Chapter 35

I turned when Simon started to scream at me.

“What the fuck are you doing, you stupid bitch, firing a weapon in here?” he ranted.

“Protecting the Prince,” I replied and scanned the area again.

The Prince was in the building and Justin and the two guards had slipped off to the side of us. I was happy to provide a distraction while they went to see if they could locate the assassin. I’d not seen the door to the room move and believed the assassin was still on the balcony, but I wasn’t sure just how hurt he was as I suspected that I had hit him.

“That is not your job. What are you even doing with the Prince? You are supposed to be investigating the shuttle blowing up, not swanning around with Arab Royalty,” Simon snarled at me.

Carmel then butted in and said in a frosty voice, “Firing a weapon in a dome for no good reason is instant dismissal. I want you and your partner on the next shuttle out of here. I will not have undisciplined officers working for me.”

“So, the fact that a sniper rifle is now laying in the street is not a good reason for an officer of the law, to protect a citizen of this dome? I also believe that Prince Rashid is very much part of the investigation of why the shuttle was blown up and that is why we were with him,” I told them.

“I agree that he does have to be informed, but that isn’t your job either, you were supposed to go through Simon. You are not very professional, and if you are supposed to be the best that your country has to offer, I’m not impressed. You will leave on the next shuttle,” Carmel said in a tightly controlled voice.

Her ire and displeasure were rolling off her in waves. I was just about to tell her that I was more than happy not to work with her when I heard Justin shout out to me.

“Danny, you got him or rather I should say, her.”

While Carmel and Simon were looking up at Justin in disbelief, I called Oliver. “Oliver, where are you?” I asked him.

“Waiting for you with Jock and Cantara. We are in the canteen,” he replied.

“Find some transport and head to the hospital. I’ve shot a sniper and have a car bomb that needs removal. You three need to come and record the scene for me please,” I asked him.

Oliver groaned and replied, “Will do, Boss.”

Carmel heard Oliver’s reply and looked daggers at me. In a frigid voice, she said, “Why is he calling you the Boss? You’re just a rooky detective, or is there something someone forgot to tell me about you, Detective Carmichael?”

“Not that I’m aware of Colonel Darcy. Oliver was just joking about the fact I have a bad habit of taking over and that he and the others seemed to do whatever it was that I asked them to do yesterday.”

“Personally, I thought we made an effective team. I’m sorry you’re not happy with me shooting the assassin. For all I know, she was aiming at you, Ma’am.”

She looked startled, so I went on with my ‘cover my arse’ suppositions, “Prince Rashid mentioned that you were also here to attend the meeting. I’m not sure that you are safe, Ma’am. Disrupting the MPs by harming you could well be part of whatever plan the terrorists are acting out.”

“I’m sure that killing a high-ranking official like yourself can only be seen as a win for them, Ma’am. The Prince’s transport was supposed to blow up. So, who was the assassin after if the Prince was already supposed to be taken care of?”

She frowned at me, and Simon also looked perplexed. I was amused when they both seemed to realise that my little story made an excellent cover for them. I then frightened Simon.

“By the way, Sir, why hasn’t the grenade launcher been put in with the other evidence?”

“W-what?” he blustered as his eyes flicked around.

“Well, someone picked it up, Sir, and it wasn’t us. I found the imprint, and we can identify the make and model to a fair amount of accuracy, but it is still missing from the evidence that has been collected,” I told him.

“How on Earth can you tell the make and model?” he asked me with more concern than he should have in his voice.

He should be happy that I could identify it. I knew without a doubt that he was up to his eyeballs in whatever plot that was going on.

“The imprint was deep, as the man who fired it had fallen with it in his hand. Even with low gravity, mass is mass. The Americans were also the only country to make that style of a grenade launcher.”

“Prince Rashid also recognised it from the photo I showed him. His personnel had confiscated a shipment that had been on one of their shuttles a few weeks ago.”

“He is certain that it was from that shipment, he has put his own personal team onto tracking what did happen to the weapons since they were supposed to have been destroyed.”

“He is very upset about it, and I’m sure that he won’t back off. Sheikh Hamdan is his only son, and he was the pilot on the shuttle, so the Prince is taking it very personally.”

I was delighted to see that they were both now worried. Carmel hid it better than Simon did, but the tension in her body was a dead giveaway to me. I wondered if LTC Paulo Rodriguez was also in on whatever it was these two were up to. I would need to check him out.

The fact he wasn’t here didn’t mean he wasn’t involved. However, it was interesting that Simon’s team was here and that they could veto whatever evidence got back to the other teams that Paulo was overseeing.

I wondered if they planned to send the other teams on wild goose chases and muddy the water as much as possible. I suspected that by having the weapon that was used disappear; they didn’t expect the investigation to go far.

It would stir up a lot of people and could affect the Arabs getting the mining and expansion rights, but I still couldn’t see why that was important and who would benefit the most. I also didn’t know who wanted the Prince, and his family wiped out, but I was now certain that their deaths were part of the big picture.