It was late, the girls would be in bed. Clare was likely to be in her bed too, but she wouldn’t be asleep. She didn’t sleep when he was working late. She propped herself up on cushions, a book on show but not being read, and rehearsed her recriminations.
As Valentine pulled into the drive he noticed a light burning in the new extension. For years Clare had campaigned for extra space but it had taken his father’s decline in health to turn the wish to a necessity. Four months had passed since the building work finished but the DI still wasn’t sure he had done the right thing. Clare was happy to have a bigger home, had delighted in being able to match their neighbours for once, but the place had changed. The combination of having his father home and the girls growing up made Clare introspective and it worried Valentine.
The hallway sat in darkness, only a little light seeping through from the kitchen at the back of the house. He was used to coming home to silence, of having to remove his shoes so as not to wake the girls and to give Clare a chance to go to sleep now he was home. He followed the light to the kitchen and on to his father’s room where he tapped the door frame.
‘Hello, Dad.’
‘Oh, hello. I thought you were on an all-nighter.’
‘No. Done as much as I can.’
His father sat in front of him with a cup of tea. ‘Kettle’s still warm, want a drink?’
‘No, I’m OK.’ He moved into the room, pulled out a chair. ‘How was Chloe?’
‘She was amazing!’ His father’s heavy eyes widened as he spoke.
‘Really, she was that good?’
‘Oh, yes. A star is born.’ He picked up his cup, plugged his mouth. When he spoke again, the subject had changed. ‘It must have been serious them dragging you away like that.’
‘About as serious as it gets.’
‘I don’t know what this town is coming to, I’m just glad your mother isn’t around to see it. Mind you, it’s the girls I worry about.’ He raised the cup again.
‘How was Clare, you know, about me leaving in a hurry?’
‘She was fine.’
‘I doubt that, Dad.’
‘Well, she gets a little worked up now and again, but it’s just because she cares. She wants the family together, wants you to see more of the girls, you can’t blame her for that.’
‘No. I can’t blame her for that.’
Since he had moved in, his father had become like a resident counsellor, listening to everyone’s concerns and making sure each party considered them. Valentine didn’t object because his father had already saved his marriage once and he hoped the experience might confer some wisdom on him. There were times when so many competing challenges assailed his mind that clear thought became impossible. The job took priority and family suffered, most of the time. His father would never get into that situation, and he envied and admired that.
‘Still, who am I to tell you how to run your life? I’m just a house guest.’
‘You’re family, Dad.’
‘No. Clare and the girls are your family.’
‘Don’t let Clare hear you say that, her days revolve around getting the lot of us to sit down to dinner together.’
‘She’s a nest builder.’
The term lodged itself with his current thoughts, it wasn’t welcome, made him think he might be the very opposite. By looking out for other families, had he neglected his own? Surely a father’s priorities should stop at his front door, didn’t everyone else’s? ‘I really should get to bed now.’
‘You get some sleep, son.’
Clare turned the light out and faced the wall as Valentine entered the bedroom. He undressed in the dark, as noiselessly as possible, though not without stubbing a toe on the dresser.
‘Christ above.’
‘You’ll wake the house,’ said Clare.
‘What if I’ve broken my toe?’
‘You’ll be driving yourself to hospital.’
He sat on the bed, rubbing his toe. ‘I’m just back from there.’
‘What?’ Clare turned round.
‘Not for me, for work.’
‘Oh, I see.’
‘I didn’t mean to give you a fright.’
‘You mean you don’t want me to worry about you. My husband with his damaged heart, who nearly died on the job, who leaves his family to run to the latest crime scene.’
Valentine reclined on the bed. ‘We’ve spoke about this, Clare. I have a job to do.’
‘You have a family too.’
There was no point in arguing with her, the conversation had been covered before. The only reply Clare wanted to hear was one that he could not give her. Not now the girls were heading for university and his father was living with them in an expensive new extension. ‘A man died tonight. And an old lady. They had family too.’
‘Not your family.’
‘Have you any idea how cold that sounds?’
Clare spun round and pulled the light on. ‘Don’t give me that, Bob. I’m not going to listen to the public service broadcast anymore. It’s all very sad that we live in a world where people are running around killing each other but there is nothing I can do about that and very little that you or anyone else can. You have a family, a wife, two beautiful daughters who worship you, and an elderly father who won’t be around for ever. It’s about time you started devoting some of your precious time – and I mean precious, you are not well enough for this either – to your own people. You need to understand that because if you don’t then your next shock might be the last.’
The light went out and Clare moved to her side of the bed.
Valentine didn’t consider a reply because there was nothing he could say that hadn’t already been said. When he came home with a blue folder under his arm, his first day of active policing after the stabbing, she cried. Just seeing that small oblong of cardboard meant days filled with worry and nights without sleep when she didn’t know if her husband was alive or dead.
He didn’t want to hurt Clare but what choice did he have? There was only one way to conduct a murder investigation and that was by devoting himself to it. He couldn’t leave the station and forget about the case. Two people had died now. They deserved better.
As he closed his eyes and tried for sleep the detective pressed the thick ridge of flesh in the centre of his chest. The scar tissue was hard, a bulging seam that marked the point where death had touched him. So much had changed since that day, he had questioned everything about his life, but he had resolved nothing. Clare was right, the time for answers was coming.
10
Darren Millar’s journey from the east coast to the west was filled with panic. Since fleeing Glencorse Barracks, without permission, he expected to be identified every time he turned onto a new street. People were staring, hostile. To avoid scrutiny he waited outside Penicuik bus station in the rain, rather than under the sheltered roof of the depot. His nervousness peaked when he joined the queue on the concourse but as the bus finally departed he got a fleeting sense of freedom. The delusion was soon replaced by serious nervousness as the journey progressed. Stomach cramps and incessant worry arrived. This wasn’t the same as the early panic that he might get caught, and returned to barracks for a kicking, but a sustained and terrible fear his family wouldn’t survive without him.
Jade was always a worry, but weren’t all little sisters like that? He expected his friend Finnie to look out for her, to make sure she went to school and didn’t stay out all night, but that clearly hadn’t been happening. He wouldn’t be escaping barracks and rushing home, or fielding phone calls and text messages from Jade – some into the wee hours – if everything was OK.
His mother had said that Jade needed help. She was too young to understand what losing Dad meant at the time, but as she got older the realisation that she no longer had a father was always going to cause problems. ‘Being a teenager was hard enough,’ Mum said at the time and Darren knew she was right.