The Toy Taker. Luke Delaney

looked from his office into the main office outside and decided that enough of the team had gathered for the meeting to begin. He exhaled, took a deep breath and walked the few steps next door, suddenly aware of the relentless noise; the laughter and loud chatter mixing with the seemingly constant ringing of land and mobile phones. He caught Donnelly’s eye, but his other stalwart detective sergeant, Sally Jones, seemed to be holding a girls-only meeting with the other female detectives in the far corner next to the coffee- and tea-making facilities: a limescale-clogged old kettle and a fridge that smelled like something had died in it.

      Donnelly knew his job. ‘All right, all right,’ he boomed across the office in his Glaswegian-tinged-with-London accent. ‘This office meeting is officially open, so park your bums and listen up.’ He seemed to make eye contact with everyone in the room while he waited for total silence, not speaking again until he had it, turning to Sean. ‘Guv’nor – all yours.’

      But before Sean could start, a dissenting voice spoke up.

      ‘Guv’nor,’ DC Alan Jesson asked in his Liverpudlian accent, ‘when we gonna get a new case? I’m fucking skint. I need the overtime just to make ends meet here, you know.’ The murmur of approval from the others told Sean they were all feeling pretty much the same way.

      ‘Something will be coming our way soon enough,’ Sean tried to assure them.

      ‘How d’you know?’ Sally asked. ‘How can you be sure it’ll be sooner rather than later?’

      ‘Because the sea we fish in just got a whole lot bigger,’ Sean answered in a voice almost too quiet to hear.

      ‘I’m sorry,’ Sally replied. ‘I don’t understand.’

      ‘We’re no longer a south-east London Murder Investigation Team, we’re a London-wide Murder Investigation Team.’ He watched the silent, blank faces trying to understand what he’d just told them.

      ‘Excuse me?’ Donnelly finally broke the stunned silence. ‘We’re a what?’

      ‘We’ve just gone London-wide,’ Sean explained. ‘Express orders of Assistant Commissioner Addis. Featherstone told me earlier this morning – the Commissioner’s agreed to it, so that’s that. As of now, anything a bit special comes our way. Potential serial offenders, child murders by strangers, sexually motivated murders – all the good stuff’s going to land on our desk. It won’t be easy, but it will be interesting. Anybody not up for it needs to have the applications for a transfer on my desk by this time tomorrow. I’m sure HR can find you all suitable posts on division. You could even stay here at Peckham.’

      ‘Stay?’ Donnelly said. ‘Then by inference if we decide to stay part of this team we’ll be moving?’

      ‘Yes,’ Sean told him, beginning to enjoy the game.

      ‘D’you mind telling us where to?’

      ‘The Yard.’

      Donnelly closed his eyes and groaned as he leaned back in his chair so much he risked over-balancing. ‘Jesus. Not the fucking Yard. How am I supposed to get there from Swanley every day? And there’s nowhere to park.’

      ‘They’ve reserved us a few spaces in the underground car park.’

      ‘Oh, that’s all right then,’ Donnelly said sarcastically.

      ‘Sounds great to me,’ Sally chipped in with a mischievous grin, keen to kick Donnelly while he was down.

      ‘Aye,’ Donnelly continued. ‘It’s all right for you, living in Putney. Putney to Victoria every day – lovely.

      ‘Sorry, Dave,’ Sally told him, her grin turning into a fully fledged smile.

      ‘I’m all right, Jack, eh?’

      ‘All right,’ Sean broke it up, ‘enough of the table tennis. Let’s make this official – if you don’t want to come with me, put your hand up.’ He scanned the room, but saw no raised hands. ‘I promise you there’ll be no hard feelings. Many of you have wives, husbands, kids, so if the nature of the work or the travelling’s too much I’ll understand.’ Still no raised hands. ‘Dave?’

      ‘Aye, fuck-it – why not? But there’d better be plenty overtime.’

      ‘More than you could possibly spend.’

      ‘Aye, there better be.’

      ‘Right,’ Sean snapped to attention, ‘we’re moving today.’ The groans almost drowned him out. ‘So let’s get everything packed up and over to the Yard – Room 714, seventh floor in the North Tower. Take everything that’s not screwed down and even stuff that is, if it’s of any use. Take the computers, chairs, phones – everything we’ll need to be up and running straight away.’

      ‘Pickfords not moving us then, boss?’ Jesson asked.

      ‘Where d’you think you are, Alan – the City Police? This is the good old Met – remember? Pile everything into anything with four wheels that’s been left in the yard with keys in and let’s get out of this toilet.’ He still felt eyes upon him. ‘Well come on, then. What you waiting for?’

      As the detectives burst into action, Sean slipped quietly into his office, summoning Donnelly and Sally with a nod of his head. Within a few seconds they were all gathered together.

      ‘Problem?’ Sally asked.

      ‘Not yet,’ he told her as Donnelly caught up with them.

      ‘Not yet what?’ he asked.

      ‘A problem,’ Sally filled him in.

      ‘There’s a first!’ Donnelly replied.

      ‘Yeah, well,’ Sean continued, ‘I’ve got a feeling we won’t have to wait too much longer before something comes our way, and when it does it’s clearly not going to be anything straightforward and not something we’ll be able to quietly get on with. The Yard’s full of senior officers with not enough to do who’ll be more than keen to stick their noses where they’re not wanted – and that means our business.’

      ‘So?’ Sally asked.

      ‘So we need to be ready for anything,’ Sean warned them. ‘Which is why I need you two to keep a fire burning under everyone’s arses until we’re up and running at the Yard. Understand?’

      ‘Yes, guv,’ Sally answered.

      ‘Whatever,’ Donnelly agreed unhappily.

      ‘I’m going to pack up some essentials and head over there ASAP – check out the lay of the land before anyone else gets there.’

      ‘Looking for anything in particular?’ Donnelly asked suspiciously.

      ‘No,’ Sean answered, too quickly. ‘But let’s just say I’d rather we used the phones we’re taking with us than the ones that will have been left for us.’

      ‘That’s a bit paranoid isn’t it, guv’nor?’ Sally asked.

      ‘It’s the Yard,’ Sean reminded her. ‘Being a little paranoid can go a long way to keeping you out of the brown sticky stuff.’

      ‘I’ve always avoided the place,’ Donnelly added. ‘Things can get very … political there very quickly. That’s why I always stuck with the Flying Squad – squirrelled away in Tower Bridge, out of sight, out of mind – beautiful.’

      ‘However,’ Sean interrupted Donnelly’s reminiscing, ‘the Yard it is, so just be mindful and be ready,’ he warned them. ‘I’ve got a feeling something really nasty’s heading our way, and heading our way very, very soon.’

       2

      Sean staggered along