The Company of Fellows by Dan Holloway Read Free Book Online Page A

just noticing body language, the tone of someone’s
voice, how they dressed, what they chose off a menu. Nothing more
than attention to detail really – exactly like a fairground mind
reader’s so-called second sight. It gave him an uncanny ability to
transform a client’s room into the exact realisation of what they’d
always wanted but never imagined. Outside of work, though, he
didn’t see many people. Just a few close friends, hardly the social
whirl of old. Now he was supposed to look into this girl’s eyes and
perform his juju cold. It felt like the light was being shone
inside him. “I can tell that your father loved you,” he
said.
    “ I loved my
dad too, you fuck.”
    “ Like I said,
I can tell that your father loved you. I can tell you’re bright,
but then with your genetics that’s a no-brainer.” He paused.
“There’s something in you that’s totally alien to society’s norms,
but I don’t think you know what it is.” He stopped again. She
didn’t fill the space. “And I can tell that you’re really pissed
off that your mum and dad split up. But I haven’t worked out which
of them you’re pissed off at. That’s it, not very much.”
    “ OK, then.”
Becky sat up straight and put her feet on the floor. She flicked
her hair and steepled her hands. “What do you want to
know?”
    “ I want to
know why, if you think your dad was murdered, you’re speaking to me
and not the police.”
    “ Well, Tommy,”
she began. “Suppose I’d been somewhere with lots of people when he
died. Or suppose people didn’t know I was angry that he cut my mum
off dead and left her to bring me up on her own straight after my
twin sister died. Then, I suppose, I might have wanted to persuade
the police to look more closely.”
    Tommy made a
mental note of the information about the twin sister. “And how
angry were you with him?”
    “ These days?
Not much really, but that’s not what people remember, is it? I’ve
seen quite a bit of him recently. Mum doesn’t know. I’d like it to
stay that way,” she added hurriedly. “We were starting to get
close. Fuck it, Tommy, I was just getting him back and now he’s
dead.”
    “ So basically
you’re not going to the police because you don’t want your mum to
find out you were seeing your dad? Don’t you think it’s gone beyond
that?”
    “ What the fuck
do you know?” She didn’t raise her voice, didn’t break from her
steepled hands. If she had recomposed herself when she carried on
there would have been no way of knowing. “As well as that, of
course, I wouldn’t want to get anyone else in trouble either if
they’d gone in the house after dad was killed and they hadn’t
called the police.” She looked at him. Tommy didn’t flinch. “Well,
whatever,” she shrugged. “Dad said if you couldn’t work it out
no-one could.”
    “ Let me have a
think.” Tommy smiled.
    “ You don’t
need to think, Tommy. You’ve already decided what you’re going to
do. Are you going to tell me what it is?”
    “ Well,” said
Tommy. “How about supper tonight?” He wanted to go home and
catalogue the papers in his head. “I’ll tell you then.”
    “ OK,” she
said. “Meet me here at half six.”
    Tommy jumped.
Wagner, Siegfried’s funeral march, reverberated through the room.
He looked at the screen on his phone. “It’s my ex-girlfriend,” he
said.
    “ Lovely,” said
Becky.
    “ Emily Harris.
DCI Emily Harris.”

____
    8
     
    “ So, any
thoughts during the night about the delightful Shaw women?” asked
Emily, gulping her coffee between words.
    “ Thoughts like
whether one of them was capable of murdering the Professor?” said
Rosie. The truth was she hadn’t had any thoughts on the subject at
all. She’d got home shortly after 11, managed to fetch a few
locusts from the fridge for Chris, her pet chameleon, and within
ten minutes she’d been spark out.
    “ It would be
great if you had.” Her boss didn’t sound hopeful, but Rosie