by JL Merrow
“And what about names? Your own, after the ceremony, I mean, unless there is some other news you’ve been keeping mum about? I do hope this isn’t a shotgun wedding.” Gary chortled. He and Darren were now cheerfully double-barrelled. Hyphenated for all eternity.
Well, hopefully.
“We’re keeping our own names,” Phil said shortly. “Look, I’ve got some paperwork to do, so I’ll leave you to it for a bit.”
He headed upstairs with his laptop. Phil finds Gary easier to take in small doses.
Especially when Gary’s got a face on him like the one he was sporting right now. “Keeping your maiden names? Don’t you think that shows a certain lack of commitment?”
I shrugged and wrote Fine by me in my notebook.
Gary arched an eyebrow. “The names? Or the lack of commitment?”
I gave him an eye roll. Then I wrote, It’s what he wants, and I’m not bothered.
“Oh, sweetie,” Gary said, his tone sorrowful. “You don’t want to be the one who always gives in. It’s a slippery slope, Tommy dearest.”
I scribbled down, I’m not.
Gary just raised an eyebrow, the git.
Phil didn’t say he was going to stay over that night, just hopped into bed with me as if he owned the place.
I can’t say I was all that surprised, to be honest. Actually, for a moment there I was worried he’d taken Dave’s advice to heart and really was intending to hold my hand while I went for a piss.
Course, if he moved in with me, it’d be our place, not just mine, and he’d be hopping into bed with me every night. Which, yeah, no cons there.
Just . . . I’d lived alone for years now. And yeah, he was round here a lot, but that wasn’t the same as him having nowhere else to go.
Maybe it would be better to take up Cherry’s offer? Start off fresh somewhere new? Somewhere bigger, where I wouldn’t feel he was invading my space?
Christ, though, Pluck’s End? I mean, don’t get me wrong, it’s lovely there. But would it be home, like Fleetville was? I felt like I belonged here. I knew the people in the local businesses, and, well, I fitted in. Would I fit in, in Pluck’s End, with all the lawyers and the doctors and the retired bank managers?
Phil would, with his cashmere sweaters and his shiny VW Golf.
Everyone would think he was slumming it with me.
I felt a lot more chipper next morning, after a decent night’s kip and a lie-in. My eyes were still a bit on the satanic side, and the bruises looked, if anything, worse than the day before, but at least my throat wasn’t as sore. I wasn’t planning on entering X Factor anytime soon, mind.
I could tell Phil was torn. He clearly wanted to be out and about tracking down whatever bastard had tried to break our engagement permanently, but he didn’t want to leave me on my own. I had a feeling he was going to try to ship me over to Gary’s to be babysat, and if that was the case, we were going to have to have words.
Probably written ones, in my case. But they’d be in all capitals.
“Feel up to a trip out?” he asked in the end.
“Yeah,” I croaked, louder than I’d meant to. “Thought you’d leave me behind,” I added in a whisper.
“Don’t talk. You need to rest your throat. No. We’re going to talk to Alex Majors about his plumbing, and having you along looking like that might loosen his tongue.”
I grinned and grabbed my notebook. You’re sexy when you’re ruthless, I wrote.
It was a lie. He was sexy all the time.
Phil went off to make a couple of phone calls, and I set about making myself more presentable. With one of Phil’s cashmere scarves round my neck to hide the bruising and sunglasses to hide the demon eyes, I looked like Lance Frith’s less trendy cousin. Maybe I should grow a beard. I mean, I hadn’t felt much like shaving this morning anyhow, so I already had a start on it.
I thought about mentioning it to Phil as we drove off in his Golf—he looked like he could do with a laugh—but although my throat was definitely better than it had been, I still wasn’t keen on speaking when it wasn’t absolutely necessary, especially when there was background noise around. Maybe I’d text him. Trouble was, he was driving. If I made him hit a lamppost, I’d be well embarrassed.
I fiddled about with my phone until I found the text-to-speech app and had an idea moment. I hit Play, and a robotic American voice asked, “SHOULD I GROW A BEARD?”
Well, it certainly got a reaction. Phil looked over, startled, the car swerved, and we almost did hit a lamppost. “Jesus, you want to warn me next time?”
