LITMIR.BIZ

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on bikes and young mothers. Nothing of interest there. Then Laura saw something.

      ‘Stop!’ she said. ‘Go back.’

      Carson looked round. ‘Which one?’

      ‘The picture before.’

      Carson clicked the back button and scoured the screen for someone of interest. And then he saw him, loitering at the back of the scene, his hands in his pocket, distant from everyone else.

      ‘Do you recognise him?’ Laura asked, and she could tell from the frown on Carson’s face that he did.

      ‘Deborah Corley’s father,’ he said quietly, before he looked at Joe. ‘It looks like we are going to have to look into more than just sex fiends.’

      Chapter Ten

      Jack strode into the offices of the Blackley Telegraph, a seventies relic of glass and concrete next to the bus station, made dusty by the passing fumes. The reception area was typical of a newspaper office, with a high counter and low chairs, the latest edition spread out over tables, the walls lined by recent photographs and framed past editions. There was no one at reception though, so he just strode through into the offices behind.

      He missed the buzz of the newsroom. The shouts, the banter, the rush to make deadlines. Things were different now though. Most stories were done on the telephone, and the noise was just the sales staff trying to drum up advertising space. It was past two o’clock in the afternoon and people were busy trying to finish work on the next day’s paper. Dolby Wilkins worked from a glass-fronted office at the end of the room. He was leaning back in his chair, talking into a telephone.

      Jack walked between the desks, smiling the occasional hello, pausing to knock on Dolby’s door, who waved him in impatiently. Jack settled into a leather chair opposite and read the newspaper cuttings pinned to the wall as Dolby finished his call. They were all headlines from after Dolby had arrived, part of the new style that he wanted the paper to adopt: unsubtle and edgy. Dolby liked to attack the police whenever he could, and once that became stale, he turned to the other easy targets, asylum seeker appearing often.

      The phone went down and Dolby grinned, showing off bright white teeth, and swept his hair back, a habit of his, although it only ever flopped forward again. He was younger than Jack, only just past thirty, but he had the confidence that a good education brought.

      ‘How was it at the murder scene?’ Dolby asked.

      ‘Pretty much the same as always. Police en masse and everyone kept back.’

      ‘Do we have a name yet for the woman?’

      Jack shook his head. ‘Not mentioned to me.’

      ‘There’s a press conference in thirty minutes,’ Dolby said. ‘There should be enough padding in that to make up the front page.’

      Dolby could get one of his staffers to do it, Jack knew that, but this was about the power balance. Dolby gave out an assignment as an order, not a request, and being freelance was just like being a staff reporter, but without the paid holidays.

      ‘It will delay your Whitcroft feature,’ Jack said. ‘You wanted it today, but I can’t do it if I’m running around doing this.’

      ‘How is that story?’ Dolby said.

      Jack frowned. ‘It’s not the hell-hole you want it to be,’ he said. ‘Just people like all of us, trying to make their way in life. It’s just that some do it better than others.’

      ‘Knock on some doors. We could run a good life on benefits story instead,’ Dolby said.

      Jack sighed. He knew how they worked. You talk to people about their struggles, and then make sure you get a picture of them in front of the big television, grinning.

      ‘What do you want, someone with plenty of kids, or a brown face and a foreign accent?’ Jack said.

      ‘Don’t be like that, Jack,’ Dolby said. ‘It sells papers, you know that. It gets people talking in the pubs.’

      ‘And it gets innocent people beaten up.’

      ‘Okay, okay, you’ve tweaked my liberal conscience,’ Dolby said, sarcastically. ‘What about delinquent kids, causing mayhem as their parents sit in drinking?’

      Jack smiled. ‘Lucked out again, Dolby. They have private security on there now, and so even those kids are probably better than they used to be.’

      ‘Private security?’ he said.

      ‘There’s a van that patrols the estate. Just a couple of bald men in black satin jackets, you know the type. It sounds like the residents pay for them.’

      Dolby thought about that and then said, ‘Find out what you can about that. Why are people on the lowest rung paying someone to do the work the police should be doing?’ He leaned forward. ‘You never know, this could turn out to be a story to fill your pinko heart, the noble working class looking after itself.’

      ‘You really are an arsehole, Dolby,’ Jack said, shaking his head.

      ‘I know, but I write your cheques, so be nice to me.’ He tapped at his watch. ‘Press conference soon. I don’t want you to miss the show.’

      Jack got to his feet and managed a small smile as he headed back towards the sunshine.

      He was a spot of calm surrounded by noise. The jumpsuits and boots. Detectives deep in consultation. The air around him felt still. No one saw him. No one spoke to him. He could see them though. He watched them, saw how they gathered in small groups. Talking, laughing, always moving around him as if he wasn’t there.

      He could tolerate the uniforms, because they knew their place, that it was all about eight-hour shifts and then home, nothing more. It was the detectives that he fucking hated. Glory hunters, just egos in pastel shirts.

      He smiled, and then lifted the cup to his mouth to hide it. Beware the quiet man.

      Chapter Eleven

      Jack had to park some distance from the police station because the spaces were taken up by the out-of-town television crews sorting out their equipment, and the growing huddle of newspaper journalists who sucked on cigarettes as they waited for the show to start.

      The police station was shiny and new, on the edge of town and visible from the motorway, its red brick and high windows towering above the low-rise office complexes that surrounded it, high steel fences guarding the car park. Jack saw Karl Carson ahead, Laura’s boss, a bald-headed bully of a man, making chit-chat with some of the reporters. They’d come across each other before, had fallen out and then made up again, and so when Jack got up close, Carson just smiled and made sure he used plenty of force when he slapped the visitor sticker onto Jack’s shirt.

      Carson turned and walked back into the police station, holding the door as the journalists trooped past. When Jack got close, Carson muttered, ‘No trouble, Mr Garrett.’

      ‘Not if you behave yourself, Inspector,’ Jack said, and winked.

      They were ushered to a room on the ground floor that looked out onto the police canteen. Jack went to the back as everyone else fixed their microphones to the tables at the front, the television people jostling for a prominent spot, so that their question could form a part of their edited highlights, ego over news. Cameras lined the back of the room. Deborah Corley’s murder three weeks earlier had provided fodder for columns filled with tales of her social life – how she was a pub regular and liked the company of married men. The television people just wanted to fill the late afternoon news slots, but the newspapers were wondering what the new murder might give them, needing to write it up for a deadline, and so the air crackled with tension. It went quiet though as Carson entered, with Joe Kinsella and Laura right behind him. As everyone settled into place, Jack ended up behind a television camera, his view restricted to what he could see over the cameraman’s arm.

      Carson and Joe sat

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