Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [reading in the dark TXT] 📗

TWO

She stared at me for a long time while I stared at the large glass of dark beer on the table in front of me. Eventually, she said, “Your wife?”

I nodded, still without meeting her eye. “We were only married a very short time.” I finally looked up at her. “I’m sorry. I should have told you a long time ago.” She frowned and I kept talking, trying to preempt her anger and disappointment. “There always seemed to be something else to talk about, or it was inappropriate, or it would have spoiled the mood. It’s not exactly something you bring up on a honeymoon. There never seemed to be a right moment.” I sighed. “Like I said, Carmen, it’s not that I didn’t want to tell you. I guess I’ve just grown used to avoiding it, not thinking about it… I’m sorry.”

She was still frowning. “Hey.”

I looked into her eyes. They were serious.

“You’re my guy. Stop apologizing. I told you once, whatever it was you were not talking about, I’d hear it when you were ready. You don’t need to apologize to me for anything, Stone.”

She held out her fist. I smiled and punched it gently. “You’re one of a kind, kiddo. I should marry you.”

“So, do you still love her?”

I shrugged. “I love her memory. I always will. She was a very special person, and we were good. But it was fifteen years ago. I have laid her to rest.” I shook my head. “It’s not the same…” I gestured at her and then at me. “I’m a different person now. What we have is not like anything…”

She gave me a smug smile. When she spoke, her voice was quiet. “I know what we’ve got, Stone. You don’t need to explain.” Then she became serious. “But if we’re going to do this, investigate this murder, you’ll need to tell me what happened. You’ll also have to tell me, honestly, if you can do it. We don’t have to do this. We can go home.”

I thought about it. Eventually, I gave a single nod. “Yeah, knowing you’re there.”

“Always.”

“I met Hattie…” I stopped.

Dehan had given a little start. She smiled and shook her head. “It’s stupid, but, realizing she had a name…”

“Yeah, Henrietta: Hattie. We met soon after I moved out here. We took it slow. I guess we were cautious about my job, and the fact that I lived on another continent. Plus, I was only supposed to be here six months.” I paused and gave a small laugh. “We’re supposed to be checking in and ordering martinis at Heathrow Airport. Instead we’re here, doing this… You sure you’re OK? It’s the past. It’s fifteen years ago…”

“Stone. Look at me…”

I realized I had been talking to the ceiling and sat forward to face her.

“Sometimes, when we don’t confront something that we need to confront, life kicks us in the ass and makes us confront it.”

I smiled. “Is that in the Torah?”

She nodded. “Yeah, in those very words. Exactly like that. It also says, ‘Now cowboy up’.”

I sighed noisily. “After I got my first six months extended, I guess we both decided it was time to get a bit more serious, and look at options. I could move here. I like England, the guys at the Yard were getting used to me. We had a good working relationship. Harry was a friend…” I spread my hands. “Or, she could move back to the States with me. She wasn’t crazy about that option. She was a talented artist and illustrator. She was known here, her publisher was here in London…”

I stopped and took a long pull on my drink.

She waited a moment, then said, “So by your seventh month here, you were beginning to get serious.”

I nodded.

“You always were rash and impetuous, even back then…?”

I gave her a lopsided grin. “I guess I was. So we started talking about marriage. We got engaged and I asked for a second extension, got told yes, but that was the last: either I came home or I stayed in London. We decided, whatever we did, whether we stayed in London or moved to New York, we would have to be married. So, that was what we did. I don’t think her family were thrilled. A New York cop from the Bronx wasn’t exactly what they had in mind for their daughter, but they accepted me.”

“Was she from a nice family?”

I nodded. “What they call posh.” I smiled. “Port Out Starboard Home. That’s where the first class cabins were.”

She laughed.

I went on. “She was posh, yeah. Her parents had a house in the country and another in Chelsea. We used to visit them, and with time, they grew to like me, more or less. I don’t think they ever forgave me for not having a huge wedding, but Hattie told them she had better things to spend her money on, and bought me the Jag. She knew I would love it, and it was a subtle way of making it that much more difficult to go back to the States.”

I fell silent. Dehan stood and went to the bar. She came back a couple of minutes later with two more pints and set one of them in front of me. It struck me that she could not have been more different from Hattie. But then, I was no longer that John Stone. She took a pull, smacked her lips, sighed and smiled.

“So meantime, almost a year has gone by. What’s happening at work?”

“That was more than a year. That was about fifteen months, by the time we got married. Meantime, the killer they were now calling the Butcher of Whitechapel was turning into a real nightmare. He had