Free Death in the Sun by Adam Creed

like a memory he won’t ever be able to lose.
    When she is all the way gone from his sight, not looking back even once, Manolo follows. He ties Suki to the drainpipe that runs down from the roof he sometimes sees her on, hanging her washing, drying her peppers, looking across the valley towards the sea. Sometimes, he hears her sing. It saddens him so, the beauty of everything she is.
    He walks quickly away, out of the village along the acequia and all the way across the sierra to the Silla Montar. He is going over the top and down into Granada, into the past to make things right before any more harm is visited upon him, the remnants of his family, and the people he loves.
    Above Edu’s cortijo, he pauses, watches Edu coming across the campo from the direction of Mecina. In all the years he has patrolled these mountains, tending his father’s flock, Manolo has never seen Edu on his land. Stretched out on his terrace, bottles littered at his feet – yes, but never striding his land the way he is now. He drinks water from his bota and waits for Edu to come close enough to speak, which he does, and Manolo turns his back, continues on his way. Once Edu stops calling him, Manolo’s thoughts turn to his English friend; what he might be made of. Manolo can’t help thinking he might come up short.

PART TWO
    Nine

    DS Pulford isn’t sure where he is. These last few months he has been doubling his shifts: official, and not. He rubs his eyes, thinks for a moment he is upside down, but he is on the sofa. He is still wearing his clothes and the sun is just up. It is twenty to five. Two nights running, he hasn’t made it to the bedroom. Sometimes, he doesn’t know if he’s taking work home, or the other way round.
    Immigrant labour gangs have reared up again in Hackney and knife crime looks as if it will never go away. The other day, they stabbed a seventeen-year-old temp on Fenchurch Street. It was her second day at work.
    He thinks he has a plan; can persuade Brandon to give up the gun that Jadus Golding used on Staffe‚ and possibly – if a deal with the CPS can be achieved – obtain a statement, but he has to be careful. A decent defence lawyer could leave them hung to dry, and Jadus could walk – for good.
    Brandon says he knows where the gun is, says he was upstairs in Cutz when it happened. But he is still insisting that his warrant for the hit and run is withdrawn before he gives anything up. If Pulford was to bring him in now that would be game over, because B-Lat’s barrister says they have enough evidence that Pulford has breached procedure to ensure he never works again.
    So last night, after he was done at Leadengate and after he had been to see the poor temp down at City morgue, Pulford went and stood in the Limekiln, looking up at Jasmine’s flat. She screamed at him, and some neighbours had come out and told him he was a bastard, and shouldn’t he be out catching rapists. But he stood there, for maybe half an hour, until he could be sure she had called Jadus.
    His phone is ringing. Somewhere. That’s what must have awakened him. Dawn is pale and he rubs his eyes, knows he won’t get back to sleep, so he rifles the pockets of his jacket and pulls out his phone and answers. In all these months, it is the first time he has heard the voice. ‘Fucking back off,’ says Jadus.
    ‘Come out, like a man, and I won’t need to keep an eye on your woman.’
    ‘I won’t tell you again.’
    ‘Is that a threat?’ says Pulford.
    The line is silent. It hisses, as if expressing what Jadus could say – that he has shot a copper before and if he’s in for a penny he may as well go down for tuppence. Jadus doesn’t say anything.
    ‘I saw a man going in there, Jadus. I suppose she’s got to find the rent, now you’re not working.’
    ‘I’ll fucking . . .’
    ‘Yes?’
    The line hisses again.
    ‘We should meet, Jadus.’
    ‘Maybe we will. But you won’t see me coming.’
    And the line is dead.
    *
    ‘How did