The Secret Dead (London Bones Book 1) (22 page)

42

Samson glanced over at me. ‘She’s taking this hard.’

‘She’s entitled to therapy. It could help.’

Samson shook his head. His glossy, flat hair moved with it. ‘She won’t. Not even for Finn. Oh.’ He stood up and went over to a small table near the door where he picked up a flyer, which he passed to me. ‘We’re holding a memorial service tomorrow morning.’

‘I got the email. I’ll be there.’

In my opinion, it was a little early. Malcolm wasn’t far off being able to read his own eulogy, but I understood. It wasn’t for the rest of us. This was for Jillie.

I stretched across and put my empty tea mug on the side table across from where Jillie had been sitting. ‘Can I ask what happened with her and Leslie?’

He sighed. ‘That wasn’t exactly the Comfort sisters’ most shining moment. Leslie and Malcolm were at school together. They were an item since she was fifteen. I’m oldest, then Leslie. Jillie was the baby. Jillie had a crush on him from the moment she met him, but we all knew he was Leslie’s.’

‘What did they see in him?’ I was genuinely curious.

‘I have no bloody idea. He was a good looking bloke when he was younger, but not
that
good looking. All the girls at school had a thing for him. Maybe because he was always such a flatterer. Anyway, Leslie got pregnant and they got married. I don’t know if he was sleeping with Jillie while he was still with Leslie. I suspect he was.’

‘What made Leslie go to the States?’

‘She’d always wanted to travel. I woke up one morning and she was gone. I got a couple of emails from her and then she was dead.’

‘You didn’t speak to her?’

‘No.’

‘You know if Malcolm or Jillie did?’

‘I doubt it.’

So no one spoke to her between the time she supposedly left for the States and when she turned up in a suitcase. Except she hadn’t done any travelling at all.

‘Do you still have her emails?’ I asked.

‘It was the last communication I had from her. I printed them out.’

‘Can I have a copy?’

‘Why?’

I debated giving the real reason. If he wasn’t the murderer, he deserved to know his nephew was still alive. If he was, then it was going to come out sooner or later. He would have guessed the police had their suspicions when they started asking about Leslie.

I told him about my trips to the underworld and the one to St Anguiculus.

He was silent throughout, then his face hardened. ‘That policeman—Dunne I think it was—told me they found a body hidden behind Malcolm’s house. An old one. The police must think that’s Leslie.’

‘Yes.’

‘Well, it’s a good thing Malcolm’s dead then, because if he wasn’t, I’d kill him.’ He smiled then, and the predator shone through. It was everything I could do to keep from flinching. ‘But it’s even better. I can’t think of anything worse than rotting alive. I hope he lasts a long, long time.’

‘You sure it was him?’

Samson looked at me a long time before he answered. ‘Who else would it be?’

43

Arctic wind made short work of the black clouds scudding across the sky as we left Carapace. By the time we reached the train station, I was shuddering uncontrollably with cold, and grateful for the overheated carriage despite the default aroma of BO and perfume.

A couple of teenage girls scowled when they saw us, but gave up their pull-down seats without asking. I smiled my thanks, wheeled Sigrid into the empty space, and set the brake on the chair. I’d tucked her hands into the pockets of her jacket for the journey, and the cold radiated out through her woollen gloves as I settled them onto her thighs. How much did she feel? She never gave me any indication that she noticed anything from the living world. I rubbed her hands in mine to warm them anyway.

It took longer than it should have to get to Camden, mostly due to the need to find a step- free route, and it was close to midday by the time I finally wheeled Sigrid off the double decker and onto Camden High Street. I’d spent some of the commute on hold to the council to try and find out what had happened to Sigrid’s carer, but I’d been disconnected twice, passed through countless people, and was still no closer to an answer.

Margery had told me that the young man she knew as Oliver had a bar job at the Flag and Dragon, an ancient pub situated one road up from Camden Lock. The Flag and Dragon had started life as a pub in the seventeenth century, then was ‘cleansed’ during the purges in the eighteenth, and turned into a church that became one of the leading lights for conversion to Christianity until the late twentieth, when declining church populations forced its sale, again to the pub trade. It had had a variety of owners since then, and fortunately—for the punters—most of them had been forced to sell because they’d spent too much money on conservation projects. Even in Camden, no one could sell enough beer to make the maintenance of an ancient place like it worthwhile. Rumour had it the current owner made his money in commodities trading and had a while to go before the Flag and Dragon sapped the lot.

There was no hope of a table. I’d been passed a half dozen New Year’s Eve fliers on the trek up from the bus stop, and early revellers filled the booths and stone cubbyholes where long ago thauromancers once conducted dodgy deals.

I manoeuvred Sigrid to an open space near the bar where I could keep an eye on her. The female bartender wore pink dreads and enough face jewellery to set off airport metal detectors. I worked my way to the front and tried to catch her eye.

