Love You Dead Read online

  LOVE YOU DEAD

  PETER JAMES

  MACMILLAN

  Contents

  1 Tuesday 10 February

  2 Tuesday 10 February

  3 Tuesday 10 February

  4 Tuesday 10 February

  5 Tuesday 10 February

  6 Tuesday 17 February

  7 The past

  8 Tuesday 17 February

  9 Wednesday 18 February

  10 Wednesday 18 February

  11 Wednesday 18 February

  12 Wednesday 18 February

  13 Wednesday 18 February

  14 Thursday 19 February

  15 Thursday 19 February

  16 Friday 20 February

  17 Saturday 21 February

  18 Sunday 22 February

  19 Sunday 22 February

  20 Monday 23 February

  21 The past

  22 Tuesday 24 February

  23 Tuesday 24 February

  24 Tuesday 24 February

  25 Tuesday 24 February

  26 Wednesday 25 February

  27 Thursday 26 February

  28 Thursday 26 February

  29 Thursday 26 February

  30 Friday 27 February

  31 Friday 27 February

  32 Friday 27 February

  33 The past

  34 Saturday 28 February

  35 Sunday 1 March

  36 Sunday 1 March

  37 Fourteen years ago

  38 Sunday 1 March

  39 Sunday 1 March

  40 Sunday 1 March

  41 Sunday 1 March

  42 Sunday 1 March

  43 Sunday 1 March

  44 Sunday 1 March

  45 Sunday 1 March

  46 Sunday 1 March

  47 Sunday 1 March

  48 Sunday 1 March

  49 Sunday 1 March

  50 Monday 2 March

  51 Monday 2 March

  53 Monday 2 March

  53 Monday 2 March

  54 Monday 2 March

  55 Monday 2 March

  56 Tuesday 3 March

  57 Tuesday 3 March

  58 Tuesday 3 March

  59 Tuesday 3 March

  60 Tuesday 3 March

  61 Wednesday 4 March

  62 Wednesday 4 March

  63 Thursday 5 March

  64 Friday 6 March

  65 Friday 6 March

  66 Friday 6 March

  67 Sunday 8 March

  68 Monday 9 March

  69 Monday 9 March

  70 Monday 9 March

  71 Tuesday 10 March

  72 Tuesday 10 March

  73 Tuesday 10 March

  74 Tuesday 10 March

  75 Tuesday 10 March

  76 Tuesday 10 March

  77 Tuesday 10 March

  78 Wednesday 11 March

  79 Wednesday 11 March

  80 Wednesday 11 March

  81 Wednesday 11 March

  82 Wednesday 11 March

  83 Wednesday 11 March

  84 Wednesday 11 March

  85 Wednesday 11 March

  86 Wednesday 11 March

  87 Wednesday 11 March

  88 Wednesday 11 March

  89 Wednesday 11 March

  90 Wednesday 11 March

  91 Wednesday 11 March

  92 Wednesday 11 March

  93 Thursday 12 March

  94 Thursday 12 March

  95 Thursday 12 March

  96 Thursday 12 March

  97 Thursday 12 March

  98 Thursday 12 March

  99 Thursday 12 March

  100 Thursday 12 March

  101 Thursday 12 March

  102 Thursday 12 March

  103 Thursday 12 March

  104 Friday 13 March

  105 Friday 13 March

  106 Friday 13 March

  107 Friday 13 March

  108 Friday 13 March

  109 Friday 13 March

  110 Friday 13 March

  111 Friday 13 March

  112 Saturday 14 March

  113 Saturday 14 March

  114 Saturday 14 March

  115 Saturday 14 March

  116 Saturday 14 March

  117 Sunday 15 March

  118 Sunday 15 March

  119 Monday 16 March

  120 Monday 16 March

  121 Monday 16 March

  122 Monday 16 March

  123 Tuesday 17 March

  124 Tuesday 17 March

  Glossary

  Acknowledgements

  FOR SUE ANSELL

  My very dear friend who has read every book since my very first, giving me her sound wisdom and advice.

