Tony Hill u Carol Jordan 08 - Cross and Burn

vehicles though the car park itself was empty. She identified half a dozen police cars and Land Rovers, the ID numbers emblazoned on their roofs revealing them to be from the West Yorkshire force. One displayed the solid circle of a Dog Unit but the others were standard response units. There were also four unmarked cars and an ambulance. She could see what looked like crime-scene tape fluttering round the perimeter, and several figures were milling around something she couldn’t identify. Something waist high, stone-built, possibly.
    It was a crime scene. And a serious one at that. The only crimes that would merit this sort of police presence so early in the day were murder, attempted murder or serious sexual assault involving a high level of violence. The kind of crimes that had been her bread and butter, her meat and drink, and the icing on her cake for years. The kind of crimes she’d built a career on. The kind of crimes that both answered and thwarted her fundamental craving for justice.
    It felt strange to be a distant spectator at the first stages of an investigation. For so long, she had been the person controlling the scene. Taking the decisions. Deploying the personnel. Driving everyone to do their best for the dead and the living. And now, she was just another rubbernecker.
    ‘Flash, come,’ she said, snapping her fingers for the dog, who was quartering the hillside a hundred yards away. Low to the ground, Flash moved swiftly to her side and dropped down beside her, tongue lolling out of her mouth. Carol crouched down and buried her hand in the thick mane at the back of the dog’s neck. She didn’t want to leave yet; her history wouldn’t let her go. But she didn’t want to be obvious to anyone scanning the landscape from below.
    While she watched, another car came hammering up the road. And instead of West Yorkshire’s 13 on the roof, this one carried the 51 that signified Bradfield Metropolitan Police. What had brought BMP officers to a West Yorkshire crime scene? She knew from her own experience that there was little love lost between the detectives of the two forces. There would have to be a very good reason for BMP cops to be here this early in an investigation.
    The BMP car pulled up by the entrance, double parking to let two people out. Even from that distance she could see they were women. Carol couldn’t rely on the evidence of her eyes to identify them. But common sense told her the small, dark figure who had been in the front seat could only be DCI Alex Fielding. Her equal in rank, but her opposite in so many other aspects. Fielding was authoritarian and formal where Carol was more relaxed and inclined towards teamwork. Fielding was all about hard facts and never mind the story behind them; Carol loved working with Tony because he helped her to understand why. Fielding was married with a son, a hinterland of emotional connection that Carol had failed to establish. And now it appeared Fielding had a new bagman. Her former sergeant had been a lanky raw-boned Ulsterman who always talked about going home. Wherever he’d gone, the person filling his shoes looked very familiar. Carol couldn’t have sworn to it, but she’d have put serious money on Fielding’s new bagman being Paula McIntyre.
    The realisation provoked a confusion of feelings in Carol. Outrage at Paula’s skills being put at the service of so unimaginative a boss; a stab of regret that it wasn’t her down there; an acceptance that that life was behind her; and a benediction to Paula, who could still manage to do what she would not.
    Carol stood up, backing into the trees. This was no place for her. She’d turned away from all that was going on down there, and she was slowly growing better for it. Hard physical work, all those books and movies she’d missed out on over the years, a dog for company. Somewhere in the middle of that, she’d finally manage to forgive herself.
    Let other people speak for the dead.
    When she turned to go, a spasm of shock flashed across her chest, stopping her breath and making her heart clench. A few feet away, a man stood watching her. How could he have come so close without her realising? And why was the dog not reacting? Carol was on the point of making a run for it when her brain clocked on and she understood what she was seeing. The reason for Flash’s passivity was that the man standing in the shelter of the trees was George Nicholas. At his heels, Jess, cheerfully licking her