CHILDHUNT: A Mystery & Suspense Thriller in the Bestselling Diana Rivers Series (The Diana Rivers Mysteries Book 5) (2 page)

Roger gave a short laugh. “Maybe, but it’s more like I have plenty of time to sift through information. Don’t forget, I only have a handful of old cases which I’m interested in, and Yvonne’s happens to be one of them.”

“I keep forgetting you’re going to write a book about them one day.”

“That’s one plan, and Diana keeps giving me encouragement. She says there are plenty of ex-solicitors and barristers who write books on crime, but she doesn’t know of any barristers’ clerks who have. Perhaps she’s right, and I have a bestseller in me, but I’m not sure if I can be bothered. I’m enjoying the freedom of not being tied to a desk anymore, and writing a book means I would be. Diana can be a bit of a bully, though.”

Adam laughed. It was no twist of fate Roger and Diana lived so close to each other in Cyprus. Roger took early retirement when he fell ill, and after completing the invasive chemotherapy treatment for his cancer, he decided it was time to retire from the chambers and go and live somewhere quieter and warm. When Adam visited the crusty old clerk as he convalesced at home, Roger asked him what he thought about Cyprus as a place to live. Adam knew his ex-fiancée lived there, and it didn’t take him long to find out exactly where she lived on the island. She was a well-known writer, after all. Roger flew to the Mediterranean island and spent a month exploring. Being an island with many resident ex-pats, it wasn’t long before he was invited to a barbeque party, where he and Diana met. Roger explained who he was and how they had a mutual friend in Adam. After getting over her surprise, Diana introduced Roger to her own circle of friends and suggested he could do worse than considering Agios Mamas as a place to live. The rest was history.

Adam came out of his reverie and once again got out his phone.  Never one to spend a long time dwelling over something, he made a quick decision. The Yvonne Brookes case had played on his mind for some time after it was turned over. He still regretted the unsolved crime. She had suffered, and it was indirectly his fault. He would pay a visit, and he knew exactly how to make it look like a coincidence. He and Clare, an old theatre friend of Diana’s, were seeing each other on a regular basis. Clare had an open invitation to visit Diana and Steve, and Adam thought it was about time she should take them up on the offer. But because he was certain the invitation wouldn’t extend to him, they intended to find alternative accommodation in the area. Roger told him there were plenty of places to choose from when he first arrived there, and with the present economic situation, there were sure to be many empty holiday homes.

Chapter 3  A week before Christmas

Diana pressed ‘send and receive’ on her laptop email button and waited for new mail to appear. She saw there were only twenty-eight messages that morning and hummed while she waited for them to download. The internet was even slower than usual that day. She suppressed a sigh and glanced outside at the gathering clouds, giving an involuntary shiver. The weather forecast said it would snow, and it looked like it was right for once. Weather
was
an inaccurate science after all. Diana didn’t mind cold, snowy conditions; in fact, she loved nothing better than a good walk in the countryside whatever the weather. But, being Cyprus with its out-dated technology and lackadaisical infrastructure, she knew that if and when it snowed, hailed or simply came down in torrents, everything ground to a halt. She even remembered one power cut due to a snake which had slithered into the power plant. Whatever the reason, the island inhabitants would often lose electricity for half a day, which was very inconvenient. Steve, Diana’s husband, said she was impatient and needed to relax a bit more, but she remembered how
he
would create merry hell whenever a lack of power hit them.

She quickly processed the emails, skimming the unimportant or boring ones and deleting half. Some were nice chatty notes from her readers, and she smiled as she read one particular long letter from a devoted fan. Although Diana had been writing for over ten years, she still found it amazing and gratifying knowing her work pleased many people. She hoped she would never take anything for granted and always found the time to respond to fan mail.

