Kennedy 03 - Where Petals Fall

by Shirley Wells

  ‘Thanks, but some other time,’ he replied, unlocking his car.

  Jill got in her own car and followed him out of the car park. As she did so, she switched on the radio and tried to find a station that would give her the racing results. Damn it, she’d missed them. She’d have to wait until she got home.

  They struck lucky. Terry Yates’s car was parked on his drive. Jill didn’t expect he had much of a social life, but his work involved a lot of driving.

  When he answered their knock, however, Jill was dismayed to see that he had been drinking. A lot. He was swaying on his feet and his speech was slightly slurred.

  ‘Oh. You’re back,’ he said.

  He hadn’t shaved today, she noticed.

  ‘Yes. May we come in?’ Max asked, already taking a step forward.

  ‘Of course. You’ll have to excuse the mess,’ he added, ‘but I’ve been working from home today.’

  The small brown dog was pushed into the kitchen and Yates staggered around his lounge gathering up papers that had been scattered on every available seat.

  An empty wine bottle stood on the hearth and a half-full one was on the coffee table. Cheap red wine, Jill noticed.

  ‘What a nice way to work,’ she said lightly. ‘With a glass in one hand,’ she added with a smile.

  He shrugged. ‘It’s OK.’

  Jill wandered over to the window and looked out at the back garden. It was small, but tidy.

  ‘I had a chat with your ex-wife this morning,’ she told him.

  ‘Oh?’ He was still putting papers in a pile, but he looked worried.

  ‘I hadn’t realized you were hoping the two of you could get back together.’

  He sat down while he considered his answer. Although he waved a hand in the direction of the now free seats, Max and Jill remained standing.

  ‘I thought it would be better for the twins,’ he said at last. ‘She’s turning them against me. I know I treatedher badly,’ he allowed. ‘I had an affair and left her. But I couldn’t help falling in love with someone else, could I?’

  He looked to them both for an answer, didn’t get one, and carried on. ‘I thought we could make a go of things, and I thought it would be better for the twins. She didn’t want to know. She’s happy causing problems between me and the kids. Vindictive bitch.’

  Vindictive bitch? Hardly the best foundation for making a marriage work.

  ‘She says you put a brick through her kitchen window,’ Jill pointed out.

  ‘I did,’ he admitted.

  ‘Drunk again, were you?’ Max asked.

  ‘A bit,’ he replied. ‘But God, she’s been driving me mad. She’s on the phone constantly telling me that Cherie doesn’t want to see me again or that Adam’s doing great at school now I’m out of his life. When news of Carol’s death hit the headlines, she was on the phone immediately.

  “Your girlfriend’s dead then,” she said. “You’ll have to find someone else’s knickers to jump into.” I mean, for God’s sake.’ He grimaced. ‘Evil bitch!’

  Jill walked round the room and stopped to gaze at the photos of the twins.

  ‘Why,’ she asked, turning to look at him, ‘would you want to live with someone you consider evil and vindictive?’

  ‘Who knows? Probably because she’s driven me to insanity.’ He thought for a moment. ‘In my more crazy moments, I think that, if we lived together again, she’d have what she wanted and stop making my life hell. Stop turning my children against me.’

  ‘But Carol was alive and you were still hoping she’d come to her senses,’ Jill pointed out.

  ‘Yes, I know. Carol was never going to come back to me though, was she? I knew that. Deep down, I knew it.’

  ‘So you’d rather have your ex-wife than no one?’

  ‘I’d rather my kids didn’t grow up hating me,’ he corrected her.

  ‘Now that Carol is dead,’ Jill said, watching closely for any reaction from him, ‘I suppose there’s more chance that your ex-wife will agree to get back together?’

  ‘Who knows how her mind works?’ he answered flatly.

  His phone rang out, but he made no move towards it.

  ‘The machine will get it,’ he told them.

  After six rings, the machine clicked into action. Yates’s voice, dull and flat, assured whoever was calling that he wasn’t available right now but, if they would leave their name and number, he would return their call as soon as possible.

  ‘Call me back,’ a voice Jill recognized said. ‘If I can persuade Cherie to see you, and God knows that’ll take some doing, you can take them out for an hour on Sunday. You can pick them up at four but they’ll need to be home by five at the latest.’

