Someone Who Isn't Me by Danuta Kot (romance novel chinese novels .TXT) 📕

‘Yes sir. I’m just waiting for their report. I was talking to them just before the briefing. They say this can’t be our car.’

As if on cue, the door of the briefing room opened, and a woman came in with a sheet of paper. ‘Report for DC Mason,’ she said.

Hammond took it and read it in silence. ‘It looks as though they’re right. This car belongs to an Elizabeth Bagnall, who lives in Stockport. She’s in her eighties and is a chronic invalid.’

‘So someone else is using the car,’ Dinah said.

‘No.’ Hammond gave her back the report. ‘They checked it and it’s in no condition to be driven. Mrs Bagnall has a live-in carer who says the car hasn’t left the drive for weeks. The Stockport people were able to confirm that.’

Dinah brought up the image on the screen again – a red Ford Fiesta with the correct number plate leaving Sunk Island and turning left along the main road. ‘I checked with the DVLA,’ she said. ‘It’s taxed and it’s got its MOT. Why pay that? Why keep the car if no one is using it?’

‘Cloned plates,’ Hammond said. ‘Cloned from a car identical to the one they’re using, so the ANPR won’t spot it.’

Dinah felt deflated. Her big lead, and all the time, the car was sitting in a garage in Greater Manchester. But as Hammond picked the topic up, she began to feel better. ‘Whoever cloned those plates might have known the original car wouldn’t be out and about. There could be a connection. Let’s get details of the owner’s family, friends, any other contacts who’d have that information. Let’s get ANPR sightings of that number over the past month and see what the car’s been up to. If they thought they had a safe number, they might have been using it for a while.’ And it was when people got careless that they made mistakes, and mistakes was what got them caught. He looked at Dinah. ‘Good work, DC Mason,’ he said.

So her big break was a big break after all. Now was the time to get in with her next bit of information. ‘There’s something else,’ she said. ‘I went into the Smokehouse the other evening, just… I mean, I got talking to the barman and he said—’

Hammond held up his hand. ‘Later, DC Mason. Right. You all know what you’ve got to do. How did the drug get into the car? Karen, check though his record of recent arrests, see who he picked up and what they were carrying. We need to find that car with the cloned plates, and we need to keep checking for any sign of his phone. Karen, bring me up to date later, will you?’

The team began to move on. Dinah hesitated, not sure whether she should go back to her desk, but Hammond indicated she should wait.

Once the team had dispersed, he looked at her. ‘My office,’ he said. Once they were in there, he closed to door and sat down at the desk, leaving her standing. ‘DC Mason, tell me why you decided to go to the Smokehouse. You do remember what I told you at the first briefing?’

Curwen’s casual, You’re allowed to drink where you want to suddenly seemed very thin.

‘You said there was no evidence of a link, but I thought it wouldn’t hurt to—’

‘DC Mason. There are issues around that pub that you may not know about. It’s part of a serious complaint issued against this force. If there was any evidence linking Yeatson’s death to the place, we’d go after it. But there isn’t. Now, I’ll tell you this once, and I expect you to listen. This is a team. You want to look into something? You ask DS Sykes or you ask me. You don’t go off on your own. If you can’t follow that rule, then maybe you need to rethink your position. You were transferred – when?’

‘Just a few months ago, sir.’

‘Right, and the role carries responsibilities. I don’t want to be worrying about how you deal with those when I write your performance review.’

‘Sir, I—’

‘Did you get that, DC Mason?’

‘Yes, sir.’

‘Right. Now get on with those car checks. We need to know where that Fiesta went.’

‘Yes, sir, but…’ He was about to interrupt her again, so she said quickly, ‘Andy was seeing someone in the pub. I think. The barmaid.’

‘DC Mason, how many times do I have to say this? That is not part of your job. I don’t want the team distracted from important work by this kind of speculation. Your job is to find that car, and find out who knows the Bagnall woman’s car is off the road. Now you’ve got that bit of gossip off your chest, do you feel ready to do that?’

He wasn’t just ignoring it. He was trying to shut her up, and trying to stop her from talking about what she’d found out to the others. She opened her mouth to protest, caught his eye and closed it again.

‘Yes, sir,’ she said.

Chapter 27

Curwen sat at his desk, looking at his phone impatiently. He was trying to think of his next move. He hadn’t given up on Becca the Barmaid. He’d issued a challenge, and she looked like the type who would respond to that. He hated to admit it to himself, but there was something about her he liked.

What else had he got? He went over everything she’d told him. There wasn’t much, except she’d seen Lavery with the holdalls more than once since that first time, and – hang on, hang on – she’d seen him with them coming out of… He sat very still as he tried to recall that conversation in his car. She’d said: I saw his car once on that street down from the main road. He came out of that café, you know? And he was carrying a couple of bags then.

That street that runs down from… He