Miss Take

Chapter 13 (6283)

Chapter 13 (6283)

Niles got Connor dressed, breakfasted and ready to go outside. Kelly and Lavius waited patiently in the sauna like heat of the snug little kitchen.

'I'll take him out for a while. Down to the Gyle to look at the toys or something,' he said as he came into the kitchen to get his keys. As he passed Kelly, he smiled and then put out his hand to smooth down some of her errant hair.

'This one never used to cause us any trouble,' mused Makepeace. 'Can you believe that Sergeant Lavius? Me and Jean have fostered dozens of kids over the years. Kelly was so quiet and serious, she did all her chores and never answered back. The perfect child.'

'Don't let us keep you, old man,' said Kelly in embarrassment.

'How times change,' went on Makepeace, completely ignoring her. 'Dare I ask what is going on?'

Lavius looked up from his tea. 'Well, Kelly is very kindly helping me with my enquires. It's all very serious I'm afraid and probably best left to just the two of us for now.'

'Fair enough son,' said Niles as he got his coat on.

Connor, squealing with excitement bolted out the front door, calling on Niles to keep up. Cold air wafted into the kitchen until after a minute or so later Niles also left, closing the door and stopping the draft. The heating was on full and in a few moments the kitchen was stiflingly warm again.

Once he had left, Lavius said, 'Niles must have been a good dad.'

'It was him and Jean back when I was here. They divorced. It was after I'd left home though.'

'It must have been tough, even though...' Corum let the sentence tail off.

For a moment Kelly considered asking some leading questions to get information on his father, but her curiosity as to what news he had brought was too much.

'So come on,' she demanded. 'Spill it.'

'Right,' answered Lavius. 'Have you heard of Reggie Cunningham? He's a politician.'

'No.'

'Really?' asked Lavius. 'He's known as "Scotland's Farage". A real right-wing nut job. Used to be a Tory minister – front bench for a while – before falling from grace. No bells ringing?'

'Never heard of him, sorry, I don't follow politics,' shrugged Kelly. 'So, it's him?'

'A number of things strongly suggested that he's our man. I looked into the Nostrum case. Reggie was on the list of suspects. He had a cast iron alibi for the night of the murder, but that makes sense if it was Price that he sent to do it. He also knows Price; they were in the army together and were in the same unit for a while. There are even a few pictures of them together, but well – as a politician he does shake a lot of hands I suppose. The thing that persuades me the most though is that just after Price shot me, he said something like "Reggie will get me flights to Brazil". If you hadn't Jackie Chan'ed him at that point, I'd be dead and that's where he'd probably be.'

'I don't know how you guys work,' said Kelly once she had sat down. 'Just go arrest him?'

Lavius sighed. 'He's well connected, it would be a huge deal to arrest a former cabinet minister. I've not even taken it to the Chief yet. Every cop in Edinburgh is looking for Price now, it would mean... I don't even know. I've no actual evidence, just conjecture. I think I'll have to go have a little chat with Reggie first.'

Lavius wiped a bead of sweat from his forehead. Kelly got up and opened a window, climbing up onto the counter to do so. Corum finished his tea and put the cup in the sink.