(2006) Cleanskin by Val McDermid

Author:Val McDermid [McDermid, Val]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harper Collins Publ. UK
Published: 2011-05-30T01:11:12+00:00

CHAPTER TWELVE

I WAS AT HEATHROW AIRPORT, waiting for Stella to emerge from customs and immigration, when I got the call. The clerk on the other end of the phone didn't have much info. All she could say was that a body had been found in Paddington Basin and that she had been told to let me know about it.

'Do they want me at the scene?' I asked.'Yes. Soon as you can get there, my screen says.'

'I'll be there,' I said, ending the call. I'd come all the way out here to get Stella and I wasn't going back empty-handed. She wouldn't be much longer, and if she felt up to it, she could always come to the scene with me. It was on the way back to her house in St John's Wood, after all.

I hadn't told Stella I would meet her. I'd got the flight details from her secretary, not from her. I wanted it to be a surprise. So there was no way I was going to walk away right then, not just for a dead body that wasn't going anywhere.

Within a couple of minutes of the phone alert, I saw Stella walking down the concourse towards me. It was a rare treat for me to be able to watch her without her knowing, and I took pleasure in letting my eyes follow the easy swing of her walk. Her hair was pulled back in a pony tail and she looked a bit bleary-eyed, but given that she'd just got off a night flight, she seemed pretty alert. I couldn't help myself. I was grinning from ear to ear.

She was only a few yards away when she spotted me. Her eyebrows shot up in surprise, but the smile followed so fast I knew it was real. I stepped forward and we kissed like friends, cheek to cheek. 'Wow, Andy,' she said, putting down her suitcase and hugging me. 'My very own police escort.'

I let my arms slip around her, smelling lavender and feeling the warmth of her flesh. '"Working together for a safer London,"' I said. 'That's our motto.'

I grabbed the handle of her wheelie suitcase and fell into step beside her. 'Flight OK?' I asked.

'It's over. That's the best thing you can say about any flight,' she said. 'So, how have you been managing without me?'

'Andy the man, or Andy the cop?'

She tucked her arm through mine. 'We're in a public place, Andy. Better stick to the cop angle for now.'

As we made our way to the car, I filled her in on what she'd missed while she'd been watching bodies rotting in the States. By the time I'd finished, we were on the motorway back to London. 'Interesting,' she said. 'Jack Farrell kills himself and the genie is let out of the bottle.'

'Some genie,' I snorted. 'If I had three wishes, I wouldn't spend them like that.'

'You sure? It gets a lot of garbage off the streets.'

She had a point. 'I don't mind losing any of them, it's true.

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