Free Thicker Than Water by Kerry Wilkinson - DS Jessica Daniel 06 - Thicker Than Water Page A

getting the chummy reply she was hoping for, both young men sunk backwards. She could see any forced confidence they had drain away. Terry started to speak but, as the other
boy’s body language tensed, he stopped and turned it into a cough.
    Jessica looked from one to the other. ‘We’re talking privately,’ she assured them.
    The silence told her the moment was lost. She had missed something but wasn’t entirely sure what.
    Richard glanced at his watch, then at Jessica, this time looking directly at her. ‘We’re going to be late for a class . . .’
    He stood before she could reply but Jessica knew there was little else she could ask anyway.
    ‘Let me leave you my number,’ she said. ‘If you think of anything, you can call any time. Even if you think it’s not important it might be helpful.’
    She gave each of them her card and, even though it wasn’t something she would usually give out to teenage boys, wrote her mobile number on the back. If she started getting calls consisting
only of heavy breathing, then at least she would know where they were coming from.
    The pair shuffled out but Jessica saw them transform almost instantly as they entered the corridor. Their backs straightened again and they stood tall as they walked towards reception. Jessica
closed the door and sat back in the seat. She took out her mobile phone, hoping she had missed a call from Izzy while it had been on silent. The screen was blank, so Jessica flipped through the
contacts and called her friend instead.
    ‘How’s it going?’ she asked.
    ‘“Hi” to you too. We’ve got a few things on the go but you’re not going to like them.’
    ‘What have you found?’
    ‘We know who the casino owner was but Jack told me not to tell you everything today. He said we’ll talk tomorrow.’
    Jessica checked her watch. It was the end of her shift but she was still confused. ‘Why?’
    ‘Let’s just say it’s complicated.’

8
    Jessica was tired of living in someone else’s property. First it was Adam’s house, which never felt like home, now it was her friend Caroline Morrison’s flat.
Adam was dealing with the insurance company and they knew that, at some point, they would be house-hunting. The house they used to live in had been seriously damaged by the fire and even if they
were given the money to repair it, neither of them was keen to return. Jessica’s problem was that she had no inclination to spend her days off traipsing around other people’s houses as
if she knew what she was doing.
    When she’d been looking for a flat, before she knew Adam, her dad had advised her to ‘check for damp’. Jessica had no idea what that meant, other than physically touching the
walls to see if they were wet. He had laughed for almost fifteen minutes on the phone when she told him what she had done. If it had a roof, some walls, an indoor toilet that flushed and no holes
where there shouldn’t be, she would have declared everything ‘fine’ – which was likely why a career in surveying was never going to be on the cards. Knowledge-wise, it did
rank her above a fair percentage of estate agents, though.
    Adam seemed to have some idea of what he was doing, so Jessica was more than happy for him to ‘pick somewhere’. He wasn’t as enthused about making such a big decision on his
own, which only annoyed her more.
    The one aspect of Caroline’s flat Jessica would miss when they eventually left was the view. If there was nothing they liked on television, which was most of the time, Jessica and Adam
would sit on the balcony watching the whole of Salford Quays beneath them. Even if it was cold, they would wrap up in coats and jumpers, put their feet up on the railings and play I-spy. It might
seem childish but Jessica had as much fun doing that for free as she had paying for all sorts of other things.
    The evening wasn’t too cold for the time of year, but Jessica was still wearing the heavy coat she had ‘liberated’ from