Chapter One

The day the letter arrived was a perfectly normal day. Ash worked in the morning, lining up the neat columns of numbers until everything balanced out nicely, and at twelve fifteen precisely tucked in her chair and pulled on her down jacket. The weather was surprisingly chilly for March and she was glad of the jacket as she walked down the Embankment.

She spent a satisfactory forty five minutes at the Royal Opera House attending a free lunchtime concert, and by two o'clock was once again walking back down the Embankment toward her building.

The first odd thing that happened was that her phone rang. Pausing by the railing overlooking the river, Ash stared at the tiny screen. The number was unknown, but that didn't mean anything. After all, it could be a client. She was a freelance accountant, it wasn't beyond the realms of possibility that someone would phone her.

On the other hand, she currently only had long-term jobs and all of those had, so far, been dealt with online.

It might be spam or the phone company, she supposed. Or perhaps it was a wrong number.

She sighed and decided there was only one way to find out.

"Hello?"

"Ash?" The voice on the other end of the phone was crackly and sounded far, far away. Which, given that it was her mother, and given that her mother was currently on an around the world cruise with her latest husband, was probably true.

"Mum?"

"We're in port," her mother said. "So Ted said I should ring because it's impossible to call from the ship."

"Is everything alright?" Ash asked, perhaps a little anxiously because her mother had, once, left a husband on what was supposed to be their honeymoon.

"Wonderful, darling. We're in Patagonia." There was an infinitesimal pause. "Or Paraguay. Peru?"

"South America," Ash said helpfully.

"That's the one," said her mother "Everything's beautiful and all in Spanish, which does make it all sound more… passionate, doesn't it?"

"I suppose," Ash said, looking into the dismally brown-gray river. She'd heard somewhere that at any one time there were at least a dozen bodies bobbing along down there. "So if there aren't any problems…"

"Yes, I'm calling to check on you," her mother said. "You're my only child. Is that so wrong? I just want to know that you're alright."

"Mother, I'm almost forty years old, you don't need to do welfare checks."

"You live alone, for all I know you choked to death on a steak three weeks ago and no one's found you yet," retorted her mother.

"I'm sure the neighbors would have complained about the smell," said Ash. Later she cursed herself for this because perhaps, just perhaps, she'd brought all of this on herself by mentioning the word neighbors. Maybe she's awakened some ancient neighbor spirit or something. "And anyway, as you can tell, I'm perfectly fine."

"Work?"

"Fine."

"Other… things?"

"Fine."

"Seeing anyone?" The question was almost but not quite casual.

"Mother."

"Right, yes, alright, well, I suppose since everything's fine then you don't really need to talk to me, do you?"

Ash sighed, put one hand in her jacket pocket and started walking down the embankment again. "I was at the Opera," she said, and began filling her mother in on the concert.

By the time she could see her building her mother had become bored with the run down of concerts and exhibitions and books that Ash had read, and had decided that Patagonia (or Paraguay or Peru) held greater interest.

"Well, I'd better be going," her mother said cheerfully. "Or the boat might go without me. I'll call again when I can. But it might be a while, I'm afraid. We'll be at sea for quite a while this next stretch."

Ash thought about how many dead bodies were potentially bobbing around under the giant cruise ship and shuddered. "Fine. There's nothing to worry about. I'm perfectly fine. And if I do choke to death in my sad lonely flat, I'll make sure to show up and haunt you, just so that you're not left uninformed."

"There's no need to be flippant. Love you."

Ash sighed. "Love you, Mum."

Her mother had a habit of assuming that Ash had never grown up, and to be honest, after a ten minute conversation, Ash was left feeling like she'd never grown up. Like she was a sulky fifteen year old on her fourth step-father, rather than an almost forty year old with a flat and a job and interests.

She unlocked the building door and walked into the foyer, where she was greeted by rows of mailboxes. Without much thought, and definitely without thinking that she was about to change her life for good, Ash opened her box and pulled out a tiny slip of paper with something scrawled on it.

A tremble of anger went up her spine.

Honestly, she'd been out for all of a couple of hours, and spent most of her time at home. How come the only time she went out was when the postman actually came? Was he watching and waiting for her to leave?

And surely the point of a registered letter was that it was supposed to be delivered to her. Not to a neighbor.

