The Cuckoo's Calling(81)

As he climbed the metal stairs, past the closed door of Crowdy Graphics, Strike resolved to treat Robin with a slightly cooler edge of authority for the rest of the day, to counterbalance that glimpse of hairy belly.

The decision was no sooner made than he heard high-pitched laughter, and two female voices talking at the same time, issuing from his own office.

Strike froze, listening, panicking. He had not returned Charlotte’s call. He tried to make out her tone and inflection; it would be like her to come in person and overwhelm his temp with charm, to make of his ally a friend, to saturate his own staff with Charlotte’s version of the truth. The two voices melded in laughter again, and he could not tell whose they were.

“Hi, Stick,” said a cheery voice as he pushed open the glass door.

His sister, Lucy, was sitting on the sagging sofa, with her hands around a mug of coffee, bags from Marks and Spencer and John Lewis heaped all around her.

Strike’s first surge of relief that she was not Charlotte was nevertheless tainted with a lesser dread of what she and Robin had been talking about, and how much each of them now knew about his private life. As he returned Lucy’s hug, he noticed that Robin had, again, closed the inner door on the camp bed and kitbag.

“Robin says you’ve been out detecting.” Lucy seemed in high spirits, as she so often was when she was out alone, unencumbered by Greg and the boys.

“Yeah, we do that sometimes, detectives,” said Strike. “Been shopping?”

“Yes, Sherlock, I have.”

“D’you want to go out for a coffee?”

“I’ve already got one, Stick,” she said, holding up the mug. “You’re not very sharp today. Are you limping a bit?”

“Not that I’ve noticed.”

“Have you seen Mr. Chakrabati recently?”

“Fairly recently,” lied Strike.

“If it’s all right,” said Robin, who was putting on her trench coat, “I’ll take lunch, Mr. Strike. I haven’t had any yet.”

The resolution of moments ago, to treat her with professional froideur, now seemed not only unnecessary but unkind. She had more tact than any woman he had ever met.

“That’s fine, Robin, yeah,” he said.

“Nice to meet you, Lucy,” Robin said, and with a wave she disappeared, closing the glass door behind her.

“I really like her,” said Lucy enthusiastically, as Robin’s footsteps clanged away. “She’s great. You should try and get her to stay on permanently.”

“Yeah, she’s good,” said Strike. “What were you two having such a laugh about?”

“Oh, her fiancé—he sounds a bit like Greg. Robin says you’ve got an important case on. It’s all right. She was very discreet. She says it’s a suspicious suicide. That can’t be very nice.”

She gave him a meaningful look he chose not to understand.

“It’s not the first time. I had a couple of those in the army, too.”

But he doubted that Lucy was listening. She had taken a deep breath. He knew what was coming.

“Stick, have you and Charlotte split up?”

Better get it over with.

“Yeah, we have.”

“Stick!”

“It’s fine, Luce. I’m fine.”

But her good humor had been obliterated in a great gush of fury and disappointment. Strike waited patiently, exhausted and sore, while she raged: she had known all along, known that Charlotte would do it all over again; she had lured him away from Tracey, and from his fantastic army career, rendered him as insecure as possible, persuaded him to move in, only to dump him—

“I ended it, Luce,” he said, “and Tracey and I were over before…” but he might as well have commanded lava to flow backwards: why hadn’t he realized that Charlotte would never change, that she had only returned to him for the drama of the situation, attracted by his injury and his medal? The bitch had played the ministering angel and then got bored; she was dangerous and wicked; measuring her own worth in the havoc she caused, glorying in the pain she inflicted…

“I left her, it was my choice…”

“Where have you been living? When did this happen? That absolute bloody bitch—no, I’m sorry, Stick, I’m not going to pretend anymore—all the years and years of shit she’s put you through—oh God, Stick, why didn’t you marry Tracey?”

“Luce, let’s not do this, please.”

He moved aside some of her John Lewis bags, full, he saw, of small pants and socks for her sons, and sat down heavily on the sofa. He knew he looked grubby and scruffy. Lucy seemed on the verge of tears; her day out in town was ruined.

“I suppose you haven’t told me because you knew I’d do this?” she said at last, gulping.

“It might’ve been a consideration.”

“All right, I’m sorry,” she said furiously, her eyes shining with tears. “But that bitch, Stick. Oh God, tell me you’re never going to go back to her. Please just tell me that.”

“I’m not going back to her.”

“Where are you staying—Nick and Ilsa’s?”

“No. I’ve got a little place in Hammersmith” (the first place that occurred to him, associated, now, with homelessness). “Bedsit.”