Career of Evil (Cormoran Strike #3)(109)

“Yeah, which is why—”

“—you’re trying to cover four cases single-handedly and you sent me home. I didn’t ask for time off.”

In the euphoric aftermath of replacing her ring, Matthew had actually helped her rehearse her case for returning to work. It had been quite extraordinary, looking back on it, he pretending to be Strike and she putting her arguments, but Matthew had been ready to help her do anything at all, so long as she agreed to marry him on the second of July.

“I wanted to get straight back to—”

“Just because you wanted to get back to work,” said Strike, “doesn’t mean it was in your best interests to do so.”

“Oh, I didn’t realize you’re a qualified occupational therapist,” said Robin, delicately sarcastic.

“Look,” said Strike, more infuriated by her aloof rationality than he would have been with rage and tears (the sapphire sparkling coolly from her finger again), “I’m your employer and it’s down to me if—”

“I thought I was supposed to be your partner,” said Robin.

“Makes no difference,” said Strike, “partner or not, I’ve still got a responsibility—”

“So you’d rather see this business fail than let me work?” said Robin, an angry flush rising in her pale face, and while Strike felt he was losing on points he took an obscure pleasure in the fact that she was losing her cool. “I helped you build it up! You’re playing right into his hands, whoever he is, sidelining me, neglecting paying cases and working yourself into the—”

“How do you know I’ve—?”

“Because you look like shit,” said Robin baldly and Strike, caught off guard, almost laughed for the first time in days.

“Either,” she resumed, “I’m your partner or I’m not. If you’re going to treat me like some piece of special-occasion china that gets taken out when you don’t think I’ll get hurt, we’re—we’re doomed. The business is doomed. I’d do better to take Wardle up on—”

“On what?” said Strike sharply.

“On his suggestion that I apply to the police,” said Robin, looking Strike squarely in the face. “This isn’t a game to me, you know. I’m not a little girl. I’ve survived far worse than being sent a toe. So—” She screwed up her courage. She had hoped it would not come to an ultimatum. “—decide. Decide whether I’m your partner or a—a liability. If you can’t rely on me—if you can’t let me run the same risks you do—then I’d rather—”

Her voice nearly broke, but she forced herself onwards.

“—rather get out,” she finished.

In her emotion, she swung her chair round to face her computer a little too forcefully and found herself facing the wall. Mustering what dignity she felt she had left, she adjusted her seat to face the monitor and continued opening emails, waiting for his answer.

She had not told him about her lead. She needed to know whether she was reinstated as his partner before she either shared her spoils or gave it to him as a farewell gift.

“Whoever he is, he butchers women for pleasure,” said Strike quietly, “and he’s made it clear he’d like to do the same to you.”

“I’ve grasped that,” said Robin in a tight voice, her eyes on the screen, “but have you grasped the fact that if he knows where I work, he probably also knows where I live, and if he’s that determined he’ll follow me anywhere I go? Can’t you understand that I’d much rather help catch him than sit around waiting for him to pounce?”

She was not going to beg. She had emptied the inbox of twelve spam emails before he spoke again, his voice heavy.

“All right.”

“All right what?” she asked, looking around cautiously.

“All right… you’re back at work.”

She beamed. He did not return the smile.

“Oh, cheer up,” she said, getting to her feet and moving around the desk.

For one crazy moment Strike thought she might be about to hug him, she looked so happy (and with the protective ring back on her finger, perhaps he had become a safely huggable figure, a de-sexed noncompetitor), but she was merely heading for the kettle.

“I’ve got a lead,” she told him.

“Yeah?” he said, still struggling to make sense of the new situation. (What was he going to ask her to do that wasn’t too dangerous? Where could he send her?)

“Yes,” she said. “I’ve made contact with one of the people on the BIID forum who was talking to Kelsey.”

Yawning widely, Strike dropped down into the fake-leather sofa, which made its usual flatulent noises under his weight, and tried to remember whom she was talking about. He was so sleep-deprived that his usually capacious and accurate memory was becoming unreliable.

“The… bloke or the woman?” he asked, with the vague remembrance of the photographs Wardle had shown them.

“The man,” said Robin, pouring boiling water onto tea bags.

For the first time in their relationship Strike found himself relishing an opportunity to undermine her.

“So you’ve been going onto websites without telling me? Playing games with a bunch of anonymous punters without knowing who you’re messing with?”