Kick Back by Val McDermid Read Free Book Online Page B

about how the new conveyancing protocol is working out, and they got talking, and they got on to the topic of builders catching a cold because they’d bought land speculatively and the bottom had fallen out of the market, and this hack said how one of his colleagues, i.e. Alexis, was looking for a chunk big enough for ten people to do a self-build scheme, and
Cheetham said he knew of a colleague who had a client who was a builder who had just the thing, so we went to see Cheetham, and he said this T. R. Harris had bought this land and couldn’t afford to develop it himself so he was selling it off.” Chris talks in sentences longer than the law lords.
    â€œAnd did you ever meet this builder?”
    â€œOf course. T. R. Harris, call me Tom, Mr. Nice Guy. He met us all out there, walked the land out with us, divided it up into plots and gave us this sob story about how desperate he was to keep his business afloat, how he had half a dozen sites where the workers were depending on him to pay their wages, so could we please see our way to coughing up five thousand apiece as a deposit to secure the land, otherwise he was going to have to keep on trying to find other buyers, which would be a real pity since it obviously suited our needs so well and he liked the idea of the land being used for a self-build if only because he wouldn’t have the heartache of watching some other builder make a nice little earner out of such a prime site that he’d been really sick to have to let go. He was so convincing, Kate, it never crossed our minds that he was lying, and he obviously fooled Cheetham as well. Can you do something?” I couldn’t ignore the pleading note in her voice, even supposing I’d wanted to.
    â€œI don’t really understand what’s happened, but of course I’ll do what I can to help. At the very least, we should be able to get your money back, though I think you’ll have to kiss goodbye to that particular piece of land.”
    Chris groaned. “Don’t, Kate. I know you’re right, but I really don’t want to think about it, we’d set our hearts on that site, it was just perfect, and I’d already got this really clear picture in my mind’s eye of what the houses were going to look like.” I could imagine. Eat your heart out, Portmeirion.
    â€œI’ll take a look at it tomorrow, promise. But I need something from you. You’ll have to give me a couple of letters of authority so that your solicitor and anybody else official will talk to me. Could Alexis drop them off on her way to work tomorrow morning?”
    We sorted out the details of what the letters should say, and I only had to listen to the tale once more before I managed to get
off the phone. Then, of course, I had to go through it all for Richard.
    â€œSomebody’s been bang out of order here,” he said, outraged. He summed up my feelings exactly. It was the next bit I wasn’t so happy about. “You’re going to have to get this one sorted out double urgent, aren’t you?”
    Sometimes, it’s hard to escape the feeling that the whole world’s ganging up on you.

5
    I gave Alexis her second shock of the week next morning when she dropped off the letters of authority. It was just before seven when I heard her key in my front door. Her feet literally left the floor when she walked through the kitchen doorway and saw me sitting on a high stool with a glass of orange juice.
    â€œShit!” she yelled. I thought her black hair was standing on end with fright till I realized I was just unfamiliar with how untamed it looks first thing. She runs a hand through it approximately twice a minute. By late afternoon, it usually manages to look less like it’s been dragged through a hedge backwards then sideways.
    â€œSsh,” I admonished her. “You’ll wake Sleeping Beauty.”
    â€œYou’re up!” she exclaimed. “Not only are you