‘Why don’t you have a look while I’m out? Are you on call today?’ she asked.
He nodded. ‘I’ll drive you in. Pick you up later too. How long will you be there?’
‘It all depends if we can get confessions wrapped up and a likely case for the CPS. Things might heat up if any new information comes to light. We know who did it; we’ve got the fall guys in custody. But we don’t know exactly who ordered it. Remember that colonel you told me about? Leo Brown shagged his daughter at Catterick.’
‘Dansford?’
‘Same. He shot himself yesterday.’
‘Fatal?’
Kelly nodded, and sat up to stretch.
‘Christ. Why?’
‘Well that’s it, I’m not sure, but without him, it’ll be harder to pin down who did what.’
‘So he was definitely involved?’
‘Up to his eyeballs. But he’ll take his contacts to the grave.’
‘Come here.’ He took her face between his hands and kissed her. Her body was willing her to stay in bed and phone in sick, or pretend to be invisible: anything to not leave.
‘Have you checked on Graeme?’ she asked, pulling herself away.
‘I was going to do that today. Is the girl all right?’
‘Tilly? She’s going to be OK. My mission today is making the bastard who stabbed the officer talk.’
Johnny took her hand. ‘Why don’t you have a shower and I’ll do breakfast. When do you want to leave?’
Thirty minutes later, they were in Johnny’s car on the way to Eden House. When they got there, Kelly sighed and swore.
‘What?’ Johnny asked.
‘That’s Matt.’
Johnny looked to where a man was standing on the red stone steps outside the office. He pulled up and Kelly opened her door. The man stared at him. Johnny smiled and waved.
Kelly turned to him and widened her eyes. ‘Stop it.’
Matt came towards the car. ‘Morning, Kelly.’
‘Matt, this is Johnny. Johnny, Matt.’
Johnny reached across and held out his hand. Matt shook it.
‘Call me when you want a lift,’ Johnny said, and Kelly shut the door, watching him drive away.
She and Matt entered Eden House in silence and took the lift up to her floor. She would only call her team in should she need them. Coordination with London would allow her to make that decision later.
Matt spoke first. ‘Did you sleep?’
‘Like the dead.’ She regretted the choice of phrase. ‘Too well.’
He updated her on what had come in overnight, and they had a brief argument about him not going to catch up on sleep. The commissioner wanted an update at 9 a.m., and Kelly’s chief constable would sit in.
‘Good news,’ Matt said.
‘What’s that?’
‘We arrested the guy caught on the dash cam driving the Ravensword lorry that killed Miranda Cooper.
‘Confession?’
‘Yup, his prints and DNA were all over the lorry, and he had no alibi.’
‘Randomly thought he’d take her out, or an order?’
‘Came from Dansford.’
‘Shit. His suicide could derail the whole fucking thing.’
‘What about Cyprus?’
‘No leads so far. If that was Dansford too, it could be serving personnel on the military base there.’
Matt agreed but it also meant another battle with red tape: this time, the MoD.
‘Has Dansford’s house been processed?’ Kelly asked.
‘Yup. There was a whole team crawling all over it. They’re still there. The wife has been put up in temporary accommodation. A bereavement officer is with her. We’ll ask the commissioner if we have enough to keep Tooting, Slater and Montague-Roland in custody.’
‘By 9 a.m.?’
‘Knowing Commissioner Pickford, she’ll have been up all night working every possible angle. She won’t let the death of an officer go. It’s a shit thing to say, but it could turn out to be our trump card. There’s too much at stake, and it’s likely the press will have her head if she ignores the web behind it all.’
They made coffee and set up their equipment. There was a perceptible silence and Kelly looked at Matt.
‘Boyfriend?’
‘Yes.’
‘Rugged.’
‘Yup.’
They went back to what they were doing.
At 9 a.m. sharp, the chief constable of Cumbria Constabulary came on line and on screen, along with the commissioner of the Met. Kelly and Matt were ready and sat side by side, prepared to fire what they knew at the pair of senior officers with the power to proceed or limit.
‘Could you convey my condolences to the family of the PC who lost his life?’ The commissioner spoke first, and the chief constable assured her that her thoughts and sympathy would be passed on formally. ‘He leaves how many children?’
‘Two, ma’am.’
‘Carter? Porter? What have we got?’
They started at the beginning. Each knew the facts of the case intimately without once glancing at notes. They spoke in turn, supporting and corroborating one another, for a full hour. Finally they referred to the potential involvement of senior civil servants.
‘I’ve got a meeting booked with the Foreign Office this afternoon,’ the commissioner said when they’d finished. ‘They’ve taken an interest in the formula for Compound P. I see the Home Secretary after that: he’s in a hurry to weed out any wrongdoing and release a statement to the press. He’s making one concession, and it was on the basis that I confirm the scale of involvement with private business. That is that Charlotte Cross will be stripped of her damehood and arrested at home rather than at work, pending questioning. The prime minister is being briefed later today. Good work, you two. Carter, I suggest you get back to London. Porter, there’s a job for you at the Met if you want it.’
