DI Melinda Huss was annoyed with herself for about five minutes after losing Joad, but then decided not to waste emotional energy. In Huss’s view there was never any point in crying over spilled milk. If something went wrong, you fixed it. Tractors, machinery, fences, bent coppers, all one and the same. As soon as she saw his thin, high shoulders and greased-back hair disappear into the department store, she realized she had lost him. She turned round and pedalled back to the station.
She chained her bike up and, helmet in hand, went in search of Worth. Fortunately, he was still at work. He looked up admiringly from his desk at the sweat-stained form of Huss. Worth found DI Huss extremely attractive. There was a lot of Huss and here she was, kind of gift-wrapped in her damp, Lycra finery.
‘Melinda, can I help you?’ he said eagerly.
‘I hope so,’ she said. ‘I want Joad’s username and password for his PC. Do you know them?’
Worth grinned. ‘Do you really think that Joad would be thick enough to write important stuff like that down on a Post-it note and stick it underneath a drawer?’
Her face fell and his smile broadened. ‘Absolutely he is.’
He pushed his chair backwards on its castors to his colleague’s desk, opened a drawer, felt underneath and removed the yellow piece of paper. Huss copied down the information.
‘Thanks, Ed,’ she said.
Worth watched Huss’s broad back disappear across the office. She was a big girl, he thought, but oh so sexy. Mentally he wished her luck in her feud with Joad.
Back at her own desk, Huss logged on as Joad and went to his history folder. There, amongst what were almost certainly porn sites, was a request for number-plate identification. Hanlon’s number plate. Her address was of course listed.
Bingo, Huss thought.
She sat at her desk, thinking, tapping her strong white teeth with the end of a pen. She had the following day off, so she could stay in London if she wanted, or come back to Oxford on the last train.
Joad and Hanlon; Hanlon and Joad. What could it be about?
Well, she thought, I can discount the journalist theory. No writer would be after information like that, post-Leveson. Hanlon’s disciplinary record, yes; her car registration, her address, no way. So who else would possibly want to know a policewoman’s home address and why?
She could think of several reasons, none of them pleasant. Well, one thing was for sure, she’d get nothing from Joad. She wouldn’t be able to do anything at all official with the information, but she could pass it on to Enver. He could act on it and say it came from an informant, which would be essentially true, and keep her name out of things.
She got her phone out and texted him.