  1

  Tuesday 10 February

  The two lovers peered out of the hotel bedroom window, smiling with glee, but each for a very different reason.

  The heavy snowfall that had been forecast for almost a week had finally arrived overnight, and fat, thick flakes of the white stuff were still tumbling down this morning. A few cars, chains clanking, slithered up the narrow mountain road, and others, parked outside the hotels, were now large white mounds.

  Everyone in the smart French ski resort of Courchevel 1850 was relieved – the resort managers, the hoteliers, the restaurateurs, the seasonnaires, the ski-rental shops, the lift companies, and all the others who relied on the ski season for much of their livelihood. And, most importantly of all, the winter-sporters themselves. After days of blue skies, searing sunshine and melting snow, which meant treacherous ice in the mornings and slush and exposed rocks in the afternoons, finally the skiers and snowboarders, who had paid top money for their precious annual few days on the slopes, now had great conditions to look forward to.

  As Jodie Bentley and her elderly American fiancé, Walt, put on their skis outside the boot-room entrance of the Chabichou Hotel, the falling snow tickled exposed parts of their faces beneath their helmets and visors.

  Although a seasoned skier and powder hound, this was the financier’s first time skiing in Europe and he had been relying all week on his much younger fiancée, who seemed to know the resort like the back of her hand, to guide him.

  They skied down carefully in the poor visibility to the Biollay lift, just a couple of minutes below the hotel, went through the electronic turnstiles, and joined the short queue to the chairlift. A couple of minutes later, clutching their ski poles, the wide chair scooped them up and forward.

  Walt pulled down the safety bar, then they settled back, snug in their cosy outfits, for the seven minutes it took for the lift to carry them to the top. As they alighted, the wind was blowing fiercely, and without hanging around, Jodie led the way down an easy red then blue run to the Croisette, the central lift station for the resort.

  They removed their skis, and Walt, despite suffering from a prolapsed disc, insisted on carrying Jodie’s skis as well as his own up the ramp to the lift. As a red eight-seater gondola came slowly round, he jammed their skis into two of the outside holders, then followed Jodie in. They sat down and pushed up their visors. They were followed by another couple and, moments later, just before the doors closed, a short man in his fifties clambered in after them, wearing a smart Spyder ski outfit and a flashy leather helmet with a mirrored visor.

  ‘Bonjour!’ he said in a bad French accent. Then added, ‘Hope you don’t mind my joining you?’ He settled down opposite them as the gondola lurched forward.

  ‘Not at all,’ Walt said.

  Jodie smiled politely. The other two strangers, both busy texting on their phones, said nothing.

  ‘Ah bien, vous parlez Anglais!’ The stranger unclipped his helmet and removed it for an instant to scratch the top of his bald head. ‘American?’ he said, pulling off his gloves, then removing a tissue from his pocket and st
arting to wipe his glasses.

  ‘I’m from California, but my fiancée’s a Brit,’ Walt said, amicably.

  ‘Jolly good! Beastly weather but the powder at the top should be to die for,’ the man said.

  Jodie smiled politely again. ‘Where are you from?’ she asked.

  ‘The south – Brighton,’ the stranger replied.

  ‘Good lord, what a coincidence! So am I!’ Jodie said.

  ‘Small world,’ he muttered, and suddenly looked uncomfortable.

  ‘So what line of business are you in?’ Walt asked him.

  ‘Oh, in the medical world. Just recently retired and moved to France. And yourselves?’

  ‘I have a group of investment trusts,’ the American replied.

  ‘I was a legal secretary,’ Jodie said.

  As the small gondola climbed, rocked by the wind, the snow was turning into a blizzard and the visibility deteriorating by the minute. Walt put his arm round Jodie and hugged her. ‘Maybe we shouldn’t go too high this morning, hon, it’s going to be very windy at the top,’ he said.

  ‘The powder’s going to be awesome up there,’ she replied, ‘and there won’t be too many people this early. There are some really fabulous runs, trust me!’

  ‘Well, OK,’ he said, peering dubiously through the misted-up windows.

