Val McDermid - Cleanskin

'Yes. Soon as you can get there, my screen says.'

'I'll be there,' I said, ending the call. I'd come all the way out here to get Stella and I wasn't going back empty-handed. She wouldn't be much longer, and if she felt up to it, she could always come to the scene with me. It was on the way back to her house in St John's Wood, after all.

I hadn't told Stella I would meet her. I'd got the flight details from her secretary, not from her. I wanted it to be a surprise. So there was no way I was going to walk away right then, not just for a dead body that wasn't going anywhere.

Within a couple of minutes of the phone alert, I saw Stella walking down the concourse towards me. It was a rare treat for me to be able to watch her without her knowing, and I took pleasure in letting my eyes follow the easy swing of her walk. Her hair was pulled back in a pony tail and she looked a bit bleary-eyed, but given that she'd just got off a night flight, she seemed pretty alert. I couldn't help myself. I was grinning from ear to ear.

She was only a few yards away when she spotted me. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise, but the smile followed so fast I knew it was real. I stepped forward and we kissed like friends, cheek to cheek. 'Wow, Andy,' she said, putting down her suitcase and hugging me. 'My very own police escort.'

I let my arms slip around her, smelling lavender and feeling the warmth of her flesh. '"Working together for a safer London,"' I said. 'That's our motto.'

I grabbed the handle of her wheelie suitcase and fell into step beside her. 'Flight OK?' I asked.

'It's over. That's the best thing you can say about any flight,' she said. 'So, how have you been managing without me?'

'Andy the man, or Andy the cop?'

She tucked her arm through mine. 'We're in a public place, Andy. Better stick to the cop angle for now.'

As we made our way to the car, I filled her in on what she'd missed while she'd been watching bodies rotting in the States. By the time I'd finished, we were on the motorway back to London. 'Interesting,' she said. 'Jack Farrell kills himself and the genie is let out of the bottle.'

'Some genie,' I snorted. 'If I had three wishes, I wouldn't spend them like that.'

'You sure? It gets a lot of garbage off the streets.'

She had a point. 'I don't mind losing any of them, it's true. But I could do without the extreme crime scenes.'

'Deep down, Andy, you're a wuss,' Stella said.

We both laughed. Then I said, 'If you really feel like you've been missing out, we could take in a nice fresh corpse on the way back to yours.'

Stella turned in her seat to look at me. 'You know the way to a girl's heart, don't you?'

I risked a quick glance at her. 'I hope so. At least where you're concerned. I missed you, Stella.'

She nodded, as if she got it. 'Nice of you to say so.' She shifted in her seat and put her hand on my thigh. It didn't feel sexual. It just felt like she wanted to be touching me. 'Being apart's useful, though. It made me wonder if it was time for us to rethink what's going on between us.'

This wasn't how I'd planned it out in my head. I thought things would settle right back into the same groove as before. I'd had a month of sleeping on my own and I'd been looking forward to changing that. Time for a bit of sweet talking, I thought. 'Seems like you had to go all the way to America before we noticed how much we care about each other,' I said, patting her hand.

'I wouldn't put it quite like that,' she said slowly. 'I guess what I'm trying to say is that we need to make our minds up.'

I didn't much like the sound of this. 'About what?'

'About being together.' She moved her hand back into her lap. 'Andy, I'm at a crossroads in my life. At the Body Farm, they made it clear that there was a job for me if I wanted it. Now, I love what I do here. But I know I would also love working there. I can't choose between here and there based only on the job.' She sighed. 'I'd hoped I could work up to this in a more relaxed setting.'

I knew just what she meant. This wasn't the scene I'd imagined on my way to the airport. 'What are you saying, Stella?'

'It's pretty simple, Andy. If I'm going to stay, there needs to be a strong reason why. You could be that reason. But if you're going to be the reason, I need more from you than you were giving me before I went away. I want something more than a friendly fuck.'

I pursed my lips and blew out the breath I'd been holding. It wasn't as bad as I'd feared. 'Stella, I don't know how to ...'

'No. Not now,' she said, her tone abrupt. 'Think about it before you say anything. We don't have to rush it.' She sat up straight in her seat, making it clear the subject was closed for the time being. 'Now, didn't you say something about a body?'