Matthews was easy to catch. It took just seconds to grab him by the neck with a wire. A finger held the emergency button on the lift. The detective let out a gasp of surprise as the metal cut into his skin, the sound loud in the contained space.

Pull

Twist

Tighter

Release

Drip drip drip

The dismantling of the parts took a little longer, and the lift groaned as if in protest or disgust. But it was late, the building was empty and there wasn't a hurry to use it. The surge of nausea was strong, but it was done and the evidence bag full. Dropped into the internal mail bag lifted from the fraud office, the lift was released and the dusty smell of the basement hall was welcome when the doors sprung open.

Pulling the stair door open, it was a relief to climb up, move limbs and feel alive, unlike Matthews. At the half glazed door on the first floor, there was only one desk that mattered. Two lumpy envelopes were carefully arranged and then out, into the clean London air.

DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM

Dempsey balanced the mail with a Styrofoam coffee cup and a donut in his mouth. Harry glanced at him with amusement as he almost walked into her with a look of apology as the post toppled. The first envelope fell into her hands.

"Aunt Thelma?" She fingered the pink paper with amusement as she took the stairs with him, taking his coffee.

Dempsey grumbled and shrugged as he used his free hand to hold open the doors and free his mouth of the cake.

"The address here probably looks more impressive." Harry handed it back and glanced at the two yellow mail bags.

"Probably about her knitting or something." He remarked, "You can open it."

Dempsey put down his cup as the papers slid to one side, briefly he wondered why the mail bags were not flat. He recalled someone sending him knickers in the post which caused endless weeks of snappy Harry. The work experience girl had been 'moved on'. Call it sixth sense but something didn't feel right, he almost knew it wasn't underwear. Dempsey almost called for Harry to stay. Instead he let her go for her own coffee and asked if she could check to see if Spikings was in, just to delay her return, somehow unwilling to open the two envelopes in front of her.

Something felt wrong, the nose knew and his body crawled with the urge to run but he was overwhelmed by the need to find out more. With a sense of foreboding that told him, whatever he did next would drag him away from whatever he was working on now, he opened them, tipping out the contents of them both. For a man who ate sandwiches in autopsy rooms, he had to quell the urge to gag.

And this was how Chas found him, one hand holding a leaky half-eaten donut with the jam on his hands, the other holding an evidence bag contained the unmistakable round shape of a human eye.

His friend called to Harry as Dempsey stuffed the site into the evidence bag and they headed to Spikings' office.

DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM DM

"It's Matthews." Dempsey read the lab report out loud later that day. "The hand in the second bag belonged to Sturgeon."

Makepeace sat beside him. "There are no fingerprints or trace evidence, it was all wiped clean."

"Indicates that they know what we would do then?" Dempsey observed, "They knew where my desk was 'cos it didn't come in with the internal."

Chief Inspector Spiking's scowl managed to embed itself further into his face. His eyes burned with impatience as he glared between his two best detectives and around the assembled team. Most of them squirmed but Dempsey was sprawled out giving the air of unconcern. Spikings knew him better these days. In the past, he'd been irritated by the American's body language but realised that it contained a man with more thought. His body might be collapsed into ease, but his eyes were narrowed and his mouth tight-lipped. His proximity to Makepeace was telling, her presence keeping him leashed. She sat within his eye line and touch, ready to employ both.

If Spikings knew them both as well as he did, Dempsey was about to explode at the time wasting meeting and take his partner with him, both of them going rogue, Dempsey because he could, and Makepeace because, somehow… well, Dempsey. Right now, nobody needed that particularly as the feeling between the current senior detective on this case, Lloyd, and Dempsey was legendary. Spikings, like everyone else apart from perhaps Makepeace, had no clue why, just that it was.

