Dead & Buried

Chapter 5

5

It wasn’t often that Jack Culverhouse wished he did internet shopping, but he could more or less be guaranteed that feeling each week when he stepped into the local supermarket.

He watched the Tesco and Ocado lorries parking up on his street, delivering to his neighbours, and wondered how much easier it actually was. Either way, it had to be better than trying to navigate his way past the prams and pushchairs as little old ladies clattered their shopping trolleys into his ankles at every turn. Sometimes he wondered if it’d be easier to starve.

If he was working long shifts, he’d make use of the supermarket’s twenty-four-hour opening and get his shopping done at five o’clock in the morning before heading in, or past midnight once he was finished. On his days off, though, he tended to brave the hordes during the mid-morning rush. It was a case of having to. He wasn’t going to force himself to get up at half four or stay up past midnight if his work didn’t dictate it. Fortunately for him, today was one of those days when he was forced to get up early.

He’d lain awake for much of the night worrying about Emily. Not only was she out at all hours with no explanation as to where she’d been, but she was always perfectly bright and chirpy when she got in. That was probably a good sign, of course, but it worried Jack that there was no sense of remorse or indication that she recognised she’d worried him.

She was a teenager, he told himself. They don’t have those levels of understanding yet. He was, no doubt, the same when he was her age. But that didn’t stop him from feeling angry about it. The anger, though, was dampened by the shock and upset of seeing the marks on Emily’s forearm last night.

The marks he’d noticed a few months back were old scars, and he’d chosen not to bring the subject up. These ones, however, were fresh. How could he sit back and not say anything now? A history of self-harm was one thing; Emily had been through some traumatic experiences and had had a tough childhood. He could blame himself for that one. Digging up the past wouldn’t help anyone. But these marks were new. This was the here and now. Although Emily seemed bright and happy enough, something was clearly troubling her on a deeper level.

He’d thought about how he might broach the subject with her; what he’d say, how he’d begin the conversation. His main worry was how she’d react. He couldn’t risk her freaking out and disappearing on him or wanting to go to her mum’s. Helen had problems enough of her own to deal with, without having Emily land on her doorstep. Besides which, Helen had barely shown the slightest interest in looking after Emily for the past few years, choosing instead to palm her only child off onto her own parents while she disappeared off into the night.

Jack tried to hide his frustration as a young woman barged her trolley in front of him, just as he was reaching for a shelf. He bit down on his lip to stop himself from yelling an obscenity at her.

‘Unbelievable, isn’t it?’ a voice said from just over his right shoulder. ‘Makes you wonder how anyone gets anywhere in life with manners like that.’

Culverhouse grunted and nodded slightly, acknowledging the woman who’d spoken to him. She wasn’t looking back at him, but was checking the ripeness of the mangos as she popped three of them into a see-through plastic bag and put them in her basket.

‘Smoothies,’ she said. ‘I find they wake me up far quicker than my morning coffee used to.’

‘Never tried one,’ he replied, strangely drawn to the fact that someone was actually making polite small talk in the supermarket rather than racing around the aisles as if nobody else existed.

‘You should. It’s easy. You just need a juicer. They do them in here for about thirty quid. They’re by the greetings cards. Christ knows why.’

‘Probably the same person who thought it was a good idea to put the bacon in one aisle, and the cooked ham four aisles further down.’

‘Ah. Health and safety, that’ll be. Cooked and uncooked meats.’

‘What’s the point? They’ll still end up inches apart in my fridge anyway. How bloody big do they think my kitchen is?’

The woman laughed. ‘I’m Chrissie.’

‘Jack.’

‘I imagine you enjoy the supermarket run as much as I do, Jack.’

‘If you’re fantasising about having red hot needles jabbed into your eyeballs right now, you’re probably about halfway there.’

She smiled and continued up the aisle, grabbing a bunch of bananas and some apples as Jack followed her. ‘I tried online shopping once but it wasn’t for me,’ she said. ‘I needed thirty-five millilitres of white wine vinegar for a recipe. Ended up ordering thirty-five bottles of white wine.’

‘Sounds like a pretty convenient mistake to me,’ Jack replied.

‘It does, doesn’t it? Except I wasn’t as far wrong as I thought. The vinegar would’ve tasted better, as it happens. So, what brings you to the supermarket at such an ungodly hour? Actually, no, don’t tell me. It’s not going to be good news either way. It’s either alcoholism, a pig of a job or insomnia. Or all three, in my case.’ She laughed, letting Jack know she was mostly joking.

‘I can relate to that,’ he said.

‘You’re not married, then, I’m guessing? Don’t see many married men in supermarkets at this time of day.’

‘No. Well, I was.’ He didn’t go into the details as to how technically he was still married, but to a woman he’d seen two or three times in ten years.

‘Probably for the best, if you’re anything like me. I was with someone for almost nine years before he decided he couldn’t deal with my work schedule. Nice, that, isn’t it?’ She smiled, and Jack could see she genuinely wasn’t bitter. She seemed to have this boundless confidence and optimism; a sense that life goes on. C’est la vie. Besides which, he knew exactly what she meant. He was fairly sure she probably wasn’t a copper — at least not in this neck of the woods — but sensed she didn’t want to talk about her job.

‘So. Jack. I don’t normally do this. I promise. But I don’t suppose you want to swap numbers, do you? No pressure or anything. I just thought maybe if our pain in the arse jobs allowed us to share an hour or two off, we might have a drink together. Chew the fat over our shared love of supermarkets.’

He had to admit he liked her attitude and sense of humour. She had the sort of dry wit he admired. But something was holding him back. He certainly hadn’t had the best of luck with women, particularly not recently. He’d flirted with the idea of a dating app on his phone a few months back, but had quickly discovered the only women of his age who were single were either spinsters who’d never had a partner for more than three weeks or makeup-plastered women whose previous sixteen husbands had all died.

He was about to think of an excuse — or a false mobile number — when his work phone rang. He fished it out of his jacket pocket and answered it. He knew it wasn’t going to be good news.

‘Yeah?’

The officer on the other end introduced herself. ‘Sir, we’ve got an incident that needs CID involvement. Human remains found buried in some undergrowth near Middlebrook. We don’t know much more at the moment, but it doesn’t look as though it’s historic.’

‘Right. Email me the details. I’ll be there in half an hour. Sorry,’ he said, to Chrissie. ‘Going to have to pay for this lot and dash off. Work calls.’

She smiled, and he could see she was perfectly at ease. ‘Not to worry. Maybe we’ll bump into each other another time. If you haven’t discovered online shopping by then. It’s not all bad, but steer clear of the white wine.’

Jack let out a chuckle, then fished a scrap of paper from his trouser pocket. ‘Here,’ he said, writing his personal mobile number on it before handing it to her. ‘If you’ve still got any of that cheap plonk left, I’m game.’