Preface to Murder by M Morris (best books to read for success .txt) 📗

For the first time since their initial meeting, Bridget began to feel some sympathy towards the murdered academic. It was crystal clear now that Diane had loved her son very much, and yet in his eyes she had been a cold, indifferent mother – one that he had ultimately rejected. Perhaps that was why Diane cultivated such a hard, unfeeling exterior, and why she had never remarried – to protect herself from future heartbreak. Bridget thought once more of Chloe, and a cold fear filled her heart at the prospect of her own daughter ever turning her back on her. She would not allow that to happen. However hard Ben tried to infiltrate himself into their daughter’s life, no matter how Chloe responded, Bridget resolved always to be there for her, and to support her in whatever choices she made. Alfie, Chloe’s boyfriend, would be joining them all for lunch at Vanessa’s on Sunday – proof no doubt of just how far the relationship had come – and Bridget was determined to be on her best behaviour and say nothing that would embarrass her daughter in his presence.

The final photograph in the album had been taken at Daniel’s graduation ceremony at Durham. There, Diane and Ian stood either side of their son, but there was a distant look on their faces, as if the marriage was already showing signs of the fault lines that would result in their so-called amicable divorce. Despite Ian Dunn’s assertion that the split had been without rancour, Bridget wasn’t sure that any marriage could fail without recrimination and resentment. But maybe that was her own personal experience colouring her view, and other people were able to handle the matter more maturely.

Ffion handed her another album, this one red, and Bridget opened it, expecting to find yet more pictures of Daniel as a child, but this album was older than all the others. On the inside front cover someone had written Italian tour, April 1983. The same year as Diane and Ian’s wedding. Bridget had a fondness for all things Italian – pasta, Chianti, opera, art, sun, piazzas, and, of course, gelato – and couldn’t resist turning the pages for a sneak peek. The pictures told her that in the spring of that year, Diane, Ian, Annabel and John had embarked on a three-week road trip around Italy in a Fiat Panda. The two sisters and their respective boyfriends had started in Milan, detoured to Venice via Verona, then worked their way down the spine of the country, sampling the architectural and culinary delights of Bologna, Florence and Rome before arriving in Naples. In the shadow of Vesuvius, they had rented a palazzo-style villa of quite idyllic charm. A photograph that had presumably been taken by an obliging local showed both couples seated around an outside dining table laden with mouth-watering bowls of pasta and glasses of red wine.

It was a vision of yet another version of Diane, a carefree, young woman, with a taste for fun and the simple pleasures of life. Somehow that woman had vanished over the years, submerged beneath adult responsibilities of marriage, motherhood, and a demanding academic career. Diane had made many choices travelling along that road. One of them had – perhaps – led to her death. But the solution to that mystery wouldn’t be found within these old photo albums.

‘Ma’am?’

Bridget closed the album and dragged her thoughts away from sun-drenched Italy back to a damp and still chilly Oxford. ‘Sorry, yes?’

‘Should we move upstairs?’

‘Yes,’ she said, returning the album to the shelf, and wrapping her coat firmly around herself. ‘I think we’ve done all we can here.’

Bridget had visited Diane’s bedroom before, on the morning of the discovery of the body. This time, however, with the curtains drawn back, the body removed to the morgue, and the sense of urgency gone, she was able to take a proper look around. As expected, the room was furnished to the highest specification, with fitted walk-in wardrobes and an en-suite bathroom. But even here there was little sign of any personality. The bedside table held nothing but a reading light and a small glass jar of lip balm.

Ffion swept her gaze around the minimalist interior. ‘Not a single book on display. I thought that writers were supposed to spend all their spare time reading.’

It was a little surprising, given that there were so many books downstairs.

Bridget made her way into the bathroom which, like the kitchen, was all gleaming surfaces and high-spec functionality.

The skincare products, displayed like works of art, were all brands that Bridget coveted but had never been able to convince herself that she was worth spending that amount of money on. But that wasn’t what interested her most.

She pulled open the doors to the bathroom cabinet and rummaged inside. But amongst the prosaic packs of Paracetamol, Ibuprofen and indigestion tablets, there wasn’t a single packet of sleeping pills. She was still no nearer to explaining how Diane, supposedly a light sleeper, had not been awoken by the sound of breaking glass in the middle of the night.

13

Bridget returned to Kidlington with much on her mind: a dead woman, killed while under her responsibility; the seemingly unavoidable conclusion that matters of national security were to blame; not to mention the implied threat to Bridget’s own career prospects if she screwed this up.

The circumstances of the murder itself were cloaked in mystery and Bridget’s visit to Diane’s house had done nothing to shine any light on them. And if all this wasn’t enough, the undercurrent of resentment that Ben had aroused in her tugged heavily at her emotions, and the continued absence of Jonathan and Chloe was beginning to feel like a void in her own heart.

Ffion, too, seemed lost in thought, but Bridget took some solace in the sense that her constable’s thoughts might be lighter and happier than