A Slice of Murder, page 10
‘You could say,’ Theo said. He lifted his head up to take a sip of his water, and she noticed his strong jawline. How was this man still single?
‘The trouble is you can’t just leave your work at the office. It follows you everywhere,’ he continued. ‘When there’s a murderer at large, an unsolved case, you get little sleep until it’s solved. This is a rare hour out for me. Danny convinced me I needed a break. Said I was lucky there was only one murderer on the loose.’ Theo laughed. He adjusted his wristband and looked at his watch. ‘After this I’m heading back to the station.’ He looked up and fixed his eyes on her. ‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t joke about killers and victims. We get so used to dealing with death and its ugly and often brutal causes that we try and make light of it. Keeps us sane. I hope you don’t think I’m callous. We take our job quite seriously.’
Shilpa shook her head. ‘Not at all,’ she said, looking away from the intensity of his stare. Danny was right: Theo was self-assured. Usually, this would have irked her. She didn’t normally go for the alpha male, but perhaps it was time to make an exception. ‘I’ve seen Broadchurch.’
‘Ha!’ he said, looking towards Danny and Olivia. ‘This is slightly different to how they do it on television.’
Shilpa saw her opportunity. ‘You’re holding someone in relation to Mason’s murder. I read about it on the news. So, doesn’t that mean you can sleep easy tonight?’
Theo didn’t respond immediately. ‘Don’t believe everything you read online,’ he said eventually.
‘Come on, you two,’ Danny said from across the court as he bounced a tennis ball in front of his poised racket. ‘Stop chatting so we can get on with our game.’
‘You can be such a grump, can’t you, Danny boy,’ Theo said. He turned to Shilpa and grinned. He gently touched her forearm, and a small electric current passed through her. They took their places on the court, and in less than twenty seconds she saw a ball hurtling towards her. She swung her racket. The game had started.
Shilpa was exhausted by the time the match finished. She wasn’t the best at tennis, but she wasn’t as bad as she had expected, and Theo said she had a mean serve.
‘Back to the station for me,’ Theo said, picking up his towel from the edge of the court and wiping his face. Shilpa turned to see Danny and Olivia heading towards them.
‘I don’t suppose you fancy dinner one evening this week – if you can tear yourself away from the case, that is?’ she asked.
‘I’d like that,’ Theo said. He picked up his phone and unlocked it before handing it to her. She tapped in her number and handed it back. He gave her a missed call and slipped the phone into his pocket. ‘See you later then,’ he said with a wry smile. He turned towards Danny, who had just reached them. ‘Come on, mate,’ he said. ‘Back to the office.’ The two men started walking away.
‘Sorry, pet,’ Olivia said to Shilpa. ‘I’ve got to get the kids, so I can’t stay and talk, but tell me quickly, what d’you think?’
‘Yeah,’ Shilpa said, trying to sound nonchalant. ‘He seems all right.’
‘He’s a catch. Anyway, I’ve gotta go. Speak later, okay?’
Shilpa nodded as Olivia started running, racket in hand, in the direction of the car park.
As Shilpa walked home, she wondered what had come over her, asking Theo out like that. Yes, he was good-looking and they had got on well, but she wasn’t normally so forward, and she didn’t know the first thing about him. This probably happened to him regularly. No wonder he didn’t stutter when he agreed to the date. She should have looked into Danny a little more before pursuing him, and then she wouldn’t have felt so foolish when she found out he had a wife. She doubted Olivia and Danny would set her up with a married man though. She smiled as her phone buzzed and looked at her screen. It was a message from Theo saying he would be free tonight if she wanted that dinner. She responded with a yes.
As she approached the house, she noticed that the door was open and Tanvi was standing there with what looked like a photograph album in her hand. She had forgotten all about Tanvi. She couldn’t just go off on her date tonight, especially when Tanvi had just broken up with Jason. She would text Theo and ask to rearrange. It was probably for the best, given she had fifty cupcakes to make for Steven Drew’s party tomorrow.
