He had almost run from the room, and then he had taken the stairs down to his office, trying his best to ignore the rest of the team as they stared at him through the glass wall that separated him from the mere mortals.
The walk through the building to the car had been humiliating, he could hear colleagues whispering, knew they would be staring at him, sniggering as he hurried to the front door. He'd rushed out into the wind and rain, his heart hammering, a gasp of despair escaping his punished lungs as he half-ran, half-staggered to the car.
He had spent the following hours driving around town like a rat in a maze, finally heading out to the moorland that surrounded Wigan in a desperate attempt to escape the feeling of torment.
Now, he sat in the middle of nowhere, facing a dry-stone wall, the headlights illuminating the myriad of cobwebs that clung to the stone surface. Taking another glug from the bottle, he was wiping his lips with the back of his hand just as his phone started to trill.
Reaching over, he lifted it from the small slot and checked the number, grimacing when he saw Gemma's name flashing on the screen.
Closing his eyes, he dropped it back into the slot and took another drink.
He had been with Gemma for twelve months and she was gorgeous, Moss knew that he had been punching way above his weight. The truth was she was to die for, blonde-haired and blue-eyed with a figure that could stop traffic. In the past he had been out with plenty of women, but the truth was they had always looked the same, false tans and hair extensions, coupled with a penchant for wearing next to nothing no matter what the weather. For years he had been happy with the trophy woman on his arm but now he knew that it was all a façade, he had lost count of the times he had seen one of these women without makeup and been horrified at the reality. But Gemma was a different class, she wore very little makeup and her beauty didn't come via a bottle or a surgeon's scalpel, it was all natural. Moss caught sight of his face in the interior mirror and grimaced at the reflection. He had no doubt in his mind that when she found out what had happened she would pack her bags and leave. It was no use trying to deny the truth, the bitch, May Linton, had the evidence plus Walker had sacked him on the spot, so the truth would come out and Gemma would walk away. Moss lashed out his left hand and swiped the mirror away in despair.
His faltering mind tried to find a way to stop her from finding out but then he thought of Walker warning him that May could sue the arse off him. He imagined the coppers turning up at home and Gemma answering the door, her face creased with confusion that rapidly turned to disgust as they filled her in on what her boyfriend had been doing at work.
Taking another gulp from the bottle, he shivered at the image of the coppers leading him away to the squad car parked at the front of the house. By the time they had bundled him into the back, the front door to the house would have already been closed as his girlfriend raced upstairs to pack her bags.
'Fucking shit!' he hissed.
Then he pictured May, her face hinting at a smile, lunging back from her desk, the phone held up, catching every twist of his face as he tried to get at her.
Moss began to seethe at the unfairness of life. He was good at his job, he got results in a high-pressure market and now it had all been blown to pieces by one whore who had been spying on him, gathering evidence to use against him. Gradually another thought entered his brain, perhaps she was doing all this so she could get his job?
'Yes!' he spat as the thought grew into a fact.
That was exactly what she had been doing, watching and planning his demise then she could be the one sitting in the office with the executive chair and plate-glass window, keeping her eye on the minions.
Moss grabbed his head in shaking hands as the truth seared through his brain.
She didn't really give a shit about the workload, it had all been part of her plan to screw him over and take his forty-grand-a-year salary.
'Oh, you fucking bitch!' his voice reverberated around the car. 'Think you'll get away with being a snide twat, well think again!?'
All rational thought was forced from his mind until all that remained was making her pay for ruining his life.
'Make you suffer for this, I fucking swear it,' he hissed as he slammed the car into reverse and tore out of the parking space. Heading off along the country lane, his anger rising, his brow started to sweat as he crashed through the gears.
73
It took twenty minutes for Spenner and Steve Black to arrive at the restaurant.
Lasser had stayed near the door in case Andrew Viner or his broken-nosed friend tried to make a break for it.
Tasha had taken Jenny over to a table in the corner and even poured her a brandy from behind the bar in an attempt to calm the woman down.
Now, Lasser watched as Viner blew into the breathalyser, his eye glaring at Lasser as his cheeks inflated.
Ignoring him, he walked over to where Tasha and Jenny were sitting.
'You OK?' he asked.
Jenny looked up at him and managed to drag up a smile though her eyes still shimmered with tears. 'I'm fine, thank you.'
'Does Viner come here regularly?'
Jenny dabbed at her eyes with a napkin and sighed. 'He used to come in once or maybe twice a month but lately he's been coming in at least once a week.'
'And I take it he keeps the customers away?' he asked as he pulled out a chair and sat down.
Jenny glanced across the restaurant, watching Viner being led away by the two uniformed officers.
Her eyes flooded with relief as the main door closed with a quiet click. 'I've known Andrew for years and he's always been a nuisance but the older he gets the worse he becomes.'
'What about his father?'
Jenny sniffed and gave a small shrug. 'Mr Viner's always been good to me. I've worked here for over twenty years and when he bought the place I thought he might have let me go, you know replace me with someone younger, but he didn't.'
