‘You tried the other place, in Openshaw? Anything you want there.’
Shap’s eyes lit up. ‘A club?’
‘Knocking shop. Nice girls, straight off the plane. Eager to please.’
‘I might just do that,’ Shap told him. ‘Thanks, mate. You take it easy now.’
Shap stuck his head round the door of the dressing room. She was fiddling with her hair, tweaking the ends as he came in.
‘Openshaw. Ring any bells?’
He saw her eyes flicker but she recovered quickly. She kept her mouth shut.
‘We’re not interested in soliciting or living on immoral earnings, Andrea. Rosa’s murder – that’s why we’re asking.’ He watched her, could see her hesitate. He kept waiting, reckoning that another push might mess it up. Then she grabbed her bag, the bracelets on her arm clinking together. She rummaged inside it then handed him a small business card. Just a logo on it; a couple of pen strokes suggesting a reclining woman, and a phone number. ‘I never gave you it.’
‘You ever work there?’
Andrea shook her head.
‘What about Rosa?’
She pressed her lips together, crossed her arms, looked away from him for a minute then back. Uneasy. Finally she gave a nod.
*****
It was the break they’d been hoping for. When Shap rang and told her, Janine felt like kissing the phone. She instructed him to return to the station.
‘It’s all very hush-hush,’ Shap said, when the team met in the incident room.
‘Any bog-standard massage parlour they’d have an ad in the papers, number in the phone book.’ Richard agreed.
‘You think they’re illegals?’ Janine asked him.
‘Yes, like Rosa.’
‘The Polish connection,’ she mused. She called over one of the DCs and told him to get more on Sulikov, the owner of the Topcat Club and, in all likelihood, the Openshaw brothel. ‘See what Poland can give us, any criminal record, current activities and so on.’
She turned back to Shap. ‘Well – what are we waiting for?’
He held out the card Andrea had given him. ‘The address.’
‘Ah.’ She smiled. ‘You can be our Trojan Horse, Shap.’
‘Donkey,’ Richard corrected her. ‘New customer. After the full monty.’
Shap pulled out his mobile phone and began to dial. Then, to Janine’s surprise and amusement, spots of colour bloomed on his face. ‘Can I have a bit of privacy, or what?’ he said belligerently.
Shap shy. Who’d have thought it.
