Kennedy 03 - Where Petals Fall

by Shirley Wells

  ‘If you wanted to buy a bunch of flowers, you’d visit a florist. If you wanted a stately home, a cathedral or offices decked out, you’d visit a floral design company.’

  Max shrugged. To him, a flower was a flower.

  ‘Was she married?’ Jill asked, and he nodded.

  ‘No kids? Career woman?’

  He nodded again. ‘Her husband’s been away on a golfing holiday. His plane lands in an hour or so and he’s on his way here to identify her.’

  The pages of Jill’s newspaper fluttered in a sudden gust of breeze and she leaned over to pick up a nearby stone to weight it down.

  She watched in astonishment as Max reached in his pocket, brought out a packet of cigarettes and proceeded to light one.

  ‘I thought you’d given up.’

  ‘I have,’ he said, tossing the spent match into her hedge. ‘I just felt like buying a packet.’

  ‘Oh. Right.’ Ask a silly question. Yet she could understand that last night’s discovery would unnerve anyone.

  He exhaled, and the smoke went straight into Jill’s face. ‘Chloe Jennings, Zoe Smith, Anna Freeman and Julie Brookes – it’s the same MO, Jill.’

  Jill could still remember the victims’ names, too. Chloe had been an attractive barrister, dark-haired Zoe had held down a high-powered job in banking, Anna had run a successful recruitment agency and Julie, with her short auburn hair, had owned a thriving health and fitness centre.

  ‘There must be differences,’ she insisted.

  ‘Yeah?’ Max didn’t look convinced.

  ‘Had coins been put on her eyes?’

  ‘Yes.’

  Despite the heat of the day, Jill felt chilled. If she’d made a mistake and The Undertaker was still alive –

  ‘What else have you got?’ she asked.

  ‘Not a lot yet. Someone had thrown up about three yards away from the body,’ he told her, ‘and we don’t think it was the victim. She was dead before she got there.’

  ‘The killer? Surely not.’

  ‘Perhaps he’d eaten a dodgy prawn,’ Max replied. ‘Although I expect it’s more likely to be the person who found her. Not a pretty sight.’

  ‘Who was that?’

  ‘We don’t know. Someone made an anonymous call. It sounded like a young kid.’ He tossed his cigarette butt into the hedge. A thin spiral of smoke appeared, and Jill wondered if she would have to phone the fire service. Then he emptied his mug and got to his feet. ‘I’ll have to go.’ He reached for her hand and absently stroked her fingers. ‘Sorry about last night.’

  ‘It’s OK,’ she replied, grudgingly.

  ‘I’ll call in later this evening, shall I?’ he asked.

  ‘If you like.’

  He dropped a brief, rare kiss on her forehead – an apology perhaps – and strode off.

  He was the other side of her lawn when she called out, ‘Eddie Marshall is dead, Max!’

  ‘Is he?’ And he was out of sight.

  A cloud passed in front of the sun, causing Jill to shiver again. Edward Marshall was dead. The fact that his body had never been found had no bearing on that at all. He had to be dead.

  Chapter Three

  Mowing the lawn was hard work and, when it was done, Jill vowed to keep on top of it. If she kept the grass short, it was much easier. For one thing, she didn’t have the job of raking up the clippings and that was more exhausting than cutting the stuff in the first place.

  ‘Coo-ee!’

  Jill emerged from her shed to see the owner of that voice, Ella Gardner, walking around the back of her cottage.

  ‘You should keep your doors locked,’ Ella greeted her, ‘until they’ve found the lowlife responsible for this spate of burglaries.’

  ‘I should, Ella.’ Jill was still breathing hard.

  ‘Mind,’ Ella sighed, ‘there are few that do in Kelton. We’ve never had a need to until now.’

  Ella took the fact that four houses in Kelton Bridge had been burgled as a personal affront. The unknown burglar or burglars were breaking in during broad daylight – no small achievement given the prying nature of local residents – when the occupants were on holiday. How they came by their information was a mystery. Only one of the victims had booked their holiday online, and two of the victims didn’t even have an internet connection, so they weren’t after a computer hacker.

  ‘You look worn out, girl,’ Ella noted belatedly, and Jill laughed.

