I got stuck into my work, and it was Stephen that realised what the time was. “Better get moving,” he said, nudging my shoulder.
I looked up, tilting my wrist to check my watch. “Oh damn,” I muttered, quickly saving what I’d done so far and shutting my computer down.
“You want me to drive?” Stephen offered as we caught the lift downstairs. I usually tried to take the stairs, but in this case, the lift was probably faster.
“Are you saying my driving is too slow for you?”
Stephen shot me a cheeky grin. “You drive like a country boy in the city.”
I held my hands out and gave a shrug. “Can’t help it, that’s what I am.”
He ended up in the driver’s seat. I held onto the handle above the window as he swung us around the car park and onto the main road.
“You wait,” I said, “if I ever get to drive you around my home turf, you’ll be the one trying to hold on to your lunch.”
Stephen laughed quietly, accelerating out of the traffic lights hard enough to press me back into my seat. “I believe you,” he said. “I always hated twisty country lanes. We used to do family holidays in Devon, and I swear I actually turned green going round all those u-bends.”
I groaned. “I can’t believe that bothered you and this doesn’t.” As if on cue, Stephen wheeled us around a roundabout, bumping my shoulder into the door. “You should have been a rally driver or something.”
He grinned. “Jealous of my skills?”
“Shut up and watch the road,” I grumbled, but I couldn’t help but smile. Sometimes he really was more like a teenager than the thirty-something that he actually was.
We turned up at the solicitors five minutes early and were greeted at the door by a greying man in an impeccably tailored suit.
“Gentleman, come in.”
We stepped inside, and I gave my boots a good wiping on the doormat so I wouldn’t track muck across the floor. What was it with rich people and light coloured flooring?
“Through here.” We were directed into a room at the rear of the building and stepped inside, finding another man sitting behind a desk there. I had the feeling that this was the sort of place where five generations of the same family had worked here down the ages, though only the sons, of course. I glanced around the lush room, with the wood panelling on the walls and the large, dark coloured desk, and resisted the urge to roll my eyes.
The man we were here to see, Adrian Drew, seemed friendly enough at least, and he stood up as we came in. He held out his hand, and I shook it firmly, Stephen following suit.
“DCI Mitchell,” I introduced myself with a hand on my chest, and then gestured to Stephen, “and this is DI Huxley, my partner.”
“And I presume you already know who I am?” Drew said with a smile. “How can I help you?”
“We’re here about the Wooding family, as we discussed on the phone,” I prompted him.
“Oh yes, of course,” Drew said. He lifted a folder of papers from the left side of his desk and put them in front of Stephen and me. I had the impression he’d remembered perfectly well why we were here and had just been standing on ceremony. “Here are the paper copies I made up for you two gentlemen.”
I’d never been called a ‘gentleman’ so many times in my life and shared an amused glance with Stephen.
“We appreciate that,” I said, pulling the papers towards me.
Drew folded his hands together atop the desk and waited in patient silence as Stephen and I looked over the wills. My brow furrowed as I skim read the dense legalese, finding that every time I thought I understood what it was saying, I lost the thread again.
“Okay, could you sum this up for me?” Stephen said. “This is like reading Shakespeare.”
Drew gave a slightly condescending smile. “Somewhat less poetic than that, I’m afraid, detective.” He reached forwards to spread the papers out, tapping one with his finger. “This is Mr Wooding’s will, which clearly states that he intended his worldly possessions to be placed in the safekeeping of his wife, Mrs Ellie Wooding, until his son came of age.”
My eyebrows rose. “Until Lawrence came of age?”
Drew bowed his head in a polite nod. “Indeed.”
I frowned. “That would be only a year, since he’s seventeen-”
“Ah, no.” Drew put up a finger. “In actuality, Mr Wooding stipulated the age of twenty-five for his son to receive his inheritance. It was changed recently, I believe.”
“Really?” Stephen said, intrigued. “How recently?”
Drew hummed, pinching one of the papers between his thumb and forefinger and turning it towards him. “Two years ago.”
I hummed. That wasn’t too recently, but perhaps Mr Wooding had opted to change the age of inheritance after Lawrence started to act up. I considered Drew for a moment as I weighed my words.
“In your opinion,” I said, “how much control would Mrs Wooding have had over this money? Could she have spent it? Or moved it into her name?”
Drew made a thoughtful face. “The will isn’t constructed in an airtight manner, no. In fact, I remember warning Mr Wooding that there were areas he left open to exploitation when he had it written, but he had complete trust in his wife.”
I rubbed my chin. “Thank you for your help-” I started.
Stephen cut in, holding up a hand to me to ask for a moment longer. “What if Lawrence died, Mr Drew?”
It was a good question. I liked to think that a boy’s parent would never consider such a horrific thing, but it was clear that Mrs Wooding had motivations that we weren’t entirely clear on yet.
Drew looked startled, before he recovered his composure. “Well,” he said, “if it was ruled an accident, the Wooding estate and everything included in that, would remain with Mrs Wooding.”
Stephen gave a nod, looking grim. “Alright, thank you.” He looked to me, signalling he had finished now, and we got to our feet, shaking Mr Drew’s hand.
