Business of Dying by Simon Kernick

clients was experiencing a lack of customer satisfaction. In reply, we could just about make out the calm, measured tones of one of the social workers. It was greeted with another blast of abuse. Talk about a hiding to nothing.
    Car la Graham sighed resignedly. 'I'd better go and see what all that's about.'
    'You certainly have a difficult job to do here,' I told her.
    'We've all got difficult jobs to do,' she answered, a rueful smile playing about her lips, and turned to go.
    'I think you had a bit of a thing for her,' Malik said when I joined him outside.
    I grinned. 'She's an attractive woman.'
    'A little bit old.'
    'For you maybe. Not for me.'
    'A social worker, though, Sarge? It would hardly be a match made in heaven, not with your views.'
    'Yeah. Somehow I don't think it's a goer.' But in an odd way I wished it could be. I needed some romance in my life.
    It was getting on for one o'clock, so we grabbed some lunch at a nearby McDonald's. Malik plumped for Chicken McNuggets while I took the traditional route of Big Mac, fries, and a hot apple pie for pudding, washed down with a regularCoke. Not exactly the ideal start to my new diet.
    'I didn't like her,' Malik said as he slowly chewed on a McNugget.
    'I know you didn't.'
    He swallowed. 'She was too cynical, you know? Like nothing would faze her.'
    'It's no different to the way it is in our game. You build up a shell so that things don't affect you. You have to. I mean, let's face it, how would you like to work with those little fuckers?'
    'No discipline. That's the problem.' He picked up another McNugget with his fork. 'Do you think any of them knew anything?'
    'Anything of interest? I doubt it. I think we'd have known if any of them were lying through their teeth. They're not that good actors.'
    'So it was a bit of a waste of time going down there, really.'
    I smiled. 'Well, in some ways maybe.'
    He ignored my comment, and changed the subject. 'I was surprised this morning by the preliminary findings.'
    'That there was no sign of sexual assault?' He nodded. 'So was I. It sort of begs the question, what was she killed for?'
    Malik hunted down and pinned his last McNugget. 'That's why we need to talk to the pimp.'
    But talking to the pimp had not proved any easier for our colleagues than it had for us theprevious day. When we got back to the station we heard that he hadn't been at home when DS Capper and three others had called there several hours earlier. Apparently, he had a girlfriend who lived in Highbury, and he was supposed to spend quite a lot of his time with her, but he hadn't been at her place either. Nor was she in residence. Both properties were now under surveillance and all patrols had been advised to bring him in for questioning should they come across him. So far no one had.
    When I left that afternoon at 4.20, citing a nonexistent doctor's appointment as the reason for my departure (Malik made me feel guilty by looking concerned and asking if it was anything serious), the inquiry was heading towards thirty-six hours old with few substantial leads and a suspect against whom there was pretty much no evidence and who, so far, hadn't even got a viable motive.
    There was, of course, still a lot of the race left to be run, as a sports commentator might say, but whichever way you looked at it the start hadn't been particularly inspiring.

9

    After picking up the suitcase at King's Cross, I took it home, counted the contents (it was all there), and stuffed a jiffy bag with Danny's cut. I sealed the bag and placed the rest of the money, bar a couple of hundred spending, in a safe in my bedroom. It wouldn't stay there for long. I have a personal deposit box at a hotel in Bayswater where I stash my ill-gotten gains. One day I'm going to have a hefty lump sum. It doesn't pay interest, but it keeps growing.
    I've known Danny for about eight years now. He was the brother of a girl I used to go out with. Her name was Jean Ashcroft and she was the only non-Force girl