Dead Man's Footsteps

smells on them. It was intensely satisfying to iron those beautiful shirts and then watch him wearing them, as if he was wearing part of herself.
    Now it was a chore, and she found herself resenting his meanness.
    She went back to the article on HRT she had been reading. The ongoing debate about whether the reduction of menopause symptoms – and the retention of youthful looks – outweighed the extra risks of breast cancer and other nasties. A wasp buzzed around her head and she flapped it away, then paused to stare down at her own chest. Two years away from forty and everything was starting to go south, except for her expensive breasts.
    Lorraine was not a flawless, striking beauty, but she had always been, in Ronnie’s parlance, a looker . She owed her blonde hair to her Norwegian grandmother. Not that many years back, like a trillion other blondes around the globe, she had copied the now classic hairstyle of Diana, Princess of Wales, and on a couple of occasions she’d actually been asked if she was the Princess of Wales.
    Now , she thought gloomily, I’m going to have to do something about the rest of my body .
    Lying back in the chair, her stomach resembled a kangaroo’s pouch. It was like the stomach of women who had had several children, where the muscles had gone or the skin had been permanently stretched. And there were cellulite dimples all over the tops of her thighs.
    All that disaster happening to her body despite (and to Ronnie’s chagrin at the cost) going to her personal trainer three times a week.
    The wasp returned, buzzing around her head. ‘Fuck off,’ she said, flapping her hand at it again. ‘Go away.’
    Then her phone rang. She leaned down and picked up the cordless handset. It was her sister, Mo, and her normally calm, cheerful voice sounded strangely agitated. ‘Have you got your telly on?’
    ‘No, I’m out in the garden,’ Lorraine replied.
    ‘Ronnie’s in New York, isn’t he?’
    ‘Yes – I just spoke to him. Why?’
    ‘Something terrible’s happened. It’s all over the news. A plane’s just crashed into the World Trade Center.’

8
OCTOBER 2007
    The rain worsened, rattling down on the steel roof of the SOCO Scientific Support Branch van, sounding as hard as hailstones. The windows were opaque, to allow in light but keep out prying eyes. There was little light outside now, however, just the bleakness of wet dusk, stained the colour of rust from ten thousand city street lights.
    Despite the large external dimensions of the long-wheelbase Transit, the seating area inside was cramped. Roy Grace, finishing a call on his mobile, chaired the meeting, the policy book he had retrieved from his go-bag open in front of him.
    Squeezed around the table with him, in addition to Glenn Branson, were the Crime Scene Manager, a Police Search Adviser, an experienced SOCO, one of the two uniform scene guards and Joan Major, the forensic archaeologist Sussex Police regularly called in to help with identification of skeletons – and also to tell them whether the occasional bone found on building sites, or by children in woods, or dug up by gardeners, was human or animal.
    It was chilly and damp inside the van and the air smelled strongly of synthetic vapours. Reels of plastic crime-scene tape were packed in one section of the fitted metal shelving, body bags in another, plus tenting materials and ground sheets, rope, flexes, hammers, saws,axes and plastic bottles of chemicals. There was something grim about these vehicles, Grace always felt. They were like caravans, but they never went to campsites, only to scenes of death or violent crimes.
    It was 6.30 p.m.
    ‘Nadiuska isn’t available,’ he informed the newly assembled team, putting his mobile down.
    ‘Does that mean we’ve got Frazer?’ Glenn responded glumly.
    ‘Yes.’
    Grace saw everyone’s faces fall. Nadiuska De Sancha was the Home Office pathologist everyone in Sussex CID preferred to work with. She was quick, interesting and fun – and good-looking, as an added bonus. By contrast, Frazer Theobald was dour and slow, although his work was meticulous.
    ‘But the real problem is that Frazer is finishing a PM up in Esher at the moment. The earliest he could get here is about 9 p.m.’
    He caught Glenn’s eye. They both knew what that meant – an all-nighter.
    Grace headed the first page of his policy book: PRESCENE BRIEFING. Friday 19 October. 6.30 p.m. On site. New England Quarter development .
    ‘Can I make a