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Overview
It would be the height of British understatement to say that retired surgeon Charles Bromley and his step-daughter Antonia Halliday do not have the rosiest of relationships. After all, Antonia did accuse him of intentionally botching her father’s surgery so that he could marry her rich, widowed mother. Now Antonia has been found murdered on the grounds of Bromley Manor, and Charles isn’t exactly stricken with grief. He’s plenty upset, however, by the disruptions caused by DCI Neil Paget and his team as they investigate the crime.
While Bromley complains to Paget’s superiors, Paget forges on with the investigation, doggedly uncovering a nest of nasty family secrets. Though he is warned to tread lightly, nothing will stop him from getting to the bottom of this perplexing case before the killer decides to tie up loose ends.
Product Details
| ISBN-13: | 9781780103808 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | Severn House Publishers |
| Publication date: | 09/01/2018 |
| Series: | The Neil Paget Mysteries , #9 |
| Sold by: | Barnes & Noble |
| Format: | eBook |
| Pages: | 240 |
| File size: | 760 KB |
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CHAPTER 1
Thursday, September 8th
Antonia Halliday pushed the rolled-up paper serviette across the table, then withdrew her hand quickly and dropped it into her lap as if to distance herself from the action. 'I know it's only a ring,' she said defensively, 'but honestly, Simon, it's the best I could do. I mean, she does have a lot of jewellery, and she's careless with it, but she's bound to realize that some of it is missing sooner or later. And those are diamonds.'
Simon Conroy's dark eyes continued to hold her own as he palmed the serviette and put it in his pocket. 'And stop looking at me like that,' she said petulantly. 'You've no idea what it's like to be stuck out there in that Godforsaken place. It's been eight boring weeks, and —'
'Seven.'
'And five days,' she shot back. Tears of frustration glistened in the corners of her eyes. 'And I'm bloody well fed up with it. It isn't working and I want to go back to London.'
'And live on what?' he asked mildly. 'Remember what it was like before? Remember how you were living? That money belongs to you, Toni. It's yours, you deserve it. A few more weeks and I'm sure your mother will —'
'A few more weeks?' The very thought chilled her. 'Impossible!' she said. 'I've tried everything, but every time I think I have her convinced, she starts talking about my settling down with them out there and becoming a real family. God! If she only knew how much I hate that place, and how much I despise her. And then there's Charles. He's always there, hovering in the background like some sort of guardian angel, and I know he's not buying it. It just might work if he weren't there, but he isn't going to budge.'
'I know it's hard, love,' he said soothingly, 'but we knew it would take time. And if it's happy families she wants, then give it to her. You won't have to put up with it for long, and once she loosens the purse strings, you can do what the hell you like.'
Conroy reached across the table, his hand palm upward in a silent invitation for her to put her hand in his. Almost against her will, she slid her hand across the polished wood; their fingers touched. His hand was warm. She looked into his eyes, and suddenly everything she had planned to say melted away. She squeezed her eyes shut. It wasn't fair, but she knew what his response would be, and she couldn't risk losing him. He was her lifeline, and she needed him more than she had ever needed anyone before. She sucked in her breath. Thank God she hadn't told him ...
She felt the tug of his hand. 'Toni ...? Are you listening to me?' His voice was sharp. Like that of a teacher she'd once had. Sharp, with a hint of warning.
She opened her eyes. 'Yes, yes, of course, Simon. Sorry. I was just —'
'You've been drinking,' he accused.
'Just one before lunch,' she lied. 'Honestly, Simon, it was just one. You were late and I was afraid you weren't coming ...' She shrugged an apology.
Conroy released her hand and sat back in his chair. 'Oh, Toni,' he said despairingly. 'I am so disappointed in you. Do you really want to throw everything away for the sake of a few drinks when you know what they do to you? Well, do you?' he prompted harshly when she didn't answer.
Toni bit her lip. If only she could make him understand how hard it was. She shook her head. 'I am trying,' she whispered, 'I really am. It's just ...'
He sighed heavily. 'I had such faith in you,' he said sorrowfully, 'but perhaps it was too much to ask. I've tried my best to help you, I really have, love, but if you simply can't do it, then there's not much point in carrying on, is there?' He dropped his crumpled serviette on his plate and started to rise.
'No! Don't go, Simon. Please don't go.' Panic gripped her. She could hardly breathe. 'I can do it, Simon. Honestly, I won't let you down. Please, Simon?'
He pursed his lips, eyes narrowed as he studied her. She forced herself to hold his gaze, afraid that if she so much as blinked he might leave.
'Well,' he said diffidently, settling back in his chair. 'If you really think you can; if you're sure ...?'
She nodded vigorously and allowed herself to breathe again. 'I am, Simon, I am sure. I won't let you down. I swear. It's just that it's taking so long and I feel so alone out there.' She knew she was babbling but she couldn't seem to stop. 'If it wasn't for our time together I don't know what – are you sure you couldn't make it every week? Two weeks is such a long time, and I do miss you, Simon. It would mean so much to me if —' She stopped. The lines around his eyes and mouth were beginning to set in a mould she'd seen before. 'Sorry,' she said hastily. 'I know you're busy; I didn't mean to upset ... I shouldn't have asked. Let's just enjoy the afternoon.'
