Wild People
A DS Glyn Capaldi MysteryDS Glyn Capaldi is in hospital recuperating from concussion and the after-effects of a car crash.But, worse than that, a young woman is dead. She was the passenger in the car, whom he was bringing in for questioning following a night operation in a remote rural location.Glyn is initially riven with guilt and self-recrimination. Until he starts to question the possibility that it may not have been an accident. But, if not, who had been the target? Had he made an enemy capable of achieving that level of planning and implementation? Or, if not him, what could a young woman have possibly done in her short country life to warrant that degree of retribution?Glyn, on sick leave, has time on his hands to explore the background to these questions, and, in doing so, confronts a conspiracy that envelops arson, torture, blackmail, and leaves a clutter of bodies that further muddy the already murky waters.
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DS Glyn Capaldi is in hospital recuperating from concussion and the after-effects of a car crash.
But, worse than that, a young woman is dead. She was the passenger in the car, whom he was bringing in for questioning following a night operation in a remote rural location.
Glyn is initially riven with guilt and self-recrimination. Until he starts to question the possibility that it may not have been an accident. But, if not, who had been the target? Had he made an enemy capable of achieving that level of planning and implementation? Or, if not him, what could a young woman have possibly done in her short country life to warrant that degree of retribution?
Glyn, on sick leave, has time on his hands to explore the background to these questions, and, in doing so, confronts a conspiracy that envelops arson, torture, blackmail, and leaves a clutter of bodies that further muddy the already murky waters.
EWART HUTTON
Wild People
Harper
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London, SE1 9GF
First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2014
Copyright © Ewart Hutton 2014
Cover layout design © HarperCollinsPublishers 2014.
Cover design © www.blacksheep-uk.com
Ewart Hutton asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.
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Source ISBN: 9780007391196
Ebook Edition © March 2014 ISBN: 9780007507511
Version: 2015-03-05
For all the scattered ones – family and friends.
Contents
I was bad juju again. But this time they had learned from experience, and had tucked me away out of sight. Unlike the previous fiasco in Cardiff, when they tried to pull a PR trick and highlight me as a hero in an attempt to deflect the mess that had really gone down. No, this time they knew better. This time they treated me like the crazy uncle in the attic, and used the equivalent of nine-inch coach bolts and a heavy-duty plank to keep me secure behind the door.
I didn’t care, because this time I had real injuries.
The medicos were mostly concerned about the after-effects of the concussion that had knocked me out. I wasn’t, because that was nothing more than clinical record by the time I surfaced from it. The real bitch for me was the cracked ribs. Especially since the fuckers had only just started to heal after the Evie Salmon investigation. The contusions didn’t help either. The fact that my face looked like a twisted biochemist was trying to cross a yellow tomato with an aubergine. With stubble, as it hurt too much to shave.
They had shipped me off to a specialist hospital in north Shropshire. I only found out later that I was in a secure and private wing that they kept reserved for damaged cops and high-echelon gangsters who had been mysteriously injured in the course of turning Queen’s evidence.
I was hurting.
And as I started to adjust to it and come to terms with the physical side of the pain, the emotional trauma took over. But no one would tell me anything. They shushed me and said I needed to reserve all my mental strength for the recovery process. But even in a tight, shut-down place like that I was picking up the broad brushstrokes through a kind of osmosis.
Something terrible had happened.
I had quickly checked out the fundamentals. I still had my arms and my legs, my cock and my balls, and could move the parts that were meant to be moved. I could still remember that a tangent was the product of the opposite over the adjacent, and my date of birth. So it wasn’t me.
It wasn’t too hard to figure out after that. Although I was still refusing to accept it.
Until I had to.
Two days into it and they deemed me fit enough to receive a visitor.
DCI Bryn Jones knocked diffidently and shuffled his big bulk uncertainly into the room. It was crepuscular, the blinds were drawn, and I could tell that he wasn’t ready to be sure that he had the right occupant. Until he started to adjust to the light and his expression screwed-over involuntarily at the sight of my face.
