[Knight and Culverhouse 09] - In Plain Sight Read online

  ‘Trust me,’ the officer said, leaning forward and whispering. ‘It’s easier if you do it yourself.’

  Frank looked at the razor blade and started to cry. The main thing was his wife was going to be okay. He knew Jack would see to that. The guvnor would be angry for a while, but he was a good man. He’d see to it that everything was alright. He knew he would.

  58

  Jack hoovered his living room floor for the third time that day. It wasn’t a job he had ever been keen on before — he got the vacuum cleaner out perhaps once a fortnight, if that — but he’d had enough of sitting around the house moping.

  Moping meant thinking, and he’d had enough of thinking. Nothing good ever came of it. All he did was brood about the situation with Emily, what Frank had done and which direction his life was going to take. Telling Penny Andrews to go fuck herself had been a brief moment of delight, but in everything else he was very much still waiting for the dust to settle. Retirement, however, was very much at the forefront of his mind.

  Chrissie had already gone up to bed. She was still on strong painkillers for her leg, and Jack had moved her in with him until she’d recovered. She was able to get around on crutches much better now, and she’d taken to sleeping upstairs again on the doctors’ advice. Jack was pleased to have finally put the camp bed away and made his living room a living room again, rather than a makeshift bedroom. He didn’t mind, though. Looking after her had given him something to do. She’d told him time and time again she wasn’t an invalid and was perfectly capable of getting around on crutches, but he’d needed something to take his mind off everything else. Deep down, he knew she knew that.

  He unplugged the vacuum cleaner and tied the cord around it, before putting it back in the cupboard under the stairs. As he did so, he heard the sound of the front door unlocking and opening. There was only one other person who had a key, and Jack knew immediately who it was.

  He also knew he couldn’t panic or react too much. This had to be normal. It had to be undramatic, yet welcoming.

  ‘Em,’ he said, smiling as he watched her walk into the living room. ‘Sorry, just doing a bit of hoovering.’

  Emily flicked her eyebrows briefly upwards. ‘Well, you were right. You have changed.’

  Jack let out a small chuckle. ‘It’s good to see you,’ he said. As he stepped towards her, he could see she’d been crying. ‘Everything okay?’

  ‘Not really. Ethan and I had an argument.’

  ‘Oh,’ Jack replied, keen not to overreact or jump to the conclusion that it had all been Ethan’s fault. ‘Do you want to talk about it?’

  ‘No, not really.’

  ‘That’s fine,’ Jack said, wanting to kick Ethan Turner’s head in. ‘I’m here if you want to, though. Are you… staying?’

  Emily shrugged. ‘Well it’s my home, isn’t it?’

  Jack smiled. ‘Of course it is. It’s always your home. You know I love having you here. And I really am sorry about what happened before. I won’t go on about it, but I just wanted you to know that.’

  ‘It’s fine.’

  ‘Seriously, Em. Whatever you need, I’ll be here to support you. We’re a family,’ he said, looking down at her belly. ‘All of us.’ Noticing that Emily was on the verge of tears again, he pulled her into a hug, which was only broken by the sound of Chrissie trying to get down the stairs on her crutches. ‘Woah, hang on. Let me give you a hand,’ he said.

  ‘I’m not a cripple, Jack. I can manage. Hi, Emily. I thought it might be you. How’ve you been?’

  ‘Yeah, alright. Not as good as you, by the looks of things.’

  ‘I’ll heal. Much better than I was, anyway.’

  ‘I heard what happened. At school. Everyone’s talking about it.’

  Chrissie exchanged an awkward look with Jack. ‘Yes, well, it’s nice to be popular, I suppose.’

  ‘Do you want something to eat?’ Jack asked Emily.

  ‘It’s cool. I’ll do myself a jacket potato,’ his daughter replied, chucking her bag down next to the sofa and making her way through to the kitchen.

  ‘Like she’s never been away,’ Chrissie said, hobbling across the room and sitting down on the sofa.

  ‘Shouldn’t you be in bed?’ Jack asked.

