‘DI Beardmore!’ someone called, and he made his apologies to Lucy, heading across the drive to speak with the FMO.

Briefly, Lucy lowered her head, trying to shut out the lights and noise. She felt nauseous but put that down to shock rather than the chemical fumes she’d been exposed to, though the ambulance crew had wanted her to get that checked out at hospital too. They’d told her that the ultra-concentrated acid in the cellar had likely been weakened by the pollutants – in other words the multiple organic remains that now clotted it. If it had been fresh and uncontaminated, just being in that room would probably have blinded and poisoned her.

‘Well, miss …’ someone else said.

Lucy got tiredly to her feet. ‘Ma’am?’

Priya Nehwal’s stony expression was as merciless as ever.

‘You’ve got some explaining to do,’ she said.

‘I’m terribly sorry, ma’am.’ Lucy didn’t see what she could do other than apologise. She doubted that even one of Nehwal’s infamous bollockings would make her feel any worse at present. ‘I had to keep going … I had to prove that I’m still onside.’

‘That admission itself, after I had specifically ordered you to go off duty, could be sackable.’

‘Then … fuck it. Yeah, that’s it.’ Lucy couldn’t keep the charade going. She plonked herself back on the wall. ‘Fuck it. Give me the heave-ho, why don’t you? Christ … you’d be doing me a favour. You think I’m enjoying this bloody abattoir—’

‘Enough!’ Nehwal said firmly. ‘Don’t make things worse for yourself.’

‘Well, I’m sorry, ma’am, but I’m a bit dizzy at present. I mean, on one hand you want to kick me out—’

‘I didn’t say that.’

‘And on the other, DI Beardmore wants to commend me.’

‘And you deserve a commendation.’

Lucy regarded her uncertainly.

The DSU still seemed unimpressed, but perhaps had softened a little. ‘If you’d given me a chance to speak, I’d have told you that myself.’

‘Look, ma’am … I’m sorry,’ was all Lucy could say, again. ‘I know you won’t send me packing. I know you wouldn’t do that even if I hadn’t made this score. But to be frank, I’m not sure I care any more. I mean, some future I’ve got in the job, eh … related to a major player in the Northwest underworld? I might be estranged from him, I might hate the ground he walks on … but that shadow of suspicion will follow me around throughout my career, won’t it?’

Nehwal glanced back towards the trestle-table and its heap of plastic-wrapped paperwork. ‘Less so after tonight, possibly. That cardboard tube you directed us to. The one with the bulldog on it. You saw me inspecting the contents?’

Lucy nodded glumly. ‘I hope it was useful.’