Free Small Town Suspicions (Some Very English Murders Book 3) by Issy Brooke Page B

something for us,” Cath
said. “I’m on my way down later. Do you want to meet at Alec’s house?”
    “Sure. Name the time.”
     
    * * * *
     
    Penny went on foot. When she reached the driveway entrance
to Alec’s house, Cath was standing by the blue and white tape, her phone held
to her ear.
    “Of course,” she was saying. “That sounds great. I can come
to yours, Mr Bailey. I’m in Glenfield right now, not far away … yes, that’s
right. Oh, okay … you don’t have to …”
    The phone call tailed off and Cath shoved the phone into
her smart jacket pocket. “Reg Bailey does like his own way, doesn’t he? I wish
he wouldn’t call me a ‘lady police woman.’ I know he’s polite, but it makes me
feel I ought to be wearing more pink.”
    “That’s a terrible thought.”
    “What, me in pink?”
    “No, you being considered a lady.”
    Cath looked as if she were about to make a rude hand
gesture at Penny, but she thought better of it. “Anyway. Hi, nice to see you
too. So, Reg has some information, apparently, and he’s on his way down here to
show me.”
    Penny felt a frisson of excitement at being in the right
place at the right time. They didn’t have long to wait, and while they stood by
the cordon, Penny filled Cath in on the stuff she’d learned about Alec’s online
activities, which felt woefully little.
    “Hmm. I had Steve pegged as a suspect,” Cath said, “but
this Carl chap sounds worth looking into.”
    “We might be in luck, then. Here comes Reg.”
    The Jaguar purred to a stop, and Reg emerged, a vision of
dapper Englishness. He even wore a white hat, which he tipped in their
direction. “Good afternoon, ladies.”
    “Hi, Mr Bailey.” Penny thought it was so typical of dealing
with him that she called him “Reg” in her head and “Mr Bailey” to his face.
    Cath was obviously of the same mind. “Hello, Mr Bailey.
Thank you for coming down.”
    He was clutching a sheaf of papers and he fanned himself
with them. Cath glanced at the police officer on guard, who nodded.
    “Come on, we’ll get out of the heat.”
    “You can’t go in the kitchen,” the officer said. “Boris
will bite your arm off if you go in there. You know what he’s like.”
    “Of course. We’ll be in the studio at the back.”
    Penny and Reg followed Cath around. Penny hung back, trying
to peer in through the kitchen window to see if Boris was a police dog or an
officer, but she couldn’t be sure.
    As a sun room, the poorly-named conservatory was rubbish.
It faced north, and was cool and shady. As a studio, however, it was ideal, and
it was the perfect place to stand when in the grip of a heatwave.
    Reg’s facial expression quivered and his lip curled when he
saw some of the paintings that Alec had been working on.
    “What do you think to his work?” Penny couldn’t resist
asking.
    “Each to their own,” he said stiffly. “He’s not here now to
explain his work.”
    She felt chastened by his reluctance to speak ill of the
dead. “Of course. Yes.”
    He flapped the sheaf of paper at Cath. “Now, young lady.
You are sure to laugh but I have discovered something new that I can do on a
computer and I’m very proud of it!”
    “What is this?” Cath asked. Although Reg was waving the
papers at her, when Cath reached out to take them, he seemed reluctant to let
go. Instead he fanned them out.
    “Did you know that every website you’ve looked it gets
stored in a list on your computer?” he said.
    “Yes,” Cath said. “Although we in the police often find
that our dozier criminals don’t know it.”
    “You’ll be telling me you can see what people are doing in
their own homes, right from the police station, next!”
    Cath and Penny exchanged a look, and Penny smiled. “If you
have nothing to hide…”
    Reg thinned his lips. “An Englishman’s home is his castle!
Now look. That Alec chap, Mr Goodwin, God rest his soul, came to see me last
week because he wanted to find out about two