THREE

"You're drunk," Boyd accuses, dropping down next to her on the long leather sofa. He sounds amused, and he looks slightly tousled, which might – or might not – have something to do with gallantly offering to help Michelle clear some of the remaining debris from the dining table out to the kitchen.

"I'm not," Grace tells him with considerable and considered dignity, trying not to picture him pinned up against Elaine's huge American-style fridge by the beady-eyed and tenacious Michelle. "I might be pleasantly relaxed, but in no way, shape or form am I drunk."

"If you say so."

"I do."

"Okay."

"Okay." Sipping her brandy, she lets her gaze idly roam for a moment, surveying their fellow guests. Larry, Simon, and Stannard seem to be outside on the patio smoking postprandial cigars, while Elaine, Helen and Ian are sitting chatting at the table. Graham is nowhere to be seen, and Lochlan is hovering near the kitchen door talking to Michelle. Or being talked at by Michelle. One or the other. Still mulling over her dark suspicions regarding the pinned-to-the-fridge scenario, and recalling her earlier conversation with Simon, Grace says, "I wonder if Lochlan knows about Larry's… proclivities."

"Oh, I don't think he's in much danger," Boyd says, stretching out his long legs. "Elaine would claw Michelle's eyes out before she could lay a single finger on him."

"Didn't fancy it yourself, then?" she asks, the impertinent question voiced before she has a chance to think better of it.

The answering look he gives her is enigmatic, but the verbal reply is simple enough. "Call me old-fashioned, Grace, but I've never considered sex to be a spectator sport. Strictly participants only for me, thanks."

"Maybe Larry likes to participate as well as watch," she suggests, mainly to see his horrified reaction.

A quiet derisive snort and, "Maybe he does, but as far as I'm concerned three's definitely a crowd."

"It's nice to know you're not obsessed by stereotypical male fantasies, Boyd."

He frowns. "Eh?"

"Two girls, one guy," Grace clarifies. A perplexed, slightly panic-stricken part of her mind can't believe she's leading such a conversation with him, of all people. The spectre of the cold sobriety of the Monday morning to come tries to manifest itself, but she determinedly ignores it.

A muscle twitches in Boyd's cheek, betraying the amusement he hides incredibly well as he retorts, "Well, I suppose there are exceptions to every rule."

"Oh, you'd run a mile," she guesses with a chuckle. He would… wouldn't he?

This time he doesn't bother to hide his wry grin. "You know me far too well, Grace."

She smirks at the tacit agreement, but doesn't have time to comment as Graham returns to the room, barking, "Some bloody little shit has keyed my damn car. Can you fucking believe it?"

A polite flutter of commiseration and mild excitement goes around the room, and Lochlan abandons Michelle to ask, "Where did you leave it?"

"End of the road, near the church," Graham tells him, scowling. "I went to get Helen's shawl for her, and the whole right side has been done. Every single damn panel. It's going to cost me a bloody fortune."

"Saturday night Youth Club," Lochlan says. "It's a decent area, but we've had trouble with the kids from there before."

"I'm going to call the police," Graham announces. "Little bastards can't – "

"Oh, there's no point," Helen tells him, joining the small throng. "They won't come out for something like that. We'll just have to claim on the insurance."

"Like fuck we will," her angry husband growls back. "Do you know what it would do to our annual premium?"

Lochlan glances at his expensive-looking watch. "Well, it's only half-ten. They don't finish up down there until eleven."

"So?" Graham demands.

"So," Lochlan explains patiently, "we have our own Peeler right here. On your feet, Tim, this is your big moment."

Not stirring, Boyd groans and then protests, "I'm a detective, for fuck's sake, not a PCSO. What do you expect me to bloody do? March up there and launch a full-scale investigation?"

"No," Lochlan says, neatly plucking the half-empty brandy glass from Boyd's hand. "Something much more effective, old lad. Go up there and read them the Riot Act. Shout at them, and throw your weight around a bit."

Boyd rolls his eyes. "Right, because that's really going to help, isn't it?"

"It might make them think twice about doing it again," Grace points out. She's not sure whether she believes it, or whether she says it just for the fun of irking him.

