Seven Eight Play It Straight (Grasshopper Lawns Book 4) Read online

  ‘In case the show was awful, of course.’ Edge smiled sweetly at Fiona. ‘I didn’t want my connections to get me evicted.’

  ‘Oh, ha-ha.’ Fiona’s brows twitched back together. She was of medium height, bone thin, with delicate mobile features and a mop of unruly hair. In direct sunlight the heavy stage makeup reversed the youthful effect of the friendly spotlights and she looked older than her stepmother. ‘This has been lovely, catching up, but I do have to go. Do you expect me and Jamey to visit while I’m here?’

  ‘It would be lovely if you did,’ Vivian answered hastily for Edge. ‘You must be incredibly busy. I didn’t realize JJ was here as well.’

  ‘He and Tim are living back in Edinburgh, I’m staying with them during the Festival. We’ll see what we can do. I know he would love to meet William.’ She put the slightest emphasis on the last word, swept them all with a glance and a nod which warmed to a smile as it reached Donald, and half-raised her hand in farewell before turning on her heel.

  ‘Ooh, take that.’ Sylvia was still waspish as Fiona crossed the emptying square back towards the makeshift theatre. ‘You must have been a very wicked stepmother, Edge.’

  ‘Was there ever a stepmother who wasn’t?’ Edge remarked lightly. ‘Especially one not that much older than her stepchildren.’

  The distant boom of the one o’clock gun from the Castle galvanised them into action. It had already been arranged that everyone would buy whatever they fancied from the vast variety of street stands, and head for the Princes Street Gardens to meet up for an al fresco lunch.

  Clarissa tucked her hand in Edge’s arm. ‘Your stepdaughter looked as if she wanted to drag Donald away and eat him,’ she said slightly disapprovingly, making Edge laugh.

  Clarissa had a long-standing crush on Donald which dated back to his performing days over twenty years earlier. He had moved to the Lawns shortly before Clarissa herself, and Edge, for her part, had at first thought him a chilly and unlikeable addition to the retirement village. A flurry of murders at the Lawns had proved excellent ice-breakers and she and Vivian had forged strong friendships with both Donald and the flamboyant William. She still couldn’t see what it was about him that made Clarissa so tongue-tied in his presence that she’d had to ask Edge to get Donald to sign her cherished publicity photos from his tours with Grease and the Rocky Horror Show, or be so convinced that he had any interest in women at all. She glanced across as he and Brian, who were meeting the minibus at the Gardens, strode away and couldn’t resist teasing.

  ‘Look at the difference between the way they walk,’ she challenged and Clarissa looked reproachful.

  ‘Of course he’s graceful, he was a dancer. How else could he walk?’

  ‘You’ll never convince Edge, she insists that he is her token gay friend.’ William grinned down at them and offered Vivian his arm. ‘If I faint with hunger, my lovely, you’ll never get me back on my feet. I’ve invited Miss P to come lunch-hunting with us, but if you don’t stop blethering right now and feed me I’ll give up on you and elope with her.’

  Miss P giggled and tucked a plump hand in his other elbow and Vivian patted his arm soothingly.

  ‘Shush, William. Edge has been back two days already and we’ve not had a minute to catch up. You and Miss P elope, if you feel you must.’

  ‘No, go!’ Edge shooed her with her free hand. ‘We’ll not all get into one taxi anyway. I promise, coffee and a long blether after exercise class tomorrow. Deal?’

  Vivian eyed her narrowly, then broke into her beautiful smile. ‘Deal.’

  She let William and Miss P sweep her away and Edge and Clarissa followed Jayenthi Pillay, who was delightedly taking photographs of a police box which looked as if it had escaped from an old Dr Who set. Edge obligingly photographed her standing in front of it and handed the camera back.

  ‘Shall we find a taxi and go straight to the Mound? There are always lots of food stalls and the bridge crosses the Princes Street Gardens, couldn’t be handier.’

  ‘Oh, I had hoped we would walk!’ Jayenthi was wistful. ‘I have friends arriving to stay this afternoon who will expect me to show them round and I have never been to the Festival before. I thought maybe you could point out a few things first—is it too far?’

