Resolutions by Jane A. Adams Read Free Book Online

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    â€˜Oh, you’re turning into a soft southerner, that’s your problem,’ Alec laughed, blowing on his hands to warm them before he started the engine. ‘No, the weather’s turned mean this morning and they reckon it’s in for the week. Naomi sends her love, by the way, and you’re invited to dinner on Sunday.’
    â€˜Give mine to her,’ Mac said. ‘And thanks, but if I can get back home at the weekend, I’m going to.’
    Alec nodded. ‘Don’t count on it,’ he said. ‘Things start moving, we’ll be lucky if we get lunch anywhere.’
    Mac looked at his friend, who was now concentrating on pulling out into the traffic and not looking his way. It seemed to be taking a lot of concentration considering the lack of other vehicles.
    â€˜Alec?’
    â€˜Yes.’
    â€˜What’s happened since last night?’
    Alec grimaced. ‘DCI Wildman,’ he said. ‘As of this morning, he and his team are leading the investigation. Rest of us are now other ranks.’
    â€˜Wildman.’ Mac closed his eyes. ‘Someone up there doesn’t like me and I don’t think I mean God.’
    Alec managed a laugh. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘we knew there’d be someone from the taskforce coming in. That was inevitable. We just don’t have the resources, never did; that was the problem last time.’
    â€˜Oh, I know, but whatever spin you try and put on it, any scenario that includes Wildman is a bad one. I thought the man was an arse and he thought I was an idiot long before the Cara Evans case, and we neither of us took the trouble to, well, to hide that.’
    â€˜No, I remember. Look, Mac, we just do our jobs, let him do his, and, well, keep it zipped.’
    â€˜I will if he does.’ Mac subsided into silence for a moment or two, but it couldn’t last. ‘He’s more than an arse, Alec, he’s . . . Does he know I’m here?’
    â€˜Oh yes,’ Alec nodded, ‘and he’s waiting for any excuse, Mac, remember that. Don’t give him one. Right,’ he interrupted as Mac began to object again, ‘glove compartment, two files. Our assignments for this morning, well away from you know who. Get yourself up to speed.’
    Reluctant but glad to have the distraction, Mac fished the folders out. One was familiar to him, one was not. Philip Rains had been in prison since before Mac had left for Frantham. Thomas Peel had blackmailed him for years and, when his usefulness as a distraction had become greater than his usefulness as a source of income, he had thrown him to the proverbial lions via an anonymous phone call to one of the crime hotlines and a brown envelope containing some particularly nasty pictures of Rains and two young boys.
    Alec glanced over. ‘Got a ten o’clock appointment,’ he said. ‘Prison governor reckons he’s been a model inmate, but, of course, he’s getting all that personal attention, isn’t he?’
    Mac nodded, understanding what Alec meant. Rains could never be part of the general prison population. He’d have been dead within the month. Less, probably. Someone would have known who he was and what he’d done and taken it upon themselves to do something about it. Mac had a sneaking suspicion that Alec thought that was exactly as it should be, though unlike some of their colleagues – Wildman included – he’d never voiced the opinion out loud.
    He turned back to the file, noting that Rains was due for a parole hearing in six months and would have every reason to be behaving himself. ‘Have his family stayed in contact?’
    Alec shook his head. ‘There was never a suggestion he’d touched his own kids, but the wife took the children and left the country. She’s Canadian, I think. Not British, anyway, and I understand she’s gone back to her parents. Rains always reckoned Peel threatened his