Mitchell Robb wasn’t just a surgeon, he was the best surgeon put on this planet. By his own admission. Promotion to Consultant was on the cards, and he’d be earning even more money. That was what it was all about at the end of the day; making money was the sole reason for being a surgeon, not this pish about making people better. Life was good.

He drove the Mercedes out of the hospital car park and headed home. Just thinking about it and his mood evaporated. Lynn would be waiting for him to come home. Squeaky clean Lynn-the-girlfriend had turned into moaning bitch Lynn-the-wife almost overnight. He thought about heading to his golf club instead, have a few drinks with the boys, but then thought better of it. That would push the moaning fuck right over the edge if he didn‘t come straight home.

The problem was children. Or the lack of them. It had started when she had told him to sell the Merc and get a Volvo. A Volvo? he had asked her in his best sarcastic tone. Why would we trade this in for a Volvo? They’re for people who have children.

She had smiled at him then and he had felt himself breaking out into a cold sweat. Children? What did he want those things for? You paid for everything for them just so they could wait fourteen years to tell you to piss off, it was their life and they’d fucking well do what they liked.

He had told her in no uncertain terms that he was a surgeon, a skilled craftsman who saved peoples lives on a daily basis, whose very hands had the power to decide between life and death. He didn’t want to come home and find that very small people, most likely aliens in human form, had taken over command of his TV and communicated by shouting at the top of their voices or crying, or both.

Children frightened him.

He remembered one night before they were married, and she’d asked him if he liked children. Yes, but I couldn’t eat a whole one, he was going to say. But thought better of it and gently steered the conversation around to golf.

More recently she'd started screaming about the matter: “What was the point of getting married, if you don’t want children?’

He couldn’t find the answer. The moaning hoor had let herself go after he put a ring on her finger. She’d packed her job in as a nurse, and now she languished around the new flat all day, watching TV and eating. He deeply regretted getting married. She had been married before and knew what to expect. But this was his first time and he thought the sex might have carried on the same way.

He could still hear the boys from the golf club laughing now. Bastards.

He turned the car into the car park and stopped in front of his garage. He looked out the window at the new block of flats. Lights were burning in his penthouse. Like they owned a fucking power station.

He switched the lights and engine off and locked it before making his way across the car park. It was cold and dark. The sky was clear, promising to bring frost with it in the morning. He should have put the car in the garage, but that was only a small problem on the scale of things.

The flat still had that new smell about it. They’d only been in for three weeks and still had some unpacking to do. He’d met a couple of the neighbours, but only in the passing. They didn’t seem to be curtain twitchers, but you could never tell.

The place was like a sauna when he got in. Their heating bills would be through the fucking roof. And then it came waddling into the hallway. Hair not washed, no make-up, looking like it had just dragged itself out of bed.

“Where have you been?” his wife asked.

“Out working. Unlike you.” He took his jacket off and hung it up on the wall rack. There was no smell of cooking. Take out again, he supposed.

Lynn went back into the living room, her gait slow.

“You been drinking again?” Robb asked her.

“So what if I have? It’s not as if I’ve got children to worry about.” She stood looking at him, a scowl on her face. “Thanks to you, miserable bastard.” Now the voice was raised and something was on fire behind her eyes.

“Not this again. If you wanted to have kids, then you should have married one of your other boyfriends. Oh, wait, I forgot; you can’t get pregnant by taking it in the mouth.”

“Fuck off. That’s something you’ll never experience again.”

“Not from you, anyway.” He turned away from her. Made to go into the kitchen. Bad move.

“You fucking bastard!” she screamed, running at him. The fastest she had moved all day.

He stopped and turned to her, about to tell her to shut the fuck up, he didn’t want the neighbours to think he was married to some hoor from the schemes, but out of the corner of his eye, he saw some deranged beast that had taken his wife’s persona and was living in the shell that used to be her body.

If Lynn hadn’t been drinking, the punch might have been thrown that bit faster and might have connected, but it ended up shy.

Robb’s wasn’t. As she swung wildly past him, he lashed out. Just to teach the bitch a lesson. He had to be careful; he didn’t want his delicate surgeon hands damaged.

“You’re a bastard, you know that?” Lynn said, wiping the blood from her mouth with the back of her hand.

“So you keep telling me.”

“Well, that’s the first and last time you’ll ever put your fucking hands on me. I’m off.”

