Blood Atonement Read Online Free PDF Page B

told the news of Katie Drake’s death and her proud, handsome face, which looked familiar to Foster, presumably from one of
    her TV appearances, was still blanched by shock. She let Heather and Foster into her sitting room, adorned with ethnic artefacts, grotesque carved masks, a few wooden
    statues and colourful batiks hanging from the wall. The
    air smelled of incense and smoke. Once inside and seated on the sofa she lit the first of a chain of cigarettes.
    Foster made their apologies and offered the usual
    condolences. Darlinghurst drew deeply on her cigarette,
    pushing away a blonde curl of hair that constantly fell
    over her right eye.
    Awful,’ she said in a crisp, well-enunciated voice. ‘Just fucking awful. Any news about Naomi?’
    Foster shook his head sadly. Heather explained the
    reason for the visit — to build up as detailed a picture as they could of Katie Drake’s life, in the hope it might lead them to her killer.
    ‘What do you want to know?’
    ‘What sort of person was she?’ Foster asked.
    ‘Wow,’ she said. ‘What a place to start. What sort of
    person was she?’ Katie’s friend looked away for a short
    period of time, lost in thought. ‘She was honest. She was loyal. She was a fabulous mother, a good friend and a fucking good actress.’
    ‘How long had you known her?’ Foster asked.
    ‘Sixteen years. She was twenty-one and I was a year
    older. We were in rep, doing a version of Salad Days. Bloody awful play. But we had a scream doing it. We came back to London and stayed friends. Through marriages, divorces, childbirth, for her at least, and all manner of job crises. She was always there for me, as I was for her.’
    Foster nodded. ‘How had she been recently?’
    She tapped another cigarette from the pack and lit it.
    ‘How had she been?’ she said, repeating his question once more and glancing away. After another drag she answered.
    ‘I haven’t seen her for two months, though we spoke on
    the phone a couple of weeks ago. She was … OK. I mean, work was causing her a bit of angst, or rather the total bloody lack of it. I’d just landed a little part in a TV drama.
    Load of bloody shit it is, too, but it’s work. Usually we took great pleasure in each other keeping the bastards at bay and finding work, but I did sense she was a bit deflated. I think it must have been a year since she did anything and I’d not been doing too badly in comparison …’
    ‘What do you mean by “keeping the bastards at bay”?’
    Heather said, the beginnings of a smile on her face.
    ‘Oh, that? Well, when you’re an actress approaching
    forty the work tends to thin out, either that or the roles you get are pretty shitty ones. The men, of course, just keep getting more work. But that’s the way it is. You can either plug away and keep the bastards at bay, or you can give up and walk away and … well, God knows what you’d do. Teach, or something.’ She pulled a face.
    ‘So if work had dried up, do you know how Katie spent
    her days?’ Foster asked.
    ‘She read. She wrote. I know she was trying to write a
    novel of some sort. Two days a week she helped out in a
    charity shop near her home.’
    ‘Which one?’
    ‘Cancer Research. Other than that, I know she had
    other friends, ones she’d made through Naomi, other
    single mums.’
    ‘What did she do for money?’
    A bit of voice-over work every now and then. Crappy
    but it pays good money. She had a lovely, clear voice. And whatever contribution she received from her ex-husband, though most of that was towards Naomi’s upkeep.’
    Was there a man in her life?’
    She let out a derisive snort. “Men? We’d given up on those shower of bastards a long time ago,’ she said and laughed.
    ‘Sorry, detective,’ she added, looking at Foster. And no, she wasn’t a lesbian if that’s what you’re thinking. Bloody hell, no. What I meant is that neither of us enjoyed much luck with men. Both had a failed marriage. A couple of aborted