He gives her a sideways glare. "Whose side are you on?"

"Lochlan's," she tells him, straight-faced.

"Up you get," Lochlan says, having put the glass aside. "We'll even come with you for moral support, won't we, Price?"

"Oh, for…" Boyd complains, but gets reluctantly to his feet. "Fine. Whatever you say."

"Good man."

"Complete waste of bloody time," Boyd grumbles, but allows himself to be shepherded out of the room, leaving Grace to shake her head and smile to herself.

Helen, who doesn't seem to be anything like as annoyed about what's happened as her husband, sits down next to her. Her opening gambit is direct. "That's him, isn't it?"

Bewildered, Grace frowns. "Who? What?"

"Tim," the other woman says, nodding towards the door to the hall. "He's your boss at the Cold Case Unit, isn't he? I saw his picture in the evening paper recently. Something about drink-driving and a young motorcyclist getting badly injured?"

"It was a set-up to discredit him," Grace tells her, the urge to defend him far stronger than any lingering desire for discretion. She knows how ridiculous the claim sounds in such a quiet, domestic setting, but the truth's the truth. "His drink was spiked. There was an accident, that's true, and a girl was hurt, but Boyd wasn't responsible. He wasn't the one driving."

"Oh." A thoughtful pause. "Well, that's good, then. He really doesn't seem the type."

"He's not," Grace assures her. "They printed an update on the story a few days afterwards, but of course it was buried away at the bottom of page ten or something instead of being plastered all over the front page."

"Always the way," Helen says, sounding sympathetic. Seeming to lose interest in the matter, she inquires, "So, are you two…?"

"No," Grace replies, perhaps a shade too quickly. "No, no, nothing like that. In fact, I had no idea he was going to be here. I didn't even know he knew Lochlan and Elaine until tonight."

A sage nod accompanies, "Don't tell me, Elaine's been up to her old tricks again, hasn't she? Match-making?"

"Should my ears be burning?" the woman herself asks, gliding across the room to join them. "Helen, Simon wants a word about something. I told him he couldn't come back inside unless he ditched the cigar, so now he's lurking out there in the cold on a point of principle."

Helen laughs and stands up. "Sounds just like Simon."

As she moves away, Elaine takes her place on the sofa. Gimlet-eyed, she says, "Well?"

"Well, what?" Grace asks, not intending to make her old friend's life easy by playing along.

Elaine heaves a dramatic sigh. "You know very well what, Grace. Or rather, who. Tim. He's lovely, isn't he?"

Not the first word that generally pops into her head when she thinks of Boyd, Grace muses. Deadpan, she says, "He seems… very nice."

"'Nice'?" Elaine echoes, clearly outraged. "'Nice'? That's the best you can do?"

Deciding that it's time to finally come clean, Grace says, "Well, if you want me to be completely honest – "

But Elaine isn't listening. "Half the divorced forty-something women in London are running after him, tongues hanging out, and your considered opinion is that he 'seems very nice'?"

"Elaine – "

"You could do so much worse, you know," Elaine continues. "He's sober, hard-working – "

"Elaine," Grace presses.

" – and the ex-wife lives a long, long way away in Turin."

It's more than enough to divert her attention away from the need to explain things. Faster than she intends, Grace says, "Turin?"

Elaine shrugs. "Well, she's Italian, so..."

Not sure why she's so surprised, Grace echoes, "Italian?"

"Mm," Elaine confirms, plucking at an invisible bit of fluff on her elegant black dress. "Family used to own a delicatessen in Stepney until all the redevelopment that went on in the area during Thatcher years, apparently. I think that's where they first met, actually."

Recalling snatches of a long-ago idle conversation, Grace almost nods but stops herself just in time. Curiosity and just a touch of masochism make her ask, "You knew her?"

"Mary?" Elaine shakes her head. "Not personally, no. Lochlan did, of course. He and Tim have been friends for years. There was a son… can't remember his name, off-hand. Bit of a tearaway, by all accounts. Ran away from home a few times, and eventually disappeared for good."

