by Tim Ellis
'Of course!' Coveney exclaimed. 'If it's been made from human remains, it can't belong to any of the victims, can it? Which means there must be more bodies than those in the waxwork figures.'
'That's right, Sergeant.'
'Do you think the bodies are murder victims, Sir?' Amies asked.
'It's certainly a possibility Amies, but until Doctor Solberg determines the cause of death and we identify the victims, that's all it is.'
'It must be a current or past employee,' Hanson said. 'And there can't be that many to choose from if they have the expertise to create duplicates of the wax figures.'
'Good point, Hanson. You won't be surprised to learn that DC Rummage has been working her fingers to the bone all afternoon interviewing current employees and carrying out background checks on disgruntled past employees. What she found was that there was a significant turnover of sculptors between 1989 and 1999. We've narrowed twenty-eight past employees down to four and we'll be interviewing them at the station tomorrow morning.'
His mobile vibrated.
'Quigg.'
'It's Perkins, Sir.'
'I hope it's good news, Perkins?'
'Not if you think another six bodies is good news?'
'Six is certainly better than twenty-six. Which exhibits?'
'James Cook; Captain Scott; Baby Spice; Sleeping Beauty; Pope John Paul II; and Mother Theresa.'
He added the names to the previous list of eight exhibits on the whiteboard.
'Mother Theresa!'
'I'm afraid so, Sir.'
'So, that's fourteen bodies now – ten male and four female?'
'Yes.'
'Did you find anything else of interest?'
'Such as?'
'That's what I'm asking you.'
There was a pregnant pause on the line.
'You found something, didn't you?'
'I'm a forensic scientist, not a forensic pathologist, Sir. It's my job is examine the scene of the crime, not dead bodies. As such, I don't know if it's my place to say anything.'
'If not yours, whose? If not now, when? There's also the fact that if you don't tell me, I'll make sure you're transferred to Gilligan's Island.'
'That's not a real island, Sir.'
'Well?'
'I don't know about George Washington because he's not here anymore, and Marie Antoinette has lost her head, so I can't be sure about her either, but the other twelve have Roman numerals tattooed on the inside of their bottom lips.'
'He's numbered them?'
'So it would seem.'
'One to fourteen?'
'No – one to seventeen. We must have missed three.'
'Or they're not on display?'
'I suppose that's possible.'
'Okay. Call it a day, Perkins. And thanks for your work today.'
'Nice of you to say so, Sir.'
He ended the call and stared at the four women. 'Did you get that? Forensics have physically found another six bodies, but each corpse has a Roman numeral tattooed on the inside of their bottom lip, and those numerals go up to seventeen, which means we're missing three bodies.'
'A serial killer?' Rummage said.
'Let's not count our bodies before we find them, Rummage.' He looked at each one of the women in turn. 'Well ladies, there you have it. A strange to-do and no two-ways about it. Observations?'
Amies started to put her hand up, but then changed her mind. 'Is he still in the waxworks, Sir?'
'Well, we haven't found him yet, so that's the assumption.'
'Then we should make sure we station officers on each floor. We don't want him coming out and swapping exhibits over in the middle of our investigation, do we?'
'Good point, Amies. Call Inspector Wright and make the arrangements, will you?'
'Have you heard about Inspector Wright being pregnant, Sir?'
'It's come to my attention.'
'Is it yours?'
'Do you think that's likely when I'm Inspector Wright's least favourite person?'
Coveney chipped in. 'It would explain how she let you have this mobile command centre when she said you'd only ever get another one over her dead body.'
'It's not mine, ladies. I have a happy home life and don't need to have sex with old aged pensioners.'
They giggled.
'Now, if we can stay on task. What else do we need to do?'
'What about Sergeant Lockley?' Hanson said.
'I'm waiting for him to finish his search and then Rummage and I are going home. It's been a long day, hasn't it, Rummage?'
'Even longer than that.'
'There you are, straight from the horse's mouth. So, I want the waxworks locked down tight once Sergeant Lockley and his people have finished and left the building. All the staff are to leave and not return until further notice; patrols on each floor should be in pairs, I don't want any officer going anywhere alone; the lights are to be left on overnight . . .'
There was a knock on the door and it opened.
Mitch stepped inside and said, 'Hey, Inspector Maigret!' He looked around and smiled. 'A harem! You didn't say you had a harem.'
'This is the apprentice in the waxworks,' he explained to the three ladies. 'He's been our guide all day. Has the habit of opening his mouth before putting his limited brain into gear. What do you want, Mitch?'
'I could do the night shift in the harem if you're calling it a day?'
'If I left you in here with these four ladies, you wouldn't get out alive.'
'But what a way to go.'
'What did you want, Mitch?'
'Just wondering if you'd finished with me? Got places to go, people to see.'
'Yes. We're done for the day. Also, there's no need to come in tomorrow. The waxworks is a crime scene now and inaccessible until further notice.'
'Well, if you do need my expertise – call me. I don't charge much, and I'm happy to negotiate group discounts.'
'Good night, Mitch.'