Robb smiled. “Off? Off where? You have nowhere else to go, you stupid fucking cow.”

“I’ll find a hotel. And you’ll be paying for it.”

“You think so?”

“I know so, smartarse. And when my lawyer’s through with you and your bank account, you’ll be lucky if you can afford a junkie flat in a housing scheme.” She stormed off and slammed their bedroom door.

+ + +

Adrian King sat and nursed a hangover. The other guys in the canteen were laughing, joking with each other. He just sat and smoked and drank coffee. Where was that old bastard, Pete? His partner on the tail-lift truck went for a pish about ten minutes ago and was taking fucking ages.

“You ready, cock?”
King felt a hand on his shoulder. Pete the Perv was standing looking at him, a grin on his unshaven features. Christ, the manky old bastard stank, and they would be sitting in that truck together for the next six hours or so.

“Aye, I’m comin’,” King said, getting up form the chair and pulling his fleece on.

“Hey, Pete,” one of the other drivers shouted, “I heard that you’re dressing up as Santa this year. You want to empty your sack for the bairns!”

The canteen erupted with laughter.

“Fuck off, Docherty. She told me she was sixteen! You bastards know that.”

Christ, I hope they don’t think I’m like him, King thought as he stood up. They went out into the cold morning air with their folder for the day. Pete was the loader, and the man who planned the route for the pick-ups, all the shite that the residents in their city couldn’t be arsed taking to the skip.

Then he grinned to himself. He thought about all the extra money he was making and that would make the day go all that faster. He wondered what he would be picking up today that he could sell. Maybe he could get enough money for the weekend, hit a nightclub and take an old tart home.

“You know something,” Pete said in the truck, “you’re the only friend I’ve got in this place.”
“That’s not true, Pete,’ King answered, putting the tacho in place. Of course it was; that girl was a schoolie and Pete-the-dirty-old-bastard had it away with her, and her old man had kicked the shit out of him. Pete had no friends at work.

“Come on then, you old bastard, let’s get the fuck out of here.”

Pete chuckled and picked up the dirty mag that he’d found yesterday.

+ + +

Mitchell Robb was all set. The manky bastards would be here sometime today. He’d given the tart on the phone a hard time, but then he’d cooled his jets a bit. He did want them to turn up after all. The pick-up would be in three days they said. Fair enough.

The flat was eerily quiet with Lynn gone, but he could get used to the peace and quiet. Not here though; an estate agent would be round to call tomorrow, where he would discuss the market potential and the discerning needs of a lucrative target buying group. Techno-talk for, how quickly we’ll sell your pad, mate. At the end of the day, he didn’t care about making a profit on this place, which was just as well. After only being in here a few weeks, he’d take a loss on the place after the sharks took their cut. Still, he would be glad to get out of here.

+ + +

The tail-lift was still in the vertical position but lowered right down to the ground so the top of it was level with the bed of the truck. King remembered a time he’d been a loader for a miserable old bastard, who’d shouted at him for lowering the tail-lift into the horizontal position. “We’ll be here all fucking day if you keep doing that,” he said.

These days, King and Pete did it the way all the others did, to get away early. Lifted washing machines from the ground right into the truck, ignoring the rule about bending the knees and keeping the back straight. Now, as they lifted a fridge up on the truck, King had already earmarked a three-piece suite and two pieces of bedroom furniture that he would keep aside for selling later.

Old Pete was quite happy. King would let him get out and get a bus home and Pete would turn a blind eye to all the thieving. And he still got a small percentage of the takings. Enough to get him a wank in a sauna.

King raised the tail-lift and they both got back in the cab. “Where to now?” he asked. Pete opened the folder. “Marcuston,” he said.

King smiled to himself. These daft bastards in the rich areas always threw good stuff out. Maybe he’d get lucky today.

+ + +

Robb had just poured himself another whiskey. It was only 10.30 but fuck it. He had the day off and he was planning on pissing about on the internet later, so he didn’t have to watch his intake. He stood up to go to the toilet when he saw it out the window.

A big, white box truck, pulling into the car park. He’d made sure to tell the wee skank on the phone that he was disabled, so the men would have to come to his door. If you didn’t, and the stuff wasn’t out on the kerb, they’d fuck off without lifting a thing. He practised walking with a limp and waited for them to get out the truck.

