© J.K. Rowling. All Rights Reserved.
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Career of Evil
3
Strike had managed to make himself unpopular among the Metropolitan Police over the previous year, which was not entirely his fault. The fulsome press coverage of his two most notable detective triumphs had understandably galled those officers whose efforts he had trumped. However, Wardle, who had helped him out on the first of those cases, had shared in some of the subsequent glory and relations between them remained reasonably amicable. Robin had only ever seen Wardle in the newspaper reports of the case. Their paths had not crossed in court.
He turned out to be a handsome man with a thick head of chestnut hair and chocolate-brown eyes, who was wearing a leather jacket and jeans. Strike did not know whether he was more amused or irritated by the reflexive look Wardle gave Robin on entering the room—a swift zigzag sweep of her hair, her figure and her left hand, where his eyes lingered for a second on the sapphire and diamond engagement ring.
“Eric Wardle,” he said in a low voice, with what Strike felt was an unnecessarily charming smile. “And this is Detective Sergeant Ekwensi.”
Career of Evil
6
“No problem,” said Robin. “I wanted an early night anyway.”
She took a low-calorie hot chocolate and a copy of Grazia to bed with her, but she could not concentrate. After ten minutes, she got up and fetched her laptop, took it back to bed with her and Googled Jeff Whittaker.
She had read the Wikipedia entry before, during one of her guilty trawls through Strike’s past, but now she read with greater attention. It started with a familiar disclaimer:
Career of Evil
6
In 2005 Whittaker was jailed for dealing crack cocaine.[15]
Robin read the page twice. Her concentration was poor tonight. Information seemed to slide off the surface of her mind, failing to be absorbed. Parts of Whittaker’s history stood out, glaringly strange. Why would anyone conceal a corpse for a month? Had Whittaker feared that he would be charged with murder again, or was there some other reason? Bodies, limbs, pieces of dead flesh… She sipped the hot chocolate and grimaced. It tasted of flavored dust; in the pressure she felt to be slim in her wedding dress, she had forsworn chocolate in its true form for a month now.
She replaced the mug on her bedside cabinet, returned her fingers to the keyboard and searched for images of Jeff Whittaker trial.
Career of Evil
6
The bathroom fan whirred into life next door. With a guilty start, Robin shut down the page she had been viewing. Matthew had lately developed a habit of borrowing her laptop and a few weeks previously she had caught him reading her emails to Strike. With this in mind, she reopened the web page, cleared her browsing history, brought up her settings and, after a moment’s consideration, changed her password to DontFearTheReaper. That would scupper him.
As she slid out of bed to go and throw the hot chocolate down the kitchen sink it occurred to Robin that she had not bothered to look up any details about Terence “Digger” Malley. Of course, the police would be far better placed than she or Strike to find a London gangster.
Doesn’t matter, though, she thought sleepily, heading back to the bedroom. It isn’t Malley.
Career of Evil
13
Having read several scientific papers online, Robin now knew that sufferers of BIID were rare and that the precise cause of their condition was unknown. Visits to support sites had already shown her how much people seemed to dislike sufferers of the condition. Angry comments peppered the message boards, accusing BIID sufferers of coveting a status that others had had thrust upon them by bad luck and illness, of wanting to court attention in a grotesque and offensive manner. Equally angry retorts followed the attacks: did the writer really think the sufferer wanted to have BIID? Did they not understand how difficult it was to be transabled—wanting, needing, to be paralyzed or amputated? Robin wondered what Strike would think of the BIID sufferers’ stories, were he to read them. She suspected that his reaction would not be sympathetic.
Downstairs, the sitting room door opened and she heard a brief snatch of a commentator’s voice, her father telling their old chocolate Labrador to get out because it had farted and Martin’s laughter.
To her own frustration, the exhausted Robin could not remember the name of the young girl who had written to Strike, asking for advice on cutting off her leg, but she thought it had been Kylie or something similar. Scrolling slowly down the most densely populated support site she had found, she kept an eye out for usernames that might in any way connect to her, because where else would a teenager with an unusual fixation go to share her fantasy, if not cyberspace?
Career of Evil
27
“Two hundred and thirty quid for an old mobile number,” he said as she pulled away from the curb and accelerated towards the town center. “I hope it’s bloody worth it. We’re looking for Adam and Eve Street—she says it’s just up here on the right—the café’s called Appleby’s. She’s going to meet me there in a bit.”
Robin found a parking space and they waited, discussing what Ingrid had said about Brockbank while eating the Danish pastries that Strike had stolen from the breakfast buffet. Robin was starting to appreciate why Strike was carrying extra weight. She had never before undertaken an investigation that lasted more than twenty-four hours. When every meal had to be sourced in passing shops and eaten on the move, you descended quickly to fast food and chocolate.
“That’s her,” said Strike forty minutes later, clambering out of the Land Rover and heading for the interior of Appleby’s. Robin watched the blonde approach, now in jeans and a fake-fur jacket. She had the body of a glamour model and Robin was reminded of Platinum. Ten minutes passed, then fifteen; neither Strike nor the girl reappeared.
Career of Evil
30
Glad to have got rid of her, Strike made himself his third mug of tea of the morning and laid back down on the bed with a pile of newspapers. Several of them displayed a photograph of MURDER VICTIM KELSEY PLATT, wearing a navy school uniform, a smile on her plain, pimply face.
Dressed only in boxers, his hairy belly no smaller for the plentiful takeaways and chocolate bars that had filled it in the last fortnight, he munched his way through a packet of Rich Tea biscuits and skimmed several of the stories, but they told him nothing he did not already know, so he turned instead to the anticipatory comment about the next day’s Arsenal–Liverpool match.
His mobile rang while he was reading. He had not realized how tightly wound he was: he reacted so fast that Wardle was taken by surprise.
Career of Evil
47
“Call me if there’s any news. Or even if there isn’t.”
The brief spurt of enthusiasm she had felt at the prospect of going back to Wollaston Close had faded by the time she had reached Catford station. She was not sure why she felt suddenly downcast and anxious. Perhaps she was hungry. Determined to break herself of the chocolate habit that was jeopardizing her ability to fit into the altered wedding dress, she bought herself an unappetizing-looking energy bar before boarding the train.
Chewing the sawdusty slab as the train carried her towards Elephant and Castle, she found herself absentmindedly rubbing her ribs where she had collided with the large man in the goatee. Being sworn at by random people was the price you paid for living in London, of course; she could not ever remember a stranger swearing at her in Masham, not even once.
Career of Evil
51
“Cheers for the sandwich an’ ev’rything,” said Stephanie, who had reappeared beside her. “I’m gonna—”
“Have something else. Some chocolate or something,” Robin urged her, even though the waitress mopping table tops looked ready to throw them out.
“Why?” asked Stephanie, showing the first sign of suspicion.