Chapter Fifteen

Strike and his employees are in their staff room, and he wraps up the meeting with, "Any questions?"

Dev asks, "Should we be personally worried about Whitehall?"

Strike has considered that. "I really don't think so, but I'll understand if you want to lay low for a while. If, as I suspect, he's got a beef with me, his only interest in you is to make my life difficult." Dev only nods, and Strike looks at each of the contractors in turn, but no one else speaks. "Okay, we'd best get to it."

When they've dispersed, he says to Spanner, "You wanted a chat?"

"Uh, yeah. Should we wait for Rob?"

"I'll catch her up. She's sleeping."

"Okay, well, I found a copy of your Mum's old case file. I can extract that and send it to you, or you can dive right in. There's a whole subreddit about the trial, with theories about who killed her and other stuff. It's bound to be two-thirds crap, but you might be able to use something. You feature heavily, so be prepared for that."

"In what context?"

"Oh, that the cops should have listened to you, basically. It was mostly dormant for years, but someone had to have been monitoring it, because there's been a bunch of new posts in the past couple of weeks."

"Right, thanks. I really just want the original police report, so could you send that to me?"

"Sure thing. There was something else, if you've got a minute?"

"Sure, but only a minute. I'm overdue about fifteen hours' sleep."

"I've been thinking of ways we can make more money. And you know how some jobs you're just staring at a building?"

"Yeah. Not my favourite part of the job."

"Well, I crunched the numbers, and you'd save around 400 quid a year per static job, if you instead rented cars, put them in place and did the surveillance via dash cam. It would also mean that this Whitehall guy couldn't fuck with you, because he won't know the cars."

All thought of sleep forgotten, Strike commands, "Show me."

Minutes later they're sitting before one of Spanner's computers, as he shows Strike all the relevant information, concluding, "Unless you spot something I missed, then I really think this could work. If it's a public place, the only legal stipulation is that the camera not obscure the driver's view, so that's not a problem."

"What about parking fees." Spanner merely points at that information on the spreadsheet. "Right. Okay, this looks good to me. How soon could you implement this?"

"As soon as the cameras come in; few days to a week."

"Just order a couple for now, and we'll trial it, in case there's a wrinkle we haven't considered. If that goes well, we'll expand. This is very well done. It'll bring in money while the contractors are able to do other jobs. Does this mean I'm not giving you enough work to do?"

Spanner laughs and says, "Oh, no, I've got enough to fill the days. I thought of this the other night. I just did the figuring on your time."

Strike claps him on the shoulder, saying, "Well, you obviously got all the brains in your family, and you can tell Nick I said so. In the meantime, I'm going to bed."

Spanner grins and says, "Sweet dreams."

Strike wakes to Robin's smiling face. He could do that for a lifetime of two. She smiles and says, "Hey. You can go back to sleep if you want, but your phone is having a silent fit, so I thought I'd see if you were close enough to awake that saying your name would work."

That explains the dream. He scrubs some alertness into his head with both hands, saying, "Thanks. What time is it?"

"Almost two. One hell of a nap."

I slept for five hours? He smiles and claims, "Must be lying down next to you."

Robin kisses him and is already moving away as she says, "Check your phone. Lunch is ready."

A few minutes later, Strike joins Robin in his kitchenette, saying only, "Whittaker is dead. Jeff, I mean."

It takes Robin a moment to process the words, and then she asks, "Are you okay?"

Strike blinks and says, "Me? I couldn't stand the guy."

"Still, you don't look too good. Maybe sit down."

He complies, but says, "I'm fine." When Robin merely sits down opposite him at the table, he adds, "This has to be Whitehall."

"How did Jeff die?"

Strike hesitates a moment before revealing, "Heroin overdose."

"Oh. But surely, that doesn't stretch credulity very far. Was he a user?"

"Last I heard, he was mainly into crack cocaine, but he wasn't like Mum; he didn't discriminate when it came to getting high."