  ‘I am. I’ve mown the lawn,’ she explained, ‘and now I’m going to sit under the lilac tree with a well-deserved glass of something cold. Will you join me, Ella, and make it worthwhile opening a bottle?’

  ‘I’m delivering the church magazines,’ Ella replied, flicking through the handful she was carrying. ‘I’m sure it grieves them to let a cantankerous old atheist like me do it, but as Joan’s done her ankle in, they don’t have much choice.’

  Jill laughed. ‘Was that a yes or a no?’

  ‘Go on then. Thanks, Jill. Having the magazines delivered by a drunken cantankerous old atheist could well be a first for the village.’

  Ella was a great one for walking, and was often seen striding round the village at a cracking pace. Yet, dressed in cream-coloured linen trousers, and loose sleeveless pink top, she was managing to look cool. Jill, in desperate need of a shower, and wearing an old pair of cut-off jeans, felt like a tramp by comparison.

  Jill had been friends with Ella almost from the moment she’d moved to Kelton Bridge. Ella, retired and afforded the title of local historian, had a wicked sense of humour that Jill loved. Going on appearances – the short grey hair, the sensible shoes and clothes – one could be forgiven for assuming Ella to be a biddable old soul but, despite the fact that she’d recently lost her much-loved husband to cancer, nothing, outwardly at least, lessened her sense of fun or her pithy observations of life.

  ‘So what’s new?’ Ella asked when they were sitting in the shade with a glass of chilled white wine each.

  ‘Not a lot.’ Ella was discretion itself, but Jill didn’t see much point in telling her about the gruesome discovery at the quarry. There was nothing to discuss until they knew more.

  ‘What about this new neighbour of yours? Olive, old gossip that she is, reckons he’s into black magic.’

  ‘The tarot and astronomy,’ Jill corrected her. ‘He runs an internet business. And charges people a fortune for readings, no doubt.’

  ‘Mumbo-jumbo,’ Ella scoffed. ‘Still, if people are daft enough to pay him . . .’

  ‘Quite.’

  ‘He’s a looker, mind,’ Ella added. ‘I’ve only seen him a couple of times, but if I were forty years younger –’

  ‘You’d have to join the queue,’ Jill finished for her.

  Finlay Roberts must have kissed the Blarney Stone. He wasn’t Irish, he’d been born in Scunthorpe, but he was full of charm and flattery. His family were circus people, and he’d travelled the length and breadth of the country as a child. He was still travelling, and was only renting the cottage next door for three months because he remembered the area from his childhood and had always vowed to return. His current job, and Jill gathered there had been many, was running his online tarot business. It meant he could work from anywhere that had internet access.

  Around the six feet mark, he had a rangy, lean body, brown curly hair and striking green eyes. Whenever he spoke of his business, those eyes shone with devilment and Jill found it impossible to tell if he believed in the tarot or if he was merely running a scam. It was difficult to see through the charm to the man beneath.

  ‘He’s attracting a lot of interest,’ she told Ella.

  ‘Strangers always do.’

  ‘Don’t I know it.’ Jill had lived in the village for almost two years now, and some still thought of her as ‘that fancy psychiatrist in Mrs Blackman’s old cottage’. For fancy psychiatrist read forensic psychologist. But what was the point? It was all the same to most people.

  ‘Talk of the devil,’ she murmured as Finlay pee
red over the hedge.

  From the look of him – old, paint-spattered jeans and ragged T-shirt – one would be forgiven for thinking he’d been doing a spot of decorating or sitting in front of an easel for hours. Jill guessed he’d been doing neither. This, she’d come to realize, was his usual mode of dress. It did nothing to lessen his appeal, though.

  ‘Hi, Finlay,’ she called out. ‘Will you join us in a glass of wine?’

  ‘Is the Pope a Catholic?’ He vanished from view briefly before vaulting the low part of the dividing fence. ‘I wasgoing to follow your example and mow the grass,’ he said, pulling up a chair and positioning it so the sun wasn’t in his eyes, ‘but this is a much better idea, darling girl.’ He smiled at Ella. ‘Mrs Gardner, isn’t it?’

  ‘It is, but I suppose that, devil worshipper or not, you may call me Ella.’

  ‘Did you hear that?’ he asked, grinning, as Jill rose to fetch another glass. ‘I’ll have you know, Ella, that I’ve just read the church magazine from cover to cover.’

