Behind Dead Eyes (DC Ian Bradshaw #2) - Howard Linskey Page 0,60

several weeks premature you know, so she’s had to fight to survive from day one. I’ve always encouraged her to question everything but she is still a young woman and can be naïve. I was the same when I was her age,’ he admitted. ‘I was the big idealist who thought I could change the world. She thought she could drop out of college and travel then somehow magically have a career, despite a bloody big hole in her CV and no proper qualifications. I told her she was an idiot for thinking that way after all the hard work she’d put in to get there. Look, if I could go back in time I would handle it differently. I was too harsh on her and she got upset.’ He looked downcast. ‘She then said some things that I wouldn’t tolerate.’

‘What kind of things?’

‘She was rude to me,’ Jarvis seemed embarrassed at the recollection, ‘saying I knew nowt about the real world. She started shouting at me so I shouted back. I’m not proud of my behaviour or hers but I was worried she was throwing her life away.’

‘What brought the argument to an end?’

‘She did,’ he said. ‘She stormed off.’

‘And you let her go?’

‘I thought it might be for the best,’ Jarvis said. ‘Let her cool off and try to talk some sense into her later.’ Tom could tell he was hurt by the implication he did not care enough to go after his daughter. Maybe Frank Jarvis wondered if Sandra might still be here now if he hadn’t let her go. He visibly slumped then. ‘I never realised it would be the last time I’d see her,’ he said, obviously fighting back the tears.

‘Not the last time,’ Tom assured him, for he was embarrassed by the man’s discomfort and the fact he had caused it. Tom never liked to plant false hope in anyone but he couldn’t help himself now. ‘We’ll find her.’

Chapter Twenty

He’d started the argument but it was only now he realised Karen was right. He had been an arse. When Bradshaw saw his girlfriend that night after a long, tiring day he was still feeling righteously indignant, which is why he greeted his girlfriend with the words, ‘How come everybody thinks we are shacked up together?’

‘Eh?’

‘What have you been saying to make them think that? Even Kane said it to me.’

‘I haven’t been saying anything,’ said Karen, ‘and I certainly haven’t been talking to your DCI about us.’

He had intended the conversation to be a relatively mild one, during which he would tell his girlfriend he didn’t appreciate people discussing them behind his back. Unfortunately, he had not foreseen the conclusion Karen would naturally come to.

‘Oh, so you’re ashamed of me, are you?’

‘What? No, of course not!’

‘I’m good enough to be seen with, good enough to be shagging – but not good enough for anyone to think we might be in a proper relationship.’

‘Don’t be daft. We are in a proper relationship.’

‘Yeah, course we are … just so long as it doesn’t involve me staying over too many nights a week and I take my toothbrush with me when I go?’

While he usually felt he might be a little more intelligent than his girlfriend, Bradshaw had to admit he was absolutely no match for her in an argument. They rowed for over an hour and she seemed to effortlessly move between all of the emotional states: from anger, to sadness and despair then back to rage, via tears and some highly imaginative industrial language. Karen even threw cushions at him at one point while he desperately tried to placate her. In the end she opted to leave and Bradshaw belatedly realised this had been a problem entirely of his own making, so he very quickly went into reverse gear and apologised – a lot.

‘I hate it when we row,’ she said as she snuggled up to him in bed an hour later, following make-up sex that had somehow pleasingly evolved from the high state of adrenalin they were both in by the end of their argument.

‘Well we don’t do it very often, Karen,’ he said as he drew her closer to him.

‘I can see why people might get confused by us though,’ she said. ‘We do spend a lot of time with each other but that’s cos we’re good together, babe.’ She laughed again. ‘I mean I do practically live here.’

‘I s’pose you do,’ he admitted. ‘You’ve got a key, you’re here more nights than