Driving into Darkness (DI Angus Henderson 2) (10 page)

‘Thirty-love,’ he said aloud, hoping his voice didn’t betray the smugness he felt. He hadn’t been ahead much in this game and part of him wanted to savour it. He served again, but Suki’s return landed well away from his racket and the desire to reach it left him panting. The same thing happened with the next three balls and it sealed her victory. It hurt him to admit it, but he had been beaten by a better player.

William Lawton could run Suki close but she always seemed to have an extra reserve to draw on, and even on those odd occasions when he played well, she could always go that little bit further. After two sets, Suki still looked gorgeous and when she released the sweaty headband and shook out her curly, golden-coloured locks, a younger man than him might interpret such a gesture as a come-on.

She had always been a good tennis player and had received coaching from the age of eight, but now about to turn thirty and having spent too many years as a London socialite, partying hard and staying out much later than was good for her, he hoped it would slow her down, weaken her game and give him half a chance but alas, not today.

Her father, Sir Mathew Markham cheered heartily from his seat beside the net, a good place to spot any cheating, he said but Lawton suspected it was to admire his daughter’s play and follow every shot she made, as the old man was convinced his daughter walked on water.

It was not unreasonable to expect the recipient of such unstinting adoration, not to mention a haloed place in industrial history with the first million selling, British-made microprocessor named after her, to be an arrogant prig or a spoiled brat, but Suki Markham was neither of these things.

‘Well played Suki, yet again,’ Lawton said as he shook her hand across the net.

She leaned over and kissed him on the cheek. ‘Bad luck William, you ran me close a couple of times, especially at the start of the second set.’

‘Yes, but not close enough,’ he said as he flopped down on a hard metal chair beside Sir Mathew. He reached for a glass of barley water.

‘I’m pooped, Mathew,’ he said putting the glass to his lips and taking a long gulp. ‘Thank God I don’t play Suki every day of the week.’

‘You need to think more about your opponent William, seek out her weaknesses and exploit them. It’s just like business.’

‘Yes, but as we know, Suki doesn’t have any weaknesses.’

‘Yes, you do darling, don’t you.’

‘Well–’

‘She doesn’t like the ball coming towards her face, she hates receiving a backhand slice that’s bouncing awkwardly and you can always lob her as she’s not so tall.’

‘Don’t give away all my secrets Daddy, William might win and it won’t only be me who’s devastated.’

Lawton listened as they moved into one of their little father-daughter exchanges, she playing the old man but not wanted to hurt him, while he tried to avoid questioning her lifestyle, as a wrong word could send her into a strop for the rest of the evening or away to her car and back to London.

Lawton often visited the Markham household on a Sunday afternoon, although not as often as in the early days, when the company was growing rapidly and they would spend every waking hour discussing issues and fighting the many fires the business threw up. Nowadays, they would sit in the garden with a glass of chilled wine or have a genial discussion in the library while drinking fine whisky and listening to one of Mathew’s Mozart CDs.

Mathew was too old to play now, so whenever Suki came to Ditchling and stayed for the weekend, Lawton made a point of being there and giving her a game. He tried to get his son Ben interested, but even the attraction of becoming the envy of all his friends for appearing on the same court as a celebrity ‘it-girl,’ wearing only a short, frilly skirt and a tight polo shirt, and who would give him a kiss and a hug at the end of the match, couldn’t persuade him. He was starting to think the boy was gay.

Being the beautiful and sexy daughter of one of Britain’s leading entrepreneurs and thinkers on innovation, who at one time was never away from television screens receiving one award or another, attending meetings with government ministers, or being interrogated harshly by some old growler on Newsnight, she had become cannon fodder for the red tops for close on ten years. When she wasn’t being photographed flashing her knickers, falling out of a taxi as pissed as a newt, she was on the arm of the latest movie sensation, pop star, or God-forbid, a tattooed footballer with more brains in his boots than between his ears.

