Ice Blue (11 page)

“I’m not – oh, fair enough,” she said. “I am.
Probably look like something the cat coughed up. I was up most of
the night, worried about Henry.”

“Henry is … your brother?”

“My nephew. The eight-year-old. Yesterday,
his headmaster told me he’s been skeeving off his classes and
hiding in the library, making excuses to avoid the other students.
Apparently he’s being bullied something awful. Mostly verbal, which
means there isn’t a damn thing the school will do about it. They
practically blame Henry for not being tough enough to stop it
himself. All this time, I thought Henry was doing great. Turns out
he’s miserable, and doing so badly, he may fail his year and have
to repeat. I always knew being Ritchie’s sister was tough, but I
thought being Henry’s aunt was a piece of cake. I had no idea he
was drowning at school,” Kate said, mouth contorting as she
controlled herself. “I’m useless! Some mum I’ll be.”

Hetheridge found himself without an idea what
to say. After a moment, he settled for the absolute truth. “You’ll
be one hell of a detective.”

Kate stared at him. Then she wiped her eyes,
sniffed, and gave a high-pitched little cry of a laugh. “Shit.
Would it kill you to say I
am
one hell of a
detective? Even if it isn’t quite true?”

Hetheridge smiled. “You prefer men who
lie?”

When she laughed again, it was softer, and
with full control. “It’s all I know.”

“Must be why you enjoy practicing the martial
arts so much. One of the first things I noticed in your file,”
Hetheridge said. “You’re ranked at the top of the Yard’s female
detectives.”

“Yeah, well, they’re not an athletic bunch.
Eating Pop-Tarts every day and smoking between training sessions,”
Kate said. “I’m great at defense. I can immobilize blokes three
times my size. Offense is more of a challenge. Apparently, I suffer
from bad form. What about you? Bhar told me you’re a champion
duelist.”

“Fencing,” Hetheridge said. “Pastime of
mine.”

“I thought you were going to say,
passion.”

Hetheridge stared back at her. He was aware
of the distance between them, the drape of her shirt over her
breasts, the smooth expanse of her skin. “I have no passions.”

“That’s it. Lie to me,” Kate said. “And show
me the house while you’re at it. I’ve always wondered how a baron
lives.”

Hetheridge, who had never before undertaken
such a working class ritual, rather enjoyed it, lingering in each
room as he did his best to take Kate’s mind off her nephew’s
troubles. He showed her the marble floor tiles imported from Italy,
the Vermeer that had been prized for generations (until proved a
fake) and the bedroom his great-aunt Lucy had insisted was haunted.
He even produced the Victorian chamber pot, still beneath the bed,
where Lucy had not-so-secretly stashed a whiskey bottle to fortify
herself against spectral visitations. Kate was especially delighted
by the antique telephone, non-functioning, and the antique lift,
which had been reengineered to modern standards. And unlike most of
Wellegrave’s guests, who pretended indifference their surroundings,
since commenting upon them was hopelessly ill-bred, Kate was
captivated by the lift’s scarlet carpet and brass-cage door.
Hetheridge was happy to oblige her with a ride.

“Let’s go up to the third floor. I want to
show you something.”

When the bell dinged, Hetheridge pulled aside
the cage-door, gesturing for her to exit first. He led her through
a pair of double doors into a bright, airy room with high ceilings
and a wide skylight. The walls were mirrored, and the heart-of-pine
floors were bare except for exercise equipment – an elliptical
trainer, a set of stainless steel weights, a treadmill, and a large
mat in the center of the room. The white padded mat was about two
meters wide and fourteen meters long, with an electric cord running
from one end to a wall socket.

“The electric piste,” Hetheridge said. “For
fencing with electrified swords. Less traditional but more
fun.”

“Will it zap me if I step on it?”

“Not at all. It would be fine for practicing
hand-to-hand, if I had any aptitude for such things these days.
Been many years since I was the hapless runt, getting bullied at
school.”

“Were you really bullied?” The worry returned
to Kate’s eyes, but interest flared there, too, as if she were
relieved to return to the subject.

