by P. F. Ford
‘That sounds ominous,’ said Slater. ‘What’s the bad news.’
‘This afternoon I had to attend a meeting.’
‘What does that mean?’
‘I was asked to explain my actions over the last week or so regarding certain CCTV and ANPR searches.’
‘Oh, crap!’ said Slater. ‘Does that mean what I think it means?’
‘If you mean, “is there a big boot headed towards my arse?” I think that’s probably a fair assessment.’
‘Bloody hell, Stella, I didn’t mean for this to happen.’
He realised he’d just used her first name, but if she objected, she didn’t say.
‘Oh, don’t blame yourself. I knew what I was getting into.’
‘How bad will it be?’
‘We’re reconvening tomorrow afternoon.’
‘Have you been suspended from duty?’
Robbins sighed. ‘They call it gardening leave,’ she said. ‘It’s not quite as bad, but it doesn’t sound promising, does it?’
‘Seriously, though, what’s the outcome likely to be?’
‘The worst-case scenario is I get my marching orders.’
Slater felt empty inside. ‘Christ, what will you do if that happens?’
‘Well, first, I’ll cry my eyes out, then I’ll take my mum’s dog for a walk.’
‘I don’t know how you can joke about it.’
‘Who’s joking?’ she said. ‘Didn’t you tell me there’s always a silver lining? Well, that’s the one I’m clinging to at the moment. Me, the dog, and somewhere peaceful to walk. It usually works.’
Slater was struggling to think of something he could say that would make things better but, of course, he couldn’t.
‘I know it sounds pretty trite, but I’m sorry, Stella. I never wanted anything like this to happen.’
‘Maybe it won’t be so bad,’ she said, with false bravado. ‘Perhaps they’ll slap my wrist and tell me not to be naughty again.’
Slater could only hope she was right. ‘Look, you will give me a call and let me know what happens, won’t you?’ he asked.
‘You’re not going to offer me a job, are you?’
‘Ha! I wish. There’s barely enough work here for one now we’ve handed this case over to you lot. You will call me, though, right?’
‘D’you really want to know?’
‘Yes, I do. I feel responsible.’
‘Please don’t. I always make my own decisions, and I made this one. Any blame should be attached to my foolish pride, not to you.’
‘Maybe,’ he said, ‘but is it foolish to have principles? I’ve done the same sort of thing myself in the past.’
‘Yes, so I’ve heard. No offence, but that’s not exactly a comforting thought.’
‘I was just saying there’s nothing wrong with having principles. I have them.’
‘Yes, exactly,’ she said. ‘And look where it’s got you.’
‘Ooh, that’s a bit below the belt.’
‘You’re right, it is. I’m sorry, I guess I’m not at my best right now.’
‘That’s okay, I get it,’ said Slater.
‘I’ll let you know when I know,’ she said.
The line went dead, and Slater felt another rush of guilt, but then he thought about it and realised he hadn’t asked her to do this for him. As she had said, it had been her idea.
Even so, he still felt terrible about it.
Chapter 39
Someone was hammering on Slater’s front door, and he wondered who it could be at 9 a.m. on a Saturday. He swung the door open to find Watson standing on his front step.
‘Sam! You won’t believe how pleased I am to see you,’ he said. ‘Thank God you’re alright.’
He took a step towards her and was about to place his hands on her shoulders to kiss her cheek when he realised her face was telling him maybe she wasn’t equally pleased to see him. He hastily withdrew his hands and took a step back.
‘Sam? What’s the matter?’
‘What’s the matter? What do you think is the matter?’
‘Come in,’ he said. ‘You’re obviously upset about something.’
He stepped back to let her in, and as she passed him, she spoke again. ‘Yes, I am upset about something,’ she said. ‘And that something is you!’
‘What have I done?’
‘I told you to leave me alone, to stay out of it.’
‘Yeah, but—’
‘Not only do you keep on calling me, you even had the nerve to go and harass my sister!’
‘I didn’t harass anyone,’ said Slater, indignantly. ‘You wouldn’t answer my calls, and I was worried about you. What else was I supposed to do?’
‘You could have done as I asked and minded your own business. Who do you think you are?’
‘I’m the bloke who spent two weeks in Thailand with you, and then lent you my car to get home, that’s who I am.’
‘That doesn’t mean you own me.’
‘I don’t think I own you, and if anyone has a right to be indignant it’s me, not you!’
‘You should have kept out of it. Why do you think I didn’t answer your calls?’
‘Keep out of it? How the hell could I do that? You seem to forget you used a car exactly like mine as a decoy. I had two police officers turn up showing me photographs of what appeared to be my car blown to bits! Did you think I wouldn’t want to know what the hell was going on?’
