Tony Hill u Carol Jordan 08 - Cross and Burn

was private.’ The words were out before she had time to think. She walked to her car, thinking how hard it was to break the habit of mistrust.
    She climbed into the Land Rover and took out her phone, keeping one eye on Scott, whose engine purred into life as soon as she’d settled herself into her seat. Carol waited till the solicitor had driven out of the car park, considering her options. It was late and she was tired, but the clock was ticking for Tony. There were strict limits on how long the police could hold him after arrest. If the defence couldn’t blow apart the evidence against him, Fielding would charge Tony when the time ran out – or before that, if she could build a stronger case – and everything would become much harder. The police would stop looking for an alternative suspect. Mud would stick, even if Tony was subsequently cleared.
    It dawned on Carol that she minded the idea of his name being blackened. She tried to convince herself that it was simply because it offended her sense of justice. She wasn’t ready to accept that her history with Tony might mean there was a possible future for them. She was merely reacting as she would to the idea of any innocent person being unjustly imprisoned ahead of a trial for a crime they could never have committed. That was all it was. But that was enough to sanction any amount of unreasonable behaviour. Wasn’t it?

52

    T he journey back in the car from the Mather house to his place wasn’t long enough. He needed to savour what had happened, to replay it in his head and set it in stone so it would be the bedrock for what came next. This was so beautiful, you couldn’t make it up. It was the perfect scene-setter for turning Marie Mather into the perfect wife. And the joy of it was that he hadn’t had to do a thing himself.
    He’d forced himself to stand at the garage window for a full five minutes, to be certain that Marco Mather wasn’t moving. Five motionless minutes meant death or, at the very least, a deep unconsciousness he could take advantage of.
    He’d debated whether to try the back door or to brazen it out at the front. There were a pair of mortise keys on her ring, but only one Yale. He guessed that, like most people, there would be a Yale and a mortise on the front door and a mortise on the rear. So, only one unfamiliar lock to fumble with at the back, and out of sight at that. On the downside, his limp made him less than stealthy, and gardens were notoriously cluttered with plant containers and hoses and bags of compost. Better to risk the front door than clatter around the pitch-black patio and rouse the neighbours.
    Treading carefully, he returned to the front of the house and slipped the Yale into the keyhole, gambling that it would be the only lock engaged while Marco Mather was at home expecting his wife to return from work. It turned and the door swung silently open. He stepped inside confidently, for the benefit of anyone glancing out of their window on the way to bed. And he breathed in the smell of her home, nosing it like a wine connoisseur, relishing the faint scents of cooking herbs and the heady notes from the vase of lilies on a recessed windowsill. Yes, she had the basics of good taste, even if the lilies were a little florid for his liking.
    Down the hall and into the generous dining kitchen. It was clearly the heart of the house, the sort of kitchen where cooking was observed like a religious ritual. A well-used batterie de cuisine was on parade and ready for use, a small array of battered cookbooks on the windowsill alongside pots of thyme, basil and oregano. His heart lifted. She was going to be the one. She’d cook like an angel and fuck like a whore.
    The door to the garage was closed. He moseyed across the kitchen, helping himself to a baby tomato from a bowl sitting on a butcher’s block. He popped it into his mouth and burst it with his teeth, enjoying the sudden explosion of flavour, sharp and sweet. Oh yes, this was going to be special.
    There were no surprises on the other side of the door. Marco Mather was lying in exactly the same position. Only now he could see Marco’s face. There was no doubt about it. The guy was definitely dead. And from the looks of him, there had been nothing peaceful about it. Heart attack, at a guess. Fat bastard on an exercise bike, what did he expect? Greedy twat couldn’t resist her excellent cooking and look where it had got him.
    The beauty of it was that there would be no