Double Dealing (Detective Sergeant Catherine Bishop Series Book Two) Read Free Page A

feelings she had thought long buried. Her first few months on the force, keeping her sexuality hidden. Confiding in another new recruit that she had thought she could trust, who had then blabbed to everyone. The comments, the sneers, the looks of pity, some of understanding. No one willing to stick their own neck out enough to sympathise or empathise though. She swallowed, feeling sick. Just when you thought change had happened, that acceptance and equal rights were the norm, a throwaway comment, or unguarded phrase revealed the truth – that some people’s prejudices were still hidden away. Scratch lightly and they would be revealed, sickening and abhorrent, running through them as deeply as bedrock and as eternal as the colour of their eyes.
      What could she do though? It was Foster’s case. She had resolved to keep her head down as much as she could, do her job with a fixed smile, however much it might hurt. Was it worth disrupting that, sabotaging her career, damaging it even more than it had been already?
      She thought back to what she had heard about the ordeal of the young girls in the brothel, the filth they had lived in, the men they had been forced to service week after week, month after month. Stories similar to many she had heard during her career, but still so affecting, so tragic. Girls in their teens, girls whose lives were blighted, ruined. Girls whose days were endured, not enjoyed. Was she betraying them as well? Foster and his team were on the case, she knew that. He was an experienced officer, and who was she to think she could do a better job than he could? She shook her head, furious with herself. Her feelings about the case, about the betrayal and exploitation of the young women involved wouldn’t help them. She had been blinded and had allowed, for the first time in her career, her personal life to infringe on her working hours.
      She had let them down.
      Hating herself, she turned back to her emails.
      ‘Catherine?’ Jonathan Knight was standing in his office doorway, smiling. ‘Could I have a word?’ She got to her feet slowly. ‘Did you speak to DI Foster?’ he asked as she approached. Catherine blushed, her eyes on the grubby carpet tiles.
      ‘I did, but he wasn’t encouraging. It might be best if I leave them to it.’
    From her expression Knight surmised that Foster had said a lot more than that, but he didn’t want to push.
      ‘I see.’ He met her eyes for once, seeing the hurt there, the betrayal. It would take time for her to come to terms with what had happened, he knew that. Being the talk of the station, if not the whole force, couldn’t be helping. Catherine cleared her throat.
      ‘How’s the Paul Hughes murder investigation going?’ she asked.
    Knight shook his head. ‘Honestly? It’s not. Dead end after dead end. I’m expecting the case to be reassigned, in fact I’m surprised it hasn’t been already. Paul Hughes was a career criminal just like his dad Malc, involved in organised crime and who knows what else. We’re struggling and I don’t think I’ll be given much more time.’
      ‘But you’ve had experience with the Hughes family, you know how they work.’
      ‘That might be part of the problem.’
      ‘How do you mean?’
    Knight met her eyes and held them for a few seconds. Having come to a decision, he got up from his chair, stepped across to his office door and closed it. Catherine half-turned in her chair as the DI began to loosen his belt.
      ‘Don’t worry . . .’ Knight’s shirt was untucked now and he was unfastening buttons. He turned his back, pulled his shirt up as high as he could, and Catherine gasped as she saw it. A crude tattoo filled the upper right part of Knight’s back; the rough outline of an eye and the initials ‘MH’. For a moment, Catherine couldn’t speak but eventually she managed to stammer, ‘Malc Hughes did that?’
    Knight let his shirt fall back to his waist and Catherine looked away as he