As she read through the remainder she saw the last one was from a good friend in England. She opened it to find what Clare had to say and gave a hoot of laughter as she read through her message. Steve wouldn’t believe her when she told him. Diana read the email again and sat back as she thought what it meant to her. When they last saw Clare, it had been during the summer months. She and Steve had been staying on the outskirts of Cheltenham in Gloucestershire in England. They, together with many old friends, were guests at Havershall House with hosts Duncan and Isabelle Macpherson. It had been a visit that proved to be one of the most frightening and upsetting times in their lives. Two people were murdered, another died after an accident, and Diana was subjected to a period of particular terror. Her friend, Clare, was also a guest during that dreadful interval, although she hadn’t suffered nearly as much as Diana.

Diana looked at Clare’s words again. ‘…so I thought it would be great fun for the two of us to come out for Christmas and stay in Cyprus for a while.’

It would be fun, wouldn’t it?
Diana mulled it over. She needed to get this straight in her head before she mentioned Clare’s email to Steve. She had to be calm and matter-of-fact about it all. It transpired that Clare and Diana’s ex-fiancé, Adam Lovell, were now an item. Did Diana care? Did she?

‘…I know you invited me to stay at your own house in Agios Mamas, but I truly think it will be better if Adam and I rent our own place. That way we can come and go as we please, you won’t have to cook and put up with our erratic hours, and I appreciate you might feel odd having an ex-boyfriend around the place with me as his new partner.’

Diana thought it all made jolly good sense for Clare and Adam to stay in a different place. She hoped Adam had finally got the message and suggested the arrangement. When they last met, Adam had deliberately gone out of his way to flirt with Diana, and she was as mad as hell. Even though she loved her husband with all her heart, it disturbed her to know that the handsome police superintendent could still needle her. Adam always liked to see how far he could go, and although Diana resisted, she remembered how persuasive he could be. If she had given him one hint of being interested, she knew he would have whisked her knickers onto his bedpost before she had time to blink. Did she mind? Diana thought not and mentally congratulated Clare on tying Adam down. They were both strong characters, and Clare played the field as much as he. It would be entertaining having them around over Christmas. Diana was planning events with various friends during the festivities; Adam and Clare would be just two more.

Christmas in Cyprus was nothing like Christmas back in England. For one thing, the Greek Cypriots didn’t celebrate the birth of Christ nearly as much as they celebrated his death at Easter. Consequently, there was little of the razzmatazz and the usual Christmas frenzy seen during December back home. A typical Cypriot Christmas of old involved fasting for forty days; it was fifty days for Easter. Basically, this meant eating no meat or dairy produce for the allotted
time. The Cypriots went to church on Christmas day and then returned home to eat barbequed souvla—normally pork. Seeing as this was the meat they ate ninety-nine per cent of the time, Diana couldn’t see that they had a lot of fun during the period.

Although at times she abhorred the amount of money wasted on seemingly trivial items when they lived in the UK, Diana sometimes missed it in Cyprus. She thought about the carol-singing, midnight mass, mulled wine and the pretty decorations…as well as watching friends and family opening their presents on Christmas day, which was why she liked to make sure the holiday period in Cyprus was as good as it could be. When she had time, she copied her mother and made her own cake, plum pudding, mince pies and sausage rolls—and that was just for starters. She usually roasted either turkey or goose on the big day, and they invariably had friends dropping in for drinks and nibbles during the week of festivities. She made sure Steve and Poppy didn’t miss out on anything.

She read further and realised Clare had done her research on the island. However, she was surprised to learn they had already booked their accommodation and were renting a small house in Agios Mamas. Good heavens…they didn’t hang about! They were arriving almost immediately.

Diana decided to go and find Steve and tell him the news. She wondered what he would think about Clare and Adam hooking up. Diana hadn’t mentioned Adam to Steve since their return to Cyprus, but she knew he missed very little.

*****

During that morning, there was a light dusting of snow, and Diana looked excited as she gazed out of the kitchen window. “Wouldn’t it be amazing if it really snowed hard? Just imagine…it’s mild back in the UK right now, with no forecast of snow for Christmas, but if it snowed here, it would be our first white Christmas abroad.”

