Here's the next chapter, it appears I've gotten over my writers block :-)
Chapter 4
Dempsey was up early the next day, with the combination of travelling and sea air, he had slept very well. He heartedly tucked into the full English breakfast laid out in front of him, it was one of things he enjoyed about England and was glad to see it on the Spanish hotel's menu. As he ate he read a news paper, also English. Dempsey chuckled to himself as scanned the article on Gene & Alex 'Your one helluva lucky guy Genie boy. Just don't anything stupid like marry her.' He flipped the page over and continued to dip a piece of sausage in his fried egg.
Harry made her way down the stairs towards the dining room. With the coming of morning her mood hadn't improved and she was ready to tear Dempsey's ear off. As she walked in Dempsey greeted her with a bright smile "Morning Princess, sleep well?"
"Yes thank you." She replied curtly and took her seat opposite him. She narrowed her eyes at him as he bit into a slice of toast
Dempsey picking up on her frosty demeanour asked "What's eating you?"
"Where the bloody hell did you get to?" she hissed.
"Told ya, I went for a walk on the sea front." He shrugged not understanding the problem he had apparently caused.
"For three bloody hours?" her voice rising an octave
"I was making enquiries, y'know doing some leg work." He replied simply
"And what did you find Leftenant?" her eyes glaring in simmering anger
"Some legs I'd like to do some work on." He grinned. Dempsey knew he wasn't helping her mood, but he did like to wind her up.
"Oh how nice for you, glad you were enjoying yourself while I was sat here fending off that infernal, greasy manager." Harry gestured in the direction of the hotel manager's office.
Dempsey smirked at her discomfort. "Yeah, she's really into me, we're going to go for dinner.
"What was her name then?" asked Harry suspiciously, she had half an idea he was teasing her and there was no woman.
"Monica, she's one of you lot."
"One of my lot?" she raised an eyebrow at him. "Now I know you're lying, no one with that breeding would touch you with a barge pole...if only to push you out of the door."
He said chewing another mouthful "Monica, from the Cotswolds." He confirmed further using his posh English accent. Now she knew he wasn't lying, Dempsey would have never been able to pull Cotswolds out of air.
"She has good legs, she rides horses." Added Dempsey
"And strange American men it would seem." Said Harry sardonically
Dempsey was trying to read Harry "Are you jealous...Makepeace?" he was enjoying riling her making her think he had slept with Monica.
"Ha! Me, no, never." She snapped
"Jeez, what's got into you. Have you got the decorators in?" he grinned
Harry stared aghast at her partner "Where in God's name did you get a comment like that from?..oh I see." Harry sang with sarcasm "Hunt, of course. Should have guessed he'd have an effect on you. You make a right pair. Two cavemen together beating their chests, clubbing poor unsuspecting women over the head and dragging them back to your caves."
"I ain't never had to drag a woman back to my cave sweetheart." Dempsey sneered "Although you would be the exception."
Harry held her head loftily and stood up "Come on, we'd better get going."
"I haven't finished my breakfast yet." Protested Dempsey
"Dempsey, this isn't a holiday, we have a job to do." She made for the door "Oh..and just for the record, I wouldn't touch you with a barge pole either."
"Makepeace, Harry, wait up." Dempsey grabbed the news paper and took off after her.
"Yeah, I'll hold." Ray sighed heavily with the phone pinned to his ear. He was getting frustrated with the distant lack of co-operation from the Oxford police. The files SI10 had sent over on the Daly/Hughes case, as it now been dubbed, weren't much more helpful than the information CID already had. Barton had clammed up refusing to impart any knowledge, therefore Ray had been forced to involve Thames Valley police.
"Inspector Abbott." answered a posh voice at the end of the line.
"Inspector Abbott, It's DI Carling, Fenchurch East CID."
"What can I do for you Inspector?" his tone was flat and uninterested.
"I need all the information on DCI Hughes you have there...er please." Ray was trying to be polite.
"Uh, not this again. Look here, I have already explained to your work experience girl, if you want my files you will have collect them yourselves."
"Work experience girl?" snapped Ray "DC Granger I think you'll find."
"Whatever you say Inspector, I'm still not sending you the files. Thames Valley don't have the budget of the Met so we can't afford couriers and I haven't got any men to spare..they are working on their own cases. I suppose I can expect to see you in an hour's time...no later. I have to attend the police charity golf tournament."
Ray's blood was starting to boil 'Golf charity tournament, bollocks to that'
"Thanks a bundle, you're really helpful." Ray slammed down the phone and leapt to his feet grabbing his jacket. "C'mon," he gestured to Chris and Shaz " We've got to go to Oxford and bring SI10 div boy with you."
"Great we can interview Simon Hughes while we're at it." piped up Shaz enthusiastically.
"Good idea Shaz. The sooner we can sort this case, the sooner we can get back to bloody normal. Poirot I'm leaving you in charge and if that prick from the News of The world rings again tell 'im where he can stuff his wads, I'm not interested."
Gene and Alex, having spent a very laid back afternoon taking in the sights, were now wandering from bar to bar trying to find Simone. It wasn't really a chore as their evening was rapidly turning into a bizarre pub crawl. In each bar they had a drink and quickly scanned the room for Dempsey's ex. Unsurprisingly, after the fourth bar, they were starting to get sozzled.
"This is getting ridiculous," sighed Alex "We can't go into every bar in New York, we're going to have to do some detective work. Some holiday this is turning out to be."
"I know Bolls." agreed Gene "As soon as we find this tart and give her the sodding letter, then I promise we can start our holiday proper." Gene looked at Alex's crestfallen face. She had been so looking forward to her and Gene spending some quality time together and so far the trip had resulted in a busman's holiday.
