David turned back round to the window, looking out over the river. Everything looked so perfect. He could see the trees of Battersea Park. The Thames slid past, moving slowly, catching sparkles of sunshine as it went.
Emma, the air stewardess. They’d met a few months earlier. She’d walked into a bar in her uniform, pulling a small black case behind her, cool and distant, that airline arrogance, smart and made-up, with a long, athletic body and trailing blonde hair. Most of all, she seemed unimpressed by his fame. That had been the attraction. He was young, good-looking and famous, and so he had done the easy sex circuit. But Emma had reminded him of how much he enjoyed the chase. He was a winner, and to win there has to be a contest.
‘I suppose you heard,’ said David.
Emma stopped drying her hair and put down her towel. ‘I heard.’
He exhaled and roughed-up his hair. ‘He was a decent bloke, you know, a good player.’ He bent down to put his beer on a table and then leant against the window.
‘What happens now?’ asked Emma.
He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. Maybe a minute’s silence on Saturday. They can’t cancel games; the season’s just started.’
‘Do you think you should play?’
‘No reason why not.’
‘Is it worth getting shot over?’
David bristled at that. He knew what the ‘it’ was. It was football. Just a game. David is paid for playing a game. He had heard that before, too many times.
‘It’s not about what’s worth getting shot over,’ David responded, his irritation showing. ‘It’s about me doing my job well. And that job gets me all of this.’ He waved his hand around the apartment, every room filled with designer furniture, every window looking out on one of the most expensive views in the city.
‘Okay, okay. I’m sorry.’
‘You got that right.’ He sighed, not wanting to argue. ‘Look, Emma, it’s a business, not a game.’
‘Should it be?’
David turned back to the window and picked up his beer, looking back down to the river. ‘No, maybe not.’
He sounded rueful. He remembered his childhood, when football wasn’t about money. It was about muddy shirts and the feel of the grass beneath your boots. Messing around with your friends, Saturday morning kickabouts, swapping cards.
‘If they cancel the games, come to my parents. They would love to meet you. My dad’s got a new boat and he’ll want to show it off.’
David nodded. ‘Maybe it’s time to say hello.’
He stayed by the window for a while, and then he turned around as Emma began to get ready, watching her shrug off his shirt so that she was naked. He turned back to the window. That’s what he’d miss when she was gone for a couple of days.
But then she’d be back and he’d get on a bus to the next away game, maybe a plane to Europe. That was their life. He played football. Emma flew around the world. When they connected, they made sparks, but most of the time it felt like they’d hardly met.
Most of all, he liked her because she was so unlike all the other players’ wives and girlfriends, who were greedy and predatory, all with a hunger in their eyes that frightened him. And it used to be just about money. Now it was a route to their own fame.
He looked out of the window and drank his beer. Emma was different. She avoided publicity. Didn’t ask for money. Hadn’t done a magazine shoot.
Maybe that’s why he liked her.
Laura was one of the first into the flat, Tom just behind her. When she saw the bodies, she stopped. She didn’t need to get any nearer to know that they were dead.
She stepped back out of the flat and blocked the way in. ‘We’re too late. Save it for crime scenes.’
Tom sighed and turned around, pushing police officers away, asking for someone to get the photographer. When he turned back into the flat, he said, ‘We can presume this is the place, can’t we?’
Laura nodded. ‘If we can’t, it’s been a busy day in Soho.’
There were two people, a male and a female, both smart in suits. Except that one had a pool of blood around his head, gravity doing the job that the heart had stopped doing, and the other hadn’t moved for some time, despite the open eyes.
‘Is it some kind of suicide thing?’ he said, looking back into the room. ‘He shoots Dumas, strangles the girl, and then turns the gun on himself?’
Laura peered into the gloom, tried to see the detail of the scene at the other end of the room. ‘Unless he could do it with his hands tied behind his back, I doubt it.’
Tom looked back into the room and then looked down.
‘Shit. Three murders in one afternoon. Looks like we better cancel everyone’s leave for a few weeks.’
Laura sighed to herself. Her parents’ goodwill was stretched already by her childcare needs, her ex-husband regarding that as her job to arrange. ‘Have we spoken to the estate agency yet?’ she asked.
Tom looked up. ‘Someone’s on the way there now. Appointment made in the name of Paxman, but nothing else. Done over the phone. That’s why there were two here, just in case.’
‘Do you get a bad feeling about today?’
He nodded. ‘Very.’
Laura was about to say something else when she felt her phone vibrate in her pocket. It was a text, a simple message, two words: ‘call me’. It was from Jack Garrett. She stopped the smile which started when she saw his name. She hadn’t heard from him in months. He would have to wait.
She checked her watch and realised how late the day was going to get. She caught Tom looking and she cursed to herself.
‘Kids?’ he asked.
She shrugged. ‘Police life. They understand.’
He nodded. ‘If you need to go, Laura, you need to go. Maybe you’re the one who’s got it right.’
Laura said nothing; just cursed some more and then snapped open her phone. She knew straight away what he was getting at. This will be a long haul. If you don’t have the time, step aside.
But then she thought of something.
‘There is one body of people who might know all about Dumas,’ she said.
Tom nodded. ‘Go on.’
‘The press. They’ll have all his secrets,’ and as Tom began to smile, she pressed the call button.
I smiled when my phone rang. I knew Laura would call. She always did.
I tried hard to hide the skip in my voice.
‘Hello, detective. Fancy hearing from you today.’
‘Jack, you know I’m busy.’
‘Detective McGanity, why on earth do you think I’m calling?’
‘Look, Jack, I can’t talk right now. There’s too much going on.’
‘When?’
I heard her sigh.
‘Where are you?’
‘In my apartment, a few doors down from where you are.’ I lowered my voice. ‘What’s in that building? Quite a crowd went in there a few minutes ago.’
‘I can’t disclose any secrets, Jack, you know that.’ There was a pause, and then, ‘We could meet up. I haven’t seen you for a while. It’ll be good to catch up.’