  The machine beeped and all was silent.

  ‘A whole hour,’ Yates said bitterly. ‘Things must be looking up. I wonder what this weekend’s excuses are.

  Perhaps Cherie’s washing her hair again. Oh no, that was last weekend.’ He expelled his breath on a sigh. ‘Believe me,’ he went on quietly, ‘if I ever murder anyone, it will be her.’

  ‘Is that a threat?’ Max asked.

  ‘No,’ he answered sheepishly.

  ‘According to your ex-wife,’ Jill said, ‘your marriage was in difficulty very soon after you married, when she was pregnant with the twins, in fact.’

  ‘Yes, that’s true.’

  ‘Why was that, do you think?’

  ‘Probably because I was shut out,’ he said flatly. ‘All she cared about was the welfare of her unborn child – or children as it turned out. Her children. Not mine. As she took great pains to point out, she was the one carrying them. She was the one feeling sick every morning, the one walking around like a bloated whale, the one being poked and prodded at the clinic. When they were born, I had no say in anything – names, feeding, putting them tosleep, dressing them. If I offered to do anything, she’d look at me and demand to know who’d carried them into the world.’

  Why, Jill wondered, would he want to try and make a go of a marriage with someone he disliked so intensely? And why did he think there was the remotest chance of his ex-wife agreeing to spend any time at all let alone the rest of her life with him? Neither had a good word to say for the other.

  ‘This alibi of yours,’ Max put in, ‘doesn’t really check out.’

  Jill looked at him in amazement. He’d told her it did.

  ‘What?’ Yates was as shocked as Jill and a lot more nervous. ‘It must.’

  ‘Not really,’ Max said casually. ‘You weren’t at breakfast on the Saturday morning.’

  ‘Well, no. I don’t eat breakfast. Never have. I have a couple of strong coffees and that’s my lot.’

  ‘Your colleagues were all at a table having breakfast,’ Max reminded him. ‘So why didn’t you have your coffee with them?’

  ‘I never do.’ Yates was breaking out into a sweat. ‘I have it in my room. The last thing I want to do is watch them stuffing their faces with bacon and eggs. You ask them. I always have coffee in my room.’

  ‘You went to your room early on the Friday night too,’ Max said.

  ‘What? Oh, for God’s sake. I mean, I can’t remember but it must have been well past eleven.’

  ‘It was about eleven, as far as I can tell,’ Max informed him. ‘Your colleagues were in the bar until gone one in the morning.’

  ‘They often are.’

  Max sat in a chair so that he was directly opposite Yates.

  ‘So you had plenty of time to get from your hotel to –’

  ‘No!’ Yates leapt from his chair so quickly that he staggered and had to grab the back of Max’s chair to keep himself upright. ‘I swear to you, I didn’t leave the hotel.’

  ‘You like a drink,’ Max said, ‘and, when you’re away, it’s all on the company, right? I’m sure you’d hang around for the free drinks.’

  ‘No. Believe me, I’d rather buy my own.’ Frightened eyes darted from Max to Jill and back to Max. ‘You have to believe me. I was in my room the whole t
ime. I swear it.’

  ‘How do you get on with your colleagues?’ Jill asked.

  ‘They’re OK. A bit full of themselves, but OK.’

  ‘A bit full of themselves? In what way?’

  ‘Oh, you know.’ He was managing to stand unaided now. ‘They like to brag about their grand houses, their beautiful wives, their even more beautiful mistresses, their super-intelligent kids, that sort of thing. They’re all very competitive. But yes, I get on OK with them. I’ve known them for years.’ He thought for a moment and the panic blazed once more in his eyes. ‘Why? What have they been saying about me?’

  ‘That you’re a bit quiet,’ Max told him. ‘Not much of a mixer.’

  ‘Yeah, I suppose that’s right. I am quiet. Quieter than them at any rate.’ His gaze locked on the half-full bottle of red wine. ‘But that means nothing,’ he said, turning back to look at Max. ‘And I swear to you, I was in my room all night. I left them at about eleven o’clock and I was at the exhibition by nine the next morning. By then, I’d had a shower, drunk a couple of coffees and made some phone calls.’

