Secrets of the Dead

Norris was looking at a piece of paper. ‘According to his passport, his name was Michael Lascaris.’

And that did mean something. The smile left her; she slumped back in the bed. The monitor raced away at a million miles an hour. Beep. A red sports car gunning through mountains. Beep. A dark bay and a bright pool and dead faces watching from their plinths. Beep beep. Waking up in the middle of the night. A man with a gun. A struggle. The scream as Michael fell over the cliff – her scream. Beep beep beep beep beep …

Someone banged through the door – not a man with a gun, but a woman in green overalls with a syringe in her hand. ‘Wait,’ she heard Norris say. ‘Give her a chance.’

But they wouldn’t give her a chance. Strong hands clamped around her arm and a sharp point slid into her flesh. The monitor slowed its runaway pace.

Then there was silence.

‘So you remember Michael Lascaris?’

The metronome beat of the monitor was stable now, a gentle andante. They’d sat Abby up in her bed, though she couldn’t move much more. A plaster cast covered her right arm and shoulder, entombing her chest and most of her stomach. Somewhere underneath, she’d been told, was the bullet wound.

You were shot. It still didn’t seem like her. Being shot happened to other people – victims. Abby had seen enough wounds in her old job to know they weren’t just things that happened on TV or in the cinema, but there’d still been the distance. You suffer, I pity.

‘Do you remember Michael?’

‘He drove a Porsche.’

Norris’s piece of paper had grown into a folder. He flicked through the pages.

‘A 1968 Porsche Targa, red, UK registration?’

Abby shrugged her one good shoulder. ‘It was red.’

She wasn’t trying to be flippant – not much – but Norris took it badly. He stood, flapping his folder at her.

‘I know you’re in a bad way – Christ, you’re lucky to be alive – but you have to understand how serious this is. Someone bursts into a house and attacks two European diplomats. It doesn’t look good.’

He didn’t burst in, Abby thought. He was already there, out by the pool with Michael.

‘The Montenegrins are running around like it’s the end of the world. They’re terrified it’s going to cause a storm in Brussels, derail their EU application, put them on a terrorist blacklist or whatever. Frankly, they’re overreacting.’ A stern glare, as if it was her fault. ‘You’re not that important.’

‘Thanks.’

‘But we’re still trying to keep it quiet. It doesn’t look too good for us either. Pretty embarrassing, to be honest.’

The monitor accelerated a fraction. ‘I’m sorry if I embarrassed you.’

‘We’ll cope.’ The sarcasm missed him completely. ‘But we need to know what happened.’

‘I wish I knew.’

But she was stalling. There were pieces there, waiting to be turned over and examined. She didn’t quite know what they’d show, but she knew they frightened her.

‘Let’s start with Michael Lascaris.’

A fragment of their earlier conversation came back to her. ‘He’s not my husband.’

‘We know that now. Your file in London said you were married; you and Michael were found together; we made an assumption. Turns out we were wrong.’

‘Am I divorced?’ Again, she knew she’d got it even before Norris confirmed it. The word tasted sour and true.

‘Michael Lascaris fell off a cliff,’ Norris continued. ‘The police fished his body out of Kotor Bay three days later.’

Abby forced herself to sit up straighter. Pain shot through her ribs, making her wince, but she held herself steady. ‘He didn’t fall off the cliff. He was thrown off it.’

‘So you do remember.’

‘It’s starting to come back.’

Norris took out a pen. ‘Let’s take it from the beginning. Was going there your idea?’

‘I don’t think so.’

‘Michael’s?’

‘The villa belonged to a friend of his.’

‘Did he say who this friend was?’

The memories were coming more easily now. ‘An Italian judge.’

The pen moved across the paper. ‘Was he there? The judge?’

‘Just us.’

‘A romantic getaway.’ There was a tone in his voice that Abby didn’t like. She slumped back.