The Dead Dog Day (8 page)

Cora finished her first éclair, chose a second, and took a big gulp of tea. She looked gratefully at her two friends. They'd brought wine as well as cakes, but after last night she thought it might be wise to hold off on the booze for a while.

Rosie finished her cheesecake and wiped her mouth. ‘Yum. I might have to have a chocolate muffin now – the baby wants one, don't you, my love?'

She patted the minute bump under her grey jumper dress and smiled. Rosie was four months pregnant with her third child, but you could barely tell. Tiny, her short red hair dusted with blonde highlights and with perfect alabaster skin, Rosie always made Cora feel like a great galumphing hippo. She ran her own florist's, and her friends always thought she looked a bit like a flower – a perfect little rose, with a sweet personality to match.

‘Go for it. You've hardly put on any weight yet anyway, cow,' Cora said affectionately, pushing the plate in Rosie's direction. She and Rosie had been mates since they'd met at secondary school aged twelve, and in all these years Cora had never seen her friend get even vaguely fat, despite her pregnancies.

Nicole nodded vehemently, mouth still full of custard.

‘I don't know how you do it,' she said, swallowing. ‘I was like a heifer with Elliot from about day two!'

Rosie smiled serenely, carefully extracting a chunk of chocolate from the top of her muffin. ‘Good genes,' she said. ‘But you lose it quicker, Nicole. You were back in your size eights ten minutes after Elliot – it took me months to deflate.'

She glanced at Cora, obviously suddenly realising the turn the conversation was taking.

‘Oh – sorry. Look, no more baby talk, OK? Do you want to talk about Justin, Cora, or something entirely different? Like the murder? Gosh – how exciting that must be, your boss being murdered practically in front of everyone!'

Cora ran her forefinger around her plate to wipe up the last smears of cream. She wondered for a minute if she should mention the CCTV footage, and then changed her mind again. No, not yet.

‘I'm a bit murdered out today, to be honest. And as for Justin – well, I still can't believe he did it by phone. But I suppose I'm sort of counting my blessings. My job's going well, and I've got you lot, and the guys at work … I mean, I kind of wish it wasn't Christmas, but I'll be OK, I really will. It just wasn't meant to be, you know. The kid thing and all.'

She stopped, suddenly feeling sad again. Nicole pushed the cake plate to one side and took her hand.

‘Exactly,' she said gently. ‘But Cora – don't get cross – you are sure, aren't you? I mean, really, really sure? Because Justin used to say he didn't want kids, but he obviously … I don't know … had a void or something that he suddenly realised needed to be filled. Are you sure that isn't going to happen to you, somewhere down the line? I mean, if you're starting to lose relationships over it. I just don't want you to end up old and lonely, and regretting it.'

Cora tried to snatch her hand away but Nicole held it fast. Across the table, Rosie was starting to look worried.

‘Please, not this again! I don't have a void, Nicole, you should know that by now! There are loads of men out there who don't want children, I just need to find one, that's all. And since when does having kids guarantee you won't be lonely? That's just a stupid thing to say. I have loads of friends – and I'd rather find my own than give birth to them.'

‘OK, OK, I'm sorry, you're right.' Nicole dropped Cora's hand and stood up, pulling an elastic hair band from her wrist. She caught her long, dark hair up into a ponytail and looped the band deftly around it, pulling it back from her face. In her customary black, today wearing tight jeans and a long silky jumper which clung to her leggy form, she looked like an elegant spider as she stretched her arms out to loosen the tension in her back, and sat back down again.

‘Oh, it's fine. I know you're only saying it 'cos you care.'

Cora exhaled heavily. She loved her friends, but why could they not accept this one aspect of her personality? Why were they so insistent that she was wrong? It drove her crazy, but she was so used to it by now that she never stayed cross with them for long. She leaned back in her chair.

‘Last cake, anyone?' she said.

Rosie, who hated rows, stopped nervously fiddling with a silver bauble she'd picked off the Christmas tree and looked relieved. She stretched over and selected the cream slice, pointing to her belly remorsefully.

‘Baby's still hungry … come on, let's put the telly on or something.'