‘What have you found?’ she said as she approached the house. The spa had been fully booked, so she had left her friend with the task of going through some of Dipesh’s old possessions and making piles of charity shop, bin and keep items. She had only recently discovered a couple of boxes of his in the guest room when Tanvi came to stay and had tasked her friend with having a clear-out so that the room could be used. The rest of her uncle’s stuff was in the garage. She still hadn’t found the key, and just thinking about it sent a shiver down her spine. Something about that missing key felt off. Especially after the noise she had heard coming from inside the garage last night.
‘You know how your mum always said that you and Dipesh were kindred spirits?’
‘Yeah. Single to the end. That’s my epitaph.’
‘Dipesh wasn’t as single as we thought.’
‘Mum would have known if he had a significant other,’ Shilpa said.
‘You may want to take a look at this,’ Tanvi said, opening the photo album in her hand.
Chapter Twenty-Two
‘Glad you made it,’ Steven said as he entered the room.
‘No problem, sir,’ Evan said, although he didn’t mean it. Steven had kept him waiting for over forty minutes. He stood up and extended his hand to his future father-in-law. ‘It’s a terrible time for you all. I was hoping that Harriet would be here, and Margery. I haven’t seen her since the party.’
Steven waved away Evan’s comments. ‘They’re both out,’ he said. ‘Please sit. Did Rosa offer you a drink?’
Evan nodded and pointed to the glass of water on the coffee table.
‘You need something stronger than that,’ Steven said. ‘Come on. You may as well come to my study.’
Evan suppressed a smile as he followed Mr Drew. Only a select few were allowed into this man’s study. He wondered if Mason or Finley had made it through the door. He straightened his back as he strode through.
Steven poured two glasses of whisky and motioned for Evan to sit on the large Chesterfield. ‘It’s no secret that I wasn’t the biggest fan of Mason Connolly. Harriet could’ve done better.’ There was a long pause while Steven stared at Evan as if gauging his reaction. ‘I’m not saying I would want any harm to come to the boy, but Mason Connolly wasn’t all that he appeared.’
‘How so?’ said Evan.
‘Well,’ said Steven, a little flustered, as if he hadn’t anticipated any questions. ‘He was a sneak.’ Steven downed his drink. ‘It sounds heartless of me, I know, and so soon after the event, but Mason Connolly’s no longer with us, and it’s time to think of our future.’
‘Our future?’ Evan said.
‘Harriet doesn’t like being alone. Never has done. Even as a child she always wanted someone around. We were lucky she took to Rosa. We should have given her a sibling, I suppose, but it wasn’t to be, and it was probably for the best. I shouldn’t admit this, but parenting wasn’t really our forte.’ There was an awkward silence before Steven spoke again.
‘Harriet likes you, and from what I’ve heard, I’d say that you like her too. Am I right, Evan?’
Evan felt the room get a little warmer. Perhaps he didn’t know where this conversation was going. He pulled at his shirt collar and looked at his drink. The glass of cold water he had left in the drawing room would have been a welcome relief as opposed to the warm liquid he now brought to his lips.
‘I’m fond of Harriet,’ he said.
‘And you’re self-made, Evan. The last two years have been very successful for White Water. You’re ambitious, despite what you like to portray to others,’ Steven said, looking Evan up and down.
‘Excuse me?’ Evan said.
‘I know you keep a low profile,’ Steven said, ‘but you’re ambitious, and you have the mind of an entrepreneur. You wouldn’t have the kind of turnover you do otherwise.’ Steven didn’t pause long enough for Evan to respond. Evan wasn’t sure whether to admire or be offended by Steven’s manner and blatant admission of checking his company accounts.
‘Devon is ripe and ready for people like you. People who want to make something of themselves. There is opportunity here, unlike other places, where everything you can think of has been done to death. You just have to have some determination and a little know-how, which you have.’
