Case Histories

It felt as if all the air in the office had been used up. It wasn't midday yet but it was already sweltering. Shirley's light brown hair was screwed up carelessly on top of her head and the fine hairs at the nape of her neck were dark with sweat. He wondered what she'd do if he invited her to lunch, a nice pub with a garden, or buy a sandwich and go for a walk by the river. It wouldn't be unprofessional, it would just be moving this appointment outside. Who was he kidding? His motives were entirely unprofessional.

If Josie died Jackson would get sole custody. Marlee wouldn't go to the other side of the world ("Lord of the Rings," she'd said to him, quite thrilled, as if Bilbo and Gandalf and the rest of their crew actually lived in New Zealand and were waiting for her to join their fellowship. She hadn't read the books, only seen the DVDs, which were far too scary for an eight-year-old in Jackson 's opinion, but not in the opinion of David Lastingham apparently).

For her part, of course, Josie had failed to keep any of the promises she had made – to love and honor him, to be faithful to him – he could still hear that little flutter of emotion in her voice when she said, "Until death us do part." They had opted for the Traditional wedding service. Now she was planning a tropical beach ceremony with a Maori gospel choir and homemade vows. She was going to marry that wanker and "start a new life."

Jackson wondered if he was capable of killing Josie. He was bet-ter placed than most people – he knew all kinds of ways to do it, it wasn't doing it that was the problem, not being found out, that was the thing. He wouldn't wait around for hours with an ax sitting in his lap. What was that Lizzie Borden rhyme? "Lizzie Borden took an ax, gave her mother forty whacks." If he killed Josie it would have to be done in a "calculated, cold-blooded killing" – fire, explosives, a gun. A gun for preference, an L96 Al sniper with a Schmidt and Bender sight, so you could be as far away as possible – he couldn't do an intimate killing, something close-up and personal like strangling or a knife, he couldn't be there, watching the blood stop pumping round her cheating heart, couldn't watch the life fade from her eyes. And not poison. Poison was for psychopaths and deranged Victorian women. Had he really been mugged the other night? Nothing had been taken from him, his wallet, his watch, his car, were all left behind, but then he'd fought back before the guy could take anything. In Jackson 's experience, muggers didn't usually try and smash your skull in. "There's a lot of bad people out there, sir," the DC ("DC Lowther, sir") who took his statement said. They'd sent a DC where they'd normally have sent a PC. Jackson supposed he should feel flattered. He remembered DC Lowther when he was an eager young recruit in uniform. "There's been a spate of mugging? recently, Inspector," DC Lowther said, and Jackson said, "It's just plain 'Mr. Brodie' now." It was funny, he'd never really been Mr. Brodie, he'd joined the army at sixteen and until then he'd just been Jackson, sometimes "Brodie!" from the male teachers. Then it was "Private Brodie" and so on up the ranks until he left the army and then he'd started again as "PC Brodie." He wasn't sure how he felt about being "plain Mr. Brodie."

"Do you have any enemies, sir?" DC Lowther asked hopefully.

"Not really," Jackson said. Just about everyone he'd ever met.

Jackson 's shirt was sticking to his skin, it was way too hot to be in an office.

"I don't know what triggered it," Shirley said. "She just went berserk."

There was always a trigger, there was a lot of things that the defense could have used – psychotic episodes, sleep deprivation, baby blues, shit childhood, self-defense (what about the bruise on her face?). "In court," Jackson said, "Michelle said that he woke the baby. The baby was asleep and Keith woke her up, that was the nearest she got to giving a motive." Jackson could imagine how that went down with the judge. She might as well have pleaded guilty. Michelle Fletcher hadn't run away or made up a story, she had simply waited to be found. By her sister.

If she had served two-thirds of her sentence Michelle Fletcher would have been back on the outside in 1989, at the age of twenty-eight. The same age Laura Wyre would be if she'd lived. Jackson would lay a bet that Michelle had been a model prisoner, trans-ferred to an open prison by '85, catching up with her exams probably, so she could start her "new life" when she came out. Like Josie. A fresh start, wiping out the past. Just like that. What was Michelle doing now? Shirley Morrison didn't know, of course she didn't know. That was why she was here.