Peter James - Dead Simple

As they stepped inside the lift, Grace pressed the bottom button, marked 'B'. Still deep in thought, he didn't reply.

Branson watched him. 'Something's not right with that dude. You read that?'

Still Grace said nothing.

'You should have pressed "G" for the ground floor - that's the way we came in.'

Grace stepped out into the underground garage and Branson followed. The place was dry, dimly lit, with a faint smell of engine oil. They walked past a Ferrari, a Jaguar saloon, a Mazda sports car and a small Ford saloon, then a couple of empty bays until Grace stopped in front of a gleaming silver BMWX5 off-roader. He stared hard at the car. Droplets of rainwater still lay on the paintwork.

'Cool machines, these,' Branson said. 'But they don't have much room in the rear. Much more in a Range Rover or a Cayenne.'

Grace peered at the wheels, then knelt down and looked under a door sill. 'When I was here last night,' he said, 'and came down here for my car about quarter to one in the morning, this BMW drove in, covered in mud. I noticed it because it seemed a little unusual - you don't often see a dirty four-wheel drive in the centre of Brighton, they're mostly used by mothers doing the shopping run.'

'You sure it was this car.'

Grace tapped the side of his own head. 'The number plate.'

'Your photographic memory - still working at your advanced age...'

'Still working.'

'So what's your take?'

'What's yours?'

'A missing coffin. A forest. A mud-caked car. A best man who is the only survivor, who wants to speak to his lawyer. A bank account in the Cayman Islands. Something smells.'

'It doesn't smell, it stinks.'

'So what happens next?'

Grace pulled the copper bracelet out of his pocket and held it up. 'This happens next.'

'Is that what you really think?'

'You have a better idea?'

'Take Mark Warren in for questioning.'

Grace shook his head. 'The guy's smart. We need to be smarter.'

'Going to a flaky pendulum dowser is smarter?'

'Trust me.'

You had to stay awake. That was how you survived. Hypothermia made you sleepy, and when you fell asleep you would sink into a coma and then you died.

Michael was shivering, near-delirious. Cold, so, so cold; he heard voices, heard Ashley whispering into his ear; reached up to touch her and his knuckles struck hard teak.

Water slopped into his mouth and he spat it out. His face was squashed tight against the lid of the coffin. The flashlight didn't work any more, he tried keeping the walkie-talkie above the water, but his arm was hurting so much it was not going to be possible for much longer.

He wedged his mobile phone, which was useless, into the back pocket of his jeans. It made it uncomfortable, but it gave him another inch and a half height. For whatever good that would do. He was going to die; he did not know how much longer he had but it wasn't long.

'Ashley,' he said weakly. 'Ashley, my darling.'

Then more water filled his mouth.

He rubbed away at the ever-widening and deepening groove in the lid with the casing of the flashlight. He thought of the wedding tomorrow. His mum showing him the dress she had bought, and the hat and the shoes and the new handbag, wanting his approval, wanting to know she looked good for his special day, wanting him to be proud of her, wanting Ashley to be proud of her. He remembered the phone call from his kid sister, from Australia, so excited by the ticket he had paid for. Early would be here now, staying with his mother, getting ready.

His neck hurt so badly, he didn't know how much longer he could stand the pain; every few minutes he had to relax, sink back, holding his breath, let the water wash over his face, then push himself up. Soon that would not be possible any more.

Crying with frustration and terror he lashed out at the lid, pummelled it. He pressed the talk button again. 'Davey! Davey! Hey, Davey?'

He spat more water out.

Every molecule in his body shivered.

Static came back at him.

His teeth clicked in his mouth. He swallowed a mouthful of the muddy water, then another mouthful. 'Please, oh please, somebody, please, please, oh please, help me.'

He tried to calm himself down, to think about his speech. Had to thank the bridesmaids. Propose a toast to them. Must remember to thank his mother first. Finish with the toast to the bridesmaids. Tell funny stories. There was a great joke Pete had given him. About a couple going on honeymoon and--

Honeymoon.

It was all booked. They were flying tomorrow night, at nine o'clock, to the Maldives. First class - Ashley didn't know about that bit, that was his secret treat.

Oh get me out of here, you idiots. I'm going to miss my wedding, my honeymoon. Come on! Now!

The clock on the dash of the Ford read 7.13 p.m. as Branson drove Grace along past the elegant Regency townhouse faces of Kemp Town, then onto open road, high above the cliffs, past the vast neoGothic buildings of Roedean girls' school and then past the Art Deco building of St Dunstan's Home for the Blind. The rain lashed down and the wind buffeted the car, crazily. It hadn't stopped for days now. Branson turned the radio up, drowning out the intermittent crackle of the police two-way radio, swaying to the beat of a Scissor Sisters track.

Grace tolerated it for some moments, then turned the volume down again.

'What's the matter, man - this group is so cool,' Branson said.

'Great,' Grace said.

'You want to pull a bird, yeah? You need to get with the culture.'

'You're my culture guru, right?'

Branson shot him a sideways glance. 'I ought to be your style guru, too. Got a great hairdresser you should go to - Ian Habbin at The Point. Get him to sharpen up your hair - I mean, like, you are looking so yesterday.'

'It's starting to feel like yesterday,' Grace responded. 'You asked me to have lunch with you. It's now past teatime and heading for supper. At this rate we'll be having breakfast together.'

'Since when did you have a life?' Almost as the words came out, Branson regretted saying them. He could see the pain in Grace's face without even turning to look at him. 'Sorry, man,' he said.

They drove through the smart, cliff-top village of Rottingdean, then along a sweeping rise, dip, followed by another rise, past the higgledy-piggledy suburban sprawl of post-war houses of Saltdean, then Peacehaven.

'Take the next left,' Grace said. Then he continued to direct Branson through a maze of hilly streets, crammed with bungalows and modest detached houses, until they pulled up outside a small, rather shabby-looking bungalow, with an even shabbier-looking camper van parked outside.

They hurried through the rain into a tiny porch, with wind chimes pinging outside, and rang the doorbell. After a few moments it was answered by a diminutive, wiry man well into his seventies, with a goatee beard, long grey hair tied back in a pony tail, wearing a kaftan and dungarees, and sporting an ankh medallion on a gold chain. He greeted them effusively in a high-pitched voice, a bundle of energy, taking Grace's hand and staring at him with the joy of a long-lost friend. 'Detective Superintendent Grace! So good to see you again.'

'And you, my friend. This is DS Branson. Glenn, this is Harry Frame.'

Harry Frame gripped Glenn Branson's hand with a strength that belied both his years and his size and stared up at him with piercing green eyes. 'What a pleasure to meet you. Come in, come in.'

They followed him into a narrow hallway lit by a low-watt bulb in a hanging lantern and decorated in a nautical theme, the centrepiece of which was a large brass porthole on the wall, and through into a sitting room, the shelves crammed with ships in bottles. There was a drab three-piece suite, its backs covered in antimacassars, a television, which was switched off, and a round oak table with four wooden chairs by the window, to which they were ushered. On the wall Branson clocked a naff print of Anne Hathaway's cottage and a framed motto which read, 'A mind once expanded can never return to its original dimensions.'