Two patrol cars had pulled up while she was in the ambulance. Officers had moved everyone back from the accident and taped off the area. A fire crew had also arrived, but were now in the process of packing up their gear.
Louisa pulled out her terminal. She groaned in dismay at the smashed screen. She tapped on it a couple of times but it was unresponsive. Apart from the screen the damage didn’t appear to be too bad. It might even repair itself in a few days if she set it down on a charging plate, but for now it was dead. The lack of a terminal meant she was stranded. She couldn’t order a taxi or even call someone to get a lift.
She limped to a constable who was sitting in one of the squad cars with the door open, entering something on his terminal.
‘I’m DS Bennett,’ Louisa said. ‘Is there any chance of a lift back to Scotland Yard?’
The officer’s attention was on his terminal. ‘I can call a car for you, Detective.’
‘Yes, thank you.’
He glanced up at her, then frowned. He got out of the car and looked her up and down with a wary expression. ‘Were you involved in the accident, Detective?’
She suddenly realised how she must look. Her trousers were torn at the knee and streaked with dirt. At least they were dark enough to hide the blood. Her white shirt, on the other hand was covered in dark red stains. The second set of clothes ruined today. She raised a hand to the cut above her eye. It wasn’t bleeding any more, thankfully.
She considered the constable’s question. If she told him she was pursuing the professor it would form part of the accident’s case file when the constable gave his report. She’d have to make a statement. Then there would be the accident investigation. Why was she pursuing the professor? Was he a suspect in an official investigation?
‘I was passing by and got hit by flying debris,’ Louisa smiled. ‘Just unlucky, I guess.’
‘Can I see your MET ID, Detective?’
‘My terminal’s broken. Can you do a retinal scan?’
The officer held up his terminal before her face. It bleeped as the ID check came through. He visibly relaxed. ‘Sorry, Detective. I’ll request a car for you now.’
‘Can I use your terminal for a moment? I need to check in with the station.’
‘Sure, I’ll delegate control to your profile.’
He handed her the terminal. Louisa got into the squad car and shut the door, sighing in relief as the weight was taken off her leg. The terminal ran through some biometric checks and then reset itself to her profile settings. The profile delegation allowed her to use the officer’s terminal but the functionality was greatly restricted. However she was still able to place a call through to Ed.
‘You were knocked clean off your feet!’ Louisa winced as Ed’s voice, raised in excitement, blasted from the terminal. ‘Bam! It was crazy. I followed the taxi on the sense footage and then you got out and, I was so sure you were dead once the truck hit the car, and—’
‘Ed, please, a little less volume, thank you. I take it you saw the accident?’
‘Oh, do you want to see for yourself? I can show you the sense logs. Let me bring them up for—’
‘No!’ Louisa shuddered. Then an idea occurred to her. ‘Can you send me an aerial view of the crossroads just before the accident?’
‘Are you in your car?’
‘No, but I’m in a squad car. Why do you ask?’
The windscreen and side windows of the car faded to black, as if VANS had taken control of the vehicle.
‘Ed, what are you doing?’
‘The professor’s car was brand new. All cars now come equipped with a sense strip by default, providing full external capture. I’m going to replay what it recorded.’
The windows flickered, then cleared.
The car was moving! Louisa sat upright and clamped her hands down on the edges of her seat. No, not moving—it was sense footage being replayed on the patrol car’s windows. Footage from the professor’s viewpoint. The car pulled away from the lights. She looked out the rear window. Sure enough, Louisa spotted herself, red faced and panting, pelting up the road. It was eerily realistic, almost as good as the SCD7 sense both. Then she heard a horn blast.
Oh no.
Louisa turned to look out the passenger window and watched in horror as the truck hurtled towards her.
‘Jesus, Ed!’ Louisa closed her eyes and wrapped her arms around her head. ‘Move the footage back!’
‘What? Okay.’
