Fallen Angel Read Online Free

wag more freely than it should have done. There was one occasion, he said, when he had caught Collins attempting to falsify evidence in a child molestation case. Blackwell had listened and quietly absorbed the antics of this renegade officer. He would never have had her on his own team, and would never have wanted to work with her, especially on a case like this. But he knew that,although the Eliot case had started out with SCD7, it would now proceed as a regular murder case and therefore had to be passed over to homicide’s murder investigation team.
    ‘So. Who fucked up? You?’ asked Collins once Blackwell had finished.
    The DCI spoke through gritted teeth. ‘Remember who’s the senior officer here. This is my case.’
    ‘You mean
was
your case,’ she replied, turning to look directly at him. ‘SCD7 is for kidnapping and extortion; once it turns into a murder, it comes under the jurisdiction of MIT. I’ll be answering to DCS Higgins – which you know as well as I do. I’ve already called my team in, and they’ll be here shortly.’
    Blackwell frowned. He knew she was right, and it annoyed the hell out of him. ‘But we have a relationship with the parents, we’ve been with them from the time the first call came in. And anyway, it’s not down to you.’
    ‘True, it’s the Chief Super’s call, but you guys don’t have the manpower to run something like this. Something tells me we’re going to have to learn to get along.’
    Blackwell nodded slowly. ‘I need to make a couple of …’ He was interrupted by the ringing of his mobile. He glanced at the screen and saw displayed a number that filled him with dread: that of Daniel Eliot’s parents. He had received more than a dozen hysterical calls from Christina ever since the kidnapper had told her he was going to kill her son. The family liaison officer was doing her best to try to calm the parents down but failing miserably. Blackwell knew he could not postpone the inevitable for much longer.
    Blackwell excused himself from Collins, headed to a quiet corner of the church and hit the answer button.
    ‘Do you have him yet?’
    Blackwell knew he couldn’t tell Christina over the phone that her son was hanging above him from the rafters of a church in Peckham. ‘I’m going to be heading over to you very shortly, I promise.’
    ‘What’s going on? Something’s happened. Something’s happened to Daniel, hasn’t it? Why won’t you talk to me?’
    ‘Christina, I promise I’ll be with you soon.’
    ‘Please bring my little boy back with you,’ she sobbed. ‘Please.’
    Collins went over to the table the SOCOs were using to hold their evidence. A page from a Bible was inside an evidence bag next to a pile of gloves and swabs. She picked it up and read the words underlined in blood:
By the disobedience of one man, many were made sinners
.
    The sound of a disapproving cough came from behind her.
    ‘Didn’t anyone ever teach you to keep your hands in your pockets at a crime scene?’
    Collins turned to see Edward Larcombe, a veteran forensic scientist with whom she had worked with many times, walking along the aisle towards her, two more evidence bags in his hands. They exchanged weak smiles.
    Despite Larcombe’s joke it was clear that they were both deeply affected by the horror of what they could see around them.
    ‘I hope to God you catch the sick bastard that did this,’ said Larcombe.
    ‘I’ll need everything you can find.’
    ‘I’m already ahead of you. That’s why I called in Jessica Matthews: she’s the best forensic pathologist I know.’
    Collins chewed slightly on her lower lip. She was always telling Sophie not to do this but sometimes did it herself without even noticing.
    ‘Edward, are you religious?’
    He looked confused by the question but shook his head. ‘No,’ he replied. ‘Why do you ask?’
    Collins glanced down at the page from the Bible. ‘It doesn’t matter. Have your guys found any sign of a forced