Page 4 of The Shadow Code (Heroes of War #3)

D CI Lilian Wyles had known Eleanor since birth and had watched her grow over the years from a squalling infant to the young woman now standing before her. Still stubborn, still thinking too fast for her own good.

‘Close the door,’ Lilian said, without looking up from her desk. ‘And hang up your coat. You’re dripping all over my clean linoleum.’

Ellie obeyed in silence, peeling off her rain-soaked coat. ‘I wasn’t expecting a summons, ma’am.’

She stood up, crossed to the table in the corner, and unscrewed the top of a flask, pouring steaming water into the prepared teapot.

Soon the aroma of strong Earl Grey filled the air; familiar, grounding fruity notes of bergamot.

She let it brew while she gathered teacups.

They were only plain white and hers now sported a chip, but tea always tasted better in a china cup than in the enamel mugs her colleagues used.

She then poured the milk and tea and brought the cups to her desk.

‘You look like you could do with a warm drink,’ she said, setting the cup in front of Ellie with a muffled clunk.

The small office was Lilian’s sanctuary.

It had peeling paint, organised shelves and everything in its place the way she liked it.

Beyond the door, war made a mess of everything, but in here, order still held.

The windows, fogged with condensation, were criss-crossed with anti-blast tape, like a game of noughts and crosses abandoned mid-play.

Outside, the city was blurred in rain and smoke, all soft edges and grey.

‘Fancy a digestive?’ Lilian retrieved a tin from her desk drawer. ‘Rationed to high heaven, but I keep a few back. For emergencies.’

Ellie smiled, reaching for one. ‘And this qualifies?’

‘Let’s say it was close.’ Lilian moved the telephone aside. ‘Inspector Calloway’s report reached me this morning.’

Ellie straightened. ‘I—’

‘You followed him to the crime scene. Disobeyed a direct order. Interfered in an active murder investigation.’ Lilian studied her goddaughter. ‘Remind me, what is your assignment?’

‘I’m his driver,’ Ellie said quietly.

Lilian picked up her pen, tapped it against the desk twice, then set it down.

She had spent fifteen years in this building, watching young constables stumble through their first cases.

Most learned to follow orders. The smart ones learned which orders to break.

Truth be told, she couldn’t be angry, not for one second.

Eleanor Harcourt was a genius – and it pained her to say it, but thank God she was a gutsy young thing.

Without that spine of hers, she wouldn’t last a week at New Scotland Yard.

It was hard enough being a woman here. You needed skin like a rhino and the patience of a saint, neither of which came naturally to Ellie, but both of which Lilian had learned to fake.

She’d spent years weathering the jibes, the raised eyebrows, the slow, grinding resistance of men who didn’t think women belonged here.

And it wasn’t only the police; it was also the public.

Even now, as Chief Inspector, she knew of plenty who still didn’t approve.

She turned her focus back to Ellie. ‘So, I suppose this report is accurate.’

‘If it says I was told to stay in the car, and I didn’t, then yes.’ Ellie lifted her chin a fraction.

Lilian gritted her teeth to stop herself laughing. The girl was exasperating at times. ‘So, you didn’t feel it was safe waiting in the car?’

Ellie shook her head. ‘No. It was dark, post air raid, fires everywhere. Besides, anyone could have come along, and the whole scene felt off.’

Lilian raised one brow. ‘These days, what doesn’t feel off?

We’re dodging bombs every night.’ She sighed.

‘Eleanor, I know it’s not ideal being stuck in an auxiliary role, but there are rules.

If you want a future here, you have to toe the line at least long enough to prove you can be trusted to bend it.

How else are we to change the system for others? ’

Ellie set her cup down. ‘His hands weren’t dirty. No blood or defensive wounds. And the lining of his coat was stitched shut with uneven thread, as if it had been resewn in a hurry. Everyone missed that.’

‘You saw all that in a minute and a half?’

‘I notice things.’