By four o’clock, it was beginning to cool but it was an effort for Lawton to rise from his seat and help pack everything away. He carried the balls and rackets to the little pavilion at the far end of the court, a place where the old man used to find himself in the evening, as his second ex-wife, couldn’t stand the smell of cigar smoke. Lawton was at pains to point out that it was made from varnished wood and would go up like the Ariane Space Rocket if ever he fell asleep and dropped a lit cigar. The annoying bitch, who took an instant dislike to Lawton at their first meeting, ran off with her hairdresser before the old man ever succumbed to such a doomsday scenario and now he could smoke wherever he damn-well pleased.

Suki busied herself in the kitchen, preparing the evening meal while the men made their way into the library. Lawton poured two whiskies while Markham slumped into his favourite chair, as if it was he who had played two sets against a semi-pro tennis player. He was getting plumper by the week, which wasn’t surprising as he had little to do now he was retired, whereas at work he buzzed around like a queen bee, fearful a new development would take root and grow without his input.

‘Make mine a large one, William, I always feel more relaxed when Suki’s around.’

He picked up the drinks and handed one to Markham. Before sitting, Lawton walked behind the small settee and nudged it a little closer to his host, to save him raising his voice or repeating his last comment, as the old boy was in vain denial about his growing deafness.

He took a seat. ‘Have you had any interest in the house yet?’

‘Funny you should ask. Do you remember the author who viewed the house a week or two ago, the one I said didn’t seem interested on account of the garden being too large or something...’

‘Yes, I do, the guy who writes all those gory crime novels. What's his name again...ah yes, Phillip Jones.’

‘Yes, him. Well, he came back to see it. I’ve never read any of his stuff though, have you?’

‘Never seem to find the time myself but Stephanie devours books and loves reading his, the more gruesome the better.’

‘Perhaps I could get his autograph for her.’ He paused for a moment. ‘Do authors do these sort of things, you know, sign autographs? I don’t think of them as celebrities. Are they?’

‘I imagine such a sobriquet is restricted to pop stars, movie and television actors, and footballers. If you want to know, ask Suki as she knows more about those sorts of things than you or I.’

Markham gave him a reproachful look which seemed to say, ‘Don't go there.’

‘This author fellow came back to see the house on Friday afternoon and said he liked it. Then, this morning and out of the blue, his estate agent phoned to say he’s putting in an offer.’

‘What great news. Is he part of a chain?’

‘He’s much too rich to bother about a chain. According to the agent, if he can’t sell, he’ll move anyway.’

‘I’m pleased for you as this place is much too big for one person. Has he agreed to pay your asking price?’

He nodded into his whisky glass. He was happy to talk about the results of the business, or intimate details of strategy on national television and at an international convention, but he became coy and defensive when the conversation turned to personal things like money. He seemed to forget, sitting opposite was someone he had known for twenty-odd years, a person fully aware of what his salary and bonuses were while he was working and indeed, the size of the pension he received now.

‘Will you be sad to leave this house?’

His eyes darkened. He bought Stavely House as a wedding present for his second wife, Olivia as it was the one house in the village she really loved and he saw it as a convenient way to make a fresh start after the break-up of his 23-year relationship with his first wife, Lucinda. The newly-weds took to their new house with gusto, demolishing walls, extending rooms, and building the tennis court, and for over six months, they couldn't entertain visitors due to the amount of rubble and dust and instead, often relied on the kindness of others for a decent evening meal.

‘I don’t know,’ he said, turning the glass around and around in his hand. ‘I love this place and have many happy memories here, but I don’t think I can say the same for Suki, Jackson, and Hamish. They were all grown up by the time I bought it and living elsewhere.’

‘Yes, I know.’

‘You see, when they talk of ‘home’ or recall favourite childhood memories, it’s Lavender Cottage they mean, not this house.’

‘So why don’t you try and buy Lavender Cottage? It would suit you better than a big house like this.’

