Inescapable by Niall Teasdale Page A

would like to call
their own on a Sunday night.’
    ‘Good point,
well made. You remember that little problem I had with finding a
body recently?’
    ‘Felix Kenan. I
remember.’
    ‘Well, I’ve
inherited his house, and a tenant and housemaid in the basement,
actually, but it’s the house I’m concerned about.’
    ‘You moving
home on me, Sam? I thought we had a good, neighbourly thing going.
Mind you, it did look like a nice house…’
    ‘I’m trying to
work out whether I can actually afford to run the place. He left me
money to help with it and there’s no rent, but my outgoings will
rise. I’ve aimed my accountant at it, but that’s not the issue.
Someone broke in there last night.’
    ‘NAPA not
hopeful on a resolution?’
    ‘I doubt NAPA
could resolve it, but the thing is… Well, they didn’t take
anything. Seemed like they broke in, opened up a wiring cupboard,
and ran away when they were noticed, but they tried to make sure
the place looked like no one had been there.’
    Fox’s brows
furrowed. ‘There’s a lot of that kind of thing going around.’ Sam
raised an eyebrow, but she just shook her head. ‘You want me to
take a look?’
    ‘I was
thinking, when you get back, maybe I could hire a security
consultant to come in and review the building’s systems. Like I
said, I’ve got money for renovations.’
    ‘Okay. Can you
clear a couple of Palladium operatives for a visit tomorrow? I’ll
get someone around there to review the security straight away and
see if Jackson can spare someone to run a forensics swarm over this
cupboard of yours.’
    ‘Tomorrow… I
can get Marie to let them in. That’s the maid. You’d like her;
she’s a redhead.’
    ‘Job’s looking
up already. I’m not sure when I’ll get back. I’m hoping I’m
going to be done here in the next day or so, but it may take
longer.’
    ‘Well, it’s not
like my problem is urgent. Or I don’t think it is. I just have this
feeling…’
    ‘B and E with
no taking away isn’t always a sign of something weird going on. But
when the previous owner has been murdered, it does tend to push for
a degree of caution.’
    ‘Good,’ Sam
replied, a smile curling his lips, ‘it’s not just me being paranoid
then.’
    29 th March.
    ‘Trouble sleeping, Miss
Meridian?’
    Fox looked
around at the sound of the voice and saw a man in his middle years
she did not immediately recognise, but Kit’s rapid scan of
personnel files did. ‘Doctor Fieldman, right?’
    He bowed his
head in acknowledgement. It was not long after dawn and the air was
still. The light had turned the eastern sky a pale blue with a
faint taint of red at low altitude, the result of dust stirring up
from the desert. Fieldman was dressed in shorts and a T-shirt, even
though his frame was not suggestive of a man who exercised
regularly. He seemed to note the way her gaze was moving and
grinned. ‘I like to run when the air is still and the sun isn’t
quite up. It’s cooler and I don’t need to wear a mask.
Unfortunately, it’s not as common an occurrence as I’d wish.’
    She returned
his smile. ‘I… get nightmares. There wasn’t much point in going
back to sleep. Besides, I’m not sure I’m going to get another
chance to see this without a mask.’
    He let out a
bark of a laugh. ‘I’d heard you believe you’ve discovered what our
break-in was about.’
    ‘Looks like it.
I’ve got some forensic data analysis software running to confirm
it. I think it should all be wrapped by tonight.’ Her gaze returned
to the red light low on the horizon. ‘You might want to make that
run fast; I don’t think it’s going to stay clear for long.’
    ‘You may be
right.’
    ‘How the Hell
did we ever let it get this bad?’
    Fieldman
paused, stepping a little closer and following her gaze. ‘When I
was a boy, before the century turned over, this was all plains, dry
but inhabited. I lived through the arguments about climate change.
The more we look, the more we find