Free Quarter Square by David Bridger Page B

its evidence number. “You asked what happened to Carole and Tony.” He opened the folder. “This is what happened.”
    I stared down at two photographs of carnage. Carole’s and Tony’s naked bodies lay torn apart in the master bedroom of our old home. There was blood everywhere. Blood and guts and flaps of skin and clumps of hair. Everywhere. The bodies were unrecognisable, but that was definitely our bedroom, and the police were telling me it was Carole and Tony.
    I couldn’t take in the horror. Couldn’t believe what I was seeing. My heart thumped massively, and my mind rebelled. I shoved my chair away from the desk, from the photographs.
    Dawson’s mouth moved, but I couldn’t hear anything other than the blood drumming in my ears. He and Smith studied me while I reeled from the shock. It took me a while to get my thoughts in order. I sipped a glass of water and focused on Dawson to keep my gaze away from the photographs.
    “I didn’t do this. I couldn’t do this. Please, hurry up and find a way to know I didn’t do this, so you can start looking for whoever did.”

Chapter Six
    “Okay,” Smith said. “Help us to help you. Tell us about you and Carole.”
    “What do you want to know?”
    “Everything. How long have you been married?”
    “Twelve years.”
    “Why do you think that happened between Carole and Tony?”
    “I think you’re asking the wrong person.”
    “But we can’t ask them. Why do you think it happened when it did?”
    That one was easier. “I changed jobs a year ago. Neither of them was very keen about it. In fact, that’s an understatement. My whole family thought I was having some kind of breakdown.”
    “Who do you mean?”
    “Carole and my parents. And Tony, I suppose.”
    “Where are your parents?”
    “Florida. When I left the firm last year, Dad sold up in disgust, and they took early retirement.”
    “You don’t get on?”
    “We share a mutual disappointment.”
    “You’re a self-employed builder, aren’t you?”
    “Carpenter.”
    “What was your old job?”
    “Chartered surveyor.”
    “That’s quite a downsize. So were they all correct? Were you having a breakdown?”
    “No.”
    “Come on, Joe,” she urged. “Stop making me drag this out of you like I’m drawing teeth. You said you wanted to help.”
    “Okay.” I sat forward. “This is how it was. Carole and I met at university. We were both studying maths for our first degrees, although with different careers in mind. I was planning to join my father as junior partner, and she was heading to the city.”
    I smiled in memory of her fierce ambition.
    “She worked hard and was very good at her job. It involved project management, hiring and firing, with quite a big team under her. She was always busy and well regarded in the industry. Headhunters stalked her all the time.”
    “Firing?” Smith interrupted. “Did she do much of that?”
    “Not individually, I don’t think, but her last project was working out how to run the business with fewer people, which meant redundancies.”
    “Did she ever mention any names to you? Anyone who might have felt hard done by?”
    “No.” I couldn’t remember a single name from Carole’s work. What did that say about me? “Sorry.”
    “No problem. We’ll ask her colleagues. Carry on.”
    That was an interesting angle. I tried to remember what I’d been about to say. “Well, she was a go-getter basically, and she always expected me to go-get too. I played the game for as long as I could, but even by the time we got married, straight out of university, my plan was to get out of surveying eventually. I had this dream of working with wood, turning my hobby into a business and being my own boss.
    “It wasn’t a secret. Carole knew all about the dream. But apparently she never thought I’d do it. She was shocked when I said I was actually going to leave the job.”
    I flashed back to that bloody awful family dinner with Carole announcing my intention