"Come 'ere." Whispered Gene as he wrapped an arm round her waist and pulled her into him. He rested his chin on her head and murmured into her hair "I promise, If we can't find her by the end of the night, we'll give up and give the letter to Mrs Dempsey to pass on."
Alex smiled into his chest "At this rate I doubt we'll even remember that we found her. By all accounts she sounds like a party animal...we could be drinking into the small hours."
"Well then Bolls, the worst we'll get out of the night is a stonking hangover."
Alex raised her head to look at him. Grinning she planted a kiss on his lips. He returned her grin.
Gene pulled away and fished Simone's photo out his jacket pocket. He turned to the bar tender "Skuse us mate, but we're trying to find this woman, have you seen her?"
"Whadda ya? Cops?" the bar tender replied.
Gene was about to answer as he had done before with Rosa, but he felt Alex gently kick him on the leg.
"No old friends over from London, haven't seen her for years." Gene lied
"Yeah, I seen her, every bar tender in town knows her."
"Great," replied Alex brightly "Do you know where she lives?"
The bar tender narrowed his eyes at her "How the hell should I know? She's a lush."
"Friendly bunch." Gene muttered to Alex
"She was here about an hour ago until I kicked her out. Try the next bar along." With that the bar tender moved to the other side of the bar to serve a customer. Gene and Alex downed their drinks and left for the next bar.
Dempsey and Makepeace, having picked up a hire car, sat in stony silence as they drove to the local police station.
Harry couldn't stop her mind whirring, why was she so angry with him? She didn't know. They had been getting along fine in the past couple of weeks and now they were right back to square one. Harry wrestled with the answer. Was it the fact that he had left her in the restaurant to fend for herself or was it that he had picked up a woman in less than 24 hours of arriving in Alicante. 'It's not my business if decides to sleep with someone.' She tried to reason with herself. Then the recurring image of Dempsey lying in her arms bleeding to death surfaced again. Try as she might, she couldn't get that image out of her head. She suddenly felt guilty, she had just acted like super bitch to him for no real reason. A light ticking off would have sufficed.
Dempsey was equally confused. Harry had been, well, nice to him the past couple of weeks. He thought that they had finally turned a corner, how wrong can you be? She had all of a sudden, as if a switch had been flicked, reverted back to DS Makepeace ice maiden. Dempsey really didn't understand what he had done wrong, ok, so, perhaps he should have called her to say he wasn't going to make dinner, but did he deserve the treatment she meted out to him? Dempsey pulled up outside the Police station and got out of the car. Harry stayed sat in the passenger seat lost in thought,
"Sergeant, are you coming?" he glared at her.
"Er, yes." She exited the car and made her way up the steps to the entrance. Across the street, watching the pair in a red Mini, was Monica, camera snapping away.
Gene and Alex had had enough in more ways than one. The whole evening had been completely futile and they had failed to find Simone. Not only that, but their alcohol levels had reached the point of dwindling coherency, therefore they had decided to call it a night. They wobbled out of a particularly scummy bar at the top of an equally seedy alley. Gene was doing his best to make sure they both made it back to the hotel in one piece.
As they propped one another up, weaving slightly towards the end of the alley, Gene became aware of a figure behind them. He dismissed it as just another pisshead making his way home. Except it wasn't a drunk. Before they knew it, the figure had broken into a run and launched himself at Alex. Alex shrieked in surprise as the assailant snatched her handbag and forcefully shoved her to the ground. Alex hit the tarmac with a painful thud. Gene, although intoxicated, was quick to react. He took off after the mugger yelling "Bastard!" as he charged down the alley. The mugger ran like lightning, and having local knowledge, disappeared without trace. Gene reached the end of the alley, realising he had lost his prey, he stopped to catch his breath by a group of wheelie bins. Alex having recovered swiftly caught him up.
"Bollocks!" exclaimed Gene "Scum are scum no matter where you go. You ok?" he asked concerned as Alex rubbed her elbow.
"Yeah, I'm ok." She smiled meekly
Gene rested against one of the wheelie bins panting for breath.
"Great holiday this." He quipped with sarcasm
"Urm it's becoming interesting." agreed Alex.
"I spose we better get to the local cop shop and report this." As Gene spoke he glanced down into the wheelie bin. In the flashing neon light on a club sign, Gene caught a glimpse of something buried in the rubbish. He blinked as he thought he imagined it. He focused as he waited for the next neon flash to illuminate the item.
"Gene?" Alex queried as she recognised the look which was forming on Gene's face.
The light flashed again, he was right first time, his eyes weren't playing tricks. It was a human hand.
"Bloody 'ell" he exclaimed
Alex hurried over to see what had caused his outburst. She peered into the rubbish not seeing immediately what Gene had found. Gene cautiously delved into the rubbish as Alex looked on. He pawed at the waste paper and fast food wrappers, then his fingers touched something solid. As the light flashed again it lit up the face of a black man staring vacantly up at them.
"Ohhhh shit." Said Alex slowly
Gene looked at Alex puzzled "'es had his throat cut. 'es still warm."
"Lovely!" said Alex witheringly "Another dead body, how nice. Did I say this holiday is getting interesting? Next time we go on holiday, can we please find a deserted island with zero crime?"
"Next time?" Gene raised an eyebrow.
They barely had time to take in the enormity of their discovery when they were alerted to shouting.
"FREEZE!"
Gene and Alex's head snapped up to see four NYPD police officers poised with Magnums trained on them.
"HANDS IN THE AIR! DON'T MOVE OR WE'LL SHOOT!"
"Oh Bollocks!" exclaimed Gene as he obeyed raising his hands in the air in surrender. Alex resignedly did the same.
Oh dear, not quite the holiday G&A were expecting and I think a certain DS has had an attack of jealousy. And Ray my have a nervous breakdown at this rate.
