I was expecting a normal shift when I arrived at the police station. I'd just changed into my uniform, checked my make-up and was on my way to report to the desk sergeant, when Dougie Wilson, one of my colleagues and a complete arsehole, intercepted me with a grin. "Hey, Fraser, Chief Inspector McFarlane wants you to report to his office as soon as you get in. Been a bad girl have you?" Pausing only long enough to tell him to piss off, I made my way along to 'Super Mac's' office. He greeted me with his usual taciturn grunt, then told me to take a seat, which was unusual to say the least. It was only then that I noticed the other three people in the room.
I took them in in a second or so. The first was Detective Inspector Peter Leslie from the Drugs Squad. Immediately I started to take more notice: clearly there was nothing routine about this. The second guy was a stranger in his 40s, short, dark and rotund, hunched in a crumpled business suit it looked like he'd slept in -- an impression reinforced by the dark sheen of overnight stubble around his chin. The last person I registered was the one I really noticed. She was maybe 10 years older than me (I'm 24), long-legged, slim with very short reddish-blonde hair, alabaster skin, a wide smiling mouth and wide but narrow green eyes that put me in mind of a cat. Unlike the guy who I guessed was her companion, she was wearing what was clearly an expensive, tailored black trouser suit, with sandals displaying purple-painted toenails - not exactly standard dress in Edinburgh Central Police Office. A little older and classier than the sort of women I usually go for, but drop dead gorgeous. McFarlane made the introductions. "This is WPC Fraser. Fraser, this is Inspector Estelle van Sluiter of the Amsterdam Police, and her colleague Sergeant Piet van der Gaal."
The bloke didn't react at all, but Inspector van Sluiter's smile widened even more and she reached out to shake my hand. "Please, call me Stelle." I had no idea what I was doing there, but I smiled back and told her to call me Izzie. As we shook she held onto my hand for just a fraction of a second longer than necessary, which made me wonder about her. I noticed that her long slim fingers were topped with manicured nails, also glossy purple. And she wasn't wearing a wedding ring. I also noticed as she leaned towards me that her white V-neck jumper was sufficiently low-cut to give me a nice view of her cleavage.
I was eager to find out what was going on, and McFarlane, clearly slightly offended by the informality of the senior Dutch officer, enlightened me. "You applied recently for transfer to the detective branch didn't you, er, Isobel. Well, we need a bright young female officer to work with our Dutch colleagues for a few days, and Inspector Leslie was quite impressed with your work on Operation Ferret, so we thought this would be an ideal opportunity to see how you get on." Ferret had been an op where I'd been one of the uniformed cops attached to the Drugs Squad and done a quite a lot of intel work, plus one evening 'under cover' sitting in a rather nasty Edinburgh ale house pretending to be Leslie's girlfriend.
McFarlane was offended again as Stelle, with her throaty, sexy accent, interrupted him. "Perhaps I could explain Donald. (The Chief Inspector was mildly apoplectic with outrage at her use of his first name, much to D.I. Leslie's barely concealed amusement.) "You see Izzie, we're after one of our local drug dealers, a small time crook but nasty, you know? We've lost sight of him recently, but we've had a tip that he's arranged a meeting with one of your local dealers in the next couple of days and, for reasons I can't go into, we're very anxious to speak to him back in the Netherlands. So your authorities have kindly agreed that we can come over and keep a watch on your man, with support from the local force. Are you interested?"