“We appreciate your help,” I told him.
Drew clasped his hands together in front of him, looking very much like he might bow to us. “Of course,” he said. “I hope we’ve been of some help.”
“One last thing,” I said, hooking my thumbs through my belt loops. “If Mrs Wooding visits here to claim what that will says she’s owed, we will need you to call the police.”
Drew’s eyes widened. “Oh?”
“I’m sorry to inform you, but Mr Wooding passed under suspicious circumstances, and Mrs Wooding is currently a person of interest.”
Drew’s eyebrows rose, and he blinked. “I see.”
Stephen had fished out a business card while I was talking and handed it to Drew, who accepted it tentatively.
“If she comes by, give us a call as soon as you’re able,” he said.
Drew agreed to do so, placing the card down on his desk like it was in danger of shattering if he handled it carelessly. He walked us out of the building, and Stephen and I made our way back to the car.
“I’m driving this time,” I told him firmly. He just smiled, heading around to the passenger side to climb inside.
“Thoughts?” I asked him once we were on our way home.
Stephen was silent for a long moment, and I looked over at him to see if he’d heard me. He looked both thoughtful and troubled, so I stayed silent and waited for his response.
“I don’t like to think that she could’ve done something like that, but policing has taught me that people can be far more selfless, and far more selfish, than I could’ve previously imagined. She clearly had a great deal of money to gain through the death of her husband.”
“Aye,” I sighed. “The only thing that doesn’t add up for me is that this gang had kidnapped children before. That suggests that they work independent of her.”
Stephen grunted. “Good point. So she, what, enlisted them?”
“Or got tangled up in it somehow,” I agreed. “She might be more of an opportunist than premeditated.”
/> “I don’t know about that,” Stephen said. “She seems plenty cold enough to me.”
I tilted my head. “In some ways, yes. But in other ways, she’s not been the best planner. She went to see Lawrence, which put her on the hospital cameras. I can’t see how that benefitted her, exactly.”
Stephen rubbed a hand over his face. “Maybe she does have some regard for her son, after all.”
I pulled an unconvinced grimace. “Maybe.”
As we got closer to York and the new information began to settle in my brain, like silt falling to the bottom of a lake, I had a new idea. Patting my pocket, I pulled out my phone and handed it to Stephen, who took it with a bemused expression.
“What do you want me to do with this?”
“Call Lawrence’s aunt and uncle,” I told him. “If anyone would know what Ellie Wooding’s feelings were about her husband and son, it ought to be her sister, right?”
“Or the housekeeper,” Stephen suggested, though he was already doing as I asked.
“Good thought,” I agreed, “but I don’t think Rebecca would be comfortable telling us if she did know. She’s right loyal.”
Stephen hummed. He’d put in the number and brought it to his ear now.
“Mrs Kelley?” he said.
They didn’t talk for long, and while I could guess at the other side of the conversation, I waited to ask Stephen himself.
“Well?” I asked. We were close to the centre of York now, and I needed to know whether to head towards the station, or to Alicia’s, wherever that was.
“She’s fine with us coming round to hers now,” Stephen said. Without further ado, he reached forwards to input the address she’d given him into the sat-nav, and I altered my course towards Leeds.
“What did she say?”
Stephen shrugged. “Not a great deal. She asked if we had information on Lawrence, of course, but I told her this was something else. She and her husband are still going out looking for Lawrence.” He was silent for a beat. “If it was my kid, I wouldn’t stop looking either.”
“Aye,” I agreed, before sighing. “Look. Hopefully, this will help piece some bits together. If we have more of a complete picture of the situation, it’ll help us with all the parts we don’t know.”
“Like Lawrence’s whereabouts,” Stephen said with a nod. “I know. I just feel for her.”
“As do I.”
It was another half hour or so before we arrived at the Kelleys’ house, which was a modest townhouse, made of the typically Yorkshire honey-coloured yellow stone.
Dan wasn’t in, Alicia told us as she welcomed us inside and fixed us some tea. The house was deceptively spacious inside and beautifully decorated with traditional solid wood fixtures, giving it a generally homely atmosphere.
“Black coffee for you,” Alicia said as she put a coaster down on the coffee table in front of me, placing my coffee cup on top. “And tea for you.” She put Stephen’s down beside my cup, and then took a seat opposite us, her own cup of tea in hand.
I took a sip of mine, which was thick like Turkish coffee and absolutely perfect. “God, where did you get this stuff?” I said, inhaling the fragrant steam rising from the mug.
She smiled. “Dan got it on one of his business trips, I believe, but I couldn’t tell you where exactly. He globetrots all over the place.”
“Well, it’s delicious,” I said warmly, taking another scalding sip. We sat in quiet for a moment, and I took the time to look around the sitting room, which had a number of picture frames on the mantelpiece and was brightly lit by the large windows at the back.
Before long, Alicia rested her mug in her lap and looked expectantly at us. “So what did you need to ask me?”
I glanced down at the wooden floorboards as I wondered where to start. “First, we’ve got some… disappointing news for you,” I said carefully, holding up a hand when she immediately opened her mouth. “Not about Lawrence.”
