Seven Eight Play It Straight (Grasshopper Lawns Book 4)

by EJ Lamprey

  ‘No, because he already offered to drive me back, so unless you’re going to pretend to be at Prestonfield House by coincidence—which you can’t because we talked about it yesterday while you were still there—it’ll hurt his feelings. Anyway, stupid to take two cars.’

  ‘On your own heads be it,’ Edge shrugged. ‘All I’m saying is he drives the way he talks. Totally single-mindedly, without a moment’s thought for anyone else around. Fiona, it’s nearly one. If you want to see Jamey before your performance, you need to get moving.’

  Prestonfield House

  Edge opened one eye cautiously as Gerald’s battered Peugeot rattled to a halt, and sighed with relief at the sight of Prestonfield House bathed in afternoon sunlight. She scrambled out of the back seat to ease the kinks out of her tense muscles and couldn’t resist a malicious smirk at Vivian, who was pale and got out of the front seat on unsteady legs to join her.

  ‘Behold, the half was not told me,’ she whispered to Edge, who choked with laughter.

  ‘Scripture? You’re quoting scripture?’

  ‘I prayed from the moment he switched lanes right in front of that truck. I’m surprised you didn’t hear me. How on earth are we going to get back?’

  ‘I see smoke coming from behind that big oak, ladies.’ Gerald, completely unconcerned, limped briskly round the car to join them. ‘I’ll hazard a guess that’s Fiona nicotine-loading ready for her grand entrance. Shall we?’

  Tim’s parents were unexpectedly elderly, considering Tim had barely turned forty. They were both nudging the eighty mark, and his father was a little frail. They had commandeered the chairs nearest the door and Tim’s mother was keeping a sharp lookout. Edge and Vivian drifted discreetly away to a table within earshot and Fiona smilingly joined the Murdochs with Gerald in her wake.

  The couple were sitting with another, younger couple but no-one within twenty feet was left in doubt of their identity, thanks to Janet Murdoch’s bugle voice. They were introduced as Jasper Murdoch’s younger brother Tobias, and his wife Moira, who looked as if she wasn’t enjoying her identity being broadcast to everyone within hearing. Tobias looked a sprightly sixty-something: Moira, skilfully made up, looked at least twenty years younger than her husband. Edge risked an interested glance over her shoulder—this, then, must be the aunt who had tried to seduce the teenage Tim, and was so passionate about being a Murdoch. She was strikingly attractive, but Edge could well imagine her terrifying a teenage boy, her good looks set in stone and marred by a sulky mouth.

  It grew sulkier as Janet Murdoch launched into exhaustive enquiries about Fiona’s son Fergus, who was at boarding school in Switzerland. Fiona, unexpectedly maternal, produced photographs which the older woman pored over at length, her foghorn voice finally lowered as the two women bent over the images. Gerald tried to start a conversation with Jasper Murdoch, who looked papery and ill, but had to fall back on the younger Murdochs. Tobias met him halfway, but Moira ignored them both and stared off into the distance.

  Edge and Vivian were pouring second cups of tea before Tim’s name came up for the first time and his mother’s braying voice suddenly muted again.

  ‘A tragedy. A tragedy for us, and for you, Fiona. We are leaving Edinburgh today to sort out the funeral. It’s to be next Tuesday, at home. You’ll stay with us, of course. Will Fergus be able to get here in time?’

  Edge and Vivian exchanged puzzled glances as Fiona, caught by surprise, stumbled on a reply. Gerald, bang on cue, said smoothly that Fergus wouldn’t, but suggested solicitously that Fiona should instead have her brother Jamey for support, especially as Jamey had been a friend of Tim’s. There was a noticeable pause before Janet Murdoch said thinly that she quite understood.

  Tobias Murdoch glanced around the room, and focused on Edge and Vivian. With a quick word to his wife he left the others and came across, smiling.

  ‘Excuse me, but you’re Vivian Oliver, I think?’

  ‘Yes, I am.’ Vivian blushed and introduced Edge. He shook her hand briefly and looked back at Vivian. ‘I didn’t mean to intrude, only to say hello, and to assure you that our offer remains open. Any time you change your mind.’

  He nodded politely to Edge and headed off towards the gents lavatory.

  ‘Offer?’ Edge raised her brows and Vivian’s colour deepened.

