Dangerous Games Read Online Free PDF

Henry Marlowe liked to call ‘the nerve centre of our investigation’. But since there was, as yet, no official inquiry – since Terry Pugh’s death was still ‘officially’ a suicide – no such transformation had begun, and instead Woodend had convened what he always thought of as his ‘inner’ team, at their usual table in the public bar of the Drum and Monkey.
    The team consisted of four people – Woodend himself, Monika Paniatowski, Inspector Bob Rutter, and Colin Beresford who had recently been promoted to detective constable. It was a team Woodend trusted – one he wouldn’t have changed even if he’d been given the choice. But, like any team, its effectiveness was sometimes challenged by both internal conflicts and individual problems.
    The relationship between Monika and Bob was probably the most straining of its difficulties. They had been lovers, and though they had broken off their affair before Rutter’s blind wife was murdered – and though the murder itself had absolutely nothing to do with their relationship – they still both sometimes acted as if they felt responsible for Maria’s death.
    And that was not the half of it, Woodend thought, taking a slug of his first pint of the day. Bob Rutter had started ‘seeing’ Elizabeth Driver …
    â€˜She’s a friend!’ Rutter had told Woodend, when he’d asked. ‘No more than that.’
    â€¦ and Driver was the chief crime reporter for a daily tabloid newspaper which specialized in lurid headlines, and was rarely inclined to let the truth stand in the way of a good story.
    Woodend had had a number of encounters with Driver over the years – all of which had left a bad taste in his mouth – and didn’t like the idea of the friendship developing at all.
    But his reaction to Rutter’s relationship with Driver was nothing when compared to Monika Paniatowski’s. She
resented the hell
out of it, for while she didn’t want Bob Rutter back herself – or
said
she didn’t want him back – she certainly didn’t want a scheming, unscrupulous bitch like Driver to have him.
    The problems that the fourth member of the team, DC Colin Beresford, found himself facing were of quite a different nature. His mother was only just sixty-one – ‘And I’m not so far from that myself,’ Woodend thought unhappily – but she had been struck down by Alzheimer’s disease, and though Beresford was – for the moment – managing to balance looking after her with handling his job, there was no doubt that at some point in the none-too-distant future,
something
was going to have to give.
    Woodend put his pint down on the table with a slight thud, which served to call the meeting to order.
    â€˜This investigation is going to be a tricky one,’ he announced, ‘especially since our esteemed Chief Constable has made it quite clear that he wants us to pretend that it’s a suicide we’re investigating.’
    â€˜When he said that, why didn’t you just tell him to stuff it, sir?’ Beresford asked.
    Woodend sighed, and then smiled with a sort of paternal indulgence at the newest member of the team.
    A couple of months earlier, Beresford would never have spoken out like that, he thought. Back then, he would have sat at the table as quiet as a mouse, over-awed at even being in the presence of these three local CID legends. Now, he was starting to chance his arm – which was a good thing, because ‘yes’ men were of no bloody use to Woodend – but he still had a lot to learn about the
realpolitik
of being at the sharp end of dealings with the Chief Constable.
    â€˜If I was to tell Mr Marlowe to stuff it every time I disagreed with him, I’d end up sayin’ virtually nothin’ else to the bugger,’ he explained to Beresford.
    â€˜I’m sure that’s true, sir, but