Elizabeth George - In Pursuit of the Proper Sinner

“You've had my answer.”

“Is Reeve the bloke?” Nkata asked her.

“Reeve?” Vi reached for her glass again.

“Martin Reeve. MKR Financial Management.”

She didn't drink. Instead, she swirled the liquid and watched as it slid across the ice cubes, which rattled against the side of the glass. She finally said, “I lied about MKR. I've never worked for Martin Reeve. I don't even know him. I just knew about him and Tricia from what Nikki said. And when you asked about him yesterday, I followed your lead. I didn't know what you knew. About me. About Nikki. And in my line of work, it doesn't make sense to trust the police.”

“Then how did you two hook up in the first place?” Nkata asked her.

“Nikki and I? We met in a pub. Jack Horner on the Tottenham Court Road, near her college. She was being chatted up by a bald-headed bloke with a paunch and bad teeth, and once he left her alone, we had a laugh about him. We began to chat and…” She shrugged. “We just got on. Nikki was easy to talk to. Easy to tell the truth to. She was interested in my work, and when she knew how much money could be had on the job-a far sight more than what she was making at MKR-she decided to try it.”

“You didn't mind the competition?” Lynley asked.

“There wasn't any.”

“I don't understand.”

“Nikki didn't like it straight,” Vi explained. “She only serviced men if they wanted quirky sex. Costumes, play-acting, domination. I'll do little girls for men who prefer it from twelve-year-olds without the risk of going to gaol for their pleasure. But that's about as quirky as I get. I'll give hand relief and do oral in addition to the little-girl bit, naturally. Otherwise, what I have on offer is exactly what Nikki couldn't be bothered with: romance, seduction, and understanding. You'd be amazed how little of that goes on between husbands and wives.”

“So between the two of you,” Lynley concluded, sidestepping any discussion of what marriage could do by way of cocking up the works of a relationship, “you covered all tastes and all inclinations?”

“We did,” she replied. “And Shelly knew it. So she also knew that I wasn't about to choose her over Nikki if the two of them didn't get on once Nikki and I hooked up, which is why you need to talk to her. Not to some non-existent punter with money enough to give Nikki this place.”

“Where c'n we find this Shelly?” Nkata asked.

Vi didn't have her address. But she'd be easy enough to locate, she said. She was a regular at The Stocks, a club in Wandsworth that “catered to individuals with specific interests.” She was, Vi added, “special mates” with the barman.

“If she's not there now, he'll be able to tell you where to find her,” Vi told them.

Lynley examined her from his position on the love seat. He found that despite the volume of information she'd given them, he still wanted to give her some sort of veracity test. Glibness was one of the essentials for survival in her profession, and the course of wisdom-not to mention the years of rubbing elbows with those who lived on the edge of the law-suggested that he take her word as something less than gospel.

He said, “Nicola Maiden's movements in the months preceding her death seem at odds with each other, Miss Nevin. Was she using prostitution for a quick source of income to tide her over till her law work was profitable?”

“No law work is as profitable as this,” Vi said. “At least not when you're young. That's why Nikki dropped out of law college in the first place. She knew she could go back to the law when she was forty. But she couldn't be turning tricks at that age. It made sense to her to get the money while she could.”

“Then why did she spend the summer working for a lawyer? Or was she doing more than merely working for him?”

Vi shrugged. “You'll have to ask the lawyer.”

Barbara Havers worked the computer till midday. She'd left Lynley's office in the thrall of an effort to maintain such a strict control upon her anger that for an hour at the glowing screen, she'd been completely incapable of assimilating a single piece of information. But by the time she'd read through the seventh report, she'd calmed down. What had been rage metamorphosed into blind intent. No longer was her performance in the investigation a case of redeeming herself in the eyes of a man she'd long respected. It was now a matter of proving to them both-to herself as well as to Lynley-that she was right.

She could have dealt with anything other than the professional indifference with which he was making her current assignments. Had she seen the slightest indication on his patrician face of scorn, impatience, disregard, or loathing, she could have confronted him and they could have battled openly as they'd battled in the past. But he'd obviously concluded that she was criminally inadequate, marginally hysterical, and hence beneath his notice, and nothing she could say by way of explaining her actions was going to make him think otherwise. Her only option was to prove to him how incorrect his assessment was.

There was a single way to accomplish this. Barbara knew that to do it was to put her entire career on the line. But she also knew that she had no career of value at the moment. And she never again would be able to have one unless she freed herself from the shackles of judgement that were currently binding her.

She began with the idea of lunch. She'd been at the Yard since early morning, and she was due a break. So why not, she thought, take a stroll during the time that was due her? Nowhere was it written that she had to take all her meals in Victoria Street. Indeed, a little hike through Soho would be just the ticket to prime her with a bit of exercise before she faced a few more hours sifting through the SO 10 cases on CRIS.

She wasn't, however, so wedded to the idea of Soho and exercise that she considered walking there. Time was of the utmost importance. So she toddled out to her Mini in the Yard's underground car park, and she zipped up to Soho via Charing Cross Road.

The crowds were out. In an area of London that blended everything from book shops to skin shows, from street markets offering vegetables and flowers to sex shops selling vibrating dildos and pulsating ersatz vaginas, there would always be crowds on the pavements of

Soho. And on a sunny Saturday in September with the tourist season not yet on the wane, those crowds spilled from pavements into the streets, making the going treacherous once one turned off the theatre-oriented congestion of Shaftesbury Avenue and began heading up Frith Street.

Barbara ignored the restaurants that called to her like sirens. She inhaled through her mouth so as to avoid the beguiling fragrances of garlic-laden Italian food that were carried on the air. And she allowed herself a sigh of relief when at last she saw the timbered structure-part arbour and part tool shed-that marked the centre of the square.

She made a circuit once, looking for a place to park. Finding nothing available, she located the building she was seeking and resigned herself to giving half a day's wages to a car park a short distance from Dean Street. She hoofed it back in the direction of the square, digging from her shoulder bag the address that she'd found on the crumpled bit of paper she'd taken from a pair of Terry Cole's trousers in his flat. She verified the address: 31-32 Soho Square.

Right, she thought. So let's see what little Terry was up to.

She rounded the corner from Carlisle Street and sauntered to the building. It stood at the southwest corner of the square, a modern structure of brick with a mansard roof and transom windows. A portico supported by Doric columns sheltered the glass-doored entrance, and above this entrance in brass were identified the occupants of the building: Triton International Entertainment.