Grace knows the sad story so well that she's not sure she can give an appropriate-sounding response. "That's – "

"Terrible," Elaine supplies with a grimace. "I know. According to Lochlan, it was just about the final straw for their marriage. I think they staggered along together for a couple more years, but that sort of pressure… Well, it's going to make or break a relationship for good, isn't it?"

"It is," Grace agrees, reflecting on all the things that went wrong in her own marriage. Too many demands, not enough time…

"Anyway," Elaine continues, "whatever else he is or isn't, he's certainly not another Owen."

He's definitely not, as Grace is well aware. He has his weaknesses, but Peter Boyd is a much stronger, tougher man than her ex-husband ever was – or ever will be. In every single way she can think of. Stronger, tougher, and much, much more dependable, despite the capricious side of his nature. She nods. "I believe you."

"But," her friend guesses with a searching look, "you're still not interested? You don't find him at all attractive?"

How, Grace wonders, is she supposed to answer such a question when she's been consciously attracted to him on at least some level ever since they first met? It's still so clear in her mind, the memory of that initial encounter. A wintry crime scene, an only partially-clothed dead man staring up unblinkingly at the cloudy sky, his blood-streaked body shielded from public gaze by temporary screens, and a tall, good-looking, but fiercely impatient man in a long dark coat barking orders at scurrying subordinates. Not the most romantic of introductions, but there had been something about him... She manages a weak shrug. "I didn't exactly say that."

"It's the police thing, isn't it?" Elaine says, seemingly not aware of how close to the truth she is. "Grace, you can't write off a whole profession because of one bad experience."

"I'm not," she insists, refusing to entertain any half-buried thoughts of DS Harry Taylor. Such a long time ago. An entire lifetime ago, it sometimes seems. Yet, even then she was old enough and experienced enough to have known better, to have asked the questions that would have saved her from… She shakes her head. "I haven't. That was years ago, anyway. It's just… well, it could be… difficult. Because of work."

"Why? The Met must be thousands strong. The chances of you – "

"Elaine," a chortling Simon calls from the now partially-open patio window. "Bit of a crisis. Henry's fallen into the begonias."

It's the kind of announcement absolutely guaranteed to terminate every other conversation taking place in the immediate vicinity, Grace reflects as she gets up and follows a wide-eyed, incredulous Elaine towards the rear of the house. Certainly not something one hears every day of the week.

-oOo-

"He frightened the bloody bejesus out of them," Lochlan announces, still laughing as he takes a seat at the dining table. "Sweet Mary, mother of God, you should have heard him effing and blinding at them."

"Tim?" Elaine says, sounding so sceptical that Grace has to struggle hard not to laugh. "Our Tim? But he's so… so…"

"Easy-going?" Stannard, who's recovered admirably from his horticultural mishap thanks to a large drink, says. "Even-tempered? Ah, well, it's always the quiet ones you need to watch out for you, you see."

Easy-going? Even-tempered? Quiet? Struggling with the notion, Grace says nothing. If the extraordinary evening has taught her anything, it's that Boyd's friends and acquaintances – the ones who don't stem from the workplace – seem to have a completely different view of him than his long-suffering colleagues.

Fiona says, "True, but he's always had a bit of a temper, even when we were kids. When my brother deliberately broke his favourite toy train, my father had to step in and physically separate them. And Mark was seven – two years older."

"What about the car?" Helen asks, her attention all on Lochlan. "Did he find the boy responsible?"

"Naughty, naughty," Lochlan drawls, waving a languid finger at her. "You shouldn't assume that the culprit was of a particular gender."

"I'm a therapist, Lockie, not a bloody barrister," Helen counters, putting down her half-empty glass. "Well?"

Lochlan shakes his head as he picks up the brandy bottle sitting in front of him. "Sadly, Tim-of-the-Yard made no arrests. But I don't think the guilty party will do the same thing again in a hurry. Certainly not round here."

"Where are they, anyway?" Fiona asks. "Tim and Graham?"

"Still looking at the Jag," Lochlan informs her, refilling his glass. "Tim thinks some of the scratches will polish out."

"Oh? And when did he become an expert on such things?"

"To be fair," Stannard tells his partner, "he did completely restore that old roadster of his, didn't he?"

