Bliss paused, realising why he had felt free to make that statement. ‘Which reminds me – anybody know why Glen Ashton isn’t here?’
‘I think he was going to his ERSOU office first thing, boss,’ Phil Gratton offered up. ‘Chasing down something more solid than he thought we were coming up with.’
‘That’s in our favour, then.’ Bliss looked to DSI Fletcher. ‘Ma’am. I take it the Met officer in charge of their case wants to meet with us? If so, are we going there or are they coming here?’
‘That was one of the things I came down here to tell you. They’re already on their way.’
Bliss breathed out, his heart thumping behind his ribs. ‘More good news. That gives us time to prepare for their visit. I know this goes against the grain, but I don’t have a problem with them taking the lead on this. They have three victims to our one, so they must have a lot more intel and evidence to share with us than we have for them. But I’m buggered if I’m going to see us elbowed out of the way only for Cambridge to step in. We’ve worked this case, not them. It might only have been for a couple of days so far, but those are our man-hours and our sleepless nights. If everyone agrees, I want us to split our efforts: one half of the team works the new information, the other stays on Drake and his seedy little empire.’
‘Is that simply a tactic to keep us involved or a genuine avenue to explore?’ Fletcher asked.
‘It’s both, ma’am. I’m not big on coincidences, but I accept they occur. Our victim being one of Drake’s girls might well be one of those curious things that happens every now and then. On the other hand, until we’ve pursued the matter to its logical conclusion we won’t know for certain. I think that keeps us in the mix, and might still lead to something we can explore further.’
Fletcher uncrossed her arms and nodded. ‘You have a green light from me.’ She turned to Warburton. ‘Diane?’
The team’s DCI gave her own nod. ‘I’m happy with that. How about you, Bish?’
He responded without pause for reflection. ‘I think it’s the perfect strategy.’
‘Good. And you’ll take point on this?’
Bishop drew himself up to his full height. His barrel of a chest rose and fell. ‘Of course,’ he said. ‘Myself, DC Ansari and DC Gratton will focus our attention on the clothing, the intel we have in from HOLMES, and the killer. I’ll put DC Hunt with DS Chandler and DS Bliss to continue working the Lewis Drake angle, together with our victim.’
Hunt groaned theatrically. ‘Why am I always the last to be picked or the first to be handed over to the other team? I feel like the fat kid in school at playtime.’ Everybody laughed, including Hunt himself. ‘It must be my winning personality,’ he said. ‘I have too much charisma, and you bosses don’t want to be outshone.’
Bishop nodded enthusiastically. ‘He’s right, you know. Sunglasses on, everyone. John has his disposition set to stun.’
When the resulting laughter died down, Bliss wandered over to Hunt. He patted the DC on the back and said, ‘Just for that, the cakes are on you.’
A raucous cheer went up and there were wide smiles all round.
Fletcher pushed herself away from the desk she’d been leaning against. ‘Excellent,’ she said, seemingly delighted with what she’d seen and heard. ‘I’d say Majidah Rassooli is in good hands.’
Eighteen
Having been told the Met contingent would make the journey in no less than two hours, Bliss had made excellent use of the time. He first questioned DC Ansari about EE and the apparent code written on the back of the black business card. She had spoken to three different people on the tech side of the company, each of whom was confident it had nothing to do with them.
‘John did have a good thought, though,’ Ansari said. She glanced across at DC Hunt and nodded for him to continue.
Hunt cleared his throat first. ‘My brother was always showing me these games hidden away inside software. Microsoft Excel was a particular favourite. They were known as Easter eggs. I could be entirely wrong, but EE could stand for Easter egg. I say that because the rest of the letters and numbers on the card could easily relate to a spreadsheet. A1 is the first cell reference in every sheet. And I’m guessing if you type Enter into that cell, the Easter egg pops up in cell DP575.’
He looked at Bliss expectantly.
Bliss gave him a blank look in return. ‘John, you had me right up to the last bit. Are you saying DP575 could be one of these cell references? I don’t think I’ve ever seen anything more than a Y or Z column.’
Hunt’s face broke out into a smile, clearly happy to be on solid ground. ‘Oh, yes. You can have over sixteen thousand columns, and more than a million rows. Sir, I could be completely wrong, but I’ve seen these Easter eggs in action for myself, and this could be one.’
‘To what purpose?’
‘I have no idea. Usually they’re games, inserted by the developers. But in theory it could be anything. Excel ’97 had a basic flight simulator hidden away inside it.’
Chandler was shaking her head, not appearing to follow the thread. ‘Hold on a minute,’ she said. ‘You said these Easter egg things were small programs built into the software. How could some code added by a developer – somewhere in America, presumably – possibly have any connection to our case?’
‘I was wondering that myself,’ Bliss said.
Hunt shook his head. ‘Those are official Easter eggs – as you rightly
