Or rather, his son Neil was. Charismatic, urbane, sophisticated, the graphic design graduate was a far cry from the lads she met at Young Farmers get-togethers. He didn’t talk incessantly about sheep, for a start. It hadn’t taken long for her treacherous heart to fall for his charms; and Delilah never questioned why, if he was such a creative talent, Neil was back in Bruncliffe selling houses for his father. She was too in love to question anything. Within weeks they were dating. Within six months she’d given up running. And before the year was out, she’d moved in with him and he’d left his job in order to pursue a career in design.
It was only looking back that she was able to see the flaws. The months Neil had spent not working, bemoaning the cultural desert that was the Dales and refusing to sacrifice his artistic beliefs in order to find clients. When she’d mooted the idea of going freelance herself, he’d been quick to support her, turning her solo project into a joint venture. She’d been flattered. His expertise would make their company stand out. By the time she was twenty-five, they were married and co-owners of a website development company. They bought a small cottage, high up at the back of town, and an office premises off the marketplace. For Delilah, life was like a dream.
Then Neil had had an affair.
Delilah had found out the way everyone in Bruncliffe found things out – from someone letting something slip after a pint or two. It transpired that the whole town had known about the florist in Grassington who’d needed a new website, and got more besides. It also transpired that Delilah had more of a forgiving heart than she’d thought. She’d accepted Neil’s apologies. She’d buried her pride. She’d tried to forget. And she’d wished for the first time in years that she was still running so she could escape the town, the sympathetic looks and the pointed comments.
But if she’d thought her world had fallen apart when Neil’s attention strayed, she realised how much more she was capable of being hurt the day Ryan was killed. On the outside, she stayed strong for Lucy and Nathan, but inside she went to pieces. She let the business slide and turned to Neil for solace. Which is when she’d seen her husband in a new light: the light her brother Will had always viewed him in. While the debonair designer embraced the role of supportive husband for the first couple of months, he soon tired of the commitment. He began to moan about the hours he was having to work. He began to complain about the fact that she was always sad. And finally, he came home with a puppy, his remedy for Delilah’s grieving.
She doubted he had any idea how perfect that gift had been.
Tolpuddle burst into Delilah’s life in a blur of paws, ungainly legs and love. So much love. He adored the pair of them, but especially Delilah. When she found it hard to get up in the morning, he was there on the bed, gambolling around, begging her to come and play. In the face of such enthusiasm, she found it impossible to stay depressed and before long, returned to work, Tolpuddle establishing his place in the office by her side.
Her return to her desk, however, brought bad news. The company was struggling, partly due to the recession, which had really taken hold, but mainly because Neil hadn’t been doing his job. Or rather, he’d been concerned with the design part of the business, neglecting the more prosaic aspects such as securing new clients and chasing slow payments. He’d always claimed he was the style in their company while she was the substance. She realised now that, as a graphic designer, he hadn’t meant that to be a compliment.
As she struggled to get things back under control, Delilah had come up with the idea of the Dales Dating Agency. Neil hadn’t been enthusiastic. So she’d worked in the evenings, staying late at the office with Tolpuddle while she developed a concept she was sure would be successful. The irony of it all was that as she was trying to build a business based around love, Neil was having another affair.
This time Will told her about it. Told her she was an idiot as well. Given the Metcalfe propensity for stubbornness, that should have been enough to see Delilah forgive Neil a second time. Perhaps it would have been, if her husband hadn’t blamed her for his wandering affections. She was never home. She never had time for him. She gave all her attention to Tolpuddle.
Then he’d announced that he was leaving her for this latest flame, a student from Leeds who was young enough to believe in his dreams – dreams Delilah had once believed in herself. They’d sorted out the finances, Neil wanting nothing to do with either company, or the properties they had mortgages on, as he was moving to London to pursue his career. Will had advised her to cut her losses too, but Delilah had refused to give up on everything. Her marriage was dead; she would fight to the death to keep her businesses alive. And so she’d ended up saddled with debt, running two companies, and with a Weimaraner who came out of the divorce with anxiety issues.
All in all, thought Delilah, jilted wife and dog were both doing well. Her broken heart had healed and she’d moved on, holding no bitterness for a relationship that had been too hasty, its participants too young. She heard from Neil occasionally, had his furniture stored on the top floor of the office building and had no doubt that she’d still find him charming, if she were to bump into him in town.
But she’d never forgiven him – or herself – for the running.
How had she allowed Neil to persuade her to give it up? Although, to be fair, she’d been coerced. He’d been so persistent. The training had got in the way. He hadn’t liked her heading off for races at the weekends. He’d always had something planned in advance that would clash with the major events. Until it all became too much of an effort for a young woman who was head over heels.
Plus, she’d felt the pressure. Not from Seth, but certainly from the other locals. Always asking how she was doing. Always boasting to outsiders about Bruncliffe’s fell-running prodigy. Club junior champion, national junior champion … only a matter of time, everyone said, before Delilah Metcalfe, Bruncliffe’s finest, was English National Fell Running Champion.
So many capital letters; such a heavy weight to bear.