  ‘Tobias Murdoch is CEO of Spinner, the music people. They’ve been chasing me ever since I did that amateur dramatics thing in April, to sign with them. They were becoming so persistent William finally roped in Donald, who’s been pretending to be my agent, and running interference ever since.’

  ‘Heavens! And you weren’t even tempted?’

  ‘To be honest, yes I was. At first. One of the biggest labels in Europe wanting to sign me, what do you think? But they scared me off. They were sketching out international plans and throwing the Susan Boyle name around a bit too much. I would have done it like a shot if I thought I could record a couple of songs which I really like, have a bit of fun. Being thrust into a public spotlight and expected to compete with someone who captured the imagination of the whole world, probably told to lose weight and dress a certain way, sing the songs they choose, be promoted as a cash cow—well, that’s dizzyingly exciting if you’re eighteen, or if it is all you ever wanted to do. It’s the last thing I’d ever want to do. The more I say no, the more they push. That weekend in Rome that I told you I was offered? That was them again.’

  ‘That was Spinner? I missed out on a lot, going away! You kept very quiet about it.’

  ‘You can talk about keeping quiet,’ Vivian said tartly. ‘One moment William’s complaining that Brian seems to be joining us a lot more, and I’m assuring him there’s no chance you’re getting keen because I know the signs, and the next minute you’re an established couple.’

  Edge sighed. ‘We seem to be getting more entangled every day. He’s so possessive, and always wanting us to spend time together. I’m simply not used to that. If he wasn’t in training and off every morning, I’d have gone into meltdown by now. He’s already talked about marriage. Not proposed, but artless comments about when we’re married. Just the thought of spending the rest of my life standing on icy mountains in all weathers, so that I can clap my frozen paws together when he finally comes into sight, and treat his blisters and rub his aching muscles like a good little wife, nearly makes me faint. I don’t know how to get out of this without telling him bluntly to never come near me again, but I don’t want to hurt him. I owe him so much!’

  ‘Oh, Edge, I never realized. This is going to be so awkward, how could you let it happen?’

  ‘I don’t know! I doubt I’d be alive if not for him, remember. I still wake up sometimes at night in a cold sweat. So when he kept turning up at my door looking wistful I couldn’t exactly turn him away, and he kept on, and on, and on until he just wore me down. And to be honest, while it was a secret it was quite fun, but now I feel a little trapped. It’s too much, too quickly. As soon as I get comfortable with one stage of our relationship he takes a huge jump to the next.’

  ‘For goodness sake, Edge, you can’t take a man to bed out of gratitude! And what about Donald? I’m afraid to ask how you thanked him.’

  Edge snorted. ‘Donald doesn’t want sex with me—more’s the pity,’ she added slightly regretfully, then giggled at Vivian’s slightly shocked expression. ‘Clarissa would murder me first. How do I get out of this? I was even trying to get used to the idea of marriage, but Fiona said something yesterday that rocked me. I was furious at the time, but she was right: she said I let James love me, but I loved Alistair. It was true, I did let James love me, and we were very happy, but could I do it again, knowing the difference? Not fair on Brian, and I would know that, and feel guilty. And then I’d feel resentful about feeling guilty, and we’d end up making each other very miserable indeed.’

  Vivian touched her arm warningly and nodded across to the Murdoch party, who were rising to their feet.

  ‘Looks like we’re on our w
ay. Edge, you have to demand that you drive us back!’

  Enter a murderer

  Gerald wasn’t to be ousted from behind the wheel, and insisted gallantly that she leave all the ‘work’ up to him. Even blatant flattery, and a pretty plea to be allowed to drive his ‘classic’ Peugeot, failed, although it did put him in a remarkably good mood. Edge had to fall back on pretending to be unsure how to get to the Bentwood apartment to rein him in, and they travelled slowly and relatively smoothly to the Morningside address, parking across the road.

  ‘I’ll be ten minutes at the most. I’m just emptying a drawer into a suitcase.’ Fiona was still crossly rubbing her arm where Edge had pinched her when she tried to interrupt with directions. ‘No point in you coming in, but Gerald, we’ll be heading back along this road if you want to turn around.’ She jumped out, waited for a car to pass and crossed the road, pausing to wave from her door.

