Laura stared at herself in the mirror of the pathology department toilets. The light was harsh and artificial. Up close, she could see that her eyelids still bore the tell tale signs of last night's tears, slightly red and puffy. Her face appeared sallow and washed-out. God, I look old, she mused. Absently, she rubbed at the loose skin underneath her chin, feeling it gather in folds under her fingers.
She regarded her reflection intently, willing time to stop so that she didn't have to give this damn post-mortem in front of Ryan and Robbie. Mercifully, she felt fairly numb, or at worst just a bit bruised round the edges. It was one of those days where she just existed, not really sure if she was breathing. Not really caring either. She knew she'd get through the PM, she had sufficient professional pride not to let her personal life impinge, but she really didn't want to. In the distant place where she had temporarily stored her emotions, she felt it was unfair.
The door squealed open and Laura's gaze met Ryan's in the mirror. Ryan's cheeks coloured ever-so-slightly and she immediately broke eye contact. Laura forced up the edges of her mouth in greeting.
"Morning."
Ryan smiled, recovering herself: "Good morning, Laura."
"How was the ball?" Laura heard herself asking, not really sure why.
"Good." At least Ryan had the decency to look sort of sheepish, Laura thought to herself.
"You didn't make it?" Ryan added, making her way towards a cubicle.
Laura hesitated. "Oh yes, I just came along a little later." Laura began washing her hands unnecessarily for a second time, just for the distraction.
"Oh?" Ryan tilted her head to one side. "We didn't see you."
"No." From the distance of her numbness, Laura noted that her tone was almost rude, yet she struggled to care, right at this moment.
"Robbie, I mean, Inspector Lewis tried to call you." Ooh, now that registered with Laura – an emotion at last - a pain deep in her chest as Ryan used Lewis' first name.
"He did?" Laura sounded surprised, but in fact vividly recalled hurling her phone down the stairs last night, as Lewis' caller ID had flared up repeatedly on the screen.
"Yes, a couple of times, I believe."
"My phone must have been switched off." Laura lied, deadpan. She finished drying her hands on a paper towel, before stomping down on the bin pedal to dispose of it. She'd made the requisite polite conversation, now she just wanted a speedy exit:
"Anyway, I'd best go. Wouldn't want to be late for the PM, would I?"
Ryan sniffed as the door swung shut. Whilst she had not exactly enjoyed the awkwardness of the conversation, she found herself quite amused by it. It was almost as if Hobson knew that she and Lewis had been flirting outrageously last night. Not that it had come to anything - somewhat to Ryan's disappointment. Yes, Hobson was definitely behaving oddly.
Of course, Ryan had heard all about the epic Lewis/Hobson 'almost' love story: the great Thames Valley force romance that never was. Innocent had filled her in and Ryan herself had been witness to the air of stagnant ardour between the pair. For Ryan, the biggest irony about last night was that, in suggesting Lewis as an escort to the ball, Jean Innocent had specifically selected him as a safe pair of hands. 'Secretly in love with Laura, you see', had been Innocent's exact words, 'just too ineffectual to do anything about it.' Ryan had therefore started the evening with a bit of harmless flirtation. However, following the exchange of a few drunken home truths with Lewis, she had surprised herself in wanting more. She'd misjudged him: in fact he made a more than worthy, not to mention charming, adversary.
Ryan straightened her collar in the mirror. It was unfortunate that she may have ruffled Hobson's feathers by her behaviour last night. She had by now seen enough of Hobson's work to respect her and, in other circumstances, she felt they would have made a good team. However, the dynamic surrounding Lewis was complicating things. It was a long time since Ryan had met a man with whom she felt a connection. Ultimately, Ryan was a woman who got what she wanted. She wasn't finished with Lewis yet.
Looking back on Thomas Wainwright's post-mortem, Hathaway was astounded that it had actually made it from start to finish. Even now he wasn't sure how Hobson had managed to pull it off. The tension in the air was murderous, if you'd pardon the pun.
He'd clattered into the lab at the very last minute, clutching the Constantine report, and throwing Hobson an apologetic grimace for his lateness. At that point, there was no indication that something was awry: Lewis and Ryan were assembled and listening carefully. Hobson, all credit to her, was conducting the PM as normal, noting that Wainwright had been garrotted before being made to look like he had hanged himself using his Hermès tie.
Hathaway couldn't read Lewis' expression: ever the professional, he appeared to be focusing intently on what Hobson was saying. Ryan, on the other hand, looked stiff as a poker, quite different from her demeanour last night. Yet Hathaway suspected this was probably part of the grand professorial persona, rather than any sort of unease with the social situation. He relaxed slightly. Perhaps Lewis would emerge unscathed from his temporary lapse of judgement after all.
However, it was when Hobson came to mention what was found in Wainwright's body that things in the lab started to heat up:
"In his stomach is a gold signet ring, inscribed with two words in what looks like Russian." Laura extracted the ring before using a visualising camera to display a magnified image on screen for the others' benefit:
The words read: 'Завинаги твоя'.