‘You don’t know how much trouble you’ve caused me,’ she snapped.
‘The trouble I’ve caused you?’ said Slater, incredulously. ‘Give me a break. I’m the one who got dragged into a murder investigation. I was a possible suspect, for Christ’s sake. And, apart from all that, as far as I knew you still had my car, so it seemed quite reasonable to assume you may have been hurt. I was worried about you.’
‘But I wasn’t hurt!’
‘How was I supposed to know that?’
‘I told you over the phone. Wasn’t that good enough?’
‘It might have been if you’d explained, but you told me almost nothing.’
‘I couldn’t tell you anything. My boss is going potty because of you and that DI Robbins. I suppose it was your idea to get her to poke her nose in after the case was closed, was it?’
‘Maybe if you hadn’t used a car just like mine, with my registration plates ...’
‘Oh, don’t worry, I realise what a mistake that was!’
‘So why did you?’
‘Because that man followed me all the way back to London from Gatwick.’
‘You mean the Russian guy, Lenkov?’
She nodded. ‘We believe he’s the guy who planted the bomb that killed my sister. We made sure he knew I was looking for him in the hope he would try to do the same to me. As he knew which car I was driving, we thought the best way to draw him out into the open would be if I used the same car again, and sure enough, we were right, he followed me.’
‘But why didn’t you tell me all this before? If I’d known, I wouldn’t have needed to keep calling. I might even have been able to steer Robbins away.’
‘I couldn’t tell you. It just wasn’t possible.’
‘You said, “we”. So, you weren’t acting alone, then?’
‘Of course not.’
‘But if you wanted to bump him off, why not do it quietly in London? Why bring him all the way down here to my patch?’
‘You don’t own Winchester. It’s not your patch.’
‘You know what I mean. This is my area, and anyway, it was inevitable the police would track the number plates back to me. You should have known that.’
‘It wasn’t supposed to play out the way it did. The police shouldn’t even have known about it.’
‘It doesn’t matter how you dress it up, Sam. You used a mock-up of my car to murder a guy, and then you kept me in the dark. You can hardly blame me for being pissed off.’
She shook her head. ‘We didn’t commit murder!’
&
nbsp; ‘I saw the photographs of the body. Are you trying to tell me that was some elaborate hoax that managed to fool a detective inspector and a pathologist?’
‘He wasn’t supposed to die.’
Slater studied her face. He wasn’t convinced. ‘According to Robbins, the bomb was detonated by another device that was already under the car.’
‘Do you seriously think a guy who plants bombs for a living would fall for that? The second device was his. We didn’t know it, but he always plants a smaller device as a failsafe in case the main one doesn’t detonate.
‘We watched, and waited, while he planted the bomb. We even filmed him doing it, then we moved in to arrest him. The idea was to grab him, remove the bomb, drive the car back to London, and no one would have known a thing. It should have been a simple, straightforward arrest, but that’s where it all went pear-shaped. We didn’t realise he would rather blow himself up.’
Slater still wasn’t sure what to believe. ‘He pressed the button when he saw you coming?’
She nodded. ‘It made it a bit difficult to drive the car back and pretend nothing had happened.’
‘So, you decided to run off and leave me to carry the can,’ said Slater.
‘It wasn’t like that. There was no time to do anything. We just had to get out before the police arrived.’
‘Yeah, like I said, leaving me to carry the can.’
‘Look, I’m sorry. You have to believe me when I say there was nothing I could tell you. It’s my job. The police should have been more thorough. If they had been, they would have known it wasn’t your car.’
‘If you hadn’t left the number plates, they would have had to be more thorough,’ said Slater, ‘but in the circumstances, I don’t blame them at all. They did the right thing.’
She said nothing, so Slater continued. ‘You should have told me.’
‘I have to follow orders. I couldn’t tell anyone.’
‘So, you do work for MI5?’
‘I can hardly deny it now, can I?’
‘Was Norm right about you being undercover when we first met?’
She nodded. ‘Yes, I’m sorry.’
‘Has it all been a sham, then?’
‘Sorry?’
‘You and me? Did I mean something to you? Or, was I just a part of your alter-ego’s background story?’
She smiled a sad smile.
‘When Bradshaw first appointed you, I didn’t know if I could trust you, and even if I had known, I couldn’t have said anything.’
Slater wasn’t quite sure if should be angry, or sad, or what!
‘I have to admit you were bloody good,’ he said. ‘I had no idea you were playing me all that time.’
‘It wasn’t like that, at all. I liked you straight away. Believe me there were some nights in those hotel rooms when I would happily have come to your room.’
‘You never said.’
‘Nor did you.’
‘I was trying to be professional,’ said Slater.
