No Mark Upon Her

had come easily to Milo—this man had had to grab opportunities and hang on to them with a coxswain’s tenaciousness. And it was certainly possible that his relationship with Becca Meredith had been more complicated than that of coach and crew member. “You knew Freddie and Becca for a long time,” he said.
    “Since they were both still at university. They had such promise, both of them. But there was a worm in it somewhere.” Milo sounded infinitely sad.
    Shrugging, he straightened, the briskness back in full force. “And I’ve got a crew to get on the river for a second session. When you find Freddie, tell him to ring me.” He started down the stairs to the boatyard, then turned back to Kincaid. “Have you tried the cottage? That’s the one place Freddie might see as a last refuge.”
    K incaid considered going back for his car, which he’d left in the Greys Road car park near the police station. But he suspected that if he did, the incident room would suck him in like a magnet, and he still felt that invisibility was the better part of valor until he knew what they had on Craig.
    He would walk to Remenham. He’d driven the distance, after all, and it hadn’t seemed that far.
    He soon discovered that although the lane looked idyllic, the hamlet was considerably farther than he’d remembered. By the time he reached Becca Meredith’s cottage, he was warm, even in the lightweight leather jacket he’d worn that day, and he’d have given a king’s ransom for his trainers.
    The cottage looked less tidy by daylight, the lack of routine maintenance more evident. The hedges needed trimming, the lawn needed cutting, and the paint round the front porch was beginning to peel.
    The front gate was off the latch, and as Kincaid stepped through it, he realized the cottage’s front door was standing ajar. A dozen scenarios ran through his head in an instant, none of them pleasant.
    He stopped, his heart pounding, examining what he could see of the house and the garden. After lecturing Gemma about being careful, he didn’t need to be the one who carelessly walked into a dangerous situation.
    There was no sound, no movement. Then he saw the footprints. There had been heavy dew that morning, and the overlong grass in the front garden, which had been shaded by the hedge, was still damp. A distinct single line of footprints led from the front porch into the grass, and around the side of the cottage.
    Kincaid followed cautiously. When he rounded the corner of the house, he saw Freddie Atterton standing at the far end of the garden, looking out over the river. He wore jeans and a faded Oxford-blue T-shirt, and his feet were bare.
    “Freddie,” Kincaid said quietly, and Atterton turned.
    “Oh. It’s you.” The smile Freddie gave Kincaid was tentative, and he seemed a little disoriented.
    “Are you all right?” Kincaid asked, going closer. He saw that the Oxford-blue T-shirt really was Oxford blue—it bore the Oxford University Boat Club emblem on the front. “You’ve had us all a bit worried. Especially DC Bell.”
    “Imogen. Nice name. Pretty girl.” The smile was a little stronger this time, then Freddie’s brow creased in a frown. “She was looking for me?”
    “You haven’t checked your messages.”
    “No. Turned the bloody phone off. Press.”
    “You’ve been here since last night?”
    Freddie nodded.
    “What are you doing out here in the garden?” Kincaid asked, as gently as he would have asked one of his children.
    “I wanted—I just wanted to see—” Freddie stopped, his teeth chattering. Kincaid saw that the legs of his jeans were soaked halfway to the knees from the damp grass, as were his own trousers. “You can’t quite make it out from here,” Freddie went on. “Temple Island. But she was so close.”
    “Yes,” Kincaid agreed. “She was.” Just as matter-of-factly, he added, “You seem to have lost your shoes.”
    “Oh.” Freddie looked down, and seemed surprised to see that he was barefoot. He touched the front of his shirt. “I found these. My things from uni. In the wardrobe. She’d saved them.” There were tears in his eyes.
    “I think,” Kincaid said reasonably, “that we should go inside, have a cup of tea, and get warm. Then we can talk about it. All right?”
    I t was obvious from the rumpled duvet on the sofa that Freddie had slept there, and not upstairs in the bedroom. Kincaid couldn’t blame him. Sleeping in one’s dead ex-wife’s bed would be bad