Flyte

FLYTE

was on the phone to her mentor William at the IOPC.

‘So you're saying that now Bronte's death is a murder case, DI Bacon is the lead investigator running the show day to day?'

‘That's right. He will be deputy SIO to Malcolm Bellwether's SIO.'

‘So where does that leave me?' Trying to repress her irrational fury.

‘You will continue to shadow the murder inquiry since it is inevitably entangled with the original IOPC investigation. You'll be kept informed of all developments but DI Bacon will be in the driving seat. Your role from here on in is as an observer.'

‘Right,' she said. ‘I'm going to be kept out of the loop, aren't I?'

‘Phyllida, now that it's a criminal matter clearly the police must take primacy,' said William, sounding testy.

‘After they made a total hash of the initial investigation.'

‘That was down to a uniformed sergeant from Camden. DI Bacon is a murder detective with a solid record at Canning Town and the incident room will be staffed with a team of detectives from outside the borough.' He paused to clear his throat. ‘There has been a suggestion that you haven't been entirely .?.?. candid about your contacts with the mortuary technician in the case?'

What the .?.?. ? So Bacon had been squealing. How appropriate.

‘It's imperative that you share anything with any bearing on the ongoing investigation with DI Bacon. That would be the best way to ensure you stay in the loop.'

hung up fuming. She was already sensing a shift in the dynamic between her and Bacon: she would be tolerated, but would have little to no influence over the direction of the murder investigation.

It was Saturday, and she had the weekend off, but at 5 p.m. she opened the BBC News app to watch the live coverage of the Camden police press conference. It was fronted by Bellwether and Bacon, her old boss displaying the comms savvy that had seen him reach DCI rank by his mid-forties. He revealed what he would only describe as ‘newly discovered' injuries to Sophia Angelopoulos's body which had emerged during the forensic PM. A journalist asked – reasonably enough – why a forensic PM hadn't been requested earlier. Bellwether said ‘in this case, we should have done a better job exploring all possible scenarios' before pointing out that the IOPC investigation was ongoing and that ‘their representative' would be given ‘full access' to the murder inquiry.

made a scornful sound. It couldn't be clearer: from now on she'd be playing the role of fig leaf, a human shield to help deflect further criticism of the Met's screw-ups.

Bellwether finished by adopting his ‘concerned' face: ‘I want to assure the family and the public that we will not rest until the truth about Bronte's death is uncovered and any perpetrator brought to justice.'

Cut-and-paste corporate pap . knew that the chances of that happening were vanishingly small. The ‘golden hour' at the start of any investigation was the critical moment in which evidence was found and leads established, and it had now been ten days since Bronte's broken body was discovered on the towpath. Ten days in which any useful forensics at the scene had been lost and potential witnesses' memories had long faded.

Opening the dating app which she'd recently signed up to she scrolled through her latest likes with a feeling of gloom. The experience of coming out – to everyone except her mother, that is – and dating women hadn't been the liberation she'd imagined it might be. She had already exhausted the possibilities of the only surviving bar in supposedly alternative Camden frequented by gay women. She didn't like the newly ubiquitous term ‘queer' which, like the word ‘lesbian', had only ever been used as an insult at her all-girls boarding school.

Clicking on the face of a freckled, red-haired woman, she skimmed her profile. KikiZee described herself as ‘creative, passionate', but then ruined it with a flurry of cretinous emojis, hobbies that included ‘climate activism, self-care, reiki, veganism', and a stern list of NOes – ‘NO Tories, NO Brexiteers, NO meat-eaters, NO Terfs' .?.?. What would KikiZee make of a former police officer? Fascist pig , probably. It had come as a shock, discovering how judgemental a long-marginalised minority could be.

Prejudice came in all shapes and sizes .

The next ‘like' came from .?.?. A leap of excitement. Was it .?.?.?

Clicking on the image she realised her mistake: the Mediterranean colouring, the undercut and soot-black hair was similar to Cassie Raven's but without Cassie's heart-shaped face and generous lips.

She berated herself: that ship had sailed – or never even been launched – so why the hell couldn't she stop thinking about the morgue girl?