Read Prime Suspect 3: Silent Victims for Free Online

looked at Otley standing a few feet away, head sunk on his shoulders, flipping through the pages of a report that just happened to be on the desk.
    Under the force of her gaze he raised his eyes. “I’d say, now, the buck stops with you.”
    She knew that. It was the sly curl of his lip she didn’t like.

3
    “ S o we stop, and old John looks at this unattended vehicle, he looks at me, we’re both wet behind the ears, and I said, ‘What do you think?’ There it was, parked without lights in the middle of this copse on a housing estate in Cardiff . . .”
    Chief Superintendent Kernan paused, smiling down at the man seated next to him at the top table, the “old John” in question. Kennington, receding silver hair brushed back, distinguished, with a supercilious air, returned the smile. He puffed on his cigar, smiling and nodding at the great and the good gathered for his farewell dinner in the banqueting room of the Cafe Royal. Every senior-ranking policeman on the Metropolitan force was here. These were colleagues he had worked with, served under, commanded during the nearly forty years of his rise to very near the top of the heap.
    Several judges were in attendance, not one under sixty-five. Barristers who’d defended against him, prosecuted with him. Pathologists, forensic scientists, doctors, one or two people from the Home Office, a junior Minister, and a sprinkling of sober-faced top brass from the security services whose names and photographs never appeared in the newspapers.
    Kernan took a sip of brandy before continuing. In spite of his apparent joviality, the puffy, pasty face with its mournful hangdog look seemed painfully at odds with his black tie, starched shirt, and black dinner suit. Leaning forward, hands splayed on the white tablecloth, he spoke into the microphone.
    “So we drive across the copse. Midway across we get bogged down in the mud. So we get out and radio for assistance.”
    Grins and nods from the rows of tables stretching down the long elegant room, chandeliers reflecting in the gilt-framed mirrors. Everyone relished a good cock-up story.
    “. . . a Panda was just passing, so they followed us across the copse—and they got bogged down about ten feet away from us. Next came a Land Rover. They got as far as our patrol car. So there we all were . . . and John says, maybe we should check out this abandoned vehicle. So we wade across this bloody bog, and find a note pinned to the windshield. ‘GONE FOR HELP. STUCK IN THE MUD.’ ”
    Thumps on the tables. Flushed faces guffawing. Everybody having one hell of a good time, getting better by the minute so long as the free booze kept flowing.
    Three seats down from Mike Kernan at the microphone, Commander Chiswick took advantage of the laughter to mumble into his companion’s ear, “Sweep it under the carpet job. Now I’ve been warned to keep it there . . .” He met the other’s wide-eyed gaze, nodding meaningfully.
    Kernan had consumed three large brandies while on his feet, and his speech was getting slurred. He now poured another treble, ready for the finale. “So I would like to propose my toast, and to give my very good wishes for a happy, productive retirement—to John Kennington. Gentlemen! Please raise your glasses!”
    There was a gulping silence while everyone drank, and then a loud buzz of animated chatter, ribald comment, and hee-hawing laughter. Plump hands beckoned urgently to the waitresses, beavering around in their short black dresses and white pinafores. The speeches were only halfway through, a powerful incentive to get three sheets into the wind by the shortest possible route.
    Kernan stood back from the microphone. He then remembered and swayed forward, bending over to speak into it. His voice boomed like a station announcer’s, bringing winces and bared teeth.
    “Gentlemen . . . please may I ask your attention for Commander Trayner.”
    Kernan shook hands and slapped backs on his unsteady return to