The Bones Beneath Read Free Page A

her make-up was severe. Only her voice was at odds with the impression she wanted – or thought she
ought
– to create. There was almost no colour in it, and she spoke so quietly Thorne had twice needed to ask her to repeat herself.
    Not that the conversation was exactly sparkling.
    The completion of each set of forms – one for each of the prisoners – was celebrated with a short break for chit-chat. Specifically, one inane enquiry after another about the journey Thorne and Holland had made from London that morning. The route, the weight of traffic, the weather conditions at various stages.
    Then back to the task in hand.
    She said, ‘Even when these prisoners have been handed into your care and are off the grounds of Long Lartin, they will still
be
prisoners and as such will remain my legal responsibility. I don’t need to tell you I’d rather they were returned here at the end of each day, but as the geography would seem to make that impossible, they will need to be escorted to a designated facility.’
    ‘You don’t need to tell me, but you did,’ Thorne said.
    ‘As I said, best to get things clear at the outset.’
    ‘We’ll look after them.’
    Colquhoun had just begun talking about procedures in the event of a prisoner being taken ill, when the message alert sounded on Holland’s phone. She stared at him, like an irritated librarian.
    Holland checked his message. Said, ‘Back-up car’s here.’
    ‘Tell them we shouldn’t be long,’ Thorne said, eyes on the deputy governor.
    Though he was hardly making it difficult for her, Colquhoun could sense Thorne’s growing impatience, his desire to get on his way. ‘My officers are busy getting the prisoners prepared,’ she said. She smiled, showing no teeth, and began straightening papers. ‘For obvious reasons, we only informed them that the handover was taking place today at the very last minute.’
    ‘Right,’ Thorne said.
    ‘Obviously, it would be lovely if they were all prepped and ready for you in advance, but that would rather compromise security, don’t you think?’
    ‘Obviously…’
    What Thorne had
actually
been thinking for several weeks now was that security protocols such as this one were little more than a challenge for the likes of Stuart Nicklin. It made sense of course that prisoners should not be given the chance to pass on details of the time they would be spending outside prison to anyone else. But it was not a fool-proof system at the best of times and Nicklin was no ordinary prisoner. Over the years he had spent inside, he had demonstrated an alarming ability to gather information. To foster any number of sources on whom he could call when the moment was right.
    The last time Thorne had seen him, five years before, Nicklin had gleefully advised him to shop around for his utilities and to keep an eye on his overdraft. He’d told him that he might want to think about cutting down on takeaways.
    ‘I think I know you pretty well now,’ he had said.
    Getting some low-life to go through a rubbish bin was hardly rocket science, but Nicklin had also shown himself able to procure phone numbers, addresses, personal details; to monitor the movements of anyone he chose to take an interest in.
    With all that in mind, it was hard to have too much confidence in the advance security as far as this operation went. There would be plenty of people in the prison administration who had been aware of the details for days already and who would have known exactly when Thorne was turning up to collect Stuart Nicklin. Officers in every force whose jurisdiction they would be passing through had already been informed and issued with descriptions and up-to-date photographs of the prisoners.
    There were plenty of… sources.
    Thankfully, it only took a few minutes more to complete the paperwork and when it was done, Colquhoun called down and spoke to one of her senior officers. She told Thorne that the prisoners would be brought out to the vehicles