She’d quit on a wet Tuesday night in March when Seth had been shouting at her, pushing her to run faster, accusing her of slacking, of carrying winter weight. Something inside her had just snapped. She’d walked off the playing fields and never went back. And Seth being Seth, he’d never asked her to. While everyone else was busy telling her what a mistake she was making, what talent she was wasting, Seth Thistlethwaite simply let her be, concentrating his coaching skills on those who wanted to benefit from them.
Bloody idiot! She shook her head in despair at her younger self, took the final bit of grassy slope in one bound to land on the tarmac and sprinted with Tolpuddle down the lane to the house. With the prospect of a lovely day ahead – lunch with Ash and then a family get-together in the evening to celebrate her parents’ wedding anniversary – she swung through the gate in a fine mood. It was only when her hand automatically reached round to the small pocket on the back of her running top that she realised.
She’d brought the office key by mistake.
Damn! She was locked out of the house.
She checked her watch. Eight-fifteen. She could be at the office in minutes, where both a spare key and a spare set of clothing were kept. She glanced down at her shorts and mud-splattered legs. If he was there, it would be game up. Samson O’Brien, her old running partner and inspiration, would know she’d been running.
What choice did she have?
‘Come on,’ she called to Tolpuddle, who was already at the porch, panting, ready for breakfast.
She started running, the dog quick to follow, down Crag Lane to the steps that dropped steeply to the ginnel which ran at the back of her building. Taking them in bounds, she arrived in the narrow passage and sprinted towards the back gate. And almost collided with Ida Capstick, who was just coming out of the yard, pushing her bicycle.
‘Morning,’ said Delilah, doubled-over to catch her breath. She wasn’t worried about being seen post-run by Ida, as the cleaner’s discretion could be relied on. Gett
ing two words consecutively out of the woman was a marvel.
‘Tha’s headed for another shower!’ The statement was delivered as Ida’s disapproving eyes took in the muddied legs below Delilah’s shorts. ‘One a day’s enough for most folks.’
‘Yes … no…’ Delilah faltered, confused, while Ida nodded brusquely and headed on her way, wheeling her bike. Delilah and Tolpuddle were left staring after her.
‘What was that about?’ muttered Delilah, watching the cleaner disappear around the corner – the cleaner she couldn’t afford, but was too scared to sack.
That wasn’t strictly true. She’d tried on a couple of occasions. She’d first broached the subject a year ago; Ida had stared her down into a gibbering wreck, and nothing had changed. The next time, Delilah had tentatively suggested that Ida cut her hours to two days a week, thinking that would at least be a start. Ida had nodded, lips in a thin line of condemnation, and had turned up the next day as usual. And the next. And the day after that. But when Delilah had gone to pay her at the end of the week, Ida had opened the envelope and put three days’ worth of her wages back on Delilah’s desk.
‘Tha can keep that,’ she’d said, pushing the money away from her.
‘But you’re still working five days,’ Delilah had protested, pushing the money back again.
‘And tha’s not paying for it,’ Ida said with a sniff. ‘Mr Taylor is.’
Delilah had blinked, not understanding a word of this communication, but her cleaner had left the room before she could ask for an explanation. That explanation came a few days later, not from the lips of the cleaner but when Delilah overheard the estate agent, Bernard Taylor – her former father-in-law and the mayor of Bruncliffe – moaning in the Fleece that Ida Capstick had demanded a wage increase. And from then on, Ida had continued to clean the Dales Dating Agency offices five mornings a week, but took pay for only two of those days. Bernard Taylor, it seemed, unbeknownst to him, was subsidising the rest.
‘She’s an enigma, that woman,’ said Delilah with a shrug of incomprehension.
Tolpuddle panted back at her and then let out a sharp bark, reminding the whole neighbourhood that he hadn’t been fed yet.
‘Talking of cutbacks…’ threatened Delilah, smiling down at the dog. ‘How about you go on a diet?’
Tolpuddle looked up with the martyred expression which had earned him his name, making Delilah laugh as she entered the yard. That laugh was quickly smothered by a curse.
A scarlet motorbike stood resplendent on the concrete paving.
‘Damn!’ she muttered for the second time that morning. Samson was already in the office.
She glanced down at her running kit. There was no way he wouldn’t notice it. And for some reason, she didn’t want the attention. Her running was private – until such time as she chose to make it otherwise. Plus, he might offer to come with her, like he used to do when Seth wanted someone to stretch her. The pair of them – her in her teens, Samson almost adult – striding out across the fells in the evening light. It used to be the highlight of her week, and she sometimes wondered if her lack of enthusiasm for the sport hadn’t arisen as a result of Samson’s abrupt departure from town. With no one else to challenge her, she’d become bored, making it easier for Neil to discourage her. Now that she had regenerated her love of running, perversely she didn’t want Samson sharing it. Nor did she want to contemplate what Will would have to say, if word got around that Delilah had been seen out on the hills with the man he considered the devil incarnate.
So, there was only one thing for it. She was going to have to sneak into her office unobserved.
