They were in his office. Outside, the afternoon was dying; in here, it could have been any time from 1972 onwards. Lamb had poured himself a medium-huge glass of whisky; had poured one for Catherine, too, which he did sometimes. Perhaps he wanted her to drink from it. Perhaps he just wanted to watch her resisting. So much of his life seemed to consist of testing other people’s limits. Presumably he’d grown bored testing his own.
‘You do know,’ she said, ‘that Flyte’s probably rounding up her Dogs even now. And that wherever they’re keeping Roddy, there’ll be a space next to him just for you.’
He looked indignant. ‘What did I do?’
‘… You want a list?’
‘She’s not going to go crying all the way home,’ Lamb said. ‘She did that every time a nasty man handcuffed her, she’d never have any fun.’
‘You know, I’d think twice about offering that in mitigation.’
Lamb waved her objection away, unless he was chasing off a fly. ‘She’s a cop,’ he said. ‘She knows damn well that if there’s even the slightest chance what Coe said is true, then it needs chasing down. And stopping to file a complaint about what happened here’s just gonna clog the wheels.’ He paused to raise his glass to his mouth. He’s already drained a bottle of wine, Catherine thought. She could almost taste it, if she tried hard enough. But that was a door she wasn’t walking through: not today. He was talking again. ‘Besides, she’s not gonna want everyone knowing what a crap job she made of it. Dander went out for sweeties, for Christ’s sake. I’m pretty sure that’s outside the lockdown guidelines.’
‘I don’t think they were drawn up with you in mind.’
He nodded seriously at that. Guidelines never were.
Catherine said, ‘You sent our crew out after a bunch of killers.’
‘I’d have gone with them, but—’
‘But you couldn’t be arsed, yes. That wasn’t my point. Coe’s carrying a knife if you believe Shirley, but other than that they’re unarmed. Just supposing a pair of them do run into this gang. How’s that likely to turn out?’
‘Well, I’m an incurable optimist, as you know,’ he said. ‘But I expect it’ll all go to shit, as usual.’
‘That’s reassuring.’
‘Oh, grow a pair. Actually, on second thoughts, don’t.’ He stared at his glass a moment, as if trying to work out what it was, and where it went, and then solved that puzzle in the usual way. When he’d done, he said, ‘These killers aren’t up to much. Slaughtering a bunch of pedestrians is one thing. But they failed to whack Ho twice, and let’s face it, he’s a walking wicket. Nah, they’re amateurs. I’d back Guy and Dander against them most days.’
‘What about River and Coe?’
‘Okay, you’ve made your point. But at least we’ll have a spare room.’
‘Jackson—’
‘The targets, both of them, ’ll have a police presence. Armed police, more than likely. If our crew spot anything, all they have to do is raise the alarm. It’s not like I’m expecting them to lay their lives down.’
‘… All right.’
‘Of course,’ he said, ‘if they weren’t fuck-ups, they wouldn’t be here in the first place.’
‘You’re wasted on us,’ she told him. ‘You should be writing greetings cards.’
A shattered sneer pasted across his face; he reached for her glass.
There were five of them, and one was dead.
They’d wrapped him, tight as they could, in what came to hand, which was cling film. This lent a horror film sheen to the corpse, and every time Danny looked at him – it – he had the feeling it was about to move; to extend its mummy-like arms and shuffle to its feet. Just yesterday, he’d been among the living. Joon, he’d been called then. Now Joon was an it, and cling film-wrapped, as if sheets of skin-thin plastic could keep him fresh.
They all knew that wasn’t going to happen.
‘Bad fall,’ Shin had said.
Apparently, there were good ones. In Joon’s case, this would have involved not landing neck first, after falling through a big window. And pretty clearly, even before his meeting with the pavement, Joon had not been having a successful evening: if he’d completed the task in hand, there’d have been no need to take such a dramatic short cut. He could have padded down the stairs and let himself out through the door. No, the target was still upright, that was clear.
