02 Blue Murder (15 page)

***

H
etheridge was due to pick her up at eight; when Kate glanced
at the clock, she saw it was barely six. Her hair was already
salon-perfect—accustomed to styling her unruly blond hair herself,
the cost of a trim and an updo had shocked her, though she’d
grudgingly paid. Taking her time with her makeup, she decided to
stick to the classic: no foundation on her fair skin, just
jet-black mascara and deep red lipstick. Once that was done, there
was nothing left but to wriggle into her rented gown, enlisting the
help of her nephew, Henry, with the zipper.

“
It’s awfully tight,” he
said doubtfully.

“
It’s supposed to be. I’m
part of an undercover operation,” she said, enjoying how the
eight-year-old boy’s eyes widened. “I have to blend in with all the
poshies, don’t I?”

“
Shouldn’t be hard. You look
good. And Tony will be there,” Henry said wisely. Highly verbal and
already reading at an advanced level, he frequently spoke like an
adult, although he lagged behind developmentally in almost
everything else. “Do you think he’ll have time to read my school
essay? I want him to—”

“
Lego,” Ritchie called from
the front room, revealing he wasn’t as mesmerized by BBC World News
as he appeared. “I have a new Lego.”

Her brother had been saying that for two
days; when he stumbled upon a phrase he liked, he tended to stick
with it as long as possible. “I have a new Lego” referred to the
latest project on his bedroom floor—asymmetric yet oddly
compelling, like most of his nameless creations. Tall and slender,
with curly brown hair and a perpetually spotty face, Ritchie was
three years Kate’s senior and resembled her not in the least. Then
again, it was highly unlikely they had the same father. Kate’s mum
wasn’t around to ask. Mrs. Wakefield had spent most of Kate’s
formative years either on the game or serving time, either for
petty theft or prostitution. Now her whereabouts were unknown, a
circumstance Kate occasionally paused to give thanks for.

At least I don’t have to
worry about Mum turning up and demanding to have Ritchie
back
, Kate thought.
She’d sell his organs on the black market before she’d take
charge of him again. Assuming she’s still alive …

“
I have a new Lego,” Ritchie
repeated, louder.

“
And I adore it,” Kate
called back, sucking herself in as Henry, short and pudgy for his
age, strained to zip her all the way up. “But Tony’s on a tight
schedule, luv. I don’t think he’ll come up to the flat to hobnob
with you lot tonight. More like, I’ll walk down and meet him at the
curb.”

“
Balls,” Henry said,
deflating.

Kate gave him a quick consoling hug. Henry
and Ritchie’s transparent starvation for male attention was
something she preferred not to dwell on. Not long ago she’d made
the mistake of letting them get too close to her ex-boyfriend,
Dylan. And his sudden disappearance from their lives had hurt Henry
and Ritchie far more than it hurt her.

No more male bonding. Not till I’m sure
where Tony and I stand.

With almost an hour left to kill, Kate stood
in the living room—her dress was too snug for extended sitting—and
watched the news over Ritchie’s shoulder. Often her mind wandered
to the case, to the physical similarities between Kyla Sloane and
Tessa Chilcott.

Could they be related
somehow?
Kate wondered.
Has anyone checked?

“…
with Roderick Hetheridge,
spokesman of the Foxhound Fanciers,” a TV voice said, rousing Kate
from her thoughts. Onscreen, a reporter for the Beeb thrust his
microphone toward a dour man with the high forehead and jutting
chin of an aristocrat. “Mr. Hetheridge, why do you believe so
passionately that the national ban on foxhunting should be
lifted?”

“
Well, it isn’t quite fair,
is it?” Roderick Hetheridge flashed a toothy smile. “Foxhunting
isn’t banned in Northern Ireland. Yet all the rest of us are made
to suffer. And moreover, it isn’t fair to rural culture. This
country is already going to the dogs. Do we really want to stand by
and give up every last thing that makes us British?”

“
Wanker,” Henry groaned. He
couldn’t bear stories of animal cruelty in the news. When a cat was
flattened by a lorry just outside their building, he’d cried for
hours.