She shut her mouth and gave a stiff nod. “Go on.”
“We need to talk about your sister,” I said, glancing over at Stephen as I talked. He gave me a small nod of encouragement in response, and I turned back to Alicia. “What she told me, what she claimed, what she led us into.”
Alicia bowed her head, looking down at her hands, cupped tightly around her mug. “She couldn’t have done it on purpose,” she said slowly, timidly. Very quietly, she added, “Could she?”
I cleared my throat. “We don’t know exactly.”
“But you suspect that she did,” Alicia said, her voice stronger. “That she did it on purpose.”
“It looks that way,” I admitted.
“I see,” Alicia said crisply, taking another sip of tea. She seemed to be thinking hard, and I stayed quiet, letting her process what I’d told her. Hearing that your sister was suspected of something like that couldn’t be easy in the slightest, and we hadn’t even told her how Mrs Wooding would benefit from her husband’s death, and how that might have incentivised her.
“What precisely did you want from me?” Alicia asked, after she’d lowered her cup of tea. Her expression was difficult to read. It occurred to me that I might’ve misjudged, and that she was as loyal to Mrs Wooding as Rebecca was.
But we’d come this far, and I figured that we might as well finish. “We were hoping to hear your opinion on how likely that might be,” I told her evenly. “Whether Mrs Wooding felt in any way dissatisfied with her life.” I went for a more evasive opening question than simply, ‘Did Ellie Wooding hate her husband?’
I braced for Alicia to tell us to leave immediately. Instead, her shoulders slumped, and she looked abruptly tired.
“Yes,” she said after a long pause. “My sister was always unhappy with what she had.”
Stephen had subtly pulled out his notebook at some point and was taking notes, leaving me free to focus on Alicia.
“I understand,” I said. “Did she tell you what exactly she was unhappy about?”
Alicia sighed, leaning sideways to rest her elbow on the sofa armrest. “A great number of things. Primarily, Lawrence’s difficult behaviour. She never had a great deal of patience, and Lawrence only really responded to his father. They were much closer, and I think Ellie resented it.”
This was useful information, and I nodded encouragingly.
Alicia took another sip of tea before continuing. “Then there was her husband, Aaron. She said he was controlling, which initially concerned me, of course.” She gestured with her free hand as she spoke. “But the more she talked about it, I realised it was that Aaron wanted to save his money for Lawrence’s future and Ellie didn’t. She said that she wasn’t living the lifestyle she’d believed she’d have when they married.”
Alicia exhaled heavily. “I know this makes her sound like a gold digger, but her feelings are complex, you understand? She believed Aaron’s refusal to let her spend his money meant that he didn’t love her as much as Lawrence.”
“She told you that?” I couldn’t help but ask.
Alicia raised and dropped a shoulder. “She passed it off as a joke, but yes. She worried that Aaron was falling out of love with her, and she couldn’t make Lawrence love her either, it seemed to her. So, the money was the surface-level problem,” she held her hand up near her shoulder to indicate the surface and then lowered it, “while the real problem was her fear of being abandoned.”
Alicia’s analysis took me aback, and I kept silent until it was clear that she was done for now. “Why would she fear that?” I asked quietly.
Alicia pressed her lips together, and it seemed like she wouldn’t answer. “We have a family history that made her anxious about such things,” she said finally.
I nodded, accepting that. Alicia had given us a great deal of insight, but there were clearly lines she didn’t wish to cross. I could read between the lines and guess that a parent might have left them, but the exact details belonged to Alicia and her sister.
“Thank you for telling us,” I said.
Stephen cleared his throat at my side, and I looked over at him, wondering what he wanted to ask. But before he got the chance, my phone started ringing. It broke the bubble we’d created, and I winced, snatching it out of my pocket, intending to shut it off. But Rebecca’s name flashed up on the screen, and I paused.
“I need to take this,” I said, excusing myself into the corridor. “Rebecca?” I said into the phone once I was mostly out of earshot of the sitting room.
“Detective?” Rebecca’s voice was higher pitched than I’d heard it before and I couldn’t tell if she was excited or scared.
“Yes, Mitchell speaking.”
“Lawrence is here,” she said in a rush, and I went still, briefly shocked, before my face split into a grin.
“That’s great news,” I said warmly. “Is he alright?”
“Yes, thank god,” Rebecca said, sounding hugely relieved. “He was hungry and cold, of course, but no real harm is done. He’s resting.”
“Thank you for calling me,” I said. “Where did you find him?”
“We didn’t find him,” she said, “he found us. He knocked on the door, needing us to pay the taxi that had brought him here.” She laughed softly at that, clearly overjoyed to have him safe.
“I’m glad he felt safe with you,” I said gently. “When he’s awake, we’d like to talk to him, but I’m sure he needs his rest for now.”
“We’ll call you,” she assured me.
“Is it alright if I pass the news onto his aunt and uncle?” I asked. “They’re very worried about him.”
“Oh, I was just about to call Mrs Kelley,” Rebecca said.
“I’m with her now,” I told her.
“Very good, I’ll trust that to you, then.”
“Thank you.” I paused. “Give Lawrence my best. We were both worried about him.”
The Stolen Children Page 21