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aware she had no way of knowing who this journalist’s “guy” was – let alone a way of getting him fired – but she may as well try to get someone sweating a bit.
    ‘Okay,’ he said dismissively. ‘I’ll tell them that… so do you want to make a comment then?’
    ‘No.’ The cheeky swine had gone right to the top of her list with that flippant remark. Jessica hung up abruptly after considering sending the journalist packing with a two-word send-off. She wondered if she should tip DI Cole off or not but thought that, if the journalist was going to go over her, he would have done already. Besides he was probably just full of it. One of those Scene of Crime people, or someone in uniform, had just blabbed and he was trying it on, seeing if she let anything slip. She would wait for the Sunday paper, then decide if she was going to hunt him down and make his life difficult or not.
     
    As much as Jessica wanted to get on with the case, CID struggled with weekends simply because of everyone else’s working patterns. Courts, coroners, solicitors’ offices, forensics, their own Press Office and all kinds of other departments were either closed or trying to run with a cut-down weekend workforce. While uniformed officers had many more call-outs and lots more work to do across Friday nights, Saturdays and Sunday, plain-clothed officers were often left catching up with paperwork.
    She had been planning on going home and possibly getting something to eat with Caroline but, given her mood, knew she wouldn’t be the best company. After her talk with the journalist, she went back into the station to catch-up on some paperwork, figuring it would be one less thing to do the following week. The desk sergeant was clearly confused, seeing as Saturdays were usually the day when plain-clothes officers were battling to get out of the door, rather than back in it.
    She had her own office but wanted a bit of company. DC Rowlands was on the main floor doing some paperwork of his own so she went and sat opposite him. ‘Wotcha,’ she said.
    ‘You’re way too old to be talking like that.’
    ‘Oi. How are you doing anyway? Did Eric Christensen get home okay?’
    ‘I assume so. Someone took him in a car to identify the body then they were going to drop him back. How are you ? Isn’t it this week that...?’ He tailed off.
    As much as they bickered and joked with each other, there really was affection under the surface, albeit strictly platonic. ‘Yeah, Monday.’
    ‘How long has it been?’
    ‘Eight months.’
    ‘Do you still miss him?’
    ‘Yeah, of course.’
    Everyone who first joined CID started as a Detective Constable after previously spending around two years in training as well as a period before that in uniform. Generally, being a new DC meant you were the first point of call when the teas needed to be made or you could possibly be sent on a biscuit run on a quiet day. Woe-betide a freshly-recruited constable who brought back a packet of custard creams from a mid-morning dash to the local supermarket. Even hardened criminals didn’t get as much abuse as some unfortunate new recruit returning with something that didn’t have chocolate on it.
    You learned pretty quickly.
    On top of that really important work, you also got all the jobs no one else really wanted. You would get the vast array of forms to fill in and handle the rest of the paperwork to file and send off to wherever it was needed. You would have to hunt through the mountains of papers or computer files to fulfil the freedom of information requests. You might have to work with the Press Office if you really annoyed someone, or perhaps liaise with other police forces around the country and make the endless hours of phone calls to rule people out from enquiries. If you were really unlucky, you could even get the task of hunting through hours of CCTV, phone logs or anything else in an attempt to find a breakthrough.
    Every now and then you were actually