“
Gone to the dogs?” the
reporter repeated. “But Mr. Hetheridge, critics of the Foxhound
Fanciers would say that’s just the problem. The fox is beset by
hounds and killed, they would argue, quite inhumanely …”

“
I don’t agree. Foxhunting
began as a vital form of pest control and grew into a highly
disciplined sport. All this handwringing about kindness to animals
is pure emotion,” Roderick Hetheridge said. “And propagated, I
might add, by those who came to this country as immigrants and now
seek to replace our historic way of life with their
own.”

When the segment wrapped, the studio
newsreader added, “That was Roderick Hetheridge, first in line for
the barony of Wellegrave and founder of Foxhound Fanciers, a
pro-hunting activist organization.”

“
But Tony’s the baron of
Wellegrave,” Henry said. “How can that prat be first in
line?”

“
First in line when Tony
dies,” Kate said. She narrowly resisted the temptation to rush to
her computer, Google that video snippet and replay it in all its
horror. Once or twice she’d imagined Hetheridge’s relatives,
envisioning them as cold, arrogant and out of touch. How bracing to
discover the reality was, quite possibly, even worse.

“
Dies?” Henry’s eyes widened
behind his round specs. “Tony’s not that old, is he?”

“
Nope. Just turned two
hundred last week,” Kate laughed, mussing Henry’s hair. He still
looked worried, so she started to tickle him, keeping up the
assault until he darted away.

“
I’ve got it!” Henry called
from the safety of his bedroom. “You can marry Tony and have his
baby. Then the baby will be the next baron and Mr. Fox-killer can
shut his cake-hole!” Giggling madly, the boy shut his door and
locked it before Kate, hampered by her gown, could
follow.

***

A
t
eight o’clock Kate exited her flat. Four-inch heels in hand, she
boarded the lift barefoot, sharing it with a greasy-haired delivery
boy. All the way down she pretended not to notice his lascivious
gaze, despite the fact it never left her breasts.

“
Dead sexy,” he announced as
the jerky old lift finally shuddered to halt. “What you charging,
luv?”

“
Night in the nick.” Kate
wished she had her warrant card to wave under his nose. “Care to
get banged up?”

“
Blimey. Just joking.
Wouldn’t poke you with a borrowed stick.” Tossing an unimaginative
curse over his shoulder, the delivery boy hurried away.

It was a cool night, too breezy to stand
outside for long, at least without a wrap. Unwilling to spoil the
effect of her gown with her grotty old trench coat, Kate elected to
wait in her building’s glass-fronted lobby. After three minutes
barefoot on the linoleum—originally white, but now a sludgy
gray—she imagined she could feel fungus creeping in, so she set
about putting on her shoes. Brand new and a wee bit too small, they
had delicate ankle straps that were so difficult to fasten, she
didn’t notice as Hetheridge’s silver Lexus appeared in front of her
building. By the time Kate straightened, Hetheridge was emerging
from the sleek sedan.

The man had been made for evening dress.
Despite her awareness of that fact, Kate still caught her breath
when she saw Hetheridge. His tuxedo was no rental—she happened to
know he owned three. Its precise fit, along with his steel gray
hair and ice blue eyes, combined to make the man ludicrously
handsome. Which explained the nervous thumping inside her
chest.

“
Kate.” Hetheridge stopped
dead, staring.

Determined not to mince or teeter, she
strode toward him. Her long black gown was couture, or so the shop
girl claimed. It had a V-shaped neckline, revealing the cleavage
that had so mesmerized the delivery boy, then nipped in at the
waist, emphasizing Kate’s curves. It fell to her ankles, except on
the left side, where a deep slit exposed her leg to midthigh. She
wore only one piece of jewelry—a necklace Lady Margaret Knolls had
lent her from her own collection. Fashioned in the shape of a
golden serpent with jeweled eyes and stylized scales, the necklace
hung heavily against Kate’s flesh. And those heels, the highest
she’d ever attempted, gave her the very boost she’d aimed for. For
her evening on Hetheridge’s arm, she’d be the taller of the pair by
at least three inches.

“
What do you think?” Kate
hadn’t meant to ask—nothing made her hate herself more than
whinging for approval—but the words were out before she could stop
them.

