The Inspector Walter Darriteau Murder Mysteries - Books 1-4 by David Carter (best finance books of all time .txt) 📕

22.20. In the Greenwood flat twenty miles away they were just getting up and dressed. Ten minutes later she saw Greg out with an embrace in the hallway.

‘Sign her up straight away,’ insisted Greg. ‘Don’t muck about, don’t miss the opportunity!’

‘We’ll see,’ she said, kissing him quickly one last time, and then he was gone.

22.30. ALL WAS SILENT in Walter’s house. He was sitting in the dark in the front room, thinking, hunched down in his favourite armchair, the curtains half open, watching the path, the front gate, and the quiet road. An occasional vehicle ticked by, an occasional dog walker; an occasional couple returning from the pub, an occasional brace of teenagers arm-in-arm, wondering if they were going to get lucky and land a snog.

He found himself thinking of Joan West and wondered how her bridge night had gone. Maybe he should take up bridge, he could play of course, just didn’t see it as an all important social night out – crikes, some of those bridge players treated it so damned seriously, bought text books, did homework, studied the masters, became obsessed, almost as bad as some golfers pursuing a low handicap all their lives. Didn’t they have anything better to do? He mused. Probably not.

He found himself thinking of a previous time he had hunkered down in that same way, waiting, watching, and of course it was the night he first met Jessica Stone, and the ill-fated Stevie Cliffe. The difference was that that night he knew someone was coming. This time he only thought it an outside possibility. He still hadn’t decided whether he would go to bed at all.

The moon appeared and shone through the dirty glass, the moonbeams playing on the hole in the carpet in the centre of the room, and he thought, I really must do something about that, I’ve had the money ages now, just been a bit busy. Another ten minutes and he got up and closed the curtains, cursed the spirits, double locked both doors, and went to bed.

22.59. PRYCE GLANCED at his watch. Yelled, ‘Brinton!’ and Brinton came running. ‘Get the boys started,’ and Brinton went off to get the van in situ and the people carrier doors opened.

TEN MINUTES LATER AND all four guys were staring down at Jessica. She was sleeping like an infant and she looked quite different.

Pryce said, ‘Have you cut her hair?’

Brinton looked uncomfortable. Said, ‘Just the forelock, it was really annoying me.’

‘Sad bastard! What did you do with it?’

‘Threw it away.’

Man One and Two shared a look.

They always knew Brinton was a bit weird.

Pryce shook his head and whispered, ‘Remove the plaster.’

‘Are you sure about that, boss?’ asked Man One. ‘It wouldn’t do if she woke up and started screaming just as we were going through security.’

‘That’s not going to happen, she’ll be out like a light for hours.’

Brinton moved closer and for once, gently, removed the pink plaster.

Pryce nodded his approval. Said, ‘Take a corner each,’ and in the next moment Jessica Stone, supermodel with the irritating hair, now slightly less irritating, was being lifted and turned and taken out of the pep talk room, a room she would never see again, out into the inner hallway, through the doors that led to the corridor where Pryce and Brinton’s offices lay, past them, and the stationery room, and accounts, the boardroom, and reception, and on through the main doors and outside into the crisp night. No one about, not a sound other than a distant budget holiday jet, plying its way in to John Lennon airport in Liverpool, on the far side of the wide and dark Mersey river.

The rear seats in the people carrier had been removed.

The back door was wide open, and the gurney slid easily in and fitted well, Man One had tested that earlier. The tailgate was closed with a gentle clunk. Man Two was told to stand guard over their precious cargo, as the others retreated inside for a final briefing.

‘Stop a quarter of a mile from the Freeport,’ Pryce was saying. Cover her completely, but loosely with the blanket. It won’t be for long, it doesn’t matter if her face is covered. She mustn’t be seen, she mustn’t be recognised. We don’t want errant former lovers coming to our door. Understand?’

It was nothing that Man One hadn’t heard a hundred times before, but he nodded and said, ‘Sure boss,’ because he wanted to be away, and on the road and completing the job as soon as possible.

Pryce went through the paperwork again, over and over the same ground, here’s the money you know what to do, et cetera, blah blah blah, it was all Man One could do to stop himself yawning, but he managed it, and finally, after much faffing around and unnecessary revision, Pryce and Brinton appeared satisfied.

Man One glanced at the clock. 23.49.

Pryce still had one final parting comment.

‘If you have any problems at all, you ring me, understand?’

‘Sure, boss.’

All three of them trooped outside into the late night autumnal air, dew forming on the windscreen, and even then Pryce insisted on the back door being opened, and all four of them looking in at the woman one last time, as if paying their respects, as if she were some ancient Egyptian Goddess, about to cross into the underworld.

Men One and Two both thought that more than a little weird.

Pryce said, ‘On your way!’ and Man One jumped into the driver’s seat, started the engine, flashed the wipers to sweep way the dew, buzzed down the window and said, ‘No sweat!’ and the people carrier pulled gently away and out of Minstrel Electronics car park, and Pryce and Brinton watched it heading down toward the M53, and northbound for the Mersey Tunnel, under the murky and cold river, to Liverpool beyond.

LIGHT TRAFFIC ALL THE way, through the tunnel, cut back to the dock road, headed due north,