“I was indeed. My older brother was my
protector until I was ten. Then he died in a boating accident. I
was left alone at school, smaller than most of the boys in my year,
and sad over the loss of my brother. Every day was a beating, or a
long day of avoiding a beating. Finally someone suggested I take
lessons in sport, after school and on weekends. I took to fencing.
Needless to say, I couldn’t take my epee to class, though heaven
knows I would have. But as I learned to fence, I learned how to
take hits, and give hits, and how to fall, and how to act brave
when I really wasn’t,” Hetheridge said, wondering if he’d ever
spoken to anyone in quite this way before. “By the next year, I had
no more problems with bullies.”

“That bears thinking about,” Kate said,
stepping onto the piste and bouncing lightly in her blue-striped
trainers. “All right. You’ve cleverly maneuvered me into position.
Come on. Attack me. Take me down.”

Hetheridge glanced at his Sunday attire –
crisp white shirt, tie, and razor-creased slacks. “I’m hardly
dressed for it.”

“Come on. You mentioned my standing for a
reason. Top of the women detectives, but sixteenth among both males
and females. You want to prove you’d be listed higher than me, if
you weren’t exempt from the ranking.”

“Very well.” Hetheridge studied Kate,
evaluating her size and posture. Then he went for her center mass,
intending to pin her arms and bring her to the mat. They collided,
but before he could process what was happening, his arms were
behind his back, his right shoulder was on fire, and he faced the
opposite wall. Kate’s breath was hot against his ear.

“Oi! You’re nicked,” she said.

Hetheridge went still, his right shoulder
still aching, as if further aggression on her part would separate
tendon from bone. He shuddered, trying to shake her off. Then he
began to tremble all over, his breath coming in quick, ragged
gasps.

“All you all right?” Kate diminished the
strength of her grip. “I was going to make you say something like
uncle, but – seriously, are you all right? Is it your heart? I –
oh!”

The mat came up fast, letting out its own
gasp of air as they struck, Kate first, Hetheridge on top of her.
The moment her hold had lessened, he’d abandoned the heart attack
routine, kicked her feet out from under her, and used her own
weight to spin her around and throw her down. The impact was hard,
her chin striking his chest, but he stifled a grunt of pain.

“You cheating bastard!”

“Old age and treachery will always overcome
youth and skill.” His hands were tight on her forearms, pinning her
into place; his knees were on her thighs, his greater weight
holding her down. Hetheridge meant to say more – something dry and
witty had come to him as they pitched to the mat – but the words
vanished, the cerebral replaced by the visceral. Her skin was warm
beneath his hands; he could see her pulse throbbing in her throat.
Then the wave of lust rose, filling him so fast, he almost pressed
his lips to hers, almost slid his body along the length of
hers.

“I … I apologize,” he muttered. Rolling off
her, he got to his feet as quick as his aching left knee permitted.
“I doubt I could have hurt you, but I certainly could have hurt
myself, pulling a stunt like that. I don’t know what I was
thinking.” He turned away as he spoke, pretending to fuss with his
shirt and tie, hoping the physical evidence of his sudden desire
would disappear before she noticed.

“Sorry I called you a cheating bastard,” Kate
said. He heard the mat scrape as she got to her feet. “In the heat
of the moment, I forgot our relative positions.”

So did I, Hetheridge thought, still amazed
with himself, and wondering how soon he could get Kate on her way.
So did I.

Kate stopped by a chemist’s on the way home
from Wellegrave House. She bought a Diet Coke, a box of chocolate
biscuits for Henry and Ritchie to share, and, after a long inner
debate, a home pregnancy test. She drank the soda during the drive
home, trying not to think about the pregnancy test jammed in the
bottom of her bag. That could wait until morning.

When she arrived back at the flat, Henry was
immersed in a book, and Ritchie was positioned in front of the
telly, endlessly scrolling through the onscreen guide in search of
something better. Cassie, Ritchie’s live-in assistant, was in the
kitchen, peeling potatoes over the sink. Something fragrant, like
chicken broth with rosemary, simmered on the cooker. Giving Cassie
a wave and grateful smile, Kate dropped her handbag on the living
room floor, retreated to her bedroom, and felt a wave of sleepiness
roll in like a fog. She couldn’t be a zombie tomorrow. Tomorrow she
had to be on. And right at that moment, there was nothing she
wanted more than a long, luxurious nap before dinner.

Stripping to bra and knickers, Kate wrapped
herself in her duvet and fell asleep almost immediately. She dreamt
she was working the Comfrey crime scene with Superintendent
Jackson. He was snacking on powdered doughnuts, spreading white
crumbly bits on the corpse’s hair and shoulders.