“
I think what every man
thinks in the presence of such a beautiful woman.” Taking her right
hand, Hetheridge brushed his lips against her knuckles. “That I am
undeserving, but not unwilling.”

He helped her into the Lexus. Kate climbed
into the bucket seat with care, mindful of her gown, which pulled
snug across her backside. Hetheridge, clearly at home in evening
dress, dropped behind the wheel as if wearing a track suit. Was he
slimmer? Kate decided he was, and after only few days’ abstinence
from the team’s usual rich breakfast. She’d barely eaten for almost
two weeks, yet the scale refused to budge. Typical.

As the Lexus pulled away from the building,
Kate glimpsed movement at her front window. No doubt it was Henry
who watched them go, still disappointed that Hetheridge hadn’t come
up to critique his school essay. Ritchie loved TV more than
anything; when immersed in one of his many programs, he required
little else. But Henry needed more attention than Kate alone could
give him.

“
There’s something I’ve been
meaning to mention.” Kate took a deep breath. Keeping family
matters private was an ingrained survival strategy, despite the
fact she pried into other people’s lives—and deaths—for a
living.

Hetheridge muted the Lexus’s stereo.
“Yes?”

“
Next time I drop off Henry
for his fencing lesson, I’d appreciate it if you don’t reference
his mother. I never meant to spring it on you, about Maura residing
in a mental hospital. It just popped out when Paul explained about
Tessa Chilcott,” Kate said. “Henry’s delicate when it comes to his
mum. He says he wants to visit her, but he always comes back from
Parkwood depressed and anxious. He really enjoys his time with you,
Tony. I’m sure if you brought up his mum, it would only be out of
kindness. But I don’t want to risk upsetting him.”

“
Of course.” Slowing for a
traffic light, Hetheridge added, “Mind you, I already knew. About
Maura being a resident at Parkwood.”

“
What?” Kate’s voice sounded
strange to her own ears. “You ordered a full intelligence report on
me?”

Hetheridge shot her a startled glance. “Of
course not. It was Henry who told me about his mother. Sometime
around the third or fourth lesson, while you were still in the
hospital.”

“
But he …” Kate started to
say, “wouldn’t do that,” and realized she wasn’t sure. Just because
she preferred secrecy over confession didn’t mean her nephew felt
the same way. “He’s usually close-mouthed about family
problems.”

Hetheridge nodded.

Kate, who for some reason had expected
Hetheridge to keep talking—to pass on everything Henry had
said—realized he had no intention of doing so. Just as Bhar’s
professional missteps had been safe with him, so were a young man’s
secrets.

“
I notice Henry’s lost a
smidge of weight,” Kate said at last. “He was getting too big for
an eight-year-old, so fencing must be giving him a good workout.
And his school hasn’t called about him being bullied lately,
either.”

“
That’s all well and good,
but those bullies aren’t done with Henry. These things always get
worse before they get better,” Hetheridge said. “I think Henry
understands that now. He’s resolved to hold his head up and ignore
as much as he can. Then, when the time comes, he’ll have to
fight.”

Kate’s jaw dropped, but with effort she bit
back her initial response. What would a sixty-year-old bachelor
know of modern schools, zero tolerance and student behavior
contracts?

“
Henry can’t actually fight
the kids who are bullying him,” she explained gently. “That’s
against every rule under the sun. He’d get detention, maybe even
expulsion. And if he managed to actually hurt one of the bullies,
their parents would have me up on charges.”

Hetheridge kept his eyes on the road. His
expression, illuminated by passing streetlights, was serene.

“
Did Henry already tell you
that?” Kate asked.

“
He did.”

This time Kate couldn’t stifle a huff of
frustration. “Knowing all that, you still advised him to fight
back?”

“
I told Henry it’s very
simple. If they call you names, ignore them. If they get in your
way, step around them. Face blank, head high. But if they touch
you, if they place so much as a finger on you …” Hetheridge’s gaze
flickered toward Kate, then back to the road. “Issue one warning.
Then attack. If your opponent is your size or smaller, punch him in
the face. If your opponent is bigger and stronger, go for the
bollocks. Strike as if you have only one chance to make your
point.”