A Matter of Trust Read online

  Markie nodded wordlessly, and followed him as they approached the front door. The cottage looked to be the only habitation for miles, and when he used one of the keys on his keyring to let them in, the cottage had the echoing, empty sound of an abandoned building.

  ‘I always think that houses somehow know when their owners have truly left them,’ she said quietly. They were standing in a tiny hallway, with a set of steep stairs leading off one side, and two doors opening out into rooms on the other.

  Callum, who’d been thinking much the same thing, glanced at her quickly. He hadn’t expected her to be so sensitive to atmosphere. ‘Yes, I know what you mean,’ he said softly.

  For a moment, the two of them simply stood in the quiet cottage in silence. Then Callum shrugged his broad shoulders, and said briskly, ‘Right, let’s get searching. I’ll take his study area, through here in the living room,’ he indicated one of the doors. ‘You take the bedroom upstairs. See if you can find any diaries, personal papers, anything that might give us a clue as to who might have wanted him dead.’

  ‘Right,’ Markie agreed just as resolutely, heading for the stairs and sprinting up them with the grace of a gazelle. She was wearing a plain stone-coloured skirt, with a deep rust top. Her hair was held back in a ponytail, and tied with a chiffon silk scarf of the same rust colour. With the minimum of make-up and flat rust-coloured shoes, Callum thought that she couldn’t look more strikingly perfect if she’d been wearing Dior and diamonds.

  He pushed open the nearest door and found himself in the familiar living room. In one corner, bookcases lined the walls at a forty-five degree angle and a small kneehole desk housed a simple computer. It was where he’d done his own work whenever he came down here to write some papers in peace, and now he made his way over to it and sat down in the old-fashioned swivel chair.

  He offered up a brief prayer of regret to his old mentor and asked his forgiveness in desecrating his privacy in this way, and then with a stiffening of his spine he opened the first drawer and began to take out the folders he found there.

  It didn’t take him long to find what he was looking for, and he soon found himself looking down at what was obviously a photocopy of an old thesis. The name of the author, Brian Aldernay, was unfamiliar to him, but when he began to read it, he found that the contents of the work most definitely were not.

  He felt a cold chill creep down his spine as he continued to read.

  * * *

  Upstairs, Markie was sitting on the edge of a double bed and was reading just as intently. But she had in her hands an old fashioned, leather-bound journal, and she was reading Sir Vivian’s own handwriting as he described his first meeting with a young woman called Nesta Aldernay.

  She read it all—feeling every emotion that the old psychology Don must have felt as she read his account of Nesta’s story. She understood at once why he’d been so appalled and hardly able to believe or credit her story.

  She could see instantly, from his words of pain and regret, how much it hurt him, when he began to do his own research into the matter and slowly, inexorably, came to the heart-breaking conclusion that she was right.

  ‘Oh you poor old soul,’ Markie said, closing the journal and unable to read on any further. She needed to get this to Callum.

  But when she went downstairs, she saw him hunched over at the desk, reading something with such a ferocious scowl on his face that any words died in her throat. Every now and then he would stop and stare unseeingly out of the window, obviously deep in thought, then he’d bend his head once more to the pages in his hand.

  He was so deeply absorbed that she made her way, as quietly as a mouse, to the sofa opposite him, and curled up on it, watching him silently, Sir Vivian’s journal placed carefully on the floor in front of her.

  With his mind so fully occupied elsewhere, she was able to study him and think. And she had plenty to think about.

  Why was she so deeply attracted to this man? Because she most definitely was! Their first meeting couldn’t have been less auspicious, and since then, it seemed to her, he’d done nothing but rebuff every attempt she’d made to get closer to him.

  OK, she sort of got the whole Oxford thing. He was an old-fashioned man, with a brilliant mind, who was into living life in the ivory towers of academe. But did that have to mean he lived life like a monk?

  Her lips twisted into a grim smile as she remembered the blonde woman who’d been all over him back in his College rooms. Obviously not!

  So he had a love life. He was not so crusty and staid that he was gathering dust, like some of the books on his shelves. So was it just that he didn’t fancy her in particular?

