Pulling off her sunglasses, Melissa Graham squinted at the victim. ‘Is he dead?’
Umar shrugged. The hovering paramedics told their own story. ‘Yeah.’
‘Holy shit.’ She giggled nervously.
‘Do you know who he is, or, rather, who he was?’
‘No idea.’
Umar pointed at the woman in the red bikini. ‘Or her?’
‘No, sorry.’
‘Do you know who’s in charge here? Who are the organizers?’
‘I’m not really the person to ask, Officer.’ Melissa perched the sunglasses back on her nose. ‘I just came along for the ride, so to speak.’ Half-turning, she pointed to the chinless bloke talking to the girl with the red chest. ‘Will should know, though. He was the one who got me involved in this.’
Umar thought he detected a hint of bitterness in her voice. ‘Okay, thanks.’ Digging out a business card from the pocket of his jeans, he handed it over. ‘This is me. What’s your name?’
‘Melissa . . . Melissa Graham.’
‘Okay, Melissa. You have to stay here now until someone takes a statement.’
‘But I didn’t see anything,’ Melissa complained, ‘and I need to pee.’
‘It shouldn’t take long,’ Umar lied.
‘But I need to pee right now,’ she protested. ‘Otherwise I’m going to look like the woman in that Harvey Nichols advert.’
The policeman looked at her blankly.
‘The advert of the woman pissing herself with excitement at the Harvey Nicks sale?’
Umar shrugged. The upmarket department store was way out of his league. ‘Must’ve missed that one.’ From the corner of his eye, he saw Detective Inspector Julie Postic marching down the empty eastbound lanes of the Strand, her faithful lackey, Sergeant Lawrence Shames, in tow, along with a couple of uniforms who were having to jog to keep up. Postic was already waving her arms in the air and generally asserting her authority.
‘Thank God for that,’ Umar mumbled to himself, carefully plotting an exit route that would keep him away from the beady eyes of the DI. ‘The cavalry have finally arrived.’
‘What?’
‘Never mind.’ Once again, he placed a hand on Melissa’s shoulder. ‘Tell you what, come with me.’ He pointed in the direction of Agar Street. ‘My station is just up there. You can come and use the facilities and then we’ll take a quick statement. Then you can be on your way.’
‘That would be great, thanks.’ With a final glance towards the chinless wonder, Melissa began pushing her bike back through the crowd, towards the pavement. With a broad grin, the sergeant followed on, right behind her.
‘Police. Coming through.’
TWENTY-FIVE
After an hour or so of semi-careful reading, the inspector had sorted the papers from the dead lawyer’s briefcase into three piles. The first was personaclass="underline" a series of letters and statements relating to a two-million-euro mortgage on a property Winters had bought in France. Two million euros was what? Carlyle’s best guess was something like one point seven million quid or thereabouts. One point seven mil. That was a lot for a mere copper, but not necessarily such a big deal for a City lawyer.
The second pile of papers were also personaclass="underline" a series of letters from a legal firm in North London asking for details of Winter’s assets – bank accounts, pensions, property and so on. Apparently, Mrs Giselle Winters – née Aceveda – was seeking a divorce on the grounds of ‘unreasonable behaviour’.
‘Unreasonable behaviour,’ Carlyle mumbled to himself. ‘That doesn’t exactly narrow it down.’ He felt a sudden stab of male solidarity. ‘No wonder the guy was so stressed.’ On the other hand, the disaffected widow must now be sitting pretty.
The final set of papers was presumably what Chris Brennan was after: three copies of unsigned contracts concerning the merger of WBK – Winters Brennan amp; King – with an American legal firm called Austerlitz amp; Co. Nothing particularly interesting as far as Carlyle could see.
‘Here you are.’ He looked up to see Sonia Mason’s head popped round the door. ‘I’ve been looking for you all over the station.’
‘Sorry,’ Carlyle shrugged. ‘I just wanted somewhere quiet to sit and do some reading.’
Mason slipped through the door, waving a set of papers of her own. ‘I’ve been doing some reading too.’
‘Oh?’
‘Yes, your man Winters – very interesting.’ Pulling out a chair, she dropped the documents on the table and sat down opposite him.
Behind her head, Carlyle caught sight of the clock on the wall. Christ, he thought, is that the time? If he wasn’t home in the next forty-five minutes or so, Helen would kill him.
‘Gimme the quick version.’
‘Brian Winters seems to have had a fairly spectacular mid-life crisis, or rather, late mid-life crisis.’
Carlyle watched his mobile vibrating across the desk. He didn’t need to check the screen to know that it was his wife. As the phone’s voicemail kicked in, he eyed Mason. Get on with it, he thought.
‘According to the gossip column in the innkeeper . . .’
‘The what?’
‘It’s a website for lawyers. The name references Lincoln’s Inn, where the legal bods hang out.’
‘Yeah, yeah.’
‘He had set up home on the Cote d’Azur with an escort, was getting a divorce and threatening to scupper his firm’s merger with some American outfit.’
‘Why the latter?’
‘Because, allegedly, he didn’t think he would get enough of a pay-out.’
Money and sex, Carlyle mused. It always came back down to money and sex. In a way that was reassuring. It certainly made life a lot simpler. However, it still didn’t mean that the guy had died of anything other than a bog standard heart attack. His mobile phone started ringing again. Once again, without looking at the screen, he knew that it would be his wife.
You can run, but you can’t hide.
He picked up the handset and hit receive.
‘I’m coming right now.’
‘Good,’ said Helen firmly, ‘and make sure you bring Umar with you.’
He found his sergeant sitting at his desk, chatting away happily to a young blonde girl. It was impossible not to notice that she was wearing nothing more than a flimsy T-shirt and the skimpiest pair of shorts that the inspector had seen in a long time.
‘Managed to tear yourself away from sexyuniforms.com then?’ Carlyle asked as he hovered behind Umar’s chair.
The sergeant chose to ignore the bait. ‘Inspector, this is Melissa Graham.’ The girl smiled at him politely. ‘She was on the bike ride today.’
‘Glad to see you’ve managed to get some clothes on before you came in here,’ Carlyle quipped, gesturing round the office, ‘or the forces of law and order would have ground to a complete halt.’
Melissa’s smile wavered but she said nothing.
‘And the bike ride,’ he asked, ‘how did it go?’
‘Not too good,’ Umar said. ‘A bloke got stabbed.’
‘Not seriously, I hope.’
‘Dead.’
Carlyle looked at the girl and frowned. ‘By her?’
‘No, no,’ said Melissa, blushing violently. ‘I was just-’
‘She was just a witness,’ Umar explained. ‘I was taking a statement.’
Yeah, right, Carlyle thought. Along with an email address and a phone number, you dirty little sod. ‘I see.’ Slowly, he looked around the room. ‘So where are all the other witnesses?’
‘Lawrence Shames and DI Postic are rounding them up now; it looks like it’s gonna be their case.’
Thank God for that. The last thing he wanted at the moment was more on his plate. ‘I’m sure they’ll get to the bottom of it . . . no pun intended.’