‘Yes.’
‘The Whalley foundation is a not-for-profit NGO subsidised by the EU and registered in the USA.’
‘Yes,’ she said.
‘You have been busy,’ Joe said.
She turned and stared at him.
‘You know who these people are. Now you know what they do. Now you know what to do with the information you have. And then you’ll be richer than you’ve ever dreamt of, which, I guess, you already are. Selling your soul is the easiest thing in the world once you accept it doesn’t hurt,’ she said.
She had no idea how right she was.
She winked at him and he likened it to how he imagined a cup of cold sick.
She stared at him and blew her last breath of dirty fumes, as if symbolising the toxic nature of what was at stake.
‘You can’t go against these people and win,’ she said. It was a last warning as if she hadn’t made it clear enough. ‘Jamie tried, and look what happened to him. Don’t be a martyr, Joe. You’ve done your job. Now let us do ours. It’s time to let it go.’
She waited.
‘I’m sorry about Angelina,’ she said. Her voice softened and Joe saw a flicker of a different side to her. ‘Jamie knew he would be obliterated by dirty money. He always knew it would be made to look like something else,’ she said. She reached out and patted his arm. ‘People who get mixed up in this do so knowing they are risking everything, including Angelina.’
Joe gazed across the gardens.
‘There’s one more thing we need you to do,’ she told him.
He stared at her.
‘Then you can fuck off and live however you want to at our expense.’ She grinned. ‘If there’s anyone who is going to find Angelina’s paintings, it’s that female detective who has taken on Jamie’s case.’
Joe stared at her.
‘I can sense it from her. She’s not going to let this go. They investigate murders sensibly here, don’t they? Our English police like to tick boxes and tie off the fraying edges. It’s cute but a pain in my ass. Angelina knew what she was doing, Joe. You couldn’t get it out of her. I will.’
‘She’s dead.’
‘I know she’s dead. But she was clever. That’s one thing you didn’t predict. She didn’t even tell you what she did with the information Jamie stole.’
She patted his arm again and threw her cigarette away. He didn’t feel her petting. He was numb.
‘You tried,’ she said. ‘We’ll find what we’re looking for and this will all be over for you.’
She walked away and Joe felt his stomach hit his toes.
Chapter 40
First thing Saturday morning, Kelly stood in front of her team in the incident room at Eden House. Her first job was to get the team’s view on what she’d spotted in the video from Jamie’s death. She’d watched it so many times now that she questioned her sanity.
‘I want fresh eyes on this because mine have stopped working.’
She brought up the end of the footage and froze it on the character she’d seen in the foyer. The male in the hoodie.
‘Any takers? Dan, did you trawl through the attendance list?’
‘I did, boss, and there was only one who wasn’t accounted for. A guy called Greg Minda. He’s down as an Instagrammer from Chicago but I can’t for the hell of me find him on any other literature, no passport record, no paper trail. He was in room 7.’
‘Greg who?’
