Burning Truth by Scarrow Alex

Author:Scarrow, Alex [Scarrow, Alex]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Mystery, Crime, thriller
Amazon: B093X2F2TW
Goodreads: 58143605
Publisher: GrrBooks
Published: 2021-07-18T07:00:00+00:00

He turned back to face his team. ‘Anyone know what this is?’

‘Anarchy sign?’ suggested Sully.

Warren shook his head. ‘No… the A’s middle bar is missing. And anyway the A extends outside the circle.’

‘Where’s that come from?’ asked Lane.

‘It was scrawled on Sutton’s front wall. At the point where the intruder was lingering on the pub’s CCTV footage.’ He showed them his phone screen. ‘It looks like relatively recent graffiti. I think our chap might have been lingering to scrawl that. So, Lane… here’s a task for you, if you want? See if you can work out if this means anything.’

‘Semiology?’ Lane smiled. ‘Interesting. I’ll have that.’

Boyd was about to wrap up the meeting when he noticed Okeke was staring at the symbol on the whiteboard, frowning, her eyes narrowed.

‘Okeke?’

She pressed her lips together. ‘It’s nothing, guv.’

‘Are you sure?’ he queried.

‘Sure,’ she replied.

‘Right. Final thing, everyone. The gardening-party-slash-barbecue-slash-piss-up at mine on Sunday. Do I have any takers?’

The room fell silent.

‘I’ll be there,’ said Okeke eventually. ‘And Jay.’

‘Excellent.’ Boyd smiled, relieved that at least it wouldn’t be a complete no-show. ‘Anyone else?’

The collective murmur from the others, as they stood up and shoved their chairs under the table, could, at best, be described as lukewarm.

‘Okeke, wait a second,’ said Boyd. She lingered beside the conference table. ‘How’s Margot Bajek doing?’

‘I called Lena this morning,’ she replied. ‘Her mother’s stable for now, but still critical. If her lungs become infected it’s… well, it’s all over for her.’ She paused. ‘Guv, that thing you drew on the whiteboard?’

‘Yup? The graffiti?’

‘Last night – I told you this already – when Margot was trying to communicate with me, she raised her arm – perhaps to draw an A. I thought she was trying to air-spell that dog’s name at the time, but maybe…’

‘She was drawing that shape?’ he completed.

Okeke nodded.

Boyd took a moment to consider the implications of that. If there was a link – and that was a bit of a leap, to be fair – then it would have to suggest that she knew the same piece of information that the killer did. And what did that mean?

His eyes settled on the small pile of newspapers spread across the conference table. He looked thoughtfully at the picture of the fire engine, next to the overgrown wall, the faint outline of the symbol sprayed across the flint wall.

‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Maybe there’s something in that.’

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