VAL McDERMID
KICK BACK
To Lavender Linoleum Lovers Everywhere
‘Property is theft’
Pierre Joseph Proudhon
CONTENTS
The Case of the Missing Conservatories. Sounds like the Sherlock Holmes story Conan Doyle didn’t get round to writing because it was too boring. Let me tell you, I was with Conan Doyle on this one. If it hadn’t been for the fact that our secretary’s love life was in desperate need of ECT, there’s no way I’d have got involved. Which, as it turned out, might have been no bad thing.
I was crouched behind the heavy bulk of the elevator machinery, holding my breath, desperately praying I’d pick the right moment to make my move. I knew I wouldn’t get a second chance with a nasty bag of works like Vohaul’s hit man. I caught sight of him as he emerged from the stairwell. I leaped to my feet and threw myself at one of the pair of heavy pulley attachments suspended from the ceiling. It shot across the room towards my relentless opponent. At the last minute he turned, spotted it and ducked, letting it whistle over his head. My mouth dried with fear as he caught sight of me and headed menacingly in my direction. I dodged round the elevator machinery, trying to keep it between us so I could make a dash for the stairs. As he rushed after me, I desperately swung the other pulley towards him. It caught him on the side of the head, the momentum plunging him over the lip of the lift shaft into the blackness below. I’d done it! I’d managed to stay alive!
I let my breath out in a slow sigh of relief and leaned back in the chair, hitting the key that offered me the ‘Save Game’ option. A glance at my watch told me it was time to leave Space Quest III for the day. I’d had the half-hour lunch break that was all I could spare in my partner Bill’s absence. Besides, I knew that our secretary Shelley would be returning from her own lunch break any minute now, and I didn’t want her wandering in and catching me at it. While the cat’s away, the mouse plays Space Quest, and all that, which isn’t very businesslike behaviour for a partner in a security consultancy and private investigation agency. Even if I’m only the junior partner.
That particular week, I was the only show in town. Bill had abandoned ship for the fleshpots (or should that be lobster pots?) of the Channel Islands to run a computer security course for a merchant bank. Which meant that Kate Brannigan was the only functioning half of Mortensen and Brannigan, as far as the UK mainland was concerned. Say it fast like that and we sound like major players instead of a two-operative agency that handles a significant chunk of the white-collar crime in the North West of England.
I headed for the cupboard off my office that doubles as the ladies loo and office darkroom. I had a couple of films that needed processing from my weekend surveillance outside a pharmaceutical company’s lab. PharmAce Supplies had been having some problems with their stock control. I’d spent a couple of days working on the inside as a temporary lab assistant, long enough to realize that the problem wasn’t what went on in working hours. Someone was sneaking in when the lab was locked and helping himself or herself, then breaking into the computer stock records to doctor them. All I needed to discover was the identity of the hacker, which had been revealed after a couple of evenings