Hanging Hill - Mo Hayder [70]
‘It certainly looks like it.’
‘I don’t mean Sophie, I mean Millie. Millie’s in love with Peter.’
She turned woodenly to him, hardly believing what she thought he was saying. ‘Nial?’ she said curiously. ‘You don’t mean you …’
He gave a weak, embarrassed smile. ‘Yeah, well – nothing I can do about it, is there?’
She stared back at him. Good God, what a mess. No reciprocity – no returns. Sophie in love with Peter, Millie in love with Peter, and Nial in love with Millie. Poor little Nial. It was like watching elephants in a circus ring, each with its trunk linked round the tail of the animal in front, plodding on, blind to the futility of it all. Really and truly, life just wasn’t fair.
She sighed. ‘Oh, God, you’re probably right. At the moment. But you wait. You wait.’
‘What?’
‘One day, Nial, Millie will see you in a different light. I promise you that.’
He blinked. ‘Do you?’
‘Oh, yes – oh, yes.’ And in saying it she prayed, with all the hope in the world, that she was right.
35
Zoë had taken a sleeping pill last night – she’d needed something, anything, to help escape the persistent voice in her head. At first it had been bliss, sending her sliding over the edge into oblivion. But she woke with a jolt five hours later, the first light of dawn at the window and the same clawing pain in her centre that she’d gone to sleep with. She didn’t look at her reflection when she got dressed. She sat on the edge of the bed and carefully wound a bandage around the wound on her arm, holding its end in her teeth. She selected a heavy black-cotton shirt with sleeves that buttoned securely at the wrists. She pushed her arm into it gingerly, not wanting to make it bleed again. She was an old hand at this.
She drove across town with the radio on, trying to keep her mood up, but the sight of the battered sign in the doorway of Holden’s Agency, the steps up to it, covered with chewing gum and stained with God only knew what, sent her resilience for the day down another notch. She hesitated – suddenly reluctant. But it was too late. Through the wire-meshed glass the man inside had noticed her. He came to the door and swung it open. He was suntanned, in his sixties, wearing a cheap pinstriped suit and a neat white shirt that were both a size too small. He was obviously trying to beat the smoking habit, because he had a Nicorette inhalator tucked in his breast pocket and the faint tang of tobacco smoke lingering around him.
‘Hi.’ He gave her his hand to shake. It was huge and meaty and he had the big grin of a Texan car salesman. She expected him to say, ‘How can I be of assistance to you, ma’am?’
‘Zoë,’ she said.
‘Mike. Mike Holden. What can I do you for? You’re not looking for the health-food shop, are you? It’s round the corner.’
‘No – I—’ She fumbled for her warrant card. Gave it a quick flash. ‘I’m from CID. In Bath.’
Holden paused at the sight of it. ‘Wendy? Is it Wendy? Has something happened to her? Just say it if it has. I’ve been preparing myself.’
‘Wendy? No. It’s an investigation. Something that happened in Bath. No bad news.’
He took a step back, breathing slowly, calming himself. ‘That’s good. Good.’ He looked her up and down – seemed to notice her for the first time. ‘I’m sorry – no manners. You’d better come in.’
The office was clean and less depressing than it was on the outside. It had the smell of a kitchen showroom, with industrial-grade brown carpet and a few pieces of furniture that looked a little lost in the large area. On one wall there was a line of framed black-and-white prints. Girls in bikinis, girls in swimsuits. Nothing topless.
‘You’re a model agency.’
Holden nodded. He sat at his desk, gestured for her to take a chair and turned a book towards her. ‘Our portfolio.’
She leafed through it and saw what the manager at Zebedee Juice had meant. These