Beautiful Losers: A Novel of Suspense (25 page)

sixty-one

Before I could answer,
Darke intervened.

“What were you driving?”

I told him. “Traffic was slow and I had a puncture,” I added.

“Where?”

“Outside Loddiswell.”

“What did you do?”

“Changed the tyre.”

Hatchet raised his pale blond eyebrows in disbelief. “You didn't call Chris?”

“Why would I? I believed he was going to work. I'm perfectly capable of changing a wheel.” I tried to laugh, but it got choked off somewhere. “I called Cathy,” I said, a light pinging on in my head.

“Cathy?”

“Cathy Whitcombe at Ellerslie Lodge, where I work. I told her I was going to be late. You can check.”

“How long did it take to sort the puncture?” The question sounded clipped.

“
Forty-five
minutes.”

Hatchet's eyes fixed on mine once more. “Anyone see you?”

“I don't have a clue. I don't think so. I was concentrating on what I was doing. Look, do we have to do this now?” I said, suddenly tense with exhaustion. I understood they had a job to do. I genuinely wanted to help, but I wasn't ready for being shoved under a microscope yet. More importantly, I needed to think, to process the horrible news.

Darke was more solicitous. “Is there a friend you could call to come and stay with you?”

I immediately thought of Claire and wished I'd been more civil to Charlie. “I'll sort something out,” I said, eager to be rid of them.

“We'll need you to come to the police station tomorrow to formalise things,” Hatchet said, “and resume our discussion,” he added pointedly.

Oh God, I thought. “What time?”

“Eleven.”

“Should I have a lawyer with me?”

“You have the right to have a solicitor present. Up to you. We'll be sending a team round to search the cottage and you'll also be assigned a family liaison officer.”

Someone to check up on me. I walked with them to the door. Darke paused. “I see you have the cottage on the market. How long's it been on?”

“Not long.”

I didn't dare analyse the expression on his face.

I stumbled back from the closed door and slid down onto the floor. I wanted to reel the footage back, to discover that it was all a mistake, anything to deflect the desolation. Chris had betrayed me, but now that he was dead I felt bereft and stricken. I closed my swollen eyes, tears seeping out between the thickened lids, sat absolutely still, constricted.

To die like that …

The thought of him not being quite dead before the fire started tore into me. And what if he hadn't been? The grim thought made me crawl inside.

Fire. The word alone conjured up a primitive and elemental fear. I knew its strength. I understood the terror it engendered, the pain it caused, its ability to scorch and disfigure. Mystical and sexual, it symbolised both death and rebirth. For arsonists it was a
turn-on
, the ultimate power, and means to create impact. Whatever the reason for setting Chris's body alight, I doubted it was simply a means to cover the evidence. There was a message in the murder. For me.

And the cops were hunting Chris's killer in the wrong place.

sixty-two

Andy lived in one
of a row of cottages in Eastern Backway in Kingsbridge. Situated in the cleft of a steep road, the little home vibrated with the permanent sound of cars slowing down and changing gear. The front aspect looked out onto a park and fire station.

The sun beat down on the yard outside his front door and welded me to the concrete.

As soon as I saw Andy, I knew he'd heard.
Red-rimmed
eyes accentuating his pale skin, he held his arms out to me like a child asking for a carry. We fell into each other. He gave a low groan. I'd no idea how long we stood there, propping each other up.

Eventually, we went inside. Same jumble. Same smell of Chinese takeaway. A vase of fresh flowers was the only clue that a woman had made a recent visit. I commented on them. “Jen,” he explained. As if on cue, she popped her head around the door.

“Hiya, want a cuppa? That's all I've done since we heard the news. Terrible, isn't it? Everyone's talking about it. They're saying it's murder. Sugar, milk?” she said, coming up for air.

“Tea, no sugar, thanks,” I said, feeling awkward. I'd wanted to speak to Andy alone, without interference. We sat down together on the one available sofa. It was covered in cat hairs.

“How did you hear?” I asked him.

“South Hams Radio. Wasn't specific at first, but it didn't take long to work it out. Half the school is in shock. He's going to be badly missed.”

“Have the police seen you?”

“Not yet. It's true, then?” Andy's voice cracked.

I took his hand in mine. “I'm sorry, Andy.” Without warning, a wave of tears erupted. He put his arms around me. I buried my face in his shoulder, soaking his shirt, and he stroked my hair.