  Edge hesitated. ‘It’s pretty far for Clarissa.’ However, slightly to her dismay, Clarissa, who was well into her sixties, plump and not long recovered from a stroke, felt she could manage if she could lean on Edge’s arm. She too said she had never been to the Festival and would love to see it with a native. Never an enthusiastic pedestrian, especially on crowded city pavements, Edge resigned herself to the inevitable.

  Of the several festivals that put Edinburgh en fête in August, it is the Fringe that crams the famous Royal Mile and spills out across the city, and the excellent weather made it more popular today than usual. Their progress was excruciatingly slow by the time they reached Lawnmarket, and Clarissa was flagging, weighing on Edge ever more heavily as they finally descended to the bridge plaza which served the National Gallery and the Royal Scottish Academy. Other purple peaks could be seen bobbing in the cheerful crowds as they made their picnic purchases and turned for the rendezvous point. Brian suddenly re-appeared, took in the situation at a glance, and solicitously took Clarissa down the last flight of stairs into the Gardens. Unfortunately he did so as if she were an elderly aunt instead of some five years his senior, to her obvious indignation. Edge exchanged rueful glances with Jayenthi as they followed behind—tact wasn’t Brian’s strongest suit.

  The Princes Street Gardens were once a loch and slope down sharply, a green and pleasant refuge from the crush in the streets. The Lawns minibus driver, coordinating with almost military precision with Donald and Brian to deliver cooler boxes, picnic blankets and foam cushions, had reversed hastily back out into the traffic with promises to return in an hour, and the picnickers had pitched their camp around a hefty bench on one of the criss-crossing paths. Brian lowered Clarissa onto a foam cushion on the grass slope next to Vivian, who shifted up to leave space for Edge, and brought over one of the cooler boxes before sitting on the grass slope on a level with their feet.

  Fiona’s ‘old age home’ crack was still stinging and Edge found herself seeing her companions with fresh eyes as she munched on the pitta with falafels and salad she’d bought for her lunch. Most of the party fell somewhere between sixty and seventy and were at the very least greying, although William’s hair and tidy beard were a rather determined Tudor red: Edge’s own sun-streaked colour was owed in large part to her expensive and very talented hairdresser. As individuals they were lively company: some likeable, some irritating, all vigorous and opinionated. As a group, she had to concede that it wouldn’t only be to Fiona that they would fall into that odd invisibility that happens between middle and old age. It was a small comfort to remember, slightly maliciously, that Fiona only had a few years left to enjoy her forties.

  A welcome breeze eddied towards them, bringing with it the skirl of a busking piper. Vivian, who knew the friends Edge had been visiting, asked about her holiday and she started to feel more cheerful as she brushed crumbs off her cotton-clad legs and accepted a glass of champagne and orange juice from Brian. It was lack of decent sleep, that was all, and the heat, which was her own fault for wearing a camisole which was turning out to be far too hot under her light short-sleeved top. She plucked it away from her skin and fluttered it in a futile attempt to cool down, was winked at by a nice-looking male passer-by who couldn’t have been more than forty, blushed and felt better. Shallow, vain, but better.

  Brian helpfully packed the remaining bottles and fruit into the smaller cooler box and hefted it thoughtfully. He was a pleasant looking man, well put together with good shoulders, a slightly bent nose and, since Donald had taken him firmly in hand, superbly cut hair, a dusting of distinguished grey at his temples.

  ‘What do you think?’ he asked generally. ‘I could carry this—keep it with us for the rest of the afternoon?�
��

  ‘It has shoulder straps, you could even put it on your back,’ Donald pointed out helpfully. ‘You might be glad of it.’

  ‘This is the first time I’ve ever been to the Festival when it wasn’t either bucketing or so hot people were fainting in the streets.’ Sylvia looked around approvingly. ‘I may stay on after all. What’s the plan for the afternoon?’

  ‘Olga, Vivian and I are off to the ballet,’ Donald looked at his watch. ‘Actually, Vivian. . .’

  ‘I know, but we’re catching a taxi. We’ve still got time.’

  ‘Assuming we can get one straight away.’ He got to his feet in one swift easy movement and offered Olga a hand which she loftily ignored, getting up gracefully and brushing a few errant blades of grass from her cream linen suit as she bent to pick up her foam cushion. Edge wasn’t as proud—or as superbly fit—and gratefully accepted Brian’s helping hand as they all started getting to their feet.