Louisa prised open her eyes. The car was stopped at the traffic lights. A young couple was crossing the road in front of her, the woman pushing a pram. Behind them, two schoolgirls in uniform rushed to cross as the green man started to flash.
‘Pause it here,’ Louisa said.
The schoolgirls and the couple froze in mid-stride. Louisa looked to the right across the other three lanes.
He was standing at the junction corner. It was him all right. The man from the Portal headquarters. He was looking straight at her. The same cold stare that had turned her blood to ice. But it wasn’t her he was looking at. This time it was the professor.
Louisa drew on the window with a finger and a red line circled the man. ‘Ed, can you add him to Claire’s case file? I want him ID’d.’
Ed was silent for a moment. ‘His name is Kane Shepherd. He works as a security consultant for Portal.’
A security consultant? It was vague enough to mean anything. She had a name, but she wanted more. ‘I want a full history graph on him.’
‘I can’t, Louisa, not unless he’s directly linked to Claire’s death. The news came down a few minutes ago. The emergency protocols have been rescinded.’
‘Please, Ed. This is the last one. We need to find out who this guy is. It’s important.’
Ed hesitated. ‘All right. But this is the last one.’
There was another pause. ‘That’s…strange,’ Ed said. ‘The request didn’t go through straight away. I’ll get back to you. There might be some network latency slowing things up.’
Ed ended the call.
Louisa continued to stare at Kane Shepherd. What are you doing here? The professor was on his way to South America. A one way trip. He wasn’t planning on coming back any time soon. Had he called it quits with Portal? Maybe he had another job offer. She’d have to check it out, but Louisa couldn’t shake the feeling he was running from something.
Could Kane have caused the accident? It seemed far-fetched, but a few days ago she would have laughed if someone had told her there was a technology that allowed you to deceive sense strips.
VANS’ safety record was exemplary. How could it have caused the truck to crash into the professor’s car? The only problem Louisa had ever experienced with VANS was the other night when after she’d picked up the kids from John’s. Perhaps something similar had happened here? But Louisa wasn’t buying it. She was sure the truck had been breaking the speed limit. It didn’t just run a red light.
Kane Shepherd, who are you?
CHAPTER NINETEEN
‘Would you’d like to go home first to freshen up, Detective?’
Louisa frowned and glanced at the officer who was driving her back to Scotland Yard. There was something odd in the woman’s tone. She was driving manually as well. That wasn’t strange in itself, but as she drove she steadfastly faced forward, her eyes on the road, not turning to look at Louisa once. Then there had been the startled look the constable gave her when she got into the car.
Louisa pulled down the passenger mirror and her hand went to her mouth, appalled by what she saw. Her forehead was stained a dark brown from the antiseptic wash the paramedics had liberally applied. The wound had stopped bleeding, but the skin around it was puckered and swollen, and her eyebrow below the cut was matted with dried blood. She licked a finger and rubbed away a streak of dirt from her cheek. It didn’t help much. You look like something from a horror film.
The constable was right—she needed to clean herself up before returning to the office. Bu
t she couldn’t go back home. The apartment block would be swarming with newscast crews and Guerrilla Casters. It probably wasn’t the best idea either to be wandering around there on her own, especially now she’d given poor DC Ives the slip. Victor Korehkov wants you dead. As absurd as the thought was, she still had to take the threat seriously.
There was a gym at Scotland Yard. She wasn’t a regular user, but she kept a spare change of clothes in a locker in case she pulled an all-nighter and didn’t get a chance to go home. The gym had showers as well. All of a sudden the idea of a shower was very inviting.
*
Louisa had the constable drop her off in Scotland Yard’s underground car park. The guard at the security barrier eyed her on the way in, but Louisa kept her head down as he lifted the barrier and they drove past without being stopped. The gym was underground on the same level as the car park so she didn’t come across anyone else on the way. She was doubly relieved to find the changing rooms empty. Louisa took off her blouse, examined the stains, then binned it, deciding it was beyond saving. She had to sit on a bench in order to pull off her trousers. Her hip had continued to throb on the drive over and was stiffening up. She stood and tottered over to a mirror to get a better look. It was visibly swollen and already showing some colour. That’s going to be one almighty bruise. She pressed the surrounding area with her fingers, wincing at the discomfort. She wouldn’t be very nimble for a while.
