No, they had to consider that this was certainly the case.
“We can’t let them have their way.” Echika rubbed the bridge of her nose. “We have to do something about this, Chief Totoki’s false charges included. That much is for sure.”
“I agree, but what can we do…?” Bigga bit her lips, stumped.
Echika felt much the same way. As she looked at Bigga’s face, she remembered what had happened between her and Harold. She was probably putting up an indifferent front so as to not worry Echika. Harold had asked Echika to look after Bigga, but she didn’t feel like she had the right to intrude on their conflict.
Echika honestly found Bigga’s strength dazzling. She felt like she had to learn from her example.
“Oh, right. About that.” Bigga’s big eyes suddenly turned to look at her. “I should give this back to you.”
She rummaged through her shoulder bag and took out something that made Echika stop in her tracks. Bigga stopped as well in response.
“Chief Totoki picked this up when you were abducted in Al Bahah. She left it with me… I’m sorry I didn’t give it back sooner. I forgot about it in all the commotion.”
Shining in Bigga’s palm was the nitro-case necklace. It was definitely Echika’s, down to the small, minute scratches on its surface. Echika hadn’t expected Bigga to be holding on to it, since she thought she would never see it again. She relaxed for a moment at the relief of having it back…but then she tensed up again.
Had Bigga looked at the contents of the nitro case?
“Thank you.” Echika took the necklace, trying to look as natural as possible as she did. “I’m really happy to have it back. I thought I’d never see it again.”
“You had it on you during the sensory crime incident, too, right? I figured it must mean a lot to you.”
Bigga didn’t know that the nitro case had once contained Matoi. At best, she probably realized, through Harold’s speculation at the time, that it served as emotional support for her. So even if she had checked its contents, she would probably have assumed it was just a normal HSB. Just like Harold said, it was unlikely she could figure out what it was really for.
And that was why—why Echika had to assume that the hint of doubt she saw in Bigga’s eyes must have been her imagination. Her own guilty conscience was forcing the worst possible image into her thoughts.
“It holds, how do I put it…? Memories of my family.”
“Then it’s a good thing I gave it back to you.” Bigga’s smile felt somehow stiff. “Let’s go! We don’t want to let Investigator Gardener leave us behind, do we?”
She walked off quickly. As Echika followed, she put on the necklace. While Bigga was looking away, she opened the case to check its contents. The HSB was definitely inside, same as it was when she’d dropped it.
For the first time in days, she felt truly relaxed. Thank goodness. She needed to ensure that she never lost it again. Regardless, thanks to Bigga, she’d been able to get a bit of relief.
Lloyd’s villa sat atop a small hill. It was a deserted corner lot detached house. Its white outer walls were turning a dull gray from years of wear, and the chimney sticking out of its trapezoid roof gazed melancholically at the overcast sky. At the edge of the eaves were neglected old beehives, and the windows’ curtains were pulled down, preventing anyone from peering inside.
It was immediately apparent that this was a deserted house.
“Supposedly, some distant relatives of Lloyd’s look after the place now. They gave me a spare key.” Gardener unlocked the front door. “I’ll check the second story. Could you check the ground floor?”
“All right.” Echika nodded. “Have the police been here?”
“The local police did look through the place after Lloyd’s suicide. They didn’t find anything linking him to the incident, though, so the record shows they just took some photos and left.”
Gardener pushed the front door open. The corridor was furnished with an old rug, and a strong, offensive scent of mold hung in the air. Gardener made a show of pinching his nose and strode up the staircase to the second floor.
“Assuming the local police didn’t take anything…” Bigga gave a small sneeze from all the dust in the air. “There might be some clues about Lascelles and the Alliance lying around.”
“Assuming the place really is untouched…” Echika looked around. “It took an oddly long amount of time for the warrant to be issued. The mole in the bureau could have destroyed any evidence in that time.”
That was their biggest fear at the moment.
“If that’s what happened, it really is unfair.” Bigga frowned in exhaustion. “Also, a thought… Can we really count on Gardener to handle the second story all on his own?”
Echika understood how she felt. With the risk of an insider in the bureau, there was no telling who it was, so they had to suspect all their coworkers, no matter how bad they may have felt about it. It was quite vexing.
“We’ll have to sneak up there and check on him later. For now, let’s check our position.”
Echika and Bigga walked about the first floor, getting a sense of the layout of the house. There were three rooms on this level: a sitting room and two other rooms, full of stacked boxes. They tried opening a nearby box, finding it was full of books and documents.
“I thought a villa would be more elegant…,” Bigga said, looking overwhelmed.
“Apparently, Lloyd’s home in London was small, so he used this place as storage.”
“Maybe we should split up.” Bigga put on some gloves, ready to work. “I’ll check around here; you can go check the basement.”
“Thanks. I’m counting on you.”
Leaving the ground floor to Bigga, Echika stepped into the corridor. She climbed down a spiral staircase leading to the basement floor. The smell of mold was joined by leaden moisture, the combination of which made her head spin a little.
The cellar was barely illuminated, just bright enough for her to see. She’d expected the place to be completely dark, but apparently the kitchen and dining room on the north side of the house were also a semibasement, with light filtering in from illumination windows.
The floor was divided into two sections, one dedicated to a 3D printer for domestic use, the other a workroom. Echika had seen similar equipment in Lexie’s villa, so she assumed it was somehow related to robotics. Echika approached the workbench, which was empty. By contrast, the wall was covered in slips of paper, stacked on top of one another like the scales of a fish, without a single gap to show the wall.