Dead Cold Mysteries Box Set #3: Books 9-12 (A Dead Cold Box Set) by Blake Banner (read a book .TXT) 📗

The door closed and Caulfield looked at me and Dehan, then at Chiddester. “What is this? What are you doing, Chiddester?”

“I am shining a light,” snarled Chiddester, “on the swarming rats and cockroaches that claim to represent the working people of this country!”

A moment later, the door opened and the servant, accompanied by a young man in his early twenties, stepped into the room. Between them, they held Sadiq Hassan.

Hastings’ face crumbled and he began to sob into his hands like a child. Caulfield gaped. “You treacherous…”

“You dare to call me treacherous, you murdering bastard?”

I smiled. “We scared the living daylights out of him and left his ears ringing, Well, Dehan did, but we didn’t shoot him, despite being gun totin’ cowboys. Maybe it’s time you revised some of your stereotypes, huh, Hastings? See, we figured, if you thought you had something over us, if you thought there could be some give and take, you might just give, and you did. You gave your DNA, and you gave a confession.” I held Caulfield’s eye for a long moment, then I said, “So here’s the thing I’m curious about, Caulfield. Here we are, two cops without jurisdiction, a back bench Member of Parliament, a member of a Marxist group who has close ties to Islamic extremists, a prime suspect in Katie Ellis’ murder, and you, a Shadow Cabinet Minister. What do you propose we should do next?”

He returned to his chair and sat staring at the floor, chewing his lip. Hastings looked at me and said, “I swear I did not kill her. I was very fond of her.”

Dehan gave him a look that could have castrated a bull and said, “Shut up, Adolph.”

Caulfield spoke to the carpet, with both hands stuck out like he was holding an invisible box.

“What will it take, Chiddester? Men like us, though we may be bitterly opposed to each other’s ideals, we must see the bigger picture. What happened to your daughter is an outrageous crime, and the man, or men, responsible must and will be brought to justice. But can’t you see the crises that will enfold our society if the Labour party is brought down?” He suddenly looked at me and at Dehan, appealing to us. “Imagine if in the States the entire Democratic Party were brought down. It would be a devastating blow not just to the left, but to the country as a whole!”

I grunted. “So what are you proposing?”

He closed his eyes. “I admit, there has been an issue in the party with anti-Semitism, and I will hold up my hand and say clearly, we should all have been more vigilant, more aware of the problem. I will give you my personal undertaking, my word, that we will address this problem…”

I interrupted him. “What about the ties to Islamic fundamentalism?”

His mouth worked but no words came out. Sadiq was staring at him fixedly. “I am not aware that any such ties…”

I pointed at Sadiq and half shouted. “You’re looking at one right now, Caulfield! This man right here, who tried to murder us, he is a tie between you and Islamic fundamentalism. He was carrying out hits for the Labour Party, for crying out loud!”

“No…” He was shaking his head. “No, no, no! He and Hastings were operating without the sanction of the party!”

I shouted, “Total deniability, huh? Is that what you had? And what did you promise in exchange?”

“No! You can’t do this! We are the Parliamentary Labour Party, for God’s sake! We are the establishment!”

A deathly silence lay on the room. I pulled my phone from my pocket and dialed. After a moment, I said, “Harry? We have Hastings here. We’ll hold him till you arrive.” Then I turned to Sadiq. “Get the hell out of here. Try and find the passages in your book that talk about universal love for all people, despite their religion.”

He spat at my feet. “There aren’t any, filthy Jew loving pig!”

He turned and walked out of the room, slamming the doors as he went. Finally, I looked at Caulfield. “Get out, Caulfield. You make me nauseous. It’s depressing that people can be like you. Even if you had no hand in this murder, what Lord Chiddester says is true, you created the conditions for this corruption to flourish. You are beneath contempt. Get out.”

He stood, and his legs were trembling. He walked out of the room with a strange, stiff gait and again we heard the door slam.

Hastings looked at me resentfully. “Why do they get to go home, and I get arrested? You know full well they are as guilty as I am.”

It was Dehan who answered. “That’s what happens to fall guys, schmuck.”

“Besides,” I said, “you really figure Sadiq for the heroic type? We delivered him to Lord Chiddester on the way back from Kent. Before we got there, he was saying he wanted to turn Queen’s evidence. He’s on his way now with a couple of cops to collect all the evidence Katie had put together. He told us he’d collected it from her apartment after…”

Hastings’ eyes were swiveling this way and that like they had a life of their own. He blurted out, “That’s not right, that’s wrong. Why would he have her stuff?”

“Well if he hasn’t, who has?”

The question was obvious and so was the answer, and if he hadn’t been in such a panic, he would have seen he was being led. But he was too scared to see the nose in front of his own face.

“Obviously I have it! I killed her, to shut her up! And I have her stuff! That’s obvious, isn’t it!”

I frowned. “Can you prove that?”

“Of course I can prove it! I have everything—her laptop, her memory sticks, her notebooks. Everything! It’s all at…!” He faltered, realizing too late