Читать книгу Bestselling Conspiracy Thriller Trilogy: Sanctus, The Key, The Tower - Simon Toyne, Simon Toyne - Страница 82

As crime scenes go, the cold-storage chamber of the city morgue was about as good as it got. Highly restricted access had prevented the usual build up of partial prints, hair follicles and other assorted trace evidence that clouded most investigations. All the surfaces were clinically clean. And there was a complete CCTV record showing where the suspects had been and what they had touched.

‘There,’ Arkadian said, pointing at the edge of the bunched-up green plastic sheet on the trolley. ‘The first suspect touched it as he pulled it over himself.’

Petersen smiled. The only thing easier to lift prints off was glass.

‘He also touched that drawer.’ Arkadian pointed to locker number eight. ‘Let me know as soon as you find anything.’ He left Petersen laying out his brushes and unscrewing a tub of fine aluminium powder.

A uniformed officer was stationed by the door, ensuring no one else came in or out. Reis paced the corridor outside his office. He held up a specimen jar as Arkadian approached.

Arkadian took it without breaking his stride. ‘Where is she?’

‘First-floor staff room,’ Reis called after him.

The statement detailed everything that had happened to her from walking into the morgue to identifying the mystery man on the CCTV footage. Liv was preparing to sign it when Arkadian appeared. She still wondered what Gabriel’s game was and why he was playing it. She hadn’t described him as ‘the man who tried to kidnap me’. The most he had done was to impersonate an officer and offer her a lift into the city. He wasn’t the one who’d stuck a gun in her face. He hadn’t snatched her brother’s body either, although she still wasn’t sure what he’d been doing in the cold-storage room. In the end she’d settled for ‘the man who met me at the airport and claimed he was my police escort’. It wasn’t elegant, but it was accurate. She scribbled the date next to her name.

The uniformed officer checked her signature then scraped his chair back from the narrow table. Arkadian closed the door behind him.

Liv dragged a depressed-looking geranium across the table towards her and started deadheading it, pinching the shrivelled flowers from the choked stems and crumbling them into the pot. ‘Found him yet?’

Arkadian looked down into the street. It would have been the perfect moment for a police van to screech to a halt in front of the building with all three suspects cuffed in the back, but it didn’t happen.

‘Not yet,’ he said. A diesel rainbow was smeared across the wet road where the fire-trucks had parked. ‘We’re working on it.’ He turned back to the crumpled newspaper on the table between them, the front page now a kaleidoscope of letters and crossings out. ‘Had any luck with that?’

‘Haven’t had much time to focus on it, to be honest. Been kind of distracted.’

Arkadian said nothing, hoping the silence would soften her.

‘Do you really believe this is why they took him?’ She examined the scrawled symbols and letters once more.

‘Maybe. As soon as we catch them, we’ll ask. Until then, I’d like to ask you something.’ He laid the package Reis had given him down on the table-top.

Liv’s eyes narrowed. ‘That’s a buccal swabbing kit.’

Arkadian nodded. ‘Given what Reis got back from the lab, it would be very helpful for us to compare your DNA with your brother’s. It would also establish your biological kinship beyond any doubt.’ He slid the kit towards her.

Liv picked the last dead flower from the geranium and mulched it with the others. She rubbed her hands together then opened the specimen jar and wiped the cotton swab inside her cheek. She screwed down the lid and handed it back to him. The Citadel rose up behind the buildings across the street, stark and impassive against the sky. The sight of it made her shudder.

Arkadian followed her gaze. Saw a flash of movement from the street below. ‘Jesus,’ he said, springing from his chair. A TV news van had pulled up in front of the building.

‘I didn’t call them,’ she said. ‘I’m strictly print. We hate those guys.’

There was a knock on the door.

‘Sorry, chief,’ Petersen said, ‘but I’ve lifted practically a whole set of latents from the sheet. You want me to send them for routine processing or fast track?’

‘Hang on a minute, I’ll come with you.’ He turned back to Liv. ‘I know you didn’t call that news crew, so don’t misread what I’m about to say … I think we need to get you out of the building.’

Liv’s expression darkened.

‘This isn’t an attempt to get rid of you; I just think you’d be safer away from here. If the press know what’s happened, they’ll lay siege to the place. I don’t want the people who took your brother finding out on the six o’clock news that you’re here. But I think it’s best you stay under our protection. I’m going to arrange for someone to drive you back to Central so you can get a shower and a change of clothes. I’ll catch up with you later, OK?’

Liv looked down at her mud-encrusted outfit.

‘OK,’ she said. ‘But if you’re using this as an excuse to sideline me, then I’m going to walk straight back out and call a press conference.’

‘Be my guest,’ he said. ‘Just stay away from the windows. I don’t want to see your face on the news.’

Neither do I, Liv thought as she inspected her grimy blouse. She pulled a dirt-roughened lock of hair down from her fringe and glanced over at the window, trying to catch her own faint reflection in the glass. Instead her eyes were drawn back to the thin, dark mountain soaring into the clear blue sky.