Deception on His Mind (Inspector Lynley, #9)(98)

Behind her, Emily said with some passion, “Jesus. This is just like going down the goddamn rabbit hole.”

The tone of Emily's comment prompted Barbara to study the DCI more closely. Emily was leaning her bum against the edge of the table. For the first time, Barbara noticed the smudged skin under her eyes.

“Em?” she said.

“If it's one of them, Barb, this town's going to blow.”

Barbara knew what she was implying: If the killer was English and the town caved in to more racial unrest because of that fact, heads would roll. And the first would be Emily Barlow's.

In the silence that hung between them, Barbara heard voices in the entry downstairs. Terse words were spoken by a man and answered by a woman sounding calm and professional. Barbara recognised the man, at least. Muhannad Malik was in reception, arrived for his afternoon meeting with the police.

Azhar would be with him. So the moment had arrived when Barbara knew she ought to tell Emily Barlow the truth.

She opened her mouth to do so but found that she couldn't. If she fully explained—at least as fully as she was able, considering how little she had bothered to examine her motives before setting forth to Balford—Emily would have to dismiss her from the case. She could hardly view Barbara as an objective party in the investigation when at the side of at least one of the suspects moved a man who lived a bare fifty yards from her own shack-like dwelling in London. And Barbara wanted to stay on the case for more than one reason now. While it was true that she'd initially come to Balford-le-Nez for the sake of her Pakistani neighbours, she realised that she wished to remain for the sake of her colleague.

Barbara was well aware of the myriad prices women had to pay to succeed in policework. Men in the profession didn't have to persuade a single soul that their competence was unaffected by their sex. Women lived with having to do that daily. So if she could help Emily maintain her position and prove herself as a DCI, she was determined to do it.

“I'm on your side, Em,” she said quietly.

“Are you.” Once again Emily said the two words; she didn't ask them. Which reminded Barbara of another fact: The higher one climbed in authority and power, the fewer true friends one actually had. But a moment later, Emily roused herself from whatever black thoughts of the future were troubling her. She said, “So where was Theo Shaw on Friday night?”

“He says he was at home. His grandmother was there, but she won't be able to confirm anything, as she'd gone to bed.”

“That part of his story is probably true,” Emily said. “Agatha Shaw—that's the grandmother—had a stroke some time ago. She'd need her rest.”

“Which gives Theo plenty of opportunity to have taken himself over to the Nez on foot,” Barbara pointed out.

“Which would explain why no one in the vicinity claims to have heard another car.” Emily frowned thoughtfully. She directed her attention to a second china board. On it she had scrawled surnames of suspects and first initials, followed by their alleged whereabouts for the time in question. She said, “The Malik girl seems docile enough, but if she was secretly involved with Theo, she may have had a reason to send her fiancé tumbling down the Nez stairs. It would sure as hell end her obligation to Querashi. Permanently.”

“But you said her dad claimed that he wouldn't have forced her to marry the man.”

“He says that now. But he could be covering up for her. Perhaps she and Theo are in this together.”

“Romeo and Juliet killing off Count Paris instead of themselves? Okay. I see that it works. But aside from the car-tossing, which we'll forget about for the moment, here's something else we're not considering: Let's say Querashi got tricked into going to the Nez to meet Theo Shaw for a confab about Theo's relationship to Sahlah. Then how do we explain the condoms in his pocket?”

“Shit. The condoms,” Emily said. “Okay, so he may not have been going to meet Theo Shaw at all. But even if he didn't know about Theo, one thing is certain: Theo knew about him.

Barbara had to admit that the scales of culpability were beginning to tip in the direction of one of the Englishmen. She wondered what the hell she was going to report to the Pakistanis when they had their meeting. She could only imagine what Muhannad Malik would do with any information that supported his belief in the crime's racist nature.

“Okay,” she said, “but we can't forget that we've caught out Sahlah Malik in a lie. And since Haytham Querashi had the receipt, I think we can conclude that someone must have wanted him to know that Sahlah had another relationship.”

“Rachel Winfield,” Emily said. “She's still the enigma in all this for me.

“A woman went to see Querashi at the hotel. A woman wearing a chador.”

“And if that woman was Rachel Winfield, and if Rachel Winfield wanted Querashi for herself—”

“Guv?” Emily and Barbara turned to the door, where Belinda Warner had come to stand, with a stack of chits in her hand. These were neatly clipped together in several different piles. Barbara recognised them as the copies of the telephone messages from the Burnt House Hotel that she'd handed over to Emily that morning.

“What is it?” Emily said.

“I've sorted through this lot, arranged them in categories, and tracked everyone down. Or at least nearly everyone.” She entered and placed each small stack down as she identified it. “Calls from the Maliks: Sahlah, Akram, and Muhannad. Calls from a contractor: a bloke called Gerry DeVitt from Jaywick Sands. He was doing some work on the house that Akram'd bought for the newlyweds.”