The three of them got up and moved to the sofas. Cora and Rosie sank onto one, Rosie cradling her cake, while Nicole kicked off her spiky black boots and arranged her long legs under her on the other.

‘Sorry,' she said again.

Cora, who was flicking disconsolately through the channels, threw a cushion at her.

‘Shut up, it's fine,' she said. ‘Honestly.'

Nicole stuffed the cushion behind her back and grinned. ‘Thanks, I'll keep that. Had to deliver a bugger of a calf this week – nearly did my back in.'

‘Oh, don't start, please, unless you want me to vomit.' Cora shuddered and carried on channel-hopping.

A vet who normally specialised in small animals, Nicole occasionally got called out to nearby farms in emergencies. Cora and Rosie had met her at a party six years ago, and although the three of them had been inseparable ever since, some of Nicole's stories were a little hard to stomach.

‘Yuk,' Rosie agreed. ‘I can't imagine sticking my hand up a cow's bum. I don't know how you do it, Nic.'

‘Well, I can't imagine pottering around with flowers all day. I mean – poncy
flowers
,' Nicole retorted. ‘And as for you, Cora, what did I see you doing earlier in the week – oh yes, standing in the dark at some ungodly hour, in Liverpool of all grotty places, pretending to be
reeeeeally
excited and impressed by some completely insane people who had about a zillion Christmas lights all over their house and garden. I mean, honestly. You do have a crap job.'

Cora and Rosie looked at each and started to giggle. Nicole was funny when she went off on one.

‘I know. I hate Christmas lives. But you weren't saying that when I interviewed George Clooney, were you?' Cora threw another cushion across the room.

Nicole caught it with one hand and added it to the pile behind her.

‘OK, I'll give you that one … oh, stop flicking, look! It's that travel thingy, with that Boland bloke, whatever his name is – now, he's almost as yummy as Gorgeous George, don't you think?'

Cora's heart sank as they all stared at the screen. Benjamin Boland was striding across a desert somewhere, his dark hair damp with sweat but still managing to curl sexily around the nape of his neck. His white shirt, open at the chest, clung to his tanned, hairless torso.

Oblivious to the blush spreading across Cora's cheeks, Rosie stroked her bump dreamily. ‘Oh yes. Now that, Cora, is a man who doesn't want to be tied down with kids, I bet. A real adventurer, roaming the world – crikey, look at those thighs! I bet he is
fantastic
in bed.'

‘Cora – Cora, what on earth is wrong with you? Why have you gone all red and sweaty?' Nicole was leaning forward on the sofa, sharp eyes taking in her friend's fiery complexion.

‘Cora?' Rosie sat up too, looking perturbed.

Cora sighed and stood up. ‘Anyone for a glass of wine? And then, I have a rather funny story to tell you …'

11

‘Baby, you look seriously hot! Come watch with me!'

The tiny Japanese girl curled up on a huge purple leather beanbag beckoned to Benjamin with a manicured finger. Her shiny black bob swung as she turned back to the TV. On screen, Benjamin was now hacking his way through a rainforest, the muscles in his forearms bulging as he swung the axe. The shot cut to a python slithering through the undergrowth, and the girl let out a little scream, and then giggled.

Benjamin, who was standing by the window of his South Bank apartment, gazing down at the river through his shiny new telescope, suddenly felt irritated. He'd done it again, hadn't he? Last night when he and the boys had moved on to a club. This one wasn't a model – he'd at least managed to stick to that part of his pre-Christmas resolution. She was a – receptionist? In a gym? Something like that. And she was stunning, there was no doubt about that. But she was still stupid. And he was bored. Bored rigid in fact. Fed up of these beautiful but vacuous females, most of whom only wanted to hang out with him because he was on TV. But what could he do about it? In the world in which he moved, these were the only women he met most of the time.

Ignoring the girl, he went to his bedroom and shut the door. He slumped onto the red velvet chaise longue by the window and put his head in his hands. He'd just have to stop dating altogether, it was the only solution. He would not go out with another woman until he found a real one – an equal, somebody he could actually talk to, for heaven's sake. Surely that wasn't too much to ask? He thought again about Cora, and the way she'd rejected him so amusingly in the A-Bar, and wondered how he could wangle another meeting. Somebody like her, that was what he needed.

