The Order of Things Read Online Free Page B

waiting to happen. The way I read it, most climatologists stick to the science and avoid thinking too hard about the consequences. Bentner doesn’t see it that way, never has done. He thinks the two go together. We pump all this shit into the atmosphere, the world heats up, and we all die. I think that’s the way it goes. That’s certainly Bentner’s line.’
    ‘He changed his address recently, sir.’ Houghton was looking at Nandy. ‘The place used to be called Two Degrees.Since last week, according to the neighbours, he’s been living at Five Degrees.’
    ‘Meaning what?’
    ‘We’re all doomed, sir.’ This from Suttle. ‘Five degrees is where Bentner thinks we’re headed. A temperature rise that big would kebab us all.’
    ‘And is he right?’
    ‘I asked that.’
    ‘And?’
    ‘No one knows. These people are scientists. They’re into evidence.’
    ‘Sure. Just like we should be. So where is Mr Bentner?’
    Houghton shook her head, said she hadn’t a clue. His ID photo from the Met Office had been circulated force-wide and would be going national tomorrow, along with details of his ancient Skoda. The media department were organising a press conference for late morning at which Nandy would be making a personal appeal to find the missing man. In the meantime local uniforms were scouring empty properties and other likely hidey-holes within a three-mile radius in case Bentner had gone to ground.
    Suttle wanted to know about Harriet Reilly. Houghton gave him the headlines. Local address, a sweet little cottage on the outskirts of the village. Worked as a GP partner in a big Exeter practice. Allegedly lived alone after the collapse of her marriage years back. DC Luke Golding had already talked to a neighbour up the lane, and tomorrow, after the first Buzzard squad meet, Houghton wanted him and Suttle to pay the GP practice manager a visit.
    ‘Her name’s Gloria, Jimmy.’
    ‘And she knows what’s happened?’
    ‘She does.’
    Houghton scribbled a couple of lines and passed them across. The practice address plus a phone number.
    Suttle looked up. ‘Anything else I should know, boss?’
    ‘Yes.’ She gestured at her PC screen. ‘I just had the pathologist on. He’s finishing up at Lympstone, and whether it’s germane or not, he thought we ought to know.’
    ‘Know what?’
    ‘Our victim was pregnant.’
    Oona was asleep when Suttle got home. It was nearly midnight. He checked in the bedroom then helped himself to a can of Stella from the fridge. She’d left him half a saucepan of chilli con carne and the remains of some rice left over from a takeout they’d bought over the weekend. Also, a note.
    Suttle sat in the window. ‘My beautiful one,’ she’d written. ‘What’s a girl supposed to do without you? The porn channels are useless and masturbation’s a wank. Wake me up and tell me you love me. Special prize if you mean it. XXXX’
    The big loopy letters brought a smile to Suttle’s face. In the view of many in the Job he’d nicked this amazing woman from Luke Golding. Luke and Oona had been living together for the best part of six months when she transferred her affections to Suttle. It was true that Golding couldn’t keep his hands off other women, and it was equally true that her departure hadn’t surprised him in the least. There’d been some awkwardness between the two detectives for a while, but nowadays Golding was the first to admit that Oona deserved a great deal more than his serial excursions into Exeter’s clubland, expeditions that frequently ended in sex with his latest conquest.
    Only last month, for the first time since the break-up, the three of them had risked an evening in the pub together and a curry afterwards. Serafin had promised to show but never turned up, a gesture Oona attributed to more than a lapse of memory. ‘She’s probably shagging someone else,’ she’d told Golding with a smile. ‘Long live the sisterhood.’
    Later, close to one o’clock,