Dead Tomorrow

understand.
    The specialist had put Sandy on acourse of medication, although he had told her there was less than a 50 per cent chance of it working, and that had depressed her, making her feel inadequate. Sandy always liked to be in charge. Probably one of the reasons why she too had liked to drive fast, commanding the road, he thought. She was the one who created the Zen minimalist look inside their house and who designed the garden. She always made the arrangements when they went away. Sometimes he wondered if she had been more depressed than he had realized about her infertility problem. And whether that might have been the reason behind her disappearance.
    So many unanswered questions.
    But now the vacuum in his life was filled. Dating Cleo had brought him a sense of happiness he had never believed would be possible again. And now this news, this incredible news!
    He saw her car ahead, this time stopped at the lights at the junction with Shirley Drive, where there was a safety camera.
    Please, darling, please drive a little less crazily! Don’t go and wipe yourself out in a wreck, just when I have found you. Just when life is beginning for us.
    When life is growing inside you.
    He saw her brake lights come on before the next camera and finally caught up with her car at the next lights. Then he followed her, right into Dyke Road and along to the Seven Dials roundabout. Half past eleven on a Wednesday night and there were still quite a few people on the streets, in this densely populated area.
    Instinctively checking outevery face, he soon saw someone he recognized, a ragged, small-time drug dealer and police informant, Miles Penney, shambling along, head bowed, cigarette dangling from his lips. From his slow pace it did not look as if he was on his way either to score or to sell tonight, and besides Grace didn’t care what he did. So long as Penney didn’t rape or murder anyone, he was part of another division’s set of problems.
    He followed Cleo on down past the railway station, then through the network of narrow streets of the North Laine district, filled with its mix of terraced houses, individual shops, cafés and restaurants, and antiques dealers, until she found a resident’s parking space near her home. Grace pulled up on a single yellow line in sight of her car and got out, casting a wary eye around for any moving shadows, feeling doubly protective of Cleo all of a sudden.
    He followed her through the gates of the converted warehouse building where she had her town house, and put an arm around her as she pressed the entrance keypad.
    She wore a long black cape over her dress, and he slipped his hand inside it and pressed the palm against her stomach.
    ‘This is amazing,’ he said.
    She stared at him with wide-open, trusting eyes. ‘Are you sure you’re OK with this?’
    He slipped his hand out of her cape, then cupped her face in both his hands. ‘With all my heart. I’m not just OK with this, I’m incredibly happy. But–I don’t know how to express it. This is one of the most incredible things ever. And I think you will be a wonderful mother. You will be amazing.’
    ‘I think you will be awonderful father,’ she said.
    They kissed. Then warily, because it was late and dark, he glanced around again, checking the shadows. ‘Just one thing,’ he said.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Your driving is something else. I mean, Lewis Hamilton, eat your heart out!’
    ‘That’s a bit rich coming from a man who drove his car over Beachy Head!’ she said.
    ‘Yep, well, I had a good reason for that. I was in a pursuit situation. You just did eighty in a forty limit and shot a red light for no reason at all.’
    ‘So? Book me!’
    They stared into each other’s eyes. ‘You can be such a bitch at times,’ he said, grinning.
    ‘And you can be such an anal plod!’
    ‘I love you,’ he said.
    ‘Do you, Grace?’
    ‘Yes. I adore you and I love you.’
    ‘How much?’
    He grinned, then held her close and whispered into her ear. ‘I want you inside, naked, then I’ll show you!’
    ‘That’s the best offer I’ve had all night,’ she whispered back.
    She tapped out the numbers. The gate lock clicked and she pushed it open.
    They walked through, across the cobbled yard and up to her front door. She unlocked it and they went inside, straight into a scene of utter devastation.
    A black tornado hurtled through the mess and launched itself into the air, hitting Cleo in her midriff and almost knocking her