We stepped out of the car, and I put a hand on the roof briefly to centre myself. I couldn’t afford to get hung up on sentimentality. Tonight, when I was in the quiet of my own home with Sam, then I could afford to let myself feel all that worry and sick horror. But right now, I was at work, and I had a duty to give the case all I could, which included not letting my emotions distract me.
“You good?” Stephen asked, concerned.
“Aye.” I forced a stiff smile. “I’m alright. Let’s go talk to these youngsters, see what they’ve been getting up to.”
Stephen accepted my answer, and we walked side-by-side into Hewford and up the stairs. One of the constables waved us over as soon as we were in the office, and I paused only to snag my water bottle from my desk before moving over to him.
“DC Cole, I assume?” I asked him after I’d taken a slug of water, wetting my dry throat.
“Yes, sir.”
“You found the CCTV, did you?”
“Uh, it was a joint effort, sir,” he said, looking endearingly flustered.
I smiled slightly. “Let’s see it, then.”
He brought it up on screen for us, cutting it down to the correct segment. Stephen and I both leaned forwards as the grainy footage began to play.
“That’s him, that’s Jackson,” I murmured as a group of young men came up on the screen. There were at least six of them. “Damn it. I knew Max and Jackson didn’t go out on their own.”
“I recognise most of them, too, sir, from the interviews,” DC Cole told me. I glanced at him and gave a nod.
“Liars, the lot of them. We’ll have them in for obstruction of justice.”
“Which ones don’t you recognise?” Stephen asked Cole as he replayed the video. It was only a short clip of the men walking down a quiet road, past the camera, but it was enough to pick up their faces and confirm that they’d lied.
“Uh, these two, sir.” He paused the video and pointed them out: a tall, blond bloke who looked like he ought to have been head boy at a private school and a scruffy, dark-haired man in an army jacket.
“Who do you think the two mysterious guys are?” Stephen wondered aloud.
“No idea. Did one of them call the ambulance? That’s the question.”
“I can’t believe they were there when Jackson and Max were… like that. And they just left them. If they didn’t call an ambulance, I swear I’ll throttle them with my own two hands. How shitty a friend can you get?”
“Aye, clearly they cared more about looking after their own skin than helping anyone else.”
Stephen made a disgusted noise, his nose scrunched up.
I turned to Cole. “Have we got a drawing from Farrell yet?” I asked him. He looked at me blankly. “Duncan Farrell, the teenager? He helped us out with identifying Jackson’s friends-”
“Oh yeah, of course! I remember now. Sorry, sir. I’m not sure about the artist’s sketch. I can chase it up?”
“Do that,” I agreed before changing my mind. “Wait, you know what? I think a meeting would be better to discuss all this. There are a few points we need to cover, and we need everyone on the same page.”
DC Cole went round to gather up the team Rashford had given us, herding them into a spare meeting room whilst I got settled at the front of the room. I had my notepad out to jot down anything of importance and twiddled the pen between my thumb and forefinger as I thought about what we needed to discuss. Stephen was standing at my side, shifting from foot to foot in clear discomfort. I put a hand on his arm.
“It’s going to be fine. I can handle it if you don’t want to speak, but you’re free to give your input anytime, okay, mate? You know this all as well as I do. You’ve got it.”
He blew out a nervous laugh. “Yeah, yeah, okay. Thanks, Mitch.”
“Anytime.”
The officers finished arriving, and the last one in closed the door. I quickly counted them up and frowned when we were missing two.
“Is there a pair out right now?” I queried.
“DC Johnson and Willams went to the hospital, sir,” a curly-haired woman spoke up.
“They wouldn’t tell us how Roberts was doing over the phone?” I frowned. She shook her head. “Alright, someone can catch them up when they’re back. Let’s see what we’ve got so far.”
The meeting progressed efficiently, though not without a little prompting and guidance from me, when a couple of the DCs went off on tangents. I gave them a brief run-down on what had happened this morning with Victor Roberts for the ones who hadn’t heard before we returned to hearing about their work. I made notes in my pad as we worked through what they’d achieved, finding myself impressed by what they’d accomplished in such a short amount of time.
“Summing up, then,” I said, twenty minutes later. “Firstly, the neighbours confirmed there was no loud music or visitors on the night of the supposed house party, so if we weren’t sure that Lowe’s friends were lying beforehand, we are now.
“Second, Duncan Farrell has worked with the artist to create a sketch, and we’ve compared that to the CCTV footage, matching it with the blond man. We can assume, then, that it was him who was Lowe’s particular friend and finding out this man’s identity is crucial.
