Nigel inclined his head towards her. ‘We’re Big Brother,’ he said. ‘The one that is watching you, that is, not the one that you watch on your telly. We manage data for everything from your local supermarket to speed cameras to mobile phone networks. I could track you from your front door to the office without your knowing.’

Rob laughed nervously. ‘Pay no attention to him, he likes to wind us all up, does Nige.’

Creep, she thought. ‘I’ll bear that in mind,’ she said mildly, not making it clear which one she was responding to.

‘I was just making sure Rob’s coming along tonight. A bunch of us are going out to celebrate landing a tasty new contract. We’re going to Honeypots, do you know it?’

You didn’t have to be a lad about town to be aware of Honeypots, Bradfield’s biggest and brashest lap-dancing club. Marie would rather have nailed her hand to the wall than spend an evening there. Not for the first time, she counted her blessings and was grateful for her Marco. ‘I never go out on a school night,’ she said.

Nigel raised one side of his mouth in a sneer. ‘You ladies and your beauty sleep. Another time, maybe. On a Friday?’

Marie gave her sweetest smile. ‘I’ll bring my husband. He likes a good laugh.’ She gathered her papers and stood up. ‘Rob, perhaps we could finish this when you’re free?’

Twat, she thought as she marched back to her office. It didn’t seem to matter where you worked, you couldn’t escape them. More’s the pity.

12

The mobile incident room was bedlam with the volume turned down. A constant stream of police officers, CSIs and civilian support staff tramped in and out, covering all the bases from grim and grumpy to crass and chirpy. One look told Paula it was the worst possible place to examine evidence that might end up as a key plank in a court case. Clearing it first with Fielding, she left the crime scene and headed back to Skenfrith Street to find a quiet corner. And if she was honest, she wanted to put some distance between herself and the dead woman.

During her years with Carol Jordan’s Major Incident Team, Paula had confronted a wide range of the hideous things human beings could do to one another. The things she’d seen had disturbed her nights and her days, but she’d always managed to put them in a box in her head where they couldn’t contaminate the rest of her life. She’d known what it was to be at risk herself, and she’d lost colleagues to the job. It was only by chance that she’d escaped the act of violence that had destroyed Chris Devine’s future during the hunt for Jacko Vance.