by Jane Casey
‘I’m glad you asked. I’m going to make your inhibitions disappear.’ He didn’t wait to see how I reacted, just carried one bag into the kitchen and started rummaging in it. Tuneful whistling floated out into the hall: Rob was in a good mood.
I sat down on the edge of the sofa to try to recover some composure. I was suddenly aware that I was way out of my depth. It was nice that everyone – including me – had been so concerned about Rob’s romantic well-being. I was beginning to realise I should be a lot more worried about my own.
Chapter Six
‘For God’s sake, Maeve. I thought I’d bought everything you could possibly need. Who doesn’t have a wooden spoon?’
‘Me. But try the boxes.’
Rob gave me a very unenthusiastic look before addressing himself to the pile in the hall. Cooking had come to a premature halt when he opened a drawer and discovered the shortcomings of the kitchen extended beyond its size and the constantly dripping tap. It was, it seemed, impossible to cook spaghetti Bolognese from scratch without a wooden spoon. Who knew?
I leaned against the wall and watched him methodically work through the boxes.
‘You could help.’
‘You’re doing fine.’
‘This doesn’t count as cooking, so you don’t get a free pass on it.’ A box landed at my feet. ‘Get hunting.’
The box contained sheets, I discovered, and towels. I had never seen any of them before. ‘Try again.’
‘I think I’ve struck gold.’ Rob crouched down beside the last box in the pile and lifted out a stack of saucepans. ‘Here we go. A wooden spoon. I knew you’d have one somewhere.’
‘Mum must have put it in. What else is in that box?’
‘A sieve, baking tins – cooking stuff. And cutlery. No plates.’
‘They must be somewhere else,’ I said, distracted. ‘I’ve never owned a sieve.’
‘Well, you do now.’ He twirled it by the handle. ‘I love your mum. She’s thought of everything.’
‘Oh yeah, she’s great.’ My voice was loaded with sarcasm. ‘Everything in that box is designed to make me feel bad for not being remotely domestic.’
‘It is useful,’ Rob said carefully, ‘to be able to feed yourself without having to resort to the takeaways section of the Yellow Pages.’
‘There’s always toast.’
‘You frighten me. How all your teeth haven’t fallen out from vitamin deficiency, I’ll never know.’
I grinned at him to prove I still had a full set. ‘Toast with Marmite. Toast with jam. Cheese on toast. Beans on toast. All the major food groups. It’s the perfect food.’
‘Well, you’re not having toast tonight.’
‘I am actually looking forward to a proper meal,’ I admitted, trailing him back to the kitchen where he got on with scraping chopped onion into one of the saucepans. ‘So you were more than a little mysterious about your case. What’s the mess you’re clearing up?’
‘Remember that domestic in Chiswick a couple of weeks ago? Morty arrested the husband? The victim was Andrea Tancredi. Strangled with the electrical cord of her hairdryer.’
I did remember. DS Mortimer had spent a long time telling everyone how easy the case had been to clear up. Art Mortimer was a large, bearded, untidy man and spent most days wandering the office like the last lonely mastodon on a perpetual quest for a primeval forest to call his own. Godley kept him on the team because he had years of experience and a gift for getting confessions from people, but he was not the most dynamic of police officers.
‘Ray Tancredi, the husband, was having financial trouble. His property business was seriously in the shit. The house was burgled on the day of the murder – or at least, that was what we were supposed to think. Broken window, safe hanging open, money and jewellery missing – oh, and Mrs Tancredi’s rapidly cooling body in the master bedroom. The SOCOs found blood on the window that matched Tancredi, and there was a fresh cut on his right forearm. It didn’t take a huge leap of logic to have a look for the jewellery that was missing in places where he had been, and Morty found it in Tancredi’s locker at his golf club. He’d been golfing with his best friend that afternoon – that was his alibi for the murder.’
‘So he definitely staged the burglary.’
‘Definitely.’ Rob paused in the middle of chopping a mushroom. ‘All of this talking is making me thirsty.’
‘Do you want a glass of wine?’
‘Thought you’d never ask.’
