Free Coming, Ready or Not (D.S. Hunter Kerr Book 4) by Michael Fowler Page B

the sole occupant of the office. He was writing up the incident board.
    Making his way across the room to make a hot drink he commented, ‘You’re in early.’
    Over his shoulder, light-heartedly, he answered, ‘No thanks to you, Hunter.’
    ‘ What do you mean by that, Mike?’
    ‘ Four days ago you called me out in the middle of the night telling me you’d got an easy domestic murder for me. Do you remember saying that?’
    Hunter knew where this conversation was going given what they had learned yesterday. He switched on the kettle.
    ‘ Well this is a right monkey you’ve handed me.’
    Shuffling two cups together he responded , ‘You’ve only yourself to blame, Mike. You were the one who kept pestering. And now I’ve given you a simple job to get your teeth into all I get back in return is a moan. Some people are just never grateful.’ With a smirk, he dropped two tea bags into empty mugs.
    ‘ Simple job!’ Mike offered him a single finger salute. ‘Swivel on that Detective Sergeant.’
    Hunter returned a quick grin, then straightened his face. ‘Anyway on a serious note, while there’s only us two in the office, how are you bearing up?’
    Mike stopped writing. ‘I’m good, Hunter, thanks.’ He lightly brushed the right hand side of his abdomen. ‘The scars are getting less noticeable every day and it’s done wonders for helping me to lose weight. I can recommend to anyone, who’s wanting to lose a few pounds, not to bother with Weight Watchers, instead they should consider getting themselves stabbed by a psychopath.’ He flashed a smile and returned to his work.
    His colleague had definitely not lost any of his humour, mused Hunter, as he poured hot water into the cups.
     
    ‘It would be fair to say that we all now know the sensitive nature of this investigation. What Adam Fields suggested in interview yesterday has thrown everything up in the air.’ Detective Superintendent Leggate addressed the room. ‘But we mustn’t be distracted by this. We have to put the sensitive issues to one side. It is not our job to investigate those. We have a murder to detect. And on that front we have a mountain of actions to plough through and we have forensic evidence from the scene still waiting to be examined.’ She tapped one set of fingers against the other. ‘On the actions front, we still have to speak with Gemma’s parents. They were still too upset yesterday. Also, I’m told that last night Adam Fields gave up the name of the person he has been staying with during these past few days, and also the name of the person on Manvers Terrace, who witnessed Gemma, and the unidentified man, going into her home in the early hours of the eighteenth. Those actions will be followed up straight after briefing.’ She continued tapping her fingers. ‘We need to know how she got home. We know that she told her friends that she was getting a taxi when she left the pub. Did she get one or did she get a lift from our mystery man. If she did get a taxi, we’ve got CCTV all around the location she was drinking so I want that checked today. We also know she got a pizza from somewhere. There’s a couple of places on the High Street where she could have got that. I want them visiting. See if anyone remembers her.’ She stopped tapping and interlinked her fingers. ‘On the forensics front let me remind everyone that SOCO have lifted fingerprints from the knife which was used to kill Gemma. We’ve got prints on the pizza box, on the bottle of wine and two glasses, and we’ve got semen stains on the bed linen. And we’ve also got fibres. Lots of them. Given the circumstances Headquarters have allocated the funding to get those fast-tracked. And so, until we are absolutely sure, one hundred per cent, that the mystery man is DC Hagan, and evidence points towards him, then we go nowhere near him and we certainly do not say anything about this outside of this room.’ She raked the room with her eyes. ‘Do I make