Chosen Read Free Page B

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    â€˜Coffee?’ Rod suggests.
    â€˜This time of night?’
    â€˜Think we’re going to sleep?’ He flicks the kettle switch, tips the stale grounds out of the cafetière and into the sink.
    â€˜It’s my fault.’
    â€˜Stop!’ He holds up a hand almost as if he’s about to strike her. ‘She was depressed. She was ill. It was
nothing
to do with you. Say it.’
    â€˜It was nothing to do with me.’
    Sometimes, she does love him despite –
    She watches him spoon coffee, the bulk of him in her kitchen, the sexy shape of him. Will he still leave? The kettle clicks off. Rod fills the cafetière and fetches a bottle of Grouse and two mugs.
    â€˜Put some sugar in mine,’ Dodie says, thinking of Donna’s advice. Besides, it’s nice with sugar. He stirs sugar into both and holds the bottle up.
    â€˜Why not?’ It’s like a treat, at nearly midnight. The strangest moments can become occasions. People do the strangest things. It can strike at the oddest moment or be calculated down to the last detail, is what the forensics man said. Halfway through a carrot is an odd moment all right, but he implied that he had seen odder.
    â€˜What if it wasn’t suicide?’ she says.
    Rod sits down opposite her, hands cradled round his mug. ‘
What?
What are you saying?
Murder
you mean?’
    Dodie takes a tiny sip. Sweet. Hot. Strong. ‘Do you think they might think it’s kind of suspicious that Seth’s gone?’
    He frowns at her. ‘You’re not saying you think
he
’s got anything to do with it?’
    She scalds her tongue on a slurp of coffee. ‘Of course not!’
    He shakes his head, exasperated.
    â€˜Seth would never hurt a fly,’ she says.
    â€˜I
know
.’ He adds more whisky to her coffee and his own. The alcohol and the hot coffee have pinked his face; his skin looks steamy.
    â€˜Of
course
it was suicide,’ she says.
    â€˜I know.’
    â€˜How could you even think that about
Seth
? This is
Seth
we’re talking about!’
    â€˜
You
mentioned him. Mind if I smoke inside? It’s pissing down.’
    Dodie stares at him and he eyeballs her right back. She runs upstairs to have another look at Jake, to shut his door and keep him safe from the smoke. He’ll never remember Stella now. She bends to sniff his cheek, breathe in the soapiness of breath and skin. His eyelashes are such long, dark wings resting on the smooth roses of his cheeks. She nudges his shoulder and he wriggles and sighs. The sheet’s a bit crumpled; she lowers the side of the cot to straighten it and his eyes snap open, stare at her blankly, bottom lip folding down.
    â€˜OK, Jake,’ she says, ‘Mummy’s here.
Hush little baby, don’t say a word
,’ she whisper-sings, ‘
Momma’s gonna buy you a mockingbird
.’ She watches till the thumb goes in and the lashes brush his cheeks again before she creeps out: stupid, guilty mother. To want to wake a sleeping child just because she needs comfort.
    A mean niff of tobacco floats up the stairs. Inhaling, she goes down again, closes the door, feeling an urge herself. Exceptional circumstances.
    â€˜Roll me one?’
    He raises one eyebrow and pulls out another Rizla. Dodie swallows the last of her coffee, squeezes a bit more from the cafetière. ‘Anyway,
you
’ve felt like murdering Stella nowand then,’ Rod says. ‘Anyone would.’ He narrows his eyes and blows smoke in her face. They sit and sip and smoke. The fridge switches itself on with a panicky tremble. Stella is dead and Seth is missing and Rod is going away. The warmth of the whisky and the rush of the nicotine and caffeine send a flutter through her. None of it feels real at all. But Stella
is
really dead. Dusky toes under the velvet hem. Poor dead toes. Surely she should be crying? Did they think it suspicious that she didn’t cry?
    â€˜I’ve