BLOOD STAINED an unputdownable crime thriller with a breathtaking twist (Detective Claudia Nunn Book by Rebecca Bradley (rooftoppers .TXT) 📕

‘How do you know it’s the Sheffield Strangler?’

Sharpe looked to Claudia to take the question. She’d said she would. This was her show.

‘He left something behind that could only have come from the Sheffield Strangler,’ Claudia answered as vaguely as she could, then pointed to another reporter.

‘How long has DC Harrison been missing?’

Claudia sighed. ‘She’s been missing since yesterday evening.’ It was too long. She didn’t like how long it had been. They had no real concept of when she had been taken. She had left work at around five but Dominic said he hadn’t got home until about nine thirty. It could be any time between.

‘Her name is Harrison?’ said another reporter — here it came. ‘Is she any relation to DS Dominic Harrison?’

Of course she bloody was. ‘Yes, it’s his wife.’

Again the noise in the room erupted and Claudia’s ears were assaulted by the ferocity of the sound.

Sharpe nodded towards the door. It was time for them to leave. Claudia placed her hands on the table, ready to rise from the chair. ‘We are doing everything in our power to find Ruth Harrison, but again, if I can ask the person who has her to release her immediately, before any more harm can come to her, we would be really grateful.’

‘What do you mean, any more harm?’ someone shouted out from the rear of the room.

Claudia and Sharpe rose.

‘Has she been hurt?’ they shouted again.

‘That’s all in the way of questions for today.’ Sharpe closed it down.

‘What aren’t you telling us?’ from the left side of the room.

Claudia shuffled along behind the empty chairs that were pushed in behind the long table.

‘Where was she abducted from?’ this from the left side again.

‘Thank you,’ said Claudia as she disappeared from view.

Sharpe turned to her in the corridor. ‘They’re a pack of vultures. Why can’t they sit quietly, take the information we have for them, ask the couple of questions we allow and write up their articles? Why does it have to turn into—’ she waved her hand about in the air — ‘that.’ Her nose wrinkled in disdain.

‘They’re doing their job,’ said Claudia as they moved away from the door towards the stairs, back up to the incident room and Sharpe’s office.

‘If they were doing their jobs properly they’d have listened to the briefing, not exploded the minute they heard something remotely interesting.’

She had a point. They’d been like a bunch of school children. It wasn’t like them. But Ruth Harrison being abducted was big news. They had to get it out fast and they wanted as many facts for their articles as they could gather and quickly. Though behaving like a rabble wouldn’t achieve that.

‘You’re going to bed Dominic down for the night and start again in the morning?’ Sharpe asked.

Panic and fear gripped Claudia’s chest like a vice. ‘I was going to go back and continue.’

‘You look tired.’

Claudia understood Sharpe was attempting to show compassion but it came across hard and cold. ‘I can cope.’

‘Don’t get me wrong, Claudia.’ Sharpe directed a piercing gaze at her. ‘I’m not for one moment suspending the investigation for the night. It’ll continue throughout. Ruth is out there and she’s in trouble. You should know we don’t leave one of our own out there like that. But . . .’ She checked the corridor behind her. ‘You need to rest or you’ll not be able to take this all the way to the end.’

Whatever the end might be, thought Claudia darkly. Sharpe wanted Ruth back as much as she and her father did. It was the reason she had put Claudia on the job in the first place. This morning’s talk in the smoking shed seemed like weeks ago, and yet it was only this morning. ‘I can manage.’

‘But if we don’t allow Dominic to rest properly and he gets charged with anything—’

Claudia opened her mouth to interrupt, to remind Sharpe that her father was likely innocent of murdering Ruth, but Sharpe held up a finger.

‘I said if, Claudia. See, your hearing is already going. That or your ability to analyse spoken sentences. Your emotions are heightened and as you’re getting more tired the job is becoming more difficult. It really won’t hurt for you both to get your heads down. And like I said, if your father should be charged with anything then we need to have done everything by the book and that means allowing him to have his eight hours sleep.’

‘You know he won’t be happy.’ She wasn’t happy. Ruth was missing and she was being ordered to go home and leave her father in the cells overnight.

It was as though Sharpe could read her mind. ‘I’ll be here for a long time yet. I’m not resting quite yet.’

That was the positive thing about Sharpe. She may be all flinty and blunt, but the job was important to her. She was loyal to her staff. If the wheel was about to come off you could rely on Sharpe to be there trying to hold it on.

‘You’ll keep me updated?’ Claudia asked with reluctance.

‘Isn’t that my sentence?’ Sharpe tried a smile on for size. It really didn’t fit. ‘Just go. And yes, I’ll let you know if anything of significance occurs.’

With that Claudia walked away and headed back to the cells to inform her father he was staying for the night.

Chapter 46

Claudia

Her father hadn’t taken the news well. In fact Claudia had never seen him so angry. He was all over the place. It was to be expected with what he was going through, she supposed. She had to reassure him that though the interview was postponed for the evening and an extension would be sought