Lasser looked around the empty room, the tables and chairs waiting for customers that would probably never arrive.
'I know what you're thinking, seeing this place deserted, believe me up until Andrew started to come regularly we were always busy, but word started to spread about the atmosphere and people stayed away.'
Lasser picked up the pint of Guinness and took a quick sip. 'So, does he always come with cronies in tow?'
Jenny nodded. 'Sometimes he just comes with one so-called friend but other times he has turned up with five or six hangers-on and then the customers just vanish. I mean, this is a nice place, we try to make sure the atmosphere is pleasant and believe it or not the food is excellent, but you can imagine what it's like with half-a-dozen drunks at the bar.'
Lasser eyed the drink again but resisted the urge to take another mouthful. 'So, why hasn't Viner sorted it?'
Jenny glanced across the table and Tasha smiled at her in sympathy.
'To be honest I'm not sure. Mr Viner came in a few weeks ago, wanting to know why the takings had plummeted, and I had to tell him, but nothing seems to have changed, Andrew still comes in causing a ruckus and I haven't seen Mr Viner since.'
Lasser glanced at his twin, Tasha gave a slight shrug before taking a sip from her wine glass.
'Do you know what sort of relationship they have?' he asked.
This time Jenny averted her eyes towards the window, the patio hidden in shadow, the surface littered with fallen leaves.
'To be honest, I don't think they talk much.'
'Do you know why?'
Jenny turned her gaze from the garden to look at Lasser. 'Like I said, I've known Andrew for a good few years and, to be honest, I think his father spoiled him when he was growing up, and that's fine to a point and a lot of kids in his position will grow up realising how fortunate they are…'
'But Andrew Viner never reached that stage?' Tasha asked.
Jenny sighed again. 'You saw the way he behaved, he's used to getting what he wants, and his attitude is terrible.'
'A spoiled brat
then?' Lasser asked.
'I'm afraid so,' she replied, her cheeks flushed with colour.
'Right, thanks for the help, Jenny, now, will you be OK here?' he asked.
Jenny gave her eyes one last dab with the serviette before standing up. 'I'll be fine,' she replied with a shaky smile.
Half a minute later, Lasser opened the door to let Tasha through just as Spenner came walking towards them over the crushed gravel.
'So, what's the score?' Lasser asked.
'Well over the limit,' Spenner replied as he glanced at Tasha and smiled shyly.
She smiled back before fiddling in her pockets and pulling out the car keys.
'Right, get the bugger booked and then drop his mate off at the hospital to get his conker fixed.'
Spenner nodded before turning away and striding towards the squad car, Steve Black behind the wheel, Viner and his mate in the back seat.
As they walked over to Tasha's car, he saw Viner glowering at him through the side window, his face smeared with hatred.
'Looks as if you've made another friend,' Tasha said with a sigh as she opened the driver's door.
'One of many,' her brother grinned, getting into the passenger seat.
Tasha shook her head and got behind the wheel.
74
To quell the feeling of fury, May had hit the streets, the wind blowing into her face as she ran. After sending the email to change the date of the chase she had sat at home going over the day's events. The more she had thought things through the more she had realised that Moss would not let this go. It had been there in his face as he lunged towards her, the anger morphing into fury.
An hour earlier, she had answered a call from a work colleague; Tracey Ure worked in the same office, two desks away, and was by far the biggest gossip in the place. Her voice had been animated with barely-suppressed excitement as she filled May in on what had happened to Scott Moss after she had left early.
'Oh, Christ, May, you should have seen him, skulking off with his tail tucked between his legs.'
May had been sitting on the sofa, the room in semi-darkness lit only by a scented candle that flickered on the window ledge. 'He went quietly then?'
'Like a timid little mouse,' Tracey had replied in a voice laced with glee. 'I mean, why didn't you tell me you had been filming him at the water cooler?'
'I didn't want to involve anyone else, besides I was just sick of the man lording it over us all and not doing his job.'
'Well, everyone here thinks it's brilliant and we all agree that you should be the one to get his job.'
May had frowned as she listened to Tracey waffling on about the sudden vacancy.
Ten minutes later, she had managed to get rid of the office gossip and had sat watching the candle flicker in the darkness, her brow creased with concern.
Changing quickly, she had slipped into jogging pants and coat, pulling her trainers on before grabbing a bottle of chilled water from the fridge and heading down in the lift to set off running.
Now, she pushed hard, her muscles flexing as she angled off the road and onto the towpath, the wind howled over the trough of water, a large mill to her left threw shadows over the canal.
Her body moved automatically whilst her brain went through the various scenarios. For once, the thought of the chase was in the background of her mind as she tried to figure out what Moss would do to make her pay for costing him his job and reputation.
