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If her cheeks weren’t still flushed he would have wondered if the past half hour had been a hallucination.

“Notice?” He took a step towards her. “It’s my damn house and I want to inspect it.”

“She’s right,” Andy said. “It’s the law. If you hadn’t had your head stuck in drug crimes for years you’d know a thing or two about other stuff.”

“Two weeks, Mr Miller,” Davina said.

“So now we’re formal?” He leaned towards her and whispered so only she could hear. “We weren’t so formal when you had your tongue down my throat and were wriggling against Mr Big.”

Her eyes popped.

“You have a name for your...” She looked down at him.

“That’s not the point. The point is, this is my house now. I want to inspect it and I don’t want a tenant.”

She puffed up her ample chest making him lose focus for a second.

“You can’t kick me out, I have a tenancy agreement.”

“I can if there is any problem with the inspection.”

“Well in two weeks’ time, when you inspect the place, you can decide then. But not before two weeks. I want notice. In writing.”

He grunted before thrusting his hand into his jacket pocket. He found an old supermarket receipt and a pen. He wrote – inspection, two weeks today, Jack Miller, landlord – on the back of it and thrust it at her.

Davina took it with trembling fingers. Everything within Jack stilled. He knew this feeling. She was hiding something. In his house.

“Is there something you want to tell me, Davy?” He thought he sounded reasonable.

She seemed to hold her breath.

“Are you hiding something?”

She blinked as her cheeks paled.

“Yes,” she said at last. “There are ten dead bodies in the lounge and the bedroom is full of stolen treasure.”

“Okay, that’s enough,” Andy grabbed his arm before he could reply. “Time to go. It was nice meeting you, Davina. We’ll see you in two weeks.”

Jack gave her a look that said he was onto her.

She stood guard in front of the door while Jack and Andy walked to their respective cars.

“She’s up to something,” Jack told Andy.

“And you got that while she was writhing on top of you?”

“I’m telling you, there is something dodgy going on here. I know it.”

“Your instincts are a bit rusty, Jackie boy.”

Jack shook his head grimly. He’d made one mistake at work and now no one believed him. Not even Andy. That hurt.

“I’ll run a check on her,” Andy said with resignation. “Will that help?”

“Yeah.” Jack felt unreasonably grateful.

“In the meantime, how about you keep up your court-mandated appointments with the head-shrinker?”