  The thought made her smile ruefully. For all the adoring fan mail she got, and all the proposals of marriage from moon-struck men, she didn’t regard herself as irresistible.

  Let’s face it, she told herself, some men just preferred blondes!

  But for all that, she didn’t think it was the case here. For once or twice she’d caught that unmistakable gleam of desire in his stormy eyes. He might not want to, but Dr Callum Fielding desired her all right.

  The thought gave her some comfort.

  She sighed and stretched, and suddenly the sun came out and shone through the window directly onto his face, highlighting his classic features and turning his hair into the colour of old-gold.

  Good grief, he was gorgeous. Big, brainy, brawny, and determined to keep her at arms length.

  Take last night. How many men, given the opportunity to spend the night in a four-poster bed with ‘Marcheta’ would do absolutely nothing about it? Markie almost laughed out loud as she remembered her own chagrin when she realised he actually had fallen asleep.

  Still, the question remained, why? Why hadn’t he even made the most basic attempt at seduction?

  And she could only conclude that it had to be because he wasn’t interested in having a relationship with her. Was it intellectual snobbery that was the problem? Did the great man think she was beneath him?

  If so, she had the feeling that he was beginning to realise there was far more to her than just a pretty face. But to be fair to him, she didn’t think that he was that arrogant.

  No, she was more and more convinced that Callum was determined to remain cold and aloof as a form of self-defence. Which was flattering, since it meant that he saw her as a distinct threat to his way of life.

  Her mind turned back to her first view of his rooms at College. So masculine and academic. So lifeless. And she realised that he was right to be afraid. She did want to shake him up a bit. He wasn’t getting any younger, and the thought of him becoming middle-aged and then old and alone, still stuck in those rooms like a fly in amber, made her want to cry out in anger and denial. He was a deeply attractive and intelligent man. And, she felt sure, beneath that carefully controlled exterior, lurked a vibrant and passionate man.

  It gave her a peculiarly feminine ache, deep inside, that insisted she be the one to rouse the male animal in him.

  She simply wasn’t going to give up. No matter what it took, no matter how prickly he got or standoffish. She was going to find a way under his guard and under his skin if it was the last thing she did!

  At that moment, Callum turned the last page of Brian Aldernay’s thesis and shut the folder with a precise neatness that underlined, rather than concealed, the cold anger he felt.

  He’d been skim-reading it of course. He’d need to study it in far more detail before he was sure, but he’d read enough to get the gist of it.

  And recognise it.

  He should. After all, he’d read the same thesis, published under the name of Rosemary Naismith, whilst she had been his tutor.

  He sensed movement, and his head shot around in alarm, but it was only Markie. She was curled up on the sofa opposite, looking at him curiously. He felt the tension in his shoulders instantly ease.

  ‘You were so intent on what you were doing, I didn’t like to disturb you,’ she said gently.


  Callum nodded wordlessly.

  ‘Found anything?’ she persisted.

  ‘Yes. A thesis from a student called Brian Aldernay.’

  ‘That ties in with the journal of Sir Vivian that I found upstairs,’ Markie said, and, reaching down, she retrieved the volume and got lithely to her feet, walking over to him and handing it across. ‘Start here,’ she said, finding the entry where Sir Vivian first met the young woman from Durham.

  As he read, Markie stood beside him, and slowly raised her hand to touch his hair. When he made no demur, she slowly ran her fingers through the thick silver/gold mane, his scalp feeling warm beneath her fingers.

  Callum found the words in front of him beginning to blur. It was almost impossible to concentrate when she was touching him.

  ‘The thesis was stolen, wasn’t it?’ Markie said softly. ‘At least, that’s what Sir Vivian thought. I read enough of his journal to find that out. He was researching it at the rary. He came to the conclusion that someone called Dr Naismith had stolen it and taken the credit for the work someone else had done. That’s, like, the worst thing that someone in your world can do, isn’t it?’

  Callum nodded, again wordlessly.

