Liz’s mother fiddles with her waistband. ‘I always say Christmas pudding is too heavy after a big meal.’
Christmas pudding is Pete’s favourite dessert. He hasn’t eaten a mouthful since Annabelle left him.
Liz’s dad nods at Pete, his pale blue eyes going from his daughter’s last-minute guest to the remains of the meal. ‘What do you say to that, young man?’
‘Delicious,’ Pete repeats, thinking next year, he doesn’t care how many invitations from well-meaning colleagues and mates he gets, he is not spending Christmas Day in someone else’s house. Minding his manners all day isn’t too bad, but the endless expectations of gratitude are soul-destroying. And having to drive himself home means he can’t even get drunk. He sneaks a look at his watch. Another two hours, at least, before he can make his excuses.
‘Do you know who killed the tramps yet?’ Liz’s dad asks.
‘Brian, that’s enough,’ says her mum. ‘Now, I suppose—’
Liz jumps up. ‘Stay where you are, Mum. You too, Dad. Pete and I will wash up. Kids, take your grandparents into the other room and entertain them.’
There is a subdued moan from one of the kids.
‘And they do not consider watching you on your iPads to be entertainment.’
Pete gathers an armful of dishes and follows Liz into the kitchen. They run water, scrape food into bins, load the dishwasher and try to organize the chaos that is a Christmas kitchen. Pete looks at the closed door. ‘This room soundproof?’ he asks.
Liz shakes her head. ‘Not remotely.’ She drops her voice. ‘And little pigs have very big ears – not to mention their grandparents.’
‘Understood.’
They work without speaking for several minutes, listening to the sounds of the TV and the boys on their iPads.
‘You could phone her.’ Liz is at the sink, her back to him, when she breaks the silence.
‘Tricky. Latimer has told me to stay away.’
She gives him a quizzical look over her shoulder.
‘Give Maggie Rose a wide berth for a week or two, maybe longer, were his exact words. He’s probably said the same thing to her.’
Liz frowns and smiles at the same time, one of the expressions he likes most to see on her face. ‘How’s she holding up, do you think?’
Pete lifts a stack of plates. ‘Keeping busy, from what I hear. Not often at home. When she is, she rarely comes out. Situation normal.’
‘She’ll be used to pressure. She won’t scare easily.’
‘I know.’
Something in his voice makes Liz give him a good long look. She wrinkles her nose before turning back to the sink. ‘What happened to Odi and Broon wasn’t your fault, Pete,’ she says.
Pete joins her at the sink and picks up a clean tea towel.
‘It wasn’t your fault, it wasn’t mine, it wasn’t anyone’s fault except the psycho who held the knife.’
Pete glances round. ‘They were practically under my window, Liz. If I’d cranked it open a notch I could have heard them snoring.’
She gives him a sharp look. ‘You could not have anticipated that. No one could.’
‘We should have done.’
‘Rubbish.’ She gives him another smile. ‘Come on,’ she says. ‘Enough shop talk. Let’s finish this lot and get drunk.’
Chapter 67
MAGGIE GETS OUT of her car into air so icy it feels like she’s walking through knives. She pulls the collar of her coat up as high as it will go and sets off across the square. As she circumvents the enormous Norwegian spruce tree, that smells more of drunken men’s urine than it does Scandinavian pine forests, she glances up at the window of the Crown that she has come to think of as Pete’s window. She has no idea of whether it is or it isn’t, but it comforts her a little to look up at a friend’s window.
Or the window of someone who might have been a friend, had circumstances been very different.
She walks on, as the slow, sad melody of the cathedral’s organ finds its way across the crisp square and into her heart. In front of the Georgian facade of Wells Town Hall a group of people are standing silently. Some of them hold lanterns. There are tea lights on the stone flags. The flickering of the candle flames, the stronger, more garish lights of the pub are reflected on the ripples of cellophane that have been left where Odi and Broon breathed their last.
She keeps her eyes down as she gets closer to Odi and Broon’s shrine. Slipping to the front, she lays the roses down on the cold stone.
The tall male figure, walking down her drive, might have alarmed her, had she not already seen and recognized his car.
‘What are you doing here, Pete?’ She finds a key, fits it into the lock.
He reaches the bottom of the drive but keeps his distance. ‘Where have you been? You shouldn’t be going out on your own in the dark. Not while that Facebook crap is going on.’
‘I’ve been to the square in Wells. I left some flowers in the Town Hall entrance. Again, what are you doing here?’