+ + +

“Here it is in here,’ Pete said, pointing to the opening on their left. “Somebody called Robson. 8C.” It was a block of brand-new flats. They looked nice but out of character with the whole neighbourhood. Old money next to new. Not that King would have to worry about that on his wages.

He turned the truck in, driving past the row of garages on his left, and made straight for the front door, swinging the truck around. This one was a handicap uplift. Probably some lazy bastard who couldn’t be bothered bringing the stuff down.

+ + +

Robb waited for the buzzer to go before going to answer it. He pushed the button to open the door and told them to come right up.

The old wardrobe was one that he had bought at an old second-hand furniture store, and delivered yesterday. It looked shite in his new flat, but it was going today anyway.

Along with the other stuff.

The two guys who came in didn’t smell like he thought they would. In fact, they were smartly dressed in their uniforms. Glad to see my fucking council tax isn’t going to waste, he thought.

“Thanks, boys. I have an old wardrobe to go. It’s through in the spare room here.”

“Okay, no problem,” King said. He and Pete went into the room and saw the wardrobe and four, large wooden crates sitting.

“That’s it there,” Robb said. Then he looked at King. “How do you fancy making yourself a quick buck?”

“We’re always open to suggestions,” King said.

“I can give you a hundred pounds to take those boxes away as well. They’re just full of rubbish that was in this room. Household stuff. I just need it thrown away and it won‘t all fit into the wheelie bin.”

King tried to look nonchalant while Pete was nearly pissing his pants. At this rate, he’d be able to afford a blow at the sauna, never mind a wank.

“Sure, no problem,” King said. He tried not to smile as Robb handed over the cash.

“Tell me, where do you dump the rubbish that you pick up?”

The two binmen looked at each other, wondering what the catch was.

“At the recycling centre,” King answered.

‘Do you put the stuff into an incinerator, or what?

“We throw the stuff into the huge pits, and the stuff gets loaded into containers, then it’s put onto a train and dumped into a landfill up the coast. Why?”

“Oh, no reason. I was just curious, that’s all.” Robb smiled at King.

King just shrugged and thought the man was maybe a poof, trying to engage in conversation before asking them if they were a pair of shirt-lifters. But he wasn't. King decided that the man was just an eccentric. Then they got on with the job.

Robb watched as the men carried the boxes to the lift. It was a small lift, and they had to make four trips in all, squeezing the wardrobe in as well on the last one. All told, it only took the men twenty minutes to take the boxes away.


Three hours later, King was at his own lock-up garages round the corner from his house. Pete was in the pub, having been dropped off twenty minutes earlier. The older man was still deciding whether to get pished or go to the chippie for something to eat or go straight to the sauna.

The garages were in their own small cul-de-sac, away from the houses. Nobody could be bothered to walk five minutes from their house to the garage, so most of them lay empty. He had jumped at the chance of buying another garage when it came up for sale. Now he had plenty of storage for his goods.

He quickly unloaded the furniture he had earmarked earlier, and was about to pull the shutter door down when the wooden boxes caught his eye again. They were nailed shut, but that wasn’t a problem; they carried a hammer in the back of the truck, ideal for bashing the legs off crappy furniture to make it easier to stack.

He took the hammer and started prising at the top of a case. It came away easily. When he took the lid off, it was full of newspapers and cardboard. He rifled through it and then stopped when he saw the contents. He quickly opened the other three. The contents were the same in here as well.

As he reached for his mobile phone, he stopped for a minute. He could picture the snobby bastard standing there smiling. And he put the phone away.

After ten minutes, the boxes were carefully nailed shut again and sat in one of his garages.

+ + +

Mitchell Robb had a migraine coming on again. His GP said they were cluster headaches, brought on by stress. A fucking GP, telling him, a world-class surgeon, that he was stressed out! Well, of course I’m stressed out, Captain Blood Pressure, I’m saving lives every day! Well, there was only a hip-replacement today, but that wasn’t the fucking point.

He popped two Co-Dydramol from the foil and washed them down with a bottle of fancy French water that was probably recycled pish. The Mercedes purred along and this gave him some satisfaction. Fucking Volvo, my arse. Boy, was he glad that the bitch was gone now. He was actually thinking about buying a Porsche Boxster as well. It only had a small glove box, but it was dead handy for a girl to put her knickers in when you were driving her home. The thought amused him. Almost made him laugh out loud in the darkness of the car.

