Free Shatter by Michael Robotham Page B

For al you know she had an argument with a boyfriend who dumped her.’
    ‘She didn’t have a boyfriend.’
    ‘Did the daughter tel you that?’
    ‘Why hasn’t the person on the phone come forward? If a woman threatens to jump off a bridge, surely you cal the police or an ambulance.’
    ‘He’s probably married and doesn’t want to get involved.’ I’m not convincing her. I have a theory and no solid evidence to support it. Theories achieve the permanence of facts by persisting and acquiring an incremental significance. So do fal acies. It doesn’t make them true.
    Veronica Cray is staring at my left arm which has begun to twitch, sending a shudder through my shoulder. I hold it stil .
    ‘What makes you think Mrs Wheeler was afraid of heights?’
    ‘Darcy told me.’
    ‘And you believe her— a teenage girl who’s in shock; who’s grieving; who can’t understand how the most important person in her life could abandon her…’
    ‘Did the police search her car?’
    ‘It was recovered.’
    That’s not the same thing. She knows it.
    ‘Where is the car now?’ I ask.
    ‘In the police lock-up.’
    ‘Can I see it?’
    ‘No.’
    She doesn’t know where I’m going with this, but whatever happens I’m creating more work for the police. I’m questioning the official investigation.
    ‘This isn’t my case, Professor. I’ve got real crimes to solve. This was a suicide. Death by gravity. We both saw it happen. Suicides aren’t supposed to make sense because they’re pointless. I tel you something else, most people don’t leave a note. They just snap and leave everyone wondering.’
    ‘She showed no signs—’
    ‘Let me finish,’ she barks, making it sound like an order. Embarrassment prickles beneath my skin.
    ‘Look at you, Professor. You got an il ness. Do you wake up every day thinking, Wow, isn’t it great to be alive? Or some days do you look at those shaking limbs and contemplate what lies ahead and, just for a moment, a fleeting second, consider a way out?’
    She leans back in her chair and stares at the ceiling. ‘We al do.
    We carry our past with us— the mistakes, the sadness. You say Christine Wheeler was an optimist. She loved her daughter. She loved her job. But you don’t real y know her. Maybe it was something about the weddings that got to her. Al those fairytales. The white dresses and flowers; the exchanging of vows. Maybe they reminded her of her own wedding and how it didn’t match up to the fantasy. Her husband walked out. She raised a child alone. I don’t know. No one does.’
    The DI rocks her head from side to side, stretching her neck muscles. She isn’t finished.
    ‘You’re feeling guilty, I understand that. You think you should have saved her, but what happened on the bridge wasn’t your fault. You did what you could. People appreciate that. But now you’re making a bad situation worse. Take Darcy back to school. Go home. It’s not your concern any more.’
    ‘What if I told you I heard something,’ I say.
    She pauses, eyeing me suspiciously.
    ‘On the bridge when I was trying to talk to Christine Wheeler, I thought I heard something being said to her— over the mobile.’
    ‘What did you hear?’
    ‘A word.’
    ‘What?’
    ‘Jump!’
    I watch the subtle change in the detective, a little shrinking created by a single word. She glances at her large square hands and back to me, meeting my eyes without embarrassment.
    This is not a case she wants to carry forward.
    ‘You think you heard it?’
    ‘Yes.’
    Her uncertainty is transient. Already she has rationalised the possible outcomes and weighed only the downside.

    ‘Wel , I think you should tel that to the coroner. I’m sure he’l be pleased as punch to hear it. Who knows— maybe you’l convince him, but I seriously doubt it. I don’t care if God himself was on the other end of that phone, you can’t make someone jump— not like that.’

    On-coming headlights sweep over the inside of the car