I typed quickly. “SORRY.”
“Christ. Can’t you just learn sign language or something? It’s like you’ve turned into Stephen Hawking.”
I typed, WHEELCHAIR SEX. KINKY, which sounded all kinds of wrong in that cold robotic voice.
“No wheelchair sex. And no beards either.” Phil squeezed my thigh. “I like you just the way you are.”
“UNABLE TO SPEAK,” I typed to cover for a stray bit of emotion that’d got in my eye.
Phil smirked. “Got it in one.”
When he opened the front door of his farmhouse to us, Alex Majors looked to me like he’d aged a decade or two in the last day and a half. And he hadn’t been in great shape to begin with. At this rate, we’d be going to his funeral by the end of the week. His long-limbed figure looked brittle and shaky, like a dead tree facing its final stiff breeze.
“Mr. Majors?” Phil said in his polite ex-copper voice. “We’d like to ask you a few questions.”
I’d expected Alex to bluster and counter with a sharp request to know what we thought we were doing and why we weren’t leaving it to the police. But he let us in without a word. Literally. It was a bit creepy, to be honest.
Maybe he was feeling guilty I’d been attacked on his property?
Phil coughed. “Perhaps we could sit down somewhere? Tom’s not long out of hospital.”
Well, if Alex hadn’t been feeling guilty before, I was betting he was now. He nodded curtly and led us into the kitchen, maybe because that’s where we’d sat the last time we’d seen him. Who knows? He waved us to sit.
Well, if we were going to make ourselves comfortable . . . I unwound my scarf and laid it on the back of the chair, then took off my sunglasses. Catching a sudden movement out of the corner of my eye, I looked up to see Alex staring at me in horror. Had he actually flinched when he’d seen me in my full glory?
There was an uncomfortable silence, which Phil broke by clearing his throat. “Mr. Majors, thanks for having us here. I’d just like to ask a few questions about the day Tom was attacked.”
Alex blinked several times, as if he was processing it, then nodded sharply. All this silence from his end was starting to seriously creep me out.
“Is your daughter in?” It wasn’t the opener I’d expected from Phil, but I guessed it was relevant. Alex might speak more freely without her in the house.
If, you know, he was planning on speaking at all.
After a pause that was just a little bit too long, Alex shook his head and finally spoke, his voice sounding almost as rusty as mine. “No. No, she’s . . . out.”
Out where? I wondered, but Phil didn’t press him on it.
“I understand you had to call a plumber in quite recently. Can I ask you what that was regarding?”
He looked surprised to be asked about that. Hadn’t the police asked him about it already? Or had they got the plumber’s name from Vi and asked him direct?
Huh. I wondered if Phil had thought of that. And if it was going to be our next stop.
“A leak.”
“Can I ask where, precisely?” Phil bored on.
In the metaphorical drilling sense, obviously. Nobody round that table was in any danger of falling asleep.
“It was . . . It was . . .” Alex stared at the kitchen wall like it might hold some clue to staving off his imminent nervous breakdown. He made a jerky movement, his arms pressing convulsively to his sides. Then he let out a long
breath. “It was me,” he said in a voice that was almost calm.
“What was you?” Phil asked, barely controlled excitement in the way he leaned forward, like a greyhound that’s just realised it could be rabbit time.
“I . . .” Alex cleared his throat. “I killed Amelia. And attacked Tom.”
“Bugger me,” I croaked.
Well, after that, it all got a bit official. Police had to be called—Alex, of all people, insisted—and statements taken.
Right at the wrong moment—just as they were loading a handcuffed Alex into one of the police cars—Vi rolled up in a racy little bright-purple Lexus I couldn’t remember ever having seen before. Then again, if I had a car that expensive, I’d probably keep it locked up snug in a garage when I wasn’t using it. Her worries about leaving it parked on my street didn’t seem so unreasonable now.
Her eyes wide, she pulled on the handbrake, jumped out, and ran over just in time to see Daddy being driven off. I’d thought the plod might have taken pity on her and stopped to let Alex say a few words to his only child, but apparently compassion was in short supply today. Must be the budget cuts. They zoomed off down the drive, leaving Vi standing there, her fists clenched in frustration.
