Power Shift Read online

  Copyright © 2003 by Judith Cutler

  First published in Great Britain in 2003 by Hodder and Stoughton

  A division of Hodder Headline

  The right of Judith Cutler to be identified as the Author of the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

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  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  All characters in this publication are fictitious and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  A CIP catalogue record for this title is available from the British Library

  ISBN 0340 82070 5

  Typeset in Plantin Light by Palimpsest Book Production Limited, Polmont, Stirlingshire

  Printed and bound by Clays Ltd, St Ives plc

  HODDER AND STOUGHTON

  A division of Hodder Headline

  338 Euston Road

  London NW 3BH

  ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

  I am grateful to the West Midland Police for their help, and in particular to Inspector Mark Bramwell, in charge of the real Scala House team. His patience and enthusiasm were exemplary. Thanks too, to John Roe of Birmingham Environmental and Consumer Services.

  This one’s for Jon, with my love

  Chapter 1

  At six thirty on any normal Monday morning in December, Kate would have expected an easy run into the city. But this time she was heading not to the centre, but towards the covered wholesale market, where laden lorries and utility trucks Were causing chaos as they pushed their way back into the pre-rush-hour traffic. Kate was almost pleased: it showed that there were still some independent retailers left in the world of supermarkets. Not when she was cut up like that, though. She swore fluently, wondering whether to pull the driver over and give him an official earful. She didn’t like being pushed off the road in the dark, and especially not at a time when most sensible people would be hoping their partner would do the decent thing and organise a cup of tea in bed Kate had been up before six, driving through the suburbs; she’d been tempted once or twice to pick up a forlorn knot of damp commuters waiting for an early brightly lit bus. From time to time a kitchen or bathroom light snapped on, as if prompted like a security device by the movement of her car past the window.

  Shrugging—if she stopped the guy she’d only get soaking wet and achieve not a lot—she picked her way through yet another one-way diversion: Birmingham was rising phoenix-like from the concrete chaos that had once been the Bull Ring, but was taking its time about it. Soon there’d be a city to be proud of, not just because at last top retailers had decided to join international musicians, actors and restaurateurs, but also because of the stylish architecture and imaginative use of space Meanwhile, as each flattened site was developed, you had to deal with the constantly changing traffic layout and the fact that your bus stop had disappeared from where you left it last night.

  Damn. Kate had got into the wrong lane, to be blasted by a container lorry as she edged into the correct one. There. At last she pulled on to the space reserved for police vehicles near the indoor market. A security guard stopped her. Good. She preferred people to do what they were supposed to do. It would have been nice to have to flash her new ID, but the sight of her uniform silenced him. Another day she’d change at work, like everyone else. Today—yes, she wanted to establish herself somehow. This was a big day: there ought to be some sort of initiation, even if it was simply shaking the man’s hand and introducing herself.

  ‘Kate Power,’ she said, with a friendly grin, proffering her hand.

  Perhaps six thirty was too early for security men to crack their faces. In any case, he needed one hand to hold the ballpoint he used to run down his list, the other to hold the clipboard. ‘Registration number? And are you just visiting or here for a bit?’

  ‘Here for the foreseeable future.’ At least the next six months.

  ‘OK. And next time, it’s better to reverse in.’

  She nodded, popping on her hat. At least it would keep the cold, thin rain off, although she’d never felt the lack when she was in plain clothes. She’d never looked good in one when she was a rookie constable. No reason for her to do so now.

  She strode up Hurst Street towards Smallbrook Ringway. What a weird mixture, greasy-spoon cafés cheek by jowl with a very exclusive-looking Chinese casino. Rod’s favourite Indian restaurant, brilliant for an after-the-opera meal, was being refurbished. She hesitated: should she stop for a take-out coffee? No, better to see what system operated at Scala House. So she turned left on Smallbrook Ringway, and headed for Holloway Head, a traffic island proclaiming it was the gateway to the Chinese Quarter by means of a pagoda-like structure slap in the middle. But it was also home to a vulnerable-looking sculpture of a nymph. A few mixed messages. It was the boundary too of Brum’s gay village: what would its denizens—have wanted if they’d been asked to choose a boundary marker? A big pink ribbon? Perhaps not. In any case, up the road in Centenary Square, Birmingham already had a statue in a curious shade of pink, the sort she associated with old lathes’ corsets.

