Page 38 of The Impossible Fortune (Thursday Murder Club Mysteries #5)

On Thursdays they still meet in the Jigsaw Room. But today is not a Thursday, so they are meeting in the hot tub. Ron’s choice.

It’s not often that Ron gets his way, but today he has. He supposes he’s simply in everyone’s good books because of the Lord Townes tip-off.

Ron is drinking a pint, Ibrahim has a mineral water and a plate of olives, Elizabeth has one of the protein shakes that Bogdan has got her addicted to, and Joyce is drinking a steaming-hot cup of tea.

‘Here’s how I see it,’ says Ron. ‘Yeah, maybe Ravey Davey’s done it, he’s got form. And maybe Townesy’s done it –’

‘Don’t call him Townesy,’ says Joyce, blowing on her tea, and then on her own forehead. ‘He’s a lord.’

‘They’re the worst of the lot, Joycey,’ says Ron. ‘The worst of the lot. But this Nick Silver business seems too convenient.’

‘Mmm,’ agrees Ibrahim.

‘Someone tries to kill him,’ says Ron. ‘And fails. A bomb goes missing. Someone smashes up his office, and he leaves you a Post-it note? Help me, help me? Does that all seem above board to you, Lizzie?’

Elizabeth is having difficulty sucking her protein shake through a straw. ‘Hard to say. I don’t love it, certainly.’

‘And off he pops, nowhere to be seen,’ says Ron. ‘Then whaddaya know, his partner in crime gets killed the next day.’

‘But he was my son-in-law Paul’s best man, Ron,’ says Joyce. ‘I hardly think –’

‘If Holly was a suspect for blowing up Nick,’ says Ron, ‘then, until we find him, Nick’s a suspect for blowing up Holly.’

‘But the texts?’ Joyce argues. ‘They clearly weren’t from him.’

‘There’ll be a reason for that,’ says Ron.

‘And what is that reason?’ Joyce asks.

Ron shrugs. There is a sudden gush from the jets of the hot tub, and everyone’s feet float to the surface.

Officially the hot tub is a ‘massage therapy pool’, but Ron and Pauline went in a hot tub in Tenerife and it was the same make and model as this one, so he knows it’s a hot tub.

And, if the rumours were to be believed, it got the same amount of action as the Tenerife hot tub.

There’s a group of newcomers in Wordsworth Court, younger guys in their seventies, and they’ve got badges saying I ’ VE JOINED THE HOT TUB CLUB , HAVE YOU ?

Flash little gang, they are, couple of them even play tennis.

Ever since the badges started appearing, Ron only ever gets in the hot tub when it smells of bleach.

‘I believe we should be focusing on the codes,’ says Ibrahim. ‘Ron knows Bill Benson, and Connie Johnson is a client of The Compound. Between them they can get us into the vault. All we’d need are the codes to Holly and Nick’s safe.’

‘If Lord Townes hasn’t got to it first,’ says Joyce. ‘He was wearing odd socks. A lord.’

‘That’s all we need, is it, Ibby?’ says Ron. ‘The codes? Anyway, I’m not working with Connie Johnson. End of discussion.’

‘I would love the two of you to get along,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Mate,’ says Ron, raising his pint in the time-honoured tradition of a man about to make an incontrovertible point, ‘she’s a heavily armed drug dealer with revenge issues and I put her in prison.’

His friend considers this for a moment.

‘Sometimes it’s best to focus on what we have in common,’ says Ibrahim, ‘rather than what separates us. How many people have threatened to kill you over the years? Yet here you are in a massage therapy pool with a pint of beer. And the extra bubbles you keep producing suggest you are very much alive.’

What happens underwater stays underwater, that’s Ron’s credo. Besides, people have done worse in here.

‘Connie or no Connie, we have no way of finding those codes, Ibrahim,’ says Elizabeth.

‘There’s always a way,’ says Ibrahim.

‘Forget the codes and concentrate on the murder,’ says Elizabeth. ‘Ron is absolutely right about Nick Silver. The whole thing might be a smokescreen. But Davey Noakes and Lord Townes both have motives too.’

‘Though Davey’s known about the Bitcoin for years,’ says Ibrahim.

‘You could tell that Lord Townes needed money,’ says Joyce. ‘That poor stag.’

‘And we’re still none the wiser about Jill Usher,’ says Elizabeth. ‘The Manchester connection.’

‘Davey Noakes,’ starts Ibrahim, ‘Lord Townes, Jill Usher, Nick Silver.’

‘One of them killed her,’ says Elizabeth, finishing the last of her protein shake with a grimly satisfied final gulp. ‘Any luck finding the mystery solicitor for us, Ibrahim?’

‘I have sent an email about Holly and Nick to over four hundred solicitors’ offices,’ says Ibrahim. ‘However, I made the mistake of sending the emails at ten minutes past four in the afternoon, so I received over three hundred “out of office” auto-replies. But I shall keep searching.’

Ron feels himself shutting down.

He knows his friends are having fun, and he enjoyed meeting Bill Benson, but Ron realizes he’s finding it hard to get too excited about this Holly Lewis case. He should, he knows that. A young woman is dead, and there’s money buried. But he’s not feeling it. Why is that?

The four friends settle back. Ron could stay in here all day.

He can see a woman in her eighties – Paula something – doing slow lengths in the pool, and a man in his nineties – Dennis – doing slow widths.

Do what you can while you can. Their inevitable collision, when it happens, is very friendly, even flirtatious from Dennis’s end. Again, do what you can while you can.

‘It’s been nice to see Kendrick,’ says Joyce.

Paula is now helping Dennis from the pool. He makes a ‘glass of wine’ gesture, and she smiles and nods. Nice to see. Paula gives the briefest of glances towards the hot tub and, seeing it occupied, turns back. No badge for you today, Paula, Ron thinks.

‘Yeah,’ says Ron. ‘He’s a little miracle, that one.’

‘All that time with him was just lovely,’ says Ibrahim. ‘I notice Suzi didn’t come to pick him up? It would be lovely to see her too.’

‘Suzi’s got things on,’ says Ron.

Ron knows this is why his head isn’t in the game.

Something is happening with Suzi. He just needs Jason to tell him the truth.

If Suzi and Danny are getting divorced, he can take it.

Not just take it, he’d welcome it. And Jason knows that.

So something else must be going on, and Ron doesn’t like to think about what that might be.

‘I do hope everything is well,’ says Joyce. As so often with Joyce, it’s a mission statement rather than a question.

‘My biggest worry is West Ham’s defence,’ says Ron.

Mates are all well and good, but there are some things you have to face alone. Ron is momentarily distracted by the fact that he actually is also worried about West Ham’s defence.

‘Well, you know where I am,’ says Ibrahim. ‘If anything should be concerning you.’

‘Yeah,’ says Ron. ‘Hanging out with a woman who wants to kill me.’

Where is Danny, and where is Suzi? Why is Jason taking Kendrick to school? He will talk to Jason, that’s his only option. Ron refuses to be protected. He needs to get his family in order.

Then he can start concentrating on murders.