by Lisa Cutts
‘I haven’t got all day.’
I was trying to think fast. I gave it my best shot.
‘I’ve got a job interview for a CCTV operator,’ I lied. ‘Once I get the job, I pass you all you need to know about black spots and who’s doing what in your town.’
He threw his head back and laughed. The sound died in the cold basement, which was exactly what was going to happen to me if I didn’t think fast.
‘That’s only the start of it,’ I said. ‘I’ve been avoiding getting myself nicked for years.’
He had no idea if I meant it or not – that was clear from his expression. My heart rate quickened as he took a step towards the stairs. It was back to me now.
For one second, I thought he was going to leave me down there with four steel-toe-capped boots for company.
With a glance over his shoulder, he called out, ‘Come on then, let’s hear the rest of your plan. If I’m not happy when you’re done, you won’t be happy when I’m done.’
I nodded at the gargoyles and followed him out of the basement into his house.
Chapter 18
Evening of Wednesday 6 May
A large part of Harry’s day had been taken up by meetings explaining to senior management where the murder enquiry was heading and, of course, asking for more funding and staff.
He flicked through the HOLMES database, glancing at how many outstanding actions there were to be completed, and wondered how they ever managed to convict anybody. As a detective inspector, his job was a managerial one, but it wasn’t beneath him to go out and visit witnesses.
One in particular struck him as being a previously untapped source of information. He punched the name of Jenny Bloomfield’s friend, Cathy Walters, into his keyboard and trawled through everything the police system held on her. It wasn’t much, but he wasn’t about to go round her house without looking into her first. No one was that stupid.
A movement in the corridor outside his office caught his eye.
‘You still here, Sandra?’ he said.
‘Just about to head off,’ she said, leaning against the door jamb. ‘Need anything from me before I go?’
‘No,’ he said, easing himself back in his chair. ‘I was about to go out and see Cathy Walters, but you can lock up and set the alarm if you like.’
‘She’s the friend who’s crawled out of the woodwork now her bestie, Jenny Bloomfield, is dead, that right?’
‘Very cynical, yet accurate,’ said Harry as he put his hands behind his head. ‘I’ve had a look and she didn’t feature in Linda Bowman’s murder at all. If she and Jenny were such great mates, I’d have thought her name would have cropped up somewhere.’
‘Want me to come with you?’ asked Sandra.
‘Nah, I’ll be fine,’ said Harry as he stood up and pulled his jacket from the back of his chair. ‘I wanted to speak to her tonight because tomorrow we’ll need to go back and update the family. I want to find out what Cathy’s got to say before the grief hits them full-on.’
‘Night, then,’ said Sandra.
‘See you in the morning.’
Harry grabbed his paperwork and switched off the light, mindful that the witness he was on his way to see might have had a very good reason to stay out of the way up until now.
*
The traffic was heavy for the time of night and it was after 8 p.m. when Harry pulled up outside the modest terraced house that belonged to Cathy Walters.
He saw a light on through the bedroom window and hoped she wasn’t already going to bed. Keen not to miss his opportunity to talk to her, Harry got out of the car and rapped on the door.
A face appeared at the window to the left-hand side of the front door. Cathy’s expression was one of surprise, although Harry could have sworn he saw a flicker of annoyance flash over her features. Perhaps it was her long brown hair scraped back into a ponytail on the top of her head that made her look a little harsher than the last time he’d seen her.
Harry waved his warrant card at her and shouted, ‘Hi, Cathy. It’s DI Harry Powell. We met yesterday.’
She disappeared and he heard the sound of footsteps as she rushed to open the door to him.
‘All right, all right,’ she said, glancing up and down the empty street. ‘Please don’t holler that the police are at my door.’
‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘Most people we deal with couldn’t care less. Can I come in?’
With a noise that sound like a humph, Cathy stood back and let him in.
He was pleased to see that she was wearing trousers and a T-shirt, not pyjamas.
Once seated in the front room, the offer of coffee declined, Harry said, ‘Thank you for speaking to me. I wanted to see if there was anything you could tell me about Jenny that might help.’
She fiddled with her ponytail, pulling her hair over one shoulder.
‘Is it her then? Is it definitely her?’
‘We’re still waiting on confirmation,’ said Harry tactfully. ‘We hope to have some results soon.’
Cathy stared at him. Perhaps she could tell it was a lie, but Harry wasn’t budging on this one. Family deserved to know news like that first.
Eventually Cathy said, ‘We were at school together. We weren’t really friends then, but years later I bumped into her in Waitrose.’ She gave a hollow laugh.
‘Usually I shop at Aldi or Lidl, but I was on my way home from a job interview.’ Cathy looked down at her bare feet on the threadbare carpet. ‘I was feeling optimistic, so I thought, why not? I had on a brand-new and quite expensive dress, so afterwards when I thought back to the conversation Jenny and I had over the curly kale, I figured she probably imagined I was doing a lot better for myself than I actually was.’
Harry gave her an encouraging smile.
‘Well, we had a “let’s do coffee” conversation and met up a couple of days later.’
She broke off again, twirled her hair around her fingers and tucked her feet under her legs.