“This murder,” he pronounced, “cannot be
solved without questioning the child’s father.”

Kate started to remind him that Jules’s
father was, in fact, the dead man, when Bhar, Madge Comfrey, and
Hetheridge appeared at her elbow. Bhar, dressed in footie pjs,
clutched a battered teddy bear. Madge and Hetheridge looked
embarrassed.

“The father,” Jackson said, pointing at
Hetheridge, who in turn pointed at Madge.

“You told me you were on the pill!”

Madge shrugged. “I don’t know how our boy
turned out so dark. Doesn’t come from my side.”

Then the scene shifted, back to Wellegrave
House. They paced around the electric piste, Kate and Hetheridge,
circling like panthers – she still in her bra and knickers, he in
his tuxedo. Then he lunged for her. She could have deflected him,
but instead let his arms go around her. He gripped her hard, so
hard she fought him, his mouth pressing against hers. But then she
parted her lips, letting him in, feeling the heat of his tongue,
feeling herself—

Kate snapped back to reality – or perhaps
reality snapped back at her, popping her across the face like a wet
towel. She was in her own bedroom, a hand on her shoulder, a lanky
figure looming over the bed.

“You were moaning,” Ritchie said.

“Ritchie,” Kate groaned – the anguished
rendition of his name she emitted only when exasperated. “I’ve told
you, don’t hang over me when I sleep. Just because I move or make a
sound, that doesn’t mean for you to shake me awake.”

“You were squirming.”

“I was sleeping!” Sweeping aside the duvet,
Kate stretched, rubbed her sticky eyes, and launched herself at
Ritchie. He defended himself against her tickling with flailing
arms and high, girlish laughter. Soon they were both rolling on the
bed, tickling and mock-slapping until Henry and Cassie, drawn by
the raucous noise, arrived to choose sides in the battle. Kate was
suddenly embarrassed – Ritchie might be oblivious to her state of
undress, but Henry was getting much too old for auntie peep-shows.
Shooing everyone out, Kate got dressed. And by the time dinner was
served, she’d forgotten her dream altogether.

* * *

When Kate awoke the next morning, it was
half-five. Just enough time to pull herself together and get to the
Yard by seven. Heading for the bathroom, she nearly plopped onto
the toilet before she remembered the pregnancy test. Retrieving the
box from the depths of her handbag, she broke open the package and
scanned the instructions. Then, careful not to awaken Ritchie –
he’d fallen asleep in front of the telly again – she crept back to
the bathroom, locked the door, and peed on the stick. Forcing
herself to place it on the countertop, she brushed her teeth,
showered in just five minutes, and toweled off, eyeing the test.
The results had developed. Two pink lines.

She blotted her hair, then picked up the test
again. Definitely two pink lines. Suspecting the fluorescent light
was too harsh for an accurate reading, she carried the test to the
bedroom, pushing back the curtains. In the diluted early sunlight,
the test looked the same: two pink lines.

Replacing the toilet lid, Kate sat down on
it, naked, the test still clutched in her right hand. She felt more
disbelief than shock. It wasn’t true. It couldn’t be true. Not from
just one time, one unprotected time. The test was bad, or she’d
performed it incorrectly.

Or else it was true. Her number had come up.
In which case, she couldn’t dodge her responsibility: she needed to
swallow her pride and call Dylan.

All her dating life, Kate had been the first
to end a relationship, or else had behaved afterward as if the
breakup had been entirely her idea. She’d never rang a man after
their final argument, never “accidentally” turned up in one of his
hangouts to force a reunion, never written a soppy e-mail
rhapsodizing about happier times. Certain people in this world had
power over her. Certain people, by virtue of who they were, could
make her plead for consideration or attention. Her bosses at the
Yard were a prime example. And she’d spent years, almost as long as
she could remember, running after her mother, calling and searching
and outright begging, especially as her sister Maura turned wilder,
and Ritchie grew more and more demanding. Perhaps it was the fate
of daughters, at least daughters with siblings like Ritchie and
Maura, to grovel for every drop of maternal affection. But it was
not her fate, Kate had long ago decided, to chase men in similar
fashion. If Dylan had found a new woman, so be it. Kate would never
give him the satisfaction of knowing she missed him, even a
little.