Peter James - Not Dead Yet

Glenn raised a hand. ‘Boss, I’d like to suggest Bella and I do the interview. Big if , but, if this Eric Whiteley, or anyone else at the accountancy firm, should turn out to be the perp, he might react – and be thrown a bit – by having seen us on Crimewatch .’

Grace nodded assent. Both detectives were trained Cognitive Suspect Interviewers. ‘He doesn’t sound a very likely candidate, but the link between the two places is interesting.’

He looked down at his notes, then at Norman Potting. ‘Myles Royce, Norman? You’re expecting DNA results back from the lab later today?’

‘I am indeed, boss.’

‘Let me know as soon as you hear.’

‘I will indeed.’

Glenn Branson stared at Potting, still trying to figure out what on earth Bella Moy could see in the man. Twenty years her senior, charmless and, despite his recent makeover, not in any way physically appealing. At least not in his view. Although to be fair, he had been married four times, so presumably he had something that was not immediately apparent.

David Green, the Crime Scene Manager, reported on the progress that SOCOs and the Specialist Search Unit were making, looking for the missing head in the area around the West Sussex Piscatorial Society. Or rather, the lack of progress. This morning he had instructed them to widen the search parameters.

That was not good news, Grace thought. Although, from experience, he knew that there was always the possibility that the head, if buried on dry land, could have been carried off by a fox or a badger. Perps often spent hours digging deep graves for their victims. But these tended to preserve the bodies quite well. It was shallow graves that caused much bigger problems for murder investigation teams, because all kinds of animals would carry the remains away, for food and nests, dispersing them over a wide area.

He drew a circle on his pad around the name Eric Whiteley . So far their only suspect. He looked forward to the interview report.

After the meeting ended he headed back to his office and phoned Victoria Somers, the mother of his god-daughter, wondering if Jaye might like to play with Gaia’s son. She was a few years older than Roan Lafayette, but from the tone of her mother’s voice, that did not matter remotely. She sounded thrilled to bits.

One very small problem sorted.

And brownie points for himself all round.

He felt ridiculous. He had a pretty good idea that he looked ridiculous too. And he was perspiring heavily. He was in goddamn agony. The waist of the jacket was far too tight for him; the crotch of the cream pantaloons was crushing his balls, and the boots the idiot wardrobe woman had crammed his feet into were at least two sizes too small, and crippling his toes. His wig felt like he was wearing a straw bird’s nest.

He should be spending his last days on a sunlounger on a yacht in the Caribbean, drinking mojitos, surrounded by nubile young women. This was so wrong. The story of his fucking life. Screwed all the time. The goddamn movie business, goddamn television. Screwed by each of his agents. And now this final insult. Brooker Brody Productions stealing his story. The best damned thing he had written in his life.

And instead of basking in glory, he was sweating in tights and an itchy wig.

You’re going to be sorry. So sorry. All of you. Oh fucking yes.

That bitch who had been rude to him on Saturday was going to be sorry, too. He was looking around for her but had not seen her so far. He had plans for her. That was the great thing about dying – you no longer had to give a shit!

But first he had to focus. The task ahead. He had a copy of the production schedule. It gave him every day’s shooting on location in Brighton. Inside and outside the Pavilion, depending on the weather. Outside during the daytime, weather permitting. Inside when it was closed to the public.

Tomorrow after it was closed they were starting shooting the scene in the Banqueting Room when George IV ended his relationship with Maria Fitzherbert, telling her she was history.

The king would tell her while they were sitting beneath the chandelier that he was always scared of. Hollywood stars Judd Halpern and Gaia seated beneath that chandelier. How great would it be to have it crash down on both of them?

He could imagine the headlines around the world the next day. Two legends dead!

How are you going to feel about that, Larry Brooker? Maxim Brody? Bet you will be sorry you ripped off my treatment, won’t you? All your dreams shattered like the crystals of the chandelier.

See? I’m pretty poetic, really. Know what I’m saying?

The bus, packed full of costumed extras, moved off, pulling out through the gates of Brighton Racecourse, and on to the road. It turned left, down the hill, heading towards the sea, and then the Pavilion.

Drayton Wheeler clutched the small rucksack tightly. It contained his change of clothes; drinking water; food; torch; a glass San Pellegrino bottle filled with the mercuric chloride acid cocktail he had very carefully mixed; and a towel from the hotel bathroom.

When he focused on the task ahead, and forgot all about his outfit, he felt a lot better. Oh yes.

He felt extremely happy.

The bloody woman was pestering him again. Angela McNeill was managing to find an excuse to come into Eric Whiteley’s office almost every lunchtime now, on some pretext or other. He tried ignoring her, but she was not the kind of person who would even notice she was being ignored.

Today she was holding a clutch of bound annual accounts for Stonery Farm, which had been returned by a Sussex Police financial investigator called Emily Curtis, wanting to replace them in their correct filing cabinet. There was no urgency on this, Eric knew, she could have done it at any time, but she chose his lunch hour. Deliberately.

Angela McNeill stood over him, looking down at the tuna mayo sandwich, Twix bar, apple and bottle of sparkling water. ‘My, you’re a real creature of habit, aren’t you, Eric Whiteley?’

He concentrated on reading the Argus newspaper, open in front of him. They had conveniently printed the entire production shooting schedule, so that the public could know where to go and watch. The production was still appealing for more extras for some crowd scenes.

They had asked him to turn up this morning, but of course he couldn’t, not today, not during a weekday, except in his holidays. But the next days off he had booked were not until September.

‘You always have exactly the same lunch.’

He wasn’t sure whether it was a question or just a comment. Either way he didn’t care and it was none of her business. He didn’t like her voice, it was a charmless, flat monotone. He didn’t care for the way she smelled either. She wore a scent that smelled like toilet air freshener. He hated the way she stood over him, watching him feed like he was some creature in a zoo. He could imagine her being the kind of woman a husband would want to murder.

‘It’s what I like,’ he mumbled without looking up at her, and realized he had now re-read the same sentence three times.

‘It’s important to vary your diet, you know, Eric. There’s a lot of mercury in fish. Too much fish is bad for you.’

‘I’m a bit of a fishy character!’

‘Oooh, you’ve got a wicked sense of humour, haven’t you? I can tell!’

He wished he’d kept his mouth shut. Then he silently prayed that if he were ever in his life unfortunate enough to get stuck in a lift with someone, it wouldn’t be her.

His phone rang.

Saved by the bell, he thought, picking it up.

It was the receptionist. Her voice sounded strange. ‘Eric, there’s a gentleman and a lady who’d like to speak to you in the Conference Room.’