  And so into Scala House, with its uninspired entrance staircase. For this wasn’t an ordinary police station, with all the foyer bustle that that implied. No cells, either. It was a small outpost of admin offices in an ordinary commercial block, the ground floor of which was occupied by a gay bar. OK, then—onwards and upwards.

  She managed to walk past the nameplate screwed to the door without a backward glance. At least, she conceded, not a visible backward glance. It would have been nice if the nameplate had been screwed on straight, but what mattered most was that it was there.

  INSPECTOR

  KATE POWER

  Yes! It took maximum effort not to punch the air in triumph.

  There was also a desktop version, smart in gold-blocked wood, but she stowed that away for the time being. No point in over-egging the pudding. The pips on her shoulders made the point about her rank, anyway. Not to mention what she hoped would grow into an air of authority: at the moment she was a new girl and everyone knew it—herself especially.

  She shook off the hat and raincoat and looked for somewhere to hang them. Hmm, John Twiss, her predecessor, had been well over six foot. She’d have to bring a drill in and put the hook within reach. And stick a mirror on the wall—she didn’t like peeping into a compact mirror like a dowager prinking her lipstick. DCI Sue Rowley, her old CID boss at Steelhouse Lane nick, had never appeared even in the women’s locker rooms looking anything less than immaculate, hair apart, that is, whether in plain clothes or in uniform. Part of the job, she’d always said, to show the underlings you were in control, no matter how egalitarian you might prefer to be.

  From the desk at the far end—yes, if you looked up you could see who was coming through the door or, better still, who was going past it—Kate looked round her new office. Apart from the lofty hook, her predecessor had left little evidence of his occupation: on the wall by her left arm was a chart summarising official performance indicators and another beside it showing how the unit was matching up. On the wall facing her, above an empty waist-high bookcase, was a large-scale road map of the immediate area, her manor’s boundaries outlined in thick green felt pen. On the right-hand wall, opposite the window, were a white board and a noticeboard with coloured pins herded together neatly in the bottom right corner. Despite herself, she got-up to peer behind the vertical blinds: a fingertip drawn across the window came u
p grey. Well, she could do something about that. She could do less about the view the blinds concealed: cupping her hands round her eyes, she found an unattractive vista of fire escapes and dingy walls, with a flat roof immediately in front of her. The puddles were a soup of litter peppered with fag ends. She had a nasty feeling it would all look rather worse by daylight.

  Hell, she should have been over the moon at achieving another step on what she hoped would be a steady ladder of promotion. She was. Of course she was. She was just a bit lacklustre after the last case, which hadn’t gone entirely to plan. And, to be honest, she’d never been a morning woman—especially when Rod had done no more than hunch a naked shoulder and move over to the middle of the bed when she kissed him goodbye.

  She turned from the window. No, it wouldn’t be so bad. Not when she’d personalised the place a bit. She had a tiny furniture budget, which would extend to a coffee table and a couple of easy chairs. The computer would provide a reassuring presence on the acres of empty desk. Most of her colleagues filled the rest with personal photos: a silent reminder of why you were doing the job. But it would be tactless at this stage to introduce a photo of Rod. Love of her life he might be, but in the minds of unpromoted officers he no doubt figured as Superintendent Sugar Daddy, giving her a leg up in exchange for a leg over. Very well: all the more reason to prove herself a good officer.