‘So, what’re you saying?’ Evan said. It was well known in Otter’s Reach that Steven Drew despised the young of today, branding them snowflakes within his own workforce. Harriet was lucky enough to be born into wealth. He loved Harriet, but he did wonder what Steven thought of his daughter’s ambitions, because Harriet didn’t have a job. Like Mason, she worked for her dad, taking a healthy salary, and frittered her time in the boutiques and lunch spots in and around Salcombe. ‘Working is just so dull,’ she often complained to him, not that he had ever witnessed her do any. Just thinking about her brought a smile to his lips. She didn’t pretend to be something she was not, which was what he liked about her. Steven was a little two-faced. It was one rule for his family, another for everyone else.
But Steven, for all his flaws, was right about Mason. The man was underhanded. He had taken Harriet from under his nose and did everything he could to have an easy life. Harriet had been attracted to him only because she thought she had got one up on Alison and Izzy, but in reality she didn’t love him. Evan knew it. He just did.
Mason got what was coming to him, and Evan was glad. He cast his mind back to the day of the party. The knife had felt heavy in his hand at first but took on a lightness that fateful day. Now there was nothing standing between him and Harriet, and judging by the direction this conversation was headed, he would say it wouldn’t be too long before Harriet Drew was his.
‘You like my daughter and my daughter likes you. It’s fairly simple,’ Steven continued, looking down at Evan. ‘I have an event tomorrow, and I’d like you to be there.’
Chapter Twenty-Three
Tanvi held a bottle of red wine and scowled at Shilpa. ‘Marbella would have been much better than this,’ she said.
‘You said you didn’t mind helping.’
‘Last night I was icing blinking cupcakes in green and white. Talk about showing a friend a good time,’ she said, grinning. ‘Now all of a sudden I’m a drinks waiter as well. I haven’t done any waitressing since my college days.’
‘It shows,’ Shilpa said. ‘Go on, get out there and mingle while I arrange these cakes.’
‘I get all the best jobs.’
‘Perhaps you should have said you weren’t a waitress when that woman asked you to serve the wine.’
‘“Get a move on and serve the wine”, is what she said,’ Tanvi corrected her. ‘Well, I am dressed all in black like the other waiters, even if my trousers are Donna Karan.’ Tanvi laughed. ‘At least this way I can eavesdrop so you can talk to the right people. Remember, you’re here to get the word out about Sweet Treats, so put your PR hat on. You were so good at all that in London. Here you seem to be more interested in solving a crime that has nothing to do with you! The sea air has done something to your brain.’ Tanvi scanned around the room. ‘Although I must admit, playing detective is more fun than promoting occasion cakes. Saint Laurent shoes at twelve o’clock,’ she said. ‘That must be our femme fatale, Harriet.’
Shilpa strained to look and then quickly turned as Harriet looked in her direction. ‘Go on then, Tan. She looks like she favours a glass of red.’ Tanvi didn’t need to be asked twice. She headed in Harriet’s direction. Shilpa started taking the iced cupcakes out of the boxes and carefully arranging them on a stand. It had been a late night for them yesterday. After Tanvi found her uncle’s photo albums, they had searched through the remaining boxes in the house. They hadn’t found much else, but that one album had uncovered a life he had kept hidden from her family.
Dipesh had a partner, a whole life she knew nothing about. The album Tanvi had found was full of photos taken in exotic locations and on city breaks around the Mediterranean. In most of the photos, the same man was present – someone, it was clear, he loved very much. So why hadn’t he shared this with her? Perhaps he thought her parents were too antiquated, that they wouldn’t understand his sexuality.
But she had spent most of last night thinking about it, and she came to the conclusion that her parents already knew. There were so many hushed conversations between her mum and dad after her uncle’s death, and now those cutting remarks her aunts had made after his passing about the way he was made sense. But if her parents knew, why didn’t they share it with her and her brother?
She had called her brother at two this morning to ask him if he had known. He wasn’t best pleased she had woken him up, but he was as surprised as she was. Were her parents that close-minded that they wanted it hushed up even where their kids were involved?
The thought made her see red, which was why she had told her brother not to mention anything to her parents before she did. She would do some digging around on her own first before she confronted them. Who was the man in her uncle’s life, and why had she never met him? More to the point, where was he now? Surely they lived with one another. Yet there was no trace of him in the house, and that album had been squirrelled away at the bottom of a dusty old box of books, almost like it had been forgotten under the pile of Danielle Steels.
