Bad Tidings Read Online Free Page B

Leanne, one from his sister, Lisa. The texts were both from Alison and the voice message from Lisa.
    With a feeling of dread, Henry started to listen to Lisa’s voice message, knowing it could only be about one thing.
    It was one of the fastest drives of his life: Preston to Blackpool. Police headquarters to Blackpool Victoria Hospital, BVH. Twenty minutes.
    And then twenty more minutes finding somewhere to park.
    And then ten minutes walking from his car to the A&E department and another five to find the patient in a curtained cubicle somewhere at the back.
    As he drew aside the heavy plastic curtain, his eyes alighted on the frail figure of his mother in the bed, hooked up to various monitors and drips stuck in veins at the back of her bony hands, and on the faces of Lisa and Leanne, his sister and daughter, at the bedside.
    Both women turned and gripped him, suddenly in floods of tears.
    Henry consoled them, an arm around each, as he looked at his mother, her eyes closed and, he guessed, very close to death.
    Something cold and rock solid sank in his chest.
    He could have driven down the lane, using his rank, but instead he parked the Audi on the main road, pulled the Chatsworth jacket tight, got out and decided to walk. He grabbed his Maglite torch from the footwell and stuffed a few pairs of latex gloves and shoe covers into his pocket, just a few items from the kit every half-decent detective would carry with him.
    As he approached the stationary police car, the officer inside got out wearily. Henry flashed his warrant card, even though the PC recognized him.
    â€˜I’ll let you drive down, if you like, sir,’ he told Henry. ‘There’s plenty of parking outside the unit and quite a few cop cars down there.’
    â€˜Maybe later, when I see what’s what,’ Henry said, ducking under the cordon tape that had also been strung across the entrance to the lane. His mind was already starting to take in the location, trying to assess its importance, and he worked quickly back over the existing murder files as he walked to the scene of what might actually be the fourth murder in the series. And he shook his head at the memory of the past week and all that he had endured . . .

THREE
    I t had been a heart attack that had floored Henry’s ninety-one-year-old mother, Veronica Martha Christie, née Redwood. Fortunately for her it struck when Lisa, Henry’s somewhat flaky sister, was paying one of her very infrequent visits. (Cruelly, Henry wondered if the fact that Lisa had turned up had been the reason for the attack.)
    His mother lived – still fiercely independent at such a great age – in sheltered housing in Bispham, to the north of Blackpool. She had survived a previous heart attack a couple of years before, but it had become obvious to the family that she had started to deteriorate health-wise in the last six months. She was eating less and less, hardly had any energy in her frail body and was approaching, if not death, then at least the time when she would need to be cared for by professionals.
    Henry had seen the decline and begun what he knew would be the very delicate process of convincing his mum that a home would be a much better place for her. This did not go down well – she was convinced that ‘a much better place’ meant better off dead. ‘Because I might as well be dead in an old people’s home with all those old codgers about,’ she remonstrated. Henry found that, although she was in physical decline, her mental faculties were still top notch and she refused point blank to move. She had access to a warden if necessary and her main meal of the day was delivered by a charity, although it often remained uneaten.
    The other problem for Henry was the commitment needed from his family to look after her – a family that now consisted only of himself and Lisa. It didn’t help that his mother’s decline had coincided with Henry