  Her neck was itching already. She ran an irritated finger round her collar. Much as she’d like to shed the clip-on tie and undo the top button, she knew she ought to follow the Sue Rowley tradition, noblesse obliging her to be a stickler over her own appearance before she could raise so much as an eyebrow at anyone else’s lapses. However smart the crisp poplin blouses and serge skirts or trousers, after years of dressing as she pleased—within, it had to be said, self-prescribed parameters very like Sue’s—she was bound to find them irksome, wasn’t she? Heavens above, this was what most policewomen wore day in, day out. So what if her bra showed quite clearly though the shirt? So what if the trousers made her neat size-ten bum look like a saggy sixteen? Grow up, woman She straightened. That was better. And she’d better try to regard carrying all the equipment a uniformed officer was issued with as the equivalent of permanent weight training. It was only for a few months anyway: until she earned enough Brownie points to get back—into CID. Everyone agreed that that was where her career lay. It was simply policy to have a break from plain-clothes work, taking on responsibility in uniform for a period.

  Kate looked at her watch. Six fifty. Time for the early shift to be taking over from the night shift. That was something else—she wasn’t looking forward to. OK, as a detective sergeant she’d never worked anything like a nine-till-five day, but at least there’d been a semblance of routine, except—as often—when there was a crisis. Now she and Rod would have to keep elaborate diaries—wall-charts on both kitchen walls would be helpful. But at least they could be together some hours out of the twenty-four. And-it was good for everyone concerned that she wouldn’t be working in one of his murder-investigation teams. She needed to be able to grow and function apart from him.

  ‘Ma’am.’ The doorway was filled with the solid presence of one of her sergeants. He’d be about forty, already showing signs of a gut he’d end up having to support on his uniform belt.

  She was fairly sure she hadn’t heard his polite tap on her—doorframe because there hadn’t been one. And there was no lift at the end of the sentence to show any hesitation. But perhaps that was how John Twiss had preferred things—informal to the point of casual. However much she’d have liked to follow suit, she had a nasty feeling that what was seen as affable when the boss was a six-foot-five rugby-playing alpha male might be construed as weakness when you were a five-foot-five untested young woman.

  ‘Morning, Sergeant Drew. Neil, isn’t it?’ She stuck out a hand, coming from behind her desk and smiling a welcome. ‘I’d offer you a seat only there don’t seem to be any.’ There was certainly a question in her voice now she came to think about it, easy chairs were standard issue.

  ‘There’s a furniture budget.’

  ‘Which is tight. And I’d rather it wasn’t spent on visitors’ chairs when I’m sure some of the office chairs could do with upgrading So it’d be nice if the ones from in here wandered back from wherever they’ve wandered off to. Come on, Neil, there’s evidence: you can see the marks on the carpet there. Eight neat little indentations.’ She pointed. ‘Plus four bigger ones—are we talking coffee-table here? Hmm? No questions asked if they’re back here by the end of tonight’s shift.’

  ‘Ma’am.’ He looked as sullen as a schoolboy.

  ‘Are you ready to brief the early shift?’

  ‘Just going to.’

  ‘I’ll slip in while you’re doing it.’

  ‘Thought you’d be busy.’

  ‘I am. But it gives you a chance to introduce me when it’s most convenient, least disruptive. I’ll be doing the same for each relief.’

  ‘Long day.’

  She shrugged. ‘When was it ever a nine-till-five job?’

  The briefing didn’t make good listening. Neil Drew’s team was down to four out of its full complement of seven. ‘But not to worry. We don’t have to argue about who gets the car today.’

  ‘The car?’ she repeated, before remembered she should have been coolly observing and wailing for her grand moment. ‘You’ve—we’ve only got the one?’

  ‘Two. One’s double-crewed for fast response. The other is shared between the rest of the relief for routine calls.’

  She ignored the swift turn of heads. ‘And car number two is?’

  ‘In dock. Gearbox. Supposed to be under bloody warranty, but the suppliers and manufacturers are arguing the toss.’

