Hemlock – Mark Dawson (1)

He got to the top and did the same on Florence Higgins’s door. She’d obviously heard the alarm and registered the commotion on the floors below, and he heard her moving just behind her front door. He quickly stepped around the corner so that he was hidden from sight. Within seconds, he heard the sound of her coming out, locking the door and setting off down the stairs.

She bumped into her downstairs neighbour on the landing below. “Has the alarm malfunctioned?” said her neighbour. “I don’t know,” said Florence. “I would have stayed in my flat, but I heard someone banging on my door, so I thought I’d better take it seriously. Shall we go?” Cooper had a few minutes at most. He had heard her door closing and knew that she hadn’t taken the time to secure all the locks. Taking a stiff credit-card-sized piece of plastic from his pocket, he slid it between the lock and the door jamb and manoeuvred it backwards and forwards until he felt it depress the lock.

Click. He was in. Florence Higgins had said that the diaries were in her flat and under lock and key. Even at the time, Cooper had noted the words she’d chosen. If she’d said the diaries were under lock and key in her flat, it wouldn’t have told him anything other than that they were somewhere inside these four walls. But the way she’d said it suggested to him that the diaries were in the flat and locked away inside something, which meant that he knew what kind of object he was looking for.

The flat was small and sparsely furnished with beanbags, floral-print throws and IKEA rugs. It took him a few minutes to confirm that there were no lockboxes of the sort some people might use to secure cash or valuables.

Get Exclusive John Milton Material Also By Mark Dawson In the John Milton Series In the Beatrix Rose Series In the Isabella Rose Series In the Charlie Cooper Series In the Atticus Priest Series About Mark Dawson OceanofPDF.com C PROLOGUE LONDON, 1994 hristopher Wilmshurst shifted impatiently and glanced into the corner of his office where his secretary sat taking notes. She’d arranged this meeting with the two lawyers representing an Amsterdam-based firm of cloth merchants, and he made a mental note to remind her to be on the lookout for timewasters in future.

After all, he was the newly appointed Parliamentary Under Secretary of State for Business and Trade, a job title it was going to take some getting used to. He really didn’t have time to listen to a long story about the illustrious pedigree of a foreign firm looking to expand its textile production and sales operations into the UK.

He decided to bring things to a close. “Gentlemen, if I may interrupt you there, I know that Betty here has to prepare some papers for a meeting I have in the Houses of Parliament very shortly, so perhaps we should bring this to a close for now. It’s been fascinating to hear about your business, and I am confident we can move forward with measures to expedite your expansion into the UK market.” He gestured towards the door.

The two lawyers nodded and smiled but made no move to rise from their chairs. Christopher Wilmshurst decided to go one step further. “Betty, if you could find these gentlemen’s coats and then see to my ten o’clock meeting.” She closed her notepad and hurried out of the room, leaving the door open for the two lawyers to follow. Instead, one of them stood and closed the heavy oak door. “Gentlemen, please,” said Wilmshurst, smiling uncertainly. “We can arrange a follow-up once things have progressed, but I’m afraid we’re out of time for today.”

This is a short excerpt from the opening of “” by Unknown, quoted for review and introduction purposes. All rights belong to the copyright holders.

Book Information

• Unique ID: 7bb751221363fd5c
• File Extension: .pdf
• File Size: 1,756,753 bytes (1.675 MB)
• Title: –
• Author: Unknown
• Pages: 115
• Language: English (en)

Reading & Word Statistics

• Estimated Reading Time: 148.24 minutes
• Total Words: 29,647
• Total Characters: 168,361
• Average Words per Page: 257.8
• Average Characters per Page: 1464.01

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