Death Message

‘Get it out of her then,’ Brigstocke said. ‘See if we can get both these jobs off the books by the end of the week.’

Kitson and Thorne walked slowly back down the corridor towards their office.

‘He seems happier,’ Thorne said.

‘Seems…’

‘Maybe whatever it was has gone away.’

‘Since when do the DPS “go away”?’

‘Serious, you reckon?’

‘That’s the thing with them,’ Kitson said. ‘You never know. He might have lost it and battered someone in an interview room or he might have nicked some paper clips. They still have the same look on their faces.’

They stopped at the door and Thorne offered to go and get them both coffee.

‘You OK?’ Kitson asked.

‘Like he said at the briefing. Fucked.’

‘Well, go and have a night in with Louise. Get your end away and forget about it until tomorrow.’

Thorne seriously doubted he would be doing both. ‘Listen, if Sedat’s girlfriend does know something, I’m sure you’ll get it.’

‘I’m going to give it a go.’

‘Take it easy with her, though. Talk to her somewhere she’s more relaxed. Everyone’s scared in the bin, even if they’ve got no reason to be.’ Kitson just nodded. ‘Sorry,’ Thorne said. ‘I’m not trying to tell you how to handle it.’

‘That’s fine,’ Kitson said. ‘I’ll take any advice you’ve got. As long as you remember to take mine.’

Thorne went to fetch the coffees, thinking about how easy it was to stick your oar in, to be objective, when it wasn’t your own case. Not that he felt like the Brooks case was his any more. Not his to work, at any rate.

Walking across to the kettle, he glanced at the whiteboard; at the job mapped out in numbers, names and black lines; times of death and photographs of wounds. He almost expected to see his own name right next to those of the dead and the prime suspect. In the middle of the board, among the list of those central to the inquiry, instead of scribbled in capitals at the top.

When Thorne had called Louise to say that he wouldn’t be back late, and to ask what time she was likely to get away, they’d talked about going to see a movie. She’d seemed in a good mood, certainly relative to the one she’d been in at half past six that morning. They’d argued good-naturedly for a few minutes about what to see before deciding not to bother.

When Thorne got home he suggested trying a new Thai place that had opened on Kentish Town Road, but Louise had other ideas. She had brought stuff round and seemed determined to cook. While she was sorting di

Louise looked at the bottle when Thorne got back. Asked how much it had cost, and seemed pleased when he told her.

‘Cheap beer and expensive wine,’ she said. ‘That’s one of the things I liked about you first off.’

‘One of the things?’

‘OK, the only thing,’ she said. ‘Now I come to think about it.’

They ate pasta at the small table in Thorne’s living room. Got through the wine, and listened to a June Carter Cash compilation Thorne had picked up for next to nothing on eBay.

‘That stuff the other night.’ Louise reached across for an empty plate.

‘What stuff?’ Thorne said, knowing perfectly well.

‘It didn’t mean that I wanted anything, you know? That I want to have a baby, now, this minute. But I don’t think there’s anything wrong in talking about it.’

‘It’s fine…’

‘It isn’t fine, because it obviously freaked you out. So, I just want to make sure we understand each other.’

‘Does this mean we need to get into the cheap beer?’

‘I’m serious.’

Louise explained that despite what had happened in bed that night, she really did not want to get pregnant. That wasn’t to say she wouldn’t want to have a child one day, but she had a career to put first for a few more years.

‘I look at someone like Yvo

Thorne thought about Louise’s reaction when they’d talked about Kitson and he’d accused her of being jealous. He wondered if he’d touched even more of a nerve than he’d realised.

‘I’d be stupid to have a kid now.’

‘It’s fine,’ Thorne repeated.

‘You keep saying that, but I don’t think it is. I’m worried that you think I’m desperate for you to knock me up or something. That I’m some sort of nutter who’s going to stick pins in all your condoms or nick a pram from outside Tesco’s. Really, I’m happy with the way things are.’

‘Good. So am I,’ Thorne said.

‘Great. So that’s fine then.’

They moved from the table to the sofa, and when the album had finished they put the TV on and tried to lose themselves in something mindless. After fifteen minutes of saying nothing, though, Thorne wasn’t convinced that Louise was succeeding any more than he was.

She hit the mute button on the remote and was about to say something when the phone rang.

Thorne recognised the voice immediately.

‘How did you get my home number?’ he said. He pictured a glorified cupboard stuffed with recording equipment. A bored technician wearing headphones, ears pricking up on hearing his question.

‘Come on,’ Rawlings said. ‘If you wanted to get mine, how long would it take you?’

‘What do you want?’ Next to him, Louise was mouthing, Who is it? ‘I’m in the middle of something.’

‘I could do with a chat. Just five minutes.’

‘Fine, but not this five.’

There was a pause. Thorne could hear Rawlings blowing out smoke; knew that he was swearing silently.

‘What about tomorrow?’

‘Fine. Call me then.’

‘Can we meet up?’

Louise was still asking. Thorne shook his head; he’d tell her in a minute. ‘I don’t know what I’m doing tomorrow. A lot of stuff happened today, and-’

‘What stuff?’

‘Right, you’ve had your chat…’

‘Come on. We can meet wherever’s easiest for you, all right? Five fucking minutes…’

Later, when Thorne was in the kitchen making tea, Louise shouted through from the living room: ‘What about you? Did you never think about kids?’

Thorne almost scalded himself. ‘Thought about it, yeah. Not for a while, though.’

‘Why did you and Jan never have them?’

Thorne had split from his ex-wife twelve years before, after ten years of marriage. They hadn’t spoken in a long while, and as far as he knew she was still living with the teacher she’d left him for. ‘We didn’t decide not to. It just never happened.’

There was a pause from the living room.

‘Did you try to find out why it wasn’t happening?’

Thorne took his time stirring the tea. ‘No, we didn’t talk about it.’ He shrugged as he said it, asking himself, as he had when Jan had left, if it might have been one of the reasons why she’d gone. The not having kids. The not talking about not having kids. Both.

‘It’s crazy how some couples bottle shit up,’ Louise said.

Thorne carried the drinks through, settled down next to her. ‘Stupid,’ he said.

She looked at him. ‘It’s important we don’t do that. That we talk about things.’

‘We are talking about things.’

‘Right.’ She flicked the TV on again. ‘It’s just a conversation, that’s all. I don’t see any reason why we shouldn’t be able to talk about it. Isn’t it part of getting to know the other person?’

‘I think we know each other pretty well,’ Thorne said.

‘I’m just saying it should be like finding out all the other stuff, likes and dislikes, whatever. Where did you go to school? Where do you like to go on holiday? Do you think you might want to have kids one day?’

‘The first two are easier to answer.’

‘One day.’ She squeezed his arm and said it nice and slow, making sure he got the point. ‘At some point in the future, maybe, so don’t panic, OK? I don’t even mean with me, necessarily. I’ll almost certainly have got pissed off with you and buggered off with someone else by then. It’s hypothetical, that’s all.’