Her uncle had lived a life that he felt he couldn’t share with her. Thank goodness for Graham and John. She imagined they were a great support to him. She would speak to them and try and find out about her uncle’s partner. She wanted to meet him. Perhaps he would want something to remember her uncle by.
After this revelation, they had tried in vain to get into the garage, the key to which was still nowhere to be found. Shilpa was now desperate to get in there and was going to call a locksmith until Tanvi had pointed out that it was past six o’clock and that she would have to pay an extortionate amount of money for an out-of-hours one.
‘That’s her,’ Tanvi said, sidling next to Shilpa as she placed the last cupcake on the stand. Tanvi had been listening in on Harriet’s conversations, the first with a work colleague. ‘She was very corporate,’ Tanvi said. ‘Apparently she has something to do with the social media campaign surrounding the company. She was droning on about it. She probably posted one tweet. When Harriet moved on to speaking to her friend though, her tone changed. “It sounds terrible”, Harriet said, “But I can’t help but think there was a reason for all this happening to me”. Those were her exact words.’
Tanvi was surprised that Harriet could find serendipity in Mason’s death, but Shilpa wasn’t. As she was arranging the cupcakes, two young women who looked to be employees at Drew Accounting came up to her, eager to try them. After telling Shilpa how delicious they were, they carried on with their conversation in hushed tones. They were talking about Harriet and Mason. Shilpa was in earshot, but they didn’t seem to mind.
‘She knew he had lovers,’ one of the women said, explaining that a week before the engagement party Harriet found out that Mason was seeing one of his exes. The woman looked around her. Ignoring Shilpa, she said in a whisper, ‘They say that’s why she did it.’
‘Who said that?’ the other friend asked. Her friend didn’t answer. Instead she spoke at length about Harriet, who was overheard saying once that she didn’t suffer fools. This was reason enough for the young lady to believe that Harriet killed Mason.
‘He cheated on her, and she wasn’t going to take it lightly,’ the woman had said.
Tanvi poured both Shilpa and herself a glass of wine.
‘I’m not sure the staff can drink at events like this,’ Shilpa said.
Tanvi made a face. ‘Stop me,’ she said, taking a sip of wine. She looked at the bottle of red. ‘This isn’t bad.’
Shilpa followed her lead and tried the Merlot. It slipped down easily. ‘Have a cupcake too while you’re at it,’ she said. Tanvi raised an eyebrow.
‘Don’t tempt me. Tell you what else I overheard. Sounds like the Drew Accountancy firm is in a bit of trouble over not spotting some gaps in the Connolly accounts.’
‘What do you mean?’
Tanvi explained that it sounded like someone was embezzling money from the company. ‘I heard two of the junior staff talking about it. I wasn’t the only one eavesdropping though. That man over there with the scarf,’ Tanvi said, looking towards the man in question. ‘He was listening in too, and from what I gather, he works with Drew Accounting. He didn’t stop to correct them. I think there’s some truth in what the graduates were saying. Perhaps you should go and talk to him?’
‘Why? I’m not interested in the Connollys’ bank accounts. I want information on Mason Connolly’s death.’
‘It could be connected, and anyway, I think he’s a family friend,’ Tanvi said confidently.
Shilpa gave her friend a look. ‘You just said he worked with them.’
‘You know what it’s like with these rich families. Work, play; it all gets intertwined, and look, there he is joking with that lady.’
‘June.’
‘You know her? She looks very beige. She clearly got the memo that black is for waiting staff only,’ Tanvi said, looking down at her own attire and grinning.
‘She’s Mason’s mother. Maybe I’ll go over and say hello.’ Shilpa left Tanvi by the cupcakes and headed towards the old man with the neckerchief.
‘Shilpa,’ June said. ‘Lovely to see you again. I didn’t get to thank you for the cake you made.’ June turned towards the old man. ‘This talented lady catered for Mason’s funeral.’