  ‘Oh, absolutely,’ the Englishman said. ‘Trust your beautiful young lady – and the forecast is improving!’ As the gondola reached the first stage, he waited politely for them to alight first. ‘Nice meeting you,’ he said. ‘Bye for now.’

  The other couple, still texting, remained on the gondola.

  With Walt again insisting on carrying Jodie’s skis, they trudged the short distance to the cable car. Normally jam-packed with skiers squashed together like sardines, this morning the huge cabin was three-quarters empty. Along with themselves there were just a few die-hards. Several boarders in their baggy outfits, two rugged-looking, bearded men in bobble hats, wearing rucksacks, who were sharing swigs from a hip flask, and a small assortment of other skiers, one wearing a GoPro camera on his helmet. Walt raised his visor and smiled at Jodie. She raised hers and smiled back.

  He removed a glove, jamming it between his skis, produced a chocolate bar from his breast pocket and offered it to Jodie.

  ‘I’m fine, thanks, still stuffed from breakfast!’

  ‘You hardly ate anything!’ He broke a piece off, put the bar back in his pocket and zipped it shut, then chewed, peering out anxiously. The cable car rocked in the wind, then swayed alarmingly, causing everyone to shriek, some out of fear, others for fun. He put an arm round Jodie again and she snuggled up against him. ‘Maybe we should get a coffee at the top and wait to see if the visibility improves?’ he said.

  ‘Let’s do a couple of runs first, my love,’ she replied. ‘We’ll find some fresh powder before it gets ruined by other skiers.’

  He shrugged. ‘OK.’ But he didn’t sound particularly enthusiastic. He stared at her for some moments. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘you’re incredible. Not many people can look beautiful in a helmet and visor, but you do.’

  ‘And you look every inch my handsome prince!’ she replied.

  He tried to kiss her but the top of his helmet bashed against her visor. She giggled, then leaned closer to him and whispered, ‘Too bad there’s other people on here,’ running her gloved hand down his crotch.

  He squirmed. ‘Jeez, you’re making me horny!’

  ‘You make me horny all the time.’

  He grinned. Then he looked serious again, and a tad nervous. He peered through a window into the blizzard, and the car yawed in the wind, then swung, almost throwing him off balance. ‘You have your cell with you, hon?’ he asked.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You know – just in case we lose each other in this white-out.’

  ‘We won’t,’ she said, confidently.

  He patted his chest and frowned. Patted it again, then tugged open another zipper. ‘Jeez,’ he said, and began to pat all over the front of his stylish black Bogner ski jacket. ‘I can’t believe it, how stupid. I must have left mine back in the room.’

  ‘I’m sure I saw you put it in – your top right-hand pocket – before we left,’ she said.

  He checked all over again, and his trouser pockets. ‘Goddammit, must have fallen out somewhere – maybe when we were putting our skis on.’

  ‘We’re going to stay close. Just in case we do get separated, then plan B is we both ski back down to the Croisette and meet there. Just follow the signs for Courchevel 1850 – it’s well posted all the way.’

  ‘Maybe we should ski straight back down and go and check it’s not lying in the snow outside the hotel.’

  ‘Someone’ll find it if it is, darling. No one’s going to steal it, not at that lovely hotel.’

  ‘We’d better go back down, I need it. I have a couple of important calls to make this afternoon.’

  ‘OK,’ she said. ‘Sure, fine, we’ll ski fast!’

  Five minutes later the cable car slowed right down, and a shadow loomed ahead. The car rocked from side to side, bumping against the buffered sides of the station, slowly sliding in, before stopping. Then the doors opened and they stepped out in their heavy ski boots, onto the gridded metal walkway.

  They shuffled along it, then carefully down the steps and out into the ferocious blizzard, their faces stinging from snow as hard as hailstones. They could barely see a few feet in front of them, and the group ahead, ducking down and clipping into their boards, were little more than shadowy silhouettes.

  As they stood beside a sign mostly obscured with snow, Walt laid their skis down on the ground, kicked the ice away from the bottom of his boots, tapping them with his ski poles to make extra sure there were no lumps of snow stuck there, then stepped into his bindings and snapped them shut.

