particularly infuriated him. ‘I don’t need this. One day, I’ll go off and do my own thing.’
They both knew why, for the moment, he didn’t. He was well paid for his multiple roles – much better than he would be for an equivalent position in any legitimate small business. In any case, leaving Kerridge’s employment wasn’t that simple. Kerridge had a polarized view of the world. You were with him or you weren’t. You didn’t just hand in your notice and waltz over to the competition.
‘So how’d you come to take the job in the first place?’ she’d asked once, as they sat over dinner. They’d been back in the small bistro where they’d enjoyed one of their first evenings together. It felt right, she thought. Dark, discreet. Vaguely clandestine.
‘Don’t think I did. Not knowingly. Just answered an ad. Joined as finance manager, fresh from my accountancy qualifications. Looked like a good deal at the time. Well, it was a good deal. Much better than I could have got anywhere else.’
‘But that was all legit?’
‘Oh, yes. It was a while before I went over to the dark side. But Jeff realized I was a bright boy. Ambitious. Began to use me for all kinds of stuff. I didn’t even know how dodgy some of it was. By the time I did, I was up to my neck in it.’ He stopped and looked at her. ‘What about you, then? How’d you end up doing this sort of stuff? Why not just stick to printing?’
It was first time he’d asked her that kind of question. Previously, he’d tended to maintain a gentlemanly silence about the more dubious aspects of her supposed business.
‘Doesn’t pay enough,’ she said simply. ‘Had a boyfriend who was into wheeling and dealing. He got me involved, and I discovered I was good at it. Better than he was, as it happened. I built up the contacts, and I’ve carried on from there. Why not?’
‘Because one day you’ll get caught,’ he said. ‘We’re both riding our luck. Trick is to get out before it’s too late.’
‘Easier said than done,’ she said.
He had paused, gazing into her eyes. ‘Maybe we can do it together. Somehow.’
‘Maybe. One day.’
She didn’t know what to think. She was just doing her job. And she was having a good time with Jake; she felt alive. But she knew there was no future here. She had tried to get back to Liam at least every second weekend, so her time with Jake had been, for the most part, a midweek affair, snatched evenings and nights with the inevitability of work the next day. If she was honest, her relationship with Jake had felt like more play-acting, a neat adornment to a life that was ultimately fictitious. It was all a game, even if, increasingly, she was aware Jake hadn’t seen it that way.
It was around this time that she’d formally recommended Jake as a potential informant. A Covert Human Intelligence Source, to use the jargon. She had felt uneasy, as if she were exploiting their relationship. But it was his choice, she told herself. All she was doing was opening a door. No one would compel him to walk through it. Salter had taken her recommendation back to the ranch and it had been processed officially, going through all the correct channels.
She had known how it would happen. The way that some skilled handler would make the approach to Jake. Subtle at first, delicate. Testing the ground. Checking whether Marie’s hunch had been correct, without exposing too much. She’d done it herself and she’d been good at it. It was a form of seduction, she supposed. Raising the target’s interest, highlighting all the positives, playing down the negatives. Assessing the target’s motivation so that you could press just the right buttons. Taking it step by step, knowing when to go in harder and when to leave well alone. Slowly, slowly, reeling him in.
She was told officially when Jake had finally gone over. But she knew anyway. Something in his manner changed. He became more closed, a little more wary. He told her less about work, about Kerridge. Another barrier erected between them – translucent, paper-thin, but ultimately impermeable.
It was a painful irony. Both working on the same side, but never able to speak about it. Each, for different reasons, knowing that their relationship was unsustainable, but not knowing how to end it. Continually talking about a future that both knew would never happen.
‘One day soon,’ he’d said, as they finished that last meal, ‘we can do something different. Get away from this.’
She’d sat for a while, her eyes fixed on the window beside their table, watching the eerily deserted streets of this part of the Northern Quarter. It was hard to believe that, barely a street away, there were bustling pubs and bars, a main road full of traffic.
For a second, it had been as if she hadn’t heard him. Then she’d said, her face still blank, ‘Yeah. One day, Jake. One day.’
Chapter 18
‘Panini and caffe latte,’ Welsby intoned carefully. ‘Do I look fucking Italian?’ He sat down heavily at the table, making a play of dumping his cardboard-packed collation between the two of them. ‘In any case, shouldn’t it be a panino?’
Salter noted, as so often before, that Welsby’s cultural ignorance was less all-embracing than he liked people to think. He peered at Welsby’s lunch. ‘Not really,’ he said finally. ‘You’ve got two.’
‘Which just about equates to one half-decent meal,’ Welsby pointed out. He peeled back the wrapping. ‘Though man cannot live by bread alone. Even with mozzarella and fucking pancetta.’ He looked up at the brightly lit space that surrounded them. ‘How’s it come to this? Coppers need chips and meat pies and full fry-ups. Not mixed- leaf fucking salads and vegetarian bakes. No wonder everyone’s so irritable.’
‘Must take the patience of a saint, guv.’
‘Too right, Hugh, me old chum. Too fucking right.’ He began to munch, with an enthusiasm that belied his previous words, on the warm sandwich, occasionally pausing to take a slurp of the milky coffee.
‘Anything new on Morton?’
Welsby shrugged, then spoke around a mouthful of sandwich. ‘Not so’s you’d notice. But our chums on the force aren’t brimming over with information.’
‘And after we’d been so forthcoming with them, as well,’ Salter said.
‘Yes, well. Need to know and all that. They’ve had the forensics back.’
‘And?’
‘Bugger all. Lots of DNA, but, as expected, most of it Morton’s. Nothing that’s on the database. Mind you, Morton’s wasn’t on the database either.’
‘Professionals, then. But we knew that.’
‘Well, they weren’t after the DVD player,’ Welsby agreed morosely.
‘Anything else?’
‘Not much. Mind you, I don’t imagine this case is exactly top of their to-do list.’
‘Nobody likes a grass,’ Salter said. ‘Even our lot think he had it coming.’
‘Now, now, Hughie. That’s not the attitude. Grasses are our bread and fucking butter.’
Salter nodded. ‘Never been partial to bread and butter. Sticks in the throat. Even the Italian stuff.’
Welsby laughed. He’d already made short work of the second sandwich, and was tearing open a bag of exotically flavoured crisps. He pushed the opened bag towards Salter, who shook his head.
‘Christ, Hugh. Have you got any vices?’
‘Not ones I usually display in public,’ Salter said.
He gazed around them. It was towards the end of most people’s lunch hour, and the tables in the restaurant were starting to empty. He supposed it was a good thing, this replacement for the old canteen. Its new pastel walls and tasteful artwork provided an appropriate backdrop for the healthy, up-to-the-minute cuisine that wound up Welsby so successfully. A pleasant enough place to chill out for half an hour in the middle of the day. It was all a facade, though. The place was riddled with the same old vicious gossip and intrigue as in the days when overweight plods were knocking back the cholesterol pies.