  ‘William’s doing a talk later,’ Edge answered Sylvia’s question, ‘so we’re hanging about for that, but it’s tickets only, and sold out. Part of the lead in to the Book Festival next week,’ she added helpfully, when Sylvia raised her brows. ‘You remember, Fiona said her brother was going? We were thinking of a meander down the Mile to enjoy the street performances. Some of them can be very good. I get a caricature done every year; it’s my own Festival tradition, so that’s my plan for the afternoon: finding a flattering artist.’

  ‘In the crowds,’ William said disdainfully, and fumbled for his heavy walking stick to heave himself to his feet from the bench. ‘Since Vivian’s abandoning me for the afternoon, Miss P and I are heading for the National Gallery, if anyone wants to join us.’

  ‘Gallery or Royal Mile? I heard the Gallery has a wonderful exhibition this year,’ Matilda asked Sylvia, who shot a look up at Brian from under her lashes and held out a tiny imperious hand for him to help her up.

  ‘You’re very quiet,’ she challenged him and he reddened.

  Sylvia was convinced he shyly admired her, and treated him with a combination of sizzling promise and amused contempt which she enjoyed very much. The driver hooted urgently at that point from the gate and Donald and Brian, hastily collecting blankets, cushions and the bigger cooler box, strode up to the Grasshopper Lawns minibus. Clarissa and Jayenthi hurried in their wake, while Vivian and Olga followed at a more leisurely pace. Miss P looked after them a little wistfully and Edge poked her gently.

  ‘Do you want to change your mind, go home with the others?’

  ‘Oh, no, it would be a shame to waste such good weather and now that we’re actually here Ay’m happy to stay rather than come back for William’s talk. Ay do hate crowds, though!’

  ‘Won’t be too crowded in the Gallery,’ William promised. ‘I don’t care for them myself. Tourists, everywhere you look. Ugh.’

  As Brian returned alone, Sylvia shot him an arch look and shook her head at Matilda. ‘Wherever Brian goes. I’m not going anywhere with Fat and Fatter.’ Her cut-glass English accent was disastrously audible, and Miss P flushed vividly.

  Edge and Brian both started talking hastily at once and William cast Sylvia an unfriendly look. ‘If you’re referring to us, you poisonous little weasel, believe me, it isn’t an option. You’re not invited.’ He nodded to the others and escorted Miss P away to the other end of the gardens, back towards the two Galleries.

  ‘Oh! That foul, conceited, bastard!’ Sylvia glared after them and turned to appeal to Brian. ‘Did you hear what he called me?’

  ‘No, but I heard what you called them.’ He wouldn’t meet her eyes as he slung the cooler box across his back, then looked over at Edge, took a deep breath, and held out his hand. ‘Ready to go, darling?’

  Sylvia went pale and rocked slightly on her very high heels. For a moment she was speechless, then spots of colour burned in her cheeks.

  ‘Good God, Brian, don’t tell me you’re one of that series of men slipping away from Edge’s apartment early in the morning?’

  Edge, taken completely by surprise by Brian’s sudden outing of their relationship, gasped at the insult. She could feel her own colour mounting, but years in the outrageously bitchy world of television kept her voice steady. ‘You are a poisonous weasel, Sylvia. You’ve got a demon on your back sometimes, you don’t care what you say. The station’s that way, if you want to get the train back. If you join us, you’ll have to shut up. Really.’

  She was still flushed as they walked back through the gardens to the stairs, and very conscious of Brian’s firm grasp of her hand. To have their secret affair exposed so abruptly—and at his instigation—was the very last thing she had expected of the day. She glanced back slightly remorsefully as they climbed the steep steps back to the crowds, and saw that Matilda was placidly puffing up behind them, and Sylvia sulkily bringing up the rear.

  ‘You’re adorable when you’re pink,’ Brian teased quietly and she laughed breathlessly.

  ‘It’s exertion. All these stairs. And we still have to get to the top of Castlehill! Brace yourself, I’ll be irresistible by then.’

  He grinned back and let her hand go, pausing to help Matilda, who was starting to flag.

