Neil White - LAST RITES

‘What do you mean “all”?’ I asked.

Callum laughed at me. ‘He was a fitness instructor. Do you have any idea what it's like?’

I shook my head.

‘Middle-aged women try to hang on to their youth by booking one of us,’ he continued. ‘They try and get back to a shape that they haven't had since they were teenagers, and in between breaths they try and seduce us.’

‘And do they?’

‘That depends. Some of the women look good, and sometimes there are some young clients, maybe young women trying to burn off the pregnancy weight. Our only rule is that they have to be single; we don't want angry husbands coming down here.’

‘Cramp your style?’

‘Don't look at me like that,’ he snapped at me. ‘We all know the rules. Do you think the women care about us? Course not. We're just muscles to them, something different from their ex-husband. Sarah was the same. All coy and reserved on the outside, but once you take them home, well, you can guess the rest. Luke said it was like peeling off a mask, you know, like the angel was really the devil in wings and a white dress.’

‘So there were other women?’

‘Luke was a good-looking bloke – there were always other women.’

‘Anyone special? Or any who didn't like being unsuccessful with him?’

‘He didn't tell me that much,’ Callum said, softening slightly. ‘Just man-talk, you know, all about the conquests, not the losses.’

I made some notes, scribbles that I knew I would have to make sense of later. He had some good quotes, but I was starting to feel uneasy. Katie had described the relationship as close, but now Luke's friend had described it as relaxed, and whatever it had been, Luke had ended up with a knife buried into his chest. The two things didn't add up.

‘Did Luke have a temper?’ I asked.

Callum looked surprised by the question. ‘What do you mean?’

‘I'm just wondering why Sarah would stab him, if it was so casual. Self-defence?’

‘No,’ Callum replied warily. ‘Luke was a pretty chilled-out kind of person.’

‘But maybe there was something affecting his mood.’

‘What like?’

I sensed some defensiveness in his question. I pointed at Callum's arms, the veins being throttled by the knitted sleeve of his polo shirt. ‘You work in a gym,’ I said. ‘You'll know what goes on in the pursuit of physique.’

‘Are you saying Luke was on drugs?’

I cocked my head. ‘I don't know, but you don't end up looking like you do on chicken and pasta.’

Anger flashed across Callum's face, his jaw clenching as he glared at me.

‘Roid rage,’ I pressed, trying to guess the answer from his response. ‘Perhaps Sarah was just defending herself?’

Callum stood up quickly, his chair rocking back on its legs. ‘Is that what you're going to write?’ he demanded.

‘I'll write the truth,’ I replied.

‘It doesn't sound like much of a tribute,’ he said.

‘You haven't given me much to admire about him.’

‘Please leave,’ he said, his voice low and angry, his brow furrowed as he stared at me.

‘Nothing else to add?’ I asked, pushing for one more quote.

Callum didn't answer, and we both knew the interview was over.

I thanked him for his time and walked towards the door. I stopped for a moment and thought about apologising. His closest friend had died and I was making allegations without proof. I had lost both my parents and so I knew how raw grief could be. Had I sold out my humanity for the value of a good quote? I glanced back at Callum, but from the hostile stare he was giving me, I could tell that any apology would be pointless.

When I got back to my car, I threw my pad onto the passenger seat and wondered whether I was wasting my time. Sarah Goode was missing, and her occasional lover was dead. It sounded straightforward. If I wanted to use it there had to be an angle, something different from the average murder report.

But there was something different. I sensed it. If Katie was right, Sarah had killed Luke in a lover's rage, passion gone wrong. But if Callum was telling the truth, it was a murder without reason.

I checked my watch and wondered what Laura would say if she knew what I was doing. No, I knew what she would think; the memory of the argument that morning was still sour. So if I was going to write the story, I wanted Laura to find out from me.

Laura McGanity tried not to look at the prisoner in front of her, as she sat on a plastic chair that was bolted to the floor to stop prisoners throwing them, in one of the interview rooms at the end of the cell complex. No windows, no natural light. The floor was dotted with old chewing gum and scarred by cigarette burns, souvenirs of life before the smoking ban. Pete was next to her, leaning forward to make the cramped space seem even smaller.

The prisoner in front of her had been arrested from the middle of the brawl, dishing out black eyes to anyone who came close, until a blast of parva spray sent him to the gutter, crying at the pain in his eyes. His bravado had melted now, and he had slept off most of the drink, but he was trying hard to keep his breakfast down. He'd been sick down his jumper, and he held it in his hands, putting it to his mouth whenever another wave of nausea hit him. Laura kicked the bin towards him and shook her head, trying to breathe through her mouth. This wasn't on the recruitment poster.

Pete Dawson was frustrated. ‘Doesn't look like he wants to explain himself,’ he said to Laura. ‘Looks like the court will form its own conclusion.’

‘Do you really think it will get that far?’ asked the prisoner's legal representative, a young police-station runner in shiny pinstripes and gelled hair who looked like he wanted to be much further away from his client than the bolted-down chair would allow.

‘I wasn't talking to you,’ barked Pete.

‘Okay,’ the legal rep replied, his smirk forcing Pete to take a deep breath to keep his anger at bay. He turned to his client and said theatrically, ‘For the benefit of the tape, let's hear it one more time.’

The prisoner held his jumper to his mouth. ‘No comment,’ came the muffled reply.

Laura turned away as the smell of the jumper wafted towards her. She was frustrated by the no comment mantra, but she knew the advice was right. The other fighters didn't want to help, so if he didn't confess, he would win the day.

‘Let's suspend the interview,’ she said. ‘I think we all need some fresh air.’

As Pete clicked off the tape machine, a twin-deck black cube, Laura said, ‘We're going to check out the CCTV. Your client can think about that as he sits in his cell.’

As she headed for the door, Pete just behind her, she heard a groan, and then the splash of the prisoner's vomit as he lost his battle with his stomach. From the curse that came from his rep, it seemed that he hadn't quite made it to the waste bin.

Laura stepped into the corridor and smiled at Pete. ‘That's one interview room out of action for a while.’

‘Do you think we should have waited?’ he asked. ‘Let him recover? He can't think straight.’

Laura shook her head. ‘The advice would have been the same, except the rep would have kept his shoes clean. I think I prefer it this way.’

‘So what now?’

Laura checked her watch. The cells were full, the others on the CRT working their way through the list, and so when they had finished with this prisoner, it would be time to move on to another.

‘Like I said, I'm heading out to the town hall, see if the cameras picked anything up. Maybe we'll get something more than midnight lovers.’

Pete scowled. The camera operators used to liven up their evenings by looking out for drunken couples snatching romance in alleys, just behind the bottle crates and dustbins, but two people had lost their jobs when the cameras missed an assault that put someone in a coma. Pete had been the one who had explained that to the victim's parents, and the memory wasn't a pleasant one.