Quintin Jardine - Fallen Gods

The woman shook her head. "No."

"Has anyone since then?"

"Not at all; you're the first." She looked at him. "How exactly are you involved with them, Mr. Skinner?"

"You could say I'm running a quality control check on their investigative techniques."

"How are they doing?"

"Badly," he said, grimly. "So no one's approached you at all about Monday?"

"A television reporter did, but I didn't like her so I told her I'd seen nothing, and to get her crew the hell out of my driveway."

Skinner grinned. "Good for you; I can't stand it either when they get intrusive." He paused. "Can you remember," he continued, 'whether anyone did any filming during the party?"

"Sure," she answered, at once. "I did. It wasn't what you'd call filming though; I have a digital camera that takes still shots, and very short video clips."

"Do you still have the pictures you took?"

"Sure. They're on a memory stick. Would you like to look at them?"

"Yes please."

"Come through to the kitchen, then. I'll connect the camera through my laptop, and you'll see the images bigger."

"Fine." He followed her out of the living room. The kitchen was much brighter; he could see why she kept her computer there, even though it was a Toshiba portable. He waited while she linked the camera, a small

Sony, through a port in the back of the laptop case, then booted it up.

While the machine readied itself she poured two mugs of coffee from a jug and handed one to him. He took it automatically, without even thinking about it.

"Okay," she announced as the images on the screen became fixed, 'let's go." She clicked an icon and waited for a new window to open, then clicked again. A photographic image appeared. It showed a small boy, with freckles and a gap-toothed smile, standing beside the playpen in the back yard, leaning on it. He was wearing black trousers and a Buffalo Bills replica shirt.

Elaine Aitchison stood aside. "You drive if you like," she offered.

"Just click the button below the track-pad to advance the pictures."

"Thanks." He stood in from of the Toshiba and found the button, then began to click. Another shot of Ryan appeared, and another, then one of him with his younger brother. A dozen photographs into the stick,

Bob stopped. There was a man in the image on the screen, hefting Ryan up to his shoulder; the boy held a brown football with NFL markings, and gaped wide-eyed at the camera as if he could not quite believe what was happening.

"That's Ron," his mother murmured. "And just think, a couple of hours later…" Her voice tailed off into a shiver. "Ryan's heartbroken, you know; I think every little boy in Buffalo must be. If his girlfriend did it, like they're saying, then God help her."

"She didn't do it," said Skinner, quietly.

"You know this?" asked Elaine. "For sure?"

"For sure."

He clicked his way on through the photos on the memory stick, quickly, losing count, as all of them seemed to have been taken around the barbecue in the back yard, and out of sight of Neidholm's drive. But at last, the scene changed; he reached an image of Ryan and four other boys, in the front of the house. Ryan had thrown his football, in Ron Neidholm style, and his friends were jumping to catch it. The background was wrong, though; it showed only the garden, and nothing on the other side of the street. He clicked again, and again, and again, and again, and… stopped.

He was looking at a photograph of Ryan running down the yard to retrieve the brown ball. Ron Neidholm's driveway was in the background, and in it there were two cars parked, a red sporty job, a Camaro or a Trans Am he guessed, and before it, blocking it in, a white saloon.

"Wow!" he whispered.

"You got something?" Mrs. Aitchison asked.

"I think so." He moved on to the next image. Ryan had recovered the ball and the car was still there. In the next shot, he was throwing it again. His body blocked out the white vehicle, but in the further distance, in

Neidholm's doorway, he thought that he could see a tiny figure, back to camera, either entering or leaving the house.

He glanced to the side. "Elaine," he asked, 'can you zoom in on these images? To be specific, on that doorway?"

"Sure," she replied. "Let me show you." She picked up the camera, made an adjustment and pressed a button. The figure in the doorway grew larger, but as it did it lost all clarity, and became no more than a black blur.

"Take me back to the last image, please," Skinner murmured, 'and see if you can focus in on the number plate on that white car."

She did as he requested. Together they looked at the screen as the car grew larger; as they watched, letters became clear and legible.

Bob's grin widened, until eventually it was as if it stretched from ear to ear. As he looked at the licence plate, he felt almost consumed by a huge feeling of relief. "Jesus," he laughed, 'talk about signing your name everywhere you go!"

"So that's it," Paula exclaimed, 'you've actually moved out?"

He nodded. "I'm in the process of, yes."

"You're not giving yourself time for second thoughts? You're not just giving yourself a bit of breathing space?"

"No; neither of us needs any breathing space. We both know it's over."

"But why has this happened all of a sudden, Mario? You told me what your problems were, but you said you were handling them, and that you and Maggie were content to go on the way you were. God, I never felt like a whore before, but I do now!"

She turned away from him, but he put his hands on her shoulders and brought her back to face him once more. "You can stop that right now," he said, firmly. "This has got nothing to do with you."

"You can say that, but the rest of bloody Edinburgh won't see it that way. I suppose I'm a bit late to be thinking of that now'

"The rest of bloody Edinburgh can think what it will, but I can tell you this; they won't hear it from Maggie, and they sure as hell won't say it in my hearing. Paulie, the things that killed our marriage have nothing to do with you and me. They were covered up for too long; now they've got out of the box and we can't handle them. Losing custody of

Rufus might have been the catalyst for this, but in a way it's been a blessing too."

"But you were so fond of that wee guy."

"Yeah, I know, but he's going to be much better off with his uncle's family." He wrinkled his nose. "Hell, I can always get a puppy."

"And what's Maggie going to do on her own?"

"She's going to do her job; get on with her career. As for being on her own, she's been that way since she was a kid. Even when we were married, there was a part of her that I could never get near."

"There's a part of me you'll never get near, too; I hope you realise that."

He grinned. "Hell. I wouldn't want to get any where near her. She's a dangerous woman."

"You'd better believe it," she said, in mock warning. "But this part of me isn't." She slid her arms around his waist and pressed herself against him, burying her face in his chest. "This part's just a selfish bitch; she's glad that you're out of it. And if it's been wrong all along, I suppose I should be glad for Maggie too. You never know; maybe she'll find the right man, in time."

"Maybe she will, but it sure as hell ain't me."

When Paula looked up at him, she was frowning. "That should worry me, you know," she whispered. "Maybe you'll find the right woman."

"Maybe I've found her," he replied. "Maybe she's been there all along.

Maybe this is the way it should be; me in your mum and dad's old place, you here, living our lives and getting together when we feel like it."

"And maybe you should stop trying to see the future. Look at your friend Neil; you could never have guessed what would happen to him, after his wife died."