He had worked late again, but the money was worth it. And if he had a girlfriend and he came in late, then she wouldn’t be bothered. They never are; it’s only when the ring goes on the finger and you make a lifetime promise to cherish them that they start to unleash the tongue. And a girlfriend sure wouldn’t want to fuck up any chance of getting a gold band on the finger, especially if she was getting some diamonds round her neck. Discounted ones of course, if you knew the right places to shop.

He didn’t feel tired tonight. A buzz ran through him like electricity. An offer had been made for the flat - by a fucking lawyer, of all people! - and he had accepted. The wanker estate agent basically had to do fuck all to sell the place except advertise it in his shitty rag. Still, it was gone now, along with Lynn, and that was something to celebrate. One more week in that place and then he could move into the rented place he had lined up. Then he would take his time finding a new house to buy, and it would be his alone. No mental bitches like Lynn hovering around.

Robb turned into the leafy avenue at Marcuston and drove round the corner to his street. Turned into the car park and pulled up in front of the garage. He would put the car away tonight. He had a day off tomorrow and intended to go and play a round of golf in the afternoon with some of his cronies and he didn't want the car covered in bird shit.

The garage door whirred up electrically and Robb drove in carefully, the headlights illuminating pieces of car paraphernalia, and a mountain bike that he had bought for exercise but had never used.

He intended to get fit by doing lots of shagging from now on.

He locked the car with the remote and was about to press the button to bring the door down when he saw a figure standing at the door. Christ. A fucking mugger. Fear gripped him; he was stuck in here, with no escape and nobody around to save his arse. He felt a scream coming on but didn’t want to sound like a girl. Maybe the fucker would leave his face and bollocks alone if he gave him the Rolex up front.

“Hello, Dr. Robb.”

Robb froze. He didn’t recognise the voice, and he couldn’t see the face yet. But whoever it was, knew him. Somebody from the hospital? No, they wouldn’t go skulking around like Jack The Ripper.

“Are you going to stay in there all night?” The figure moved back, as if beckoning him to come out.

He walked out, trying for a confident, Dirty Harry-type walk, not sure if he pulled it off or not. The figure didn’t back away so he guessed not. He looked at the man’s face, still only half-lit by the lights from the car park. It seemed familiar, but he couldn’t quite place it.

“Do I know you?” he said, pressing the button to bring the garage door down. The man was wearing a woolly hat, and Robb wondered if it rolled down into a balaclava. He also wore a thick woolen jacket, the collar pulled up against the cold December air. Their breath plumed out of their mouths as they stood looking at each other.

“You will remember me, that’s for sure. Now, let’s go up to your flat where we can talk over a nice drink.”

“I don’t fucking think so.” Christ, the last thing he wanted was to be known as the surgeon who’d had a big willy up him, raped by a man who happened to just be hanging around the car park. The boys at the golf club would have him down as an arse-bandit in no time.

“I think you might want to change your mind on that one.” The man reached into his jacket pocket. Robb flinched, wondering just how painful it really was to get stabbed.

The man brought out nothing more dangerous than a packet of cigarettes. He lit one and blew out smoke that looked like hot breath.

Robb was starting to feel very cold. His own overcoat was starting to let his body heat escape. That was the excuse he used to explain to himself why he was shivering. He shook his head. Humour the bastard and maybe he’d go away.

“What the hell do you want?”

“Well, that’s a nice way to treat one of your friends.”

“You’re not one of my friends.” He brushed past the man, as if dismissing him out of hand.

“Right now, doc, I reckon I’m one of the best friends you’ve got.”

Robb turned to look at him. The cigarette was hanging out of the man’s mouth like he was a gangster in a cheap movie. “Really? How do you make that out?”

The stranger took his cigarette out and flicked it away into the darkness where it sparked. “I know you’re dirty little secret, that’s why.”

Mitchell Robb stood still, mainly because he thought he would have fallen over if he tried to walk. Or maybe he would piss his pants if he tried to speak. All he could do was look at the man and wait for him to make the first move.

“Right. How about that drink?” the man said, and he walked towards Robb. He put his arm around the surgeon and walked him over to the front door. Robb didn’t have much to say.

In the flat, the warmth from the central heating hit them like a wet horse blanket. Robb threw his keys down into a glass bowl on a sideboard, next to another set. Then he told the man to sit down in the living room while he fetched two beers from the kitchen.

That done, the man sat opposite Robb, on one of the two leather sofas in the living room. “Mind if I smoke?”

“I do actually.”