  As the silhouettes began to move away, Jodie said, ‘Hang on a sec, darling, I need to clean my visor.’

  Walt waited, turning his face away from the wind as best he could, while Jodie tugged down one of her zippers, produced a tissue and wiped the inside of her visor, then the outside.

  ‘This is horrible!’ He had to shout to make his voice heard.

  ‘We’re almost at the highest point in the whole resort,’ she said. ‘As soon as we get off this ridge we’ll be out of the wind!’

  ‘I hope you’re right! Maybe we should start with something easy – is there a blue run back down? I don’t fancy anything too challenging in this goddam visibility!’

  ‘There is and it’s lovely. There’s one tiny steep bit to get into it, then it’ll be a glorious cruise. It’s my favourite run!’

  He watched the last of the silhouettes disappearing as Jodie pulled her gloves back on, then stepped into her skis.

  ‘Ready?’ she asked.

  ‘Uh-huh.’

  She pointed to the right. ‘We go down here.’

  ‘Are you sure? Everyone else has gone that way.’ He pointed in the direction that the others who had been in the cable car with them had taken.

  ‘You want the hardcore black run down or a gentle blue?’

  ‘Blue!’ he said emphatically.

  ‘That crazy lot have all taken the black.’ She glanced over her shoulder and could just make out the cable car leaving the station for its return journey. It would be around fifteen minutes before the next load of skiers arrived. Right now, they were alone. ‘Blue?’ she said. ‘Are you sure? I’m sure you’d cope with the black.’

  ‘Not in this visibility.’

  ‘Then we go this way,’ she said.

  ‘I can’t see any sign pointing this way, hon. There must be a signpost up here, surely?’

  With one ski pole, she began to brush away the fresh powder snow from the ground beside her. After a moment, tracks were revealed beneath it, frozen into the cruddy, icy surface beneath. ‘See?’ she said.

  He peered at them. They led straight ahead for a couple of yards before disappearing into the swirling w
hite blizzard. Looking relieved, he smiled. ‘Clever girl! I’ll follow you.’

  ‘No, you go first in case you fall over – I can help you up. Just follow the tracks. Bend your knees and brace yourself because the first fifty yards or so are a bit steep, then it levels out. Just let yourself go!’ She shot an anxious glance around her to make absolutely sure no one was watching.

  ‘OK!’ he said with a sudden burst of enthusiasm. ‘Here goes! Yeee-ha!’

  He launched himself forward on his poles, like a racer out of the gate, and whooped again. ‘Yeee-ha!’

  Then his voice turned into a terrible scream. Just for one fleeting second before it was swallowed by the wind.

  Then silence.

  Jodie turned round, then pushing with her poles, headed off in the direction all the other skiers had taken, oblivious to the wind and the stinging snow on her cheeks.

  2

  Tuesday 10 February

  Jodie did what she and Walt had agreed if they lost each other, which was to ski down to the Croisette and wait in front of the entrance to the ski school.

  It was much warmer down here than it had been up at the top of the Saulire, and just as the Englishman they’d met in the gondola had predicted, the weather was now improving. The falling snow had turned to flecks of sleet, and the sun was trying to break through. And apart from that man, no one in either of the lifts in which they had travelled to the top had taken any notice of them.

  She removed her helmet so that, maybe later, someone would recognize her and be able to back up her story. That guy from Brighton might even prove useful. He’d be able to verify she and Walt had both set off skiing together in the poor visibility. A shame she hadn’t asked him his name.

  She glanced at her watch, wondering just how long would be considered a respectable waiting time. An hour, she decided. An hour would be a perfectly reasonable time before she headed into a bar for a nice warm coffee and an Eau de Vie schnapps – maybe a double – to take the edge off her nerves. Somewhere to sit and plan her story carefully.

  She pushed back her sleeve and glanced at her watch. 11.05 a.m. The day was still young, and more skiers were venturing out of their hotels and chalets now that the weather was clearing, and heading into the lift stations around her. Suddenly an idiot on a snowboard ran over her skis and grabbed hold of her, trying to prevent them both falling over.