Not Dead Enough

63

Cleo tried to scream, but the sound stayed trapped in her throat. She struggled manically, trying to free her arms, the man’s face a blur to her unfocused eyes. She lashed out with her leg, kicking him in the shin.

Then she heard his voice.

‘Cleo!’

Quiet, plaintive. ‘Cleo! It’s me! It’s OK.’

Spiky black hair. A startled expression on his young, pleasant face. Dressed casually in an orange top and green shorts, headphones plugged into his ears.

‘Oh, shit.’ She stopped struggling, her mouth dropping open. ‘Darren!’

He released her arms very slowly, warily, as if not yet quite sure he could trust her not to stab him. ‘Are you all right, Cleo?’

Gulping down air, she felt as if her heart was trying to drill its way out of her chest. She stepped back, looking at her colleague, then at the knife on the floor, then back at his brown eyes. Numb. Too numb to say anything else for a moment.

‘You gave me such a shock.’ The words came out in a breathless, whispered rush.

Darren raised his hands and pulled out his earphones, letting them dangle by their white wires. Then he raised his hands again, in an attitude of surrender. He was trembling, she realized.

‘I’m sorry.’ She was still hyperventilating, her voice shaky. Then she smiled, trying to remedy the situation.

Still looking uncertain, he said, ‘Am I that scary?’

‘I – I heard the door,’ she said, starting to feel foolish now. ‘I called out and you didn’t reply. I thought you were an intruder. I – I was . . .’ she shook her head.

He dropped his hands, cupping his earpieces. ‘I was listening to some heavy music,’ he said. ‘I didn’t hear you.’

‘I’m so sorry.’

He reached down and rubbed his shin.

‘Did I hurt you?’

‘Actually, yes! But I’ll live.’ There was a nasty mark on his shin. ‘I suddenly remembered we’d left the body out. I thought, with this heat, it ought to go in a fridge. I called you, but there was no answer from your home or your mobile, so I decided to come in and do it.’

Feeling more normal now, Cleo apologized again.

He shrugged. ‘Don’t worry about it. But I never thought of working in a mortuary as being a contact sport.’

She laughed. ‘I’m so, so sorry. I’ve just had a shit twenty-four hours. I—’

‘Forget it. I’m OK.’

She looked at the red weal on his leg. ‘It was good of you, that you came in. Thank you.’

‘I’ll think twice next time,’ he said good-humouredly. ‘Maybe I should have stayed in my last job – it was a lot less violent.’

She grinned. In his previous job, she remembered, Darren had been a butcher’s apprentice. ‘It’s good of you to give up time on a Sunday,’ she said.

‘It got me out of a barbecue at my girlfriend’s parents,’ he said. ‘That’s the downside of this work. I can’t cope with barbecues since I started working here.’

‘That makes two of us.’

They were both thinking of burns victims. Usually their skin was blackened, crisp like pork crackling. Depending how long they had burned for, their flesh was sometimes grey and hard, sometimes raw and bloody liked seared, undercooked pork. Cleo had read once that cannibal tribes in central Africa called white man long pig. She understood exactly why. It was the reason many people who worked in mortuaries were uncomfortable at barbecues. Particularly when pork was involved.

Together they rolled the cadaver on to her stomach and examined her back for tattoos, birthmarks and bullet-entry wounds, but found nothing. With relief they finally eased her into a body-bag, zipped it up and slid it into fridge number 17. Tomorrow the process of identifying her would begin. The soft tissues from her fingers were gone, so there were no prints that could be taken. Her jaw was intact, so dental records could be checked. DNA was a longer shot – she would need to already be on a database to find a match. Her description and photographs and measurements would be sent to the Missing Persons Helpline, and Sussex police would contact friends and relatives of anyone who had been reported missing who fitted the description of this dead woman.

And in the morning the consultant pathologist, Dr Nigel Churchman, would conduct a post-mortem to establish the cause of death. If, during the course of this, he found anything suspicious, he would halt his work immediately, the coroner would be notified and a Home Office pathologist, either Nadiuska or Dr Theobald, would be called in to take over.

In the meantime, both Cleo and Darren had several hours remaining of a glorious August Sunday afternoon ahead of them

Darren left first, in his small red Nissan, heading for the barbecue he really could have done without. Cleo stood in the doorway, watching him drive off, unable to stop herself from envying him. He was young, full of enthusiasm, happy in his relationship with his girlfriend and in his job.

She was rapidly heading for the wrong side of thirty. Enjoying her career but worrying about it at the same time. She wanted to have children before she was too old. Yet each time she thought she had found Mr Right, he would spring something on her from left field. Roy was such a lovely man. But just when she thought everything was perfect, his missing wife popped up like a bloody jack-in-the-box.

She set the alarm, stepped outside and locked the front door, with just one thought in her mind – to get home and see if there was a message from Roy. Then, walking across the tarmac drive to her blue MG, she stopped dead in her tracks.

Somebody had slashed the black canvas roof open. All the way from the windscreen to the rear window.