Free Secret Sins: A Callie Anson by Kate Charles Page A

you?’
    Morag stopped; Callie, pulling on Bella’s lead, stopped as well and swung round to face her.
    At last Morag turned towards Callie, and Callie could see that there were tears in the other woman’s eyes—tears which began to spill over and trickle down her weathered cheeks. ‘Oh, I’m sorry,’ Callie said, stricken. ‘I didn’t mean to bully you or anything.’
    ‘I’ve been to the doctor,’ Morag said, so quietly that Callie strained to hear. ‘That’s why it wouldn’t be fair to get a dog. I…’ Her voice caught on a sob. ‘I have cancer.’

    It was a part of his job that Neville hated: breaking the bad news to family members. But now that he was in charge of the case, it was up to him to tell Rachel Norton about the body in the canal. And it couldn’t be put off, either; once he’d done everything he could at the crime scene, and the body had been removed to the mortuary, he would need to escort Rachel Norton, as next-of -kin, to provide formal identification.
    ‘God, Sid,’ he said as they approached the Victorian semi. ‘Times like this, I wish I still smoked. I could use a fag right now.’
    ‘Me, too, Guv,’ Cowley stated glumly. ‘It’s been—’ He consulted his watch. ‘It’s been thirty-seven hours and twenty-two minutes since my last fag.’
    ‘But who’s counting, eh?’ Neville sighed. ‘What if she goes into labour or something? We need to get a woman FLO here right away.’
    They had reached the Nortons’ home. Just before Neville pushed the bell, he and Cowley looked at each other and said the name together. ‘Yolanda Fish.’
    ‘Ring her on your mobile,’ Neville directed. ‘Get her to meet us at the mortuary, if it’s humanly possible.’
    He waited with his finger hovering over the bell, glad of even a brief reprieve, until Cowley had done as he’d been told, and nodded in confirmation. ‘Yes,’ he said. ‘She’ll be there.’
    ‘Thank God for that,’ Neville muttered, giving the bell a savage push.
    It didn’t take long for Rachel Norton to answer the door. It was almost as if she’d been waiting just the other side of it since they’d taken their leave of her nearly twenty-four hours earlier. Her eyes were shadowed, and looked huge in her pale face. She moistened her lips with her tongue. ‘Come in,’ she said in a voice that was already heavy with tears, stepping to one side to allow them through.
    Once again they followed her into the sterile lounge. Neville declined her offer of a seat, preferring to deliver the news standing up. But he gestured for her to sit down.
    Obediently she sat, looking from Neville to Cowley. She opened her mouth as if to say something, then shut it again and sighed.
    ‘Mrs. Norton,’ Neville began. God, how he hated doing this. ‘I’m afraid we may have some bad news for you.’

    Morag Hamilton shivered and pulled her coat closer. ‘Do you mind if we keep walking?’ she said. ‘It’s awfully cold this morning.’
    Callie’s impulse was to give Morag a hug, but her body language discouraged it. Instead she fell into step beside her, heading towards Hyde Park. ‘When did you…when did you find out about the cancer?’ she asked awkwardly.
    ‘Yesterday. The consultant rang with the test results. I’d suspected for a while, of course. You do, don’t you? If you know your own body. Especially if,’ Morag added with an ironic smile, ‘you’ve spent most of your life married to a doctor.’
    ‘What…what did he say?’ She didn’t want to pry, didn’t want to press her with questions that Morag wouldn’t want to answer. Questions like ‘What sort of cancer is it?’ or ‘Have they caught it in time?’ or ‘How long are they giving you?’ Better to let Morag take the lead, and tell her only as much as she wanted her to know.
    ‘Actually, my consultant is a she,’ Morag corrected her.
    Callie felt foolish: she, of all people, should know better than to make assumptions about professions and