  Slowly, Markie slid down to kneel beside him and put her hand comfortingly on his arm. ‘Are you all right?’ she asked softly.

  Callum smiled grimly. ‘Not really, no.’

  Markie looked down at his big hands, cradling the old man’s journal. ‘Do you know who they’re talking about? Nesta Aldernay and Sir Vivian—do you know who this Dr Naismith is?’

  Callum slowly closed the journal and turned to look at her bleakly. ‘Yes. And so do you. You met, briefly, in my room.’

  For a second, Markie couldn’t think what he was talking about. She certainly couldn’t remember being introduced to any Dr Naismith. And then she realised the mistake she was making. She was assuming that Dr Naismith was a man.

  But he wasn’t.

  ‘The blonde woman who was kissing you,’ Markie whispered, appalled. Her face went pale with distress for him.

  ‘Oh Callum! They were talking about your lover.’

  ‘No!’ Callum denied fiercely. ‘Rosemary and I are not lovers. We never were lovers. She was my supervisor, when I was doing my own thesis, that’s all. We were never that close.’

  ‘And does she know that, I wonder?’ Markie asked darkly, unable to help feeling jealous. ‘From the way she was all over you, you seemed pretty close to me.’

  Callum got up and walked restlessly to the window to look outside. It had begun to rain fitfully. Showers and sunshine. A perfect metaphor for life.

  He sighed heavily. ‘Rosemary is . . . complicated. I think she’s having problems. She was always volatile, always a bit of a compulsive, obsessive personality. She drinks too much, and always seemed to need the approbation of men—and the more dangerous the men, the worse for her they were, the better she liked it. Looking back, I suppose I’ve always felt that she seemed hell-bent on self-destruction, and could never understand why.’

  ‘And you think maybe this explains it?’ Markie said quietly. ‘She had this big dark secret hanging over her?’

  At least she now knew that there was nothing going on between them. He sounded sincerely bewildered and wary when talking about Naismith. With relief, she felt the green-eyed monster within her retreat, appeased.

  Callum turned and looked at her and spread his hands. ‘Maybe. Who knows what Rosemary is thinking? I’ve never pretended to understand the woman. But that’s not the question, is it?’

  Markie looked at him for a moment in puzzlement, then went even more pale than before. ‘You mean, did she know that Sir Vivian was on to her,’ Markie asked breathlessly.

  Callum nodded, stony-faced. ‘And if she did know, did she kill him to keep him quiet?’

  * * *

  Lisle wearily collected his coat, gave a few words of encouragement for his flagging team, and headed for home. He pulled up at a set of traffic lights and tapped the wheel impatiently. He’d be better off buying a house here, in Kidlington, he mused. It would save the short but traffic-jammed commute into Oxford itself.

  Perhaps he and Nesta should start looking for one.

  He found himself grinning again.

  Nesta.

  It was madness. She’d been a suspect in a case. He’d known her only a few days. She was so much younger, so much smarter, so much out of his class, it was ridiculous to even think of marrying her. And if someone had told him just two weeks ago that he’d be engaged to be married to a woman with all those credentials, he’d have laughed himself sick.

  It was so fraught with possible dangers.

  But then, he thought soberly, the first time around, he’d done it all by the book. He’d known Marie, his first wife, since school. They’d gone out for two years. Had a proper engagement party. Put a deposit down on their first starter-home. Had the white wedding, and all the rest of it.

  And that hadn’t worked out.

  For all he’d thought that she’d been prepared for life as a copper’s wife, and for all Marie had thought so too, they had just been proved wrong. It had been as simple as that. The missed Dinners, parties, birthdays, had become more and more aggravating. The long hours, the odd hours, the lack of status in being a cop’s wife, the pity of friends, it had all undermined them. The times she’d had to go to hospital, after being told he’d been wounded in the course of duty. The tension it had caused for months afterwards. Eventually, there had just been no escape, except divorce. Now he was glad they hadn’t had children. He was also genuinely glad that Marie had found someone else—a dentist, with a good income, steady hours, and a nice detached house in the village of Yarnton.