‘What can I get you?’

‘I’m looking for Oliver Gale.’

The bartender shrugged. ‘Doesn’t work here anymore. He quit Sunday.’ The same day Ben flew away with Malcolm.

‘Do you have any contact details for him?’

‘Hang on.’ She ducked under the bar and returned with a pen and pad of paper. She scribbled wavy lines over someone’s lunch order at the top of the page and penned a line of digits below. It was the same one Margery had given me. ‘That’s his mobile, but good luck with it. I’ve been trying to get hold of him all week. He’s not answering.’

‘You don’t have a home address?’

‘Nope, sorry.’ She turned to another customer.

‘Can I speak to the manager? Is he about?’ I asked, thinking Oliver must have filled in an application form or provided a CV to get the job.

‘That’s me too. Sorry.’

‘Right. Thanks.’

Just as I turned to leave, I felt someone’s eyes on me. I turned to see Adam Brannick turning away with the sneaky expression of someone pretending they hadn’t seen someone else.

‘Hey, Adam!’

He turned with a smile that seemed genuine. ‘Hi. Nice to see you. What are you doing here?’

‘Just following up a tip,’ I said.

A lanky girl with green-tinted skin and a pound or so of costume jewellery sauntered up to him and hung an arm over his shoulder. Her slanted eyes indicated the green skin came from a dryad heritage, rather than from one of the water fae. She gave me a good look up and down. ‘Hi.’

Adam smiled again. Again, it appeared genuine, but I wasn’t sure. ‘This is Vivia. She worked with my uncle. Vivia, this is my girlfriend, Nicole.’

Nicole visibly relaxed. ‘Adam told me about you. We were just about to have lunch.’ She indicated a table in the corner, reserved with a couple of coats and a bag of shopping. ‘Want to join us?’

‘That would be lovely.’

She tinkled as she walked back to the table. I grabbed Sigrid and wheeled her closer. Adam pulled a chair out and stuck it onto another table so I could slot the wheelchair in. I introduced Sigrid then grabbed the menu slotted into a wire holder on the table. I scanned it, then braved the crush at the bar again to order a burger for myself and easily mashable pasta for Sigrid. I was given an order number on a stick in an old wine bottle to place on the edge of our table.

Adam looked up as I sat down. ‘You’ve got an in with the police. Do they know who did that to Ben yet?’

‘I don’t think so. I don’t think they’ve got much to go on, and until a body turns up...’ I shrugged. I glanced at him, considering. The skin under his eyes was tinged with purple, and I thought I caught a whiff of old whiskey. The charm bracelet on his wrist shook as he raised his beer glass. ‘Are you okay?’

He gave a hollow laugh. ‘As well as can be expected. I keep thinking about Malcolm in the pit. Do you think he knows what’s happening to him?’ Nicole squeezed his arm and gave him a sympathetic look.

‘I don’t think so. Not anymore.’

‘I just keep remembering...’ He felt silent. ‘We had some policewoman turn up this morning. She called herself a Family Liaison Officer or something. She’s supposed to be there to keep us appraised, but she won’t tell us anything. Except they want me to go for a soul craft test. Which is just ridiculous. I haven’t done magic in years.’ He wagged the bracelet at me, and I finally recognised its significance. Each little charm had a number on it—years magic free. ‘I don’t know what it has to do with anything. All the information I’m getting is from the papers. And they’re full of shit. Ben didn’t kill anyone. He’s not like that. And now if he’s dead, he won’t even have the chance to defend himself.’

The food arrived, and I used mashing up Sigrid’s food as an excuse to think about what I was going to say next. She opened her mouth and swallowed without chewing, obedient as a baby bird.

Nicole watched without the usual embarrassment people often have around her. ‘What’s wrong with her?’

‘Brain damage.’ The usual excuse.

‘She doesn’t smell like it.’ Non-humans and their creepy sense of smell, always getting in the way of a good lie.

Sigrid suddenly reached out towards Nicole, knocking her arm, then pulled her own arm back in. I recognised the gesture as ‘getting a book’. Dead Sigrid did a lot of reading, something I was grateful for. Reader Sigrid was easy to manage. I could have had Marathon Runner Sigrid or Aerobics Sigrid, but I couldn’t see the girl I had known turning into an athlete. Someone who bumped into people because she was walking and reading at the same time? Yes. Sigrid placed something in her lap, opened an invisible page and stared at it

At the touch Nicole shrunk back against Adam and whispered in his ear loud enough for me to hear her. ‘She’s wrong. She’s not right.’

Adam frowned at me. Children of dryads have a reputation for seeing the unseeable.

‘Not her.
Her
.’ Nicole nodded towards Sigrid, who turned another page.

