Aftershock

Seventy-eight

She stared at them resentfully. ‘This isn’t fair,’ Detective Constable Alice Cowan declared. ‘I’ve been in my job for a while now, long enough to have worked for both of you. Doesn’t that count for anything?’

‘In this situation,’ DCS Mario McGuire told her, ‘fairness takes a back seat. We like you, Alice, both of us; we know you’re a good officer. But there can’t be any second chances in Special Branch.’

‘Forgive me, sir, but does SB report to you? As I understand it DI Shannon’s immediate line manager is the deputy chief constable.’

‘Like Mr McGuire said,’ Neil McIlhenney replied, ‘you’re good; you’ve got the reporting chain right. But give us a bit of credit too; DCC Skinner’s been consulted about this, and he’s delegated authority to act. Sure, you can ask for a personal hearing with him when he comes back, but whose carpet would you rather be on, Detective Constable, this one or his?’

McGuire smiled. ‘Trust us, Alice, that’s a no-brainer. Be honest with yourself: you can see the situation. You passed on sensitive information about an inquiry to somebody who was one of its subjects. It was your uncle, sure, he’s a serving police officer, sure. You weren’t to know that he’d do something reckless and inappropriate with that knowledge and land the pair of you in deep shit. But none of that is a mitigating factor, given the sensitivity of what your department does on a day-to-day basis. You’ve got to be moved out of there, and that’s that. No appeal.’

The sturdy woman’s eyes misted over; she chewed a corner of her bottom lip. ‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘I should have known better. What happens to me?’

‘In career terms, nothing,’ the head of CID told her. ‘Do you think we’re complete bastards? As you said, you’ve been in that job for a while. It was time for you to be moved out anyway. Officially that’s what’s going to happen; a routine move. You’re going to be replaced by DC Tarvil Singh, from the Leith office. That’s where you’re going; it’ll be a straight swap.’

Cowan brightened up almost instantly. ‘Will that be working for DI Pye?’ she asked.

‘Yes,’ said McGuire, ‘and DS Wilding. But first, there’s something else we’d like you to consider. It’s a sensitive task; you should take that as a sign of our continuing faith in you. Although you’ll be under observation all the time, there will be a degree of personal risk, so it would be entirely voluntary. If you turn it down, there will be no blame, no pointing fingers.’

The detective constable looked up at him, clear-eyed once again. ‘Tell me about it,’ she said.

‘I’ve got a plane to catch,’ he replied, rising from his chair, ‘but it’s Mr McIlhenney’s operation. I’ll leave him to run you through it.’