  ‘That took a while then,’ Ella said drily. ‘Still, knowing where the nearest chimney sweep hangs out will come in useful . . .’

  Jill left them to it and, when she returned with another glass, they were discussing the burglaries.

  ‘I’ll be chief suspect,’ Finlay said with a grin. ‘I’m a newcomer, I’m a traveller and, to top it all, I’m a devil worshipper. I’ll have to shift all those TVs and DVD players before the police come hammering on my door.’

  ‘Why not ask the cards who did it?’ Ella suggested with a smile.

  ‘Ah, you mock.’

  ‘Oh, yes, I mock.’ Ella laughed. ‘Not you, but people daft enough to believe in it and pay you.’

  Finlay shrugged. ‘You’d be surprised.’

  ‘I’d be surprised if there was anything in it other than profit for some people,’ Ella agreed.

  ‘I must do a reading later,’ he said. ‘Jill would make a good subject.’

  ‘Why would I?’ she asked, amused.

  ‘Because, in many ways, you’re a typical Leo. And because I already feel as if I know a lot about you.’

  ‘Like what?’ Ella asked doubtfully.

  Finlay Roberts, roguish face smiling, took a sip of wine, then leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes.

  ‘She’s generous and warm-hearted –’

  ‘Pah! I could have told you that,’ Ella scoffed.

  ‘She’s very organized and tends to organize others if she thinks they need it. In most situations, she feels she knowsbest, but – and this is where it gets interesting – her self-confidence has been battered over the years. She was once in a strong relationship,’ he went on, ‘and by strong, I mean the depth of commitment was strong rather than the passion. She was living with someone or perhaps even married to someone she didn’t love.’

  His tone was level, monotonous even, but it was enough to bring Jill out in goosebumps. She hadn’t told him that she had been married. Or widowed. And she could use the fingers of one hand to count up the people who knew that she and Chris had discussed starting divorce proceedings before he was killed.

  ‘I think her work scares her,’ he continued. ‘She’s frightened of making a mistake.’

  ‘What? Oh, that’s complete crap. I love my writing and I’m returning to my job on the force in a couple of weeks.’

  ‘And the thought frightens you,’ he insisted.

  ‘Rubbish!’

  Nevertheless, if she’d made a mistake and The Undertaker was still alive – Why was she even bothering to think about it? It was complete rubbish. Anyone could invent that mumbo-jumbo!

  ‘Here, let me refresh our glasses.’

  The three passed a pleasant couple of hours but, left alone, Jill wondered again about the things Finlay had said.

  She knew, deep in her heart, that she was anxious about her return to the force. Despite having excellent qualifications and plenty of experience, she had made a mistake. That mistake, in part, was responsible for Rodney Hill, wrongly accused, hanging himself.

  Had she made another mistake? Again, it was thanks in part to her profile that the police had gone to arrest Edward Marshall. He’d resisted arrest and made a run for it in a neighbour’s car. Two people had been badly injured during a high-speed chase across Yorkshire before Marshall lost control of the car and plunged over a cliff. Experts, taking into account the tides and weather conditions, hadtried to predict where and when his body would be washed ashore but it had never been found.

  He had to be dead, though. Witnesses had seen him inside the car as it dived into the sea below and traces of blood had been found inside his car. He couldn’t have survived that plunge into the sea. No, Edward Marshall was dead.

  But had he been the right man?

  ‘My, someone’s looking fed up with life!’

  Jill looked up with a start and laughed. ‘Just thoughtful – and slightly drunk,’ she said, standing to give Louise a hug. ‘How are you?’

  Louise Craven was another friend that Jill had made on moving to Kelton Bridge. She lived along Main Street, in a beautiful stone-built terraced cottage. Not long after moving to the village, Jill had been out walking and had paused to admire her garden. Louise had invited her to have a proper look, and they’d been friends ever since.

  ‘Oh, you know,’ Louise replied, sitting on the bench next to Jill.

  ‘Trouble?’ Jill asked. ‘No, wait. Let me get another glass and then you can tell me all about it.’

  As she strode across the garden to the kitchen, she suspected she could guess the reason behind Louise’s shadowed eyes and troubled frown.

