Death on Daytime: A Tess Darling Mystery (The Tess Darling Mysteries) (10 page)

“Am now,” said Di, grabbing her arm. “Let’s get out of here.”

But the faster they walked, the harder they were pursued. “Perhaps we’re too good a photo opportunity,” Tess puffed down at her. “We look like Obelisk and Asterix. We need a distraction. Where’s Gid?”

“Up by there,” said Di. “Looking tragic.”

“Good.” He could soak up the attention, thought Tess, and give it back in the form of tears. (“
Finally,
viewers know who I am,” he’d explained earlier. “If I’m serious about making the move from researcher to presenter, I’ve got to attract the cameras – and
emote.
So I’m going to shut my eyes, and imagine life with a hare-lip”).

Watching him sob at a Channel Five News girl, Tess didn’t begrudge Gideon his star turn. Far odder was the
non-
appearance of Mark Plimpton. He’d left his wife Sandy for Jeenie; their love had burned up headlines and set light to Twitter. Yet he couldn’t make her Memorial Service? Even now, the only person who seemed to care for the murdered woman remained Fat Alan, for which heinous crime he was Suspect Number One.

With no word since his bunk from the Bayswater Road – and the police refusing to release his address – Tess had had to wait like everyone else for
The Daily Mail
to track him down. Sure enough, today’s edition had caught
Fan of Murdered Presenter Outside his Seedy West London Flat.
Grainy snaps showed Fat Alan scurrying from an inner-city tower block, his face half-concealed in the hood of a padded anorak. Poring over the pictures for clues to their provenance, Miller had got no further than confirming they had indeed been taken in England (‘because Alan’s anorak is wet. And there’s a man stood behind him eating Hula Hoops’).

Despondent, Tess had spent a fair portion of Jeenie’s Memorial Service studying a photo of her own – the snap she’d stolen from the Bayswater Road flat. Young Couple on Park Bench. Who was the guy gripping Jeenie with such fierce pride, yet hiding his face behind a baseball cap and goatee beard? A former boyfriend, perhaps, dropped by Jeenie when she took up with Mark Plimpton? It’d certainly explain the bitterness of the accompanying note: ‘I
will
come for you. A’.

Timing was everything, of course. His letter had only just hit Jeenie’s mat. The photo might be dated mere days before her death. If so, the young man could be seen as
replacing
Mark Plimpton. Prior to Jeenie’s murder, had Sandy’s cheating husband been ousted himself? By this man ‘A’, who sent Jeenie funereal flowers, vowed to be her ‘beginning and her end’… and kept his identity obscured?

‘Give us a smile, Darling!’ Tess was shoved back to the present by a paparazzo. Having tried – and failed – to stick his camera lens up her skirt, he now fired away at her face, as a poor second. “What’s the big scowl for?” he snapped. “Daddy cross you’re stealing his thunder?”

Tess stumbled. “Did you always plan to follow in your father’s footsteps?” Another hack pushed in. “What do you say to critics who claim you’re exploiting your presenter’s death?” More reporters were smelling blood. Sticky hands were pulling at her. Hot breath hit her face.

“Shit,
shit,
” said Di. “Didn’t I say this would happen? Didn’t I warn you to stay home? But you wouldn’t listen, Tess, you
never
bluddy listen – you and Miller both – you’re like Batman and Robin. Get off her, you bastards!”

For today it wasn’t just news of Fat Alan dominating media outlets. Sandy Plimpton had started to ‘leak’. “Justice for Jeenie, that’s we want,” Sandy had exclusively told every journalist she could find online, off-screen and in print. “Who better to use her unique, inside position than Tess Darling? One of Jeenie’s closest friends, she’s going to be taking up her father’s torch for
Live with Sandy and Fergal.
Tess is a hot, young talent, determined to investigate this shocking murder – a murder
she
uncovered – and hunt down the truth.”

‘Last week, you were producing a gardening slot,” shouted a man from
The Daily Star.
“This is the kind of break you’d kill for, isn’t it? I can quote you on that?”

Aided by Di, Tess made her way across Old Compton Street towards the Soho Club. Befitting its status as a jealously-guarded haven of media power and celebrity, the club was housed in a discreet, Victorian building. The face it presented to the world was not a friendly one – just a mean front door and metal-box intercom. Running towards it, Tess hit a brick wall. The Soho Club may be hosting
the
Wake of the Year, but its front door was shut fast.

Putting her mouth to the intercom, the better to shout obscenities into it, Tess turned her back on the press pack. In contrast to the melee behind her, the remaining stretch of Frith Street was uncharacteristically empty – expectant almost. Like a Wild West scene before a shoot-out, thought Tess. Tumbleweed could have blown down this dusty road, and the only obstacle it would have hit was a tall man propped beside a litter bin. He was wearing a heavy jacket and staring straight at Tess, yet his face was a thing of shadow, obscured by the brim of a baseball cap.