“That's right, you have a good cry,” Jen said, emerging from the kitchen. “That's what my mum says. No point in keeping it all in.”

We pulled apart. I felt Andy bristle beside me, Jen blundering through our grief like a cheerleader at a funeral service.

“There you go. A nice cup of tea and a plate of biscuits.”

“We're not hungry,” Andy said, speaking for both of us.

“Got to keep you strength up at times like this,” Jen said. “So what's the craic?”

“Fuck's sake, Jen,” Andy burst out. “Just listen to yourself. Will you stop fucking talking—please?”

“Oh,” she said, big eyes wide with hurt. “Sorry. I always talk too much, especially when it's serious. It's me. My mother's always telling me to button it. I didn't mean …”

“It's all right, Jen.” I gave a tired smile, wishing I had a remote to switch her off.

“Why don't you go and get a pint of milk or something?” Andy said, casting Jen a meaningful look.

“Fine,” she said, reaching for her bag. “Anything else you want—sweets, a newspaper, magazine?”

“No,” Andy snapped. “Take as long as you need,” he added more gently.

We fell silent while the door opened and shut.

“She's completely doing my head in,” Andy muttered in apology.

“She's trying to be helpful, that's all,” I said, realising that we were all overwrought. Jen couldn't help being an emotional illiterate.

“I know,” he said, apologetic. “We were supposed to be going off in the camper van together today, but this has changed everything.” He took a drink of tea. “So what actually happened?”

“Andy, I …”

“I need to know.”

I told him.

“Christ almighty.” He put his hands to his face.

“And the police think I had something to do with it.”

He looked as if I'd handed him a gift wrapped in barbed wire.

“The police know that Chris left me for someone else.”

“What's that got to do with anything?” he said, indignant.

“
Crime passionel
, revenge. Don't you see, it looks like I have a motive.”

“That's bollocks.”

“At the moment they don't know about Carolla Dennison.”

He gave me a sharp look. “You think she was involved?”

“Definitely on a sexual level.” I failed to push the bitterness and resentment out of my voice. I knew Chris. I knew his needs.

Andy shook his head slowly. “I wouldn't have put Carolla Dennison down as a murderer.”

Jury was out. Even if she were innocent, Carolla might provide a lead. “Is there any way I can get hold of her?”

“Is that wise?”

“I only want to talk. She might be able to help.”

“How?”

“She knew Chris. She might have seen him with someone, someone who had it in for him.”

“Right, I see where you're going with it.”

I didn't spell it out. We both knew I was talking about my stalker. “What about the place she's living in?”

“She was renting somewhere in Thurlestone, but I'm not sure she's still there, or whether they'll give a forwarding address. Pat Emerson might be a better contact, but he's on holiday.”

Of course, the Head was bound to know how to get in touch. “What about other work colleagues?”

Andy brightened. “She was quite pally with Jo Sharpe. She lives in Saffron Park.”

“Number?”

“Can't remember. Wait,” he said, putting a hand to his temple, “the house is called Fallowfields.”

sixty-three

“Are you Jo Sharpe?”

Small with short brown hair, green eyes, and a deeply freckled face, the woman nodded and got up from the border she was weeding. Rubbing her hands against her jeans, soil trickled through her muddy fingers. I introduced myself.

“Chris Beech's girlfriend?” The green eyes gleamed in apprehension.

Not really. Not anymore. “That's me.”

“Christ,” Jo let out.

“Can we talk?”

Jo tilted her head, looked at the sky as if she'd thought about such a moment but never believed it would happen. “I don't know. I'd rather not get involved. I'm Carolla's friend,” Jo said in response to my searing expression. “I know she behaved badly but in the end no one got hurt.”

I checked a verbal response and looked in open amazement. Embarrassment flooded the other woman's freckled features.

“You don't know what's happened, do you?” I said. “You don't know about Chris.”

Jo wrinkled her nose. “Know what?”

“He was found dead. The police think it was murder.”

We sat in Jo's cramped kitchen. Tension either makes you talkative or clam up. Jo was a gabber.

“I don't know how much you know about Chris and Carolla. I can guess what you're thinking, but it really wasn't like that. Not far off, I know. More like having sex with all your clothes on.”

“Frottage,” I said. Hell, what a comfort.

Jo looked blank.

“Having sex with … oh, never mind.”

