Free Now You See Me by Jean Bedford Page B

just punched her around a bit, hadn’t he? But even apart from that, he doesn’t seem to have made much of an effort to cover his tracks.’
    Voulas lit another cigarette. Noel felt herself twitching to take one, and she watched it go to his mouth and his sensuous inhalation. He caught her stare and smiled slightly. ‘Can’t smoke on duty any more,’ he said, ‘so I chain smoke the rest of the time. Does it bother you?’
    ‘Only because I lust after them,’ she said. ‘Two years and I could be back to two packets a day any second.’
    ‘Nah,’ he said seriously. ‘Don’t do it. It’s a bitch.’
    Sharon finally spoke. Noel had been aware of her silence, her reluctance to question a superior officer. ‘H e wa s careless, though,’ she said. ‘It is a bit strange.’
    ‘Perhaps,’ Voulas considered it. ‘But they get arrogant. Look, he’s been abusing that kiddie for years and getting away with it; never bothered to cover his tracks much before, why think this time’ll be any different? Dumb cops, wife’ll give him an alibi, that’d be how he was thinking. Plenty of time to get rid of the incriminating evidence. Except this time the wife jacked up.’
    Noel hesitated before replying. He had relaxed, he was talking to them like a friend, she didn’t want to push him back to being hostile. ‘Well,’ she said , ‘di d you think of looking back through the files for the same MO with some other child? Just in case.’
    ‘No,’ he said flatly and she sighed. ‘We’ve got a good case, there’s no point in wasting time and manpower on Albert fucking Spinks’ magical mystery tour. Now, is that everything? I’ve got to go to work.’ He stood up, not very politely.
    The women stood, too, and Sharon mumbled a thank you. Noel put out her hand and he shook it after staring at it for a moment. ‘Thanks,’ she said. ‘I think you’re probably right, but I’m still going to look into it a bit more. I hope you don’t mind.’
    ‘I can’t stop you,’ he said.
    ‘No, but you could make it hard for me to find out things.’
    ‘No,’ he said, serious again. ‘I wouldn’t do that. Listen, if we’ve got the wrong guy, I’d want to be the first to know. Will you keep me informed if yo u d o find out anything relevant? Not that I think you will.’
    ‘Yes, I suppose so.’ She wondered what Rafferty would say to this deal, but she realised she liked the idea of an excuse to contact Tony Voulas again.
    He came downstairs with them to the front entrance. When they were halfway across the street he called out to Noel and she walked back, wondering if he had forgotten something important to tell her. Sharon waited on the kerb.
    ‘Yes?’ she said, when she reached him. He looked embarrassed.
    ‘Uh ... would you like to go out one night? Or are you married or something?’
    ‘No,’ she said, then hastily as she saw he’d misunderstood, ‘No, I’m not married — or anything. I’d like to.’ She gave him her card.
    When she got back across the road Sharon said, ‘What are you looking so smug about? Oh Jesus, he didn’t ask you for a date, did he?’ She started laughing and laughed all the way back to the car, but she wouldn’t say why.
    *
    Noel came up the steps to her flat after work, grinning and shaking her head as she remembered this morning’s expedition. Sharon had finally told her that Tony Voulas’ nickname round the cop shop was Shagga, and that he put the hard word on every presentable female he came into contact with.
    ‘You, too?’ Noel had asked her.
    ‘Nah. He doesn’t try it on with women who are already attached. But, go for it, Noel. You might be the one ...’
    They’d said goodbye in a mood of hilarity, and female solidarity, too, Noel thought now. Nothing like it. Still, she thought she probably would go if Voulas asked her out. She wasn’t looking for a committed relationship, and she was forewarned. She fumbled in her bag for her key, and saw Paddy coming from the