I began to see why I'd been offered this 'chance', especially when Pete Leslie said he'd be assigning one of his D.C.s to accompany van der Gaal and I'd be keeping Stelle company. It sounded like scut work, simply playing chaperone and chauffeur to Stelle on what would be for the most part a dull surveillance op. Drugs didn't have that many female officers, and they couldn't spare them for such a menial, tedious task. No doubt they'd sweep in and grab the glory, as usual, when it came time to start making arrests. Still, Stelle was pleasant eye candy and, if my initial hunch about her had been correct, who knew what I might get out of it? So I gave her my most winning smile and said I'd be glad to help. She smiled warmly at me in return and, her eyebrows arching for a fraction of a second, she said, "Good. I'd really like to see you out of that uniform of yours." She left the sentence hanging for a second. Bloody hell, she wasn't flirting with me was she? Right in front of these guys? I don't think I look particularly dykey, even in my uniform, but maybe she'd picked up some vibes from me, and noticed the way my eyes took in her body when I first saw her. She finally added, "Have you got any other clothes you could change into?"
I told her only the rather grubby jeans and T-shirt I'd worn into the office that morning, but she said that would be fine. We stood and she walked me down to the locker room. As we walked I let my hand casually brush against Stelle's. She gave me one of her huge cat smiles and, resting her hand on my back for a moment, said "I think you and I are going to really enjoy doing it together." Christ, she really was flirting with me! It had been three months since I'd split with my last girlfriend, and with the pressures of work and post-relationship fed-upness I hadn't really got around to getting back on the dating scene. My nipples stiffened just at the thought that this beautiful Dutch officer might want to get into my knickers! In the locker room she sat on one of the wooden benches and briefed me further about the op. All the while I was changing I could feel her eyes boring into my back. When I was down just to my bra and my sensible Marks and Spencers knicks I turned to face her, pretending a question had just occurred to me. Sure enough, as she answered, Stelle's eyes roamed down my body, pausing at my ample boobs and the dark patch which showed through the front of my pants. She appeared to like what she saw. Whereas Stelle was tall and fair, I'm short -- five-three -- and dark, with big boobs, wide hips, an ample bum and, I admit, a few pounds overweight.
I checked an unmarked car out of the pool, got the canteen to do us a big flask of coffee and some sandwiches, and we set off for the target's home, in Edinburgh's Old Town. Although we were alone Stelle didn't make the slightest sexual reference or move, unless you count a comment that I'd like Holland -- "lots of pretty canals, pretty windmills and pretty dykes." I was too nervous to make a move. I was sure I couldn't have mis-read her: maybe it was simply her foreign ways, and she didn't realise what she was saying, but I didn't think so. Anyway, we sat there all day, at the end of the guy's street so as not to arouse his suspicion, and the most we saw him do was go to the corner shop for a bottle of milk and some tea bags. We saw a few people who looked like addicts go into his tenement block, and emerge again a few minutes later, but there was no other activity to speak of. Mid-afternoon I sprinted a hundred yards down the road to get us a couple of burgers and some chips, and that was about as exciting as it got. To pass the time we talked about ourselves. I told Stelle how I'd grown up in this area, in a tenement just like the one we were watching, leaving school at 16 to help support my mother and kid sister, our dad having run out on us five years before. Stelle's background was totally different: her father had been a senior police officer, a minor star of the Amsterdam force, and her mother was a highly successful commercial artist. Stelle had grown up in one of the richest suburbs of the city, and been privately educated. I had casually mentioned that I lived alone, and although Stelle didn't say she also did I noticed that there was no reference to any husband or partner or whatever.
About six in the evening the Dutch sergeant, van der Gaal, rolled up with one of the Drugs Squad D.C.s to relieve us. He and Stelle spoke briefly in Dutch, and I got the impression there wasn't much love lost between them. I greeted him but he completely ignored me. As I drove away, to take Stelle back to her hotel in trendy Leith, the old, now yuppified, port of Edinburgh, she sighed and said, "Sorry about that. The man's an asshole, and a pig." As we drove Stelle casually asked me if I had any plans for the evening. Without thinking I said I intended to go for a short run in The Meadows -- a green space in the heart of the city - then have a nice long relaxing bath and wash my hair. She shrugged and said, "Okay, only I'm going to have a drink in the hotel bar, and I wondered if you might like to join me; but that's fine."