Cold in Hand

Thirty-two

One of the paramedics reset Resnick's nose before leading him to the ambulance. "There," he said, as Resnick screamed. "Better than new." At the hospital, seven stitches were inserted over his cut eye, and an X-ray determined that his left elbow, though extremely painful, was badly bruised and not broken; a precautionary CT scan revealed no intracranial haemorrhaging. Patched up and armed with a healthy dose of ibuprofen, he was sent on his way. Medical expertise could do nothing for his injured pride, the overwhelming sense of his own stupidity.

With unwonted speed, the Force's Professional Standards Unit rolled into action. At a little after ten the following morning, the Police Surgeon deemed Resnick, somewhat conveniently, to be suffering from post-traumatic stress syndrome and registered him as officially unfit for duty.

"Fine welcome," Brent had said, when Resnick was being led off towards the waiting ambulance. "Come in of my own volition, hear you wantin' to speak to me, and what happen? This feller come chargin' at me like a wild bull, no cause, no reason."

"There was cause," Karen said sharply.

"You think?"

"You deliberately provoked him, wound him up on purpose."

"What I did," Brent said, a smile playing in his eyes, "express my sympathy. For his loss, you know?"

"His injuries are as bad as they might be, you could be facing some serious charges."

Brent scoffed. "Anyone bring charges here, it's me. Assault, yeah? Actual bodily harm." He pronounced each syllable lovingly. "Like I say, he the one come chargin' at me, all I did, step out the way. Ask anyone." He swept his arm in a circle. "Go ahead. Ask these people here. Take witness statements, yeah? Ask these people what they see."

Karen knew Brent was right. Provoked or not, Resnick had lost it completely. In many ways, it was fortunate that Brent had swerved out of Resnick's path as adroitly as he did. Had he sustained anything approaching a serious injury, then not only Resnick but the Force itself could be facing charges of misconduct and a battery of claims for compensation.

She asked one of the uniformed officers to fetch Brent a glass of water, asked Brent if he would like to take a seat while she found out which Interview Room was most readily available. Ramsden could sit in with her during the questioning, but Ramsden on a short leash.

"You've been out of the country," Karen started.

There were no cameras switched on, no recordings being made, no lawyer present; Brent was there, as he'd said, of his own volition, and could leave, unhindered, at any time. Unless, of course, anything he admitted to gave sufficient cause for him to be restrained.

"A few days, yeah."

"Jamaica."

"After what happened, a break, you know?"

"Visiting family?"

Brent made a sound midway between a snort and a laugh. "My family back home, they fell out with me long time back. We don't speak, don't text, don't telephone." He shrugged. "Their loss, okay? Not mine."

"Then why-?" Karen began.

"Friends. I got friends there."

"Girlfriends?"

Brent smiled. "Just friends, let's say."

"Colleagues? Business acquaintances?"

"Business acquaintances, sure."

"What business, exactly, might that be?"

" My business."

"Your catering business or your music business?"

Brent smiled. "I come back with a few new recipes, some-thin' to try, maybe, at the restaurant, make some changes. Keep the chef on his toes. And some new recordin's, too. Da'Ville. Jovi Rockwell. Business an' pleasure, you know?"

"Your wife, Tina. She claimed not to know where you were."

"Tina, she know what she need to know, that's all."

"There was no contact between you while you were away?"

The smile, quick and lascivious, was back on his face. "I expect she dream of me a bit, you know."

Ramsden would have liked to knock the smile, cocky bastard, off his face once and for all. "How did you hear about DI Kellogg's death?" he asked.

"We have newspapers over there, you know. Television. The Internet."

"That's how you heard about it, on the Internet?"

Brent sat straighter. "My son Michael, he told me. Called me on his mobile as soon as he heard."

"And what did you do?" Karen asked. "What went through your mind?"

"Be honest, I feel sorry for her, that my first thought. Sorry she lose her life in such a violent act. Still a young woman, eh? Then I go out and buy champagne. Drink a toast with my friends."