His face lit up under his well-trimmed beard. ‘What a great idea, William. I think I might just do that.’ He raised his glass in salute. ‘Well done. It looks like I’m not the only ideas man in the company after all.’

They chatted a while longer before Lawton decided he needed to go. His wife Stephanie always made a roast on Sunday evening, and life wouldn’t be worth living if he arrived home late. A couple of years back, she had the temerity to give him a bollocking after he and Markham worked the weekend negotiating with a Japanese phone company that wanted to be the first to install a new family of microprocessors. The deal was hugely successful and made the Markham company millions and as a result, he received a large bonus, which paid for the villa in Spain that Stephanie so loved.

He arrived back at Lawton Towers, or Beechwood Farm, as the Post Office called it, at six and after kissing his wife and complimenting her on the delicious aromas coming out of the kitchen, although no match for the ones coming out of Suki’s, he climbed the stairs to check on the kids.

Ben was in his room playing his X-Box and grunted a greeting as he dismembered four aliens, scattering body parts all over the place with a monstrous gun even Arnold Schwarzenegger couldn’t lift. Haley gave out a hysterical shriek when he opened her bedroom door and barred him from entering, as she was having a girlie get together with two friends, Jessie and Izzy, the three of them sitting on the bed and staring at something on her laptop that was making them cringe in horror.

He ambled downstairs to find the Sunday papers when Gizmo their Border Collie padded up, tail wagging, a signal to him that she wanted to go out for a walk. He always walked the dog on Sunday evenings, but for once he hoped one of the kids might have done it. He felt tired and listless after his earlier run-around on the tennis court, and all he wanted to do now was disappear into his study and read the papers or surf the web, a cool beer by his side. It was true what they said in the education pages of the Daily Telegraph, teenagers were a selfish lot and once inside their bubble, there was nothing he or anybody else could do to get them out.

He picked up a warmer jacket than the one he was wearing earlier, as the weak sun disappeared behind a big cloud over an hour ago, and it wasn’t coming back. With some reluctance, he removed the dog’s lead from the coat stand in the hall, called a general ‘goodbye’ to anyone listening, which was most likely no one as even Stephanie had the television volume up so loud she couldn’t hear him, and headed outside.

Beechwood was set in five acres, most of which was woodland, a large field with stables and paddocks for Haley’s horses, and a stream, reputed to contain trout. He didn’t know for sure as he had no interest in fishing, and wasn’t convinced he could tell the difference between a trout and a salmon, unless it was being served up to him in a restaurant or lying on a slab at the fishmonger counter in Sainsbury’s.

This evening, he needed a long, slow walk to exorcise the negative thoughts swimming around his brain like the aforementioned trout, and rather than taking a leisurely meander through the grounds as he often did, he climbed the fence at the back of the property and began walking through a working forest belonging to the Forestry Commission.

He hoped a long walk would get the comment Markham made earlier in the library out of his system, but it didn’t. Sir Mathew would always think
he
was the brains behind the company and he, William Lawton was nothing more than his sidekick, the warm-up man whose job it was to get the audience in the right frame of mind before the arrival of the great man.

When he met Dominic Green, he was told that Green would only participate in his consortium if he could buy Markham House for redevelopment. He always wanted the building, he said, ever since Sir Mathew out-bid him for it all those years ago, as it was located in a smart residential street where a block of Green’s executive flats would not look out of place.

When Lawton first heard his terms, he was appalled and told him it was a step too far, as they had spent enormous amounts of time and money remodelling the building to suit their specific requirements. Now, thinking about it, he realised the building was not the ivory tower he once thought, as they could still do their top-quality work in a purpose-built unit on an industrial estate on the edge of Brighton, or in Burgess Hill beside the rest of the Markham workforce. With all the money pouring in from the Project Kratos, perhaps it was even time to move to Cambridge and be among their rivals in the industry, basking in the glory of peer envy.