Read The Glass Room (Vera Stanhope 5) for Free Online Page B

a sugar-high after licking out the cake bowl and dipping their fingers in the icing. He loved these family events, of course, but it’d be a bugger putting them to bed afterwards, and he had his own ideas about what constituted a birthday treat. The last thing he needed was Sal fraught and knackered.
    So Vera’s call, taken on the hands-free, provoked a mixed response.
    ‘You slipped out of the office smartish tonight.’ Her voice was amused rather than disapproving, just wanting to let him know that she was aware of what was going on, even in her absence. She’d phoned the station and they’d told her he’d already left.
    ‘Aye, well, it’s my birthday.’ He slowed down to pass a cyclist in helmet and lime-green Lycra.
    ‘I’ve got a birthday treat for you, lad.’ And he listened as she talked about the murder, recognizing her excitement. Hearing too his wife’s voice in his head: That woman’s a ghoul – the delight she takes in other people’s misery. He pulled over to the side of the road so that he could write down the details, the postcode and the OS coordinates.
    ‘I’m on my own at the moment,’ she said, ‘apart from a couple of plods. So quick as you can, Joe, eh?’
    He sat where he was for the moment, deliberating. Should he call in quickly to the house, so that the family could do the hiding behind the sofa, jump out and wish Daddy happy birthday? It was only a couple of miles out of his way, and Vera would never know the difference. Or should he send Sal a text, explaining? But a text was the coward’s way out, and if he did that, Sal would be seething when he finally got home, even if it was at some unearthly hour of the morning. He couldn’t imagine life without Sal, thought she was the best wife in the universe, but she knew how to hold a grudge. Better face her now. He started the engine and drove off, thinking that at least he wouldn’t have the nightmare bathtime and bedtime hour to deal with.
    Half an hour later he was on the road again, two slices of chocolate cake wrapped in foil on the passenger seat beside him. For some reason the kids had taken to Vera and always remembered her. They sent her gifts and paintings, which he seldom passed on. He thought she’d sneer and chuck them in the bin. She wouldn’t turn up her nose at cake, though.
    He drove slowly down a narrow lane, worried that he might miss the turn to the house. There was woodland on either side of him, the bare trees caught in his headlight beams as he turned a corner. No moon. He leaned forward, his hands tense on the wheel. A shadow crossed the road ahead of him, caught just on the edge of his line of vision, and made him brake sharply, skid on the frozen fallen leaves towards the verge. He regained control of the car in time, but found he was shaking. He told himself it was nothing. A deer perhaps. Too big for a fox. Just as well he was on his own. Vera would have ridiculed his panic. What’s wrong with you, Joey-boy? Scared of your own shadow now?
    He crossed the brow of the hill and suddenly the valley below him seemed full of light. He passed Vera’s Land Rover parked in a farm gateway on his left. There was no possibility after all that he would miss the place; it was the only house for miles. The entrance to the drive was marked by a lamp. To one side of the house there was a car park. As he walked towards the front door he saw a minibus with The Writers’ House painted on one side.
    A uniformed female officer stood at the door. She must have recognized him because she let him in with a smile. ‘DI Stanhope said to send you straight upstairs. She’s expecting you.’
    ‘Where am I going?’
    ‘I’ll take you.’ He was a large man, the size and shape of a bear. ‘Lenny Thomas, one of the students.’ He held out a hand. ‘Is that big woman your boss, then?’
    Pots and kettles, Joe thought. ‘That’s right.’
    ‘I’ve written a crime novel,’ Lenny said. He ambled away and Joe followed.