Sudden Death Read Free Page A

we weren’t close.’
    ‘Dad . . .’ Jake began, but his dad silenced him with a hard stare.
    The female paramedic came alongside the detective. ‘We’re going to head off now, if that’s OK with you?’
    ‘Excuse me a moment, sir,’ said Detective Farrimond to Jake’s dad.
    As the detective and the paramedic separated themselves and talked in hushed tones, Jake turned to whisper, ‘Dad, Mr Chernoff started getting ill when he was eating.’
    His dad sighed, his eyes not leaving the detective and paramedic. ‘It might have been a coincidence,’ he said.
    ‘But don’t you think we should tell the police?’ Jake noticed his dad’s jaw tighten.
    ‘Let the police do their job.’ His dad frowned.
    ‘What about the napkin? The waiter –’
    Jake’s dad spoke in a low but insistent tone. ‘Jake, drop it . . . I’ll handle this.’
    The detective returned.
    ‘Can we do anything else for you, detective?’
    The investigator shook his head. ‘No, sir. We’ll notify the family.’
    Jake’s dad nodded. ‘And you think it was cardiac arrest?’
    ‘Almost certainly, sir. There’ll be an autopsy; in cases like this it’s procedure.’
    Jake remembered the spittle and the gurgling sounds. He knew they weren’t symptoms of a heart attack. And why wasn’t his dad telling the police about the waiter?
    A flash went off and Jake saw a photographer already on the scene, snapping pictures. When he lowered his camera, Jake noticed his wide-set pale eyes and square jaw. He had the kind of all-American look that Jake had come across so many times at his various international schools.
    The ‘American’ was wearing a dark beanie hat, a strand of blond fringe peeking out above his brow. When he lifted his camera again, a uniformed policeman placed a sturdyarm in front of him and told him to move on.
    The ambulance pulled away from the kerb, sirens and lights off. Detective Farrimond walked over and leant in close. ‘I say, sir,’ he said quietly, holding out his notepad. ‘If you wouldn’t mind . . . my son would be awfully grateful . . .’
    Jake’s dad gave a thin smile. ‘Of course,’ he said, taking the pad and pen. ‘It’s no problem. What’s his name?’
    ‘Er . . . it’s Paul,’ said the police officer.
    Jake rolled his eyes. Why do they always say it’s for their sons? If this man has a son, he’s probably never heard of Steve Bastin . . .
    ‘Thank you, sir,’ said the detective, beaming as he took back the notepad. ‘He’ll be pleased as punch.’
    Jake and his dad took a black cab home to Fulham in silence. The three-bedroom apartment they lived in was on two floors of a grand Victorian house set back from the road, with a semi-circular gravel drive out the front. The taxi skidded away, leaving them alone. When they reached the door, Jake’s dad fished inside his wallet and took out a twenty-pound note.
    ‘Are you still hungry? Why don’t you order yourself a takeaway?’ he said.
    Jake took the money. ‘Don’t you want anything?’
    Jake’s dad shook his head. ‘Lost my appetite.’ He put hishand on Jake’s shoulder. ‘Listen . . . I’ve got some work to do. We’ll talk in the morning, OK?’
    Jake tried to smile. It had been the same ever since he came to live in London:
in the morning, tomorrow, later
. . . He wondered, with Chernoff dead, would the move to Russia still happen? One look at his dad’s drawn face told him now wasn’t the time to ask. Even at sixteen, Jake was old enough to see something bigger was going on here. And he intended to get to the bottom of it, with or without his dad’s help.
    Up in his bedroom, Jake turned on his computer. The screen commands blinked into life and Jake’s fingers shook over the keyboard as the full horror of the evening hit home. His stomach felt knotted up.
    I saw someone die tonight.
    It wasn’t that he’d never seen a dead body. His mother was Irish Catholic and he remembered clearly the pale, waxy skin of his grandmother