Deception on His Mind (Inspector Lynley, #9)(193)

Barbara wandered to the lavatory window and gazed at the small car park below. DC Billy Honigman was escorting a freshly washed, groomed, and dressed Fahd Kumhar to a panda car. As she watched, they were approached by Azhar. He spoke to Kumhar. Honigman warned him off. The detective constable stowed his passenger in the back seat of his vehicle. Azhar walked to his own car, and when Honigman took off, he followed, making no secret that he was doing so. He'd come to escort Fahd Kumhar home, as promised. Obviously, that's what he intended to do.

A man of his word, Barbara thought. A man of more than one word, in fact.

She considered the answers he'd given her in response to her questions about his culture. She saw now how they applied to him. He'd been cut off from his family just as he declared Querashi would have been had his homosexuality come into the open. He'd been so cut off from his family that his daughter's existence was not acknowledged. They were—the two of them—an island unto themselves. No wonder he'd only too well understood and been able to expound upon the meaning of being an outcast.

Barbara processed all this with a fair degree of rational thinking. But she wasn't up to processing what this information about the Pakistani man meant to her personally. She told herself that it couldn't mean anything at all to her personally. She didn't, after all, have a personal relationship with Taymullah Azhar. True, she played the role of friend in his daughter's life, but when it came to defining a role in his life …She really didn't have one.

So she didn't understand why she felt somehow betrayed by the knowledge that he'd deserted a wife and two children. Perhaps, she concluded, she was feeling the betrayal that Hadiyyah would feel should she ever learn the truth.

Yes, Barbara thought. Doubtless that was it.

The lavatory door opened and Emily bounded inside, striding directly to one of the wash basins. Hastily, Barbara squashed her cigarette on the sole of her trainer and surreptitiously tossed the dog end out of the window.

Emily's nose twitched. She said, “Jesus, Barb. Are you still on the weed after all these years?”

“I was never one to ignore my addictions,” Barbara confessed.

Emily turned on the tap and thoroughly soaked a paper towel beneath it. She applied this to the back of her neck, oblivious of or uncaring about the water that dribbled down her spine and dampened her tank top. She said, “Ferguson,” as if the super's name were an execration. “He has his interview for the assistant chief constable's job in just three days. He expects an arrest in the Querashi case before he faces the panel, thank you very much. Not that he's doing a single bloody thing to help move the investigation forward. Unless threatening me with Howard Bloody Presley and dogging every step I take now constitute lending a helping hand. But he'll be happy enough to bow to the applause if we bring someone in without more public bloodshed. Fuck it. I despise that man.” She wet a hand and shoved it back through her hair. She turned to Barbara.

It was time to take on the mustard factory, she announced. She'd made application for a search warrant from the magistrate, and he'd come through in record time. Apparently, he was as anxious as Ferguson to bring the case to a close without another battle in the streets.

But there was a detail unrelated to the factory and to Emily's conviction about illegal activity going on within it, and Barbara wanted to pursue it. She couldn't ignore the fact that Sahlah Malik was pregnant, nor could she overlook the import this fact had in the case. “Can we make a stop at the marina, Em?”

Emily glanced at her watch. “Why? We know the Maliks don't have a boat, if you're hanging on to an arrival at the Nez by water.”

“But Theo Shaw has. And Sahlah's pregnant. And Theo got that bracelet off Sahlah. He's got motive, Em. He's got it loud and clear, no matter what Muhannad and his mates are up to at Eastern Imports.”

Theo also didn't have an alibi, while Muhannad did have one, she wanted to add. But she held her tongue. Emily knew the score, no matter her determination to run Muhannad Malik to ground for one offence or another.

Emily frowned as she considered Barbara's request. She said, “Right. Okay. We'll check it out.”

They set off in one of the unmarked Fords, making a turn into the High Street, where they saw Rachel Winfield teetering towards Racon Original and Artistic Jewellery from the direction of sea. The girl was red in the face. She looked as if she'd spent her morning in the bicycling third of an Iron Woman event. She paused to take a breather next to the signpost indicating that Balford Marina was just to the north. She waved happily as the Ford passed her. If she was guilty of something, she certainly didn't look it.

Balford Marina was perhaps a mile along the lane that ran perpendicular to the High Street. Its lower end comprised one-quarter of the little square whose opposite side was Alfred Terrace, where the Ruddock home stood in semi-squalor. It passed Tide Lake and a caravan park and, ultimately, the circular mass of a Martello Tower that had once been used to defend the coast during the Napoleonic Wars. The lane ended at the marina itself.

This consisted of a series of eight pontoons at which sailing boats and cabin cruisers were tied in the placid water of a tidal bay. At the far north end, a small office abutted a brick building that housed lavatories and showers. Emily drove in this direction and parked next to a tier of kayaks above which hung a faded sign advertising East Essex Boat Hire.