. Besides, I knew he was living with Freya.’

  ‘Of course,’ Ellen said. ‘Is she a friend of yours?’

  Cosima shrugged. ‘Not really. But I know her, yeah. Poor Freya. God. I can’t imagine what it would be like to be in her position right now. It’s awful. Is she okay?’

  ‘She’s coping,’ Ellen said. ‘It’s what you do. I’m guessing you had to learn that pretty early on yourself.’

  ‘Maybe.’

  ‘How did Kieran get on with the other students?’ Ellen asked.

  Cosima took a sip of coffee and seemed to consider this.

  ‘Fine, I think. I mean, he was a bit brash. And he seriously fancied himself. A lot of girls were into him so he obviously had something. I never saw it but I don’t think I’m like most people.’

  She placed her cup and saucer carefully on the table beside the black phone. The slight tremor in her hand caused her to almost knock her cup over but she righted it just in time. Ellen wondered if the tremor was caused by too much caffeine or nerves. Except what did this poised young woman have to be nervous about?

  Ellen’s phone started to ring. Apologising, she took it out of her bag, saw Abby’s name on the display and answered it.

  ‘Ellen?’ Abby sounded excited. ‘Are you still at Cooper’s place? There’s something you should know.’

  Ellen listened as Abby updated her on what she’d learned at the university. When she ended the call, Ellen turned her attention back to Cosima.

  ‘You didn’t tell me what you did,’ she said.

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘To stop Kieran pestering you,’ Ellen said.

  Cosima’s face burned a dark shade of puce.

  ‘I didn’t do anything,’ she said. ‘I didn’t have to. He got the hint in the end. And that was that.’

  ‘Only after you got your father to warn him off,’ Ellen said.

  ‘No.’ Cosima shook her head. ‘That’s not true. I never … look, I didn’t say a word to Daddy. I wouldn’t do that.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I just wouldn’t.’

  ‘Because you would be scared of what he might do?’

  A flash of something in Cosima’s dark eyes. Fear, Ellen thought.

  ‘It’s not that.’ She smiled, a real beamer this time. ‘Daddy’s a bit old school,’ she said. ‘I’m his little princess. He loves me to pieces and he worries about me. I didn’t tell him about Kieran because I didn’t want him to worry about me.’

  She kept smiling, as if she believed the smile could hide the fact she was clearly lying.

  ‘You’re a very attractive woman,’ Ellen said. ‘You must have a lot of men who are interested in you. What about boyfriends? Do you tell him about them or is that another thing you keep secret from him?’

  Cosima lifted her coffee cup then put it down again without drinking from it.

  ‘I don’t have boyfriends,’ she said. ‘I’m not saying I never will, but I’m not interested in any of that for now. All I want to do is focus on my studies, get the best grades I can and do something with my life.’

  She sounded so sincere, reminding Ellen of her own drive and determination when she first joined the force. She had been driven by a desire for truth and justice. A desire that seemed naive and overly simple to her older self. She looked around the huge room, at the painting of Cosima’s dead mother, and wondered what made the young woman in front of her so focussed on ‘doing something’ with her life.

  ‘Is there anything else you can tell me about Kieran?’ she asked instead.

  When Cosima shook her head, Ellen stood up and handed her a business card.

  ‘If you think of anything,’ she said, ‘give me a call.’

  Cosima put it on the mantelpiece without looking at it. There was a photo on the mantelpiece, beneath the portrait. Cosima – or her mother, it was impossible to tell – standing on a snowy hill beside a middle-aged man who had his arm wrapped around her shoulders. The man was smiling but the woman looked serious. Expressionless.

  ‘Your mother again?’ Ellen asked.

  ‘That’s me,’ Cosima said. ‘With Daddy. We go to Courchevel every year, in February.’

  ‘Courchevel?’

  ‘A ski resort,’ Cosima
said. ‘In France. Very lovely. You should go there sometime. Do you ski?’

  ‘No.’

  Ellen looked again at the portrait and the photo, noting the similarities in the two women’s faces. She wondered if the circumstances of her mother’s death might explain the strange emptiness in her daughter’s identical eyes. Or if there was another reason.

  ‘One final thing,’ Ellen said at the front door. ‘Can you tell me about your relationship with the Gleeson family?’

  It was a shot in the dark. Ellen knew there was every chance the question would provoke no response. To her surprise, the shot in the dark seemed to hit its target. Cosima’s jaw dropped open and she stared at Ellen for a full three seconds without speaking, as another flush crawled across her neck and up those pretty cheeks.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asked.

  ‘Just that,’ Ellen said. ‘How well do you know the family? I mean, you’ve already told me you didn’t know Freya too well but I didn’t ask you about Nick and Charlotte.’

  ‘There’s nothing to tell you,’ Cosima said. ‘He’s nice. I don’t know her.’

  ‘I heard she’s a bit of a drinker,’ Ellen said.

  ‘I wouldn’t know,’ Cosima said. She smiled again but it seemed forced. ‘You’ll have to excuse me, Detective. I’m late for uni.’

  Ellen thanked the girl for her time and handed her a card with her contact details, telling her to call if she remembered anything else.

  She waited until Cosima closed the door and then she pulled out her phone and called Abby.

  * * *

  ‘She claims her father had no idea Kieran was chasing her,’ Ellen said.

  ‘Is she telling the truth?’ Abby asked.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Ellen said. ‘She’s a strange one. I’d like you to speak to her at some point. See what you think.’

  ‘I’m intrigued,’ Abby said.

  ‘She’s got dark hair,’ Ellen said. ‘But so has Freya. We’ll wait till we get the forensics back on the hair sample. If it’s female, we’ll get DNA samples from both of them. What are you up to now?’

  ‘There’s a message from Rui,’ Abby said. ‘He’s got something from those CCTV images. I’d like to go and take a look right away.’