‘The shit has truly hit the fan, Ridpath.’ She threw the newspaper down on the table in front of him. The large black headline stared out from the white paper.
He was sitting in front of Claire Trent. Turnbull was standing on his left, hands in his pockets.
‘I’ve already had the acting chief constable on the phone, plus Chief Inspector Holloway spent an hour last night bellowing in my ear about our lack of support. He’s not a fan of yours, Ridpath, how have you managed to piss him off so quickly?’
‘It’s what he’s good at…’ said Turnbull, smirking in Ridpath’s direction.
‘And this morning I’ve had Mrs Challinor on the phone telling me you are busy with an urgent job for her. Where were you this morning?’
‘Interviewing the family of a girl who disappeared eleven years ago.’
‘Not working our case?’ Turnbull’s smirk turned into a glare.
‘Afterwards, I went to the see the crime scene manager with Dave Connor. Our case is complicated.’
‘Why?’ asked Claire Trent.
‘The hands were embalmed—’
‘Embalmed? Like at an undertakers? Who would do that?’
‘Whoever removed the hands with a hacksaw in the first place.’ Ridpath took a deep breath. ‘Look, boss, we need more resource if we are going to get anywhere near cracking this.’
‘We’re already too stretched as it is, Ridpath. We have nobody extra to spare.’
Ridpath ignored Turnbull, speaking directly to Claire Trent. ‘You know what distresses me most, boss?’
‘Tell us, Ridpath,’ said Turnbull.
The detective ignored him again. ‘We keep referring to these objects as “hands”. The truth is they are people. Three people who have been murdered and their limbs amputated. Possibly by a serial killer, or killers.’
‘We don’t know they were murdered.’
‘The hands were removed about twenty-four hours after death and placed in a jar of embalming liquid. They once belonged to people, fathers or sons, mothers or daughters. We have a duty to investigate and find out who these people were and who removed their hands.’
Claire Trent stared into mid-air, past Ridpath’s head.
‘You have a right nerve coming in here and telling us about “duty”.’ Turnbull’s face was turning bright red. ‘It’s your duty to solve this case.’
Ridpath ignored him. ‘Boss, we need to find out who these people were.’
She nodded. ‘Right, who do you want, Ridpath?’
‘What?’ shouted Turnbull.
‘I only need Emily Parkinson and Chrissy Wright, boss, we work well together and with Dave Connor, I think we can crack it.’
Turnbull slammed the flat of his hand down on the desk. ‘You can’t have them, Ridpath, I need them for MIT’s work.’
‘Last time I looked I was in charge of MIT, Paul, and I will decide the allocation of resources. Emily and Chrissy are yours, Ridpath, for this case and this case only. You have them until Monday. If you haven’t made any progress, we’ll put this on the back burner and transfer it to the Cold Case Unit.’
‘What? You’re giving him resource we don’t have?’
‘I’m re-allocating resource working for me on my projects, Paul, it shouldn’t affect your workload in any way.’
‘But—’
She leant forward. ‘Ridpath, I’d get working straight away, if I were you. You only have until Monday.’