"So it might not be Stephen."

He's not angry with Robin, he knows that, even as he snaps, "Why do you call him that?"

She blinks and leans back in surprise at his hostile tone, saying, "Not sure really; because that was how he was introduced, I guess."

He reaches out to her, and she thankfully takes his hand as he says, "Sorry, I'm just..." It takes a moment before he gets brave enough to finish the sentence. "Scared."

Robin nods, saying, "Because he might come after me, to hurt you."

Of course she worked it out. "Yeah."

"He's not going to succeed. He might be smarter than either of us, but he's not smarter than both of us."

Strike is silently praying that she's right when he vows, "Partners."

Robin releases him saying only, "Right."

Poking at his salad, unable to identify it, Strike asks, "What's this one?"

"Tabouleh. It's high in iron, which is good for pregnancy, but too much parsley is supposedly bad, so we won't have it often. I left the mint off yours."

Suddenly, nothing concerns him, and he says, "Marry me."

Robin smiles and reminds him, "Not until next Wednesday."

Blissfully happy, he echoes, "Wednesday." Smiling, they start on their meal. After a while, Strike says, "I'm glad we won't be eating this often."

Robin splutters a laugh and says, "Guess I've still got a thing for parsley, because I like it. We might have to consider separate meals, with me being underweight, and you needing a maintenance diet."

He shrugs and suggests, "Or I could get more energetic about sex, burn off some calories."

"You're energetic enough. Kind of exhausting, actually."

He smiles and says, "I do my best." And then his thoughts lead him to, "When can we move into Nick and Ilsa's?"

"Oh, right, meant to tell you; settlement day is the 9th of December. They're moving on the Saturday, so I figure we can move in on the Sunday. Does Shanker know someone with a van? I mean a not stolen one? I haven't got much at the flat, but I have a storage unit full, and there's your stuff, so for once, Shanker's mates might be the cheaper option."

Strike chuckles in agreement and says, "I'll find out. Oh, fuck, I should call him about Whittaker."

When he makes no move, Robin teases, "Are you waiting for permission to leave the table?"

Shocked at the answer he finds when it floats up from his subconscious, Strike says "Yeah, I think I was. That's weird, right?"

"For you, yes. But I wouldn't worry about it. Maybe you're just getting into Dad mode."

"I didn't know I had one. And Shanker can wait. I wouldn't want to leave this salad alone in a room with a known parsley thief."

Robin's laughter fills the small room, and she concedes, "Probably for the best."

That night, Robin is staking out an apartment in Lambeth when she receives a lengthy text from Strike:

Whittaker died at the Ritz, after spending money all over London. Whitehall's alibi is solid, but the money came from him. Might as well have shot the poor bastard.

Taking the precaution of checking the area with her night vision scope, Robin then calls Strike, who answers, "Aren't you working?"

"Yes, but there's nothing happening. Which reminds me, that idea about using dash cams for surveillance, can Spanner get infrared ones?"

"I'll ask him. Is that why you called?"

"No, I called to see how my fiancée is doing about his latest family drama."

It's reassuring when Strike manages a light laugh, and then says, "Wishing that they'd just cheat and steal like normal people."

"How certain is it that the money came from Whitehall?"

"He admitted giving Whittaker £10 000 in cash, adding that it seemed only fair his father should have some of the family fortune."

"But he must have had a pretty good idea what a profligate drug addict would do with that much money."

"I'm certain of it. In fact, Wardle asked him exactly that, and Whitehall just smiled."

Robin has given this a lot of thought, and now reveals, "I don't think he'll come after me. That time in the gym, when he turned up while I was talking to Stevie, he said that he's no threat to either of us."

"You don't really believe that he always tells the truth?"

"Well, think about it. This is a guy who believes he's always the smartest person in the room, mainly because he often is. I think it's a point of pride with him to topple his enemies without lying."

