The Murder Exchange by Simon Kernick Read Free Book Online Page B

a graduate, and, like most of
us, he's still got a lot to learn. Unlike most of us, he
recognizes it, and it means he's not as confident as
he could be. He'd only been promoted out of
uniform three months earlier, and apart from Rudi,
the casual killer and carjacker, this was his first ii,urdcr case. It was also the first time we'd worked
together.
    I shrugged. Tve been in the game a lot longer,
which makes it a lot easier to handle people like
her. Remember, you're the one who's the boss. With
the cocky ones it can be easy to forget.'
    He nodded thoughtfully. At that moment, he
reminded me of a contestant from that TV
programme Faking It. One month to turn a good
looking Home Counties college boy into a Met
detective. He was working hard to master the
ropes, to make a good impression, but he didn't
look a natural.
    He turned to me, the concern replaced by determined
zeal, the kind you sometimes see on the
faces of door-to-door missionaries. 'I let her get me
on the wrong foot. That was the problem. I didn't
do enough to make her show me respect. It won't
happen again.'
    55
1 know it won't/ I said, patting him on the
shoulder. Tou work with me, you'll be Dirty Harry
in no time.'
    He pulled out of the parking space. Teah, right.'
    Roy Fowler lived in a modern, showy-looking
development complex near Finsbury Park. It's
what these days they like to call a gated community,
although there usually tends to be very
little community-wise about them. We were
stopped at the main gates by a uniformed doorman
who was well past retirement age and looked like
he'd have trouble stopping a runaway skateboard
let alone a shadowy intruder. We showed him our
credentials and were waved into the car park in
front of the five six-storey buildings that were
arranged in a semi-circle around the well-kept, if
rather dull, communal gardens. Fowler lived in
apartment number 12 which was in the second
building on the left.
    But if he wasn't at work, he wasn't at home
either. We buzzed on his intercom for several
minutes but didn't get an answer. I phoned the
Arcadia and double-checked the address with
Elaine Toms. It was the right one. Fowler still
hadn't turned up at the club either, a fact that was
beginning to irritate me and her.
    We sat in the car and waited for ten minutes
without result, then decided to make our way back
to the station. It had been an unproductive morning
and Benin was beginning to look depressed, as if it
had only just dawned on him that life in CID was a
lot less interesting than it looked on the telly.
    56
It was as we were coming out of Fowler's
complex that I saw it. A dark blue Range Rover
driving by just in front of us. It only passed our
field of vision for a couple of seconds at most but I
noticed straight away that it had holes in the
paintwork and industrial taping over two of
the windows. It kept going and I memorized the
number plate as Berrin pulled out, heading
f]ir other way.
    'Did you see that car?' I asked him.
    Berrin is not the most observant man in the
world. 'What car?' was his reply.
    I thought about it for a few seconds. Who'd be
daft enough to be driving around in a bullet-ridden
Range Rover in broad daylight? But those holes
cLJii'l look like they'd been made by anything else
- what else could have made them? - and, as I've
said before, you should never underestimate the
stupidity of criminals. It was probably wasting
someone's time but I took my mobile from my
pocket and phoned the station to report a
suspicious vehicle, giving its location and possible
route.
    'Do you want to turn round and go after it?' said
Berrin, looking like his depression was lifting.
    'It's probably nothing. Let's leave it for the
uniforms. I need to get something to eat.'
    'What do you think? Do you reckon he's flown the
coop?'
    The loud, confident voice belonged to DCI Knox,
the big boss. No question of him ever losing control
of an interview. Berrin and I were sat in his office,
    57
on the other side of his imposing desk,