  Twenty-one years ago, an ill-fated love affair had done two things to Louise. Firstly, it had put her off men and secondly, it had left her pregnant. She’d been just nineteen years old. The man concerned had vanished, never to be heard from again, and Louise’s life had revolved around her daughter. She’d worked at a variety of jobs, sometimes juggling three at once, to give little Nikki everything she wanted.

  Nikki, spoilt from birth, had grown into a wilful and then an extremely difficult teenager. At sixteen, she was pregnant. She and the father of her unborn child left for London where she planned to have an abortion. From that moment on, Louise heard nothing. She hadn’t known if her daughter was alive or dead.

  Until four months ago.

  Jill could remember the evening clearly. It had been a dark March night and she and Louise had been to the pub for a quick drink before settling down in Louise’s lounge to watch a DVD. What that DVD was, Jill couldn’t remember. What she could remember was the shock of a seeing a young woman, a stranger to her, walking into the lounge and dropping a grimy backpack on the carpet.

  ‘Nikki!’ Louise shrieked.

  So this was Nikki. Short, probably not even five feet tall, with long, blonde hair that was badly in need of a good wash or at least a brush, she was wearing filthy black jeans, a tatty black jumper and a long, black coat. Everything about her looked undernourished and unwashed.

  ‘Oh, Nikki, love. You’ve come home!’ Louise had to keep holding Nikki, to keep touching her as if she might vanish again.

  ‘I’m not home,’ Nikki corrected her, pulling free from her grasp. ‘I just need a place to doss for a few days, OK? I need a bath, too.’

  ‘Yes. Yes, love, of course. You do that. Do you want me to –’

  ‘I don’t want you to do anything!’

  Nikki took off her coat and slung it across a chair. The shabby jumper followed. Underneath that, she was wearing a red T-shirt that didn’t quite manage to conceal the needle marks on her arm.

  ‘Won’t you say hello to Jill? Jill’s –’

  Nikki rolled her eyes in exasperation. ‘Hello, Jill,’ she chanted obediently before she flounced out of the room . . .

  Now, four months later, Nikki was still using Louise’s home as a ‘place to doss’. At first, Louise had been thrilled to have her home. It hadn’t bothered her that Nikki was only using h
er as a soft option, or that her home was being treated with no respect whatsoever.

  ‘Right,’ Jill said, plonking a glass and another bottle on the table, ‘this will make things look better. I take it Nikki’sgiving you grief?’ she added, as she filled a glass and handed it to her friend.

  The last few months had put years on poor Louise. Given a carefree life, she would be a very attractive woman, but, with a constant frown marring her features, and with no energy to reach for a lipstick, she looked drab.

  ‘I don’t know what to do for the best, Jill.’

  Jill could think of a few things, all of which included standing up to Nikki for once, but she held her tongue. ‘How’s Charlie?’ she asked instead.

  Charlie had entered Louise’s life shortly after Nikki came home and, unless Jill was very much mistaken, the unthinkable had happened and Louise had fallen in love.

  ‘I haven’t seen him for a week. We’ve spoken on the phone, of course, but it’s not the same. He says I shouldn’t give in to her.’

  ‘He’s right,’ Jill told her.

  ‘Perhaps he is, but she keeps threatening all sorts of things. She says she’d rather be dead than have him sniffing around as she puts it.’

  ‘She’s a drama queen,’ Jill said gently. ‘I blame all these soaps on TV. You have to make her see that you have a life and friends of your own.’

  ‘She was such a lovely girl once,’ Louse said wistfully.

  ‘Deep down, she still is.’ Twice, Jill had seen Nikki in a good mood, and had been astonished to discover that beneath the hostile exterior was a bright, quick-witted and fun-loving girl. Not a girl now. Nikki was twenty-one. ‘Sadly, she’s mixing with –’

  ‘Scum!’ Louise finished for her. ‘Last night, I got home at about nine thirty to find six strangers in my house. They were lounging in the chairs and across the sofa, drinking from cans and smoking God knows what. I wouldn’t mind her bringing her friends round, but these people were aggressive somehow. I felt quite threatened. Frightened to tell the truth. I went to bed shortly after ten o’clock.’

  ‘God, Louise, you should have kicked them out. Makesure you do next time. And if they refuse to go, call the police.’