The Ardmore Inheritance, Rob Wyllie [best novels for students TXT] 📗

He stood up and edged towards the door. 'That's all good then. Oh, and there's one more thing before I go. It's about the funeral. We want it to be a quiet gathering with just family and close friends. So I'm afraid you won't be able to come, either of you. I hope you don't mind, but I'm sure you understand.'

◆◆◆

Of course, afterwards when Maggie and Jimmy reflected on the outcome of the meeting, they could see very well what was going on. The Overtons, or the Overton-Macallans as they had recently restyled themselves, were forging ahead with a brand new future in Scotland and they wanted as far as possible to sever connections with the past, to somehow wipe it away as if it had never existed. But that didn't really explain why an innocuous private investigator and her assistant, whom they had met on only three previous occasions, should be barred from Elspeth Macallan's funeral. Unless they had something to hide, that was, which made Maggie all the more determined that they should be represented.

The problem was, she could think of only one way that could legitimately come about, and she feared that Jimmy Stewart was not going to like her proposal. And when, after no little trepidation, she told him what she had in mind, her fears were realised.

Chapter 25

Frank was feeling pleased with himself. It was the day of the planned raid on the home of Geordie, the egocentric hacker and street-artist, and for once, and contrary to expectations, he'd managed to get all his ducks in a row from a paperwork perspective. When you were planning one of these raids, especially an armed raid, there was a mountain of forms to be filled in and a barrage of brass-level signatures to be obtained. But because of this, these operations often had the propensity to go tits-up schedule-wise, due to the availability, or more accurately the lack of availability, of the latter. The brass set their own timetables and in particular liked to get out and about, glad-handing with politicians, community leaders and businessmen, and no ACC was going to give up a round of golf just to be in the office to sign a poxy Department 12B chit. But today, by some miracle, he had all the papers on his desk, all neat and tidy in a blue transparent plastic folder with every i dotted and t crossed. The raiding squad would be all ready to go later this evening when, if Geordie followed his normal routine, he would be arriving home from his latest assignment as a cyber-security consultant at an international bank over at Canary Wharf. Naive bastards, they clearly had no idea what sort of guy they were employing.

It had been Ronnie French's idea to postpone the raid until eight o'clock in the evening rather than the six-thirty it had originally been planned for, on the basis that they were more likely to find the Geordie guy on-line and thus have the opportunity to catch him mid-hack, if that was the right way to describe it. Frenchie's reasoning was that most people prepared something to eat and relaxed for a while immediately after returning from work, a reasoning that was hard to argue with, so Frank didn't try. It had also been Frenchie's idea to go in hard with the armed response squad. That particular proposal hadn't surprised Frank, since he knew from previous experience that nothing excited Ronnie more than to pile into a raid with all guns blazing. In fact, nothing excited the somnambulant Ronnie French except the prospect of an armed skirmish, or so it seemed. However, what had really annoyed Frank was that his boss DCI Jill Smart agreed. She had, as was her way, performed a risk assessment of the upcoming operation which concluded that since there was a material chance that the suspect could be armed, then the police should be armed too. Frank for the life of himself couldn't see why some terminally vain computer geek should be more likely to be armed than any other low-life but saw no point in arguing, especially since Jill had undertaken to take care of all the tedious paperwork involved herself. And so it was that at seven-fifty precisely they were assembled at the entrance door of Geordie's block of flats, they being Frank, Ronnie French and two taciturn armed officers in full riot gear, one of whom was equipped with a sturdy battering ram.

'Are we going to smash the front door in too boss?' French asked, pointing at the semi-glazed entrance. 'I think it's safety glass so we should be ok.'

Frank gave him an indulgent smile. 'I know you're desperate for a big rumpus mate, but let's just wait a couple of minutes shall we? There's always a bit of to-ing and fro-ing in these places.'

They didn't have to wait much more than half a minute when a stern-faced middle-aged woman appeared on the pavement alongside them. She shot Frank a disapproving look.

'What's going on here?' she said sharply.

'Nothing to worry about madam,' he said, beaming her a reassuring smile. 'Just a routine police matter, that's all. Tell me, do you live in these flats?'

She nodded. 'Of course I do.'

'And what floor are you on?'

'I'm on the second. Flat twenty-two.'

'Aye ok then. So we'll just come through with you if that's all right. We're heading up to the fourteenth in a minute so we'll be taking the lift. Now off you go and have a nice evening.'

She looked at him uncertainly before complying.

'Right boys, we're in,' Frank said. 'And remember Frenchie, let me knock first before you give the boys the nod to batter his bloody door down. Because the Met has to pay for any damage.'

'Ah come on guv, where's the fun in that?' Ronnie said.

'Don't worry, I'm sure there'll be plenty of fun once we're in.'

Frank had done