wouldn’t have put pictures of you into the public domain. These are worse than useless if you’ve contaminated the evidence.’
Silence.
‘Whose computer did you use to download and delete your images? Dr Jackson’s?’
Acland shook his head.
‘Are you going to force me to serve her with a subpoena?’
‘You’ll be wasting your time. There’s no way you’ll be able to retrieve anything, either from the disk or from a hard drive. Will you trust
‘Why should I?’
There was a brief pause before Acland drew himself to attention. ‘Because you’re the person I wanted to keep the photographs from, sir. There’s no way you’ll ever see them. I’d rather have your respect than your pity.’
‘You’re a pain in the arse, Lieutenant,’ said Jones with a growl. ‘You’d have had my respect either way.’ He stood up abruptly and held out his hand. ‘Will you give me a personal promise that you’ll come to court?’ He saw the hesitation in Acland’s face. ‘You told Inspector Beale you’d never betray a friend. If you refuse to shake on it, should I take that as a compliment?’
Humour creases appeared around Acland’s eye. ‘Not necessarily.’ He grasped the other man’s hand. ‘I prefer enemies. At least I know where I am with them.’
*
Jackson was straddling a chair at the kitchen table, head bent over some accounts, big shoulders hunched forward. She flicked an amused glance at the lieutenant as he appeared in the doorway with his packed kitbag, and he saw with relief that she wasn’t proposing to be sentimental about his departure. ‘You owe Daisy a fiver for breakfast,’ she said, tapping the top page, ‘otherwise you’re up to date.’ Acland took out his wallet. ‘She force-fed me a horse in case I starved.’ ‘It’s her way of saying goodbye,’ said Jackson, folding the note he handed her. ‘What’s yours?’
She reached over to open the money drawer. ‘A fifty-quid fine for making me reformat my hard drive. You’re lucky I’m a computer whiz.’ She watched him sort through his remaining notes. ‘On second thoughts, you can make it a hundred. I hardly had any sleep over the weekend because I had to reinstall my own data afterwards.’
Acland placed five twenties on the stash that was already there. He didn’t think the drawer had been emptied since the last time he’d paid a fine. ‘Who are you planning to give it to?’
‘I’m a businesswoman. What makes you think I hand out gifts?’
‘Intuition,’ he said with a gleam of a smile. ‘I’ve discovered I have a feminine side.’
‘You’re making progress, then.’ She watched him sling his kitbag across his shoulder. ‘Do you want me to come to the door and wave you off?’
Acland shook his head. ‘You’ll only pester me about whether I’m going to keep in touch.’
‘Not my style,’ she said firmly. ‘Either you will or you won’t . . . but I’m damned if I’ll massage your ego by asking.’
His smile deepened, pulling his scar into something approaching a laughter line. ‘According to Daisy, you’ll worry if you don’t hear from me occasionally.’
Jackson placed his five-pound note in the money drawer. ‘You’d better believe it,’ she said.