Me and Phil having already been locked out by the plod, we were in prime position to get the full blast of Vi’s impotent rage, and she gave it to us with both barrels. “What’s going on here? Where are they taking Daddy? What have you done?”
Phil was unmoved. “Your father’s confessed to killing your stepmother and attempting to kill Tom.”
“Why the hell would he do that?” she snapped.
Kill people? Or confess to it? I guessed she’d probably like an answer to both questions.
Phil confined himself to answering the first. “He said he realised marrying her was a mistake and he was worried Tom would give the police a message from her saying he’d done it.”
As he said it, I tried to remember if old Alex had ever given any sign of (a) being anything other than devoted to the missus and (b) believing I spoke to dead people.
“But it’s all a load of absolute balls,” Vi insisted. “He didn’t do it. I know he didn’t.”
I was pretty sure I agreed. I could remember how he’d looked when he’d come home to find me half-dead—that’d been genuine shock, that had. I’d stake my life on it.
Um. Probably not literally.
She rounded on me. “Tom? You’re the psychic. You have to go to the police and tell them Daddy didn’t do it. Tell them Amelia said so. Or . . . or tell them you’ve remembered something and it couldn’t have been Daddy who attacked you.”
“Look,” I said, and cleared my throat. “I’m not making stuff up.”
“But he didn’t do it.”
“Then it’s likely there won’t be enough evidence to charge him,” Phil said flatly.
“But if he’s confessed? I don’t . . . Why would he even do that?” The anger was slowly turning to tears.
Phil looked a bit unnerved at the prospect.
I put a hand on her arm. “Look, love, got anyone you can go to?” It’s not easy making a death-rattle sound comforting and sympathetic, which might have been why Vi shook me off.
She leaned against the wall of the house and put her head in her hands. Then she looked up, her tears drying, and she nodded. Without so much as a glance back at either of us, she half ran over to her little sports car, got in, and drove away.
Christ. I hoped she wasn’t going to cause an accident.
Me and Phil got back in his Golf in a lot more leisurely fashion. “Think he did it?” I croaked as we set off.
“If he didn’t do it, then he’s protecting someone.” Phil’s jaw set. “Who do you reckon Alex Majors is willing to go to prison for out of that little lot?”
I stared at him. “Vi? But . . . No. Christ, no. Not her.”
It made a horrible kind of sense, though. I mean, Alex had been floored by Amelia’s death. He’d looked ill every time I’d seen him since.
What better to do that than knowing your only kid had killed the woman you loved?
But then why would Vi be so adamant he hadn’t done it—surely it had to be in her best interest to let someone else go down for the crime?
Guilty conscience, because she’d never intended Daddy to take the rap? Or smokescreen, because it’d make people think she couldn’t be guilty? Christ, this was doing my head in. “Who do you think she’s gone to? Uncle Arlo?”
“You’re talking too much. And maybe. My money’s on not, though.”
Yeah, I didn’t reckon that wife of his would be any too welcoming. Who, then? “Lance? No, wait, he thinks she’s a waste of space. Toby?” Christ, I could murder a warm drink.
“Might find out soon.”
I gave him a look.
He smirked. “We’re off to see Lance Frith now.”
Apparently Phil reckoned he was on a roll. Maybe he was hoping Lance would take one look at us, say It’s a fair cop, and hand over that flippin’ necklace?
I dunno what I expected from Lance Frith’s place. Probably some ultramodern new age hippy eco-house half covered in turf that looked like it belonged in Teletubbyland.
Turned out he lived in your genuine olde thatched cottage, in one of the villages around St. Leonards. It even had a suitably rustic name: The Rowans. As I followed Phil up the garden path, a black cat darted out from under the tarpaulin covering a car parked at the side of the cottage. Was old Lance taking the piss?
“Why’s he not working?” I asked. It was just after noon on a weekday. If it hadn’t been for the whole attempted-murder inconvenience, I’d have been working.
“Works from home. Told you his and Amelia’s business wasn’t exactly heavy with assets.”