The man went ahead and lit up anyway. He hadn’t taken his jacket off, but had taken the woolen hat off and stuffed it into his pocket.

“You still haven’t introduced yourself,” Robb said, taking a sip of beer from the bottle. The other man hadn’t touched his yet.

“My name isn’t important," he said. He finally took some of the beer, drinking deep. Got an ashtray?”

“No. I don’t smoke.”

The man shrugged and flicked cigarette ash onto the carpet.

Robb took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “So come on then, tell me what it is you want.”

“I already told you, doctor, I know your little secret.’

Robb held his breath for a moment, trying to stay calm. Christ, how the hell does he know I’m a doctor? he thought to himself. Stay calm, stay calm. Bluff the bastard. Put on your best poker face, look him in the eye and wear the fucker down. Only one snag; he didn’t play poker.

“What little secret?” Robb took some of the beer, irrigating his parched mouth.

“First of all, what do you think when you look at me? What do you see?”

Robb looked at the man. The woolen jacket looked like it had been bought from an upmarket store. His trousers looked like high quality. Same with the shoes. Black Oxfords.

“I see somebody who likes to rob people in their own home.”

The man smiled, drank some beer and tipped the bottle towards Robb. “But that’s not what you see: if I was here to rob you, I'd have done it by now, and you'd be dead on the floor. You see me as a problem. But I'm a problem that can go away, Dr. Robb.”

“How do you know my name?”

The man took another drag of his cigarette, blew smoke into the air and flicked more ash onto the carpet. “I know your name because I made a point of getting to know you.”

Robb sat and looked confused. Maybe the man was really a fucking nut and had escaped from somewhere. What if he was? What then? Nobody knew he was here and any minute now, he could start getting violent. And everybody knew that these daft bastards that they put into the care of the community wouldn’t get prosecuted for anything, simply because they were fucking daft.

“ The way I figure things out, doc, you got off lightly.”

“What do you mean?” Robb had a feeling that this man sitting opposite him wasn’t a dafty after all.

“Getting rid of your wife without going through a divorce lawyer.”

Robb nearly lost control of his bladder and tried desperately not to go red in the face. “You’re insane. I won’t sit here and listen to this fucking pish. I’m going to call the fucking police and have you arrested.” He stood up.

“You’re good, doc, I’ll give you that.” He took another sip of beer and dropped his cigarette onto the carpet where he ground it out with his shoe.

“I’ll see you behind bars, you know that, don’t you?” Robb tried to throw some indignation into his voice but failed miserably.

“Tell you what, doc, while you’re on the phone, you could ask the police to investigate the murder of your wife. See how that goes down.”

Robb sat down. It was warm in here. “You don’t know what you’re saying.”

“Oh I think I do.” More beer. More smiling.

“What’s your point?”

“I thought I would be stuck in a mindless job for the rest of my life so I decided to better myself.”

“And now you rob people.”

The stranger smiled. “A doctor with a sense of humour. I like that.” He took another mouthful of beer, finishing the bottle. “I decided that if I wanted to get away from the rat race, I had better start studying. So I started studying computer science. I found that I was a natural for it. Who would have thought it? A longtail with a penchant for computers.”

“A what?”

“A longtail. It’s slang name for a rat.”

“So what has your knowledge of computers got to do with this ridiculous notion that I murdered my wife?”

“I really put myself into my studies. Then I met somebody on the course, a young geek who showed me how to do some extra-curricular activities for a few beers.”

“You mean hacking.” Robb felt like he had just stepped into a lift and the cable had snapped, and now he was falling fast, down to the prison level, where the only extra-curricular activity he would be experiencing, would be getting nobbed in the showers.

The man pointed a finger at him. “You’re quite bright, for a doctor. Hacking. It opens up another world of computing. Lets you get into the stuff that you normally don’t get to see. Like personnel files in a human resources department. Need I go on?”

Robb’s silence indicated that he did indeed. “Right. So there’s this guy called Robb who used to be married. To a lovely lady called Lynn Robb, who used to be a nurse at the Royal. She gave up her job, and I’m assuming here - but feel free to butt in and correct me – that she became a housewife. There’s no record of her being in the nursing profession anywhere in this city.”

Robb didn’t butt in.

“I don’t know what went on with you and your missus, but you killed her. It was you, wasn’t it, doc?”

Robb looked scared, but he knew what was coming next, otherwise the police would be here in his flat, not this scumbag.

