A Body in the Lakes by Graham Smith (great books of all time .TXT) 📕

detective. When their eyes lit on the scarred cheek, she could almost see them wondering if she’d been given a pity posting due to her injury. So far as Beth was concerned, the best way to dispel negative opinions was to show herself in a good light. Being smartly turned out was part of her armoury against negative assumptions her youth may create; the other part being her brain. She’d often seen people revise their opinions of her when she started questioning them, or they heard her responses to their statements.

The mayor’s former employees would be the next group of people she’d have to encounter. As computer programmers, they’d all have above-average intelligence and she suspected that, to them, she’d be little more than a nuisance. A young, low-ranked officer who’d been sent to interrupt their day with silly questions.

She’d have to prove each of them wrong.

As she strode to her car, she felt her determination growing. One way or another, she had to catch a murderous rapist and find a way of identifying why they were targeting the mayor.

Thirty-One

The offices of the mayor’s former company were sited in a converted farm on the outskirts of Carlisle. The whitewash of the buildings had lost its initial lustre and was peeling off to reveal pink sandstone beneath.

Around the courtyard there were several other small businesses operating out of the former farm buildings. A man was using a barrow to haul a washing machine into one of the units, the neighbouring unit was signed as a fruiterer that Beth had seen supplying hotels and pubs, and a third was a small accountancy firm.

Outside the offices of SimpleBooker, four cars were parked in neat regimen. All of them were less than three years old, but none were unnecessarily ostentatious. There was a BMW, but it was a small hatchback rather than a fire-breathing racer or a grand tourer. Two of the other cars were everyday saloons and the fourth was a Volvo SUV.

While these cars may have been nothing more than runabouts to the owners, Beth didn’t think they were. Rather she was thinking that instead of being flash and using their windfall from the sale of SimpleBooker to buy an expensive new car, the employees had merely got a decent but sensible one. Therefore they’d used their shares in a responsible way.

This made her think that none of them would have frittered away the money. In addition to the windfall, it was likely they were all on a very good wage. The company they now worked for had valued SimpleBooker as being worth tens of millions; therefore it stood to reason that the people who wrote the software would be well compensated to ward off rival companies poaching them. If that was the case, then any possible motive to bring down Forster would lie in another area than financial.

Beth walked through the door of the office and took in the scene before her. Everything she’d expected to find was missing. There were no dynamic youngsters with traces of acne and superhero T-shirts, nor were there cluttered desks laden with files. In the background she could hear a DJ introduce the next song on his playlist.

Each desk was spartan in its appearance. Beyond two computer screens per desk, a wireless mouse and keyboard, there was only a mug or a glass of water resting on each polished surface. While she liked to work in a clean environment herself, this was just too sterile for her taste.

The four people in the office all confounded her expectations as well. In the absence of young comic-book nerds, she’d thought that there would at least be a man with a ponytail. Instead there were two men old enough to be her father. Both wore smart trousers with a crisp shirt.

The two women in the room were mid-forties and, like the three manning Forster’s mayoral office, they were both good-looking and dressed in the same sort of smart casual clothing the men had chosen.

To find four people so smartly dressed working in a place that had once held livestock sat at odds with Beth’s perceptions of how computer programmers would dress and act. Beth knew that she was wrong to have come here with preconceived ideas. She also knew that the way these people dressed and kept their office was a probable reflection on their ages, the last vestiges of Forster’s influence and their individual professionalism.

As one of the women came to greet her, Beth threw a glance at the pictures on the walls. There was a framed photograph of the four people in the room all popping the cork on bottles of champagne, with Forster in the centre of the picture. To Beth’s eye, every one of their expressions looked to be filled with joy. A newspaper clipping in the corner of the frame had a headline that told of the sale of SimpleBooker. The other two pictures were of coastal scenery and could have been from anywhere, although Beth thought she recognised the location of one of them.

Beth introduced herself and explained why she was there.

‘I know why you’re here. Derek called us and asked that we answer your questions.’ The woman’s smile was as soft as her voice.

The fact the woman was on first-name terms with the mayor was understandable. They’d all worked together in this office, and with there only being five of them including Forster, they’d be a tight-knit group. While they might not have been overfamiliar with Forster, they’d have discussed holidays, meals out and all the other minor events and occasions that made for small talk.

Forster having called ahead was something of a concern to Beth. If he’d done as the woman had suggested and asked them to cooperate, it wasn’t the end of the world, but it also made her think their cooperation could be manipulated. It wasn’t that they’d lie at his request, more that they might try and cover up something if they thought it was in