8
Standing at the bedroom window, Samson watched the trail of children heading for the school, their shrieks and laughter filling the silent room, chasing away the stillness of an empty house. How must it have felt living here, he wondered, when your own kids had been taken away from you? Would that daily reminder be enough to make you kill yourself?
He turned his attention back to the cheap MDF desk that took up one wall of the smallest bedroom in what had been Richard Hargreaves’ home. Papers and folders were strewn across its surface: articles on language acquisition, students’ assignments, bills … Samson had been through it twice already and there was nothing to indicate that the man who’d lived here had been in danger.
Sitting amidst all the paperwork, Richard’s laptop had offered up its contents with no resistance the first time Samson had visited the house, the lecturer clearly not having felt that he had anything to hide. Anything that might have got him killed. Nevertheless, Samson sat down and skimmed through the emails again. They were mostly work-related matters, apart from those sent by the Dales Dating Agency – an acknowledgement that Richard had renewed his membership for a further three months, and confirmation that he’d signed up for the next Speedy Date night.
Speedy Date night. Samson laughed, the sound abrupt in the quiet. It sounded so … tacky. So unlike Delilah. He couldn’t imagine her playing Cupid. For the last week she’d stomped past his open door every morning with a grunted greeting, stopping only once to enter his office and slap a piece of paper on his desk – a list of Richard Hargreaves’ friends. Other than that, she had made no effort to interact with him. In fact, if he’d been a sensitive soul, he might have been upset by her obvious resentment of his presence.
But he wasn’t sensitive. His last twelve years in Bruncliffe had seen to that. You didn’t get to be the son of Boozy O’Brien and survive without developing a thick skin.
He pulled his mind back to his work. No enemies that were apparent. Nothing to suggest Richard had got mixed up in anything shady. And as for his finances …
A jumble of bank and credit-card statements in the top drawer of his desk showed that Richard Hargreaves was just about managing – regular payments to his ex-wife and a hefty mortgage eating into his monthly salary. But there was no record of loans, official or otherwise, which might have pointed to trouble. Nor was there enough to justify throwing himself under a train. Especially when the second drawer contained brochures for a new housing development down by Low Mill, and pages of detailed financial reckoning in what Samson presumed was Richard’s hand.
The lecturer had been planning to sell his house to buy one of the smaller properties, which, judging by the figures he’d written down, would have left him with a tidy sum. Sufficient to clear the minor debts that he did have.
Samson got to his feet. He was wasting his time here. There was nothing to imply, either in this room or any of the others, that Richard Hargreaves had been murdered. He had one more appointment to keep and then he’d write up his report. Suicide. It was the only explanation, even if Mrs Hargreaves couldn’t accept it.
He walked slowly down the stairs, heart heavy at the thought of breaking the news the grieving mother didn’t want to hear.
* * *
Delilah slipped off her running shoes and turned the key quietly in the lock. One hand on Tolpuddle’s collar, she crept into the building, easing the door shut behind her, and crossed the small kitchen silently on sock-clad feet.
‘Stay!’ she whispered to the dog as she began inching along the hallway towards the open office door.
Tolpuddle completely ignored her. With a sharp cry of delight, he bounded into the office, punctuating his arrival with loud barks.
‘Bloody hell!’ muttered Delilah. There would be no sneaking past now. Instead, she would have to adopt what had become her morning routine of late – getting by Samson’s door without having to speak. While she might have acquiesced and accepted his tenancy, it didn’t mean she had to go out of her way to be friendly. Not after the ear-bashing she’d taken from Will over Sunday lunch, when he’d let her know how he felt about Samson O’Brien being under her roof.
He’d been scathing. She’d tried to defend her corner, but it was difficult without revealing the true extent of her debts, something she’d so far succeeded in shielding from her family. It was bad enough that Wi
ll’s disparaging opinion of her choice of husband had been proven well founded the day Neil Taylor ran off with another woman, leaving Delilah to hide her heartache for fear of her brother’s caustic comments. Admitting that she’d been left almost destitute as a result would simply be giving Will something more to crow about.
Which is why Delilah had taken the latest brotherly reprimand on the chin, even when her mother – not normally one for holding a grudge – failed to support her. As far as the Metcalfes were concerned, Delilah had let the side down. So for the last week she’d been taking out her frustration at this injustice by snubbing her tenant, in a trail of logic that made perfect sense. To her.
Tolpuddle re-emerged in the hallway and she reached down to grab his collar, the dumb dog not quite on board with the decision to shun the new occupant. Every morning he ran into the office and showered affection on Samson, much to Delilah’s disgust. And no doubt, to Samson’s twisted delight. Today, however, Tolpuddle was looking forlorn.
‘Decided to be loyal, for once, eh?’ Delilah murmured as the dog let out a low whine. Then she couldn’t resist. She turned, stiff-necked, and glanced into the room.
Empty. No dark shape at the desk. No cheeky smile cast her way as she stalked past. No suggestion that they go running together. Her face fell into a frown and, despite having successfully negotiated her way into the building undetected, she felt a sense of deflation. Which, being a Metcalfe, was closely followed by annoyance.
Date with Death Page 10
