Across the Pond
Author's Note
I do not own the main characters, I am just borrowing them. Any resemblance to real people is purely coincidental. I am not a medical professional of any kind, nor am I a lawyer or police officer, and as such I apologise for any factual mistakes I will no doubt make. I write for pleasure (mine and hopefully other people's), and would appreciate any reviews or comments. Thank you.
Sam C.
Chapter 2
"And you say you were, ah, jogging, in the woods? In the dark?" The Chief Inspector's whiny tone had begun to sound like the drone of a particularly irritating wasp's nest, and was about as welcome.
Lucy's knuckles whitened as her fingers curled tightly in front of her, though she appeared anything but tense to those who didn't know her. To the detective and the uniformed officer who had replaced the surly figure of Sergeant Smith, the young woman appeared perfectly calm, at ease in the plain surroundings of interview room three. "Yes. I was jogging. It wasn't dark when I set off, and if I hadn't found a body, I would have been back at the farm before it was dark. Detective-"
"Chief Inspector," corrected the plump, short officer haughtily with an expression of having taken great offence.
"We have been through these questions half a dozen times. I am not going to change my answers. I am still here out of respect for the police, but-"
"How did you meet Miss Thompson?"
Interrupted mid-sentence, Lucy scowled, noticing with a tinge of admiration as she did so that it had not the slightest effect on Chief Inspector Rothery. "Who the hell is that?" she asked, for a moment genuinely confused.
"Miss…Freya Thompson. The lady who was with you in the woods when you, ah, found the body."
"I ran into her."
"Where did you run into her, Miss Farinelli?" A hint of impatience was showing in the large detective's tone, but his face remained set in an annoyingly blank expression with the hint of an arrogant smirk curling the corners of his wide-lipped mouth.
"In the woods. About a minute before I found the body. I wasn't looking where I was going and I ran into her."
"And then…?"
"Then she helped me up, I found blood on my clothes and looked down and saw the body, then some maniac came down the path with a shotgun and tried to fucking strangle me. I've told you all of this already. Has your Sergeant contacted my family yet?"
"How did you get away from the person who supposedly attacked you?"
It was the 'supposedly' that tipped Lucy over the edge into blazing anger. When she spoke, it was in a low growl that gradually gained in both pitch and volume as she leaned closer to Rothery's reddened face.
"I have told you. I didn't get away. He ran away, after the woman, Miss Thompson I presume, nearly pulled his arm out of its socket. I had thrown away his fucking shotgun, he must have been injured, so the bastard turned tail and ran away. Then we phoned the goddamned police - who by the way need to seriously improve their response time where murderous maniacs are concerned - you all turned up and shoved me into the back of that rubbish heap you called a car, and here I am being asked fucking idiotic questions whilst whoever the hell slashed that woman's throat is running around the countryside free as a fucking bird!"
A long pause ticked by, where nobody spoke. Lucy's fine features were reddened with anger, her green eyes flashing as she glared at the detective opposite. Rothery regarded her mildly, one eye squinting as his glasses had slipped down at one side. When the detective spoke, it was as though Lucy's outburst had never happened.
"How did Miss Thompson seem after the assailant had left the scene?"
It was a new question, and Lucy deigned to answer it with less acidity, speaking carefully but without hesitation. "She was fine. Calm, not panicking. She said she would phone the police, and she did."
"Thank you for now, Miss Farinelli. We're going to take a break; your family should be on their way. Would you like a drink, and something to eat?" Rothery's civility had the unaccustomed effect of making Lucy feel embarrassed, and she replied with equal politeness.
"A coffee would be good, thanks."
For the briefest of moments a smile passed between the dark-haired, feisty young woman and the older, balding detective, surprising them both.
