The Sugared Game - K.J. Charles Page 0,66
isn’t! I’ve been asleep down here. My bed will still be warm. In there. Go and check. Go and check right now!”
One of the constables started a salute. He caught himself almost immediately and went off, meeting Will’s eye as he passed with an apologetic look. Will waited, fuming, until he came back out. “Camp bed, sir, been slept in.”
“Right,” Will said. “Thank you. Now, am I not allowed to let a pie-eyed mate sleep it off in my own home? Is there something wrong with that?”
“I’ll ask the questions, sir,” the sergeant said. “How is Lord Arthur Secretan your ‘mate’?”
“Tell you what, why don’t you ask him that? I expect he’ll be pretty keen to talk to you tomorrow. In fact, I expect he’ll bring the sort of lawyer his type can afford to ask why you were hammering on my door in the middle of the night like the bloody Cheka, making slanderous accusations. What’s your name and what’s your station?”
“I’d like to know your relationship with Lord Arthur, sir.”
“Have you seen any evidence of anything unlawful here? Have you?”
“Sir—”
“Don’t give me ‘sir’.” Will was fizzing with rage, and had a strong feeling he knew what was going on. “Answer my question. Evidence of any offence whatsoever. Any grounds for barging in here. Well?”
“No, sir,” one of the constables put in. The officer shot him a glare.
“No. And since that’s what you’re here to harass me about at four o’clock in the morning, I don’t think I need to stand here any longer. So you can all three give me your names, numbers, and stations for the complaint I’ll be making tomorrow, and get off my property.”
He wrote down the details, saw the sergeant and his discomfited flunkies out, and bolted the door in a thoroughly bad mood.
KIM CRAWLED DOWNSTAIRS at about ten the next day. It was lucky the shop was empty.
“You look like a tramp,” Will said, in lieu of greeting.
“That’s surprisingly positive, since I feel like a corpse. I imagine I have a fair bit to apologise for.”
“You have no idea how much. Get cleaned up, get some food and coffee into yourself, and then get back here. And don’t piss me about, Kim. If you disappear on me now, you don’t ever show your face again.”
“Worse than I thought, then.”
“You’ve got half an hour. Try not to let me down, for once.”
Kim was back within the allotted time, which was mildly impressive since he looked as if it hurt to move. Will doubted he’d eaten anything.
“Tea?” he said, because the kettle was on and he was furious but not a monster.
“God, yes.”
Will locked the door, switched the sign to Closed, and led the way into the back room. Kim shot a glance at the camp bed. “I take it I stole your bed last night. Sorry.”
“Don’t be. If I’d been in it with you, we’d have been up a gum tree when the police came round.”
“What?”
Will gave him a brief summary. “I’m no expert, but I don’t think the rozzers generally bang on the doors of private homes at four in the morning to check whose beds people are in. The chap in charge was a Sergeant Spencer Thomas at Vine Street station, which isn’t the local nick, but is the station that covers the High-Low. I suppose that was Mrs. Skyrme’s parting shot at us.”
“Spencer Thomas,” Kim repeated.
Will passed him the sheet with the sergeant’s details. “He knew you were here, and exactly what he was looking to find. So we have to assume Zodiac know about you and me.”
“Balls.” Kim shut his eyes. “I’m extremely sorry.”
“I told Thomas that you’d be round with a lawyer in the morning.”
“Consider it done. Anything else I need to clean up?”
“You owe me a new bottle of Scotch, since you drank all mine.”
“Christ, did I? No wonder my head hurts.”
“And just one more thing,” Will said. “You admitted last night that you know who Capricorn is, and have for a while. So do you want to tell me what the fuck you’re playing at?”
Kim’s face froze. Will said, “If you give me any flannel now, I will kick you down the street. I’m not in the mood. I’ve been kidnapped, I’ve had guns pointed at me, I’ve killed people and mixed up Maisie in this and pissed off the War Office, and now I’ve got the police sniffing around me, all because of Zodiac, and you knew who Capricorn was all along? And you didn’t trust