Jo gave another slight mystified nod. “See, there was a group of us who'd meet up midweek for a drink after work, usually at the Hermitage. It got to be quite a regular event. We'd drink far too much and end up at the Balti House.”

This was news to me. “Who exactly?”

“Carolla, me, Paul Hammond …”

“The history guy?”

“That's the one. Faye Hannaford, the new Chem teacher, Andy and his new squeeze, Jen, Chris …” I briefly tuned out. Chris the loner, Chris the friendless, Chris who liked his own company best of all. Chris, the man I barely recognised.

“They used to go to the cinema a fair bit.”

“What, Chris and Carolla?”

“Yeah, she complained to me once that she didn't like his choice of films. She was more into comedy, romance, you know the thing?”

Crawling inside, I nodded. I'd thought films were
our
thing. I'd no idea he'd shared his passion with someone else.

“Anyway it was never going to happen with you on the scene. Sure, there was a deep attraction there right from the off. Any fool could see that. You'd only have to walk into a room and you could sense the sexual tension, but it came to nothing.”

“How do you know?”

“He felt too guilty. You were the stronger pull, I guess. Not that Carolla told me every little detail. I mean, she wouldn't, would she? My God, I wonder if I should tell her. She'll be devastated.”

She has no bloody right to be devastated, I railed inside. “You said it came to nothing.”

Jo tilted her head. “Shouldn't you be at home, or something?”

“I need to know the truth.”

“Why torture yourself?”

Because the alternative is too horrible to contemplate. “How much did Carolla really tell you? Did she tell you that Chris was leaving me? Did she tell you that he was going to fly with her to the States?”

Jo's denial was more a shout of alarm.

“I don't think you know your friend as well as you think,” I said.

sixty-four

I raced back to
the cottage. The phone kept ringing with messages of condolence from Chris's midweek drinking pals and colleagues. I let the messaging service collect the calls, poured a glass of lemonade, and took it outside. In the early evening sun the water was the colour of copper, the air still and quiet. Not so my thoughts, which were like a couple of rampant poltergeists in my head. The truth, such a flexible commodity; it all depended on whose truth I believed. Nothing to write home about, Jo would have me think, yet even she'd been forced to admit to the existence of stolen kisses, secret meetings, simmering phone calls, sexual fucking tension. So it wasn't all a one-way street then, I'd pointed out tersely. And in the end Carolla had won, not me. The final good-bye letter proved it.

Obsessively, I wondered exactly what had gone on between them. Had he fucked Carolla like he'd fucked me? Why hadn't Carolla reported him missing if they were such an item? Even if I got to speak to my love rival, I'd only be scratching the surface, getting Carolla's nicely sanitised version of events. And it all depended on Jo getting in touch with Carolla, and Carolla contacting her, and why would she? I certainly wouldn't if I were in her shoes.

I ditched the lemonade and went to the drinks cupboard, the standard Slade response to a crisis, and found the remains of a bottle of cheap cooking brandy. Pouring a small measure, I drank it neat. Whatever I did now, I couldn't afford to make the same mistake again. This time there must be no assumptions, only facts. I had to weigh them up against
cast-iron
evidence, and apply Gavin Chadwick–proof rules. My stomach lurched. The police were going to interview me the next day. I could have a solicitor with me. My choice. No sweat. They hadn't said as much but I knew the bottom line. They meant business.

I poured out more brandy, took a gulp, the heat warming my insides as I tried to work out whether it would be better to have a lawyer with me, or not. Having one might be viewed as an admission of guilt. I hadn't the faintest idea who to lobby, how to go about it, criminal lawyers being outside my field of experience—a shitty dinner party with Gavin Chadwick didn't count.

I wandered through to the study and played the first of several messages. Claire's voice was strained, not like Claire at all, which, I supposed, was understandable. Grief mixed with guilt is toxic. Claire's message was an
open-ended
invite to stay at the farm until things
died down
.

The next message was from Detective Sergeant Fiona North, a family liaison officer. Announcing she'd already called at the cottage but not found me in, North suggested I might like to phone her; the third, from Andy, no message; the fourth, from Molly, breathy, tearful, compassionate; the fifth, from Alexa, who called to say that she'd found the lawyerly equivalent of a pit bull. The last was from my estate agent, stating the obvious: no offers but endeavouring to get more punters round. I swallowed a mouthful of lemonade.

Not now you can't, I thought. Death puts people right off.