Raising his hand, the man touched his cap at her.

The intercom crackled. When Tess looked back, he was gone.

“
P
lanning to jump?” A man’s voice came from behind her.

“Why?” Tess turned from the bay window of the Soho Club’s first floor bar to find DS Selleck. “Would you catch me if I did?”

The officer flushed. Tess drained the last of her G&T, and decided
not
to tell him the real reason she’d been pressed against the glass. Even though Sandy Plimpton and Rod Peacock had hired out the whole bar for Jeenie’s wake, the subsequent squeeze made it plausible Tess was only here for the oxygen.

When the door downstairs
had
finally opened, Tess had entered with the throng of mourners at her back. As they jostled to leave coats and drop names at reception, a bottleneck formed, shooting Tess like an exploding cork at the bar. Having picked up two large G&Ts, (one for each hand), she headed straight for this window. Overlooking the junction of Old Compton and Frith Street, it was the obvious vantage point. When the man in the baseball cap failed to reappear, Tess suppressed her sense of foreboding – and readjusted her sights. This was just a bad party, after all. Tess had surfaced at enough of these to know standard procedure, namely finish her gin, and wait for Miller to come pick her up.

She wouldn’t tell Selleck that, though. The officer looked the sort that thought
all
women needed rescuing – preferably by men with clean hair and under-arm spray. In honour of the ‘solemn’ occasion, he’d put on a dark suit, and run a bit of oil through his hair. He looked like a naff James Bond, Tess thought. Then he raised his glass, and nearly took his front teeth out, and she realized he might need saving as much as her. ‘What are
you
doing here?’ she asked.

“Working. Sensitive media situation like this, Boss needs a man on the ground.”

“More liaising?”

He nodded, then looked sharply over his shoulder, as if he’d been tasked to drink with the devil. And then some.

Though the walls of the Soho Club were oak-panelled, and encasing an elegant arrangement of leather sofas and low-set drinks tables, the vibe was hellish – and hot. Flames leapt in huge, onyx fireplaces; black candelabra coiled overhead, as if ready to spit. The only bright points in the gloom were the whites of frightened eyes, realized Tess. The celebrity crush was an ugly one.

Moving a fraction closer to the Detective Sergeant, she watched with him. Sweaty soap stars, tending to fat, rubbed up against artificially-bronzed TV presenters – men with veneered teeth, and women with hair weighing more than their bodies. Tess spotted a former Dr Who, looking alone and anguished by a pot-plant. At the bar, she watched a long-faded film star sporting for a fight. The sound of smug voices swelled–’bastard Ofcom’ – ‘bollocks ratings’–’I was sorry for her, obviously, but what could I say? There’ll be other pregnancies, love, but you’ll never get another shot at Celebrity Cook-Off.”

A howl of gleeful outrage went up – an ageing newsreader was squeezing the breast of a teenage pop-star. Across the room, a BBC boss forced a shriek of laughter from a middle-aged actress, trapped in a failing show. At the heart of it was Sandy Plimpton, her eyes bright, her chins pulsing. Squeezed into something expensive and black, she was receiving tribute from the same industry folk who’d blanked her so solicitously through the past year of
Stop the World’
s decline. Close by was Rod Peacock, holding court from a huge, leather armchair. Acolytes surrounded him – crouching producers, hidden ‘talent’ – and he rewarded them with sporadic roars of laughter, throwing back his head and shaking his sandy, corkscrew perm. The King of the Jungle was back, thought Tess, any sign of fear gone.

“I see Peacock’s recovered,” said Selleck.

So he’d noticed it too? Tess was so gratified, she gave a bit back. “Rod’s a businessman,” she explained. “In another life, he’d be selling cars. Tonight, he’s trafficking talent – trading dreams and youth for cash and a gold handcuffs deal. It requires equal parts ruthlessness and bonhomie, putting him somewhere between Noddy Holder and Scarface.”

“Go on.”

Encouraged by the officer’s interest, Tess went on to identify various of the commissioning editors and development execs ranged round Rod. “The rest – the ones with less clothes on – you won’t have heard of.”

“No?”

“Not yet. They’re his latest signings. That’s why they’re 12, and crouching at his feet. Rod will put them up for a few screen-tests, and see how they do. If they’re lucky, they might land an ITV2 presenting gig.”

“If not?”

Tess considered the beautiful youngsters hanging over Rod’s lap. “The Adult Channel maybe?” she said. “Or Nick Junior?”

