Undertaking Love Page 0,82

paid to talk to him were bothering to be civil – with the notable exception of Dora. If she looked at him at all, it was with reproach.

‘What time is Dora due in?’

Melanie glanced at the clock.

‘About ten minutes.’

Gabe nodded.

‘Ask her to come and see me when she gets in, will you?’

He picked up his coffee and headed through to the mortuary. At least dead people wouldn’t shoot him daggers or mutter about him behind his back.

‘You wanted to see me, Gabriel?’

Gabe looked up at Dora as she hovered in the office doorway half an hour later. Her arms were folded across her apron-covered chest, and her mouth was set in a thin, pursed line.

‘Come and sit down for a minute, will you?’

Dora bristled with disapproval, but sat down opposite him all the same.

‘Dora, I have a problem.’

‘You’ll be wantin’ the doctor, Gabriel, not me.’

She used his full name in the same ominous way his mother had when he’d been in trouble as a kid. He opened the desk drawer.

‘Here. Look at these.’

He pushed a thin, dog-eared photo wallet across the table towards her. She glanced at it and sniffed, but resisted the urge to pick it up. Gabe knew her well enough to know that her outward restraint would be costing her dearly.

‘Please?’

Dora huffed and picked the packet up by one corner between her finger and thumb, as if she might be contaminated with Gabe’s sleaze by association. She looked through the wedding pictures slowly then slid them back onto the desk in frosty silence.

‘I was nineteen. Simone was seventeen. We were stupid and rebellious, and eloping on her eighteenth birthday seemed like the most romantic idea ever.’

Dora nodded begrudgingly for him to carry on when he paused.

‘It was a disaster, Dora. We were kids, and her da was up for killing me – and looking back now, I don’t blame him.’ He shook his head as he remembered the rage on Simone’s fathers face. ‘We didn’t love each other, it was just childish infatuation.’

Gabe glanced out of the window and sighed heavily. ‘We divorced a year later. Broke her mother’s heart to have a fallen daughter.’

Dora had given up on any pretense at nonchalance and stared at him agog.

‘So there I was, twenty, and already a divorcee. An undertaker, and a divorcee – a hard sell in any market, let me tell you. Simone and I decided back then that we wouldn’t speak about it again, so having it splashed across the front of a newspaper was –’ he grimaced as her brothers unveiled threats rang in his ears ‘– awkward, you know?’

Dora pulled her ‘you reap what you sow’ face.

‘Why are you telling me this, Gabriel?’

‘Because I miss your jammy dodgers?’

Gabe smiled and shook his head at Dora’s outraged face.

‘Okay, okay. I’m telling you because your opinion happens to matter to me, Dora. And because I’m sick of being the local pariah. People listen to you.’

Dora preened a little under Gabe’s flattery, but he’d meant it sincerely. She was one of the village stalwarts. A few supportive words in the local store would be enough turn the tide of opinion his way.

‘Those pictures, that woman in the strip club … it wasn’t what it looked like, I promise you.’ Dora looked skeptical, but he ploughed on regardless. ‘I hate those places. Ten seconds after that shot was taken she tipped a drink in my lap.’

‘No more than you deserved in a place like that, young man.’

She chastised him with her words, but the frost had melted from her tone as if warmed by a sunbeam.

After a few seconds thought, she rummaged in her shopping bag and slid a packet of jammy dodgers across the desk at him. He grinned as he ripped the packet open with his teeth, and put one in his mouth whole in acceptance of her unspoken apology.

‘You should call the police about that Rupert. It’s harassment, it is.’ She helped herself to a biscuit.

Gabe shook his head.

‘I’ll sort it out myself soon enough Dora, don’t worry about it. Besides, that wasn’t really what I wanted to talk to you about …’ he leaned in across the table and dropped his voice. ‘I need your help with something a bit more … well, personal.’

Dora’s nostrils flared with horror.

‘What sort of personal, Gabriel? You don’t want me to look at any of your weird bits do you?’

‘It’s not a health thing.’ Gabe laughed. ‘Well, not unless you count matters of the heart, anyway.’

Dora relaxed back