Whisper For The Reaper, Jack Gatland [good books for high schoolers txt] 📗

skip. There was no crime scene tape, as according to DCI Freeman, there’d been no crime scene there. And therefore forensics hadn’t bothered to visit.

As Declan walked back to his car, he stopped, noticing something glinting on the gravel floor. Walking over to it, he saw it was the coin that he’d thrown, that Karl had been too busy watching to realise that it was nothing more than a lure. The number 1 faced upwards on the surface of the coin.

Heads.

Declan almost laughed at this. Even without the fight, Karl had still lost and, no longer rigged, the coin toss had fallen in Declan’s favour. Picking it off the ground, he placed it in his pocket as he continued to the Audi, climbing in. His phone, left on the passenger seat, was flashing. Picking it up, he saw he had a new message from DCI Freeman.

As he read it, he smiled.

Billy was sitting in a booth at the Eight Club when Rufus Harrington arrived, all smiles.

‘William!’ he extorted as he sat facing his new hire. ‘I see you’re in your suit and tie? Not needed, old chum. We’re far more casual in the office.’

‘Thanks for meeting with me,’ Billy replied. ‘I wanted to say this face to face, as you’ve been so kind.’

Harrington leaned back, staring at the ceiling in mock despair.

‘Dear God, you’ve returned home, haven’t you?’ he said. ‘That’s why you’re in your best Savile Row.’

Billy smiled. ‘I’m a copper, Rufus,’ he replied. ‘I just needed to be reminded of it.’

‘You sure you’re making the right decision?’ Rufus looked back at Billy now. ‘You’re losing a lot of money, of stock options here.’

Billy smiled. ‘It was never about the money,’ he said. ‘Thanks for the opportunity.’

‘Hey, it’s always there, for when you realise this was a big mistake,’ Rufus grinned as Billy rose from the booth and walked to the entrance. ‘But at least this way I know my parking fines can be squashed.’

‘Dream on,’ Billy laughed as he left, looking at his watch.

He was late for work.

When the Temple Inn offices had first been offered to the City Police, they were part of a reciprocal deal for police security. The deal had been long forgotten now but the premises, grandfathered into the deeds meant that in this maze of barrister chambers and dinner halls, of courtyards and of pillared walkways there was a part of a small red bricked building off King’s Bench Walk that were City Police offices. Used as nothing more than file storage for the last fifteen years, it had been left ‘as is’, meaning there were no upgrades to the networks or the wiring, and the furniture was two decades out of date.

It was home.

But recently it had been renovated as The City Police, realising that they had a good thing here had renegotiated the deal with Temple Inn, or to give the official title, The Honourable Society of the Inner Temple, one of the four ‘Inns of Court’ in London, four professional associations for Barristers and Judges in the city, and an area of land set up by the Knights Templar almost a thousand years earlier.

The Knights Templar were gone now, but the Last Chance Saloon hadn’t, yet.

Declan had parked his Audi in its usual spot and stared up at the red bricked building. From the outside, nothing had changed, but the last time he’d entered it, he’d been handcuffed, and the last time he exited it had been via the roof. In part, showing these flaws in the structure had been one reason for the refurbishment; he just hoped that things hadn’t changed too much.

He’d also expected not to return here, but the message from Freeman had been pretty convincing; Declan and the team, working on their own initiative, had solved a vicious murder enquiry, and were due for a commendation. There was no mention of the fact that Karl escaped, as Whitehall most likely knew the full story, anyway.

Taking a deep breath, Declan entered the building. Before, when he walked in, he found himself in a narrow corridor, with forensics to the side; now he found himself in a police waiting room, a desk sergeant, a sturdy-looking woman in her fifties, grey hair pulled into a bun, watching him from behind a glass windowed counter. He didn’t recognise her, but she obviously knew him as she buzzed the door to the side, which opened.

‘This is new,’ he said, opening it.

‘Your ID will open that once you receive it,’ the desk sergeant replied. ‘There’ll be a sergeant on shift here during working hours. The rest of the time, it’s keys and passes only.’ With that she looked back to her paper, introductions seemingly not needed. Shrugging, and not keen to continue the conversation himself, Declan continued down the corridor. To the side, he could see three rooms, one of which had the door open, revealing a morgue table.

At least some things don’t change.

Walking up the stairs, Declan found himself on familiar ground now; the offices were still open plan, but the briefing room was double the size, the interview room now missing. Besides this, there was a new office next door to Monroe’s one; a larger corner office, too. Declan had heard that the department was gaining a Detective Superintendent, and he wondered how Monroe felt about this, considering the Last Chance Saloon was his baby.

There were still desks in the middle of the office, but now there was a section of wall that seemed to be built out of monitors. This had to be the new and updated cyber crime section; Declan hoped that they’d at least updated the fibre optics and the cables, as Billy had always been complaining about the lag. Declan also wondered who they’d convinced to join them to run it, with Billy now gone.

‘Good, isn’t it?’ Monroe said as he emerged from the briefing room. ‘Feels like a real department.’

‘Where’s the interview room?’ Declan asked. Monroe pointed upwards.

‘Next floor up,’ he