I levered the cork out of a bottle of ruby-coloured South African Shiraz and poured the wine into two mismatched glasses.
‘Go back to Ray Tancredi. What happened next?’
‘He was arrested, interviewed and charged with murder. He admitted staging the burglary, but denied the murder. And in fairness, he did seem pretty shocked about his wife’s death.’
‘That means nothing,’ I said, hitching myself up on to the work surface beside the cooker. ‘Remorse.’
‘That is a remarkably inconvenient place for you to sit, by the way.’
‘There’s nowhere else.’ There really wasn’t.
‘I can’t believe you’re willing to put up with this kitchen.’
I shrugged. ‘Converted flats always mean compromises. I like old houses. I like the living room and the bedroom. Plus the rent is cheap for a furnished flat. I can live with the crappy kitchen and the bathroom.’
‘The living room is nice,’ Rob agreed. In addition to the bay window, it was big, with a high ceiling and wide wooden floorboards. The original fireplace was still there, even if it had been coated in a thick layer of white emulsion. I had had visions of myself curled up on the big grey sofa drinking tea, looking out at the trees blowing in the breeze. Maybe while someone else was cooking dinner, I found myself thinking, watching Rob move deftly around the tiny space.
He looked at me, eyebrows raised, and I realised I’d missed something. ‘Huh?’
‘What’s wrong with the bathroom?’
‘It’s just a little bit tired, that’s all.’ That was the landlord’s euphemism for a permanent limescale mark that scarred the bath, and a loo with a chipped cistern lid. The shower was no great shakes either. ‘Look, I’m not going to be staying here for ever. It’s good enough for a few months.’
‘Mm.’ A smile he couldn’t hide was turning the corners of his mouth up.
‘What are you laughing at?’
‘Classic Kerrigan. This’ll do for the time being even though you could probably have found something nicer if you’d bothered. As long as it’s not a permanent commitment, you’re happy with good enough.’
I looked at him warily. ‘Are you still talking about the flat?’
‘Mostly.’
I chose not to pursue it. ‘How did you get involved in clearing up a mess? So far you’ve got Ray Tancredi in prison. That seems fair enough.’
‘It did indeed. The only trouble was, he didn’t do it.’
‘You shock me.’
‘I was shocked myself. I was only involved because I got stuck with doing Morty’s donkeywork for the investigation into Tancredi’s financial difficulties, because they wanted to prove he was after Andrea’s life insurance. I was supposed to be chasing up the Production Orders we’d sent his bank. The CPS wanted a full record of his affairs for the last couple of years and the bank was, as usual, completely ignoring the request. Morty was off doing something more glamorous so I took the call when a Mrs Penny Quentin rang up and asked if a detective could come to see her to discuss information she had relating to the Tancredi case.’
‘Mrs Penny Quentin being?’
‘Mrs Penny Quentin being a total fox, even though she’s not as young as she used to be – knock-out figure, blond hair, high heels, the works. In addition, Mrs Penny Quentin was Andrea Tancredi’s friend – or at least, she was supposed to be. Penny is also married to Eric Quentin, who was Ray Tancredi’s best mate and golfing companion on the afternoon in question.’
I looked at him
with mock severity. ‘Don’t tell me you flirted with the lady.’
‘I didn’t have to. She told me everything she knew almost as soon as I walked in. And what she knew – and could prove – was that her husband had arranged the whole thing. He’d got in touch with some lads who were prepared to do the job for ten grand each. She had emails, phone records, a bank statement that showed a one-off cash withdrawal of twenty thousand before the murder – the works. He had no idea that she knew all of his passwords, or that she was watching what he was doing so closely.’
‘Where did he find the lads?’
‘Eric grew up in a rough bit of Basildon. Even though he’d gone up in the world, he found it useful to stay in touch with a few old friends. A couple of phone calls set him up with two goons who were happy to commit murder as long as they got paid for it. He didn’t want to get his hands dirty, understandably. He knew Ray was having money troubles so he encouraged him to stage the burglary and make an insurance claim for the jewellery. Eric knew a man who knew a jeweller who would buy the stuff that had been stolen without asking too many questions about where it had come from. Ray was desperate for cash to keep his business afloat, so he went along with it. He left work at lunchtime, dashed home, broke the window and took the jewellery. Andrea was usually at the gym at that time of day. We found her car in the garage – he wouldn’t have known she’d never left the house.’
