Peter James - Dead Simple

Holding the unopened bottle, Mark slumped onto a sofa, then patted the cushion beside him, by way of an invitation.

After some moments of haughty hesitation, Ashley sat at the far end of the sofa, as far from Mark as possible, tugged off her veil, then crossed her legs and kicked her shoes off. 'Mark, I want to know what Grace meant about your having the BMW washed.'

'I have no idea.'

She was silent.

'Do you love me?'

Shaking her head in despair she stood up. 'Yes, I love you. I have no idea why at this moment, but I do. And Michael's mother is waiting for me to turn up and blub my bloody eyes out, which is what I am about to go and do.'

'Have a drink first.'

'Christ, Mark.'

He pushed himself up from the sofa, staggered towards her and took her in his arms. Then he nuzzled her neck. 'You know - if the accident hadn't happened - the wedding would've gone ahead. You'd be Mrs Michael Harrison now.'

She nodded, melting a fraction.

He stared into her eyes. 'You'd have been on your way to the Savoy in London. You'd have made love to him tonight, wouldn't you?'

'That's what wives are meant to do on their wedding night.'

'And how would you have felt?'

Cupping his face in her hands, she said, 'I would have imagined it was you.'

'Would you have gone down on him? Sucked his dick?'

She pulled away from him. 'Mark!'

'Would you?'

'No way.'

'Come on!'

'We had an agreement, Mark.'

He took the bottle over to the sink, removed the foil then took two glasses from the cabinet. He popped the cork then filled the glasses and handed one to her.

She took it reluctantly and chinked glasses with him. 'We had it all planned,' she said to him.

'We had Plan A. Now we're into Plan B.' He drank a large gulp, draining half his glass. 'Wash wrong wish shat?'

'The first is that you are pissed. The second is that I now don't happen to be Mrs Michael Harrison. Which means I don't get to participate in his half of Double-M Properties.'

'His two-thirds, actually,' Mark said.

'So?'

'So I do, under our shareholders' agreement, and our key man insurance policy'

'Provided he's dead.'

'Why do you say that? Provided?

'You plugged the air hole properly, didn't you? You used super glue like I told you?'

Squirming, he said, 'Yesh.'

She was staring hard at him, seeing through him. 'Are you sure?'

'Yesh. That lid was screwed down. I pulled the tube out and I put a ton more earth down on top. If he was alive he'd have made contact, wouldn't he?'

She gave him a strange look.

'You want me to go and stick a rucking stake through his heart?'

She drank some champagne, then walked over to the stereo and looked at the CD rack. 'How much do you love me?'

'How much? More than I could ever put into words.'

She pulled a CD out of its container, put it on the player and pressed the play button. Moments later, 'Love is All Around' filled the room. She put her glass down, took Mark's and put that down, then put her arms around him and began to lead him in a dance to the music. Pressing her lips against his ear she said, 'If you love me, you'll always tell me the truth, won't you?' They danced for some moments, then he said, 'There'sh shomething that's been bothering me for the past few daysh.'

'Tell me?'

'You know that Michael and I both use Palms for picking up email when we're out of the office. We've been careful not to copy him in on any emails about his stag night - but I think I might have messed

up: 'What do you mean?'

'I think I copied him on one by mistake. And he has it with him.' She pulled back from him, her eyes sharp as tacks. 'Are you saying he has it with him?' 'Possibly.' 'How possibly1?'

'I can't find it anywhere in his office - or in his flat.' 'It's in the grave with him?' 'It might be.' 'Mightbe?' Mark shrugged. 'You'd better make bloody sure, Mark.'

He stared at her in silence. I'm just telling you because--'

'Because?'

'Because it could be a risk.'

'You'd better get it back, hadn't you?'

'We're OK so long as no one finds him.'

Ashley sat down on a sofa and drank some of her champagne. 'I don't believe what I'm hearing. Why didn't you tell me this before?'

Mark shrugged. 'I thought -1--'

'You what?'

Mark joined her and attempted to clink glasses. Ashley withdrew hers, sharply.

'You'd better get it back,' she said. 'Pretty damned sharply. Like tonight. Capisce?'

50

As he drove back out towards the CID headquarters, Grace plugged his mobile into the hands-free and rang Glenn Branson. 'How's Solihull?' he asked.

'Pissing with rain. How's Brighton?'

'Pissing with rain.'

'And Ari's sister's gone to bed with a migraine.'

'So it's going to be a great birthday party.'

'I've collected plenty of brownie points for turning up, though. How was the wedding?'

'A bit like your birthday party's going to be. No show from the host'

'No surprise there. Tell me - how many of Ashley Harper's relatives turned up?'

'Just one that I saw,' Grace said. 'An uncle.' He halted at a traffic light. 'I wanted to ask you, have you checked on Michael Harrison's bank account and credit cards?'

'Got a constant monitor on them. Nothing since Tuesday afternoon. Same with his mobile. Any developments your end?'

'The helicopter's been up again but seen nothing. Nicholl and Moy are working over the weekend - they're getting Michael's photograph circulated to the press, and they're collecting all the CCTV camera footage in the suspect area - I have a team starting work viewing it. We're going to have to make a decision about calling in specials and getting a full-blown search of the area. And I'm getting unhappier by the minute with his business partner, Mark Warren.'

'Tell me?'

'Nothing specific yet, but I think he knows something he isn't telling. We need to run some background checks on him.'

'I have the Holmes team doing that already.'

'Good boy. Hang on--' Grace concentrated for a moment as he

pulled away from the lights. 'I think we should take a close look at tiieir company, Double-M Properties. See what their insurance policies are.'

'I have that under way, too - and I'm having their Cayman Islands Company checked out. What do you make of Ashley?'

'I don't know,' Grace said. 'I don't have a view. She's giving a convincing performance. I think we should check her out, too. You know What's odd about her?'

'This no relatives thing? You ever see that movie The Last Seduction, with Linda Fiorentino?' The phone signal weakened suddenly and Branson's voice became crackly.

'I don't remember it.'

'Bill Pullman was in it, too.'

'Doesn't ring a bell.'

'She was in Men in Black too.'

'OK.'

'Worth seeing - The Last Seduction. Had a predatory woman. Dark ending. She kind of reminds me of Ashley.'

'I'll check it out.'

'Get it on DVD. Play.com - great value.'

'How many twenty-seven-year-olds do you know that don't have relatives? You're twenty-seven, you are getting married, the biggest day of your life, and you can only produce one relative to turn up to your big day.'

'She could be an orphan. We need to check her background out.'

'I'll go and talk to Michael's mother - she must know about her future daughter-in-law.'

'Mine knew more about Ari than I did before I got hitched.'

'Precisely/ Grace said.

Ten minutes later Grace was walking along the corridor of the Major Incident Suite of the CID headquarters, lugging the black plastic bag from the mortuary. He stopped by a white sheet pinned to a red board which was headed 'DIAGRAM - COMMON POSSIBLE MOTIVES'. It was helpful, sometimes, to refresh his mind from these charts, although most of it was ingrained in his brain. He read the chart: