He decided to deal with the issue when it arose. In the meantime, he intended to enjoy the luxury on offer. He would have preferred Christy Nichols, the prudish prick-teaser as he saw her, but as she’d refused to have anything to do with him ‒ he should have put her availability in the contract, he thought ‒ then he would get her to sign for the whores. There was time to while away, and he wasn’t going to sit reading a book, drinking a cup of tea, for anybody.
Chapter 12
It had been a miserable trip to Worcestershire for Isaac, rain all the way and his speed had been reduced as a result. It was close to four hours before he pulled into police headquarters in Worcester, the principal city in the county.
Inspector June Brown greeted him warmly after he had waited for ten minutes in reception at the modern, clinical looking building.
‘Isaac, it’s good to see you.’ It was then he remembered her from his police training days. Then she had been a brunette, slim, with a figure that all the young police cadets had lusted after.
‘June, long time, no see.’ It was clear that he was embarrassed.
‘You’ve forgotten me already,’ she said, half-serious, half-teasing.
‘No, of course not.’ He had not forgotten her. The others cadets may have lusted, but it was only he who had sated the lust. She had latched onto him in the second week of training, only to let him go when the training concluded.
‘Isaac, it was a good time, and you helped me through, but that’s the past.’
‘I never forgot you.’
‘Don’t talk rubbish,’ she joked. ‘Two weeks, and I guarantee you were shacked up with another female charmed by your obvious attributes.’
‘That’s not true,’ he protested, not sure if she was serious or not.
‘Look at me,’ she said. ‘I’m married with two kids, and the body not as you remember. I married an accountant, not as charming as you, but you’re not the settling-down kind. You weren’t then, I suppose you still aren’t.’
Isaac had to admit that she had changed. Back then in training, she had a figure that could only have been described as sensational. What he saw now was a very attractive woman, but the weight had gone on, and the face had aged. He assumed he had changed as well, but he thought it could not be as much as her.
‘Three,’ he said.
‘Three what?’
‘Three weeks.’
‘Okay, I was out by a week, but what woman is going to resist a man like you? You were gorgeous to women back then, still are. Am I correct?’
‘I’m not sure about that, but so far I’ve not settled down. Tried to. A couple have moved in with me, or I’ve moved in with them, but it’s not seemed to last for long.’ He wondered if Jess O’Neill might be the one. He discounted the thought. He inwardly smiled, when he thought of the passionate embrace and the kiss when he had left her the last time.
With so much history between them, June and Isaac spent the next hour chatting about their lives. It was June who finally brought them back to the present situation.
‘What’s important about this woman?’ she asked.
‘I’m not sure I can tell you. Besides, I don't know too much myself.’
‘I suppose it doesn't matter.’ She resigned herself to the fact; she knew him well enough not to press for more.
‘It’s a directive from senior management to find this woman.’
‘I know who she is, of course. The sad life of a married woman and mother, when watching the television becomes a nightly highlight.’
‘It comes to us all, I suppose,’ he said.
‘Suburbia and raising a family has its drawbacks. I’m not complaining, though.’
Isaac felt the need to change the subject. She had become melancholy; better to focus on the missing woman. ‘We know Marjorie Frobisher’s phone was used there.’
‘Are you certain she was though?’
‘Cameras, surveillance, security may have picked her up.’
‘I’ve already had someone looking at any there, although it’s not London. There will not be so many. How long are you staying?’
‘Until I get some answers on her whereabouts.’
‘Good, then you can come over to the house for a meal one night.’
Isaac replied in the affirmative, but sitting down with the husband of a woman he had known intimately did not sit well with him. He would endeavour to steer away from the subject if it came up again.
The assumption that a camera would have picked up Marjorie Frobisher proved not to be so accurate. There were cameras in the banks, the hotels, even some of the shops, but relatively few of them kept the tapes for more than a couple of weeks. The stores were interested in shoplifters, and if none had been apprehended, then there was no reason to keep the record.
At the end of the first day, Isaac was anxious to get on with the task. So far, he had spent more time at the hotel than at police headquarters. It was not a case of avoidance, but the invitation to dine with the husband of a former lover continued to unsettle him.
‘June, this invite to your house,’ he tentatively broached the subject at the office the next day. There had been some developments in the case, but before she told him, he wanted to clear the air, state his position.’
‘Tonight, at eight, come casual; my husband is looking forward to meeting you.’
‘I’m not sure I can come.’
