Page 103 of Better the Devil

‘I mean, the bag. The fingerprint you say you can’t ID. You could just tell her you need to rule her out. See if she’ll agree to that. You could talk to her then.’

Logan’s eyes narrowed as he played the scenario out in his head.

‘Could work, boss,’ Tyler said. ‘Just, you know, say it’s a formality.’

Hamza agreed. ‘Then, if you thought she knew more than she was letting on, we could make it official. Let her bring her lawyers in then.’

It was… something, Logan thought. They should check for sure if the bag was hers, if the print was hers. That was worth doing, anyway.

But Eleanor Belov as the killer? Did that fit? He couldn’t hold the shape of it in his head.

A vengeful wife killing a cheating husband was one thing, but killing a cheating husband’s business rival, or associate, or whatever they were to each other? That was harder to grasp.

But then, her first husband, Jason, had been at least partly driven to his death by a drug addiction. Could that be it? Could she be on some well-meaning anti-drugs crusade that had got out of hand?

It was a strange choice for her new man, if so, given the CID case being built against him. Plus, she’d seemed surprised to hear of Victor’s death. Not especially sad, or anything, but shocked. If she’d known about it beforehand, she’d clearly been spending some of her millions on acting lessons. The fact she hadn’t bothered to hide her indifference about the murder meant she was either playing an absolute blinder, or telling the truth.

And, though he wished it weren’t the case, Logan was leaning towards the latter.

Which left… what?

Based on what they knew from the information they’d gathered, there were two strong contenders for a possible motive.

Either Bosco Maximuke was reclaiming his territory.

Or someone was trying to make it look like he was.

Sinead and Tyler were staring at him again, he was sure of it. He didn’t have to look at them to know.

He faced the board, turning his back on them.

‘What about Joe Robertson?’ he said, and the note of desperation in his voice made him wince.

Sergeant Fleck glanced down at the radio on his shoulder, as if to check it was on. ‘No word yet.’

‘I meant as a potential suspect,’ Logan said. ‘He found the first body. He stole from the scene. He has a shotgun, for God’s sake.’

‘Aye, about that,’ Dave Davidson piped up. ‘The ballistics report came in. Shotgun used to kill Kendrick Crichton was a sawn-off. Joe Robertson’s is a full-barrel.’

Logan cursed below his breath.

Shit.

‘Unless he’s sawed it off himself?’ Sinead suggested. ‘His wife said it’d been a while since she’d seen it. He could’ve cut it down.’

‘Good point. Yes!’ Logan said, seizing on the possibility. ‘So, we find him, and we find out. Did we check with the wife again? The neighbourhood watch lot?’

‘Aye, boss.’

‘And?’

‘Nothing useful.’

‘Members of HAWKS have volunteered to join the search,’ Fleck informed them. ‘I’ve told them to wait for now. Don’t want them getting in the way. We’re hoping he might turn his vest on at some point. Maureen says he was wearing it when he left.’

‘Turn his vest on?’ Tyler asked. ‘What do you mean?’

‘Wait. Yesterday. At the thing.’ Hamza frowned, recalling the sergeant’s speech. ‘You said “state-of-the-art hi-vis vests.”’