Snapshot by Craig Robertson Page B

hole, oozing dark life. Fuck, this was just what he wanted. Not even a single regret at thinking that. Not for a second. He knew what Caldwell was and he certainly wasn’t going to apologize for feeling like that. Bingo. House. Result. A quote from an interview that Metinides did suddenly fired into his mind. ‘I got to witness the hate and evil in men. ’
    Winter fired off the iPhone as best he could, cursing the slow shutter and the age before it was fit to go again. Eyes, mouth, scream, blood, hands. Cops, forensics, scene setting. Eyes, eyes, eyes. Nothing existed except the inch by two-inch world that he could see through the phone. He caught cops and forensics, a patchwork of expressions set grim on their faces. Anger, fear, worry, intent, humour, maybe even satisfaction.
    Instinctively, he swivelled on his bum and turned away from the cordon. Few of the rubberneckers were interested in him. They were all staring over his head, desperate to get another glimpse of the man with a bullet in his head.
    Some were stunned, a few were laughing. Most were desperate to have something to tell when they got home or to the pub. They craned their necks and pointed, they gawked and drank in every drop of bloodlust that dripped from their lips.
    He snapped a red-faced man, his eyes bulging at what was being played out before him, jostling shoulders with his neighbour in an effort to get that inch or two closer to the action. He caught him open-mouthed and impatient, desperate to see and to know. Agog, that was the word.
    A couple of feet from him was a woman in tears, crying for a man she almost certainly didn’t know, maybe hadn’t even heard of. Her sensible jacket and cardigan said she lived in a different world from the man with the hole in his head. Would she have wept for Caldwell if she knew what he did for a living, knew how many lives he had ruined with the shit that he peddled? All Winter knew was that the tears that streamed down her face causing strands of fair hair to stick to her cheek were wasted on Caldwell. But for him they made a picture.
    The woman must have become aware of Winter on the edge of her vision because her eyes fell onto him, causing him to turn uncomfortably back to the scene. All he could now see was the bulky, shaking body of Two Soups gesturing angrily towards him. The man was purple with rage and looked like he was about to have a fit. He was roaring at Winter but the photographer realized he could hear nothing. Not Baxter, not the sirens or the crowds, just the rush of blood that filled his ears and the pounding of his own heart. It was photographic gold. Dark gold that Metinides would have approved of.
    Winter’s self-imposed deafness was the reason that he didn’t hear the scuff of oversized copper’s boots on the road or them asking him to get the fuck out of there. He knew nothing till his collar was grabbed and he was hauled off his feet.
    Harkins and Murray were looking down at him, at once angrily and apologetically. He’d probably dropped them in it but they still didn’t feel comfortable throwing him about. Over their shoulders he saw Rachel Narey standing open-mouthed, looking at him in nothing short of disbelief. It broke a spell and the sound of the crime scene suddenly burst in on him, all discordant, angry and chaotic. He was breathing hard, elated yet embarrassed, like a teenager caught having a wank. This was not going to be good.

 
CHAPTER 7
    Evening, Tuesday 13 September
    ‘As far as I can see the only thing they can say you’re guilty of is over-enthusiasm. Two Soups is just getting his oversized knickers into a twist as usual. It’ll blow over in a couple of days. Although every cop on the shift will take the piss out of you for weeks. Sitting on your arse taking pictures of the crowd? I’ve never seen anything like it.’
    ‘Is that your considered professional opinion, Detective Sergeant Narey?’
    ‘I am never anything other than professional, Mr