"That's not Russian." Hathaway interjected. Ryan raised her eyebrows, clearly impressed, whereas Lewis and Laura barely batted an eyelid, so accustomed were they by now to Hathaway's intellectual prowess.
"What is it then, James?" Asked Lewis.
"Well it's definitely the Cyrillic alphabet… so I'd say some sort of Slavic language?"
"Can you get someone onto it?" Lewis suggested and Hathaway nodded, taking a photo of the image on the screen with his phone before firing off an email.
"So did he swallow it voluntarily, Laura?" Lewis asked. Hobson didn't look up.
"Nope. Mouth and throat are scratched, like it was forced on him."
"So someone is trying to say something with this ring?" Lewis pondered.
Hathaway's phone pinged with an email response to his question.
"That was quick! The wonders of modern technology." Lewis remarked to Ryan, who smiled at him indulgently.
"Translations team say the inscription says zavinagi tvoya." Hathaway pronounced the words with some difficulty. "According to them, it's Bulgarian, Sir, meaning 'forever yours'."
"Bulgarian? But I thought when you interviewed Wainwright he said his family were British aristocracy. What's with the Bulgarian connection?"
"A mistress?" Ventured Ryan. Hathaway briefly wondered if her tone verged slightly on the suggestive, but he decided he was probably imagining it.
"Or a love child?" Conjectured Lewis.
Ryan and Lewis continued to bandy some ideas around to the exclusion of Hobson and Hathaway.
"The connection is Sofia." Hobson interrupted, blankly. "Sofia, as in the capital of Bulgaria; and Sofia, as in Sofia Constantine, the first murder victim." Hathaway nodded in agreement, the same thought having been on the tip of his tongue.
"Not that it's my job to speculate," continued Laura, "but if you ask me I'd say it's a message between lovers," Laura's tongue faltered on the last word slightly, "which no one else was meant to understand." She looked at Lewis.
"So you think Wainwright and Constantine were 'at it' in secret?" Lewis' attention was suddenly firmly on Laura.
Discomfort flashed almost imperceptibly across Laura's face as, for the first time that morning, she met Lewis' gaze. "Perhaps." She shrugged. Her eyes flickered for a split second, but purposefully between Lewis and Ryan. "Just a theory, of course."
"Do we have anything to suggest Wainwright and Constantine were having an affair?" Lewis asked Hathaway.
"Not to my knowledge Sir, but it wasn't an active line of enquiry when he was interviewed. It's definitely a possibility."
"After all... people let down those they love all the time." Hobson's gaze at Lewis was practically caustic, but her face remained completely expressionless. "Why not Wainwright and Constantine?" She added, almost as an afterthought.
It was then that Hathaway noticed Lewis' face fall, as something seemed to click. He appeared to forget momentarily about the case. Hathaway saw him look at Hobson, at first with puzzlement, and then his face coloured. The realisation was dawning: Hobson knew about last night. A glance over at Ryan's expression suggested she too understood exactly what was going on.
Hobson held Lewis' stare determinedly and suddenly the PM stopped being so much about the lifeless corpse on the slab in front of them and more about the bizarre love triangle in the room. The atmosphere zinged with tension.
"Well, it certainly would give Wainwright's wife a motive." Lewis attempted to bluster through the sudden and cataclysmic friction in the air, looking resolutely at his shoes.
"Because hell hath no fury like a woman scorned?" Ryan's voice was cool, but laced with sarcasm, as she levelled her eyes at Hobson.
In a parallel universe, Hathaway was devouring every second of this fascinating and unexpected display of female rivalry. Yet, back on planet earth, he was sincerely struck by the look of abject bewilderment on Lewis' face. He needed to stop this.
"And 'heaven has no rage like love to hatred turned'. Ah, ha, ha, ha!" interjected Hathaway awkwardly, completing the literary analysis with false laughter. "Got to love a bit of Congreve! So where were we… Bulgaria, wasn't it?"
For the briefest of moments, his question appeared to go unanswered: Lewis was regarding Hobson beseechingly, evidently trying to communicate with her, but his desperation went unnoticed. Then, with nothing short of monumental professionalism, Hobson recovered her composure and returned almost seamlessly to examining the corpse.
Remarkably, the post-mortem proceeded without further incident and some sense of normality briefly returned. Eventually, Hobson concluded:
"And that, Gentlemen, and Professor Ryan, is all I have to tell you about Mr Wainwright: definitely not a suicide. You'll have my written report by first thing tomorrow."
"Thank you, Laura." Lewis tried, but failed, to make eye contact.
"Any questions?" Hobson asked no one in particular.
Silence.
"Right, in that case, I'll scrub out and get on."
"Laura…" Lewis rose from his seat, but it was too late. Hobson had gone.
Author's note: thank you for your reviews. As I said last time, I just love a bit of chit chat about the characters - helps get my brain churning for the next bit of the story. I'm a couple of chapters ahead, but definitely taking the reviews on board - mostly because it allows me to do a bit more Lewis-related day-dreaming than I do already! Thanks for reading :)