Looking Good Dead

of people in here. But I don’t think so.’
    Grace’s mobile phone rang. Without taking his eyes off the screen, he pulled it out of his pocket and glanced down at the display.
    It was Cleo Morey.
    Excusing himself, he hit the button to answer and stepped out of the office.
    She sounded very sweet and very humble. ‘I just wondered if you were up for a drink tonight – if you’d like to come over here?’
    He melted at the sound of her voice. ‘I’d love to,’ he said. ‘But I have a good two hours work to do.’
    ‘So, come over after that – for a nightcap?’
    ‘Umm . . .’ he said, totally thrown. This was not the time or place for this sort of conversation.
    ‘I’ve got wine, beer, vodka.’
    ‘Any whisky?’ he teased.
    ‘Now that’s a strange coincidence. I have a whole bottle of Glenfiddich I bought this afternoon.’
    ‘Obviously synchronicity,’ Grace said, trying to sound cooler than he felt – and not succeeding.
    ‘Obviously.’

59
    The family liaison officer who took over from Linda Buckley was a thin, overly-polite young PC in his mid-twenties, called Chris Willingham. He carried a small suitcase in which he claimed to have everything he needed for his night’s vigil, and within minutes was happily installed in the living room with an iPod headset plugged into his ears and a copy of the Rough Guide to Croatia open on his lap.
    Glenn Branson had rung to say he was coming over again in an hour, making Tom wonder if he had any information. He was also determined to ask the detective why, when he had obviously recognized Reginald D’Eath as the dickhead on the train, he had not revealed this to him this afternoon at the CID headquarters.
    Tom left Chris Willingham with a black coffee and a plate of chocolate digestive biscuits and retreated to the sanctuary of his den with the Sunday Times , which he had not yet opened. Normally, on a Sunday evening, he and Kellie would flop out on the sofa in the living room with all the sections of the Sunday Times and Mail on Sunday strewn around the carpet. He always started with the business pages, looking for high-profile companies to target as potential customers. Kellie began with the Mail ’s You magazine.
    But it was a waste of time even looking at a paper tonight; all he saw was a blur of newsprint. He felt so alone, so afraid. So totally lost and scared.
    Scared witless for Kellie.
    Reginald D’Eath, the dickhead on the train, the man who had left behind the CD, had been found murdered in his home. Strangled in his bath.
    By?
    By the same people who had threatened to kill his own family? Tom wondered.
    On the news it had been reported that D’Eath – who had changed his name to Ron Dawkins – had done a deal with the prosecution inthe forthcoming trial of a paedophile ring. So was it a professional hit? Or a revenge killing by a parent of a child he had abused?
    Or, he speculated wildly, the coil of fear in his stomach darkening all the time, was it punishment for losing the disk? The same punishment he and his family were threatened with because he had found it?
    Twenty-four hours ago they had been drinking champagne in the drawing room of Philip Angelides’ house. Not a great evening, but at least life had been normal. Now he just did not know what to do. He was trying to get his head around tomorrow, Monday, but was finding it hard to think more than a few minutes ahead. He couldn’t cancel the presentation to Land Rover and supposed he would have to delegate one of his team to do it for him – which would mean paying one of the two salesmen commission on the order if it came through, yet again reducing his margins and his ability to quote competitively. But at this moment that was the least of his worries.
    Then he experienced a sudden flash of resentment towards Kellie. Irrational, he knew, but he couldn’t help it. How can you bloody do this to me at a time like this?
    Almost immediately he felt guilty for even thinking that.
    Christ, my darling, where the hell are you? He buried his face in his hands, trying hard to think clearly through the fog of this nightmare and hating himself for being so damned helpless.
    It was over an hour later a blue saloon pulled up outside the house. Looking out of his den window, Tom saw Glenn Branson climb out of the driver’s door and another man – white, in his late thirties, with close-cropped hair, who looked every inch a copper – get out of the other side.
    He raced downstairs,