Spikings' eyes land on David Lloyd. If he wasn't present in the building and carried a badge, he could be mistaken for a surfer boy. Dude, as Dempsey might say. Stocky, he was neatly pressed and looked like a man on the rise through the ranks. He looked like most of the men here. Safe and nondescript. Dempsey sat in a rumpled blue suit and his hair at all angles, shades tucked into his top pocket even though it was raining. He looked like he was due on a film set or about to rob a bank. The two men couldn't be more different.

"All right." Spikings breathed out, and forced himself to confront the situation, one that he'd never encountered before. He glanced out of the window before he spoke. "It's almost certain that, from the evidence so far, we have a serial killer on the loose in our building."

"Or someone clever enough to get access. Maybe someone Matthews and Sturgeon knew and trusted to bring into the office?" Chas remarked, his eyes sharp and bright. Spikings was very aware to never underestimate his right hand man. He hoped that he would be a good influence on Lloyd.

"There aren't any visitors entered the building on the cameras." Makepeace replied and Spikings tried not to look approvingly at her. She was an outstanding officer, barely second to her partner in talent though together they were a force and he felt a sense of unease dragging her into Dempsey's world. "The evidence seems to say that they're in the building or have approved access."

"We've got lists of everyone signed in…' Chas ruffled through the paperwork, taking her seriously as he always did, a respect she didn't always get even from Dempsey at the start. Spikings noticed that Dempsey's eyes had landed on her and were yet to leave her face.

Chas continued. "Not everyone signs in though, especially late night. And there's side doors for which most of us have a key."

Makepeace frowned and tapped her pencil on a notebook. "Did they met the killer here? But that leaves the mystery of how did they know the building well enough to know this office and to leave the evidence for James… Dempsey… on his desk."

"Why leave the body parts at all?" Spikings picked up fast, aware of Makepeace's slip in calling her partner by his first name. "You haven't been in for days, Dempsey. They were here for what, three days?"

"Five maybe." That was Dempsey's first contribution which caught a chuckle from Lloyd. "The amount of dust, it looked the same as it did when I got home."

Dempsey ignored the reaction; his mind already somewhere else as he looked at Makepeace. "Why my desk?"

"Maybe the bastard wanted to dump them and knew you barely turned up for work." Lloyd interrupted in a sharp tone.

Dempsey appeared to consider this for a moment and then, eyes crinkled in thought and contempt, he shook his head and seemed to get a confirmation from a glance at his partner, "Nope, it wasn't an accident. Could have been Makepeace's desk as much as mine, our stuff is everywhere, but it was my side. I want access to the case files and… "

"No way!" Lloyd pushed off the desk on which he was leaning. "It's my case." He glared at Dempsey who languidly moved to his feet, reminding his boss of a stealthy cobra.

Towered over Lloyd, he stage-whispered, "You need all the help you can get."

Lloyd fumed at him.

"The killer has already involved me and therefore Sergeant Makepeace. All we wanna do is help. I don't want any attention but if we ignore it, it's gonna get worse." Spikings had to agree with Dempsey.

"The world doesn't revolve around you." Lloyd argued, his voice rising, "It's tenuous. He probably meant to put them on Spikings desk or mine. You aren't involved."

That seemed to do it for Dempsey who took a step forward and spoke in a low, growl. "You seem to forget that you almost cost Makepeace her life because of your own stupidity once."

"That is enough." Spikings roared, trying to dismiss the confession about the long seated hatred. Loyd fell back to the desk defeated and Makepeace urged Dempsey back into his chair. He resisted briefly and relented when he looked at her pleading face.

"This case remains with Lloyd who will work with Chas Jarvis." Spikings ignored the mixed reaction of the named officers. "However…. I expect a report daily to myself, Dempsey and Makepeace, with open access to all the case files by both detectives. I expect full cooperation. I don't expect you to be best friends but I expect you two…" He eyes Dempsey and Lloyd "… to be professional. Two of our team are dead and I don't want any more murders."

"You got that?" He contented himself with 'yes sir' from Lloyd and a nod from Dempsey. Watching them go, he saw Dempsey leave with Makepeace and wondered where they'd been for five days on leave.