LITMIR.BIZ

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Find out if he’s still with us. Then get the body disposed of. Get a move on.’

      Jason jumped up. ‘Yes, boss.’

      ‘He dead?’ Xavier’s tone was hopeful.

      Jason went over and held two fingers on the man’s neck, before looking up at his boss, shaking his head. ‘Nope, still alive.’

      Ah well, that wouldn’t last. Xavier turned to the other figure, his torch dancing over her face taking in her blood-soaked coat and blouse, the paleness of her face. Shit! It’s her! Would you fucking believe it? ‘She’s a pig, you idiots.’

      Jason placed his fingers on her neck, then looked up, all colour wiped from his face. ‘Aw crap, boss. She’s a dead pig.’

      Dumping the body of a lowlife was one thing but killing a police officer and then disposing of her was another. Xavier didn’t feel quite as generous towards his two goons, now that he saw the extent of the mess they’d created. But he had more to worry about … much more. He couldn’t be sure that there was no forensic link back to him. The last thing he needed was to be drawn into the investigation of a murdered police officer and held up to any sort of public scrutiny. Not when he had a family and a legitimate job as well as his other sidelines to consider. ‘You got a spot in mind?’

      ‘Leave that to me and Jase. We’ve got the dump spot all sorted, like. We won’t let you down. Not again.’

      ‘They both need to be disposed of. But separately. She needs to be dumped where she won’t be found for months – the middle of the moors or somewhere. And him …’ Xavier kicked the prone man. ‘Finish him. And make sure you use the usual forensic measures – yeah?’

      ‘Eh?’ Jason looked puzzled, but his brother nudged him and said, ‘Bleach, ya tosser. Bleach.’

      ‘Okay, I’m counting on you. Get on with it.’

       Chapter 6

      By the time Nikki, with the help of the young police officer, had coaxed her Vauxhall Zafira back to life at the crime scene and managed to set off back to Trafalgar House, it was getting dark and although the snow had stopped, the clouds still looked heavy with the promise of more to come. In truth, whilst the young lad had got out the jump leads Nikki always kept in her boot for such emergencies, and managed to manoeuvre a patrol car into position that allowed the leads to reach both vehicles, Nikki was on the phone barking instructions to the officer Archie had commandeered to oversee things till Nikki and Sajid got back. She was more than capable of jump-starting her car. She’d had to do it on numerous occasions recently and was now seriously considering bumping the purchase of a new car battery higher up her priority shopping list than new DMs for herself. Damn car! Her hands were freezing, her toes were numb, and she was better employed sitting in her marginally warmer car organizing things than fannying about in the slush getting colder. Besides, as her car engine sputtered to life, the officer, unlike herself, was dressed for the weather. She gave him a thumbs-up as she backed down the narrow lane, and stopping when she drew level with him, she wound down her window. ‘Remember, no telling DC Malik about this, okay?’

      As the grinning officer shook his head, Nikki frowned. ‘In fact, no telling anybody, yeah?’

      ‘Lips are sealed, Detective, lips are sealed.’

      Satisfied, Nikki nodded put her window back up and, wishing that her vehicle would choose today to spontaneously burst heat from its contrary fan, set off.

      By the time she reached the station, the promised snow had started again and Nikki was glad she’d missed driving in it. Entering the Trafalgar House car park, she was pleased to note the absence of the media. Last thing they needed was this leaking before they had a chance to speak to Springer’s next of kin. She ran up the steps to the officers’ entrance at the back of the station and jogged up to the incident room, bursting through the door, causing it to bang against the wall and rebound back almost hitting her in the face. Dodging it, she moved into the room and cast her eyes round. Apart from Sajid, a couple of uniformed officers momentarily looked up from their computers at her entrance. Otherwise the room was deserted. Everybody else was either at home or out following up the limited leads they had on Springer.

      ‘Ah, you’re back.’ Sajid, alerted by her dramatic entrance, turned around from the crime board he was creating. At the top he’d scrawled, ‘DS Felicity Springer’ and underneath ‘Abducted/Missing?’ ‘Was beginning to wonder if that chunk of metal you call a car had finally given up on you.’

      Hoping that the officer who’d helped her would keep his side of the bargain, Nikki tutted. ‘Oh, ye of little faith. Course it didn’t let me down. Pure gold, that car.’

      Ignoring Sajid’s disbelieving snort, she bent down, undid her DMs and peeled off her sodden socks before swiping a discarded newspaper from one of the cluttered desks. Scrunching it up, she stuffed pages of it into her boots and then placed them and her socks onto the heater.

      ‘Fire risk.’

      Nikki raised her middle finger at her colleague and glanced round. ‘Archie?’

      Sajid tilted his head towards Archie’s office. ‘In there.’

      Nikki began to march towards it, but Sajid’s next words stopped her in her tracks. ‘Wouldn’t go in. He’s not alone and he’s not a happy bunny.’

      ‘Oh? Who’s he with?’

      ‘The big boss.’ He lowered his voice. ‘Something’s going on, Nik and whatever it is, it’s serious. You should’ve seen Archie. I thought he was going to explode.’

      Nikki looked at the blinds that now obscured whatever was going on inside the room. That was strange in itself. Archie rarely lowered the blinds, preferring an open-door policy, or, as Nikki suspected, he really liked to keep an eye on what was going on in the office. Archie had been acting strangely all day. Agitated and off-kilter. Then, of course, there was that really strange and secretive request he’d made. Now he was ensconced in his office with the big boss, blinds closed. Detective Chief Superintendent Eva Clark was pretty much a hands-off boss. If she wanted to see Archie, she’d normally request his presence upstairs in her office, so what had prompted her to come down here? What the hell’s going on? ‘How long they been in there?’

      ‘She arrived just as I got back.’

      Nikki exhaled and then walked over to stand beside Saj. ‘Okay, let’s deal with the Archie situation later. We need to focus on Springer. Did we get some officers sent over to interview the hotel staff? We can’t rule out that it may have been a planned and targeted attack.’

      ‘Yep, I asked them to grab any CCTV footage they could, just to be sure. Everything from Friday afternoon through to ten o’clock this morning, when the conference officially ended.’ Sajid frowned.

      Nikki knew her partner well enough to sense his discomfort. ‘Spit it out then.’

      ‘It’s just, apparently someone else already requested copies of the hotel’s CCTV of the conference.’ He paused. ‘All of it.’

      Nikki shrugged. ‘No big deal. As long as we’ve got it, that’s fine. Maybe Archie was on the ball and requested it.’

      Saj nodded. ‘Yeah. It was Archie who requested it.’

      Nikki nudged his arm. ‘There then. No big mystery.’

      ‘Well, that’s just it, Nik. Archie made the request at 10.47 a.m.’

      As his words sunk in, Nikki exhaled. She pulled out a chair and sank into it. ‘You sure?’

      ‘Yep. I even phoned the hotel myself to double check.’

      ‘Shit! What’s going on?’

      ‘No idea, but it’s damn weird that Archie put in that request almost an hour before we got the call from Springer.’

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