A Bitter Feast(59)

“So what you’re telling us,” Booth said, straightening up, “is that someone deliberately hit this bloke with their car, then got out and bashed him in the head?”

The doctor shrugged. “It’s possible that the driver simply didn’t see him. Although”—she touched the anorak with her gloved fingers—“this jacket has highly reflective panels. It’s also possible that he rolled as he fell and hit his head on a stone. But I think either scenario is highly unlikely. I think this is where he landed after impact. And then I think someone hit him on the head, hard.” She stood to face them. “I think you’re looking at a murder, Detective Booth. And a particularly brutal murder at that.”





Chapter Sixteen

Wanting an excuse to grab a few minutes to herself, Melody had told Doug that she wasn’t the right person to show him round the garden. He’d looked a little offended, but it served him right for being so squirrelly over whatever it was he was keeping to himself. Relenting, she said, “Seriously. Let me find Joe. He’s the expert here. Mum likes to putter and read gardening books, but Joe’s the one who puts in the hard graft.” With that, she let herself out onto the terrace and surreptitiously checked her phone. There was nothing from Andy.

Damn. Was it too late to grovel? Did she even want to grovel?

Gemma and Duncan were out under the pergola with Charlotte, watching something the boys were doing on the lower lawns. Realizing that she didn’t want to speak to anyone at the moment, she slipped quickly along the terrace and took the path to the glasshouse. She stepped inside, breathing in the warm, humid, humus-scented air. It was a comforting smell, dirt, and she’d often taken refuge here as a child. Of course, before Joe came, when the garden and glasshouse had been the domain of Old Ted, the place had been much less tidy and more suited to childish imaginings.

But Old Ted, who had let Melody push his wheelbarrow and bury things in his borders with her trowel, was living out his days with a sister in Bournemouth, and the garden, under Joe’s care, had gone from a place pretty but rather ordinary to a showpiece, a stunning adaptation of a Gertrude Jekyll design.

Joe, however, talented as he was as a gardener and landscaper, seemed a bit of an odd duck. Several years ago, her mother had discovered him working at a garden center in Cheltenham, and after hiring him a few times for contract work through the nursery, had offered him a full-time job. Together, they’d hatched a plan to restore the gardens to their Edwardian glory. Once Joe had begun implementing the long-term plan for the ornamental gardens, he had tackled the derelict kitchen garden. Within a year, he’d been harvesting much more produce than the household could use, and he and her mum had decided to sell the excess to local restaurants. Melody thought it was about that time that Joe had asked her parents if he could fix up the old fishing hut, and in return her mum had offered to let him live there. That, Melody couldn’t imagine. No electricity, no hot water, and heaven forbid, no Internet.

Leaving the glasshouse, she wandered down through the kitchen garden and, her curiosity piqued, took the path along the river. Even though the morning was warming nicely, when she reached the hut’s clearing, a faint wisp of smoke drifted from the woodstove chimney. Otherwise, there was no sign of habitation, and she felt suddenly unsure of herself, trespassing on Joe’s privacy. Although she often chatted with him when she came for weekend or holiday visits, she couldn’t say that they were exactly friends.

Before she could either call out or change her mind, Joe came out onto the hut’s porch and looked round, as if he’d sensed her presence.

“Melody. What are you doing here?” He did not sound pleased to see her. He was dressed in a woolly jumper so ancient it might have been Old Ted’s, and his thick brown hair stood out like a thatch, obviously uncombed.

“I came to ask a favor.” She took a few steps forward but stopped shy of the porch. “I didn’t mean to intrude, especially on your Sunday morning.”

“I do have a mobile, you know,” he said, but then his shoulders relaxed a little and he added, “I don’t suppose you have the number.”

“No. Look, it wasn’t important. I’ll just—”

“No. I’m sorry. Didn’t mean to sound a total shit. Had a bad night.” He raked a hand through his hair, subduing it a bit. “I was just making some coffee. Why don’t you come in and have a cup while you tell me what I can do for you.”

“Thanks.” Melody wasn’t about to turn down a chance to see what he’d done with the inside of the place. In her granddad’s day, it had been full of cobwebs, broken fishing rods, and disintegrating lawn chairs.

Following him, she saw a single wooden garden chair on the porch, a tartan rug thrown over its arm, and beside it, a pair of muddy boots that Joe seemed to have been in the process of cleaning with a palette knife. “I used to come fishing here with my granddad, when I visited my grandparents as a kid,” she said. “But I haven’t been here in years—Dad never having held a fishing rod in his life.”

Although it was hard to tell through the beard, her little aside brought what might have been a smile from Joe as he held the door open for her. Her father, brought up in working-class Newcastle, not only abhorred golf, but had refused to take up the expected country pursuits of hunting and fishing.