Sunday passed in a delightful blur of pottering about interspersed with long stretches of not doing very much at all.
The weather was dry enough to tackle repairs to some more of the damage caused by the storm but not so hot that they were forced to stick only to the shade. Robbie felt honoured to be entrusted with the roses, although not before Laura had reminded him of exactly how she wanted it done. He enjoyed the quiet oasis she'd created since moving in five or six years ago but was under no illusion as to whose space it was. He rather thought he'd commandeered the garage and possibly the living room if only because that's where the TV and therefore the sport was, but the kitchen and study and garden remained resolutely hers.
As he clipped away, careful to only prune down to just above where he could see the telltale signs of new growth, he alternated between watching her determinedly battle with the sticky weed that the rain seemed to have encouraged in abundance, and listening to the cricket commentary from the small battery powered radio he'd positioned on the path. It was an ancient thing, battered and bruised from being taken on countless holidays when the kids were young, even France once where he'd just about been able to pick up the long wave radio signal. He remembered it that summer as one of the best, him and his son united in their delight at a memorable Ashes win. He wondered if he and Laura could plan a trip to see him, time it right to join the Barmy Army in cheering England on. Maybe in a few years, he speculated, when she retired, or at least when his bank balance had recovered from the last lot of long distance flights.
They treated themselves to a leisurely lunch under the pergola, freshly baked bread, cheese from the market and a light salad, all thrown expertly together by Laura whilst he'd opened the wine. They chatted easily about everything and nothing at all before deciding to ignore the scattered piles of weeds and dead roses they'd created between them in favour of a lazy afternoon. Robbie thought it to be too perfect, the opportunity to indulge in yet more cricket whilst Laura snuggled against him on the sofa reading something that was, by her own admission, fluffy and without literary merit. And it was only as dusk approached, the garden finally tidied and the dinner plates stacked in the dishwasher, that their minds turned to the week ahead and the need to address what they'd resolutely ignored all day.
"What does Hathaway make of it?" Laura asked as she pulled together her bag for the next day.
She'd brought her laptop home with a vague idea that she'd start prepping a lecture she was due to give in a fortnight's time but somehow hadn't had the energy to even consider given how preoccupied her thoughts had become. Robbie, who'd followed her to the study to gather up the last of the files to take back to the station, could only grimace.
"Haven't told him yet. At least..." he paused, briefly considering how to phrase it, "Not the detail. He knows there's a case that warrants a further look but technically he's not working on this. Moody only wanted me because of me elephant brain."
"Don't be unkind," she said with some sincerity, "You're not that grey, and," shifting to make a closer inspection, "Your ears are almost normal sized."
"Give over, woman," he growled, "I meant me age. Elephants never forget, or so they say."
Laura chuckled as she fastened the clasp on her bag and turned to face him full on, her free hand shoved into her pocket as she contemplated whether to say what was on her mind, her concerns at what would become the focus of their investigation. And it would be theirs. She couldn't imagine any scenario where Robbie wouldn't involve his trusty sidekick and where that sidekick wouldn't involve himself. But whether she needed to know more than that she wasn't certain and so opted for staying silent, on that at least, and instead offered a different proposal.
"Bed?"
"Bed," he affirmed with a nod, turning to lead the way. "Not that I'm very tired," he added, giving into the suggestiveness of the look she just given him. "In fact, not tired at all."
James' hand hovered over the bell, the doubt that this was the best course of action still lingering. Having spent much of the weekend tossing up the whys and wherefores of the options available to him, he'd woken up resolved that this was worth a try despite running the risk of making things worse. The other thought he kept coming back to was that no one has actually asked him to help, not a hint of a request even. But Robbie's mood had taken a downward turn over this assignment and whilst he'd done a reasonable job of pretending he was alright with his usual bouts of bad jokes and easy smiles, there was no depth to them, and that was always a sure sign. In the end it had been that which had decided it; James was damned that after all the years of unwavering support from Robbie and Laura that he wasn't going to repay the favour now. And so with a straightening of the shoulders, he decided and pressed the button.