‘Didn’t he see the body?’
Rob shook his head. ‘Everything that was stolen came from the safe in the study, downstairs. He was in a hurry – he just grabbed and ran. He must have got the shock of his life when he found out she had been there all along. Eric couldn’t have known he would make such a balls-up of the burglary, but Ray played into his hands. And then Eric took him off for a round of golf, just a bit too late to be a convincing alibi for murder.’
‘Why did Eric want to have Andrea killed?’
‘Eric and Andrea were having an affair. From what Penny said, Andrea was a total bitch. Eric had told her he was planning to leave Penny and get a divorce, but not so he could settle down with Andrea. Eric has been knocking off his secretary, Saskia, who is twenty-six to Eric’s forty-five, in case you were wondering. Penny said it was a classic mid-life crisis, right on cue. Saskia is one of your high-maintenance types and she wants a ring on her finger. Eric is head over heels, according to Penny, and is prepared to do whatever she asks.’
‘She must be some secretary.’
‘She’s got a double-barrelled surname and lives in Parsons Green. Reading between the lines, Eric sees her as his ticket to social acceptability. But that’s going to be a lot harder to achieve when he’s got a conviction for murder.’
‘Hold on. Why did Eric have to have his lover killed? I’d have thought Penny was the one who needed to be got out of the picture.’
‘Andrea was fed up because Eric was planning to marry Saskia, not her. Eric is considerably better off than Ray – Penny thinks that he was Andrea’s exit strategy from her marriage and a chance at a much more comfortable life. When he told her he was going to have to break it off with her, she threatened to tell Penny and Saskia about their relationship. And Eric had the sense to know Saskia was going to flip her lid, even though she’d been happy to help him to cheat on his wife for the past eighteen months. She’s not the sort to put up with infidelity, or so Penny says, and she’s made it her business to get to know Saskia. Keep your enemies close, and all that. There’s a big difference between being the mistress and being the one who’s betrayed.’
‘But Penny was happy to put up with it.’
‘She thought he’d come back to her eventually. And when she realised he wasn’t going to, she decided he wasn’t worth worrying about. No, Eric knew Penny wasn’t going to make any trouble. Because she’s been married to him for such a long time, she’s entitled to a huge amount of money if she opts for a reasonably amicable divorce settlement. Penny,’ Rob said, stirring the sauce, ‘is a pragmatist.’
‘So what happens now?’
‘Ray is going to court in the morning. The CPS are offering no evidence against him on the murder, and they’ve got to decide what to do about the jewellery theft. He didn’t get a chance to make the insurance claim, so he never actually got around to committing fraud, and since he stole it from himself …’ Rob shrugged. ‘I doubt anyone’s told him yet that he’s going to be a free man tomorrow, so that’ll be a nice surprise. Essex Police are picking up the two thugs, with any luck, and Liv and I are going after Eric.’
I felt a prickle of hostility at the mention of his pretty new colleague. ‘Should be easy enough. Penny’s handed it to you on a plate.’
‘There’s still a fair amount of legwork to be done checking facts, re-interviewing witnesses, and going over the evidence in the case again to make it incriminate Eric Quentin. It’s not exactly the fun bit of the job.’ He tested the spaghetti. ‘Not long now.’
‘It smells gorgeous.’ I slid off the counter. ‘I’ll go and lay the table.’
‘See if you can find a couple of plates in Cardboard City.’
There was a small table in the bay window with an upright chair on either side. I put out knives and forks and found a candle-stub in a holder on a windowsill, presumably left by a previous tenant. It looked like the ultimate in sophistication when I had put it in the middle of the table and lit it. Three matching ghost flames danced against the darkness of the window, reflected on the glass. I had decided not to risk lowering the ancient white cotton blinds that were rolled up above the window frame. One of them had fallen down the first time I’d tried, and replacing them was on my short list of things to do in the flat. Quite far up the list in fact, I thought, as Chris Swain jogged past slowly, staring in at me. He raised a hand as he went up the stairs that led to the front door and I gave a quick wave in return.
