Helen Fields - Perfect Remains

Ava put her drink down. ‘You must have overseen cases at Interpol where there was no break for ages then something happened and one piece of the puzzle landed so you could see the whole picture. You aren’t responsible for a lack of progress if there’s nothing to find yet.’

‘Isn’t it our job to seek out the answers rather than waiting for solutions to come to us?’ Ava seemed content not to answer. Callanach realised the pomposity of his response to what had been a simple attempt at comfort, and opted for changing the subject. ‘Why did you become a police officer?’

‘My great aunt was poisoned when I was five, my inheritance stolen and I vowed to find the killer,’ she said.

‘ Je suis désolé , I’m so sorry, I had no idea …’ Callanach spluttered.

Ava began to laugh, tried to control it then the giggles got the better of her.

‘I can’t believe you fell for that,’ she choked, the laughter starting again and Callanach sat with raised eyebrows as he waited for her to stop. ‘Policing felt like a good match for the person I was in my early twenties. And I probably wanted to make it clear to my parents that I had no desire to get married and have endless dinner parties until I popped out a couple of grandchildren for them. If I had my time again, I’m not sure I’d choose the same path. What about you? It was a dramatic move to leave Interpol and join a city police force. I’m guessing we’re not quite as glamorous as your French colleagues.’

‘Glamour is overrated,’ he said, finishing his drink. ‘I’m hungry. How’s the food here?’

‘The steak is excellent,’ Ava said. ‘As is the baked brie, which is what I’m having.’

Callanach couldn’t help but smile. It was an unfamiliar sensation. But Ava Turner was so open and upfront that it was completely disarming. They ordered and made small talk until the food arrived.

‘Come on then, everyone has a reason. Why the police?’ Ava asked as she dipped baguette in melted cheese.

Callanach instantly regretted having asked Ava such a personal question. He should have foreseen having to respond in kind. His pause was long enough that Ava had fully gauged his reticence before he met her eyes again.

‘You don’t have to answer. It’s not a trick. And tell me if I’m misreading this or being dense, but this is the way it usually works. You ask me a question, I ask you one. We bump into each other at work, we get to know each other better so there’s more trust. When we have a bad day, we smile at one another, remind ourselves that it’s all par for the course.’

‘I know how it works,’ Callanach said. It came out more brusquely than he’d intended and he regretted it immediately. This wasn’t how he’d wanted the evening to go. He readied himself to say sorry.

‘Don’t,’ Ava said. ‘Don’t apologise again. People are who they are. As far as I’m concerned, forcing a square peg into a round hole is a waste of energy. But you’ll have to find a better means of communication than this. Your squad doesn’t have to like you, but they do have to respect you. So here’s the thing. If you don’t say please or thank you to your detectives, they’ll still do what they’re told but they won’t feel a sense of pleasure in working their hardest for you. If you snap at everyone all the time, you’ll drag your team down. And if you don’t let anyone get to know you, whether it’s me or anyone else, then you’ve got no reason to be here because there’ll be no loyalty and no community. And that’s all you have in the police. It’s what grounds you and supports you. It’s the only thing that makes the job tolerable at the end of the day. Feel free to stop me when you want to explain that you already know all of this.’

Ava stood up, picked up her bag and strode away. Callanach realised she’d left her jacket, grabbed it and turned to call after her. He searched the small passageway of steps leading down to the exit but she had already disappeared. Letting out a stream of expletives he returned to the table, threw the jacket back onto her chair and put his head in his hands. He never used to be this person. On top of everything he’d lost – his home, his career, even his mother – he’d become someone he no longer liked. Perhaps Scotland was a mistake, perhaps he was wrong thinking he could take up policing in a new country and that it would be the way it was before. If he was going to run, he should have run much further and never looked back. Slipping on his jacket, he stood up to leave as a glass of wine was thrust into his hand. He stared at Ava.

‘Going somewhere?’ she asked.

‘I assumed you’d …’ he stuttered, trying to stop the words before he looked even more foolish than he already did.

‘That I’d what? Oh my God, you thought I’d left?’ Ava laughed, a big belly laugh that contained not the slightest hint of malice or mean spiritedness. Callanach glanced at the large glass of red in his hand and wished furiously for a time machine to start the evening again. ‘You can go if you like, but I’m off duty and I have no intention of ruining my evening by flouncing off anywhere. I went to the bar, as you can see. Thought I’d give you a moment to decide if you wanted to join in the conversation or just carry on sitting there like a lemon.’

‘ Un citron? ’ Callanach’s translation skills weren’t bad but that phrase made no sense at all.

Ava laughed again, more softly this time. Callanach gave up, took a long sip of wine and forced himself to sit back and at least pretend to relax. Perhaps that was what was required to start a new life. Perhaps the best he could do was pretend that he could still act normally around people. Maybe in time he’d get more convincing at it. He took a breath and forced himself to share the sort of confidences he once wouldn’t have thought twice about.

‘We lived in Scotland until my father died. I was four years old. After that my mother found it hard to cope, so we moved to France near her family. She had to work long hours to support us and I learned to fend for myself. I got tough very quickly, always fast with a smart mouth, getting in trouble, fighting with the local boys. To them I wasn’t properly French, didn’t fit in. I suppose I turned myself into the sort of arrogant jerk everyone assumed I was when they saw me. By university I was bedding any woman I wanted, partying constantly. My mother called them my dark years. I almost never went home, was egotistic and unlikeable. Then I met someone and it changed everything. For six months I managed to behave like a decent human being, my grades improved, I was content.’

‘You split up?’ Ava asked.

‘We had a petty row. I went out, got drunk and she found me later that night in her best friend’s bed. She left and did not return. I never saw her or spoke to her again.’

‘And that changed you forever into the much improved human you are today?’ Ava teased.

‘Unfortunately not. I was making extra cash modelling so I threw myself into that world, avoiding the university crowd. It was exploitative, drug-fuelled and toxic. Everyone was out for themselves. I spent my weekends travelling with a bunch of crazy thrill-seekers. If we weren’t drunk or high, we were skiing, scuba diving, sailing or skydiving.’

‘Sounds awful.’ Ava raised her eyebrows.

‘Everything was excessive which meant, after a while, that it all became commonplace. It’s one of the many things I regret – not being sober enough to appreciate how lucky I was. Then the bubble burst. I got arrested for drunk driving. The police officer was female. I was horribly rude about her looks when she was booking me in at the police station and she slapped my face, hard.’ He rubbed one hand across his cheek at the memory. ‘The officer changed her mind about arresting me. Instead, she put me in a car and drove me two hundred miles back to my mother where she made me stand and listen, sober by then, to the words I’d said to her. For the first time in years, I was truly ashamed. My mother cried with embarrassment. I was at a crossroads, and that police officer sent me the right way. Had it been anyone else who’d arrested me, I would not be here now.’