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

‘Only little white lies,’ he said.

‘Go on, expunge your sins.’

‘I am a detective, an Inspector actually, Cheshire Constabulary.’

‘No!’ she said, and the penny dropped. ‘I’ve seen you on the telly!’

‘You may have done.’

‘I did! That Murder Diaries business.’

Walter nodded.

‘Wicked man!’ she said. ‘What a wicked man!’

‘Mmm...’ said Walter, wondering as he always did, whether it was a good idea to let the cat out of the bag.

‘Be safe – Feel safe,’ she said, parroting the local police force’s strapline under which it promoted itself.

‘And do you? Feel safe?’

‘Not when I have some drunken loony in the cab after midnight, quibbling over the bill!’

That was understandable.

‘And does that happen often?’

‘Nah,’ she drawled, ‘only about once a day!’

And they both laughed at that, and soon afterwards she was pulling up outside his house.

‘I’m not going to quibble over the bill.’

‘Just as well, or you’d feel the wrath of Carrie’s pepper spray.’

He laughed and paid the fare and said, ‘Could you come back and pick me up at eight?’

‘Got a hot date, have we?’

‘No, nothing like that, works do.’

‘S’pose I’d better,’ she muttered. ‘Don’t want to get arrested.’

Walter grinned, heaved his goodies from the car and said, ‘See ya later,’ and then she was gone.

THE DINNER WAS A HUGE success, fourteen of them all told, gathered around one long rectangular table that kept everyone in the loop. The girls looked amazing, and Walter wasn’t the only one to notice that. Karen in a tight silky maroon number that had the boys interested, Jun sporting a little black dress that reeked of class and expense. She said it was way cheaper than it would have been back home, being a designer number, though the others found that hard to believe. She’d had her hair cut and styled too, very sophisticated and she looked a different girl. Gibbons’ eyes nearly fell out when he saw her, and he grabbed her and made sure he was sitting next to her, and with Jessica on his other side, he looked like a man who’d won the lottery jackpot.

Jess had acquired an outrageous flowing lacy creation that splashed hints of green, orange and purple, colours that had rarely been seen together before, and on anyone else it would have looked a total mess, but somehow she carried it off. She said she’d modelled the original dress when it had first appeared eighteen months before. It was like an old friend to her, and no one doubted that for a second. She’d had her hair done too, what little of it remained.

What a strange girl she was, pondered Walter, the six foot she thing, he remembered calling her, and yet she was an amazing and down-to-earth human being that none of them would ever forget. And Jenny, not to be outdone, looking very cute, came in a short black leather skirt and tight white blouse, and sat at the end of the table with Jan opposite, and they all noticed the pair of them rarely glanced anywhere else but at each other all night.

Mrs West made a big effort too. She’d donned an expensive red dress her husband had bought her when he’d taken her to New York the previous summer for their wedding anniversary, and she complemented the dress with black fishnet tights that all the boys couldn’t miss, and after a few wines, teased her over, something they might regret in the days that followed, and was it just a coincidence that she was sitting next to the hunky stinger throwing Spence, pondered Walter? Probably not.

‘So come on, Guv,’ said Gibbons loudly, intent on making himself heard. ‘Are you gonna tell us about Jan’s famous relative?’

‘Oh, I know all about that,’ said Jenny in a rush.

They all looked at her and Gibbons grinned and said, ‘I’ll bet that’s not the only thing of Jan’s you know all about, eh Jen?’

Jenny flushed.

Jan said, ‘Shut up, funky!’

‘Well?’ said Gibbons, ‘are we ever going to get to know?’

Walter glanced at Jan and he nodded.

Walter said, ‘Jerzy Popieluszko was a charismatic Catholic priest whose sermons and opposition to Poland’s Communist regime made him famous, but inevitably, put his life at risk. He was recognised as a martyr by the Church and was beatified in 2010. There was a film made about him called Popieluszko: Freedom is Within Us – I recommend it to all. He was very closely associated with the Solidarity trade union and with the late Pope’s help, eventually brought down the government, but not before he was murdered by three agents of the Polish communist intelligence agency in 1984.’

Jenny reached across the table and clasped Jan’s big hand.

‘So how come you know so much about it?’ asked Gibbons.

‘In the early eighties, Solidarity was one of the big good versus evil stories. I took an interest, that’s all. Retentive memory.’

Jan said, ‘It was before my time, and we are only distantly related, but of course the family were, and are, very proud, and very upset.’

‘You must be,’ said Mrs West.

‘What happened after that?’ asked Gibbons.

‘Divers found the priest’s remains in the Wloclawek reservoir, west of Warsaw after a two-day search,’ said Jan. ‘The kidnappers confessed they had dumped his body in a reservoir on the Vistula.’

‘That’s appalling!’ said Jenny.

‘Anyone got the DVD?’ asked Hector.

‘I have,’ said Walter. ‘I’ll bring it in.’

‘Thanks, Guv.’

‘Anyway,’ said Walter, ‘to change the subject, I would just like you all to raise your glasses to Inspector Jun Woo, who put her life at risk, came all this way as an undercover officer serving with the Hong Kong Police Force, and whose help and assistance in bringing our inquiry to a satisfactory conclusion cannot be underestimated.’

It was Jun’s moment in the spotlight to look uncomfortable.

‘Acting Inspector,’ she said, glancing at a grinning Gibbons.

‘Err no,’ said Mrs West, going to her handbag and opening it and pulling out an email from the HKPF, that she read aloud: Please advise officer Jun Woo