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15
THE HOUSE IS warm and welcoming. Jamie feels a swell of happiness as he puts his key in the lock and pushes the door open.
He calls hello and gets an answering shout. He pulls off his coat and scarf, then walks through to the living room.
Pippa looks up from the sofa and smiles. He slumps next to her.
“What a day,” he says.
“Was it horrendous?” she asks, leaning into his chest and looking up for a kiss. He plants one on her lips.
“Fucking awful. You don’t want to even imagine.”
He’s just come away from the interview with Louise Edwards’s … something. Jamie isn’t sure how to describe him. While she was being abducted and killed, Jacob Nelson was denying any knowledge of her at all.
“Police told me she was murdered,” he’d said, insufficiently quickly after introductions. “Fuck all to do with me.”
“So you’re not the father of her child?” Jamie had asked, knowing full well he’d admitted as such in his original interviews.
“Maybe,” he’d conceded. “But who knows. Bitches always saying I knocked them up.” He’d winked then, and Jamie had wanted to punch him. Tall, rangy, with a shaved head and pale bum fluff on his chin, he had a face you wanted to arrest on sight, knowing it was only a matter of time before he’d do something stupid. Jamie wondered how he’d gotten one woman to sleep with him, let alone more.
“She spoke to you guys,” he’d said, with a cursory glance to Quinn. “You did nothing.”
Jamie put his disgust to one side, sitting up straight with interest. “What about?”
Nelson thought for a moment; Jamie could almost hear machinery turning. “Someone was following her. But she couldn’t describe them. She said it was more like a feeling.”
“A feeling?”
“Yeah. She even accused me, but I said nah, stalking wasn’t my thing.” He’d looked at Jamie, an eyebrow rising. “Was it sexual? You know, her murder? Did he rape her and stuff?”
Jamie had declined to answer, and they’d let him go after that, keen to get the man as far away from them as possible. But no, Jamie thinks now. There were no signs of sexual assault on any of the bodies.
He blocks the unpleasant thoughts out of his head, desperate to enjoy his evening with his wife. “How was your day?” he asks.
Pippa laughs. “Hyper kids. But nice to be back, for about an hour. Until I collected all this.” She points to the large pile of marking. “Work for this evening.” Then she turns, her face excited. “Wedding photos are here. Do you want to see?”
“Yes,” he replies. “Yes, I do. Very much.”
Their wedding day had been wonderful. People said a winter wedding was crazy, but the weather had been bright and crisp. Blue skies, frost on the ground. The hotel was warm and cozy, with log fires, flickering candles; displays of roses and ivy and flowers Jamie couldn’t name, in red and white and green.
And Pippa had been beautiful. He looks at the photos—long white fitted dress, hair loose around her shoulders. She’d taken his breath away when he’d first seen her.
“Oh, look at my nose from that angle!” Pippa exclaims. “I should have said no profile shots.”
“Are you kidding?” Jamie stares at his wife in astonishment. “You look amazing. You are amazing. What other wife wouldn’t mind her new husband buggering off on the last day of their holiday to go to work?”
“To be honest, I’d had enough of you by then,” Pippa says. “After two weeks of California? I was sick of your face.”
“Piss off,” he says with a smile and reaches under her top to tickle her. She cries out with laughter, pushing him away, trying to do the same. Her hands under his shirt, kissing him, lightly at first, then turning into a full-blown snog. So the honeymoon isn’t over yet, he thinks, pulling her shirt over her head.
* * *
After, they lie on the sofa, a blanket pulled over the top of them. Pippa grabs the laptop, with a grin, and they go back to looking at the wedding photos. They move on to ones from the party. Their friends dancing, even their parents, hand in hand on the dance floor. A picture comes onto the screen: Adam, his face caught mid-laughter, pint of beer in his hand.
“He slept with Jane, did you know?” Pippa says.
“He did? He didn’t mention it. I hope she doesn’t expect him to call her.”