“Apart from when we were skiing,” Steve pointed out. “We had a few white Christmases then.”

“I know that, but it doesn’t count.”

Raising his eyebrows, Steve gave a slight shake of his head. “Of course not.”

Diana peered at her mate, wondering if he was being sarcastic, but he just smiled at her.

“Anyway, I hope it does.”

“Why? The inconvenience will be incredible. We’ll have no power, and you’ve invited half the island to your parties.”

“Don’t exaggerate, and we’ll be okay even if it did. We have tons of logs for the wood-burner and plenty of bottled gas for the cooker. Self-sufficient I say. By the way, fancy a walk after we’ve finished?”

Steve didn’t look impressed. “I don’t know about snow, but it might rain. I don’t relish the thought of getting wet. Where do you want to go?”

“I want to invite Debbie and William over for drinks sometime. I appreciate we don’t know them well, and they’ve always refused our other invites, but I think we should make the effort.”

“They’ll refuse to come, or at least she will. William’s friendly enough, but I always get the feeling he does what Debbie wants.”

“Maybe, it’s just—well, I don’t think she has any friends. She’s stuck there on her own while William goes to work. The only time she goes out is to the supermarket. I know because I can see her house clearly from my study window, and she comes back laden with grocery bags. The children don’t even go to school—she’s home-schooling for some reason. She’s very young, and it must be lonely being all by herself for so long with only small children for company.”

Steve studied his wife. “I understand what you’re saying, but I don’t think she’ll accept an invite. She’s very shy, or perhaps she’s just plain stand-offish.”

“That’s no reason to ignore her. Look, let’s just ask. We can say it will be nice for the kids to get together. Poppy’s nearly three and loves other children. They have a little girl who looks roughly the same age, and I thought perhaps they could play together from time to time. I know what…I’ll take her one of those pretty face masks I bought last week. Poppy loves hers, and Debbie’s daughter might like to play with one, too. It’s a good excuse.” Diana paused for a moment. “Anyway, Debbie intrigues me.”

Steve looked puzzled over her words. “In what way? She’s a pretty ordinary housewife as far as I can tell.”

“I don’t know…there’s just something about her. The few times I’ve bumped into her and spoken, she’s been very polite but almost distant. It’s as if there’s something on her mind. She’s what you might call
fey
. I feel I want to get to know her.”

Steve gave what sounded like a snort of disbelief. “Are you sure you’re not on one of your nosey-neighbour inquisitive missions?” He stopped when Diana glared at him.  “Okay, only joking. We’ll call in and ask. Have you finished? Let’s go before I change my mind and spend the afternoon sitting in the snug before a blazing log fire.”

Outside, it was far colder than they realised, and Steve commented that Diana might well have been right. Perhaps she would get her wish for a white Christmas. It was only days away. A chill wind was blowing down from the Troodos Mountains, and they were in its direct path. Before they left the house, Steve looked at the webcam recording on the ski slopes and found there was a good solid base of snow already.

“It’s freezing! Let’s just visit our neighbours and then come straight home. Slippers and a bottle of red wine with a good film on television seems a much better idea to me,” Steve complained as they left their house.

“Stop moaning. You’re becoming a right old fuddy-duddy just lately. Stay at home if you want to, but I’m going to ask them.”

Diana strode out in front, while Steve followed with Poppy in the child carrier secured to his back. He smiled at Diana’s bottom snugly covered by her tight trousers. He hoped she wouldn’t be
too
long on her mission. A bottle of wine and an hour in bed seemed like a much better proposition.

Fifteen minutes later, they arrived at the foot of the short drive leading to the house across the valley from theirs. Years ago, somebody must have loved trees because they had planted the surrounding fields with dozens of olive, almond and soft-fruit trees. Diana looked around.

“I never realised there were so many trees all together. They’re actually thickly planted in places. You can’t appreciate it now, as some have lost their leaves, but there must be lots of shade in the summer.”