  He seemed to calm himself a little.

  ‘Besides,’ he said, ‘why the hell would I want Carol dead? Eh? I was the one doing everything in my power to get her to talk to me. She won’t talk to me now, will she?’

  ‘She won’t,’ Max agreed.

  Yates’s phone rang again and he rolled his eyes for their benefit. Again, they heard his voice asking the caller to leave a message, and again, they heard Beverley Yates’s voice, slightly higher pitched this time.

  ‘I know you’re there. Where the hell is Terry No Mates Yates going to be, hm? If you don’t call me within thenext hour, you won’t see the kids at all this weekend.

  Got that?’

  The call ended abruptly.

  ‘I’d better give her a ring,’ Yates said reluctantly.

  ‘Wise move,’ Max agreed. ‘You’ll need to call at the station to make a statement, too.’

  ‘But –’

  ‘Any time tomorrow will do. Thanks for talking to us.’

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Three days later, Jill woke to the sound of rain lashing against her bedroom window. Pulling the curtain aside, she saw that the sky was a menacing grey and the rain was blowing horizontally from west to east. It must have been raining for most of the night if the huge puddles out in the lane were anything to go by.

  By the time she’d showered, dressed, had breakfast and fed the cats, it had eased off enough to dash to her car without getting soaked. As she was doing this, she heard Finlay Roberts’s raised voice.

  She stopped, and they spotted each other at the same moment.

  ‘Jill!’ He came striding over to her, seemingly oblivious to the rain. A man was walking behind him.

  ‘Jill, my darling girl,’ Finlay greeted her breathlessly, ‘is your phone working OK?’

  ‘Yes, it’s fine. Why?’

  ‘Mine isn’t.’ He turned to his companion, presumably a BT engineer judging by the van parked in the lane. ‘So if Jill’s is working, and you’ve checked the pole, the fault has to be in my cottage, right?’

  ‘So it would seem,’ the engineer agreed.

  ‘I have to go out,’ Finlay told Jill. ‘What do you think? I suppose it’s perfectly all right, but I don’t feel good about going out and leaving a stranger in the house. Not with these burglaries in the village.’ He addressed the engineer.

  ‘Will you mind having a key and locking up when you’ve finished?’

  ‘You could leave a key with me,’ Jill offered.

  ‘Would you mind?’ he asked hopefully.

  ‘Of course not. I’m not going anywhere today.’ She felt the weight of her bag on her arm. ‘Well, I was nipping up to the shop, but that can wait. I thought I’d take a day off work and give myself a long weekend. I only need some cat food so any time will do for that.’

  She was amazed to hear the lies tripping off her tongue so easily, and equally amazed to discover how eager she was to snoop around his home.

  ‘You, my darling girl, are an angel.’ Finlay grinned at the engineer. ‘I know you’re completely trustworthy, but I’ll feel happier with Jill on hand, if you don’t mind. The village has had a spate of burglaries, you see, and I wouldn’t want anything to happen. I rent the cottage, as you know, and the owners wouldn’t be too pleased. If you forgot to lock up, it would put the responsibility on you. Are you sure you don’t mind, Jill?’

  ‘Positive. It’s no bother to me.’

  ‘I very much doubt if I’ll be back before six this evening.

  When he’s gone, just pop the key through the letterbox, will you, darling girl?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’

  ‘So does anyone mind if I shoot off now?’ Finlay asked.

  ‘It makes no odds to me,’ the engineer said.

  ‘Me neither.’

  ‘Excellent.’ He beamed at them both, then winked at the engineer. ‘Sorry I was a bit rude to you, but, as things have worked out, you’ll be glad of it. Jill here might even make you a cup of tea.’

  ‘Yes. Of course,’ Jill said, hardly daring to believe her luck.

  ‘The kettle’s already boiled, darling girl,’ he called, as he strode off. ‘I’ll get you the spare key, and then I’ll be off.’

  The engineer followed him back to the cottage while Jill waited outside. Seconds later, she had a front door key in her hand.

  ‘Just pop it through the letterbox,’ Finlay said. ‘And thank you. I owe you a drink at the very least for this.’

