Blood Red Roses by Lin Anderson Page B

she wanted him there or not.
    He tipped a measure of whisky in the coffee and carried it into the bedroom.
    â€˜Want to talk?’
    â€˜No.’
    â€˜Good.’
    When he moved against her she forgot the blue lips and twisted limbs. She forgot death and celebrated life.

 
CHAPTER THREE
    Bill was seated in his favourite chair. It looked out of place in the modern office. Old leather, with a girn that could not be oiled into silence, it gave him a place to think.
    â€˜Poison,’ he shook his head. ‘It’s like an Agatha Christie novel.’
    â€˜Strychnine. She died quickly, if horribly.’
    â€˜Jonny, the fiance, is a fireman.’
    â€˜A suspect?’
    â€˜How many husbands-to-be kill their bride on her hen night?’
    â€˜We’ve had weirder murders.’
    Bill shook his head. The world of murder was as strange as it had been when he started in the force thirty years before.
    Detective Constable Janice Clarke stuck her head round the door.
    â€˜Car’s here, sir.’
    â€˜Ready?’
    Rhona nodded.
    Donna Steven’s flat was in a block on the lower end of Maryhill Road, minutes from Charing Cross. Bill left the driver with the car to safeguard his tyres.
    A team was already there. Three white suits greeted Rhona as she entered from the walkway.
    The flat was tiny. A kitchen-living room, a bedroom, cramped hall and bathroom. In the bedroom an ivory wedding dress hung on a wardrobe door. On the dressing table sat a fairytale veil. Rhona fingered the dress material, recognising the smooth feel of expensive silk.
    She tried to imagine what Donna had been thinking and feeling the last time she was in this room.
    â€˜Civil wedding. A small guest list but no expense spared,’ Bill told her.
    â€˜What did she do for a living?’
    â€˜Worked in a newsagent, Tracey says’.
    Rhona glanced again at the wedding frock. ‘If she didn’t have a family...’
    â€˜I take it the dress is expensive?’
    â€˜Silk. A couple of thousand I would say.’
    â€˜Bloody hell!’
    Bill had a teenage daughter and a son. Chances were he would be counting the cost shortly himself.
    â€˜So where was the money coming from?’ Bill said.
    â€˜The husband-to-be?’
    â€˜The guy’s in shock. I’ll interview him later.’
    â€˜Can I take a look at the room... by myself?’
    Bill nodded. ‘Be my guest.’
    Rhona’s mentor in the early days had been Dr Fields, or Eagle-eye as he was fondly known. He did everything. Medical, fibres, fingerprints, all the branches. He taught her how to get results from what was called reticent evidence. Evidence not willing to give up its secrets. One thing more he’d taught her. Forensics can help, but only if you know what to look for. To know that, you have to get to know the victim.
    The wedding dress dominated the room. Below it was a pair of matching silk shoes. A wave of emotion swept over Rhona. Donna wanted to get married. Did someone poison her to stop thathappening?
    Beside the shoes sat a small wastepaper basket. Below a couple of makeup tissues was a single red rose, wilting from lack of water.
    Rhona carefully removed it and slipped it in a forensic bag.
    Fifteen minutes later Bill was at the door. ‘Find anything?’
    â€˜Small spots of blood on the bed cover. And some hair samples from the pillow that don’t look like Donna’s.’
    She showed him the rose. ‘And this.’
    Bill sniffed. ‘Shop roses don’t usually have a scent.’
    â€˜Is Jonny a gardener?’
    â€˜He lives in a flat above the fire station. Anyway, garden roses don’t flower in November, do they?’
    Bill dropped her off at the forensic lab, promising to get in touch after he’d interviewed Jonny Simpson.
    Rhona loved the view from her laboratory window, even now in November. She looked down on Kelvingrove Park, the Art Gallery andMuseum in the distance.