"The Frog-Eye?" Lochlan says, showing renewed interest in the conversation. "Lovely little car. I always wanted an Austin-Healey. Last Christmas, I asked him if he wanted to sell it to me, but I got a very short answer."

"Good," Elaine says, rolling her eyes at her husband's foolishness. "We have more than enough – "

"Come and talk to me," Simon murmurs to Grace, smiling in encouragement as she glances round at him. "Ian's abandoned me for Michelle, which most definitely isn't going to end well for either of them."

Standing on the edge of the small group seated at and clustered around the dining table, Grace decides to accede. Letting Simon take her arm and escort her back towards the comfortable leather sofa at the other end of the room, she says, "Doesn't she know that you and Ian are a couple?"

"I'm not sure," he says, waiting for her to settle before seating himself, "that she sees that as any sort of impediment."

"More of a challenge?"

"Exactly," he beams, making himself comfortable. "Unfortunately for her, Ian has even less interest in the sensual appreciation of the female form than I do. So, you were married then?"

"I was," Grace agrees, wondering again what it is that makes him so very easy to talk to, "to a weak, inadequate man who turned out to need me far more than I was ever going to need him."

"Some inequalities are easier to live with than others, eh?"

"Owen didn't need another wife," she tells him, ignoring distant pangs of disloyalty, "he needed someone who was prepared to be a nursemaid, surrogate mother, and therapist all rolled into one. In hindsight, I think part of me knew that right from the start."

"But you married him anyway? Why?"

"I think," she says, considering the matter seriously, "that by then I was tired of having my heart repeatedly broken. Of falling madly in love only for things to go wrong the moment the honeymoon period was over. I suppose that I thought that settling for security and stability with a decent man that I at least liked was the sensible thing to do. I was in my early forties when we got married, and a little tired of unwillingly being what nowadays they'd call a serial monogamist."

It sounds so… dispassionate… when put in so few words, she thinks. So cold and calculated. But it wasn't like that. Was it?

Simon doesn't criticise, just asks, "Could you have stayed with him?"

"Was there a good reason not to, you mean?" Grace shakes her head. "No. No, there was no sudden, dramatic reason to end it. He wasn't knowingly abusive or unpleasant. Just… draining. Whatever I gave, Owen always wanted more. Money, attention, affection… you name it. I was fond of him, yes, but I wasn't in love with him, even at the start, and as time passed being with him became more and more emotionally exhausting. I just woke up one morning and realised that for me, at least, there was absolutely no point in carrying on. I regret the effect divorcing him has clearly had on my step-children, though."

"Correct me if I'm wrong," Simon says, "but getting married under such circumstances seems… atypical. You seem to be much more the kind of woman who lives or dies for the grande passione. Metaphorically speaking."

Unnerved and a little flattered, Grace allows a quiet, rueful chuckle. "I doubt anyone here would agree with you."

"Meaning?"

"Meaning… well, I suppose I'm seen as… the sensible one. The calm, collected one who – "

" – has her shit together, as our exuberant American cousins would say?"

"If you like," she agrees. Not the words she would have chosen, but he's right.

"Bollocks," Simon says with a disparaging snort. "What do they know? When I look into your eyes all I can see is fire, Grace Foley. Christ, I'd probably shag you myself if I was in the least bit that way inclined."

Genuine surprise makes Grace blink. "Thank you… I think."

He chuckles, reaches out to take her hand. "Tell me about your handsome policeman."

"He's not mine," she points out, trying not to sound as mournful as the plentiful amount of wine and brandy she's consumed is making her feel.

Simon squeezes her hand gently. "But you'd like him to be."

"Sometimes I let myself think," she says, considering her reply, "that we could be very good together. Complementary chemistry, you know? Then I remember what he's really like, and how much he infuriates me, and it seems like a ridiculous idea."

"Ian infuriates me, darling," Simon informs her, "but I still fancy him like mad."

In a half-hearted attempt to change the subject, she asks, "How long have you two been together?"

"Five, nearly six years. Neither of us thought it would last." A thoughtful look. "And how does he feel about you?"