  Onderness

  Kirsty Cameron and Drew McKenzie take the stage

  Onderness is a small town on the Firth of Forth, some twenty miles from Edinburgh. Sgt Kirsty Cameron owns a small attractive house in a quiet close in the suburb of Dunkeld, and all scenes headed ‘Onderness’ will be based in or around this suburban house

  Sergeant Kirsty Cameron sent her police hat flying towards the hallstand as she nudged the front door shut with her hip and hurried for the stairs. She’d left clothes ready that morning, knowing her shift would probably end late, and it took only minutes to shed her uniform, wriggle into her favourite jeans, and pull a deeply cowled white blouse over her head. She took out the pins that held her flaming red hair in strict submission while she was on duty and massaged her head with her fingers with intense relief before finger-combing it to tumble round her shoulders. Kirsty and her aunt were very alike, both of them attractive rather than beautiful, but where Edge had perfected her look of understated unemphatic casual elegance, Kirsty, at twenty-six, looked vital and passionate. She downplayed her looks as much as possible for her job, but for the evening ahead took time to paint her generous mouth carefully and tug the front of her blouse down. Her skin was flawless, her eyelashes and eyebrows permanently tinted. Nothing else was needed.

  ‘Drew?’ She slipped on low-heeled sandals as she called and he shouted back from the bathroom.

  She leaned against the bathroom door and shook her head at Drew McKenzie, who was peering at the mirror and trying to subdue his unruly hair. It was a battle he had yet to win, probably in all his twenty-seven years and certainly in the six months she had known him. ‘You take longer getting ready than I do!’

  He wasn’t a handsome man, certainly not compared to her previous lover, but Rory had never made her heart clutch with tenderness. Her breath caught as he turned the bathroom mirror slightly, so their eyes could meet in the reflection, and grinned cheekily at her.

  ‘Ah, be fair, you’re gorgeous. Two minutes work, and you look like Julia Roberts.’ He gave up on his hair, turned from the mirror and flicked her nose. ‘If you don’t mind everyone wondering what you see in me, I don’t. What do you see in me?’

  ‘Idiot. You make me laugh, and you tell me I’m gorgeous. No brainer.’

  ‘Well, if that’s all it takes—I hope the touch of lippy and sexy plunging neckline are for me and not someone we’ll be meeting the night?’ She smiled and bent forward to kiss him teasingly and he held up a reproving hand. ‘You forgot to mention I’m super-bright, that when I qualify as a lawyer you’ll be able to give up your sordid job in law enforcement, and I’m the sexiest man you ever met?’

  ‘I did. Dear heart, do hurry up.’

  ‘The talk is only at seven pm, we’ve got hours yet.’ He followed her downstairs and into her
bright kitchen and she pointed at the kitchen table.

  ‘Sit. We haven’t got hours. We’re meeting them around six for drinks, so we have to catch the five fifteen train from Linlithgow. If we both want to drink we can’t drive to the station, we have to catch the four thirty bus. You get all sulky if you don’t eat so we have to eat first, and it’s already nearly four. Beef and chutney sandwiches?’

  ‘I love you,’ he said gratefully, and she giggled as she turned to the counter. ‘So tell me who we’re meeting? Your aunt, obviously. I stopped listening after you said we’d actually meet William Robertson. I not only grew up reading his books, he was my hero for being brilliantly Sci-Fi and not remotely geeky. What’s he like now?’

  Kirsty paused in her swift sandwich assembly to laugh. ‘Enormous. Six foot four tall, six foot four across, and likely six foot four round the waist. Totally bigger than life. A ferocious flirt, but also very funny. I never could understand any of his books, not being super bright like you, but I’ve heard him speak before and we wouldn’t want to miss tonight. Vivian will be there, of course; she and William have been practically joined at the hip for months. You’ve met her. My aunt’s best friend since forever and ever.’

  ‘Fabulous smile. Scottish Zsa Zsa Gabor, am I right? Good, I liked her. Who else?’

  ‘Zsa Zsa Gabor? Lose the false eyelashes and you could be right. Donald MacDonald, at a guess. The four of them usually hang out. Comes across as chilly but he can be very funny, very dry. Before you ask, Paul Newman, especially around the eyes. And no doubt Brian Mitchell. My aunt said vaguely that they’re dating a bit. She didn’t seem to want to talk about it.’

  Drew, tuned to every nuance of her voice, cocked his head on one side. ‘You don’t approve.’

  ‘It’s not that I don’t approve. He’s a nice enough man, but you remember that whole terrifying senior singles investigation back in April? Brian was on the same websites, had dated a few of the women who died, so he got checked out as part of the investigation, and I couldn’t help but notice he only went for the women with money.’