Free Dead Lucky by Matt Brolly Page B

wearing a white linen suit, a crisp shirt with the top button pushed into the loose flesh of his neck. He said something into the phone, before placing it on the dining table. ‘DCI Lambert,’ he said, more to himself than directly at Lambert. Leaning back in his chair, he continued. ‘Yes, DCI Lambert. I know all about you. How is Glenn Tillman?’
    Lambert had run through Blake’s file on The System last night and knew that Tillman had investigated him a number of times over the years with no success.
    ‘You’ll have to ask him yourself. I am here on another issue.’
    Blake lifted his coffee cup. ‘Where are my manners? Can I get you something? Water, perhaps? You look like you ran here.’
    ‘I’m fine.’
    Lambert told him about Moira Sackville.
    Blake drank his coffee, lost in contemplation. ‘Poor Eustace. I never had the pleasure of meeting his wife.’
    ‘You knew Eustace well.’
    ‘Of course, of course. Eustace Sackville, reporter extraordinaire. That’s why you wanted to speak to me?’
    ‘I understand you and Eustace have a history?’
    A smirk crossed Blake’s lips but lent no humour to his face. ‘I would hardly call it that.’
    ‘You know he was investigating you?’
    ‘You must have spoken to him already. Some preposterous idea he had. He still thinks I’m twenty, thinks I’m some sort of petty criminal. He even had the temerity to call me.’
    ‘I don’t think he believes you’re a petty criminal,’ said Lambert, looking around at the ostentatious decorations of the dining room.
    Blake looked at his mobile. ‘My point exactly. This has been hard won. I work fifteen, sixteen hours a day. I’m never off this bloody thing.’
    ‘I understand that Eustace was looking at some competing groups?’
    The smirk had disappeared from Blake’s face. ‘Some perceived competition. I told Sackville then, and I’m telling you now, that I have nothing to fear from Russians, Albanians, Kosovans, or whoever is the new flavour of the month. I have nothing to do with them, and they have nothing to do with me.’
    ‘Why all the security?’
    Blake shook his head as if he was talking to an imbecile. ‘You don’t become successful in this world without making enemies, Lambert, you must know that. This is all for precaution.’ He took another sip of coffee. ‘I know why you want to speak to me, Lambert. Let me see, you think Moira Sackville was killed, what, as a warning?’
    Lambert sat stony-faced.
    ‘No, not a warning. Why bother going to such lengths, may as well have bumped him off as well? You think Eustace was being punished for something. Something he knew, or something he did. Well, I’m sorry to disappoint you but I think you are barking up the wrong tree, as it were. At least, if it’s concerning me. Why would I care about what that journalist was up to? Maybe he pissed off the wrong people somewhere. But really, it’s all a bit, well, messy.’
    ‘And it has nothing to do with you, I presume?’
    Blake pursed his lips, his face cracking into a patchwork of lines like an uncharted map. ‘Of course not. Now if you don’t mind, Atkinson here will show you out. Please pass on my regards to your superior.’
    Lambert felt a touch on his shoulder and turned to face Atkinson, who had crept up on him.
    He allowed the head of security to escort him out. He couldn’t argue with Blake’s logic and he’d summed it up very well. The case was messy. Finding a motive was proving illusive and it was a possibility that the attack was a one-off, that there was no rhyme or reason, and that unless the killer struck again they would never find out who he was.
    Lambert headed for the train station, thinking that the time may have come to start using a pool car. He’d avoided travelling by car as much as possible since the car accident which had taken his daughter but it was becoming unavoidable. Travelling by public transport may give him time to think but it also ate away at his time. As long as