"Ah, well that's the sixty-four-thousand-dollar question, isn't it?" Grace replies with a deep sigh that isn't at all feigned. It seems Simon isn't quite done with her yet. "We've become good friends over the last few years, and when we're not squabbling over something stupid at work we get on rather well despite our differences. But for him… I think that's about as far as it goes."

Simon looks quizzical. "But you've never discussed it with him?"

"No," she says, almost shuddering at the thought, "and nor am I ever intending to. We have to work together. The idea of making a complete fool of myself and then having to face him every day…"

Simon is looking thoughtful. "You remember what I said about you watching him when you thought no-one was looking…?"

Seeing a chance to even the score a fraction, Grace makes sure her tone is deliberately disdainful as she says, "I believe the word you used was 'ogling'."

"Was it? Well, that was a bit insensitive of me, wasn't it? Anyway," Simon leans towards her a fraction, "the point I wanted to make is that you're not alone. He watches you, too."

Refusing to allow herself to be intrigued by the idea, she retorts, "Doesn't mean a thing. Boyd watches every woman within twenty feet of him purely as a matter of principle."

"But his attention always comes back to you," Simon points out. "Come on, Grace, we're both psychologists. We study human behaviour, you and I. Don't tell me you really hadn't noticed?"

"I hadn't," she insists, "and even if I had, I wouldn't have thought anything of it."

"Why not?"

"Because," she says, beginning to flounder. "Just… because. Oh, Simon, trust me, I'm really not his type. I'm at least ten years too old, for a start, and that's a conservative estimate."

"Age is irrelevant in matters of the heart, my dear."

She nods, willing to concede the point. "And I'd be the first to agree with you if I didn't know better in this case."

"I don't know the man," Simon says, releasing her hand, "but, like you, I'm a trained observer, and I'm very good at my job. Tim – or whatever you care to call him – doesn't chase women. They chase him. If he allows himself to be caught now and again, well that's just human nature. Now ask yourself why he doesn't give chase."

"Because he's too damn lazy?" Grace suggests, with more bitterness than she intends.

"Because," Simon corrects her, "whether he realises it or not, his attention is elsewhere, and he's conflicted."

"Conflicted?"

"You said it yourself – you have to work together."

"Simon – " she starts, but their conversation is halted by the return of a still-angry and muttering Graham. He marches past them towards his wife, Boyd ambling in his wake. Hands buried deep in trouser pockets, he comes to a halt a couple of feet from the sofa and regards them with placid curiosity. Uncomfortable under his steady gaze, Grace asks, "No luck catching the culprits, then?"

"Too many of them," he replies with a slight shrug. "Must've been getting on for thirty kids down there, all of them looking as guilty as sin."

Simon stands up and proffers a hand. "We didn't manage to introduce ourselves properly earlier. Simon Thompson."

The hand is taken, shaken and released. "Peter Boyd."

"Known as Tim?"

"Indeed."

"I'm afraid I've rather been monopolising your… friend's… attention. That's the trouble with psychologists – we find each other far too fascinating." A quick, self-deprecating smile. "Grace was just telling me all about you."

"I wasn't," she denies, but not quickly enough to prevent the discouraging frown that's sent her way. "We were talking about – "

"Conflicted emotions," Simon supplies. "How we, as a species, can find ourselves wanting something that we're far too afraid to acknowledge, let alone actively seek to obtain."

Boyd's response is a dry, "Sounds enthralling."

"Ignore him," Grace instructs, shooting him a warning glare before returning her attention to Simon. "Boyd thinks that psychology is a dark art at best, and that all psychologists are witch doctors."

"It's a point of view," Simon says, unruffled. "So, Tim, let's go and find out where Lochlan's put the brandy, and then you can tell me what it is about us that you mistrust."

Grace waits for the terse, bristling refusal. It doesn't happen. Boyd gives her a startled, almost helpless look, then allows himself to be towed away by Simon, who is – rather surprisingly – a good three or four inches taller than him. Caught between sudden panic and the strong desire to laugh, she decides it's well past time to visit their hosts' elegant, marbled-tiled bathroom.

-oOo-

cont...