‘It wasn’t easy to tell her that I was flat broke,’ said Cathy, ‘but Jenny was so lovely and said she’d help me out, keep her ears open if she heard of any jobs coming up. I’d worked for years for a kitchen firm – anyway, you didn’t come here for my life story.
‘Jenny was great, and we met from time to time. She always paid for lunch or drinks – I felt as though I was taking advantage, but she would never take a penny, even when I was back on my feet.’
None of this was helping Harry and he was just about to think he was wasting his time when Cathy said, ‘The lunches and drinks stopped when she started the affair.’
Harry hoped his expression didn’t show surprise. There had been a suspicion that Jenny had been having an affair, yet he was expecting to have to subtly weave it into the conversation.
‘Do you know who he was?’ said Harry.
A shake of the head.
‘No, but she seemed pretty smitten,’ said Cathy. ‘She wouldn’t ever tell me, although I didn’t want to pry. It was nice to see her . . . you know, happy.’
She gave a miserable little shrug.
‘Do you think he had anything to do with her disappearance?’ asked Cathy.
‘I don’t know,’ said Harry, ‘but if he did, trust me, we’ll find him.’
Harry sat forward in his seat.
‘Cathy, this is important. You need to tell me everything, and I mean everything, that Jenny ever told you about this man. Leave nothing out.’
Chapter 19
Sophia wasn’t quite sure how the day had ended this way. It had started normally enough, before she and Dane were told that two volunteers were needed for out-of-county enquiries, which would probably mean an overnight stay somewhere.
Neither she nor Dane had seemed all that keen and she felt nervous about spending an entire night in his company. Her feelings towards him were still very much mixed, and she couldn’t fathom whether he was deliberately quiet with her on the journey because he didn’t enjoy her company, or if there was anoth
er reason.
Having spent most of the afternoon travelling across the south coast, and then the early evening taking statements from traumatized victims of telephone fraud – those who had unwittingly handed over their personal information, bank account details, PIN numbers, and then their debit and credit cards – Sophia and Dane were exhausted.
The first reasonable hotel they saw, they stopped to see if they had two available rooms.
Sophia sat in the bar of the Premier Inn, watching Dane as he strolled towards the smiling barmaid who was leaning across the counter, appearing a little too ready to welcome him. Try as she might, Sophia couldn’t help but notice the attractive, slim server was also about ten years younger than she was, with that cheery air of optimism that the drudgery and disappointment of life had yet to squash.
Whatever it was that Dane said to her made her laugh, lean against the nearest beer pump and put her hand on her hip. He definitely had an air about him, and it wasn’t all down to looks.
Still, Sophia hoped she had a better chance with him than the barmaid.
She shook her head at the idea. She looked up to see Dane standing in front of her.
Slightly flustered, she stared at him, not expecting him to have fetched the drinks so quickly. Then she noticed his empty hands.
‘Something wrong?’ he asked.
‘No, no. I just remembered something, that’s all,’ she replied, wondering what he’d returned to the table for, if not to deposit their drinks.
‘Well,’ said Dane, ‘the barmaid, who looks a little bit young to even be working here, asked if you wanted ice and lemon with your vodka and tonic. I told her that I wasn’t sure and as I’m still in the early days of trying to impress you, I thought I’d better check.’
Sophia had to admit that the line was corny, but it made her laugh.
‘Lots and lots of ice and one slice of lemon, please.’
As he turned to walk away, she called, ‘Oh, and Dane, if you really want to impress me, a straight glass. And ask about a table for dinner.’
*
Ninety minutes – and three rounds – later, Dane and Sophie had only moved as far as the bar to get more drinks. The meal they’d talked about eating, having lost much of its importance, was probably past the point of sobering them up, and no one had yet told them their table was ready.
‘So, tell me,’ said Sophia, speech not yet slurred, but displaying signs of inebriation, ‘what made you join the police?’
Dane ran a hand through his hair and took a pull on his pint before smacking his lips and saying, ‘It was the glamour and the hope that, one day, I’d meet the perfect woman.’
‘You’re so full of shit.’
‘I’ve yet to find her, so if you’ve got any fit mates . . .’ he said with a smile.
‘You’re lucky I’m in a good mood,’ she laughed. ‘Seriously, what made you want to join?’
For a few seconds, Dane considered her question.
‘I suppose,’ he said at last, ‘I’d spent years drifting around working different dead-end jobs. A couple of years ago, I decided I wanted to do something positive, and like all of us I had this starry-eyed notion that I’d help lock up villains. The reality, of course, was immediately obvious: that I’d spend longer doing the paperwork than these wankers would spend banged up. I was beginning to think that I’d wasted my time until I came here, to Major Crime, but now that I’ve got the chance to work on some more serious stuff, I think things are looking up. What about you?’
‘Similar to your story, although I have to confess, do you want to know the one thing that kept me here rather than throwing in the towel and getting a sensible job with structured hours and better pay?’
‘Go on.’
Sophia gave a sigh and said, ‘Job security and the pension. Now, I’m fucked. I’ve got to do this bollocks for another twelve years longer than I ever expected to, paying in fourteen per cent to a pension scheme I may never see a penny of. And for what? Constant criticism from the public, the politicians, the media. We all join with a notion of “making a difference”, but the reality of the situation is that we can’t win. It’s relentless; we simply carry on and do the best job we can.’