  Just what Marie should have had in the beginning, if they’d only known.

  But with Nesta, Lisle just knew it was going to be different. Not just because, as a soon-to-be practising psychologist, she’d be better able to cope with the stresses that came with the job of being Mrs Lisle Jarvis. And not just because things were better, now that Lisle had earned his last promotion, which meant that there would be a lot less likelihood of him being stabbed by a drug-crazed suspect on the streets now that he was no longer in the front line. The hours were not quite so crazy, except when he had a big case on like this. And he was well and truly on the ladder to promotion—provided he could just solve this damned case.

  No, even with all those improvements, he knew that wasn’t why he felt so outlandishly confident that this time, with this woman, it would all work out. It was something more nebulous. Just something he felt deep inside that he’d never felt with Marie. Something he’d never even known that he should be feeling.

  He got home to find all his lights on. Inside, a Dinner was cooking. Not one of those candlelight meals like Marie had prepared for them, during their first year of marriage. Oddly, if it had been, alarm bells would have started ringing.

  He could smell that this was nothing that had taken painstaking hours to cook. Just a simple shop-bought meal.

  Chicken Kiev, by the smell of garlic.

  As he walked into the door, he could see that the table was set, just with his ordinary odds-and-ends, and a sauce bottle. Nesta was sat on his sofa, books and papers scattered all around her. She was looking over the photocopies of her father’s thesis, and she hastily gathered them together when she saw him walk in. He’d given her a key to his flat yesterday, and her bedsit was looking more and more like a no-go area.

  She’d spent the day at his place, going over her options. With Sir Vivian gone, she had to decide how to proceed.

  She’d almost decided that a direct approach to the woman concerned was the only way, but right now she had better things on her mind. Her face lit up into a welcoming smile, with not a trace of unease or reproach for the lateness of the hour.

  ‘Lisle!’ She thrust the papers into her battered briefcase and uncurled herself from the sofa. She wore no make-up, and was dressed in a faded pair of jeans and
a rumpled thick-knit sweater.

  She looked gorgeous.

  She walked into his arms and kissed him. ‘Hungry?’

  ‘Starving.’

  ‘For food first? Or for me?’ she asked huskily.

  ‘What do you think?’

  She led him to the bed, watching him as he shrugged off his shirt. Mimicking him, she pulled the sweater over her own head and matched him, stripping herself article of clothing, for article of clothing, both of them feasting their eyes on the other, until they were naked.

  When he joined her on the bed, she was breathing rapidly, her eyes as large as a cat’s at night. The moment he touched her, she moaned, her skin tingling with goose bumps that had nothing to do with the cold.

  Lisle reached for her, all his cares simply slipping away . . .

  CHAPTER TWELVE

  ‘Who are you calling?’ Markie asked. It was getting dark, and they’d decided to spend the evening at the cottage, before heading back to Oxford. Now she watched Callum as he used the landline and dialled a familiar number.

  He glanced at her, ready to speak, then heard the voice in his ear instead and half-turned away from her. ‘Hello, Sin Jun. Yes, me, Callum. Look, do you have the number for Inspector Jarvis?’

  As Markie made a face, Callum looked back at her and shrugged. Putting his hand over the receiver, he said softly, ‘He’s got to know what we found out.’

  Markie sighed. She still hadn’t really forgiven the policeman for treating Callum as a suspect. ‘If you say so,’ she muttered darkly.

  Callum made a note of the number, and reached for the phone. At the incident room, he learned that Inpsector Jarvis had just left for the day.

  ‘All right, but can you give him a message please. It’s important. Can you tell him that Dr Fielding called. I’m at Sir Vivian’s country cottage, and I’ve found his journal, and papers relating to the person he suspected of cheating. Have you got all that?’

  He listened as the constable on the other end repeated his words back at him and sighed. ‘No, I’m not in Oxford, so I can’t come in first thing. I’ll be starting out from Cornwall some time in the morning. But I will go and see the inspector as soon as I can. Yes? Fine, that’s right.’ He listened for a few moments longer, then rang off.