  ‘Couldn’t sleep. Thought I’d come down and see Emily. And you, of course.’

  ‘Of course,’ Jack replied, smiling. Chrissie’s sleep patterns had been a little abnormal thanks to the strong painkillers, just as his had been thanks to his stress levels, and it was amazing how often the two bizarre schedules seemed to match up.

  ‘Is she back?’ Chrissie mouthed, thumbing a gesture towards the kitchen.

  ‘Dunno,’ Jack said. ‘I hope so.’

  ‘Maybe things are looking up.’

  Jack had thought that many times himself over the years, but had usually been proved wrong. This time, though, he hoped Chrissie was right. ‘Maybe,’ he said, sitting down next to her. ‘Listen, there’s something I wanted to tell you.’

  ‘Go on.’

  ‘I haven’t been entirely honest with you. I mean, I really love having you here, and I love spending time with you and I’m really excited by where things are going with us.’

  ‘Was that you being dishonest?’ Chrissie said, smiling.

  ‘No, that part’s a bit more… delicate. Helen and I aren’t actually divorced. We’re separated. The divorce bit is tricky, because she doesn’t have a fixed address and keeps disappearing. If truth be told, I don’t even know which country she’s in right now.’

  Chrissie looked at him and smiled. ‘Is that it?’

  ‘Well, yeah. I’d have thought it was a pretty big thing.’

  ‘It’s fine, honestly. I understand. I’m happy just being with you. Although I must admit, I’m a bit annoyed that she might end up getting hold of the stuff I’d had my eye on.’

  Jack laughed, for the first time in a long time. Perhaps retirement, when it came, wouldn’t be so bad.

  Get more of my books FREE!

  Thank you for reading In Plain Sight. I hope it was as much fun for you as it was for me writing it.

  To say thank you, I’d like to invite you to my exclusive VIP Club, and give you some of my books and short stories for FREE. All members of my VIP Club have access to FREE, exclusive books and short stories which aren’t available anywhere else.

  You’ll also get access to all of my new releases at a bargain-basement price before they’re available anywhere else. Joining is absolutely FREE and you can leave at any time, no questions asked. To join the club, head to adamcroft.net/vip-club and two free books will be sent to you straight away!

  If you enjoyed the book, please do leave a review on the site you bought it from. Reviews mean an awful lot to writers and they help us to find new readers more than almost anything else. It would be very much appreciated.

  I love hearing from my readers, too, so please do feel free to get in touch with me. You can contact me via my website, on Twitter @adamcroft and you can ‘like’ my Facebook page at facebook.com/adamcroftbooks.

  For more information, visit my website: adamcroft.net

  Acknowledgments

  Although writing in an established series does undoubtedly make things a little easier, this book — as all books do — owes a great deal to many people. Although not financially, of course, because that would be silly.

  My thanks as always go to Graham Bartlett for his experience and expertise at the highest levels of policing. Information on Professional Standards, covert policing and other aspects are notoriously difficult to come by, but Graham is always unfailingly generous with his time and advice. Any places in which I’ve strayed from realistic police procedure are entirely my responsibility. Realism is a key aim for me, but story must win out.

  Thank you again to my small team of early readers (by which I mean my wife and my mum) who managed to pick out the most embarrassing errors before the manuscript left the building. To Lucy, for her dedication and enthus
iasm for my books, and for having been such a wonderful and forthright editor over the years. My books would be noticeably poorer were it not for her input.

  For this book, my biggest debt of gratitude must go to Mark Boutros. This man is nothing short of a genius when it comes to storytelling, and he’s helped me out of Plot Hole Hell on a number of occasions. Between us, we managed to get from a few thousand scrappy words and a vague idea of plot direction to a finished novel within the space of three weeks. Not only that, but I’m eternally grateful for his patience and enthusiasm for dealing with endless phone calls and text messages to tell him I’ve buggered the plot up and need rescuing. Even after eleven years writing this series, I still run into roadblocks and difficulties more often than most people might think.

  And, of course, my greatest and final thanks go to you, the readers. Your love for Jack and Wendy and the rest of the team is what keeps me going.