  ‘Haven’t they ever heard of courtesy cars? I’ll get on to it. Can’t manage without wheels. So who’s on sickie today?’ The consequent snigger took her straight back to the schoolroom. Ah. ‘The usual suspects, ma’am.’

  ‘Gaffer,’ she corrected crisply. ‘Who are?’

  ‘WPC Kerr. She’s got a lot of problems, gaffer: women’s troubles, like.’ Neil Drew’s sneer was a challenge. ‘WPC Kerr’s pregnant, we think,’ said a stout African-Caribbean WPC, probably in her forties. ‘Well, that’s certainly a woman thing,’ Kate grinned. ‘And the other officers? Men’s or women’s troubles?’

  ‘PC Parker’s got a bad back. Has had on and off for a year or more.’

  Kate made a note: Occupational Health. ‘And…?’

  ‘Master Bates,’ Neil Drew said.

  ‘Does he now? And what else is the matter with PC Bates?’

  ‘Bad stomach.’

  ‘Bad regularly?’

  ‘Judging by how often he farts, bad all the bleeding time. But he’s here more often than he’s away.’

  ‘Just about,’ added the WPC, sotto voce. Another one for Occupational Health, then.

  ‘OK. You’ve prioritised today’s duties then, Neil? Anything you can’t cover?’

  ‘A meeting with the Chinese elders.’

  ‘Time?’

  ‘Three, I think.’

  ‘Let me know for certain, and I’ll try to clear a slot in the diary. And if you’ve got any other stuff someone new could tackle, let me have it.’

  So far, so good. There’d been a distinct frisson of what sounded like approval and she had a sense that she’d started off on the right foot—at least with those who were there. What if the staffing problems were repeated on the other shifts? She might be able to cover the odd meeting and do bits of follow-up, but essentially she wasn’t here as a roving WPC. And although she was going to stay on till after the night shift had reported, she couldn’t work till ten every night. She’d seen other bosses try to do everything and end up as one of their own sick-leave statistics. At training courses, the importance of proper breaks for everyone, including herself, had been dinned into her. R and R; regular meals. No dashing off to the pub at the end of each shift. Think healthy to stay healthy
. So one inviolable item on today’s agenda would be lunch. She’d already promised herself that. And now that the Home Office thought it was a Good Idea for police officers to eat in local cafés, she would attach herself to one of her officers and kill two birds with one stone: get to know the officer, exercise a little, eat and see the officer ate too. Four birds. And a fifth—getting her face known in the community.

  She was just heading for the outer office—the team’s name for it, though the office wasn’t even on the outside of the building—when she heard voices. ‘I heard she got a collar on her last job. A big one.’ Who was that? Not Neil Drew. Parker? No, he was the bad back. Timms. Steve Timms. ‘Yes. Undercover. Down in Devon. But she lost one of her team.’ That was Drew all right. Losing a colleague was never good news. Suddenly she was on the back foot—or would be, if she wasn’t careful. Risk time. She stepped forward, saying easily, ‘Don’t let the detective superintendent in charge hear you call it my team. Craig and I were just foot soldiers.’

  ‘But he died,’ Drew said. It was a statement, not a question. ‘You take risks undercover.’

  ‘Wasn’t there rumour of an official complaint against you before he died?’ She raised her eyebrows: Drew was going much too far. Everyone knew it. Timms, Drew, Kate, and the African-Caribbean WPC—Hale, she thought—who’d padded up behind her. ‘You have been doing your homework well, Sergeant. But I’m sure you’ve got other things to do than checkup on what a sick man did before he took a crazy risk that lost him his life. Post-traumatic stress disorder,’ she added parenthetically.

  ‘I thought it was post-traumatic stress syndrome,’ Drew, observed.

  ‘When you have it long and badly enough it becomes a disorder, as I’m sure your research will tell you. We’ll talk later, Sergeant. In the meantime, where do you people take lunch? And if you tell me lunch is only for wimps, let me tell you that current research doesn’t support that theory.’