‘Thank you, ma’am, I’ve already left once. I’m quite happy where I am, thank you.’
They ended the call.
‘I think that means you can go home,’ Kelly said.
‘I’ve already looked: there’s a train at just after 1 p.m. to Euston. I’m glad I came to see where you hang out.’
‘Can I buy you an early lunch before you go?’ she asked.
Chapter 62
‘Compound P has the potential to change the modern world. It could save millions from the misery of substance abuse and destroy drugs cartels overnight, destabilising economies reliant upon that trade. But therein lies the problem. A drug with the power to transform one of the richest countries on earth into the poorest could become a bargaining chip for those who have wanted control over those regions for decades. And the cycle of abuse is thus transferred from the impact of addiction on modern society to the subjugation of whole countries. Who wins?
‘Well, the politicians of course. And Big Pharma.
‘The cost of producing the drug, along with the necessary development procedures from review, testing and endorsement, could cost the joint government venture tens of billions of dollars, but the results would surely be worth it.
‘For now, we have been assured that Compound P is being investigated purely for research purposes. Meanwhile, George Murphy and his colleagues can finally be laid to rest. The body in The Lady of the Lake baffled investigators earlier this year, but now the truth behind the development and procurement of Compound P – long George Murphy’s wish – has been revealed.
‘In the latest twist, the five largest pharmaceutical companies in the world have all given public statements about the non-viability of Compound P. They say it can’t be manufactured; that the chemistry behind the formulas being worked on by George Murphy simply doesn’t add up. The human brain cannot be manipulated into thinking it doesn’t desire a substance. However, a Cambridge University professor has controversially stated otherwise. He thinks it could work. The professor was unavailable for comment tonight.
‘This is Tilly Knight, for the BBC�
��s special edition of Science World.’
Johnny switched off the TV.
‘She’s good.’
‘She’s covering the trials next week,’ Kelly said.
Six men, including Philip Tooting and Christopher Slater, were due to stand trial at the Old Bailey for the murders of George, Emily, Mike and Alexandros.
Nothing had been reported about Charlotte Cross’s spectacular fall from grace, and Kelly could only speculate why. An internal board of inquiry first had to establish if there was a case to investigate; only then would criminal charges be pursued. Tilly Knight wasn’t privy to the details of the police investigation, or the documents found on Miranda Cooper’s computer, and so no one but the officers closely linked to the case were aware of its depth.
The trial of Miranda’s murderer had taken place in late June and had lasted one afternoon. The killer had been sentenced to eighteen years.
Sebastian Montague-Roland had accepted a plea bargain and a suspended sentence in return for testifying against Tooting and Slater. Work had begun in earnest at Allerdale House, with Graeme dishing out the extensive work to grateful local contractors.
The house was now kept locked.
Johnny and Kelly raised their glasses of red wine to their impending holiday. Preparations and paperwork had prevented them from escaping sooner, but it was only three weeks now until their joint birthday trip to Florida. Graeme had crammed in some extra sailing lessons for them, and they’d hired a vessel out of Key West. They were to fly into New Orleans and make their way down there by car.
The doorbell rang and they put their glasses to one side as Kelly went to welcome their guests.
Ted stood in the doorway, flanked by two women around Kelly’s own age. All three of them smiled broadly. Kelly stepped aside to let them in, and one by one, they were introduced.
Acknowledgements
There are so many people who have contributed to making this series special. Thank you to my agent, Peter Buckman, for your never-ending encouragement, wisdom and faith. Also Laura McCallen and the whole team at Canelo for your passion and meticulous attention to detail. That includes Jane Selley for your incredible copyediting and Tom Sanderson for the stunning cover.
I’d like to thank Jim Armitage, my scientist friend and awesome football coach to Freddie, for your brilliant input on the pharmaceutical process.
For their fascinating insight, Harry Chapfield, Cumbria Constabulary (ret’d), Inspector Paul Redfearn, London Met Police, and DI Rob Burns, Beds Police.
To the lemons: you keep me laughing, my dear friends.
To Mike, Tilly and Freddie, I love you so much; your love and support keeps me going x
Detective Kelly Porter
When a scandal forces DI Kelly Porter out of the Met, she returns to her home turf in the north. There, a dark criminal underworld lies beneath the veneer of sleepy towns and lush landscapes, and Porter and her team soon find themselves facing the Lake District’s darkest secrets and greatest threats…
Find out more
Dark Game
Deep Fear
Dead End
Bitter Edge
Bold Lies
First published in the United Kingdom in 2019 by Canelo
Canelo Digital Publishing Limited
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Beaconsfield, Bucks HP9 2DU
United Kingdom
Copyright © Rachel Lynch, 2019
The moral right of Rachel Lynch to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act, 1988.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
A CIP catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
ISBN 9781788632683
This book is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, organizations, places and events are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or locales is entirely coincidental.
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