Page 44 of Glasshouses

“Are you seeing Scarlett tomorrow?” I’d asked Lachy to work his charms on Lily’s old friend. “We need to find who she was with the night of the first fire; see if they can remember how drunk she was.”

He nodded.

“I bet they can. How many nights do you have that end up with your friend being arrested for killing most of their family? I don’t understand why they weren’t interviewed as part of the original investigation.” I’d managed to go through more of the files I could access, still being frustrated by the ones that I didn’t have privileges to open.

Lachy shrugged. “Maybe it wasn’t just Lily who set the fire and someone was trying to protect them. I agree there’s more to it. My parents drove me mad but I’d never have dreamed of trying to set them on fire. My sister – that’s another fucking matter. Are you coming to the pub?”

“I’m going for a run. Maybe tomorrow. Vinny mentioned something about celebrating.” We headed to the door, ready to call it a day.

“Can you not do two nights on the run?” He tried to niggle me.

“Only if you’re picking up the bill.” I left him spluttering about how he was underpaid, only to be distracted by Melinda and another can of fizzy mango juice. I was going to love telling Vinny about this.

Chapter Fourteen

There was a strange man on my roof when I pulled up, another skip on my drive that was empty. I locked my car and headed up the scaffolding, not thinking about what would happen if I fell, and then making the mistake of looking down.

“You okay there?” A voice from above rang down. “You’ve not moved for a minute.”

“I’m not a fan of heights.”

“Hang on, I’m coming.”

Six feet plus of tanned maleness landed next to me on the scaffold boards, hands grasping my shoulders.

“You’ve gone pale.”

“Heights.” Was all I could get out.

I didn’t ask Atlas any more questions until my feet were firmly on the floor and I’d spent two minutes sat on the drive resting my head between my knees. I was aware he was laughing quietly at me, but I didn’t have it in me to respond.

“Why are you on my roof again?” I didn’t look at him, trying to focus on stopping the world from flipping upside down.

“You had another issue. I noticed it yesterday but didn’t have chance to fix it. It’s done now.” I heard him wipe his hands on his jeans.

“Why are you helping me?” I managed to look up.

“Bored. Between jobs. I’m not good at doing nothing.” He looked the most awkward I’d ever seen him. “How’s work?”

“Slow. I have a case but it’s full of loose threads.” I’d met Atlas a couple of months ago when he’d sent me a couple of cryptic emails that helped me solve a case. I had no idea who he actually was, or what jobs he was between. There were suspicions, of course, but any attempt from me to explore those suspicions was expertly diverted. He could well be a politician.

“Is it the fire?”

I nodded. “The one in Harrowclough.” It wasn’t confidential; a bit of a search on the internet and my name would come up in conjunction with it. “We think it could be linked to a fire seventeen years ago in Thornley End.” I stood up, feeling better now I wasn’t suspended in mid-air on scaffold boards.

“What are you up to this evening?”

“I’m going to go for a run.” And I knew exactly where to.

“Do you ever do things for fun?” He folded his arms, the arms of his T-shirt tightening over his biceps.

“I run.”

“Of course you do. Where are you planning to go?”

I glanced up at the sky. It looked promising for rain, but this was Manchester and a grey sky could just mean some rock star brothers had rowed again.

“Thornley End.”