'Not today, I'm afraid,' he said perfunctorily. 'I can't stay. I have other commitments, so I'll give you this now.' He took a slim brown envelope from his jacket pocket and slid it across the table. 'But remember,' he warned. 'It has to last you for two weeks, so use it sparingly.'
Toni picked up the envelope. Her eyes widened in alarm. 'You can't be serious,' she breathed. 'There's hardly anything in here. I can't ...' Her eyes filled with tears. 'For God's sake, Simon,' she pleaded. 'The ring is worth a lot more than that! I need it!'
He shook his head. 'Think of it as a reminder,' he said as he pushed his chair back and stood up. 'A reminder of what it will be like if you can't afford it. It will help you focus.' He looked at his watch. 'Now, I do have to go.'
'But what about this afternoon?'
'Sorry, love, I told you, I have commitments here until the evening, and I have to get back to London tonight.'
'But ...' she swallowed hard, 'I've booked the room.'
'Then you'll just have to unbook it, won't you, love?' He took out his wallet and laid several notes beside his plate, then came around the table to put his hands on her shoulders. She reached up to clutch them tightly, bending her head back to look up at him. 'Please, Simon,' she whispered, 'if it's only for an hour I'll understand.'
'There's nothing I'd like better, love, you know that,' he said, withdrawing his hands. 'But I have to go.' He bent to brush her hair with his lips. 'I'll ring you tomorrow.'
Toni pushed back her chair. 'At least I can come with you to the ...' she began, only to see he was already halfway to the door.
She sank back in her seat. There were tears in her eyes as she watched him go. Perhaps she should have told him. It might have made a difference. But deep down she had the feeling that it would only have made matters worse. You never knew with Simon. Toni brushed the tears from her eyes and sighed heavily as she slipped the envelope into her handbag, along with the two peppermints that came with the bill. She looked at the bill, then counted the money he'd left behind. It was too much. She took out five pounds and put the rest back beside his plate. It wouldn't leave much of a tip, but why should the waitress have it anyway? The service hadn't been that good.
Toni looked at her watch. So what to do for the rest of the afternoon? There was nothing she wanted to do in town, so she might as well go back home. 'Home,' she mouthed bitterly as she pushed her chair back and stood up. 'Not for long if I have anything to do with it.'
She started toward the door, then stopped. On the other hand, why should she go back before she had to? The bar was open, and she needed to try to relax. Just one, she told herself, mindful of Simon's warning. She'd sit in the lounge and make it last. Just one wouldn't hurt.
Dead Man's Hill the locals called it, and with good reason, although in fact two of the people who had died there in recent times were women. Steep and narrow as it wound its tortuous way from the top of the escarpment into the valley below, Dead Man's Hill had killed five people in recent times. At least, that was the way the residents of Clunbridge saw it, but police and coroners' reports were more pragmatic, referring to the events leading to the tragic deaths as driving without due care and attention, failure to take road conditions into account, and, in one case, involving an ancient lorry stacked high with bales of hay, overloading, and faulty brakes.
But the locals still blamed the hill.
Toni Halliday rarely mixed with the locals, so she wasn't aware of the hill's reputation when she started down on Thursday afternoon. Not that she would have paid any attention to warnings in any case. To her it was just another silly little country road built for wagons, not for cars. Grassy, bramble-covered banks rose high on both sides. Visibility was limited to the next sharp bend, but that didn't slow her down. Tyres screamed in protest as she flung the car around each corner, scraping against the bank before hitting the next curve and scraping the other side. So who cared? It wasn't her car, and it wasn't as if her mother couldn't afford to have the damned thing repainted. White was such a sick colour anyway.
The car shot round the last bend and Toni hunched down behind the wheel as if taking aim at the narrow bridge that would take her into Clunbridge. She grinned as a man scuttled to safety as she thundered through. She laughed out loud and turned to wave as she went by ...
'Oh, Christ!'
She grabbed the wheel and swung it hard, jabbing at the brake pedal as she tried to make the right-angled turn into Silver Street. The car jumped the kerb, trailing lines of smoking rubber down the pavement beside the high brick wall. Sparks flew as the car bounced off the wall and straightened out and began to slow. Toni threw back her head and breathed a sigh of relief. 'Made it!' she whispered shakily.
Which may have been why she didn't see the child come out of the gate and stop, eyes wide with dawning terror as the car bore down on her.
Charles Bromley, MB, ChB, FRCS, and local Justice of the Peace, rolled out another blueprint on the desk and put paperweights on each corner. Tom Houghton would be coming in a week tomorrow to shore up the kitchen garden wall and put new footings in where it joined the house. 'Underground stream, that's what it'll be,' Houghton had declared, but Charles had scoffed at the idea, pointing out that the manor had been there for close to four hundred years, and if there had been any underground streams, they would have known long before now.
Houghton hadn't argued, but had set his son to digging. He found water four feet down.
