Daisy in Chains(61)

‘Maggie. Maggie! Are you OK? Let me see those texts.’

‘They’re private.’ Her fork spears something that sends purple juice across the white plate and on to the table. Her fork goes down. She can’t do this.

Pete has found a handkerchief – she forgot napkins – and is wiping the sauce from the tabletop. ‘Who is sending you texts?’ he asks.

‘I don’t know.’ She shakes her head. There is no point in even discussing it. This man cannot help her. ‘I don’t recognize the number.’

‘Wolfe? Does he have your number?’

‘He can’t text me. He doesn’t have a mobile phone.’

‘He’s not supposed to have one. Lots of prisoners do.’

Pete gets up, still chewing, and comes around behind her. He picks up her phone and then resumes both his seat and his meal, but the phone is by his side, out of her reach. He can’t access the texts, the phone is passcode protected, but if another comes in, he may see it before it fades.

She has to get a hold of herself. ‘Pete, I wanted to ask you about that homeless couple, Odi and Broon. I need to talk to Odi. Can you put me in touch with any homeless charities who might be able to help?’

‘I can probably tell you where she is right now.’

‘She’s in custody?’

‘I wish she were. Given the temperature outside, she probably does too, but we can’t arrest people for having nowhere else to go.’

‘So where is she?’

‘Porticoed entrance to the Town Hall in Wells. They’ve both been sleeping there the last few nights.’

‘They’re sleeping in the square?’ She thinks back to Market Square in Wells, to the Regency Town Hall. ‘That entrance is open to the elements on three sides, it isn’t possible.’

‘You do understand what’s meant by the term, homeless, don’t you?’

‘I’ll come with you when you go. See if I can find her.’

Ping.

Too fast for her, he picks up the phone but his eyesight isn’t good enough to focus on the small type. She sees him frown, hold it further away, a flicker of frustration as the message fades. Then he taps on the keypad and she watches in disbelief as the menu appears.

‘How did you do that?’

‘Four. Nine. Seven. Seven. Most people use birthdays as their key codes. You’re a cautious type, Maggie, you wouldn’t use anything as obvious as your own birthday. Nor would you keep the same one all the time. I’m guessing you change codes on your phone every time you take on a new case. Four nine seven seven is Hamish Wolfe’s birth date. Now, let’s see . . .’

His eyebrows grow closer. He holds the phone a little further from his eyes. ‘He loves me.’ He glances up. ‘That’s the same thing that was written underneath this table. You’re getting text messages from the person who broke into your house. Why the hell wouldn’t you tell me that?’

She’s telling him now. Or rather, he’s dragging the information out of her. She thinks about the words that were scrawled on the underside of the table they are sitting at, and fights back a temptation to crawl beneath it, to check they haven’t mysteriously reappeared.

‘Have you had them before today?’

‘No.’ She can see he doesn’t believe her. ‘No.’

His eyes go back to the phone. He needs reading glasses, is too vain to admit it. His hesitation gives her a split second to think.

‘He loves me.’ Pete reads out the first message again and moves on to the second. ‘He loves me not. Then we’ve got He loves me again. Hang on, this is—’

‘A game lovers play with daisies. They count the petals, pulling them off one by one.’

‘If there’s an odd number, it’s good, an even number and he loves her not?’ he tries.

‘Exactly.’

‘When you had that break-in, did whoever it was have access to your phone?’

‘I sometimes leave it downstairs, but it’s passcode protected.’

She sees his raised eyebrows, his slightly pitying look. He got through her phone’s passcode in an instant. Someone else could have done exactly the same thing. ‘I’ve been an idiot,’ she says.

He doesn’t argue. ‘Please tell me you changed the locks,’ he says.

She nods. ‘And improved them. No one’s getting in here again.’

‘All the same, it might be time to bring that Sirocco Silverwood character in for a chat. If you still think she’s the most likely candidate?’

‘She’s the only one I’ve met who’s claimed undying love for Hamish.’

‘It does seem odd, though, that anyone from the Wolfe Pack would threaten you. They might all be an apple short of a barrel of scrumpy, but if they’re genuine, it’s very much in their interest to keep you on side.’

‘Maybe they aren’t all. Don’t killers like to stay close to the investigation? They enjoy being at the centre of things, all the time having a big secret.’

‘Anyone you suspect, apart from Sirocco?’

‘How can I say? I spent very little time with them. They all looked pretty weird to me.’

‘Says the lady with blue hair.’

Ping.