Ambush by Nick Oldham Read Free Book Online Page B

He’s got a queasy tum at the best of times.’
    â€˜I can imagine, too,’ Santiago said. She knew Tope and had liaised with him earlier in the year over crimes and criminals in the Canary Islands – and had survived the same car bomb attack at the hands of the vicious Albanian gangster, Aleksander Bashkim.
    Flynn sipped the whisky and said pensively, ‘Craig Alford, dead.’
    â€˜Did you ask Jerry what Alford was currently investigating?’
    â€˜Didn’t get a chance, but not really my business, I suppose.’
    â€˜Sounds like he’s into something, ruffled some feathers.’
    â€˜It does,’ Flynn agreed.
    â€˜And moving to the other issue of the night … why would a scumbag armed robber have a photograph of you in his apartment?’
    â€˜Let me look again.’ Flynn waggled his fingers at Santiago, who picked up her phone, found the photo, handed it over.
    It was definitely a photograph, a head-shot of Steve Flynn, about passport size. It was quite old, well over ten years. As he looked at it, something dawned on him.
    It showed him with quite long, slightly unkempt hair, wearing an open-necked shirt and with very obvious stubble around his chin.
    â€˜This is an old warrant card photograph,’ he declared, ‘from my drug squad days – hence the haircut, clothes and lack of shaving—’
    â€˜And style,’ Santiago quipped.
    â€˜That too,’ he agreed. ‘So the mystery is not only why did he have it, but also how did he get it?’ Flynn pondered and tried to get his mind to work. It did not seem to want to solve anything. He’d had a long day with a charter, then the evening excitement of busting up a robbery had made it all drag out even more. He had a day trip later that morning, so he knew he needed to be properly rested for it. The party was due on board at ten until four, and before they even set foot on deck he had to prepare the boat. The latest he could start was eight a.m.
    â€˜There was a phone number scribbled on the back, a mobile,’ she said.
    â€˜Did the detective ring it?’
    â€˜Yes … dead. A burner, probably,’ she said, meaning a pay-as-you-go disposable.
    â€˜Right.’
    Santiago watched Flynn’s face, saw his eyelids droop.
    She took her phone back and said, ‘Bed.’
    â€˜Anything?’
    Jerry Tope looked over his shoulder at Rik Dean, who was standing in the doorway of Craig Alford’s tiny study on the first floor.
    Tope was sitting at the desk, still in his forensic gear, latex gloves on, with Alford’s personal laptop open in front of him. Four other laptops, two iPads and four iPhones had also been found in the house, belonging to the various members of the family. They were stacked on the desk and had been bagged as evidence for Tope and other techies to look at later. For the time being he had occupied himself with what he assumed was Alford’s own laptop. Tope knew the DCI also had a desk computer, laptop and iPad at work which would all need investigating.
    Tope shook his head in answer to Dean’s query. ‘This looks like a computer the family all had access to,’ he said. ‘Thousands of photos stored on it, holidays and such like … and it looks like Craig was trying to write a novel, working title
The Great British Cop Thriller
. Done one chapter … looks pretty good,’ he said sadly. ‘I’ve glanced through his personal emails, but nothing of interest stands out just yet, all crap and spam, mainly.’
    â€˜When was the computer last accessed?’
    â€˜Five p.m., day before yesterday.’
    â€˜No one’s been on it since?’
    â€˜Not that I can tell.’
    â€˜Do you think this has anything to do with Operation Aquarius, Jerry?’ Dean asked.
    â€˜Has to be a possibility, I suppose … we’ve been following some really bad people, but until yesterday morning none of them