Die With Me by Elena Forbes Page A

forced to accept.
    He knew he should try and get some sleep. There was the briefing at seven that morning and it was going to be another long day. But he felt wired, thoughts buzzing in his head. He undid his tie and top button and went into the kitchen for a drink. What was it with women? Not content just to get married themselves, once they’d done that, they spent their whole time matchmaking everybody else. Nicoletta seemed obsessed with getting him hitched and his cousin Elisa, Gianni’s sister, was almost as bad. They kept reminding him that he was only a few years away from being forty, a point they viewed as some sort of a watershed, although it meant nothing to him. Why couldn’t they understand that he was happy as he was and leave him alone?
    Happy? Well, not unhappy, he thought, opening the bottle of Sicilian Nero d’Avola that Gianni had given him for his birthday, and pouring himself a large glass. Seeing Fiona Blake that morning had caused all sorts of uncomfortable feelings to surface. Why was he attracted to complicated women, women he couldn’t quite pin down? Why was he never interested in nice, straightforward women like Donovan?
    The wine was a deep, black purple and smelled heady and full of spice. He took a large draught, letting it swill around his mouth, enjoying the pungent flavour. Christ, it was good, he thought, taking another long swig. Gianni really knew a thing or two about wine. Perhaps he had been a bit hard on Fiona but he’d been angry. Screw Murray. Even though it was late, he felt like calling her. Maybe he’d apologise for what had happened earlier. It would be nice to hear her voice. Then he remembered the ring on her finger. No point. She had made her choice and he had to put her out of his mind.
    He went into the sitting room, put REM’s Around the Sun on the CD player and dimmed the lights. He sank down into the middle of the large, comfortable sofa, shoes off, feet up on the glass coffee table, and closed his eyes momentarily. Henry appeared from nowhere and jumped onto his lap, purring loudly, settling himself down into a tight pale beige coil. Tartaglia took another slug of wine and lit a cigarette, trying to lose himself in the music, watching the smoke snake up towards the ceiling. The sound was good. Like his motorbike, the player had been an extravagance, but well worth it. Thank God, he had nobody to dictate how he spent his money.
    Donovan had called to tell him about her meeting with Rosie Chapple and he had spoken to Superintendent Cornish to brief him about what they had discovered. Not a man to show emotion easily, Cornish had sounded a little rattled as Tartaglia outlined his theory that Gemma’s death might be part of a series. Cornish had refused to give him extra resources to help search the records for matching suicides, saying that he couldn’t justify such a thing on the basis of a ‘pure hunch’. But he had promised to come down to Barnes for the next day’s morning meeting, clearly wanting to keep closer tabs on things, considering what Tartaglia had said. Tartaglia hoped that that was going to be the limit of his hands-on input. Unlike Clarke, Cornish had almost no murder experience, having risen through the ranks in other departments, almost entirely on the uniform side. Cornish could handle the media, for all he cared, and he would keep him fully briefed, but he wanted to be left in overall day-to-day charge of the case.
    He could still feel the reheated lasagne from the pub sitting in his stomach, and wondered whether he’d be able to sleep. He shouldn’t have had it, but he was so hungry after seeing Kramer that he would have eaten almost anything. Kramer, the hard man, had gone to pieces once he discovered that they knew about the suicide note. Tartaglia felt deeply sorry for the man. Kramer had handed over the note, written on flowery paper in Gemma’s childish handwriting, folded neatly in a pink envelope with her mother’s name on the