The Infirmary (DCI Ryan Mysteries prequel)(70)

“Go on home, lad, and get some shuteye. I’ll man the fort here and let you know if anything happens.”

Ryan nodded, putting a grateful hand on his sergeant’s shoulder.

“Thanks, Frank. You’ll let me know—”

“Aye, I’ll call you if anything breaks. Go home.”

So Ryan drove slowly through the quiet streets, his eyes focused on the road with the kind of intensity known only to drunk drivers and those who hadn’t slept properly in several days. He fiddled with the radio until he found a particularly obnoxious station and subjected himself to twenty minutes of house party anthems to keep himself awake until he made it home.

He could have fallen asleep at the wheel by the time he brought his car to a stop in his usual bay in the parking lot beneath his apartment building, but he dragged himself the rest of the way to the lift and punched the button for the top floor.

Natalie muted the sound on the television when she heard the creak of the lift outside and hurried across to the front door, not bothering to check the peep-hole before she threw it open to welcome her brother home.

When she saw him, she was shocked.

“You look awful,” she said bluntly, and he laughed.

“You’re as bad as Phillips,” he said, shrugging out of his coat and tossing it over a chair.

A pot of soup was simmering on the hob and his stomach rumbled loudly as his nose registered the scent.

“Come and sit down,” she told him, in the same tone their mother used. “I’ll put a bowl out for you.”

“You don—” He yawned hugely. “You don’t have to.”

“I know that,” she said to herself. “But I want to.”

She watched him spoon a few mouthfuls and, when he would have stopped, she bullied him into finishing the rest.

“That’s better. You look like you could sleep for England.”

“That’s because I could,” he said, stumbling towards his bedroom.

When he entered, he found she’d left one of the bedside lights on to greet him and, if he wasn’t mistaken, there was fresh linen on the bed.

“Nat?”

She poked her head around the doorway.

“Yeah?”

“Thank you for all this,” he said, gesturing to the room and thinking of the soup in his belly. “It’s been a long time since anybody looked after me like that. Usually, I don’t need it but…it’s nice to come home to a friendly face, rather than an empty flat.”

She smiled beautifully.

“Goodnight, big brother.”

“G’night,” he replied, and face-planted on the bed.

It was only after she heard his gentle snores that she remembered there had been something she meant to tell him.

It would keep.





CHAPTER 30


Thursday 10th July

The housekeeping team didn’t find Stephanie Bernard until it was almost lunchtime. They had respected the ‘DO NOT DISTURB’ sign hanging outside her door but, when it remained hanging there for several hours, they decided to risk it. A discreet knock had not elicited a response, so they let themselves into the room she had occupied for nearly a week.

And what they found in there would stay with them for the rest of their lives.

Faulkner stepped carefully over a mound of drying vomit near the doorway, with Ryan and Phillips following closely behind. The team of CSIs were already on site and the aparthotel had been declared a crime scene. Lowerson was overseeing the process of re-housing other residents to provide a clear pathway for the police operation, while MacKenzie took over management of the Incident Room back at Police Headquarters. That was no small task, given the number of police personnel attached to the investigation which had now been given the jovial title of ‘OPERATION SUMMER’ by The Powers That Be.

The three men stood a few feet from the edge of the bed in full protective clothing, surveying The Hacker’s most recent handiwork. It seemed he had taken to his new title because this latest demonstration was less a feat of medical prowess than an act of total destruction.

“God in heaven,” Phillips choked out, focusing on his breathing so that he would not embarrass himself.

“He’s completely gone now,” Ryan said, feeling his own stomach churn. “This is something else.”

The woman was in pieces, laid out like chopped vegetables on the bed and decorated by rose petals taken from the bouquet she had been given at the end of her last performance.

“Do you realise who this is?” Faulkner asked.

Phillips could barely recognise the gender of the body parts, let alone determine an identity.

“Who?”

“I think this is Stephanie Bernard. She’s a French opera singer, a soprano.”

Ryan thought of what was playing across the theatres and musical venues and came to the correct conclusion.

“Gianni Schicchi?”

“Yes, she was playing Lauretta. I wanted to go and see it but couldn’t get a ticket,” Faulkner explained.

“You said she was French?” Ryan thought of the cross-jurisdictional complication and immediately hated himself for it.

“Yes,” Faulkner replied. “There was a write-up in The Guardian about the opera coming up to Newcastle as part of a tour of the UK. She was a real emerging talent.”