She ran a shower as hot as she could stand it. When she stepped into the cubicle she gasped as the spray zeroed in on bumps and scrapes she didn’t even realise she had. She’d skinned the palms of her hands along with her knees and they flushed an angry red in the shower’s heat. When she cleaned the grit from her palms, tiny speckles of blood formed before sluicing away. Louisa ducked her head under the shower and let the jet rinse out her hair. Now it was the turn of the bump on the back of her head to throb spitefully. She twisted her head to try and keep the water from the cut on her forehead. She didn’t want any of the temporary stitches to come loose.
Louisa put her stinging wounds to the back of her mind and tried to relax, letting the heat leech the weariness from her muscles. She closed her eyes and tilted her head back, rotating it in a wide circle.
She felt emotionally drained. Drained and very, very tired. But the heat felt good on her skin. For a moment she even forgot about her hip, then she shifted in the shower and put her full weight on her leg.
‘God dammit!’ Louisa hissed as a burst of pain shot down her thigh.
She staggered, head spinning, and reached out to steady herself. The tiles were slick but she managed to lower herself to the floor. She leaned back against the cold wall and let out a ragged breath. ‘God dammit.’
Rick is gone.
She felt a jolt at the thought, like she’d received an electric shock. Somehow she’d managed to put the morning’s events to the back of her mind, but now they flashed before her in an unceasing stream of graphic imagery. Time and time again she saw Rick clutching at his throat, beseeching her for help. His last breath wheezing from between bloodstained lips. Before she knew what was happening the tears began to flow freely.
She wasn’t sure how long she stayed there, sprawled on the shower floor, her shoulders shaking, but eventually she managed to compose herself. She sniffed and rubbed her eyes.
Wait, you’re crying now. That’s good, isn’t it? No longer destined to become a workaholic drunk? Louisa smiled weakly.
A brief summary of your predicament, then. She ticked off her fingers. One, you have a homicide case which may in fact be death by natural causes. Two, your best lead died in a car crash. Three, a Latvian drug dealer tried to have you killed. Four, your boss will want you off the case because it’s a big shit sandwich he doesn’t want to take a bite of. And five, the NCA and SCD7 probably think you’re bent and want to hang you out to dry. That’s if the DPS doesn’t suspend you first.
There wasn’t anything else for it. She started to laugh.
It was so wrong, laughing with Rick dead, and a part of her was deeply ashamed, but if she didn’t laugh then she’d start crying again, and this time she wasn’t sure she’d be able to stop. If anyone had come along they would have thought she was cracked, she was sure if it.
Enough! Louisa told herself sternly. Time to get up and face the music.
There was only one problem—she wasn’t entirely sure she could get up.
She laughed again.
*
Louisa stopped beside Rick’s desk. She picked up an abandoned take-away coffee cup and put it in the bin. She sat and pulled open a desk drawer. Someone would have to box up his stuff for Sarah, but there were procedures to follow when an officer was killed on duty. Everything would have to be itemised and recorded.
She caught a glint of gold. Rick’s ring. It would be missing from his belongings removed at the post mortem. Sarah would have enough on her plate without wondering why Rick wasn’t wearing his wedding ring when he died. She should be the one to deliver Rick’s things to Sarah. Maybe she could slip it in then, unnoticed.
‘I need a moment, Detective.’ DI Fuller was standing at his office door. He beckoned her inside.
Louisa carefully lowered herself into a chair. She mentally prepared herself for what was to follow. A MET detective dead, another the target of a failed gangland assassination attempt. The resulting investigation would be high-profile and necessarily public. The DPS would suspend her—that’s if DI Fuller wasn’t about to do it himself. He wouldn’t call it that, of course. Korehkov tried to have her killed. She was the victim. But the DPS would be coming at it from a different angle. Why was Korehkov after her? What had she done to warrant a hit being taken out on her?