The thought that he would simply vanish to lick his wounds never even entered her mind. She pictured the hatred in his eyes and suddenly she realised that it was the same look that both Clark and Bartle had worn. The truth was the three of them had been the same, at first, they had all sported that look of contempt as they stared at her – a mere woman who was secretly gagging to be fucked. Both Clark and Bartle had flexed their huge muscles as if the chase was a foregone conclusion, they would catch her, and she would give them what they demanded. The looks had soon faltered as she sprang away at speed, every time she stopped to allow them to catch up the look in their eyes had changed to one of doubt and then disbelief that they were being given the runaround by a woman. Eventually, the looks had turned to hatred, the same hatred that had been evident in Moss's eyes as he tried to get to her over the desk. The realisation hitting hard that they had been tricked and made to look a fool by this woman who stood before them with the slight smile on her mouth, while they lost the plot completely.
Her legs continued to stretch out, her speed increasing as she sprinted along the towpath.
In her mind's eye she pictured the three men, two huge body builders and Scott Moss who liked to hit the gym, no doubt in a token effort to keep in shape and then hitting the sunbeds and saunas before finding some poor individual who would then have to listen to him bragging about his life.
May smiled as she ran, she had always known that Moss was a conceited man, she had seen it on a daily basis in the way he treated those who worked for him. He was a user who always made sure he took the glory, when in reality he bullied people into doing not only their own jobs but his as well.
Now, the truth was out, and Moss would be consumed with hatred for the woman who caused his downfall. As she ran, the smile slipped from her face, her ponytail streaming out behind her in the wind, her own anger igniting and turning into fury as she realised that Moss would be out looking for revenge and she would have to be ready for when he decided to strike.
'Just try it, you prick,' she hissed as the wind howled and it started to rain again.
75
Lasser sat in the darkened living room, his bare feet on the coffee table, the glass of spiced rum in one hand, a cigarette in the other.
The house was quiet, no doubt Karen had taken herself off to bed, the air held the hint of freshly-baked bread and he sighed as he took another sip from the glass before taking a pull on the cigarette.
On the drive back to the house, he had tried to ring Bannister, but for once the DCI wasn't answering, so Lasser had left a message explaining about his run-in with Andrew Viner.
Tasha had offered to come in for a drink, but he had packed her off home promising to see her again over the next couple of days.
Stubbing out the cigarette, he drained the glass and eased back on the sofa, before closing his eyes. He still felt at a loss as he turned things over in his mind, he knew that Frank Viner had turned up at the station, Odette had told him, but he had no idea what had happened after that. Under normal circumstances he would have been in the thick of things and his mind would have been working through the facts, rather than trying to guess what had happened.
He pictured Randall Archer, his broken body sprawled on the bins, his blood dripping to the floor. He had worked on the assumption that Archer must have seen Minnie Burrows on the night she died and been killed in order to stop him recalling who he had seen on King Street. Yet somehow it all felt vague, a bit fantastical, the truth was they had no idea why Archer had been targeted. Before leaving the restaurant, he had asked Spenner about what had happened to Frank Viner and all Spenner had known was that Viner had been released after being questioned.
Lasser licked his lips, tasting the spiced rum as he stifled a yawn. He thought of ringing Odette to get the real low-down on what had happened, but he imagined a conversation in which she was forced to ignore his requests, and then the dreaded silence would come down like the blade of a guillotine and he would struggle to make small talk and the call would end in awkward embarrassment.
Lifting his legs from the table he hauled them onto the sofa before lying down on his side and plumping one of the cushions.
This time he didn't bother trying to quell the yawn, he just closed his eyes and settled down.
The last image that came into his mind as he drifted off to sleep was of a dark-haired woman, her silver-beringed hands drumming on the wheel of the small white van. Singing away to a song on the radio, she had turned and smiled, her brown eyes holding his own as she waved and turned rig
ht at the lights, her smiling face clear in his exhausted mind. With a grunt he took her image with him as he sank into the darkness.
76
Odette drove onto the M6 heading north, fingers tapping on the wheel in time to the tune on the radio, the overnight bag in the boot along with her walking boots and waterproofs.
The motorway was quiet, the headlights lancing out into the darkness as she hit seventy and flicked on the cruise control before easing back in the seat.
The wind was still blowing and every few seconds the car would be buffeted but for once the rain had stopped. Checking the interior mirror, she caught a fleeting glimpse of her guilt-infused eyes. With a heavy sigh, she tried her best to dismiss the feeling, but the fact remained that as the miles went flying by the feelings of deserting Lasser increased.
Although he had told her he understood about her meeting with Craig she knew he would find it hard to come to terms with her new friendship. The fact was they had shared so much over the past three years that her feelings had grown, but she knew that deep down it would have been an impossible relationship and one which ultimately, they would both have regretted.
She thought of the times she had almost succumbed to temptation and a small part of her knew that she would always regret not taking the chance but the price that would have to be paid was too high.
So, she turned up the radio until the inside of the car was full of music as she drove towards the Lakes, the guilt still plucking at her senses.
77
Stokes rolled over in bed and clicked on the small lamp, his eyes screwed shut as the light illuminated the pokey bedroom. With a heavy sigh, he pulled the duvet over his head and lifted his knees up, cracking a yawn before farting.
Seconds later, he grimaced as the stink drifted up into his face and he poked his head back out from under the cover in an effort to get some fresh air.
Blood Bought Page 24