I hoped he didn’t work in his pyjamas. They were probably covered in mystic sigils.
Not that I’d know a sigil if it jumped up and bit me on the bum, mind.
Phil rapped on the front door. After a wait that was definitely on the long side, given the size of the house—still, maybe Lance had been on the loo, or changing out of those magical jim-jams—the door opened.
Lance looked a bit flushed, but at least he was fully dressed. “Phil. Tom. So delightful to see you again.” He was in all black again—maybe it helped him bond with the cat—but this time it was leggings, which if you ask me are just wrong on blokes, and a loose T-shirt. And sunglasses.
Maybe he had something wrong with his eyes? Say, the sort of thing that might make you botch a strangling job in the dark?
I mean, if that hadn’t been Alex, obviously. Or Vi. Speaking of who . . . As Lance ushered us in, I looked around for signs of a female visitor—high heels by the front door, handbag on the hall table, lipstick smears on Lance’s neck, that sort of thing.
Nothing. Was that a whiff of scent in the air? Yep, and it was coming from Lance.
Actually it wasn’t bad. I wondered if Phil would like some for Christmas.
Not what we were here for, though. I listened—and nearly jumped out of my skin when Lance grasped me by the arm. “Tom, what a terrible experience for you. I’m surprised to see you up and about so soon. How are you?”
“Uh, I’m good,” I rasped.
Lance winced. “Let me make you some lemon tea with honey. Please, come through.”
The kitchen here clearly doubled as the dining room—the large, antique wooden table was all set up with hessian placemats. In the middle was one of those crystal things—geodes?—that’s like a rock football on the outside and all geometrical lumps of gemstone on the inside. Well, half of one, at any rate—not much point having a whole one, seeing as how until you break it open and see what’s inside, you might as well just have a pet rock. This one was amethyst, which I knew because it was one of the stripes on the rainbow pendulum Cherry had got me. I took off my sunglasses and had a proper look. It was well pretty.
Added to which, it’d probably make a good weapon against intruders—brain someone
with that and they wouldn’t be getting up in a hurry.
If I saw Lance’s hand straying in that direction, I decided, I was legging it and taking Phil with me. I looked up and saw Lance staring at me, his mouth slightly open.
I flashed him a smile. “The eyes?” I croaked. “It’s a whatsit.”
“Subconjunctival haemorrhage,” Phil helped me out with. “From strangulation.”
Lance swallowed. “I’ll put that kettle on,” he said, and turned away.
It struck me, looking around at the rustic units and general lack of mod cons—he even had an Aga, for Christ’s sake—that this was a weird sort of home for someone who’d been married to Amelia. Had she lived here with him before they’d split? Arlo’s home seemed much more her style.
Was this place some kind of reaction to the breakup?
I was a bit dismayed to realise his lemon tea wasn’t just your usual PG Tips with a slice of lemon instead of milk. It was your actual lemon herbal tea. Thank God he was adding honey so it’d taste of something besides boiled grass.
Then I remembered rule #1 of dealing with people mixed up in a murder: you don’t eat or drink anything they offer you. Hah. Saved. Although when Lance put the tea in front of me, the aroma rising up from the mug was pretty darn tempting. Sod it. I wished I’d paid more attention to the box the tea bags came in. I contented myself with breathing in the sweet, tart, lemony steam.
Then I remembered some gases can kill you and shoved the mug further away from me.
Lance sat down with his own mug, and Phil cleared his throat. “Can I ask where you were on Wednesday night? From around 5 p.m. onwards?”
“Here. I was working on new material for the website.” Lance drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. “I wanted to put a tribute to Amelia on there, and of course all other references to her will have to be changed.”
“You were doing that all evening?”
“A great devourer of time, websites, I’m afraid. I’m sure you both find the same.”
Phil nodded. I kept quiet. Gary did my website, which is your basic shopfront one, no bells and whistles whatsoever despite all his pleading to give me the latest widgets and whatnots. Customers don’t seem to trust a tradesman if the website’s too slick. He’d agreed in the end, and even offered to put in the odd greengrocer’s apostrophe and a few spelling mistakes, but I was fairly sure he was taking the piss by then.
