The Buried Circle - Jenni Mills [192]
My phone pings: a text from John. No police surgeon yet, no news, they haven’t done the scan. As I lock the front door of the house behind me, I can’t help glancing towards Windmill Hill. It’s still broad daylight, so what was I expecting to see up there?
I park the car in the lane outside Martin’s cottage and sit for a moment, remembering him talking about the strangeness of bedding down for the night in an ancient stone circle. The cottage is set back from the others, the last in the lane, backing directly onto the stones, with a tiny strip of garden to one side. The walls are whitewashed, probably built of sarsen from megaliths broken in the eighteenth century. So, not only sleeping inside the circle: I’ll be sleeping inside one of the stones.
Unlocking the door, I realize I’m ever so slightly nervous. Kipping down here reminds me of the woman’s skeleton found in the ditch, her body ringed by small sarsens.
Keeping something out, or keeping something in?
There are logs and kindling in a basket by the hearth. Although it’s midsummer, I lay a fire and prop myself against the sofa with a glass of wine, watching flames lick the logs, warmth and alcohol making me drowsy.
The rap on the window brings me to with a start, spilling a trickle of wine over my shirt.
‘Oh, it’s you.’
Ed is peering in.
‘I only just heard.’ He hovers uneasily on the doorstep when I open the door. About your grandmother, I mean. I’ve been at the airfield all day. Martin rang and said you’d be here. Can I come in?’
I nod, trying to be cool. Truth is, although we parted on less than friendly terms yesterday, I’m unbearably happy to see him. His jeans and T-shirt are so clean they smell of fabric conditioner, as well as the familiar safe Ed-scent.
‘I didn’t know if you’d eaten,’ he says, as he steps into the room, ‘but in case you haven’t I brought something with me?’ The question in his voice suggests he’s expecting to be thrown out any minute.
I burst into tears.
‘Hey, hey,’ he says, stroking my hair, a couple of minutes later. ‘I don’t normally have this effect on you.’
‘I’m sorry,’ I say into his chest. He does smell safe, and I’d never realized it until now. I’d always thought of him as smelling dangerous. I lift my head cautiously, tracking up the dark stubble until I find his eyes.
‘You might be able to tell,’ he says, ‘that I’ve suddenly lost interest in supper.’
‘Is it going to take a long time?’
‘Not if you keep doing that.’
‘Supper, I mean.’
‘Five minutes in the microwave?’
‘That’s all right, then.’
Afterwards he makes me sit by the fire while he busies himself in the kitchen.
‘Can’t stay all evening,’ he calls. ‘I’m earning decent money for once, flying the R44 to Ascot late tonight. Last-minute booking for a local racehorse trainer and a couple of owners. Right now, lucky bastards are celebrating at the Fat Duck in Bray.’ The ping of the microwave interrupts him. ‘Of course, nothing as fine as our sumptuous repast…’ In plastic containers from Waitrose.
‘A triumph, I think you’ll find,’ he says, bustling in with two steaming plates of lasagne and sniffing the aroma. ‘Eat your heart out, Heston Blumenthal.’
‘I suppose there are people who would actually cook this from scratch,’ I say, propping myself against the sofa and balancing the plate on my lap.
‘Like Martin.’ Ed pulls an incredulous face. ‘I found raw meat and stuff in the fridge, actual ingredients. Though could he better this? Or am I just bloody starving?’
‘It’s sex,’ I say. ‘Always makes you hungry. Well, good sex, anyway’
‘Mmm.’ He settles himself on the sofa. ‘That was outrageously good sex. First time I’ve shagged in a stone circle, mind.’
‘Don’t,’ I say, with a shiver. ‘I mean, don’t remind me I’m here by myself tonight. Can’t you find someone else to fly your bloody helicopter?’
‘Can’t be done,’ he says. ‘Not if you want me to keep cooking