Piece of My Heart by Peter Robinson

like a cottage. You know, old furniture and stuff, a creaky bed, toilet with a wonky seat.”
    “What about Nick’s personal things?”
    “You must know. You were in there.”
    “Everything’s gone, Kelly.”
    Kelly gave her a startled look. “Somebody stole it? Is that why they killed him? But there was hardly anything there,unless he was hiding money under the mattress, and I don’t think he was. You could have felt a pea under that thing.”
    “What did he have?”
    “Just a few books, a portable CD player with a couple of those small speakers you can set up. Not great sound, but okay. Mostly he liked old stuff, but he had some more modern bands: Doves, Franz Ferdinand, Kaiser Chiefs. And he had a computer.”
    “Laptop?”
    “Yes. A little one. Toshiba, I think. He said he used it mostly for watching DVDs, but he did do some work on it, too.”
    “What kind of work?”
    “He was a writer.”
    “What sort of writer?”
    “I don’t know. He never told me about it and I never asked. None of my business, was it? Maybe he was writing his autobiography.”
    That would be a bit presumptuous at thirty-eight, Annie thought, but people had written autobiographies at earlier ages than that. “But he definitely said he was a writer?”
    “I asked him what he was doing up here at such a miserable time of year, and he said he wanted a bit of peace and quiet to do some writing. I could tell he was being a bit shy and secretive about it, so I didn’t push. I wasn’t after his life story, anyway.”
    “Did he ever show you anything he’d written?”
    “No. I mean, all we did was have a curry, a chat and a shag. I didn’t go searching through his stuff or anything. What do you think I am?”
    “All right, Kelly, don’t get your knickers in a twist.”
    Kelly managed a brief smile. “Bit late for that, isn’t it?”
    “What did you use for contraception?”
    “Condoms. What do you think?”
    “We didn’t find any in the house.”
    “We used them all. On Friday, like, he wanted to, you know, do it again, but we couldn’t. There weren’t any left, and it was too late to go into Eastvale. I had to be at work. And there’s no way I was going to do it without. I’m not totally stupid.”
    “Okay,” said Annie. Once she had got Kelly talking, she had proved to be far less shy and reticent than she appeared in public. So that explained the rumpled bed and lack of condoms. But robbery hardly seemed like a motive. Obviously, if Nick had had something of great value there, he wouldn’t have told some local scrubber he’d picked up in a pub, but why cart anything of value up here in the first place? Unless he was blackmailing somebody. Or making a payoff.
    “Did he have a mobile?”
    “He did. A fancy Nokia. Fat lot of good it did him, though. They don’t work around here. You have to go to Eastvale or Helmthorpe. It’s a real drag.”
    That was a problem in the Dales, Annie knew. They’d put up some new towers, but coverage was still patchy in places because of the hills. There wasn’t a land line at the cottage–most rental places don’t include one for obvious reasons–and both Mrs. Tanner and Winsome had used the telephone box across the road, by the church. “How did he seem when you were with him?” she asked.
    “He was fine.”
    “He didn’t seem upset, depressed or worried about anything?”
    “No, not at all.”
    “What about drugs?”
    Kelly paused. “We smoked a couple of joints, that’s all. I’d never do anything harder than that.”
    “Did he have a lot of gear?”
    “No, just enough for himself. At least that’s all I saw. Look, he wasn’t a drug dealer, if that’s what you’re getting at.”
    “I’m not getting at anything,” said Annie. “I just want to establish some idea of Nick’s state of mind. Was he any different on Friday afternoon?”
    “No, not so’s I noticed.”
    “He wasn’t nervous or edgy, as if he was expecting someone?”
    “No.”
    “Did you