The Lipstick Killers

way, she carefully wiped her fingerprints off the gun and dropped it down an open drain.

10
     
     
     
    Margaret went back into the kitchen where Frankie was again sitting at the table, looking half dead, yet another cup of sweet tea in front of her. ‘Do those coppers want a drink?’ she asked.
    ‘No, they’ve gone.’
    ‘What’s that you’ve got?’ asked Frankie.
    ‘They brought these,’ said Mags, laying Monty’s wallet, top of the range BlackBerry and keys on the table, and hanging the jacket on the back of a chair. ‘Monty’s stuff. They found them when they recovered the car.’
    ‘Christ, how could he be so stupid,’ said Frankie. ‘How could he?’
    ‘Accidents happen.’ God knows she’d seen enough in her job.
    ‘But he did drink and drive. I know that. All those late night meetings. I begged him not to, for Peter and Susan’s sake. I always dreaded something happening to him, and now…’ Frankie’s voice tailed away.
    ‘He wasn’t…?’ said Margaret.
    ‘What?’
    ‘Playing away.’
    ‘Course he wasn’t!’ Frankie exclaimed, angrily. ‘Typical copper. Always suspicious.’
    ‘Don’t be so naïve. It happens. They’d been married eight years.’
    ‘No way. He loved Sharon and those kids, look at everything he provided for them.’
    ‘I know. That was unfair. It was just a thought.’
    ‘Well keep it to yourself in future, you’ll upset Sharon.’
    Margaret nodded, then said. ‘I’m sorry about this morning on the phone. Jumping down your throat. I’ve not been sleeping well lately,’ she said, looking faintly vulnerable.
    ‘I’m not surprised. Losing your job.’
    ‘I haven’t lost it Frankie. At least not yet. I’m suspended.’
    ‘What happened Mags? I know we don’t see each other much but you’re my little sister and I’m always here for you.’
    ‘I was suspended for shooting the wrong bloke. But he was a waste of space anyway. Wrong time, wrong place. At least he’s not dead – though it would be no loss if he was.’ Mags looked grim for a moment, then continued. ‘But forget that for now. What do we do next?’
    Frankie looked at the kitchen clock. ‘Half eight,’ she said. ‘We have to call Roxie. What time is it in Spain? Is it an hour forwards or backwards or the same.’
    ‘Christ, I can’t remember. Let’s just call her,’ Mags said. ‘Get rid of that jacket first, in case Sharon comes down. She doesn’t need to see it right now.’
    ‘Of course.’
    ‘You’ll be in the spare room,’ said Frankie. ‘The bed’s made up.’
    ‘I’ll take it upstairs with my bag. We’ll tell Sharon later about Monty’s things.’
    ‘Take the other stuff too. I’ve got his watch and ring. They gave them to me at the hospital. Poor Sharon couldn’t look.’
    ‘You can’t blame her,’ said Margaret, as she gathered up Monty’s stuff, then went to her car and got her bag, then went upstairs to her room. When she had put his jacket in the wardrobe, unpacked her few things and stashed the cocaine in her shoe, she put Monty’s wallet and phone in the drawer of the bedside cabinet, keeping the keys so that she could get in and out of the house, and went back downstairs. On the way she peered into the master bedroom where Sharon, Peter and Susan were lying fast asleep again, on top of the bed, the curtains drawn against the sun.
    She rejoined Frankie who looked even more shattered. ‘They’re all asleep,’ she said. ‘And so should you be. You look knackered.’
    ‘Things to do first. Let’s call Roxie, I’ve got her number. By the way I just called Joyce.’ Joyce was Monty’s secretary. A single woman fast approaching retirement age, she had become part of the fabric of the family. ‘She couldn’t speak she was so upset. Is this how it’s going to be?’ said Frankie, her eyes misty.
    Margaret nodded. ‘You know it will, at least for a bit. What about Monty’s mother?’ she asked.
    ‘I haven’t had the heart. You know she’s ill?’
    Margaret nodded again. ‘Do you think she’ll be well enough to come down?’
    ‘I don’t know. She’s all alone up there in Norwich. It’ll be a terrible shock. Monty was her only child. I don’t know what she’ll do.’ She looked confused at the phone in her hand. ‘What was I doing?’
    ‘Calling Roxie,’ said Margaret. ‘Or do you want me to?’
    Frankie shook her head and, using the phone on the kitchen wall, she dialled the number she took from the diary she kept in her