Page 108 of In Too Deep

“It wasn’t a lifestyle. It was her life. There’s a difference.”

The media officer nodded, then retreated.

Harrison stared at the board again, exhaustion pressing heavily behind his eyes. Because while all of this unfolded publicly—the appeals, the press statements, the carefully controlled release of information—there was one thing he was deliberately keeping out of the room.

Brodie.

He should disclose it. Harrison knew that. Should admit exactly how the information had reached him, accept the questions that would follow, and whatever consequence came with it. The Harrison Black who’d spent twenty years believing procedure existed for a reason would have done exactly that.

Instead, he was trying to repair the damage without exposing how it had happened. Building legitimate lines of enquiry. Creating an evidential route that might lead them independently to Brodie Simmons without Jake’s name ever needing to enter it. And he told himself it was about protecting the integrity of the investigation. Some of it even was. But Harrison wasn’t dishonest enough with himself to pretend that was all of it.

He was protecting Jake.

And, Christ, perhaps himself too.

That was the part that sat heaviest. Somewhere between sharing confidential information in bed and discovering Jake had taken it all the way to Hull, Harrison had stopped behaving like the detached SIO he was supposed to be, and was now trying to protect the case and the man tangled up inside it.

He was in far too deep with Jake Whitton.

“Guv?” Murray appeared beside Harrison’s desk, holding a small stack of printouts, her hair windswept from going between buildings. “Hull vice acknowledged the request. They confirmed Pike was known to local outreach teams, but the DI who normally covers vice has gone off shift. They’re pulling files tonight and will send a fuller intelligence package through in the morning.”

Harrison skimmed the top sheet without really reading it. “Fine. Make sure they include associates too.” He set the papers down. “Anyone moving within the same circles. And ask whether they’ve ever come across references to a stitched-heart tattoo.”

“Yes, guv.” Murray lingered a second too long after he finished speaking.

Harrison looked up. “Something else?”

She clutched the papers to her chest. “Are we following up on the visitor Kayleigh mentioned?”

The noise of the incident room seemed to dull. Phones ringing. Officers talking. Keyboards clattering. All of it pushed somewhere distant behind the sudden pressure building at the base of his skull.

Harrison leaned back in his chair. “Officially, Kayleigh described an unidentified male asking about a tattoo.”

Murray held his gaze. Smart enough to hear the distinction. “And unofficially?”

Christ. This was exactly why he respected her. Murray wasn’t stupid, wasn’t blindly obedient, and wasn’t cruel enough to force him into saying something aloud that would become impossible to take back.

Still, Harrison lowered his voice. “Unofficially, we’re not documenting speculative civilian involvement until we establish whether any of the information provided has evidential relevance.”

“So we’re following the tattoo? Not the man asking about it?”

“Exactly.”

Murray absorbed that without reacting outwardly. “You think there’s something in it?”

“I think it was important enough for Lauren to have it. Important enough for someone else to ask questions about it to a sex worker in Hull. That’s enough for me.”

Murray absorbed that. “And the visitor?”

Harrison glanced towards the board where Lauren Pike’s photograph still sat beneath harsh fluorescent lights. Twenty-something. Smiling. Dead.

“The visitor stays off paper unless I tell you otherwise.”

She knew exactly what he was asking for. Discretion. Professional discretion balanced dangerously close to personal protection.

Murray gave a small nod. “Understood.” Then she went to go but stopped and turned back. “For what it’s worth… I don’t think he was trying to hurt the enquiry.”

Harrison peered up at her. “Who?”