Page 13 of Deadly Cry

‘Mr Nock, please, sit down,’ Kim said. All four of them standing in the cramped kitchen was overpowering.

‘Just tell me—’

‘Mr Nock, if you’ll just—’

‘Sit down, Andy,’ his sister said as though she knew what was coming.

He sat and Kim did the same. Bryant moved to the doorway to offer a little more space.

Ella dried her hands on a tartan tea towel.

‘Mr Nock, I’m sorry to have to tell you that your wife is not okay. She’s—’

‘I knew I should have said no,’ he claimed, running his hand through his hair. ‘I could tell by her mood that she wasn’t quite with it, but we did the usual checks and—’

‘What checks?’ Kim asked. She’d been about to tell him his wife was dead, and she knew that anything she could learn at this point may not be accessible after he received the news.

‘My wife has problems, officer. She suffers from anxiety and depression. She refuses to take medication and normally she’s fine and handles it well, but this morning I watched her take dirty plates out of the dishwasher for breakfast.’

‘And the checks?’ Kim asked, not sure she hadn’t accidentally done the same thing herself on occasion. It didn’t mean that she was depressed or anxious. More likely distracted by some problem she was having with her current motorcycle restoration project or a case she was working.

‘She tells me exactly where she’s going, and I call her every couple of hours.’

As though knowing her next question, Bryant took out his pocket notebook.

‘And where exactly was your wife going today?’

‘She had a doctor’s appointment at ten, and then she was going to Brierley Hill to pick up some things from Asda and Shop N Save. Then she was taking Mia to the Ball Factory play centre.’

‘And you called her?’

‘Probably three times during the morning, and then I couldn’t get her after lunch. I called Ella and then I went out looking for her, just in and out of shops, and couldn’t see her anywhere, so made some calls – the hospital and then the station – to see if there had been any accidents.’

‘Is she in trouble, officer?’ Andrew asked, linking his hands together. ‘Has she done something wrong?’

In a minute, you’re going to wish she had, Kim thought, taking a deep breath.

‘Mr Nock, I am so sorry to tell you that your wife is dead.’

No matter what words she used to lead up to it, that last word still had to come out of her mouth and there was no way of softening it up.

The only movement in the room was the tartan tea towel falling from Ella’s hands to the ground.

Andrew Nock simply stared at her and began to shake his head involuntarily. His gaze moved to the door across the hallway where his daughter lay sleeping.

She watched as a range of emotions crossed his face.

The truth of the news registered with his sister first.

‘How?… I mean…’

Kim guessed Ella was thinking that Katrina had harmed herself in some way. Kim hated the fact that it was all going to get worse when she delivered the rest of the news. She’d seen many methods of suicide but breaking one’s own neck wasn’t one of them.

‘I’m afraid I have to inform you that Katrina was murdered.’

‘No… no… no…’ Andrew cried out.

Kim understood his pain. The first bombshell had barely landed before she’d ripped the pin out of a second grenade.