Page 165 of In Too Deep

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Inside Unit Twelve, Jake followed Roman through what had once been the ground-floor offices. Dust lay thick enough across the floor to hold their footprints, old signs still clinging stubbornly to the walls beside exposed wiring, stripped pipework and patches of bare plaster where fittings had been ripped out. The whole place had that strange half-demolished feel to it. Not quite abandoned. Not quite active. Just waiting for someone to finish the job. And somewhere deeper in the building, metal knocked hollowly against metal.

Jake frowned. “Thought demo was tomorrow.”

Roman sniffed. “It is.”

“Then why’s there still thousands of quids’ worth of gear sat in the building?”

Lengths of conduit sat stacked against one wall. A pallet of electrical fittings waited beside a doorway.

Roman shrugged.

Then he climbed through an old concrete stairwell, and Jake followed him. Something was off about him. Probably annoyed that he was being made to babysit Jake for something he could do by himself. But whatever. Jake claimed he knew this place better than anyone. So he’d better prove he did.

At the top landing, Roman shoved open a heavy fire door and stepped out onto the flat roof. Scaffolding wrapped the outside of the building, with temporary edge protection fencing rattling quietly around the perimeter. A small corrugated-metal plant room stood at the opposite end, built onto the roof to house the building’s ventilation equipment. Jake immediately understood why Levenson wanted him up here. Parts of the surface had already been stripped back for survey work, sections of felt peeled away to expose the timber decking beneath. Fluorescent orange spray paint marked several suspect areas.

So he crossed straight to the nearest marking. Crouched. Pressed his boot carefully against the exposed decking. The surface dipped beneath his weight.

“Well, that’s shit.” Jake drifted sideways and tested another section. That moved too. Then another. The movement travelled farther than the survey markings suggested. “Fuck me.”

“What?”

Jake pointed at the fluorescent paint. “Survey lads marked the movement to here.” He planted his boot beyond the line. The decking flexed again. “Rot’s spread.”

Roman’s cigarette paused halfway to his mouth. “Bad?”

Jake stood and scanned the corner of the roof. Water staining spread across the exposed timber beneath the stripped felt. Years of failed repairs. Years of water finding ways in. “Worse than bad.”

He walked another few metres, keeping his weight over the supporting joists where he could identify them beneath the decking. A section near the perimeter gave a worrying creak.

Jake stopped. “Jesus. If they’d sent demo lads in here tomorrow without checking this first, one of the bastards would’ve ended up with a ceiling on his head.”

He crouched again and ran his hand across the exposed timber. The surface felt soft beneath his glove. Not collapsing today. Probably. Hopefully. But close enough to make him uncomfortable. And roofs rarely made Jake uncomfortable.

He glanced back at the stairwell. “There still salvage crews coming through here?”

“Couple blokes finishing inventory.”

Jake nodded at the damaged section. “Then someone needs to look at this. If that corner lets go, it’ll kill someone before the excavators even start.”

Roman said nothing.

Jake rose to his feet and assessed the rest of the roofline, mentally tracing where the load-bearing structure sat beneath the decking. Then he fished his phone from his back pocket.

Roman frowned. “What’s that for?”

Jake opened the camera and photographed the exposed timber, survey markings and water damage spreading beneath the felt. “So I can show your dad exactly why no one should be walking over this section tomorrow.”

Roman stumbled forward and held out his hand. “Here, I’ll do it.”

“S’alright.” The screen went black in Jake’s hand. “Bollocks.”

“What?”

“Battery’s dead.” He held up the phone. “You got an old charger on site?”

Roman shrugged.