The Keeper. Luke Delaney

and poured as little as he thought he could get away with into her glass, not wishing to delay her going to bed any longer than was absolutely necessary, before putting it back in the fridge and grabbing a beer. He took his favourite glass from the cupboard and sat at the table with Kate, using the remote to click the TV on.

      ‘I take it that’s the end of conversation for the night,’ Kate accused.

      ‘Sorry.’ Sean turned to her with a mischievous grin. ‘I thought you were playing on your computer.’

      ‘Ha, ha,’ Kate replied. ‘Working, Sean. Working. All we ever do is work. Work and pay bills. That’s it.’

      ‘It’s not that bad,’ Sean argued, now glad she’d waited up, pleased to have the distraction of conversation.

      ‘We should think about New Zealand again. Remember, after what happened to Sally, you said we ought to get the hell out of here, start a new life, one where we actually see each other. Where we see the kids.’

      ‘I don’t know,’ Sean answered. ‘It just feels like running away.’

      ‘Nothing wrong with running away if it’s running away to a better life.’

      ‘There’s no guarantee of a better life,’ Sean argued. ‘I did my research. New Zealand’s not all green fields and blue skies. They’ve got plenty of problems too. You don’t really think they’d stick me in a plush office somewhere overlooking the Pacific with nothing to do but twiddle my thumbs and admire the view all day, do you? They’d find some shithole to stick me in and we’d be back where we started, only stuck on the other side of the world.’

      ‘It can’t be as bad as it is here,’ Kate insisted. ‘I’ve lived with you too long not to know your job and how it works. If you were to so much as hint that you want to go home and see your family once in a while, they’d all look at you like you’ve gone mad, like you’re somehow letting the team down. Only losers want to actually go home now and then, right?’ Sean shifted uncomfortably in his chair. ‘And as we both know, there’s no way you could ever, ever walk out on a job and let somebody else deal with it. You’re way too conscientious for that. True?’

      ‘I can’t walk out in the middle of a job. There’s no one else to pass it on to. A case comes in, it lands on my desk and that’s it. It’s mine until it’s finished. If I don’t get to come home for a week then I don’t get to come home for a week. That’s the way it is. It goes with the territory. It’s the job. It’s what I do. I can’t run off to New Zealand. I can’t run off anywhere. I am what I am. I do what I do. You don’t want to see me sitting in an office in the City pushing paper around, living for my bonus, another clone – that would kill me. I wouldn’t be me any more. I’d bore you to death.’

      Kate thought for a long while before answering. ‘You’re right,’ she told him. ‘I know you have to be a cop. You thrive on it. It makes you proud – and so it should. But the kids are getting older. At least one of us needs to be here more for them.’

      ‘Meaning?’

      ‘I’m just saying,’ Kate went on. ‘The fact is I earn almost twice what you do and I don’t have to nearly kill myself to do it.’

      ‘What are you suggesting?’ Sean asked, his voice thick with suspicion.

      ‘I don’t really know,’ Kate admitted. ‘I think we need more of a plan, that’s all. I have no idea where we’re going.’

      ‘Who ever knows that?’ Sean questioned. ‘All anyone can do is live in the day, try and get something out of every day. All these books and gurus spouting plans for a better life – it’s a load of crap. You have to just try and live your life the best you can.’

      Kate studied him a while. ‘I am happy,’ she told him, ‘but surely there’s more for us somewhere. Something better.’

      Sean searched her brown eyes for signs of happiness. He saw no signs of unhappiness and decided that was good enough, for now.

      ‘I do love you,’ she continued, ‘which is why I worry about you, which is why I don’t want to share you with the bad people, the psychos, the drug dealers, the angry madmen. I want you all for myself and the kids.’

      Her words made him smile. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘But I want you and the kids to be proud of me. I want them to know what I do.’

      ‘Christ,’ Kate replied. ‘You’ll scare the bloody hell out of them.’

      ‘I’ll spare them the details, but you get what I mean.’

      ‘So,’ Kate surrendered, ‘we carry on as we are, ships that pass in the night, absent parents?’

      ‘I’m not ready to walk away yet,’ Sean told her. ‘Let’s give it a couple more years, then we’ll see.’

      ‘I wouldn’t ask you to walk away if you don’t want to,’ she assured him.

      ‘A couple more years,’ Sean almost promised. ‘Then we’ll see.’

      ‘I’ll remember this conversation, you know,’ she warned him.

      ‘Of course you will,’ Sean conceded. ‘You’re a woman.’

       3

      Thursday morning shortly before nine o’clock and Sally was knocking on the door of a nondescript house in Teddington on the outskirts of West London, steeling herself to ask the occupants a set of questions that even their closest friends wouldn’t dare to broach. Though she’d never met these people, experience told her they would see her as their potential saviour. This morning she felt more like an intruder come to wreak havoc. So long as she got the answers to her questions – answers that could progress or kill off this new case – she didn’t really care what impact her visit might have on their lives.

      While she waited for an answer, she took a couple of steps back from the door, surveying the large ugly house that would have been the pride of the street when newly built in the seventies, but now looked tired and out of place amongst the older, more gracious houses.

      She heard the approach of muffled footsteps, comfortable slippers or soft indoor shoes, moving rapidly, but shuffling, the effort of lifting feet too much for ageing, tired muscles. There was a hurried fumbling of the latch then the door opened to reveal a grey-haired couple who resembled each other: both small and slightly dumpy, curly hair long since abandoned to nature, tanned skin from too many cruise-ship holidays, cardigans and elasticated trousers, thin-framed spectacles magnifying bright, hopeful, blue eyes. They answered the door together, something that only happened in times of joyful or fearful expectation. Sally thought they looked like children sneaking into a room in the middle of the night where their parents had lied to them that Father Christmas would have left their presents, excited by the promise of toys, afraid of being caught.

      ‘Yes?’ the old man asked, his wife peering over his shoulder. Sally flipped open her warrant card and faked a smile.

      ‘DS Jones, Metropolitan Police …’ She managed to stop herself adding Murder Investigation Team. The last thing she needed was two old people passing out on her, or worse. ‘I’m looking into the disappearance of your daughter, Louise Russell. You are …’ Sally quickly checked her notebook, silently cursing herself for not having done so before knocking, ‘… Mr and Mrs Graham – Louise’s parents?’ They were too desperate to notice her hesitation.

      ‘Yes,’ the old man confirmed. ‘Frank and Rose Graham. Louise is our daughter.’

      Frank and Rose, Sally thought. Old names. Strong names. ‘Can I come in?’ she asked, already moving towards the door.

      ‘Please,’ said Mr Graham, stepping aside to allow her to enter the hallway.

      Sally felt the carpet under her feet, worn and