After three prolonged bouts of knocking suggested that the visitors were not about to give up, Marino finally answered the door. It was gone ten o'clock in the evening on a cold November night, and he was worried. Although Lucy Farinelli was the smartest person he knew – smarter even than her Aunt Kay, and that was saying something – she wasn't careful. Marino knew that, and so did the other occupants of the old farmhouse which Lucy had rented. Marino's main worry was that Lucy had ignored the family waiting patiently for her and gone and done her own thing, and that her aunt would be hurt. Perhaps she had decided to extend her run into the night, for Lucy would not be stopped by dark and cold if she so decided. Or maybe she had travelled into one of the towns or cities (though they were some distance away, a taxi could be called) to enjoy a night away from her family. But a nagging feeling kept on at Marino through the evening, that Lucy would have sent a text message or email at least, to say what she was doing. Marino was worried.
Benton Wesley wasn't quite as smart as Lucy or Kay, but he knew people. His job as a psychiatrist allowed him to interact with different people on many levels, and he had known Lucy for years, though not as long as Pete Marino, who had taught her to swear, shoot and drink beer, in that order. Sitting in a comfortable lounge chair by the open fire which Kay had constructed and lit, Benton leaned back, thinking. There was no great reason for an adult to be worried about another adult who had gone out and not returned promptly, for there were hundreds of reasons to explain that. But it was Lucy. When Lucy disappeared, usually it spelled trouble. In England, she didn't have her guns, her computers or her car, and this reassured Wesley greatly, but he was still concerned. He was not sure why, but he knew that his wife's niece could, and did, find trouble just about anywhere. If anything, Wesley would have guessed that Lucy simply wanted some time away from them, and he hoped that she had found a way to be alone without harm, to herself or anyone else.
Kay Scarpetta was supremely unworried on the outside, whilst a knot of tangled fears and imagined scenarios curled around her stomach inside, threatening to eject the evening's meal at any moment. More than anyone, she knew what her niece was capable of getting involved in. Lucy could be going to the shop for a can of Coke and end up shooting a participant in a hostage negotiation on the other side of the world. Or she could return from her jog smiling and red-faced, having forgotten about the time and the anxieties of her companions. The worst thing was that Kay never knew. When the insistent knocking sounded for a third time, Scarpetta snapped at Marino, who rose to answer.
In the faint light seeping out through the closed curtains of the farmhouse, two figures stood on the doorstep, and Marino knew instantly that they were cops. There was a certain posture, a projected impatience at being kept waiting yet the certain assurance that they would have waited all night if need be.
"Yeah?" growled the ex-detective, scratching at his bald head. As one, both visitors stepped forward, revealing a lanky, young man whose serious expression looked at odds with his soft, boyish features, and an older woman with more curly orange hair than Marino had seen on any clown. She spoke first.
"Good evening, I'm Detective Sergeant Smith, this is Detective Constable Goodall. May we come in?"
Her sureness and confidence conveyed arrogance to Marino. "Why?"
"Are you Mr. Marino, sir?"
"Depends. You here 'bout Lucy? 'Cause if you are, you better just tell me what's happening, right now."
Smith frowned, clearly irritated that the conversation was not going according to her script. Framed in the doorway with the light behind, Marino's bulk was several feet away, the big man leaning casually against the wall, one meaty hand propping him up. "We have Miss Farinelli in for questioning at the station. I'm afraid you're all going to have to answer a few questions -"
"I ain't gotta do nothing, Sergeant. But me bein' a decent guy and all, I reckon I'll come with you back to your little station, make sure things are being done proper, like. Is Lucy ok?"
"She is fine." Smith took a deep breath and carried on. Marino was unlike anyone she had encountered before, and though his words were less than encouraging, she decided to take a gamble, for she sensed that here was a man she needed on her side. "Miss Farinelli discovered a body in the woods, approximately one mile from here. She is perfectly alright, I assure you, and she wants to see you – all of you. I will need to ask you some questions regarding Miss Farinelli's whereabouts this evening, I'm sure you understand."
Marino's eyes narrowed, then he nodded slowly. "Yeah. Give us a minute, then we'll follow you back."