'Yeah. See you around, Inspector Poirot.' He pointed an index finger at Rummage. 'Call me when you get those urges, Detective Rapunzel.' And then swivelled his finger around the other three women. 'The same goes for you hotties as well. I'm ready, able and willing.' He pirouetted on his heel and left.
'We should arrest him,' Amies said.
'If we did that,' Hanson pointed out. 'There'd be no need to negotiate a group discount.'
The ladies laughed.
Quigg's phone vibrated.
'Quigg.'
'Sergeant Lockley here, Sir.'
'Any news?'
'We're on our way out now. Nothing unusual.'
'Thank all your people for their efforts, Sergeant.'
'Will do, Sir.'
'We're calling it a day now.'
'We'll make our way back to the station then.'
He ended the call.
'According to Sergeant Lockley, our man is nowhere to be found.'
Coveney pulled a face. 'He must be in there somewhere.'
'Well, I have an architect arriving tomorrow morning with the original blueprints. They'll be checking that the building matches the drawings. If our man is in there, we'll find him one way or another.' He stretched and yawned. 'Right, I've had more than enough for one day. Goodnight ladies, and I'll see you tomorrow morning.'
'Goodnight, Sir.'
'Are you coming, Rummage?'
'Try and stop me.'
'I don't think I will.' Outside he stuffed his hands into his pockets and pulled the duffel coat tight against the cold. It was already dark and the weather girls were already suggesting that it might snow . 'You'll have to catch the tube tonight,' he said to Rummage. 'I need to go somewhere else before I drive home.'
She shrugged. 'Okay.'
'And I'll see you at the station first thing in the morning.'
'Goodnight, Sir.'
'Goodnight, Rummage. Have a great evening. And don't do anything I wouldn't do.'
'The world's my oyster then?'
'Oy
sters are slimy and overrated.'
***
A Chairman and a shadow Board of Directors! Yes, they were both problems. It seemed they were taking one step forward and two steps back. Also, when she had asked about Dixon, Jack had advised her not to ask, which meant that the DCI was probably dead.
Dixon had made it clear that he was willing to hurt her and the people she loved – including her child Luke, so why should she feel guilty about his torture and death? She shouldn't, but she did. They had no other choice though, did they? He couldn't be kept alive, because he would just turn on them. There was absolutely no way to arrest him and put him through the justice system, because wasn't that broken beyond repair? The whole thing was a complete mess. She had been thrust into a situation she was totally unsuited for.
She went down to the Operations Room again to speak to Li.
In an ideal world, she would have addressed them all and told them what Jack had discovered, but doing that could compromise their whole operation. If DCI Dixon was part of the enterprise, then what about the rest of the team? Could she trust any of them? She didn't really know them. The Commissioner had said that he'd personally vetted each member of the team, but didn't that include DCI Harvey Dixon? It was clear that the vetting system was also compromised . . . In fact, she couldn't trust anyone in the MPS – not even Sir Charles Rowan.
'DCI Dixon was one of them,' she said to Li.
Li looked at her. 'Was?'
Ruth shrugged, but didn't answer.
'Then he knew what we knew, and he passed it on to the enterprise.'
'It's not just that,' Ruth said. 'We don't know if any of the others are part of the enterprise as well. We can't trust anyone. In fact, you could also be part of them.'
'I'm not.'
'I hope that is true, Li. If it is not, then we are all lost.'
'It's true. You can trust me.'
'Said the spider to the fly.' It occurred to her that Li also needed to be protected. She would have to speak to Jack about her.
'From now on, we tell the others nothing. We leave them to get on with the work they have been allocated and you must work with Jack and Lucy in secret.'
'All right.'
'But we have a further two problems that Jack has uncovered. First, there is a Chairman of the Board – nine members, not eight. Also, they have a shadow board in an unknown location. If we take down the first board, then the shadow board will automatically take over.'
'Yes, I see those problems further complicate matters, but the money is still their Achilles heel. Without money, they become powerless.'
'Maybe the money will lead you to the Chairman and the shadow board?'
'I will look.'
'Good.'
She made her way back up to her office. It was tempting to go and knock on the Commissioner's door and tell him everything she was doing, but she knew that she couldn't. There was no way he would sanction the torture and murder of his officers, even if they were corrupt and had probably killed people themselves. He was required to follow the laws of the land, even if those laws were not fit for purpose.
Before calling the driver's number on the phone that Jack had given her, she rang Lucy on her normal phone.
'Are you running out of corrupt police officers to annoy?'
'You are so lovely.'
'Well-deserved recognition at last. What do you want?'
'I have a twenty-three year-old Chinese hacker in my team. She was smuggled out of Hong Kong after she hacked into the Chinese Communist Party computer system and deleted lots of data they had stolen from the Americans.'
'Li Xue?'
'You know her?'
'Used to work at GCHQ?'
'Yes.'
'What about her?'
'She is searching for their money and she wants to work with you.'
'I'm busy.'
'She said that she was a big fan of your work.'
'Do you think flattery will make me less busy?'
'Has it?'
'Maybe.'
'Let me give you her email address and then you can decide.'
'Shoot.'
She told her.
'No promises.'
'I understand. Has Jack told you?'
'Yes, but I don't believe him. I'm looking into it now.'
