Sorry the last chapter got depressing. One of you needs to slap me whenever it gets angsty and I'll aim for humour again. I naturally write depressing stories because I'm crap at humour - I once got a story rejected by a magazine because it was 'too downbeat' for their readers. Story of my life ;')

Chapter Seven – Every Moment with You

"Okay. Let's take this nice and slowly," Kevin said.

"Slowly? You don't know the meaning of the word, mate."

"I could learn."

The man – Kevin presumed he was a man, because his voice was low, but in truth it could've been a woman because their face was covered with a grey cloak, menacing in the darkness – gave a chuckle.

Then again, it could've been a wolf who'd learnt to talk or something. Stranger things happened in Twilight.

"What? I could."

"Not fast enough."

Then Wolfy hit him over the head with something big and heavy, and Kevin stumbled forwards and fell to his knees, as though he was about to be executed.

Well, maybe he was.

XxXxX

"Where did Kevin go?"

"Dunno, Ma'am," Rachel said wearily, taking another bite of her bacon sandwich and continuing to talk as she chewed. Rachel was too tired for manners, and Gill was too tired to notice her lack of manners; the arrangement sort of suited them both. "He rang me, said I had to come and guard the door, said he had something to do. He didn't say what; he ran off."

"Probably went home. Can't really blame him; we were all shattered," Janet suggested softly, noticing that Gill still had smears of mascara beneath her eyes, and realising her boss had probably sobbed herself to sleep last night, if she'd been to sleep at all, "Did he tell the girls where he was off to?"

Gill reached across and opened the door, and Jill and Gabby stumbled forwards from their listening positions, grimacing sheepishly.

"Well?" Janet asked, knowing they'd heard.

"He didn't say anything," Lizzie said over their heads.

The three police officers stood in the doorway, surveying the room. Amy was still buried under one of the makeshift duvets, her camera tucked in beside her, but the rest of the girls were awake and tucking into breakfast.

Hayley was writing again; God, she must've written half a novel by now. Was it a murder mystery? Melissa seemed to be drawing a picture.

"Melissa? You alright this morning, kid?" Rachel asked.

She nodded.

"What you drawing?"

"A picture."

"Really?"

"Rachel," Janet elbowed her colleague in the ribs, "Leave the poor child alone. Don't you think she's got enough to worry about without your sarcasm? I'm sure her artistic skills would go right over your head anyway."

Rachel just shrugged, unsure if Janet was teasing.

"It's alright," Melissa stood up and handed her drawing across to Rachel, keeping her head down, "You can see. You can give it to... you know Gill said they would look after the body? Like, they'd... well, would you put that with her? Just to say bye and everything?"

"Everyone signed it," Hayley added, glancing up.

"That's really nice," Rachel said quietly, holding out the picture to Jill and Janet, "Isn't it, Ma'am? Sarge?"

Gill looked down on a somewhat creased sheet of paper with a sketch on, a group of people, all of the details meticulously drawn, their smiles lifelike. In the centre was Melissa, holding onto Amelia: the rest of the picture was greyscale, but she'd coloured the lizard so it stood out from the page.

Underneath were the names of all of the people in the picture. Gill's eyes skimmed the names, Melissa and Amy and Hayley and Lizzie and Gabby and Jill. Kevin had signed it, even put a kiss, bless him.

"Wow, are you planning on being an artist?" Janet smiled, "I'm sure we can arrange something – we'll put it in her grave, okay?"

Gill knew the truth; once the detectives had finished getting evidence from the lizard's remains, it would be burnt, and the ashes disposed of. But sometimes the truth hurt, and it would be nicer for Melissa to imagine Amelia was lying in a grave underneath an apple tree somewhere. Ignorance is bliss.

Melissa held out a pen somewhat shyly to Rachel. The DC looked half flattered, half bemused, but scrawled her name underneath the amazingly realistic sketch of Rachel – Melissa had even drawn her mismatched socks poking out from her scuffed boots.

Gill felt a lump rise in her throat as Janet signed the picture too, then passed the pen along to her boss. Here was a group of girls trying to cope with the loss of a friend they hadn't even met, plus the trauma of the gunshot and Amelia's death. In the police service, the officers denied that they stopped caring about death, but in truth they did become hardened over time. Maybe that made them dead inside.

"So you don't know anything about where Kevin went?" Rachel asked the girls again, "Not like him to miss out on a free bacon sandwich, is it?"

"We don't know," Jill said, "He was texting, then he just said he had to go and that he'd see us later or something."

"I'll start adding up his skiving time and deduct it from his salary if he's not careful," Gill mumbled, "And then he'll have less money to buy his porn DVDs, or pick 'n' mix."

"Aw," Rachel wrinkled her nose, "That'd be a shame."

"And then he wouldn't bring us those strawberry bon-bons."

"What strawberry bon-bons?" Gill snapped, "Why don't I get sweets that are handed round the office? Am I automatically eliminated because I'm the boss? I need sugar as well, you know?"

"Some of our sweets might not be very appropriate, Ma'am," Rachel said hesitantly, "Some of them are... are funny shapes."

"Shapes that the chief con would have a fit about, if he saw them?"

"Yeah."

"Ah, so he mixes the two? Porn DVDs and pick 'n' mix? Like porn mix or something? Hey, why don't I work in a sweet factory, making little sugar willies for a living? Why didn't I take that career path?"

"You'd miss us," Janet smirked.

"I'd never get hungry. And my house would never be shot at."

"Unless someone wanted to sue you because their willies were the wrong shape," Rachel said, "The sugar ones, I mean. The real ones aren't exactly your problem, unless... well, unless you've done your usual trick nailing them to the wall by their testacles."
"Okay, this conversation is getting too dirty for this time in the morning," Janet reached out and covered Gabby's ears jokingly as all of the girls exchanged amused glances, "Let's save it for the pub, ladies."

"Hayley and Lizzie are old enough for the pub," Melissa said.

Amy peered out from under the cover, "And me."

"Ah, there you go, you see, Ma'am," Rachel said, "There's the reason you became a copper. Let's raise the legal drinking age so these scallywags can't get in, and pop off to the pub right now."

"Good plan, Sherlock. Might even find Kevin there."

"No, Ma'am. He likes different kinds of pubs to us."

XxXxX

I hope you're all imagining Gill working for a porn sweet shop now;')

For some reason this chapter doesn't really seem to fit together very well.

Anyway, any guesses as to where Kevin's gone, apart from the pub?