False Tongues Read Online Free Page A

his fag, Neville decided wearily. He could bloody well do with one himself, but he’d given up that luxury a few years back. He was now an ex-smoker, with all the baggage that entailed.
    â€˜No ID, then,’ Cowley said as he thumbed his lighter.
    â€˜Inconvenient, that.’ Without any identification, there wasn’t much they could do apart from waiting for someone to ring and report that their kid was missing.
    The boy had been carrying a wallet but all it contained was a couple of ten-pound notes. There was a handful of loose change in his pockets as well, and a key on a bit of string. ‘No phone,’ Neville observed. ‘Strange. Unless someone pinched it, which is possible. Kids that age, they never seem to go out without their phones.’
    The tip of Cowley’s cigarette glowed in the dark. ‘My nephew,’ he said. ‘My sister’s lad. Twelve years old he is, and it’s like that phone is attached to his hand. Texting all the time. Used to be a right little chatterbox, but not any longer. Can’t get a civil word out of him most of the time, he’s so busy with that bloody phone. Not talking, just texting.’
    What a world, reflected Neville. What a world it was for kids these days. Phones, computers…and knives. Sudden death in a churchyard in the middle of the night.
    With an unpleasant jolt he remembered that in a few months his own child would be born into this world. Poor little bugger.
    Neville shivered. Don’t go there, he told himself. Not now.
    ***
    More than two hours after Callie missed her train, she was finally on the next one bound for Cambridge. She’d managed to pass some of the intervening time in the only cafe open on Easter Sunday evening with a cup of tea and a dried-out sandwich from the chiller cabinet. Then they’d started making moves to close the cafe for the night, so she’d gone in search of something to read. W H Smith had already shut its doors; eventually she’d found a few discarded sections of someone’s Sunday newspaper and had made do with that while she waited for the platform to be announced and the gates to be opened.
    Finally, though, she was on the train, her suitcase stowed in the luggage rack and a journey of about an hour ahead of her. The train wasn’t too crowded; she’d found a seat without difficulty, facing forward and with a table.
    She should ring Marco and let him know she was actually en route, Callie decided, and then she should ring Tamsin to tell her she’d been delayed. They’d arranged to have a pizza together at their favourite eatery; it wasn’t fair to keep Tamsin waiting with no idea of her whereabouts.
    Callie pulled her phone out of her red leather bag and pressed the button.
    Nothing.
    She’d forgotten to put it on to charge last night. And the charger, she now recalled, was at the very bottom of her suitcase.
    Blast.
    She tucked the dead phone back in her bag, then folded her hands on the table in front of her.
    Her bare hands.
    â€˜Wear the ring, Cara mia, ’ Marco had said. It was just about the last thing he’d said to her this afternoon.
    The ring was on a silver chain round her neck, under her jumper. She fished it out, unthreaded it from the chain, slid it on the third finger of her left hand, then spread her fingers out to admire it.
    A large sapphire, encircled by smaller diamonds, set on a gold band. Substantial, weighty, it had been worn by Marco’s grandmother and her mother-in-law before her. Marco had put it on her finger for the first time about a fortnight ago, then they’d decided that perhaps she ought not to wear it until they’d officially announced their engagement. To her boss Brian, her congregation, her family, and friends. And most importantly, to la famiglia Lombardi.
    That was the biggie: Marco’s Italian family. Callie had been nervous about telling them the news, and the two of them had agreed that