‘Who was that?’ Rob had come out of the kitchen carrying our glasses.
‘The guy who lives across the hall. He helped Dec and me with some of the boxes.’
‘Oh, right,’ Rob said, his face and voice blank, but I happened to know him quite well.
‘Come off it. You can’t be jealous.’
‘What gave you that idea?’ Before I could answer, he changed the subject. ‘Did you find plates? Or bowls. Bowls would be better.’
‘They might be in that one.’ I pointed. ‘Dec said it was heavy.’
Rob started moving boxes out of the way. I went to help, but he snapped, ‘I can manage.’
‘Don’t be shitty.’ I hunkered down beside him. ‘You obviously didn’t get a good look at him. He looks like a student – you know, beard and glasses.’
‘Oh, an intellectual.’
‘A nerd,’ I countered. ‘He doesn’t look as if he gets out much.’
‘Okay.’ He looked sideways at me. ‘I wasn’t jealous.’
‘Course not.’ I folded back the top of the box and lifted out a stack of plates. ‘Here we go. Straight from the 1970s to your table.’
Mum had given me the dinner set she had bought when she got married, blue-green glazed earthenware with a stylised pattern raised around the edge. I ran a finger over the pattern. ‘We should really be eating gammon with a slice of pineapple on top of it. And then sherry trifle to follow.’
‘Sorry. That’s not in my repertoire.’
We were almost nose to nose when I turned to smile at him and for a second I thought he was going to take the opportunity to kiss me. I waited, not moving. Instead, abruptly, he stood up. ‘I’ll sort out the food.’
I knew my face was burning red as I went and took refuge in my wine glass. By the time he came back, I had recovered what passed for composure. ‘This looks great. Thanks for cooking.’
‘Any time.’ He pulled out his chair and looked at the magazine that was lying on the seat. I’d forgotten to move it. ‘What’s this? “Twenty Ways to Please Your Man Tonight”. Looking for tips?’
I leaned over and retrieved it, back to crimson again
. ‘Absolutely not. It was the article about unreported rape that interested me.’
‘Oh, I’m sure. “Your Happiness Plan”,’ Rob read as I put the magazine on the floor. ‘“How to Get What You Want. What Your Style Says About You.” Do women actually believe that crap?’
‘Some do. Not me.’ I picked up my fork and dug in. ‘What do you think of Liv?’
He looked up, his eyes very blue in the candlelight. ‘What do you mean?’
‘Just what I said.’
‘She’s all right. Bit quiet.’
‘She’s very pretty.’
‘I hadn’t noticed.’ I raised my eyebrows sceptically. ‘She’s okay. But you know I only have eyes for you.’
‘Hmm.’ However severe I tried to look, I couldn’t hide the fact that I was pleased. ‘Is she any good? She hasn’t got much experience, from what I’ve heard.’
‘She was Special Branch – before it got eaten by the Anti-Terrorist Branch.’ The high-ups had decided to merge the two and create one Counter-Terrorism Command. Special Branch had come off worse, shedding support staff and officers.
‘If she was worth having around, they’d have wanted to keep her. How come she didn’t want to stay?’
‘You’re not that naive. Special Branch was dead. I wouldn’t have wanted to stick around to see who made it into the new command and who got dumped. Besides, Liv said it was a good opportunity to work in a different role – she’d got too comfortable and it was time for a change. She seems fairly switched on, if you ask me. And Godley wouldn’t have recruited her just because she’s pretty.’
I nodded, concentrating very hard on winding spaghetti around my fork.
‘Wish you were working with me on the Tancredi case instead of her?’
‘No.’ I drank the last of the wine in my glass in one long swallow, then admitted, ‘Okay, a little.’
He shook his head. ‘I’ve got a nasty little domestic that’s gone wrong once. You’ve got a far bigger case to handle. A potential serial killer.’
‘Yeah, and look how well the last one worked out for me.’