Sunny called him over. His name was Faisal, and he was more surly than Sunny. He glanced at the drawing and shook his head.

“He doesn’t know her, either.”

“We hear she came here for takeaways.”

“Lots of people come here. I can’t remember every customer I’ve ever served.”

“No, but she’s an attractive girl, don’t you think? What about last Tuesday?”

“No. I told you. We don’t know her. If she came here, she wasn’t a regular. Maybe she came once and didn’t like our food. It happens, believe it or not.”

“Funny that,” said Annie, leaning on the counter.

“What is?”

“Well, we know she lived around here. In fact, we’ve just come from her mother’s place up the road. And one of the local coppers tells us your food is popular with the young people from the estate.”

“Lots of people live around here. They don’t all eat here.” He pointed across the street. “Maybe she preferred fish and chips?”

“Maybe so. But this girl was murdered last Tuesday night, Sunny, and do you know what the pathologist found in her stomach contents when he did the postmortem?”

“What?”

“Pizza and kebab. Now, what do you think of that?”

Faisal placed their orders on the counter without looking their way, and Sunny put the boxes in a paper bag. “That’s sick, that is,” he mumbled. “Here. Take it. On the house. Just go away.” He handed Annie the bag.

But Gerry placed some money on the counter. “We’ll pay,” she said. “Keep the change.”

“And do you know?” Annie held up the bag as they were leaving. “Our CSI people are very clever these days, just like on telly. They can match anything with anything if they’ve got a sample.”

8

ONE OF THE RESPONSIBILITIES BANKS HAD YET TO face in his new job was administering a bollocking to officers under him. He’d done it often enough over the years as a DCI, mostly on an informal basis, but as detective superintendent and head of Homicide and Major Crimes, it was his job both to stand up for and to discipline his team. So his heart sank when Superintendent Carver from Wytherton strutted into his office early on Tuesday morning with a complaint. He had known last night that it would be a long day but he had never imagined it would start like this.