Adam turned to me, his face red. It was usually children who made comments about Sigrid; it was the adults who should have known better who irritated me. Nicole wasn’t human, but she wasn’t a child either.

Sigrid’s eyes followed the non-existent print, her hand resting on the top, ready to turn to the next page. She blinked a few times, then mumbled something unintelligible.

‘She’s fine,’ I said.

‘Her soul’s stuck in backwards.’ The green-skinned woman looked me in the eye. ‘You should kill her. She’s not supposed to be like that.’

‘
Nic!
’
Adam’s face was horrified. ‘I’m sorry. It’s a cultural thing. The tree people have to thin their seedlings or none of them live. She doesn’t always understand how humans do things.’

‘It’s okay,’ I said. ‘She’s right, if not about the killing. Sigrid’s a bit different.’

Sigrid reached out again, putting the invisible book back on the shelf and taking another.

Nicole flinched. ‘It mustn’t touch me.’

‘She won’t,’ I said and moved Sigrid’s wheelchair a little closer to me so she was out of arm’s reach.

Nicole rolled her eyes and stood up. She crossed the room and began talking to another green-skinned woman who looked Sigrid and me up and down and copied her sister-dryad’s eye roll.

‘I’m really sorry,’ Adam said.

To save Adam further embarrassment, I changed the subject. ‘Did you know Ben was still in touch with Per Ogunwale?’

Adam had the exact same reaction I’d had on hearing the name. ‘Do you think he—’

‘No. I don’t think so. He seemed upset at the whole thing. He also said you used to be friends.’

Adam stiffened. ‘He did. What else did he tell you?’

I was aware of a sudden tension in the room. ‘Not a lot. That was it really.’

Adam drained the last of his beer. ‘Haven’t seen him in years. We used to hang out when my mum was still alive. Not so much after that. She died when I was fifteen. Heart attack. Worst thing that ever happened to me. Per wasn’t exactly supportive.’

‘Sorry to hear that,’ I said, but something was tickling my memory.

‘Don’t be. Mum’s long dead, and the friendship was no great loss. The man’s insane. Runs in the family, I believe. Excuse me.’

He got up and went over to his girlfriend. I ate my burger in silence, thinking about his words. Sigrid sat next to me quietly, absorbed in her book. By the time I was finished eating, they had disappeared.

A couple of drunk students leaned against the stone pillar to my left, clearly waiting for me to leave so they could snag the table. One of them huffed loudly when I got my mobile out and made no signs of moving.

I dialled the office.

‘Obe, what happened to Neil Brannick’s wife?’

‘She’s dead. Passed away years ago.’ That’s my squirrelly little boss. Never gives me the answer he knows I want.

‘I just had lunch with Adam, and he told me his mother died of a heart attack. Except a few days ago it was cancer. You knew her. What was it?’

Silence from the other end of the phone.

‘Well?’ I said.

‘It’s not for me to say. They don’t like to talk about it.’

‘I could just call Neil up and ask him instead.’

‘Don’t do that. Don’t drag it all up again. He doesn’t deserve it. What happened to Rosa almost killed him.’

‘What happened to her?’

‘She died in a house fire. Neil tried to get her out. Even got quite badly burned. But she died anyway. It was a horrible, horrible thing. Now let it go. It’s none of your business, and it has nothing to do with Ben.

I remembered Neil’s claw-like hand. He’d been so aggressive it had slipped my mind. ‘But it does have something to do with Malcolm?’

‘I’m not dragging his name through the mud. It’s bad enough everyone thinks he’s a murderer.’

‘How did the fire start?’

‘Good grief, Vivia. Let it go.’ Obe’s voice was getting a little high-pitched.

One of the drunk students accidentally on purpose bumped the table, and I caught my glass just in time. I resisted the urge to stick my tongue out at them.

‘Okay.’ With Malcolm gone, and me not being in the office, Obe was taking the brunt of the day-to-day work at the Lipscombe. Maybe I wasn’t responsible for him the same way I was for Sigrid or Stanley, but he was my friend, and I didn’t want him getting the hump with me. I apologised, and he calmed down a little.

I hung up then snagged the Wi-Fi code from the man who cleared our plates and set my laptop out on the table. I logged into the Lipscombe systems successfully and pulled up contact details for Patricia Stull, which I transferred to my phone.

Just as I was about to dial, someone turned the music up, prompting a wave of cheering. I grabbed my stuff and Sigrid. I heard an irritated ‘Finally!’ as I left the table.

Outside in the drizzle, I dialled Patricia Stull. ‘Ms Stull? It’s Vivia Brisk. I have a big favour to ask you.’

There was only one reason I could think of for lying about someone dying in a house fire. She’d been a victim of the great British tradition of burning your zombie neighbours in their own home.