She blew out a breath and closed her eyes, standing in front of the now empty mailbox.

She could attempt to avoid the situation. If she didn't knock on the Brown's front door then perhaps they'd knock on hers, leaving her slightly more in control of the situation.

Or maybe they'd slide whatever it was into her mailbox.

Or perhaps they'd just forget about it.

But then, it might be important. Not that she was expecting anything important. But you never knew.

She ran her hand through her short, dark hair and squared her shoulders. As much as she disliked her neighbors, this was ridiculous. They had something that belonged to her, and she needed to go and get it. It was that simple.

And, as her mother often told her, it was better to eat the frog for breakfast. By which she meant it was better to do the thing you didn't want to do first and get it over with. Ash had already eaten muesli for breakfast, and had uncharacteristically had a protein bar for lunch due to the concert. She was planning cheese on toast for dinner.

Right, fine. She stomped up the stairs. But see if the postman got a Christmas tip this year from her. She marched her way to the Brown's door and then tapped on it before getting angry with herself for being pathetic and rapping on it smartly.

"Yes?" said a voice as the door opened. Then Amanda Brown stood there wreathed in smiles, her hair newly colored and in tight curls close to her head. "Ashley, how lovely to see you. How can I help you? Oh, yes, that's right, the postie did leave something for you. Come in, come in."

"No," Ash said quickly. She swallowed. "No, thank you. I'm in a hurry."

"Nonsense," said Amanda, holding the door further open. "Come in, come in, now let me think, where did I put that letter?"

Only when it became clear that the woman wasn't going to look for the letter until the door was closed did Ash step inside.

"How are you dear?" Amanda asked. "Now let me see, where is that letter?" She poked ineffectually around a messy hall table.

"Fine," Ash said through gritted teeth. How hard could this be? She'd literally just received the letter, it couldn't have gone far.

"Good, good," said Amanda. Then she grinned, holding up a brown envelope. "Here we go."

Ash reached out for it, thinking perhaps she'd gotten lucky this time. But Amanda held it back, slightly out of reach.

"Now, let's see, what about Thursday?"

"Thursday?" Ash asked, knowing what was about to come and dreading it.

"Yes, for dinner. You haven't been round for months Ashley, we're starting to think that you dislike us." She giggled here. "So Thursday at seven then?"

It wasn't that Ash disliked the Browns. Though she sort of did. It was more their insistence at being friends that she didn't enjoy. After all, this was London, people were supposed to be cold and uncaring, something that Ash very much enjoyed. "I'm afraid..." she began.

"Nonsense," Amanda said again. "We won't take no for an answer."

Which was a shame, since that was the very answer Ash wanted to give. The thought of an evening surrounded by Amanda, her husband Jim, and their two blonde-haired children who had an awful predilection for recorder playing and impromptu concerts, made Ash feel slightly sick. "But..." she began again.

"So Thursday at seven," Amanda interrupted.

The problem was that as much as Ash might dislike the Browns, she could definitely see the advantages of staying on their good sides. Like having someone to pick up her post, for example. Or having people invested enough that if she did choke alone in her flat and die then at least she wouldn't rot for too long before she got found.

Or having someone to water her plants when she went on holiday.

And it wasn't like Amanda was going to listen to excuses anyway.

Finally, Ash sighed. "Fine," she said. "I'll see what I can do. Must run." She made a lunge for the letter, grabbed it, and let herself out of the front door all before Amanda had a chance to move. "Bye then," she said, practically running to her own front door.

"Thursday at seven," Amanda said again.

Ash cut off any further conversation by slamming her front door and leaning back against it to catch her breath. The brown envelope was stiff under her fingers and she almost didn't open it out of spite. The stupid thing had caused her to interact with the neighbors.

In the end, curiosity got the better of her. She slid her finger under the flap, pulled out an official looking letter, read it, read it again, then read it for a third time before leaning back on the front door to consider things.

On the whole, an inheritance was probably a good thing, she decided before she looked down at the letter again. The only problem was, she had no idea who had died. She frowned at the letter but it declined to answer any further questions.

Ash tapped her fingers on the wood of the front door, thinking. There was nothing for it, she'd have to have another telephone call. What a day this was turning out to be.