“This one here is Carly.” Shouting over the din, Rod shoved a dimpling blonde at a BBC commissioning editor. “Lovely in’t she? Natural energy. Joomp up and down, Carly, show him yer CBeebies. Dean now, he’s more Factual.” He prodded at a muscular young man with bleached hair and few clothes. “Take off yer top, Dean, will yer? Stretch a bit, that’s right. Now give us the weather.”

Tess looked away. She would be a part of it. (Plus she was starting to think she may have snogged Dean, a few months ago, round the back of Leicester Square). “You’re not the only one working here tonight,” she turned to Selleck. “Sandy Plimpton is exploiting Jeenie’s murder to bump up her ratings. Rod Peacock’s using it as shameless stunt to promote his surviving clients.”

She’d spoken too soon, however, and too loudly. A skinny, pinch-faced brunette was leaving her place by Rod’s side, and heading their way.

Cleo Ashanti was Rod’s personal assistant. A former catwalk model, she’d developed simultaneously a deep loathing for humanity and the ability to gush all over it. “Tess, darling, so good to see you – and so
much
of you at that!” Kissing the air somewhere to the left of Tess’ head, she ran a critical eye over her funeral clothes. (Never one for prolonged considerations as to dress, Tess had stomped around her bedroom this morning, cursing and spilling coffee, before plunging into her ‘capsule wardrobe’ aka ‘pile on floor’. She’d come up with black leather knee-boots, black leather mini-skirt and a too-tight, purple ruffle shirt. She’d bought the boots from a charity shop, the skirt from Camden Market, and the too-tight ruffle shirt… Christ knows. From the smell of rum and dope increasingly coming off its ruffles, however, Tess was starting to suspect it had been abandoned by some pigeon-chested pull… the kind she tended to eject from her flat before he could, strictly-speaking, get dressed again).

“Bit
minimal
for mourning, isn’t it?” said Cleo. “Not that your handsome friend here is complaining, I’m sure.” One look from Cleo, however, and Selleck was backing away to the bar, mumbling something about a mineral water. “He’s a cut above your usual escort.”

“He’s a policeman,” said Tess, and watched her mean, feline eyes widen with fear. Welsh Di had told Tess all about Cleo Ashanti’s modelling days – the trips to Paris, the parties in New York, the heroin addiction. (“She only took it to keep the weight off, mind.
Toppling
off them catwalks by the end, she was; had lawyers fighting to keep her outta court. She’s better now though, I think – just has a puke like the rest of them.”)

Cleo didn’t strike Tess as a leopard who’d much-changed her spots, however. (She didn’t care what Welsh Di said, that skinny
couldn’t
be legit). “DS Selleck was just saying he wanted a word with you,” she told Cleo. “I’ve got your back though, don’t you worry. I’ll tell him you had to take off – you’re needed at AA – just answer me one question, yeh?”

But Cleo was already giving her the bony shoulder. “Ask me what you like,” she said. “The answer’s
fuck right off.
” Turning, however, she collided with a waiter. He was weaving through the throng with a tray of exotic Thai nibbles.

Tess grabbed her chance – and a handful of prawn crackers. “Answer a couple of civil questions.” She raised her fist to Cleo’s chin. “Or I’ll fucking feed you.”

Cleo’s dread of the police was matched only by her fear of accidentally eating. The former model twisted her face away. For a second, it was knives drawn – just two women and the scent of sweet fat – then, almost imperceptibly, Cleo gave Tess the nod to proceed.

“The Monday Jeenie was killed,” said Tess. “Did you change her travel arrangements? Did you send an earlier car to take her to the
Pardon My Garden
shoot?”

“No, I bloody didn’t,” she hissed. “I’m an agent. I supervise celebrity careers
not
car hire, as I told
your
people when
they
called to shift her pick-up times.”

“You–? My people did
what?
”

Seeing Tess’ confusion, Cleo relaxed. She pushed Tess’ hand down, and, checking Selleck was still at the bar, proceeded to explain – in withering detail – how little Tess knew. On the Friday afternoon before Jeenie’s death, Cleo had taken a call from someone claiming to represent
Pardon My Garden
. They’d told her of a last-minute change to Monday’s shoot: Jeenie’s call time had been brought forward and a car would collect her at the new,
earlier
time of 6.15am.
Aware no such call had come from
her
production team, (Friday afternoon? They’d been in the pub), Tess asked if Cleo had recognised the voice. “Of course not,” she said. “You know I don’t talk to civilians if I can help it – and no, before you ask, I didn’t ask the caller’s name. They could have been a man, woman or dog for all I cared. I
did
pass the message on to Jeenie, however, and now I
must
get back to Rod. He needs me.”