Strangely, the DI appeared calm. Given the circumstances she’d expected him to be a mass of sweat and vein-popping rage.
‘Are you quite all right, Detective?’ The DI was staring at the wound above her eye.
‘Yes, sir,’ Louisa said. ‘It’s just a scrape. Nothing to worry about.’
‘Good.’ The DI stared off into the distance, a pensive look crossing his face. ‘It’s always hard to lose a colleague. Detective Drachman will be sorely missed. He was a credit to the force. An enquiry into his death will commence forthwith. Rest assured any actions on DI Lenihan’s part that led to DC Drachman’s death, directly or indirectly, will be investigated fully.’
Louisa sighed. ‘It wasn’t DI Lenihan’s fault, sir.’
‘That will be for the enquiry to determine. Victor Korehkov remains at large. I’ve ordered a patrol car with two officers to remain stationed outside your apartment around the clock. Until he’s picked up your safety is my number one concern.’
‘Emm, thank you, sir,’ Louisa managed. She’d never experienced the DI being so…professional. Rather than reassuring her it was having the opposite effect—she was becoming seriously unnerved.
‘Given your current circumstances your own report on the operation can wait. You can take as much time off as you need. I believe you only have the one open case, which I will personally take charge of, but I reviewed it and the post mortem results appear to indicate a verdict of death by natural causes. So I imagine it will be taken off our hands forthwith.’
Louisa tried to digest what the DI had just said. He was taking her off Claire’s case, that much was clear. ‘No, I don’t want to be removed from the case. It’s far from being in a state to be closed or transferred to another unit. The PM revealed the victim was subjected to a prolonged period of physical abuse before her death. I believe it may yet transpire the victim’s death was due to the actions of a separate party—’ Louisa hesitated. ‘Sir, what do you mean by current circumstances?’
‘Why, your daughter, of course. I assumed you would—’
‘What about my daughter?’
The DI gave her a confused look, then frowned. A hard lump formed in Louisa’s throat. Was it Korehkov? Did something happen to Jess? I should never have sent the kids to thei
r father’s.
‘The hospital didn’t get in touch with you?’
‘No. My—my terminal is broken. What happened to my daughter?’
‘I was informed her condition is stable, Detective, but I’m not party to all the particulars. All I know is that she was admitted with a serious injury less than an hour ago. If there’s anything I can do…’
Louisa hated him for it—that this prick was feeling sorry for her, that he knew more about her daughter’s wellbeing than she did.
There must have been something in her expression because the DI shifted uncomfortably in his seat. ‘As I said, Detective. Please take as much time as you need. Forget about the case. It will be handled. You should be with your daughter now.’
A warmth suffused her face. She swallowed and clenched her jaw. She wouldn’t cry. He was expecting her to do just that—another woman bound by her hormones and emotions. She didn’t believe his faked empathy for a second and she refused to give him the satisfaction of witnessing her breaking down. ‘I would appreciate it, sir, if I could be kept aware of all matters relating to the case.’ She was surprised by how steady her voice sounded.
The DI hesitated, looking as if he was debating whether or not to tell her something. ‘I’m afraid it’s out of my hands. It was referred for an internal review. Apparently a CSCA provision was contravened. I’m due to have a meeting with the DPS concerning the particulars this afternoon. You will be updated in due course if the outcome of the meeting affects you in any way.’
A CSCA provision was contravened? And he wasn’t going to tell me? It was what every detective dreaded—that somehow they’d violate one of the multitudes of provisions defined in the CSCA which supposedly protected the rights of the private citizen. Once it happened the case was gone, shut down. She’d be lucky if the case ever made it to court now, even if she proved someone had killed Claire. But what happened? What had she done wrong?
The professor’s history graph. They’d found out she ordered a history graph on someone who wasn’t a suspect.
The London Project (Portal Book 1) Page 20