The Calling of the Grave (13 page)

    'Look—'

    'You
even tried to make her think I'd been seeing somebody else. Why the hell would
you do that?'

    I
thought something that could have been either guilt or regret showed in his
eyes, but it was gone so quickly I might have imagined it.

    He
hitched a shoulder in a shrug. 'Why not?'

    'And
that's it?'

    'What
do you want me to say? Kara's a good-looker. You should be flattered.'

    His
grin was mocking.
Easy. Don't let him bait you.
This was comfortable territory
for him. If I lost control he could wipe the floor with me and still have a pub
full of friendly witnesses to vouch that I'd started it. I didn't know what I'd
done to him, but I no longer cared. And realizing that I also realized
something else.

    'Things
not going so well, Terry?'

    His
eyes narrowed. 'What are you talking about?'

    'That's
why you're here, isn't it?' I nodded around the pub. 'Recapturing the glory
days. Your reputation must have taken
a
knock after what happened with
Monk.'

    The
smile had gone. His expression was ugly. 'I'm doing fine. Just having a few
days off.'

    But
his eyes gave the lie to that. There had always been something reckless about
Terry; that was part of his charm. Now I saw there was something self-destructive
as well. He relied on luck and momentum to carry him through: both had let him
down and he was lashing out in frustration.

    I
just happened to be a convenient target.

    There
was no point in staying any longer. Kara had been right: confronting him had
accomplished nothing. As I walked out, I heard him saying something to the
group at the bar. Their raucous laughter followed me through the door, then it
had swung shut behind me and I was back in the street.

    I
went straight home. It was too late for me to collect Alice, and I half
expected them to be home before me. They weren't, so I began preparing dinner.
I was already regretting going to see Terry, berating myself for making Kara do
the school run. I resolved to make it up to them both. I'd take them somewhere
that weekend, perhaps the zoo for Alice, and then find a babysitter so Kara and
I could go out by ourselves in the evening.

    I was
so busy planning it that it was a while before I realized how late they were. I
called Kara's mobile but there was no answer. Her voicemail didn't cut in,
which was unusual. But I didn't have time to worry about it before the doorbell
rang.

    'If
this is somebody cold-calling . . .' I muttered, drying my hands as I went to
answer it.

    But
it wasn't. Two police officers stood outside. They'd come to tell me that a
businessman drunk from an expense-account lunch had lost control of his BMW and
hit Kara and Alice's car. It had shunted it in front of a container lorry that
had crushed the new Volvo's frame like balsa. My wife and daughter had died at
the scene.

    And
as quickly as that my old life ended.

    I'd
just come out of the shower when the doorbell rang. I swore and grabbed my
bathrobe. Still towelling my hair, I glanced at the kitchen clock as I hurried
into the hall, wondering who would be calling at nine o'clock on a Sunday
morning.

    I
paused to look through the peephole I'd had installed in the front door. I was
expecting to see a pair of polite young men with evangelical eyes and
ill-fitting suits, hoping to sell me the dream of everlasting life. But I could
only see one man through the distorted bubble of glass. He had turned to gaze
at the street, so all I could see of him was his broad shoulders and short dark
hair. It was thinning at the crown, exposing a palm-sized patch of scalp that he'd
unsuccessfully tried to hide with a comb-over.

    I
unlocked the door. I'd been advised by the police to fit a security chain after
I'd been attacked the previous year, but I'd never got round to it. Even though
the person responsible still hadn't been caught, the peephole seemed paranoid
enough.

    I'd
take my chances.

    The
pewter sky cast a cold light when I opened the door. The lime trees lining the
road outside my flat had shed most of their leaves, covering the street with a
whispering mat of yellow. Although the October morning was cold and damp the
visitor wore a suit without any sort of coat. He turned and gave a thin smile,
eyes taking in my bathrobe.

    'Hello,
David. Not disturbing you, am I?'

    What
struck me afterwards was how ordinary it felt. It was as though we'd only seen
each other a few weeks ago, not the eight years it had been.

    Terry
Connors hadn't changed. Older, yes; the hairline was higher than it used to be,
and the skin of his face held a tired pallor that spoke of long hours spent in
cars and offices. There were lines around his eyes that hadn't been there
before. But while the good looks were more weathered, the square jawline a
little heavier than I recalled, they were still intact. So was the cockiness
that was part and parcel of them. He still looked down on the world in a
literal and figurative sense: even though he was on the lower step, the muddy
eyes were on a level with mine. I saw them flick over me, no doubt taking in
changes just as mine were doing. I wondered how different I must look myself
after all this time.

    It
was only then that the shock of seeing him hit home.

    I had
no idea what to say. He glanced back down the street as if it led to the past
that lay behind us. I noticed that his left earlobe was missing, as though
neatly snipped off with a pair of scissors, and wondered how that had happened.
But then I bore scars of my own since the last time I'd seen him.

    'Sorry
for turning up unannounced, but I didn't think you should hear it on the news.'
He turned back to me, his policeman's eyes unblinking and unapologetic. 'Jerome
Monk's escaped.'

    It
was a name I hadn't heard in years. I was silent for a moment as it caught up
with me, bringing back echoes of the bleak Dartmoor landscape and the odour of
peat. Then I stepped back and held open the door.