  Gerald started the car and pulled forward into the crossroad to turn as she vanished inside, but had barely rounded the corner when Vivian snapped at him to stop. Edge, assuming her nerve had finally broken, was astonished when instead Vivian undid her safety belt and scrambled out.

  ‘Hurry, hurry!’ She ran across the road, a startled Edge a few yards behind, and a burly man walking up the stairs to the house paused as Vivian flung open the garden gate, then turned round and brushed past them to stride off in the other direction. Vivian stared after him as Edge caught up.

  ‘Did you get a good look at him?’ Vivian demanded and Edge shook her head, totally bewildered. ‘Well, I did. And—don’t look!—he’s not gone far, he’s stopped at the corner. We’ve got to phone the police. I think that could be the killer.’

  Edge obediently rang 999 and gave the address. Gerald veered erratically across the road, mounting the pavement where the man was standing and making him leap back into the hedge out of danger’s way. Even as Edge finished explaining to the control desk, a police car rounded the corner and the burly man lurched out of the hedge and ran, arms pumping. The patrol car instantly yelped a warning and took off in pursuit.

  ‘They must have been right round the corner.’ Edge marvelled as the little drama vanished out of sight. ‘I hope you’re right, Vivian, otherwise that man’s having a really bad day. Nearly minced by Gerald and then chased by the coppers.’

  ‘Well, so do I, but he looked so odd, his expression was just completely wrong. And he changed his mind about ringing the doorbell when we ran up, don’t forget. Don’t say anything to Fiona.’

  ‘Don’t say anything to Fiona about what?’ Fiona opened the door and handed out two bulging Ikea bags. ‘Could you manage those between you? I couldn’t find a suitcase so I dumped everything in the bags. This third one has shoes and my slap, it weighs a ton. What the hell was that pinch for, Edge? I do bruise, you know.’

  ‘I would have pinched you myself,’ Vivian told her severely. ‘Edge was feeding him directions slowly, to keep him at thirty miles per hour. He’s every bit as lethal on city streets as Edge said he was. I thought we’d never make it to Prestonfield House. At least on the motorway cars can get out of his way.’

  Successfully diverted, Fiona supervised the loading of her bags into the boot of the abused Peugeot and sat well away from Edge in the back as they got back inside.

  ‘That was weird,’ she remarked as Edge hesitantly directed Gerald slowly back to the city bypass. ‘Tim’s mother, I mean. She was acting like Fergus should be there at the funeral?’

  Gerald looked up to talk to Fiona in the rear-view mirror, and Vivian grabbed at the wheel as the car veered towards a cyclist. Gerald gave her an astonished look, but did return his attention to the road. ‘Seemed to me she has decided that Fergus is Tim’s son. Whether she genuinely believes that herself, or just wants the others to believe he had a normal heterosexual relationship, is another matter. Those photographs of yours, though, she was looking at them the way a grandmother would.’

  ‘That reminds me, I’d love to see them,’ Edge told Fiona, who produced them again as Gerald surged onto the bypass, cut across to the fast lane, and settled to a steady forty miles per hour.

  Fergus was a typical teenager, bored and a bit spotty, but a nice-looking boy with a strong look of the Bentwood men. Janet Murdoch had insisted on showing one to her elderly husband, commanding him to look at the boy’s nose, so Edge looked at that feature also but found it unremarkable.

  ‘Not much of Darren there,’ she commented to Fiona as she tapped Vivian on the shoulder and handed the photographs forward.

  ‘He’s not Darren’s son,’ Fiona admitted. ‘He couldn’t father kids, so we agreed on a sperm donor.’

  ‘Tim’s mother wasn’t just being polite, was she?’ Vivian twisted round in her seat to look at Fiona. ‘Was Tim the donor?’

  Fiona paused, then shrugged. ‘Darren was happy enough, and Tim and Jamey were thrilled with the idea. But how did you know?’

  ‘Look at Fergus’s nose and eyebrow line in this top photo.’ Vivian handed them over the back of the seat. ‘You can see it plainly. Noses carry on growing all our lives, and the old man’s brows were bushier, but the resemblance is clear. His mother knew to look, though. She definitely knew.’