‘What are you going to do, then?’
‘Dunno, if I’m being honest.’
She drained the rest of her vodka and tonic, pushed the empty glass towards him and said, ‘Is it your round?’
‘Strictly speaking it’s your turn, but as you’re knocking them back quicker than me, I don’t mind getting you another.’
Sophia raised her eyebrows at him; she wasn’t entirely sure in her alcohol-befuddled brain how she was supposed to react to that comment.
‘All I meant,’ he said in response, ‘was that judging by two consecutive nights of plying ourselves with alcohol, you’ve clearly got a stronger constitution than I have.’
As she was about to answer him, she felt her stomach growl. Not one to usually act so irresponsibly, especially where the dangerous mix of alcohol and men were concerned, Sophia got up to go to the bar.
‘I really don’t mind getting you a drink,’ he said.
‘I’m going to check on our table,’ she said. ‘It’s been ages since you asked them.’
‘She said she’d let us know when it was ready.’
Without waiting to debate it further, Sophia walked to the bar and spoke to the barmaid, who looked even younger at a close distance.
She smiled at her and said, ‘Sorry, but my friend asked for a table some time ago. I was wondering how much longer it’d be, please?’
Sophia saw a frown on the young woman’s face and then a smile as she said, ‘I told him there’s one ready whenever you are. Just go on through; it’s reserved.’
Having managed to mumble a ‘thank you’, Sophia made herself hold it together to gesture to Dane that she was going to the ladies’.
Exactly what was he playing at? Neither of them had had time for lunch once they’d been told where they needed to go and had got their paperwork in order. She’d had three vodkas on an empty stomach, all while Dane had deliberately kept her drinking instead of eating.
Now she came to think about it, he had been the one buying the shots last night too, and it was his suggestion they go down to sit on the beach.
If she wasn’t very much mistaken, she was being played.
Chapter 20
Thursday 7 May
Detective Inspector Harry Powell had hit the ground running again today. His morning had started earlier than most of his team, with a call out to an attempted murder. Two drunks had found themselves staggering home in the early hours, when one of them had staggered into someone else. That someone else hadn’t taken kindly to it and had punched him in retaliation. That one punch put the victim into a coma.
Without a doubt, Harry knew that this latest job to break in his incident room would never be the highlight of any of his team’s investigative career. Nevertheless, it was still a tragic waste of two lives: both that of the now brain-dead young party-goer, and the reckless young man who had just ruined his own life with one punch.
Still, the matter needed a mountain of paperwork and lots of enquiries to result in a conviction at court, not to mention the work to support the victim’s family and managing the offender’s nearest and dearest.
He made sure he was back in his office before Sandra Beckinsale arrived. That was no mean feat in itself, as she tended to arrive earlier than most of the others. She wasn’t going to be very impressed to hear they had picked up another job. Although, in fairness, she wasn’t very impressed by anything.
Harry heard her making an entrance into the office, smoker’s cough and all.
He was ready at her office door, cup of tea held out to her as a peace offering.
She scowled at him.
‘What’s gone wrong?’ she demanded.
‘And good morning to you too, Sandra,’ he said, stepping after her into her office.
She eyed him
with well-placed suspicion. ‘What do you want?’
Even though he knew he wasn’t fooling her, Harry tried his best.
‘Can’t I simply greet my favourite DS with a cup of tea without wanting anything?’
‘But you do want something.’ she said, coat now off, bag down and sat at her desk.
‘Biscuit to go with that?’
When he couldn’t take the gurning any longer, Harry said, ‘I’ve just been out to a new job: it’s an attempted murder at the moment, although the fella isn’t likely to pull through.’
He continued through the noise of Sandra blowing air out of her cheeks.
‘I need a team to brief, including a case officer, an officer to take a statement from the other drunk witness once he sobers up, two to interview the suspect in custody and a Family Liaison Officer. Well, you know better than I do who we need. CCTV person and outside enquiry officer, too.’
Now she looked furious.
‘We’ll make it a nine a.m. briefing,’ he said, sensing it was time to retreat, ‘and thanks in advance for sorting it out.’
He knew when it was time to give his staff some space, and that time was definitely now. Harry recognized a crumbling organization when he saw one, and he was in the midst of the biggest crisis he had seen in all his years of service.
Even so, they had a job to do, and he was well aware that he needed to visit the Bloomfield family and break terrible news to them. He had already lost two members of staff to the Fraud Department, so before he did anything else, Harry wanted to make sure the staff he had left were safe and well, even the ones who were currently seconded elsewhere.
Sophia he trusted implicitly. Dane, not so much.
Harry picked up his phone to call Sophia and check everything was all right. As he did so, he noticed the time: it was a little after seven-thirty. Was it too early to call? Their duty time started in twenty-five minutes so they should be up and on their way to work.
He rang Sophia, who answered on the fourth ring.
‘Soph,’ he said, ‘it’s Harry. Everything okay?’
‘Mmm, thanks . . . It is. What’s up?’