Little Boy Blue

27

‘Who is this? What do you want?’

Emilia suppressed a smile. It was still early in Los Angeles and David Simons sounded bleary and half awake. His cracked voice and faltering speech suggested that he’d probably been out half the night. That wasn’t ideal – he might still be drunk or high and was more liable to get emotional – but the key thing was to get to him before the police did. They would have been trying to contact him, but they were spread thin over what was already shaping up to be a major investigation. Simons was a freelance cameraman, whose website had all the relevant contact details, and she’d had his mobile number on repeat dial since early afternoon. It had been going to voicemail for hours, but finally he had turned his phone on and she had struck gold.

‘My name is Emilia Garanita. I’m a journalist.’

‘Is this about the film? You need to talk to someone in the publici-’

‘No, it’s about Jake Elder. I was wondering if you’d heard the news?’

Silence on the end. Emilia could picture the groggy Simons sitting up in bed, trying to process what he’d just heard.

‘What news?’ Simons eventually said.

‘I’m sorry to have to tell you this… but Jake was killed last night.’

‘I don’t understand. Is this a joke?’

‘It’s a lot to take in and you have my sincere condolences. I know you and he were very close.’

Another long silence. Simons’s breathing was short and erratic.

‘Killed how?’

‘He was murdered. At a nightclub called the Torture Rooms in Southampton. Do you know it?’

The first teaser question to see if he was going to lie to her.

‘Yes, I know it. But I still don’t understand. Was he involved in some kind of fight?’

‘No, nothing like that.’

‘Was it an accident? Did something go wrong?’

Even with the line as echoing as this was, Emilia heard the wobble in David Simons’s voice.

‘It looks like he was murdered. And, like everybody else, we’re just trying to work out why. Can I ask when you last saw him?’

‘Jesus… I… this is hard to take in.’

‘I know and I’m sorry to be the bearer of such dreadful news. But I thought you’d want to know straight away.’

‘Why? Who are you?’

‘I work for a newspaper here, but I also knew Jake. Given how close you were to him, I thought you’d want to be told.’

Another long silence.

‘Now I’m sure you’ll want to get back here, but that’ll probably mean you missing out on some work, not to mention the cost of the flight from LA, so I was going to suggest that we pick up your expenses.’

‘I’m not sure…’

‘And all I’d want in return is ten minutes of your time now. What do you say?’

The deal was already done – she could sense he wanted to talk, wanted to find out more about what had happened to his ex. Emilia made all the right noises, adopting a consoling tone and offering her condolences, all the while revelling in the doublespeak of it all. She said she was sorry to be the bearer of bad news but the truth was very different.

There was something exhilarating about being the harbinger of death.