Child's Play (D.I. Kim Stone #11)(39)

He’d tasked Doug to do some digging on Irina Nuryef to see if there was anything to the cheating rumour as a possible motivation for her changing her story. He prayed not. And Lynne had been tasked with interrogating the forensic evidence to see if anything had been missed. Again, he prayed not. And he himself had chosen to return to the petrol station to look for holes in Ricky Drake’s story.

He’d stepped off the bus early to pick up the trail exactly as Drake had explained it in his statement.

The man had left the pub at ten thirty, and it was dark. Right now, it was dusky but it was close enough.

Penn stood for a minute right outside the pub and looked along the road.

On his side of the road were a few terraced houses, a closed-down wine bar, a patch of wasteland about halfway up, and the chippy Drake had been heading for was about a hundred and twenty metres ahead right before the road hit a small traffic island.

Right now, he was at the furthest point away from the chippy and could see it clearly. He wasn’t sure he’d have lit a smoke only being this far away and he wasn’t even close to the petrol station on the other side of the road.

He continued moving along the pavement, retracing Drake’s steps as he’d explained them. Thirty metres down and Penn could see into the well-lit petrol station. He could just make out the figure of Mr Kapoor, partly because he knew the man well.

He continued to move forward. For a few seconds, his trajectory meant that a petrol pump obscured his view of the cash desk and then it came into sight again. He stood at the point Drake had claimed to be when lighting his cigarette. Right by the lamp-post in front of the wasteland.

Penn frowned. No, that couldn’t be right. He looked for other lamp-posts but the space between them put any others completely out of reach.

Penn felt a seed of anxiety plant itself in his stomach as he moved back and forth in front of the petrol station, walking the whole length three more times and pausing to check with every step.

Drake had identified Nuryef clearly from this position. He had glanced and then looked closely and had recognised the accused.

From where he stood Penn could see Mr Kapoor clearly in the well-lit shop. He could see that he was conversing with someone, could even see him handing change over the counter.

But because of a chocolate display rack that stretched the length of the shop, Penn couldn’t see another soul.

Ricky Drake’s witness account had been a total and utter lie.





Thirty-Nine





‘Can’t do it, sir,’ Kim said, as she walked into Woody’s office.

‘Too damn right you can’t, Stone, but I feel we may be talking about two completely different things. So, what the hell possessed you?’

‘Err…’ she offered, playing for time. She liked to be sure which issue they were talking about before she admitted to anything.

‘You allowed Travis to keep a member of your team when you have two bodies to…’

Ah that one.

‘Technically, sir, we only had one body at the time of my conversation with Travis. The second body was reported—’

‘Don’t play games with me. Who the hell gave you the authority to agree to an unofficial secondment? That should have been channelled to me.’

‘With all due respect, Penn is a member of my team who was lost to me this week anyway sat in court twiddling his thumbs. And to be fair it looks like the case has turned into one hell of a clusterf—’

‘Yes, but it’s their cluster… mess and not up to us to bail them out of it.’

‘It’s a line on a map, sir,’ she said, quoting his own words about the force boundaries. ‘We’re all fighting crime.’

DCI Woodward was one of the most progressive advocates of inter-force working she’d ever met. He felt the lines dividing forces were for budget and organisational purposes only as they were all trying to do the same job. Criminals crossed force borders, so procedures and working practices had to adapt too.

‘You know, sir,’ she continued, ‘I actually thought to myself, what would the boss do in this situation? Would he dismiss the request out of hand without consideration or would he try to co-operate with his colleagues across the operational border and try to foster a more—’

‘He would have consulted with his superior officer for a start, and just so as you know, that smoke you’re blowing is going nowhere near my behind.’

‘I could always call Travis and tell him I made a mistake and get Penn back.’

‘You know damn well I’ll refuse that offer. The damage is done now but I just don’t understand what possessed you to act so recklessly.’

‘It was his case, sir,’ she said, honestly. ‘Penn was the SIO and he needs to know if he f… messed up. And if he did he has to try and put it right, otherwise it’ll stay with him for the rest of his career.’

‘You could have just said that in the first place,’ he said, wryly.

‘And where’s the fun in that, sir?’ she asked, realising he should have known her motives were not based on inter-force co-operation. That was his job not hers and she rarely gave away or lent out anything but she knew how it felt to finish what you’d started.

‘Although that does lead nicely to my reason for wanting to see you. Sir, you have to take the shackles off. Even with Penn we couldn’t work this case nine to five and my team is losing the will to live. Stacey is looking for a part-time job and Bryant is on the brink of divorce. And if that wasn’t bad enough, I’m actually cleaning my house.’