"You were glad."

Brent inclined his head, not answering.

"You wished her dead."

"What I wish, my daughter's life back. But that I cannot have. But now that Resnick, he knows what it is to lose the one person you love in the world most of all. An' yes, that make me feel glad. Here."

He laid his fist over his heart.

"How much?" Mike Ramsden said suddenly, leaning close towards him.

Karen looked at him sharply, but he carried on.

"Enough to arrange for it to be done?" Ramsden continued, bearing down. "Bought and paid for, while you're sunning yourself a few thousand miles away, drinking rum and Coke with your friends?"

"That's what you think?" Brent's voice rose. "That's what you want me to come here for, to accuse me of that?" He stared at Ramsden, hard. "What you gonna do now? Get out the handcuffs? Make me confess? Or you gonna let me go an' follow me? Stop me in the street an' throw me up against the wall, huh? Search my clothes? Harass my family, harass my friends? Each time I go out in the car, someone pull me over, something wrong with your brake light, mister, or book me for speedin', thirty-two mile an hour in a thirty-mile zone? Maybe I find my letters opened? My telephone tapped?" He snorted dismissively and rose to his feet. "Do what you want till doomsday, try all you can, I'm tellin' you, you never gonna lay this at my door."

Karen took a breath. "Thank you for your cooperation, Mr. Brent. If we want to talk to you again, we'll let you know."

Ten minutes later, Brent escorted from the building, they were standing in Karen's temporary office.

"Nice going, Mike."

"What?"

"Subtle, the way you went about finessing information out of him."

"Got under my skin, didn't he?"

"Really? I'd never have noticed."

"Bollocks," Ramsden said.

"What did you think?" Karen asked. "That you could shake it out of him? Ruffle his feathers and he'd fall to pieces at your feet?"

"He's a prick."

"Doubtless. Two pricks going at it together. Mine's bigger than yours."

Ramsden put up a hand as if to ward her off. "Okay, okay."

Karen turned towards the window and saw her reflection, featureless against a greying sky.

"So," Karen said, "what did you think?"

"Seriously?"

"Seriously."

"I wish Resnick had hit him where it hurts and done some serious damage, instead of wallowing in like some overfed water buffalo and letting Brent take the piss. But that's not what you want to know."

"No."

"You want to know, do I think he was responsible for Kellogg's death."

"Yes."

Ramsden gave himself a moment. "Did he want her dead? Yes, I think so, beyond a fragment of doubt. Longed for it. With every bone of his jumped-up, miserable body. But did he have the balls, the common sense, the wherewithal to set it up, then give himself a nice alibi by being out of the country, I don't know." He ran his hand down across his mouth. "There's doers and talkers, you know what I mean? And up to now, I'm not too sure which Brent is."

"He could be both."

"He could. And he's some talker, I'll give him that. Gift of the fucking gab. But the rest-" Ramsden shook his head, uncertain.

"What's the feeling amongst the troops?"

"Before today? They'd like to pin it on him, all the stuff he's been coming out with especially. And, yes, I'd say some of them like him for it, but that might just be lazy thinking, you know?"

"So we should forget about him? Cross him off the list?"

"In a pig's ear!"

"What then?"

"We keep chasing down all the other lines of enquiry. By the book. You know that better than me. But, meantime, let's doublecheck Brent's contacts, ask around. Have the troops keep their ears to the ground, get every informant working overtime."

Karen nodded. "I can chase up that guy I know from Trident, see if we can't find out a little more about who Brent was seeing when he was in Jamaica."

Ramsden's face broke into a grin. "And then, of course, there's always stopping him in the street and throwing him up against the wall."

Karen phoned the hospital later that evening to be told that Resnick had been treated and allowed home. When she phoned his house, there was no answer. She rang him at nine the following morning and then again at ten: still no reply. She could understand, she thought, why he might not want to be speaking to anyone, least of all her.