'I will let you work then.'
'You do that.'
The call ended. Using the other phone she called the driver's number.
'Yes?'
'I am ready to go home now.'
'Outside the front in five minutes.'
'Thank you.' She packed everything up and made her way out to the front entrance.
A black Mercedes with opaque windows was waiting for her. Inside, a man with a crew cut, black coveralls and a bullet-proof vest was sitting in the driver's seat.
She opened the passenger door. 'Spud?'
'Yes. Get into the back, sit in the middle seat and put the belt on,' he said in a stern voice. 'It's the safest place.'
'Oh! All right.' As instructed, she climbed into the back middle seat and put on the seatbelt.
He drove her home, but didn't speak until they reached the house. 'Harrumph! Call me if you need to go out tonight, or in the morning for work.'
'Thank you, Spud.'
'Huh!'
Chapter Eleven
He knocked on the door of 14 Ashbourne Grove in Chiswick at six-thirty as instructed. Justine Chevalier had said it was an apartment, but it wasn't. She actually lived in the basement flat of a maisonette at 14b.
The door opened and the reporter from the Chiswick Camera was standing there smiling. She was in her mid-twenties, thin with short bleached-white hair styled in a pixie cut. It was so cold that he half expected her to be wearing a snowsuit, a padded coat over the top, a woolly hat and thermal gloves, but all she had on was a short flimsy sunflower pattern summer dress and a pair of old sheepskin slippers.
'Hello, Inspector Quigg.'
He stepped inside uninvited and said, 'Let's get this over with shall we, Miss Chevalier?'
She shut the door behind him. 'Are you hungry?'
He was actually. The lasagne at lunch had barely kept him alive throughout the afternoon, and he had no idea who, if anybody, was cooking tonight. Ruth now had a full-time job, Duffy was off somewhere investigating the paranormal, and Lucy had no idea how to cook anything worth eating. 'What are you offering?'
'Strawberries and cream.'
'For dessert?'
'The main course.' She pushed the straps of the dress off her shoulders and let the garment drop to the floor, but she kept her slippers on, stepped out of the dress and made her way into the open-plan living room.
She had a thin athletic body with small firm perfect breasts and a rib tattoo of a dozen blue butterflies in flight. He was surprised to discover that she wasn't wearing any underwear beneath the dress and there was also no evidence of any body hair. He looked around high and low. 'Another compromising situation with which to blackmail me, Miss Chevalier? Where are the television crew? The cameras? The microphones? The studio audience? The direct feed to the internet?'
She laughed. 'There isn't any of that. You're becoming paranoid. This is your chance to get your own back on me, Inspector.'
'I'm not that petty.' But he was hot. She'd obviously turned the heating up and he was beginning to feel distinctly uncomfortable. He shrugged out of his duffel coat, unfurled his Dr Who scarf and pulled off his roll-neck jumper.
'You're making me feel awkward standing here naked.'
'Well, put some clothes on then,' he suggested.
She nodded her head in the direction of his erection that seemed to have a mind of its own. 'You don't really mean that, Inspector.'
It was true. There was very little conviction in his voice. 'What do you want, Miss Chevalier?'
'You have to ask? And I thought you were a detective, Quigg.' She walked into the kitchen, picked up a strawberry dripping in fresh double cream from a large white bo
wl and put it to her lips. 'Oh dear!' she said, as the cream fell from the strawberry and dribbled down her left breast.
He followed her into the kitchen. 'Here, let me help you with that.' He grabbed her waist, bent his head and ran his tongue up the line of cream before it could reach her navel.
'I suggest you take your clothes off, Inspector. Strawberries and cream can be a messy business.'
Quigg didn't need any further encouragement. He stripped off his remaining clothes and dropped them on the floor.
She hopped onto the kitchen worktop like a world-class high jumper, scooped a handful of strawberries out of the bowl and spread them about her breasts and stomach as she lay down. Cream ran every which way. 'Help yourself, Inspector.'
He leapt onto the worktop, knelt astride her thighs and began slurping up double cream and devouring fresh strawberries like a starving fruit-picker.
Justine emptied the bowl on her breasts.
It took all his skill and ingenuity to prevent strawberries from bouncing off the worktop and on to the floor, and double cream from dribbling over the edges. While he was focused on the task at hand, she'd slipped his erection inside her.
He stopped to look at her. 'Are you sure there are no cameras?'
'Would you stop if there were?'
He thought about that question as he pushed himself into her up to the hilt and began kneading her breasts. He had the idea that his actions spoke much louder than mere words.
She moaned beneath him.
He grunted as he worked hard to keep his balance on the slippery worktop.
There were a lot of sound effects as their bodies meshed together – slurping, squelching, gobbling, guzzling and quaffing. Added to those, were the noises that accompanied their orgasms and then he flopped down on top of her with a slosh.
After her breathing had returned to a pre-orgasmic level she said, 'So, do we have a deal?'
'As far as I'm aware, there's no deal on this worktop.'
'You haven't been paying attention, Inspector.'
'I was distracted.'
'You can have sex with me at mutually agreeable times, and I'm the first one you call when there's a story to be had.'