Benjamin stood up and crossed the room to his enormous walk-in wardrobe. Pushing past the rows and rows of designer suits and shirts, he reached in to the back of one of the shelves and hauled out a small cardboard box. Digging under old cards and personal documents, he found what he was looking for. It was a picture, yellowing around the edges and slightly torn. He returned to the chaise and stared at the photo, gently running his finger across the faded faces. A woman, in her early thirties, with dark, curly hair. A man, maybe a little older, with smiling eyes and a shiny grey suit. And between them, a little boy, six or seven years old, with the same dark curls as the woman. He had an arm looped around each of their necks, and a shy grin, big eyes looking straight into the camera.

‘That's what I want,' Benjamin thought. ‘I want what they had. I'm thirty-five years old. It's time.'

His contemplation was interrupted as the bedroom door opened, and he jumped and stuffed the photo under the cushion of the chaise. The Japanese girl popped her head in.

‘Hey, baby, what you doing in here on your own? I'm lonely.'

‘I was just coming to talk to you, actually, er, Chloe. You see, the thing is, I really …'

He paused as Chloe stepped into the room, totally naked. Benjamin felt his willpower drain away as he watched her perfect little body with its smooth honey skin sauntering across to the big bed. She hopped up and draped herself seductively on the white duvet, one knee cocked, eyelashes fluttering coyly.

Benjamin got up slowly. OK, one more night. One more night and that would be it. Tomorrow, he'd dump her, and find a real girlfriend. Buoyed by the thought, he whooped, ripped his clothes off, and went to join her.

It might have been Saturday, and almost Christmas, but it certainly wasn't a day off for DCI Adam Bradberry and his team. Slugging down a mouthful of tepid coffee, Adam stood up and stared again at the incident board covered in notes and scene of crime photos at the far end of the room. Reinvigorated by their pub visit and early night yesterday, the murder investigation team had attacked today with new vigour, but Adam couldn't help feeling there was something he was missing here, something they were all missing.

‘OK – let's go through this again,' he pronounced. Fifteen heads, some still on telephones, turned to look at him. Everyone else was out of the office, trying desperately to get some sort of angle on what had happened before the Christmas festivities started. They all knew it wouldn't be much of a Christmas otherwise.

‘I just need to get it all clear in my mind. Gary, can you recap what we know at this stage?'

Detective Constable Gary Gilbert, young and slightly scruffy-looking in a check shirt, put down his pen and shuffled up to the whiteboard.

‘Right.' He cleared his throat. ‘Well, what we definitely know is that at approximately eight a.m. on Monday the eighteenth of December, that's the Monday just gone, forty-two-year-old TV editor Jeanette Kendrick was found dying on the ground outside TV Centre. She was lying almost directly under her office window, which was open. Seven storeys up, that room is, and her injuries were consistent with a fall from that sort of height. In fact …'

He paused for a moment, studying the scrawl on the board. ‘In fact she probably fell just before eight o'clock – say, 7.58, 7.59 – because the security guard who found her was very adamant that he always leaves on his eight o'clock rounds bang on time, and he would have taken a minute or so to check the front of the building and then make his way round the side to where she was. Probably got to her about, say, 8.01 or 8.02. Post-mortem showed she probably landed on her feet first, sounds weird to me but apparently it's not uncommon, then bounced and landed on her head …'

He flicked through a sheaf of papers. ‘Injuries – well extensive, as you'd expect. Multiple injuries to internal organs, multiple skeletal fractures, head injuries, spinal cord transected. Died of respiratory failure within a minute or two, but was amazingly able to mutter a couple of words, which may or may not end up being of some help to us. Coroner was amazed she could speak at all, vast majority of people would be dead as soon as they hit the ground, although he did say he'd heard of some incredible survival stories too, all down to how you fall and how you land I think. Anyway, he reckons she certainly wouldn't have lived more than two or three minutes with those injuries, and she was just about alive when the guard found her.'

Adam nodded slowly. ‘So – just before eight o'clock, she's pushed out of her office window by a person or persons unknown. Definitely pushed, not suicide – tell us why, again?'