  ‘Well, Fergus doesn’t, and won’t.’ Fiona was emphatic as she put the photos carefully back in her handbag. ‘Darren was a foul husband but he’s a good father, and Fergus doesn’t need any complications in his life right now. He’s at a dreadful age, and he’s just starting to settle at this latest school. I suppose Tim must have told his mother last year when she was wittering on about him marrying and having children, but she can forget any idea of barging into his life. The stories Tim let slip about his childhood, she’s not getting anywhere near my son!’

  ‘If they really want to see him occasionally, would it be so bad?’ Vivian persisted gently. ‘Not to be mercenary or anything, but the Murdochs seem to be very well off. His uncle’s rolling in dosh. If they want to help him get on in life. . .’

  ‘They’ve got other grandchildren,’ Fiona said firmly. ‘Tim was the only surviving son, but his brother left two daughters and he had at least two older sisters. There are about eight grandchildren. I do know what you’re saying, Vivian, but Darren’s not poor. Fergus doesn’t need anything from the Murdoch family. I’d rather Edge got involved in his life. Actually, Edge, I’ve been meaning to ask: will you make him your heir or are you going to leave everything to Kirsty?’

  ‘Oh Fiona, really!’ Vivian protested.

  Fiona looked sulky and shot Edge a sidelong glance. ‘Well, everything you have to leave came from Daddy and Fergus is his only grandchild, after all.’

  ‘Not quite everything,’ Edge said drily. ‘But look on the bright side, I’m not planning on dying quite yet. Maybe before I do, I’ll have actually met him.’

  ‘Talking about wills and inheritances is always uncomfortable.’ Gerald looked in the mirror again and the car drifted lazily into the middle lane. ‘Did your father leave you nothing, Fiona?’

  She shifted in her seat. ‘Not nothing. But he left nearly everything to Edge.’

  Edge took an indignant breath. ‘Oh come, Fiona, he bought you and your brother apartments in one of the best suburbs in Edinburgh!’ She looked away from Fiona’s mulish face and addressed herself to Gerald’s profile. ‘And they get the same annual allowance that I do from the tontine. The only difference is that I inherited the apartment we bought when we came back to Scotland, and his sister and I also get an additional annuity. It was a fair and generous will.’

  Fiona hunched her shoulder and stared out the window, and Edge shut up but seethed privately. Gerald swooped erratically across two lanes on the M8 to take the M9 in serene disregard of a car which clearly had right of way, and which hooted indignantly before looping around them to speed on its way.

  ‘That does sound extremely fair,’ he told his rigid passengers. ‘Do you still have your apartment, Fiona?’

  ‘It’s rented out, I’ve nev
er actually lived in it. It’s in the same building as Jamey’s. I don’t need it, since half my life is on the road and I have a villa in Spain that Darren gave me as part of the divorce settlement for when I’m not working. This bloody climate—Scotland’s nice in summer, but hell in winter.’

  ‘Well,’ he started again and Fiona snapped sharply.

  ‘Look, Gerald, I’m grateful to you for getting Jamey invited to the funeral, okay? But I’d as soon get home in one piece, so can we leave the rest of the positive attitude until we’re safely back?’

  ‘Okay,’ he said peaceably. ‘I would love to hear more about the tontine, though. I thought they were as extinct as the dodo.’

  ‘Fiona does have a point.’ Vivian stood on imaginary brakes. ‘When we get back?’

  ~~~

  ‘That was bloody terrifying.’ Fiona stared after Gerald as he left the campsite after dropping them off at the rondavel, and all three women winced as the Peugeot audibly scraped out of an entrance wide enough to allow caravans. ‘No wonder Miss P refused point blank to come with us today. What a very odd man!’

  ‘A true eccentric.’ Vivian, who had cheered up as soon as they got out of the car, lifted an Ikea bag to carry it inside. ‘I like eccentrics, but next time Edge says someone is a terrible driver I’m going to listen. Are you moving in for the rest of the summer, Fiona?’

  ‘Actually, the Murdochs—the Tobias Murdochs—invited me to theirs. If Jamey’s still not out by Friday, when I have to leave here, I’ll take them up on it. He was telling me their cellars go down into the old town. I’d really like to poke around, although Moira said some of the cellars were closed off as unsafe years ago. Some are still in use as staff apartments; now that must be amazing, sleeping in rooms hundreds of years old. I quite liked her. It would be nice to spend a bit of time with someone my own age.’ She unlocked the rondavel, oblivious to the slightly offended looks Vivian and Edge exchanged.