riddled with disease.
‘ I wouldn’t pay that for a good-lookin’ broad. Twenty-five. Take it or leave it.’
Unoffended, she bargained.
‘ Thirty-five.’
‘ Twenty-five. ‘
Seeing it was his one-and-only offer she accepted it with good grace. ‘OK — but up front.’
‘ And anything I want.’
‘ So long as I don’t get hurt. I’m not into that.’
‘ Deal… waiter! A bottle of champagne to take out.’
In the taxi Hinksman handed Jane a slim wad of five-pound notes. She stuffed them away in one practised movement, then moved a hand to his lap. As she unzipped him, and bent her head to the task, he suddenly yanked her upright by her hair.
‘ Wait,’ he said.
‘ Ow, that fuckin’ ‘urt,’ she wailed, rubbing her head. He glanced sideways at her and smiled.
She shivered. She didn’t like the look in his eyes at that moment. She thought he had the eyes of a madman. Suddenly she had serious doubts about the wisdom of this transaction.
‘ This couldn’t have come at a better time,’ Karen Wilde said to the Chief Constable. ‘The way we handle it is very important.’
She was being very matter-of-fact, despite having removed her blouse and bra. She eased her skirt down her thighs and folded it neatly over the back of a chair, brushing a hair off. She stepped out of her knickers and stood there naked but for stockings and a suspender belt — totally impractical and uncomfortable, but the Chiefs favourite. As she unpinned her blonde hair and shook it out of the constricting school-marm bun, she went on, ‘If we play it right — media-wise and result-wise — this could be your final stepping stone to the Inspectorate.’
‘ Maybe,’ said Dave August.
‘ You’ve got to take control of this, make it yours, grasp the nettle.’
‘ Maybe,’ he gasped.
He was lying completely naked on the single bed in the en-suite room which adjoined his first-floor office at headquarters. It was a room specifically designed to be used by the Chief should he or she need to work long hours or stay the night. Previous Chiefs rarely used it, preferring the detached police house which was in walking distance within the headquarters’ grounds. However, August had never even furnished the house. It might have encouraged his wife and kids to stay and he liked to keep them at arm’s length — in the house he owned in Cheshire.
Karen walked across the small room and sat astride the Chief. She wriggled provocatively. He gasped again.
‘ The biggest crime since Lockerbie,’ she mused, ‘and it’s happened on our patch. It’s got great potential.’
‘ And so have you,’ he breathed. ‘Now c’mon, stop thinking about it for a while. That’s an order, you scheming little minnie.’
She took no notice.
‘ Just suppose,’ she pondered out loud, ‘you put me in charge of the investigation.’ She wriggled.
‘ But you’ve only ever done short secondments to CID. You’d be way out of your depth. And I need someone of at least the rank of Superintendent to head it.’
‘ I’ve given that some consideration,’ she smiled.
‘ And…?’
‘ That Detective-Super from commerce branch is on long-term sick. I could become Acting Superintendent… and anyway, running it wouldn’t be that hard. Just a case of being a good manager. It’s all done by computer these days.’
Before August had a chance to reply, she kissed him. Wet. Long. Lots of tongue. She swayed her hard nipples across his chest then ran her hand his belly, grasping him firmly.
‘ How about it, boss?’ she asked, rising for air. ‘Can I? The media will love me.’
August chided himself. He wished he was big enough to say no. But she was bargaining from a position of strength.
‘ Would you take a fuckin’ look at that, man!’ whistled Agent Donaldson.
He dabbed the button on the hand-held remote control and rewound the video tape taken from one of the overhead cameras on the M6. Then he played it forwards one frame at a time. Even so, the explosion was so fast and devastating that the camera didn’t really take it in. It wasn’t designed to do so.
In one second the car was moving down the middle lane.
In the same second a huge flash filled the screen and the car was gone, replaced by chaos, death and confusion, with no discernible gap between the scenarios.
He and McClure watched it a few more times, mesmerised.
The picture quality wasn’t that good. The tape had probably been reused a million times. But it showed that the car was definitely a Daimler. And no doubt Danny Carver was in the back of it.
The Technical Services Unit would spend time enhancing the tape. They promised wonderful things. The picture would be made clear with pin-sharp images and using their electronic wizardry they’d able to enlarge selected segments of the screen. That way the number on the registration plate could be read and the faces of the people in the car might be identified (but don’t hold your breath, they said). And TSU could also speed up the tape to ‘mega-fast’ (their description) and that way the explosion could be watched and analysed, conversely, in slow motion, bit by bloody bit.
With a phtt the screen on the TV fizzled out to blank, and Donaldson handed the remote back to the Control Room Inspector.
He and McClure left the Control Room together and walked across car park at the front of the headquarters building.
‘ This certainly cocks the job up,’ McClure said.
‘ A peculiarly British understatement, I would say,’ remarked the American. ‘But you’re right, with Carver in pieces I’m back to square with Corelli — and it was going so damned well.’
‘ All may not be lost,’ said McClure airily.
‘ How d’ya mean?’
‘ Well, if you’re right and this has Corelli’s backing, then all we need to do is catch the killer, put him under pressure and we could have a lever to get to Corelli through him.’
‘ You make it sound so simple.’
‘ What about the guy you saw at the hotel?’
‘ A glimpse of someone I may have recognised isn’t exactly evidence that he’s a killer, even for British justice.’
‘ It’s a start though, so don’t forget that face. Think hard about it and keep it in your mind’s eye. I’ve got an idea.’
‘ Which is?’
‘ Tell you later,’ said McClure as they reached their car. He leaned for a second on the roof. ‘If this is down to Corelli, then it shows what an evil bastard he is.’
‘ Evil?’ Donaldson laughed briefly. ‘In the last two years Corelli’s put at least eight of his rivals out of business — that we know of. Another three are still missing, presumed dead. There’s no evidence to link him, of course, just hearsay and bar talk. But they’re down to him and he stays whiter than white. You’ve heard of the untouchables? He’s fuckin’ totally untouchable.’
‘ So who’s doing the killings?’
‘ Dunno.’ Donaldson shrugged his shoulders. ‘Someone very good, someone we don’t even know. Probably the guy who did this one. But I do know one thing…’
McClure waited, arms folded.
‘ If I was Danny Carver’s English partner, I’d be shitting in my pants right now.’
‘ Why’s that?’
