Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set), Blake Banner [reading in the dark TXT] 📗

“Oh, you have, this afternoon.”

“What?”

“You kindly left it on your gin and tonic glass. I rushed it to the lab. The latest technology is very fast, when you have access to it. Less than four hours. And your profile matches that left at Katie’s apartment. You are the Jewish guy she was sleeping with, that Sadiq hated so much.”

He covered his face with his hands. “The fucking gin and tonic…!”

Chiddester spoke suddenly, staring at Hastings with crazy eyes.

“So you killed my little girl…”

SEVENTEEN

Caulfield got to his feet suddenly and strode away across the large room with his hands behind his back. The drapes were closed, so instead of looking out at the dark street, he stopped dead and looked down at his feet. Eventually he turned and stared hard at the back of Hasting’s head.

“The damage you have done the party is incalculable, Nigel. I will disown you completely. Your actions are beneath contempt. How you could put the party at risk in this way, it is beyond words.”

Dehan was nodding, “Yeah, because that’s what’s important. Screw the fact that he murdered a young woman and destroyed her family. Hey, that’s collateral damage in the all important political war, right, Caulfield? What counts here is that this schmuck put the Party at risk. That is the real crime.”

Caulfield stared at her for a moment, then at Chiddester, who seemed to have gone into a trance. Slowly, grotesquely, the politician seemed to claw his way out of Caulfield’s face. “You are absolutely right, Mrs. Stone. I have expressed myself in a very regrettable way. Politics gets to the most human of us eventually. Lord Chiddester, you have my deepest sympathy, and naturally the Labour Party will do everything in its power to help…”

Chiddester didn’t look at him. He growled at an empty space a few feet in front of his face. “I don’t need your help. My daughter is dead. Nothing can ever change that.” He turned to look at Hastings. “And that man killed her, in the service of the toxic, twisted culture at the heart of your party.” He pointed a trembling finger at Caulfield. “You are as responsible as he is. You may as well have pulled the trigger yourself. She was killed trying to expose your sick culture of totalitarian Marxism and your grotesque allegiance to Islamic extremism. You are a traitor to your country, a traitor to your people, a traitor to democracy and complicit in the murder of a good, beautiful girl. I hope you rot in hell, Caulfield!”

Caulfield had gone white. “Steady on there, Chiddester…”

Chiddester’s face flushed suddenly crimson. “If you think you are going use this sniveling piece of shit as a scapegoat, and walk away from your crimes scot free, you are sadly deluded! I am going to destroy you, and your party! There will not be another Labour government as long as I live!” He raised his arm and his hand was trembling with rage. “I will make it my business to expose all of your treachery, your treason, your crimes against the people. How stupid do you think the British public is?” Suddenly he was shouting, almost screaming. “What fucking inferences do you think they will draw, when they read it in the papers, when they see it on the national news, that Katie Ellison was murdered by a member of your filthy party of treasonous, anti-Semitic lackeys to the Islamic State, because she was going to uncover your ties to Marxist groups and Islamic fundamentalists? What inference do you think they will draw, Caulfield?”

His voice stopped abruptly and a ringing silence was left in its place. He moved across the room and lowered himself onto the sofa.

Caulfield stared at him in what looked like genuine shock. After a moment, he stammered. “But, he was working alone, Chiddester. You must see that. The Labour Party would never sanction an operation like that… You can’t drag the whole party into this. We had no knowledge.”

“You created the conditions for it to happen. You seeded the rot, you fostered the madness, you created the culture of apologism for Islamic atrocities. You and your spineless, power-grubbing supra-nationalists. Get out of my house, you make me sick.”

Hastings suddenly spoke up. “Hang on a second. What about these two? They murdered Sadiq. The deal was they kept their mouths shut and we didn’t go after the Je… after Mrs. Stone for killing Sadiq!”

I smiled at Caulfield. “Boy, you are going to be a big loss to the march of civilization.”

He didn’t smile back. “He has a point.”

“What do you suggest, Caulfield?”

He didn’t answer me, he spoke to Chiddester.

“Look, for God’s sake, Chiddester, you’re talking about tearing apart the whole political fabric of the country. Let this couple go home. After all, it seems that Mrs. Stone was in fact acting in self-defense. There is no need to prosecute them, let them have their lives. Sadiq has paid for his crime, Nigel must pay for his, and we’ll see to that. But for God’s sake, let’s do some damage limitation and leave it at that…”

Dehan looked at me. “He wants to let us have our lives, Stone. Is that what they call magnanimity?”

Chiddester spoke before I could answer. “Damage limitation? What I am talking about, you disgusting little man, is uprooting the festering roots of the poisoned ivy you have seeded in our society. I am talking about tearing them up and showing them to the people, in all their horrific ugliness, so that the likes of you will never come to power again!”

He looked at me and I nodded. He stood and walked to the fireplace, where he pressed a bell in the wall. A moment later the door opened and the man who had let us in said, “Yes, M’Lord?”

“Bring