The Cuckoo's Calling

be talking through lawyers, but unless you can do better than £1.5 million, I will tell everyone exactly where I was when Lula Landry died, and exactly how I got there, because I’m sick of taking shit for you. This is not an empty threat. I’m starting to think I should tell the police anyway.’ Or something like that,” said Duffield.
    Dimly, through the curtained window, came the sound of a couple of the paparazzi outside laughing together.
    “That’s very useful information,” Strike told Duffield. “Thank you.”
    “I don’t want Bestigui to know it was me who told you.”
    “I don’t think your name’ll need to come into it,” said Strike, standing up again. “Thanks for the water.”
    “Hang on, sweetie, I’m coming,” said Ciara, her phone pressed to her ear. “Kieran? We’re coming out now, Cormoran and me. Right now. Bye-bye, Evan darling.”
    She bent over and kissed him on both cheeks, while Duffield, halfway out of his chair, looked disconcerted.
    “You can crash here if you—”
    “No, sweetie, I’ve got a job tomorrow afternoon; need my beauty sleep,” she said.
    More flashes blinded Strike as he stepped outside; but the paparazzi seemed confused this time. As he helped Ciara down the steps, and followed her into the back of the car, one of them shouted at Strike: “Who the fuck are you?”
    Strike slammed the door, grinning. Kolovas-Jones was back in the driver’s seat; they were pulling away from the curb, and this time they were not pursued.
    After a block or so of silence, Kolovas-Jones looked in the rear-view mirror and asked Ciara:
    “Home?”
    “I suppose so. Kieran, will you turn on the radio? I fancy a bit of music,” she said. “Louder than that, sweetie. Oh, I love this.”
    “Telephone” by Lady Gaga filled the car.
    She turned to Strike as the orange glow of street lights swept across her extraordinary face. Her breath smelled of alcohol, her skin of that sweet, peppery perfume.
    “Don’t you want to ask me anything else?”
    “You know what?” said Strike. “I do. Why would you have a detachable lining in a handbag?”
    She stared at him for several seconds, then let out a great giggle, slumping sideways into his shoulder, nudging him. Lithe and slight, she continued to rest against him as she said:
    “You are funny.”
    “But why would you?”
    “Well, it just makes the bag more, like, individual; you can customize them, you see; you can buy a couple of linings and swap them over; you can pull them out and use them as scarves; they’re beautiful. Silk with gorgeous patterns. The zip edging is very rock-and-roll.”
    “Interesting,” said Strike, as her upper leg moved to rest lightly along his own, and she gave a second, deep-throated giggle.
    Call all you want, but there’s no one home, sang Lady Gaga.
    The music masked their conversation, but Kolovas-Jones’s eyes were moving with unnecessary regularity from road ahead to rear-view mirror. After another minute, Ciara said:
    “Guy’s right, I do like them big. You’re very butch. And, like, stern. It’s sexy.”
    A block later she whispered:
    “Where do you live?” while rubbing her silky cheek against his, like a cat.
    “I sleep on a camp bed in my office.”
    She giggled again. She was definitely a little drunk.
    “Are you serious?”
    “Yeah.”
    “We’ll go to mine, then, shall we?”
    Her tongue was cool and sweet and tasted of Pernod.
    “Have you slept with my father?” he managed to say, between the pressings of her full lips on to his.
    “No… God, no…” A little giggle. “He dyes his hair…it’s, like, purple close up…I used to call him the rocking prune…”
    And then, ten minutes later, a lucid voice in his mind urging him not to let desire lead on to humiliation, he surfaced for air to mutter:
    “I’ve only got one leg.”
    “Don’t be silly…”
    “I’m not being silly…it got blown off in Afghanistan.”
    “Poor baby…” she whispered. “I’ll rub it better.”
    “Yeah—that’s not my leg…It’s helping, though…”

9
    ROBIN RAN UP THE CLANGING metal stairs in the same low heels that she had worn the previous day. Twenty-four hours ago, unable to dislodge the word “gumshoe” from her mind, she had selected her frumpiest footwear for a day’s walking; today, excited by what she had achieved in the old black shoes, they had taken on the glamour of Cinderella’s glass slippers. Hardly able to wait to tell Strike everything she had