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Then she hunted for the blackmail material her father had always kept just in case he was ever in a bad situation and needed some powerful friends, but all three spots had been emptied. Because Jackman hadn’t mentioned it, she guessed the police had found them, and tipped a hat to them in respect.

There would be a few high level people feeling very uncomfortable right now.

Then she walked over to her father’s big desk, moved his chair out of the way, and used her torch to find a slightly discolored piece of parquet flooring, and slid the slim tool her father had given her down the side of it into the slot he’d made.

She heard the click and a section of floor popped up.

She lifted it all the way up, and there was the safe beneath.

She quickly entered the combination, and again, found everything in there that was supposed to be in there.

Satisfied, she closed it up and put everything back in place.

She could talk her way out of whatever the police had and whatever they would probably find on Robby and Jackman.

That meant she could afford to take Jackman down.

He didn’t have anything to hold over her, which was all she really wanted to know.

She was going to hand that fucker to the police; lock, stock and barrel.

chapter

thirty-six

“I’m calling you a taxi to take you home.” Ruby walked out of the kitchen to the hallway, where she kept her telephone, and Gabriella sank back down into the kitchen chair.

“Thank you.” She didn’t want to get a bus this late, and as the rain was hammering down again, she didn’t even want to walk to the bus stop.

Ruby lifted the receiver, then set it down just before there was a knock on the door.

“James.” Ruby’s delight was clear, and Gabriella swiveled round and then got to her feet as James stepped in, and Ruby fussed with helping get off his wet coat.

She heard him stamp his feet on the door mat, and then he was in the doorway, rain still on his face, darkening his blond hair.

He looked slightly disheveled, and had the beginnings of stubble on his face.

He stood for a moment, looking at her, and then, as if realizing Ruby was behind him, waiting for him to move, he stepped into the kitchen and she stepped toward him, and his arms came around her.

She was very aware of Ruby standing there, so she didn’t stay in his embrace for long, stepping back reluctantly.

“I went by your house first,” James said. “But I guessed you might be here when I could see you weren’t home.”

She smiled at him, so pleased he hadn’t given up and gone home. “We went to see Teddy Roe in hospital, and then Jerry came round to say thank you, and then it was so late we made a quick supper.”

“I haven’t had time to read either of your statements. How did this all happen?” He sat down and Ruby handed him a large slice of chocolate cake, which they’d just had for dessert, and a cup of tea from the pot on the kitchen table.

He shot her an appreciative grin and dug right in, as if it was the first thing he’d had to eat in a long time.

“I found some envelopes in the road parallel to the Jamesons that said the post office thieves lived in a house with a skip outside, and they were holding two hostages.” Gabriella wondered what would have happened if she’d taken the turn to the high street.

Teddy Roe would probably still have been shot, but with no one there to see it.

She shivered.

“What I didn’t know was that Teddy Roe had also found one, and he knew the house and went straight there.” She sighed. “I went past the place on my way to the phone booth to call Mr. Greenberg and I saw him nipping round the back of the house.”

“He came to fetch me, first,” Ruby said. “But I was out. At least he left me a note telling me where he was going and as soon as I read it, I ran to try and stop him.”