If I Should Die (Joseph Stark) Read Online Free

buggered if I’m going in there without another caffeine hit.’
    The meeting was as dull as Fran’s tone had suggested it would be, not least because Stark knew nothing of the cases discussed. He wasn’t about to drag it out for everyone else with questions, so pieced together as much as he could. He was introduced to several more new faces, and surreptitiously began jotting down names.
    Afterwards there seemed little for him to do. DS Harper had been leading the happy-slapping case but he was still off sick and his DC, Bryden, was out. Rather than just get in the way Stark suggested he went out in one of the patrol cars for the day to start getting a feel for his new patch. Fran agreed with an uninterested shrug. Maggie helped find him a ride, calling him ‘sweetie’ again, and soon he was being driven around by Sergeant Ptolemy and WPC Peters, two decent uniforms, no apparent axe to grind with his CID aspirations. He bought them lunch from a local sandwich bar and they gave him an overview of their manor, warts and all. They seemed quite fond of the place, proud almost, in that learnt-rather-than-felt cynical tone used by coppers before the shine had worn off. You saw the same thing in the army.
    The first thing Stark did after they’d dropped him home was call the base. It had been on his mind all day and he needed it off. The adjutant put him straight through.
    ‘Corporal Stark! About bloody time!’ Colonel Mattherson’s rapid-fire delivery.
    ‘Constable Stark now, sir.’
    ‘Ah, yes. Thought you’d dropped off the bloody world!’
    ‘Comms were down, sir, logistical misunderstanding.’
    ‘Situation normal et cetera. Now, you got my message?’
    ‘Yes, sir.’
    ‘And the letter?’
    ‘Sir.’
    ‘Well, then, what have you got to say for yourself?’
    The next day DS Harper had failed to recover so Stark re-read the file before sitting down with DC Bryden to talk it through. In essence the investigation was at a halt awaiting new leads, meaning fresh assaults, so Stark tidied his desk and ordered a cab. Though University Hospital Lewisham was only two miles away across Deptford Creek, it was outside the borough. Greenwich’s Queen Elizabeth Hospital was four miles over in Woolwich, and Stark had no idea how to get there by public transport.
    ‘Going somewhere?’ frowned Fran, noticing him pull on his jacket.
    ‘Hospital appointment, Sarge.’
    ‘This was in the schedule you submitted?’
    ‘Yes. I’ll be back after lunch.’
    She pursed her lips. Maybe she wasn’t a fan of people getting special treatment but there was little he could do about that. The force had made it clear he was free to work around his recovery needs. Maybe resentment would build up in others if it went on too long. He also got the impression she was fishing. The schedule he’d submitted didn’t say what each appointment was for, though Superintendent Cox had full details, and Stark wondered if she’d got wind that Wednesdays were psychotherapy.
    He found the right department with little difficulty but they kept him waiting. He’d never been in one of these sessions that was allowed to overrun by a millisecond yet they still contrived to keep him waiting every time. It was some kind of institutional fourth-dimensional phenomenon. It shouldn’t make him angry or anxious but it did.
    He wasn’t looking forward to it, he never had, and the thought of starting with a new therapist, someone with no military affiliation or experience, made him feel sick. At least the military ones had gotstraight to the point. Nevertheless Stark had never balanced the pain with any alleged gain. There was a joke they used at Headley Court –
PTSD: it’s all in your head
. Post-traumatic stress disorder; symptoms manifest in various ways and severity. Stark’s were mild at most, so mild he felt fraudulent accepting treatment. But until the dreams left him alone he’d never persuade the shrinks to do the same. In theory this new one should