Broadchurch: Across the Pond

Chapter 8

TW: discussions of murder

Clara watched the Brits until they got in a cab. They were nice enough, and their reaction to the beer had made her whole day. Probably Bob's, too, judging by the green foam in his mustache.

"I think that's the first time I've seen you flirt with a man," he remarked.

"Lost a bet,"Clara said sadly. She'd love to get her hands in the lady detective's—Ellie's?--gorgeous curls, but she'd made a promise. Nobody had warned her that the pair looked and sounded like models. Then again, nobody had warned her that they would be polite, either.

Clara got out her phone and hit speed dial. Her contact answered promptly.

"Hey, amigo. Those detectives came by. I didn't tell them shit," she lied.Ellie's smile was so disarming that Clara had accidentally spilled a few forbidden beans, but nothing major. "Yeah, pretty nice folks. You should've seen their faces when I gave them the green beer. And I hit on the guy just like you said. He could just about flip me with that voice. Yep. Talk to you later."

Their expedition appeared to go unnoticed. Just as well, because the first thing they did the next day was plot another one.

"Victim two,Penny McKenney," Alec said, staring at the ceiling. He'd suffered a dizzy spell earlier. When sitting down didn't help, he abandoned dignity and laid down on the floor like he often did at home. Now he was lying flat on the carpet with his legs propped up on a desk. "Friend of Dawn. Nineteen years old, bludgeoned, left on the beach. Ex is Andy Pattinson. His alibi is rubbish. What else do we know about him?"

"Conspiracy theorist," Ellie answered. She lay sprawled opposite him, their heads almost touching. "Martial arts teacher, collects weaponry. Breakup was mutual. On a side note, we must look like a pair of lunatics right now."

"Ask if I care."

"Do you lay on the floor often?"

"It's better than passing out. Why?"

"I should get you a rug for Christmas."

"Don't you dare.About Penny's ex—a breakup is never mutual. Nobody looks at each other and says at the same time, 'I don't want to be with you.' One party has to initiate."

"Question is,who initiated?"

"Exactly. But we can't ask him, because he's in fucking Mexico!" Alec groaned and scrubbed his hands over his face. "God's sake! We're at a standstill."

"It's like one step forward and two steps back."

They were quiet for a while, until Alec found another straw to grasp at. "What about media? Are there any press cuttings or--"

"No. I looked through the files and did an online search. There's a couple two-minute segments advising women to be careful."

"I suppose that's what you get in one of the top five murder capitols of the US. Or is it top ten?" He twisted round, looking at her upside down. It was rather comical. "Would it help if we saw the last crime scene? It's the only one still intact."

"Worth a shot.What do you hope to find?"

"Ask me again after we've seen it."

Ellie sat up, accidentally bumping Alec as she did so; he didn't so much as flinch. "All right, let's go play on the beach."

She helped him up, and they took off again.

The last open crime scene was at the bottom of a set of cliffs that looked remarkably like Broadchurch. Unlike Broadchurch, the beach was boiling hot and full of people in various stages of sunburn, crammed right up to the CRIME SCENE DO NOT ENTER tape.

"I don't think there's this many people in our whole town," Ellie remarked,pulling her hair into a ponytail. "Have you ever seen so many half-naked bodies in one place?"

"No, and I grew up in Glasgow."

Ellie decided she didn't want to know what Glasgow, Scotland had to do with half-naked people.

A tall woman in a Haz-mat suit jogged over from the white isolation tent. "Are you the Brits?" 

Alec rolled his eyes; Ellie spoke up before he could say something rude. "I'm Detective Ellie Miller, this is Detective Alec Hardy. We're here to help on the case."

"Well, we'll take any help we can get. I'm Martha." She raised the crime scene tape so they could duck underneath. "You're familiar with the details of the case?"

"Let us have a look before you tell us anything," Alec interrupted. "We don't want to colour our opinions."

Martha shrugged and ushered them into the tent.

"Bloody hell,"Ellie breathed.

All that remained of the crime scene was a patch of trampled sand, with an empty sieve sitting to one side. No personal effects, no debris, not even evidence markers. Any clues were gone.

"Oh, God," Alec groaned. He crouched down and touched the packed-down sand. "There's nothing left."

"Just when Ithink nothing else can go wrong. How could this happen? How could Sanchez let it happen?"

"We won't find anything here." He stood up. "Waste of our damn time."

"Yeah, and now we've both got heat stroke," Ellie said. "I hate it here."

"You and me both."

"This whole trip was your bloody idea!"

Alec didn't ask if she meant coming to LA or their little beach outing; he didn't have the energy. He led the way out of the tent. He paused to lie to Martha that someone would be in touch, then he and Ellie began the hike back up the beach.

Behind them,Martha dialed a number from memory. "Hey, amigo. You knowhow you said to call you if anybody stopped by? Yeah, well, it happened. And you're not gonna like who it was."

1. spot the Doctor Who reference!