Dead Fall by A.K. Turner

Author:A.K. Turner
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Zaffre Publishing

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Slap! The wake of a passing boat hitting the wooden hull beside Cassie’s ear jerked her from sleep and left Dreamcatcher rocking violently. Going too fast – especially this early in the morning. The warming weather was bringing out the amateur boaters who had zero grasp of canal etiquette.

Rolling over, she was about to moan to Archie before remembering with a scalpel stab under the ribs that they were done – for good this time. But already the sharp pain of separation was easing down into the settled ache that she knew from experience would pass – eventually. She counted off in her head the number of relationships she’d had as an adult that hadn’t gone the distance. After reaching five she stopped and stretched out across the bed, luxuriating in her recovered space. Maybe it was just time to accept that she was a loner, by character and inclination.

Finding no sign of her fellow lone wolf Macavity, she pulled on some clothes and went into the cockpit. Gaz, her ex-roadie mate and neighbour, was already up on deck next door smoking his morning fag, intent on his phone.

‘Hey, Gaz. You seen that disloyal beast of mine this morning?’

Ignoring the question, he nodded to the phone. ‘You seen the latest?’

Shaking her head, she pulled up her own newsfeed. One of the fringe news sites was running the headline: ETHAN FOX ACCUSED OF BRONTE ABUSE. It didn’t take many clicks to find the whole story: @Charly_Detective had posted a vid on TikTok. She had dug up an old selfie of Ethan and Bronte when they were still a couple, which she claimed showed ‘clear bruising to Bronte’s throat’. Zooming up the darker area, Cassie decided they were a long way short of clear-cut throttle marks.

Charly shared ‘new and shocking information’ suggesting that Ethan had a kink for strangling his girlfriends during sex. She went on to recycle the misleading ‘evidence’ that the hyoid bone in Bronte’s throat had been broken. It was all framed piously as ‘questions police need to get answers to: now’.

The post had gone viral, with @BinkyBinks96 summing up the calibre of comments with the insightful comment: ‘Your telling me that someone with bone broken in throat wasn’t strangulated? Poor Brontes druggie ex has a SHITLOAD of questions to answer.’

Cassie snorted derisively.

‘So was she strangled?’ asked Gaz.

‘No! it was the fall that killed her. The world’s gone barking mad.’

‘True,’ said Gaz, pinching out his cig. ‘By the way, I gave that cat of yours a tin of mackerel this morning,’ he said with a cackle that revealed a gold molar.

‘Oh thanks a bunch, Gaz.’ She shook her head. ‘He’ll be demanding poached salmon next.’

*

Lost in her thoughts, she had almost reached the mortuary when a tall figure materialised at her side.

‘What the fu—! You nearly gave me a heart attack.’ And it was true that her heart did do funny things whenever she laid eyes on Phyllida Flyte. ‘You coming to the mortuary?’

Flyte shook her head. ‘I’m not a cop anymore, remember?’ She sounded bitter.

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