Beneath the Bleeding Read Online Free Page A

officer this weekend? Sam, wasn’t it?’
    Chris shook her head. ‘It was supposed to be Sam, but he swapped with Paula.’
    Carol jumped up and opened the door. Scanning the room, she saw DC Paula McIntyre hanging her coat up. Paula? In here a minute,’ she called. As the young detective crossed the room, Carol felt the familiar wash of guilt. Not so long ago, she had put Paula in harm’s way and harm had come running. Never mind that it had been an officially sanctioned operation: Carol had been the one who had promised to protect Paula and had failed. The double whammy of that botched operation and the death of her closest colleague had set Paula teetering on the brink of abandoning her police career. Carol knew that place. She’d been there herself, and for scarily similar reasons. She’d offered what support she could to Paula, but it had been Tony who had talked her back from the edge. Carol had no idea what had passed between them, but it had made it possible for Paula to continue being a cop. And for that she was grateful, even if it meant having that constant reminder of her own inadequacy on her team.
    Carol stepped aside to make way for Paula and returned to her chair. Paula leaned against the glass wall, arms folded as if that would disguise the weight she had lost. Her dark blonde hair looked as if she’d forgotten to comb it after towelling it dry and her charcoal trousers and sweater hung baggily on her. ‘How’s Tony?’ she asked.
    ‘I don’t know, because I’ve only just found outabout the attack,’ Carol said, careful not to make it sound like an accusation.
    Paula looked stricken. ‘Oh, shit,’ she groaned. ‘It never occurred to me that you wouldn’t know.’ She shook her head in frustration. ‘They didn’t even ring me, actually. The first I knew about it was when I turned on the TV on Saturday morning. I just assumed somebody would have called you…’ her voice trailed off, dismayed.
    ‘Nobody called me. I was having a family weekend in the Dales with my brother and my parents. So we didn’t have the TV or the radio on. Do we know which hospital he’s in?’
    ‘Bradfield Cross,’ Paula said. ‘They operated on his knee on Saturday. I checked. They said he’d come out of surgery OK and he was comfortable.’
    Carol got to her feet, grabbing her bag. ‘Fine. That’s where I’ll be if you need me. I take it there’s nothing fresh in the overnights that we need to concern ourselves with?’
    Chris shook her head. ‘Nothing new.’
    ‘Just as well. There’s plenty to be going on with.’ She patted Paula’s shoulder as she passed. ‘I’d have made the same assumption,’ she said on her way out. But I’d still have called to make sure.
     
    Dry mouth. Too dry to swallow. That was just about the biggest thought that could make it through the cotton wadding filling his head. His eyelids flickered. Dimly, he knew there was a reason why opening them would be a bad idea, but he couldn’t remember what it was. He wasn’t even sure he could trust this fuzzy warning from his brain. What could be so badabout opening his eyes? People did it all the time and nothing bad happened to them.
    The answer came with dizzying speed. ‘About time,’ the voice snapped from somewhere behind his left ear. Its critical edge was familiar but only historically so. It didn’t seem to fit the ragged impression he retained of his current life.
    Tony rolled his head to the side. The movement reawakened pain that was hard to locate specifically. It seemed to be a general ache throughout his body. He groaned and opened his eyes. Then he remembered why keeping them shut had been the better option.
    ‘If I’ve got to be here, the least you could do is make conversation.’ Her mouth clamped tight in the disapproving line he remembered so well. She closed her laptop, put it on the table beside her and crossed one trouser-clad leg over the other. She’d never liked her legs, Tony thought