'We've seen a lot of that round here,' Houghton told him. 'Started with that earthquake at Bishop's Castle back in nineteen ninety. Shifted some of the underground streams, it did, but the only time you find out is when something like this wall starts leaning. And I don't suppose that jolt they had in Melton Mowbray in two thousand and one did us a lot of good either. Mind you, it wasn't as big, but they're funny things, earthquakes. No telling what's going on right under your feet.'
No telling indeed, and the idea that there could be more structural damage to the manor had worried Charles. But Houghton had brought in a water diviner, and it seemed that the stream had merely looped beneath the wall, and posed no threat to the house or the rest of the outbuildings. 'It'll take a bit of work,' Houghton told him, 'but it can be diverted, and we'll see if we can straighten that wall up at the same time.'
'And thank God for that,' Charles muttered as he continued to look at the blueprint. But at what cost? It seemed there was always something to get in the way of completing the work that still needed to be done on the chapel. It was taking so much longer than he'd thought it would because of things like this, and there were days when he felt like giving up, abandoning the whole project. But then, as always, he reminded himself that he'd made a solemn promise, and he intended to carry it out, no matter how long it might take or how much it might cost.
The crunch of tyres on the gravelled driveway leading to the stables behind the house drew him to the window. A car he didn't recognize, sporty with lots of chrome, slid past his line of vision and stopped just past the side door. The driver clambered out.
Charles didn't recognize the man at first. With his head down and holding a broad-brimmed hat in place against a sudden squall of wind-driven rain, it was only when he seemed to sense he was being watched that he looked up and waved.
Paul? What the devil was he doing here? Charles watched with narrowed eyes as his brother made a dash for the side door. He crossed the room to the door and went out into the hall to wait for his brother to appear.
The door at the end of the hall opened, and a somewhat dishevelled Paul Bromley, minus hat and coat, came through. Younger than Charles by four years, he was a slimmer version of his brother. Tall, lean, dark-haired – compared to Charles, who was heavy set and grey – Paul, at forty-seven still had those boyish looks that seemed to attract women of all ages, and Charles couldn't help wondering if this unexpected visit had anything to do with yet another of his brother's disastrous flirtations.
'Damned strange weather for September,' Paul said as he ran his fingers through his hair. 'Cold and wet when I left London, and then the sun came out somewhere around Oxford, and it was as hot as blazes until I hit this lot a couple of miles back. Anyway, enough of that. How are you Charles? Good to see you again. You're looking chipper.'
'I'm well enough,' said Charles cautiously as he turned to lead the way into the study. 'How are things in London? You should be doing all right with the price property is fetching there these days. Care for a sherry after your long drive?'
'I'd prefer some of that twelve-year-old Glenlossie you keep tucked away at the back of the cabinet,' Paul said as he bent to study the blueprints spread out on the desk. 'Still at it, then?' he observed as Charles took out a bottle and a single glass. 'Still bent on rebuilding the chapel? Why don't you pull the damned thing down and be done with it? It never did look right when it was first built, and it's not as if you'll ever use it if you do get it done. In fact, the thing's a bloody great waste of time and money if you ask me.'
The lines around his brother's mouth tightened as he poured the whisky and handed the glass to Paul. 'I don't recall asking you,' he said. 'You've never understood, have you, Paul? I don't have a choice; I made a promise to our grandmother, and I intend to keep it. The work has to be done.'
Paul made a face as he turned away. There was nothing to be gained by going over old ground again. Charles had his own agenda, and there was nothing he could say that would change his brother's mind. He raised his glass against the light from the window. 'Lovely colour,' he said appreciatively, and downed half of it in one gulp. He grinned as he saw his brother wince. 'Good stuff, Charles,' he said. 'Gets the old blood circulating. Why don't you have some yourself?'
'I try to keep it for special occasions,' Charles said tersely, 'so go easy on it, will you? He waved a hand in the general direction of the two leather chairs beside the window. 'So, what brings you down here at this time of year? I would have thought this would be a busy season for you.'
'It is,' said Paul absently as he twirled the glass in his fingers. His face became serious. 'The fact is, I need a loan,' he said baldly, then held up his hand as he saw the look on his brother's face. 'I know what you're going to say, but just hear me out, Charles. It's not like the other times. This really is a loan. I'll be able to pay you back in a few weeks, a couple of months at the outside, but I do need it now to tide me over. As I said, it will only be for a short time, I promise. I'll pay you back.'
Charles let out a long sigh and shook his head. 'The same way you've paid me back before?' he said. 'Oh, no, Paul, I don't think so. I'm not lending you a penny. The well's gone dry as far as you're concerned.'
Paul eyed his brother stonily over the top of his glass. 'I could go to prison if I don't have the money by mid-week,' he said tightly. 'Is that what you want?' He swallowed the rest of his drink.
Charles shook his head. 'You can cut the dramatics, Paul. You seem to forget we've been through this many times, and I'm not falling for yet another of your stories.'
(Continues…)
Excerpted from "In The Shadow of Evil"
by .
Copyright © 2012 Frank Smith.
Excerpted by permission of Severn House Publishers Limited.
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