Yes, she did. Always had. Even as a girl, Ellie would ask questions that left grown men stammering. Lilian had adored her for it and feared it, too. That kind of curiosity was dangerous in the wrong place.

‘You’ve got your mother’s eyes,’ Lilian said. ‘And her sense of timing – utterly inconvenient and always right.’

That earned her the ghost of a smile.

‘You’re not in trouble,’ Lilian added. ‘If anyone asks, I summoned you.’

Ellie blinked. ‘You did?’

‘Well, I have now.’ Lilian stood up and walked across to the filing cabinet, then looked squarely at Ellie. ‘You’re doing more than driving Calloway around, aren’t you?’

‘He doesn’t like me asking questions.’

‘No one likes being shown up by someone with a better eye for detail.’ Lilian withdrew a single sheet of paper from Templeton’s case notes.

‘Forensics came back clean on the Templeton crime scene. No fingerprints, no murder weapon.’ She handed it to Ellie.

‘I can tell you’re not going to let this one go. ’

Ellie reached for the paper, her eyes narrowing as she read it. ‘War Office liaison. So it wasn’t speculation,’ she muttered.

‘Whatever this is, don’t go it alone.’

‘I can handle myself.’

‘I don’t doubt that. But the Yard isn’t built to let women like you climb quietly, and charging into crime scenes won't get you promoted.

It'll get you transferred to traffic duty in Bermondsey.

' Lilian sat back down, picked up her tea.

'The trick is surviving long enough for them to realise you're better than they are. '

‘So what do I do?’

‘You wait. You listen. You learn. Pick your moment and when it comes, strike like hell.’

‘That doesn’t sound very procedural.’

Lilian’s mouth twitched. ‘Neither is war.’ A pause settled between them, then Lilian’s tone softened a shade. ‘Your father’s worried about you.’

‘He always is.’

Lilian smiled faintly. ‘You’re more like him than you realise. And more like your mother than either of you care to admit.’

Ellie returned the smile; small but genuine. And as the young woman reached for her coat, Lilian added, ‘One more thing. If you must break the rules, be cleverer about it next time.’

When Ellie had left, Lilian remained at her desk, hands curled around her cooling tea. The girl had the taste for it now … that restless hunger to uncover the truth. It was both a gift and a curse.

She crossed to the window, brushing a finger over it, wiping away beads of condensation.

She stared at the anti-blast tape and the crosses etched on every pane: a silent, repetitive warning.

No. Not for you. Not here. Not yet. But she was here, and so was Ellie, and other women in uniform, carving space for themselves in places they’d once been told they didn’t belong.

Sometimes, Lilian thought the tape wasn’t there to stop glass from shattering at all, but to remind her how much work still lay ahead.

Because she hadn’t fought her way to DCI only to survive this war.

She’d come to change what came after it.

Inspector Morrison had once told her that women in the force were like decorative vases – nice to look at, but one good shake and they'd shatter. Well, she'd outlasted Morrison by five years.

Beyond her window, constables hurried through the rain, collars turned up against the wind.

London lay grey and scarred below, bomb craters filled with rainwater, a maze of ration lines and secrets.

Ellie could have taken a safe position at the War Office, decoding ciphers from behind a desk.

But she had chosen to chase criminals through the filth and fog, pushing herself into a system designed to push her out.

And what frightened Lilian wasn’t that Ellie might fail.

It was that she might succeed – too well, too visibly – and be seen as a threat.

Templeton’s death wasn’t random. It reeked of careful planning, possibly treasonous.

And now Ellie was tangled in it. Lilian’s eyes drifted to the old photograph beside her suffragette badge: her younger self, the only woman in a sea of uniformed men.

They’d called her a novelty then. Well, they weren’t laughing now.

Women were stepping out of their assigned places – not because they’d been given permission, but because they’d stopped asking. Place. Such a gentle word for a leash.

If this case led somewhere dangerous, Ellie would need all the help she could get. And Lilian intended to see that her goddaughter had it.