Page 101 of The Black Trilogy

My guy shrugged. “If she was, she did a good job of it. Showed us a family photo. Gabir Hassani’s missing his left arm and leg.”

Oh, fudge. It may have been dark, but there was no way the man I chased through the woods was missing two limbs.

Which meant that avenue was a bust.

I spent the afternoon calling up old acquaintances and even went out to visit a couple, but nobody had heard a whisper about a kidnapping. All the other leads evaporated too. We were chasing shadows in an Arctic winter.

No hospital in the south of England had treated a stab wound to an upper arm last night. Disappointing, but at the same time, I hoped the kidnapper was in a lot of pain. The tyre prints belonged to a common set of Goodyears, the perfect size for a transit van. You could buy them from almost any tyre fitter, and it would be an impossible task trying to trace them all.

Six people had canvassed Lower Foxford, and while four villagers thought they might have seen transit vans in the vicinity, none could give a description of the driver. A further two operatives were in Luke’s house and reported all was quiet there. They’d opened the mail, but only found a credit card bill and a circular from the local Porsche dealership inviting Luke to a canapé party.

“The credit card bill’s interesting, though,” our man told me.

“How so?”

“The man goes to a tanning salon every week.”

Yes, thanks, I had noticed.

“And he spent a fortune on that holiday to the Bahamas. Even rented a private plane for the transfers. Are you still going?”

Luke had been planning to surprise me with a holiday? Just when I’d thought I couldn’t feel any worse, I did.

“Is there anything relevant to the case?” I growled, then felt guilty because this was my problem, not anybody else’s.

“What? Oh, no. Nothing at all.”

My fists balled automatically, a subconscious reminder that I needed to speak to Jimmy.

Deep breaths, Emmy. Act professionally.

“Send the canvassers on to Middleton Foxford, would you? Keep one person with you at Luke’s, just in case. Make yourselves at home, but do me a favour and don’t drink the expensive wine.”

“Right-o, boss.”

Next up, I bit the bullet and called Mack. I couldn’t put it off any longer.

“Hey, it’s me.” I forced a smile, knowing it would transfer to my voice.

“What can I do?”

Not her usual, “Hey, honey,” or even a “How are ya?”

I’d never been great at handling these situations. With strangers, I could slip into a role, but when one of my best friends in the world treated me with such indifference, it hurt worse than a bullet.

“Uh, could you take a look through Luke’s bank accounts?”

“Yes. Anything else?”

“You know the drill. See what else you can get into. Home computers, work network, anything interesting on the web.”

“Sure.”

“Thanks.”

Click.

Talk about strained. Usually, Mack was the bubbliest out of all of us, but she’d barely given me the time of day. Boy, did I have a lot of bridges to mend.

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