“What do you want?”

The man smiled again. “Twenty-five thousand. In cash. Then you’ll never hear from me again.”

“And if I don’t pay?”

“I think we both know the consequences of that.”

Robb took a deep breath and let it out slowly. “Let me ask you something; are you married?”

The man shook his head.

“Ever been married?”

Again, a shake.

“I didn’t think so. If you had been, then maybe you would understand why I did it.”

“I live with my sister. I’ve never had a notion to throw all my wages away on a woman.”

“Does your sister know what you’re up to?”

“No, of course not.” He stood up. “I think that concludes our business here, doc. I’ll be needing the cash by the end of the week. That’s the deadline.”

Robb nodded, then looked away from him. “Let yourself out.”

The man did, palming the spare set of keys from the glass dish as he left.

+ + +

Adrian King walked smartly out of the cemetery without looking back. Pete had wanted to take him out for a pint tonight, to spend some of his bonus money, but King had told him that he had something else on. Pete was happy enough to go on his own to a sauna and then get pished afterwards.

It was getting cold, but King was sweating under his woolen jacket. His pace was getting faster the more angry he got. He would teach that fucker a lesson alright. Nobody fucked with Adrian King and lived to tell the tale. Well, he’d heard that line in a gangster movie, but right now, he was totally fucked off. But thoughts of revenge were on his mind as he reached the phone box.

He was fishing around in his trouser pocket for change when he heard the door open behind him. He thought at first it was Robb, but it wasn’t him. It was somebody else. A tall man, built like a shithouse, with a shaved head that made him look hard.

"I've got a message from Dr Robb: you're not getting any money from him, you wanking little scroat."

"Fuck you," King said. He didn't think he could kick the shit out of this guy, but the words came out automatically.

Then the man smiled. "No, fuck you." He brought the knife out of his pocket and kept his hand moving.

King couldn't even shout as the knife was pulled back out of his stomach just as quickly as it had been rammed in. He slumped against the glass wall of the phone box, his hand pressed against the front of his bleeding jacket. And the bald man did something strange just before he walked away; he reached past King and handed him the receiver.

King dialled 999 as he watched the man walk away. Thank God the phone was working. “Ambulance,” he told the voice on the other end.

+ + +

He must have passed out, but now there were bright lights all around. He’d died. And there was a voice calling his name. Was that the Man himself? Then the face was peering down at him, wearing a green mask. The figure reached a hand up and pulled the mask down, revealing a smiling face.

“Don’t worry, Mr. King, we’ll get you sorted. My name’s Dr. Robb. I’m a surgeon here at the Royal. I’ll have you fixed good and proper in no time.” Then the face was covered again.

King wanted to shout Bastard! at the top of his voice, but he could only think about being set up by Robb. Then the anaesthetic kicked in.

+ + +

The figure in the green overalls approached and stood before her. “Miss King?”

“Yes?” He had spoken to her earlier, explained what was going on. He had smiled then, introduced himself. Dr. Robb.

“I’m sorry. We did everything we could. Your brother died on the operating table.”

Stella King wept then. Thought of the phone call earlier that night, the words the last thing she would ever hear from her brother. He said he had been stabbed and had called an ambulance. And then something else. She looked up at this man Robb and hated him with every fibre in her. She stood up. “Can I see him?”

“Of course you can.”

As Robb lead her along the corridor, to make her wait while they tidied her brother up and put him in a room, her mind was running through all the people that had to be told. The funeral director. The Minister. The caterers. Pete. So much to be done.

+ + +

Cheryl and Ted hugged in the lift. This was so exciting! The start of their new life together. Who said marriage was dull?

“I love you,” Ted said, kissing his new bride.

“I love you too,” Cheryl said.

Ted opened the front door of their new flat and carried his wife over the threshold. Then they laughed and walked through to the living room. The flat would look so big without any furniture, but that would be sorted out later in the week.

“I wonder why the last guy was in such a hurry to get rid of this place,” Cheryl said. Then they saw them. Sitting in the dining area over to the right.

Four packing cases.

“I wonder what’s in here?” Cheryl said. “Do you suppose he left them without realising?”

Ted shrugged. “Let’s open one and find out.”

+ + +

Stella King could hear the screams from the van in the car park. She smiled as she put Robb’s spare set of keys in her pocket. “Come on, Pete, let’s get out of here. It’s going to be very busy around here shortly.”