The heavy, wooden door closed and the detectives heard Marino's heavy footsteps receding into the house. Both glanced at the other as the latch clicked shut. "That went well," remarked Smith, not sure herself whether the observation was meant to be sarcastic or not. With a man like Marino, it was hard to tell how things had gone.
Whatever the tepid brown liquid was, Lucy was certain that it had never seen a coffee bean. Maybe they used those beans that were picked by monkeys, she mused, and the monkeys had decided they were fed up of all that slave labour shit and picked their own faeces instead. It certainly tasted like it. She pushed the cup to the corner of the table, resisting the urge to tip it over the edge. She had been left alone for over twenty minutes, marked only by the loud ticking of a plain, plastic clock that hung on the wall behind her.
Footsteps preceded the opening of the interview room door, and it was the Chief Inspector who entered first, followed by Smith who had obviously returned from her errand. Lucy wondered what Marino had said to her, but noticed with faint chagrin that the Sergeant's cheeks were neither cherry-red nor ghostly pale, suggesting that the Marino encounter had been less interesting than Lucy had hoped for. Once more the tape recorder was switched on (about time they switched to digital mp3 recordings as far as Lucy's technological mind was concerned) and the questioning resumed.
"Your folks are on their way," Rothery began, shifting in his seat and tugging at the seat of his trousers as he settled. "We are just asking them a few questions relating to this evening's events."
I bet you are, thought Lucy. "When can I go?" she asked politely, looking the detective right in the eye.
Meeting her cool stare, the Chief Inspector replied casually, watching the dark-haired woman with practiced interest. "Just a few more questions, Miss Farinelli. You say this was the first time you had met Miss Thompson?"
"Yes." Lucy's voice was strained, mostly because she was fighting the urge to leap up and punch her interviewer on his jowly double chin. She imagined it flapping up and down as he toppled over like a fat, badly-dressed bowling pin
"Have you heard her name mentioned before, perhaps in the Red Cow, or the Post Office?"
"No." Lucy grinned. "The local pub isn't exactly my scene, Inspector. They don't like butch foreign dykes barging in and ruining their atmosphere of petty intolerance and cosy ignorance. As for the Post Office, I went in once and it took me half an hour to get to the window, where I had to convince some ninety-year-old woman that I did actually want to change dollars into pounds and not the other way around. I didn't do a lot of chatting."
Rothery smiled despite himself. This was one remarkably intelligent, quirky young woman, he thought, phrasing his next sentences carefully. "Miss Thompson is a teacher in the local school, as was her mother before her, and she is well known, as is her family. Have you met any of them?"
"I really wouldn't know."
"I'm afraid I do, Miss Farinelli." The older policeman glanced at his Sergeant and then looked down at some papers which rested on the desk before him, before raising his head and holding out one of the documents for Lucy to take. When she did, her stomach recoiled, for it was a photograph of the dead woman she had discovered earlier that evening, this time brightly lit by the photographer's flash bulb. She saw immediately what Rothery had meant, for in the light it was impossible to miss the resemblance.
"Sister?" Lucy guessed correctly, eliciting a nod from the Chief Inspector.
"Miss Ruth Thompson, Freya Thompson's younger sister."
"Does she know – Freya, I mean?" There was a concern in Lucy's voice that Rothery noticed, one which he had not expected and resolved to explore further when the time was right. For now, he answered softly.
"Miss Thompson has identified her sister's body and is being allowed home, having refused the offers of counselling and a lift home. You are also free to go now, though I expect we will have more questions for you as the enquiry progresses."
As Lucy made her way out, collecting her belongings and signing forms, her thoughts were on one thing, one person only. That person was sitting on a chair in the main entrance, and without hesitation Lucy strode towards Freya Thompson, ignoring the puzzled looks of her Aunt, Marino and Benton as she moved past them to the small, hunched figure in the corner.