    'You'd
better come in.'

    Terry
waited in the sitting room while I went to get dressed. I didn't rush. I stood
in the bedroom, my breathing fast and shallow. My fists were clenched into tight
balls.
Calm down. Hear what he has to say.
I pulled my clothes on
automatically, fumbling at the buttons. When I realized I was delaying facing
him I went back out.

    He
was standing by the bookshelf with his back to me, head canted at an angle so he
could read the spines. He spoke without turning round.

    'Nice
place you've got here. Live by yourself?'

    'Yes.'

    He
pulled a book from the shelf and read the title.
'Death's Acre.
Not much
for light reading, are you?'

    'I
don't get much time.' I clamped down on my irritation. Terry always had a knack
of getting under my skin. It was part of what had made him such a good
policeman. 'Can I get you a tea or coffee?'

    'I'll
have a coffee so long as it's not decaf. Black, two sugars.' He replaced the
book and followed me to the kitchen, standing in the doorway as I filled the
percolator. 'You don't seem very concerned about Monk.'

    'Should
I be?'

    'Don't
you want to know what happened?'

    'It
can wait till I've made the coffee.' I could feel his gaze on me as I put the
percolator on the heat. 'How's Deborah?'

    'Thriving
since the divorce.'

    'I'm
sorry.'

    'Don't
be. She wasn't. And at least the kids were old enough to decide who they wanted
to live with.' The smile crinkled his eyes without warming them. 'I get to see
them every other weekend.'

    There
wasn't much I could say. 'Are you still in Exeter?'

    'Yeah,
still at HQ.'

    'Detective
Superintendent yet?'

    'No.
Still a DI.' He said it as though daring me to comment.

    'The
coffee'll be a few minutes,' I told him. 'We might as well sit down.'

    The
kitchen was big enough to double as a dining room. It was more comfortable in
the sitting room, but I didn't want Terry in there. It was strange enough
having him here as it was.

    He
took a seat opposite me. I'd forgotten what a big man he was. He'd obviously
kept himself fit, although the signs of encroaching middle age were still
there.

    The
bald spot must kill him.

    The
silence built between us. I knew what was coming next.

    'Lot
of water under the bridge.' He was looking at me with an undecipherable
expression. 'I always meant to get in touch. After what happened to Kara and
Alice.'

    I
just nodded. I'd been waiting for the inevitable condolences, in the same way
you tense yourself against a blow. Even after all these years the words seemed
wrong, as though my wife and daughter's death contravened a fundamental law of
the universe.

    I
hoped he'd leave it at that, duty done. But he wasn't finished.

    'I was
going to write or something, but you know how it is. Then later I heard you'd
moved, packed in forensics to be a GP in some Norfolk backwater. So there
didn't seem much point any more.'

    There
wouldn't have been. Back then I hadn't wanted to see anyone from my old life.
Especially Terry.

    'Glad
you're back in the traces now, anyway,' he went on, when I didn't say anything.
'I hear on the grapevine that you've been doing some good work. Back at the
university forensic department, aren't you?'

    'For
the time being.' I didn't want to talk about it. Not to him. 'When did Monk
escape?'

    'Last
night. It'll be on the lunchtime news. Bloody press is going to have a field
day.' His expression matched the sourness in his voice. Terry had never liked journalists,
and that much clearly hadn't changed.

    'What
happened?'

    'He
had a heart attack.' He gave a humourless grin. 'Wouldn't think a bastard like
that had one, would you? But he managed to convince the doctors at Belmarsh to
transfer him to a civilian hospital. Halfway there he broke his restraints,
beat the shit out of the guards and ambulance driver and disappeared.'

    'So
it was staged?'

    Terry
shrugged. 'Nobody knows yet. He had all the symptoms. Blood pressure sky high,
erratic heartbeat, the works. So either he faked them somehow, or it was real
and he escaped anyway.'

    Ordinarily,
I'd have said both were impossible. A high-security prison like Belmarsh would
have a well-equipped hospital wing, with blood pressure and ECG monitors. Any
prisoner displaying cardiac symptoms bad enough to be considered an emergency
wouldn't be in any condition to escape: the attempt alone would probably kill
them. But this wasn't an ordinary person we were talking about.

    This
was Jerome Monk.

    The
percolator had started to bubble. Glad of something to do, I got up and poured
the steaming coffee into two mugs. 'I thought Monk was at Dartmoor, not
Belmarsh.'

    'He
was, until the bleeding hearts decided Dartmoor was too "inhumane"
and downgraded it from a Category A to C a few years ago. After that he was
shuffled round to a couple of other maximum- security prisons before Belmarsh
drew the short straw. Hasn't mellowed him, by all accounts. He beat another
inmate to death a few months back, and put two wardens in hospital when they
tried to pull him off.' He raised his eyebrows at me. 'Surprised you didn't
hear about it.'

    It
might have been an innocent comment, but I doubted it. I'd been in the US
earlier that year, and before that I'd been recovering from a knife attack and
hadn't been paying much attention to the news. It was impossible to tell if
Terry knew about that, but something told me he did. It was like him to probe
for a response, just for the sake of it.

    Keeping
my face neutral, I spooned sugar into one of the mugs and handed it to him.
'Why are you telling me all this?'