  ‘It’s nothing. Really.’

  ‘Ah, but I still want to buy you a drink.’ She was treated to that roguish, rather attractive wink of his. ‘See you later!’

  Jill watched, fascinated, as he jumped in his car, started the engine and, waving, drove off.

  While the engineer busied himself unscrewing the phone socket on the kitchen wall, Jill hunted round for a mug to make him a tea, ‘white with three sugars’.

  She still couldn’t quite believe that she was inside Finlay Roberts’s home yet, really, what was she hoping to learn?

  Max had said that everything kept coming back to Finlay, and he was right. But what did they have? He’d taken Carol out on a couple of occasions. There was no crime in that. And he’d lied about being at home when Ralph Atkins’s house was burnt to the ground. Or had he?

  He claimed later that he’d forgotten about nipping out to the filling station to fill up his car and buy a loaf of bread. That was easily done, she supposed. Really, they had nothing.

  As Jill made small-talk with the engineer, she thought how absurd her excitement was. Finlay Roberts was a lot of things, but he wasn’t stupid. If he did have something to hide, he wouldn’t leave it in the cottage for any Tom, Dick or Harry to stumble across.

  The engineer went into the sitting room to check the phone socket and Jill followed him. She was disappointed to see so few personal possessions, but she wasn’t really surprised. The cottage was rented, and the furniture belonged to the owners. Finlay was a traveller and, as such, he wouldn’t be a great one for possessions.

  In the kitchen, the most basic of utensils and crockery filled the cupboards and drawers. A calendar hung from the wall but nothing had been written on it. An unopened letter from BT was propped against the bread bin. An empty red wine bottle had been rinsed out and was waiting to be put in the recycling bin.

  In the sitting room, a couple of books on the tarot sat on the floral-print sofa. That struck Jill as odd. Why, if you were an expert, or expert enough to run your own internet business, would you need books on the subject? Jill had read up on it herself, but she was no wiser.

  The remote control sat on top of the TV. A T-shirt, clearly one of Finlay’s judging by the way the seams at the arm were hanging together by a thread, was thrown over the back of an armchair. Well-worn flip-flops had been discarded in front of the fireplace. Come to think of it, Jill had only ever seen him in flip-flops. There
was a low sideboard with three centre drawers and a door either side of them.

  As soon as the engineer had gone, she’d look through that.

  The phone rang several times, startling her each time, but it was only the engineer testing it and talking to a colleague at the exchange. Finally, he ended one call, and looked at Jill with a satisfied smile on his face.

  ‘As far as I can tell, everything’s working perfectly. It’s all this rain we’ve had. Water was getting on the wire where it enters the house. I’ve changed that, and I’ve changed the box in here, so that should have cured it.’ He gathered up his tools. ‘Fingers crossed, eh?’

  ‘Yes.’ Jill went to the window and picked up his empty tea mug. ‘Is that it then? I’ll just wash this mug and then lock up. Thanks very much,’ she added.

  ‘See you,’ he called as he was leaving.

  She heard his van drive down the lane, then, feeling all kinds of a sneak, began opening cupboards and drawers.

  Heart in mouth, she switched on Finlay’s computer and looked at that. She couldn’t download his emails, of course, but there were dozens in his Inbox and the Sent box. None were personal. Every one was connected to his business.

  She headed upstairs and saw that his bedroom was as lacking in personal items as the rest of the cottage. Except for a framed photo on the small table by his bed. That was interesting. A small photo, about five by seven inches, it was black and white and showed two young people, girland boy, hand in hand at the water’s edge, with their backs to the camera. It was a beautiful photograph, taken at sunset, Jill suspected, and by an expert photographer. Could the boy be a young Finlay? She carried it to the window to examine it in a better light, but was none the wiser. If it was him, it had probably been taken twenty years ago.

  Yet it must mean something to him. He had no personal possessions at all, yet he kept that photo by the side of his bed. Very interesting.

  Turning over the frame, she saw that it was easy enough to take the photo from it for a better look. She thought the photographer’s name and address or a date might be shown. Instead, on the back of the photo, the initials TMD had been written in pencil.