Here it comes, thought Bailey.

‘I hired that private eye. Like I mentioned before.’

‘Oh?’ Bailey was faintly surprised, having half expected Wendy not to bother following through with it.

‘Yeah,’ said Wendy.

‘And?’

‘He’s dead.’

Bailey did a double take. ‘Dead?!’

Wendy took a deep breath. Her lip wobbled and she suddenly looked like she was about to start crying.

‘He jumped off the top of a multi-storey car park. The local news is saying it’s probably a suicide.’ She swallowed hard. ‘But that’s bullshit. I know it was my husband. Him and his cronies. They did it.’

Bailey shuddered. Knowing what she knew about Rick and his organisation, it seemed utterly plausible. Many of their victims had died in circumstances that made their deaths extremely difficult, if not impossible, to tie back to the Molloys. Many others, of course, had just disappeared completely.

‘You can’t be sure,’ she said, trying to sound breezy. ‘Maybe it was just a suicide.’

Wendy shook her head. ‘I might not know much about what my husband does, but I know my husband, and I know he’s very capable of killing someone.’

She paused and suddenly glanced around at her colleagues, aware that she was talking in rather a loud voice. She dropped the volume a little.

‘We were sitting there eating dinner the day afterwards. I was watching him closely and there was no emotion whatsoever. They chucked that poor bloke off the top of that car park, but to look at Rick’s face, you’d think nothing had ever happened. I’m starting to think he’s some kind of psychopath.’

Bailey was surprised it had taken Wendy this long to reach that conclusion.

A thought suddenly occurred to her. ‘Does Rick know that you put the private eye onto him?’

Wendy shook her head firmly. ‘No, not as far as I’m aware. He would have said so. He would have hit the bleeding roof. Hopefully he won’t find out.’

Bailey eyed Wendy with concern, her police officer sensibilities kicking in. ‘Are you scared?’ she asked. ‘Are you worried for your own safety?’

Wendy hesitated a moment. ‘I don’t think he’d ever hurt me. But that man is dead because of me and I feel terrible about it.’

Bailey nodded grimly. Today’s revelation was a stark reminder to her of the sheer ruthlessness of the people she was dealing with. For Rick to kill a man just for poking into his life meant that her demise would be a veritable certainty should he ever discover that she was an undercover cop.

42

Bailey walked along the corridor to her apartment admiring her fingernails as she did so. Wendy had done a good job. The metallic grey colour did indeed suit her. She wondered if Dale would notice and comment on them. She was due to catch up with both him and Frank later that afternoon at the temporary HQ.

Unlocking her front door, she walked into the apartment to be confronted by the sight of Rick, Shane, Archie and Stephen. Her breath caught in her throat. Her sixth sense had failed her, or else she just hadn’t been paying close enough attention to it.