Cut and Shut by Jonathan Peace

Author:Jonathan Peace [Peace, Jonathan]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2023-01-23T13:00:00+00:00

CHAPTER

TWENTY-SEVEN

The journey from Sanderson’s garage to the Prospect Road police station only took five minutes but to Louise it felt like hours. Sitting at the pelican crossing opposite the Town Hall, waiting for Myrtle Watts to dawdle across, Louise couldn’t help but let out a tut of frustrated displeasure.

‘What?’ Hines said.

‘Why did you come this way? You should have just gone down the Green then left onto Prospect Road.’

‘This way is easier.’

‘How?’

‘It just is.’

Louise wasn’t buying.

‘How? How is it easier?’

Throwing a quick glance at their charge in the back seat, Hines leaned closer, hoping he wouldn’t hear.

‘I don’t have to cross over the road,’ she whispered.

Ahead of the car, Myrtle had finally reached the other side. She gave a wave as Hines started the car rolling forward. Louise waved back.

‘What do you mean… Are you serious?’

‘I don’t like crossing traffic,’ Hines said, ignoring the snort of laughter from behind. ‘Easier to go this way, then I can just turn in without having to wait for traffic to clear.’

‘Fucking women drivers…’

Hines slammed down on the brakes, and in the back, Ben, who had chosen not to wear a seatbelt, was thrown forward so hard that his head hit the back of Hines’ seat. He cried out in pain then slumped back.

‘Ow, you fucking bitch. That fucking hurt.’

‘I think it was meant to,’ Louise said with a smile.

After booking Ben in at the main desk and leaving him briefly in the care of PC Martins, who would take him through to Interview Room 3, Louise and Hines got down to work in what was affectionately known as the pen. This was where the detectives worked. Each had been given their own desk, complete with access to the Police National Computer. Notes were typed up, copied into the computer and filed away. It was a long, laborious process, and if there was any way to speed it up, any shorthand cuts that could be made without drawing too much attention from the higher-ups, then they would be happily employed. For Louise, the only shortcut was making sure her own notes were as thorough and detailed as possible. Copying them from her pocketbook onto the system didn’t take as long, she found, if she had already done most of the work.

Hines, on the other hand, was struggling.

‘Is that an e or an a?’ she asked, holding her pocketbook out for Louise to squint at.

‘A w,’ Louise said, handing the pocketbook back.

Hines peered at it, turned the book round a few times then looked up. ‘That makes more sense,’ she said, then continued to tap away at her keyboard. Louise stood.

‘You nearly finished?’

‘I will have by the time you make a cuppa. Two sugars, if you don’t mind.’

In the small kitchen area on the other side of the pen, Louise filled the kettle and switched it on. She spooned coffee into her Star Wars mug – it bore a photo print of the crew in the Millennium Falcon cockpit on one side, Princess Leia aiming her blaster on the other.

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