Sadly there’s no ketamine in the selection box. Having swallowed several tabs of acid Hook decides to leave work early to go to the Anne Boleyn and then on to Soho – anything, rather than face Monica - but just as he’s turning on his out of office he has a message from Karen asking him to pop upstairs.
Gloomily Hook knocks on the glass of his boss’s door. She looks up but doesn’t smile and beckons him in. She has a red face, which means she’s cross. Ominously, she doesn’t ask Hook to sit, so he stands, arms knotted defensively, a naughty schoolboy.
“Chris, I’ve just had Councillor Ahmed in here asking all sorts of questions! What the hell happened between you the other day?”
Hook swallows, then worries he’s swallowed his tongue. He sticks it out to make sure it’s still there. “Nothing much... I just asked him about his new role as council leader, stuff like that?”
“Did you ask him about that harassment case you were looking into?”
Karen’s Bolsover accent is poking through: a bad sign. Hook swallows again, sticks out his tongue. “Erm... I might have.”
“Councillor Ahmed also said you mentioned an alleged link to grooming, underage brothels.”
“It... came up.”
Karen looks aghast. “But why Chris, why?”
“It’s on his manor. I just thought he might have heard something. I didn’t... accuse him or anything.”
Karen puts her head in her hands and when she speaks her words are muffled by her fingers. “Jesus Chris, you asked our Leader if he runs underage brothels?”
Hook hates the upper case ‘L’ she puts on ‘leader’, even in speech – the way she talks about Ahmed you’d think he was emperor of some Pan-Galactic Federation rather than council spokesperson for toilet roll.
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