‘So was I. And I couldn’t afford to take the risk. I couldn’t be certain about you, and if I had dropped my guard …’
‘So, what changed?’
‘When Bradshaw was brought down, I knew for sure you were one of the good guys.’
‘So, Thailand?’
‘Was one of the best times I’ve ever had,’ she said. ‘I just wish I could have told you everything.’
Slater thought about Thailand, and her sister, and the cute little girl he had met.
‘Well, I know it all now, don’t I? We could always start again.’
She shook her head, slowly. ‘I don’t think so.’
‘If it’s the job, you could quit.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘I like you a lot, but I love my job. I would probably end up resenting you, and I wouldn’t want that.’
‘You’re saying that’s it, then? We’re finished?’
‘I’m sorry.’
She walked over to stand inches from him, reached forward, and gently kissed him on the lips. Then she turned and walked across to his front door where she turned to offer another said smile.
‘Try to remember the good times, and don’t be angry with me,’ she said.
He watched, sadly, as she slipped through the door and pulled it closed behind her.
* * *
It had been twenty minutes since Watson had left. As he sipped at a cup of tea, Slater stared blankly out of the window. He felt empty. He could think of about a dozen things he could, and probable should, have said but, of course, these things never come to mind at the right time, do they?
These last few days had been a serious test for his new adult self and, all things considered, he supposed he had handled the situation pretty well. He thought it was even possible that, in a couple of days or so, he might be able to convince himself there were positives to be taken from it all. Right now, though, it didn’t feel that way.
As he stared absently through the window at nothing in particular, he found he was thinking about how it was he could never get it right when it came to women. Watson had certainly been different, and for a while there he had even thought they might have a future together but, here he was, on his own again.
He concluded perhaps Norman was right, and he had a problem making a commitment. Even if it wasn’t him, this latest entanglement had left him feeling bruised and battered enough to decide he needed a rest. He resolved he would avoid all women until further notice. Maybe he would even become a confirmed bachelor. At least then he couldn’t get it wrong again, could he?
His thoughts were interrupted by another knock on the front door, although this time it was a far gentler sound. He approached the door somewhat gingerly and hesitated before he opened it, wondering who it might be. He held his breath and swung the door open.
The woman standing before him was wearing jeans, wellies, a waxed jacket, and an over-sized bobble hat. He had never seen this particular woman dressed in this way, so it was a second or two before he recognised her. Then she smiled and that confirmed it.
‘Stella! What are you doing here?’
‘You look as if you were expecting someone else.’
‘Not really. I had a visitor earlier, but I don’t think I’ll be seeing her again.’
‘Would that be your girlfriend, by any chance?’
‘If you mean Watson, I think we can safely say it’s official she’s definitely not my girlfriend.’
‘Oh, I’m sorry. You’ve had a rough morning, then?’
‘Yeah, you could say that.’
‘That woman has a lot to answer for. She’s the one who kicked up a stink about me at work.’
‘Actually, I don’t think that was her. It was someone higher up the food chain.’
‘You’re defending her, now?’
‘Let’s say, having spoken to her this morning, I have a much better understanding of her situation. It was very difficult for her.’
‘You have changed your tune.’
‘Yeah, I guess I have. Anyway, let’s not talk about her. What can I do for you?’
‘You did ask me to let you know what happened, didn’t you?’
‘Oh God, yeah, I did, didn’t I? But you could have called. I didn’t expect you to come all the way over here especially. Do you want to come in?’
‘Actually, I came over here because there are some woods the other side of Tinton. I’ve walked the dog there before, and I can assure you it’s a great place to walk for an hour or two.’
Slater thought for a second. The way he was feeling he wasn’t sure he wanted company. He looked over her head at the weather. Although it was a chilly morning, the sun was breaking through, and he knew the fresh air would probably do him good.
‘You say you’ve got the dog with you?’
‘He’s in the back of the car, that’s why I won’t come in.’
‘What sort of dog is it?’
‘A Spaniel. He’s quite friendly.’
‘Is
this after you cried your eyes out? You did say that was the first thing you said you would do, didn’t you?’
Her smile widened.
‘I’m not telling you what happened unless you come for a walk.’
Slater thought some more.
‘And you reckon this is good therapy, right?’ he asked.
‘It always works for me.’
‘Will it work for me?’
‘Why don’t you come and find out? I might even let you buy that breakfast you owe me.’
Slater remembered his resolution about avoiding women, set just a few minutes ago.
‘It’ll be a bit late for breakfast.’
‘Alright, you can buy me brunch, or lunch, or whatever you want to call it.’
‘What about the dog?’
‘Oh, he won’t mind. You can buy him lunch, too, if you like.’
Slater made his mind up. After all, he hadn’t said anything about avoiding Spaniels, had he?
# # END # #
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