The Eustice Murders (Complete)

*Chapter 15*

Hank finally finished going through the coroner's report. As he had expected, there was nothing new or exciting in there. He took a sip of his coffee and had a little sigh to himself. As good as the weekend had been, it felt like it was over in the blink of an eye. A quick glance at the clock told him that his wife Beverly should now be in the taxi on the way to the airport ready to fly home again and here he was stuck at his desk piling through what was beginning to feel like an endless stream of office work. And all without any real sense of any breakthrough coming soon, which might have been the annoyance factor. On the positive side, today would be the first day of having uniformed officers following Anthony Drummond, so there was at least some hope that something useful might come from that. He got up and put the report away in the filing cabinet.

"All done?" Sam enquired without shifting his focus away from the screen in front of him. The almost blank expression on his face suggested he hadn't found anything exciting either.

"Yeah, just as we suspected," Hank replied, heading back to his chair. Sam nodded and looked up just as captain Beesley appeared in the doorway.

"Morning guys, missed you on Friday, how'd it go with the wholesalers? Any luck?"

"Actually, yes," Sam told him. "Got the answers we were after and then also acquired a few other bits of information that could become useful too."

"Good," the captain nodded and looked over the whiteboard, wide-eyed after seeing some new notes and scribbles had appeared. He did frown briefly though upon seeing the name 'Helena Drummond' had been added to it with a line drawn from her name to a list of five men's names with a question mark over the line suggesting some sort of link. "Looks like you're making progress," he said, nodding.

"Hopefully," Hank chipped in. "Unfortunately nothing solid yet though."

"To be fair, we always thought this would be a tough case to crack, I certainly wasn't expecting anything this quick, keep up the good work and I'm sure you'll find something will break," captain Beesley offered, trying to motivate and cheer up the two fed up looking detectives.

"Oh, I'm sure it will," Sam responded, breaking into a smile even if it did look a little forced. "I'm still just as determined to solve this case as I was the day we got here," his response caused the captain to break into a smile also.

"Same goes for me," Hank added. "Besides, I'm starting to like it here." Both Sam and the captain chuckled at that before captain Beesley made his farewells and headed back to his own office.

"I take it by that last comment that the restaurant was a success last night then?" Sam asked as he smiled at his partner, a little more genuinely this time.

"Oh mate," Hank answered, his face lighting up with excitement, "it was absolutely fantastic; kind of pricey but well worth it. We'll definitely be going back there again."

"Excellent, glad to hear it," Sam smiled and nodded calmly but deep down he was rather shocked. He had known Hank for many years now and couldn't ever remember him showing such emotion or enthusiasm for anything. He knew privately, at least, that Hank was a very loving and devoted husband, that was no surprise there, but generally speaking, he had tended to keep his feelings in check. Certainly, in public, he preferred to portray the strong alpha male kind of role and in all fairness, he was rather good at it too! Such an expressive response must have meant a very special night had been enjoyed.

"Noted; if I ever find myself wanting to impress anyone I'll know where to go," Sam told him.

"Do it, you won't be sorry." They both shared a little smile and got sucked into several more hours of research. "Well, that checks out," Hank said as the office printer whirred into action. "Looks like Tamara's story was pretty much spot on. I know we didn't have any reason to disbelieve her as such but I thought I'd look into Rogers Electrical," Hank began to explain. "They are, indeed, registered under the sole ownership of a Mr. Brian Rogers who the Better Business Bureau has also confirmed has recently purchased a large amount of shares from Diabridge Enterprises."

"Yeah, as you said, we had no reason not to believe her, she seemed genuine but you were probably right to check it anyway," Sam told him.

"I'm not sure how much we need it but I've also found an address for the new unit, looks like it's not far from the airport."

"Yeah, I think that's a little too far," Sam responded. "If we were in the area then it would be worth having a nose around but an hour there, an hour back again, can't really justify that without having a specific reason to do so. Especially given our disappearing act on Friday."

"Kinda figured that, but it'll be in the file now if we need it," Hank said, holding up the documents the printer had just spat out. He then filed them away in the cabinet and poured himself a fresh coffee before returning to his seat. "I don't want to sound impatient but I must say I had hoped we might have heard back from the officers following Drummond by now," he said with a tone of disappointment in his voice.

"It would have been nice yes, depends on how long each shift is I guess," Sam offered, trying to find an explanation, although he did so with a frown on his face suggesting he was also confused as to why they had not received any reports as of yet. "Possible they moved on to another job straight after?" he queried, thinking out loud. "And then sort out the paperwork at the end of the day; in which case we possibly won't see it until tomorrow."

"Yeah that's very possible," Hank muttered. "We all know what staffing levels are like. Just because the job is done doesn't mean they've had the chance to sort the paperwork yet."

"Saying that," Sam added, rather thoughtfully, "when you're on a stakeout or anything like that it's not as if you're rushed off your feet is it? I mean, if we were following him we'd have the forms with us and be filling it all in as we go."

"As we have done many times," Hank agreed, both of them looked at the clock concerned and maybe even a little angry.