"I'm still unconvinced that he'd never lie. And you're forgetting that he doesn't have to be directly involved to harm you, or even kill you. If he engineers it that someone else does the crime off their own bat, then he's in the clear."

A sudden fear crawling like worms under her skin, Robin says, "Oh, I think you're right. I was taking his words at face value, but we clearly can't do that; he's too sneaky. Have you talked to Prudence yet?"

"No. I left her a message. Hopefully tomorrow. Do you have any theories, Freud?"

"I do. I think, fair to say, he didn't get a lot of affection growing up."

"If you tell me he's unhinged because he didn't get hugged enough, I'm hanging up. My childhood wasn't parasols and pony rides, and I didn't become a sociopath."

"Do you want my thoughts?"

Strike's sigh is audible, and he says, "Please."

"Thank you. I think, even before he found out they weren't his real parents, he wouldn't have had a loving relationship with the Whittakers. Sir Randolph said he didn't bond with either of the boys. And, while Lady Whittaker wanted to be a parent bad enough to kill for it, I suspect there was no consistency to her method; one day she might be liberal and affectionate, the next strict and cold. Schizophrenia and parenting aren't necessarily incompatible, but it needs constant medical attention, education and support. Sounds like she didn't have any of that, not regularly anyway." Seeing some movement in the darkness, Robin says, "Hang on. Looks like Sunshine might have a visitor. I'll call you back."

Robin hangs up and picks up her camera, checking that it's focused on the front door of the apartment building nearby. The approaching pedestrian might be out for a midnight stroll, except that they're fidgeting and eyeing their surroundings. As they enter the well-lit area just outside the building, Robin holds her camera steady while muttering, "Come on, look around one more time."

As if they've heard her prayer, they glance around them, and Robin snaps the shot before they disappear from view. She checks to make sure it's a good photo, and then calls Strike back, saying, "Got 'em."

"Who is it?"

"Jan Reardon, the Network Administrator."

"Rob, you're a genius to think of putting a watch on Sunshine. It would've taken ages to find a suspect at the other end."

Unable to stop a quiet smile at this praise, Robin points out, "This isn't proof though."

"No, but it's a target, when before we had forty-nine likelys and five hundred possibles. So, you're done?"

"I guess so. Though I could hang around and see how long they stay; if it's all night we might also have motive. There's always the chance that they're visiting another tenant, but they were very nervous, and not like I am when walking alone at night, more like someone with a guilty conscience."

"That'll do. I'll call Greta first thing and suggest we monitor Reardon at work. It's not even illegal with permission if there's good reason, and feeding data to their main competitor certainly counts."

Robin smiles and asks, "Are you just saying that because you want me home?"

She's certain he's also smiling when he maintains, "Not just. You can tell me the rest of your theory about my half-brother, or we could have sex."

"There wasn't much more to my theory, just that he desperately needed, or even needs, a mother figure in his life, and found it in Leda. Having died when he was a baby, she could literally do no wrong. He's probably researched her, and you're well aware how much information is out there. You know different, having lived it, but he probably romanticised that transient upbringing. I suspect he loves Leda, though he cannot possibly remember her. And I think this entire mess is him trying to be a good son by avenging her death."

Strike is silent for a few seconds, and then says, "Okay, I think maybe you should skip the sex and get some sleep. You're clearly fatigued."

Robin just laughs and says, "Wanna bet? If Prudence confirms my theory, it counts as a win."

"What stakes?"

"Lunch at my parents' place."

Strike groans, and says, "Okay, though I don't know when we'll next have an entire day free. And shouldn't you be here by now?"

Robin starts the engine, and says, "On my way. Oh, what if you win?"

"I already did. Once you get here, I'll have everything I could possibly want."

Blinking away happy tears, Robin says, "That is so not fair when I'm all hormonal."

He chuckles and says, "Sorry. But, seriously, hang up and get over here."

Robin hangs up, smiling, and heads for home, saying, "Yes, boss."