He could discern the faint sound of ringing and then a dog barking deep within the bowels of the house, itself quite an impressive affair. Double fronted with a wide driveway to one side, the newness of the brickwork softened by a wisteria winding its way up the other. The full purple blooms had long since faded away, replaced with bright green shoots that seemed to have survived the recent heat surprisingly well. A gardener's time well employed, he speculated to himself. He twisted to see if he could see any signs of life in the large window to what looked like the sitting room, the curtains still open in no doubt thanks to the lingering summer light, but he was only able to make out an expensive looking sofa and a painting might have been a horse above the fireplace. About to step back to examine the rest of the house he was startled by the door suddenly opening revealing a woman of perhaps 70, 75, casually dressed in jeans and an over-sized shirt, barefoot with a glass of wine in one hand.
"Heather Maynard?" he asked.
"Yes," said the woman breezily.
"DI Hathaway, Oxford Police. Sorry about the hour."
He held out his identification card which she duly took and examined with a smirk before handing it back and waited expectantly.
"I wanted to talk to you about a case you worked on," he explained.
"Oh? Which one?" she asked, "I worked on quite a few you know."
There was something awfully familiar about the way she stood, the manner in which she spoke with a twinkle of something behind the eyes. Were all pathologists prone to sass, he wondered?
"It was quite a way back, August 1995. Body discovered at a cannabis factory, a Benjamin Knight."
The woman regarded him carefully for a moment before opening the door more widely and turning to walk away, her words drifting back to him, "You better come in, Inspector. Coffee?"
Laura lay awake listening to the sound of Robbie's gentle snores on the pillow next to her. The fall in temperature meant that their light summer duvet had been able to make a return and she for one was grateful. She never did sleep well with just a sheet, something about needing the weight on her, the comfort of being able to cosy down under it to help her drift off. Not that it was helping now, she realised. They'd kept the window open and a breeze caused the curtains to waft in and out at varying intervals and with it the room lightened and darkened. She could pretend it was that which was causing her to be distracted and keeping her awake, but it would be a lie.
She'd nearly said something earlier, confessed to the troubling thoughts that were nestling in the pit of her stomach, that reeked of fear and worry, but she'd stopped herself. Why, she wasn't sure, but that she had only added to her worries. She didn't have anything to hide, and certainly not from Robbie, but something was niggling at her, a suspicion that this was not just going to turn out to be an administrative error. When, she muttered under her breath, was anything with Johnson straightforward? She'd admit that she'd quite liked him when they'd first met. After all, confidence was easy to like and he'd been at the centre of a seemingly welcoming crowd of them. She'd not known many people then, college friends having drifted away, and she'd readily accepted the invitations that had come her way. But it hasn't taken long for her to see him for what he was and as quickly as he'd drawn her in then she'd subtly withdrawn herself from his sphere. Nothing that had happened between them had ever presented her with any cause for second thought. Like anyone she had plenty of stories from her youth that she'd prefer not to come out, tales dalliances and youthful exuberance that didn't show her as she was now, but she'd never thought that anything that time risked coming back to haunt her, except of course now it seemed as if it was about to.
Robbie shifting beside herself tore her from her worries, his face completely at rest with the frowns and creases of daytime temporarily smoothed out. it was hard not to smile as she took in just how happy she was with the life they were building. It was a slow process, she realised, like everything between them it could not be hurried along. To the outside world it no doubt seemed as if they'd flicked a switch and suddenly they were together, a perfect fit that should have happened years before. But that wasn't anywhere close to the truth. It had been, and still was, gradual. Teeny tiny steps that had had to negotiate them both through grief, doubt, wondering, jealousy, and indecision. She knew that Robbie believed that it had been him who'd been unsure, dragged his feet when opportunities had arisen for them to take a step into the unknown, but that wasn't quite true. She'd been just as guilty and it was a truth that she feared might threaten the delicate state of blissfulness between them.
She reached out to touch his cheek, to feel the warmth of his skin under her fingers. He seemed to subconsciously turn into them and smile faintly. But perhaps she imagined it, she sighed again as she felt her eyes at last grow heavy, her hand travelling down to brush against his shoulder briefly before she curled it away under her half of the duvet and let sleep, at last, take her.