“Then we have the ambulance call.” I paused here because it felt like it was one of the most important pieces of information so far, but I wasn’t quite sure yet what to make of it. “It clearly wasn’t any of Jackson’s so-called friends who phoned in because the call was made by a woman, probably young.”
“And finally, there’s the coroner’s report that’s come in.” I hadn’t asked the constables to follow this up for me, but one of them had taken the initiative to do it, anyway. “It confirms much of what we already knew or guessed; that Jackson Lowe was both drunk and high and that it was a mixture of opioids, including an abnormally high amount of fentanyl that proved to be fatal. There were no other signs of recent injury, and there was a prolonged record of Lowe taking drugs like these, which could be gathered from his hair.”
I glanced over at Stephen. “Did I miss anything?”
“Mm, don’t think so,” he said, giving me a nod of approval.
“Let’s wrap this up, then. I want to be kept up to date on the situation with Roberts in the hospital. We could do with someone looking into Roberts’ history, any research-savvy volunteers?” A couple of officers put their hands up, and I gestured to them.
“Good. There are also several more pharmacies we need to check in York since St- DI Huxley, and I didn’t get to them after the incident with Roberts.” I checked my watch and grimaced at the time. “That can be started tomorrow, though. Most pharmacies will be closing up soon. Another job for tomorrow will be searching Roberts’ house. It’s unfortunately likely that he didn’t have anything to do with our case, but we won’t know for sure until he’s awake or we find something to say otherwise in his possessions. We-”
Stephen put up a finger. “Or the hospital says that t-the, I mean, his blood results match up with Jackson’s. That he took the same combination of drugs, I mean.” He’d fumbled his way through a bit, but his meaning was perfectly clear, and I gave him an approving look.
“Good point. Hopefully, the two missing officers will have news on that when they come back.” I looked at my watch again. “Alright, I better not keep you all for overtime or Rashford will have my hide.” There were a couple of chuckles. “We’ll get properly started again tomorrow. Good work today.”
“It was definitely thanks to the doughnuts,” a chubby blonde guy said with a bright smile. I laughed at that, and so did some of the others.
“Hint taken. I’ll see what I can do about some more doughnuts, but you better earn them, y’hear?”
I got some scattered agreements and smiled, dismissing them all. Chatter picked up as they headed out, and I turned to Stephen, wiping my clammy hands on my trousers. I managed public speaking just fine, it was part of the job after all, but it still made my heart pick up the p
ace slightly. I could certainly sympathise with Stephen’s difficulties.
“That went alright, didn’t it?” I said.
“Great. Much less boring than most meetings.” We shared a grin.
“It helped that they all actually had something useful to say. The worst meetings are when nobody’s done anything, but they spend half-an-hour claiming they have.” I rolled my eyes.
“Too damn right. You know where you did make a mistake, though?”
I frowned. “Where?”
“Promising them doughnuts.” He chuckled. “That was fatal. They’ll be expecting them every damn day now.”
“Oh, aye, probably.” I huffed a laugh and shook my head. “I’ll make them work for them, don’t you worry.”
He sent me an amused look. “As your work partner, I know too well that you will.”
“Shut up. You make me sound like a nightmare.” I shouldered him lightly as we headed back to our desks.
“If the shoe fits…” he teased back. I gave him an unimpressed look, sitting down at my desk with a huff.
“We haven’t got long till we’re due to head off,” I mused aloud. It was creeping close to five, and Sam and I were due to be running home together tonight.
“Better do some paperwork,” Stephen said with a tragic tone of voice.
“Aye, you should. And I ought to tackle some emails.” I groaned.
Still, after the rush and drama of today, it didn’t feel as dull as usual to be catching up on the humdrum day-to-day work of being a detective, which involved enough forms to topple the Amazon. More of our systems were moving online these days, but it was a glacial process, and I still ended up with ink on my fingers by the end of the day.
Stephen headed out a few minutes before me as I stayed behind to finish scanning through my last few emails, checking that I hadn’t missed anything important. There was nothing from Keira or Sam yet, to my disappointment.
I was shutting the screen down and getting myself ready to head out when a pair of DCs came hurrying up to me. I vaguely recognised their faces, remembering after a second both that they were part of the team Rashford had assigned me and that they hadn’t been at the meeting.
“You two have been to the hospital?” I said.
“Yes, sir,” the shorter of the women said with a nod. Her hair, nearly tied in a bun, was damp from the drizzle outside.
“Well?” I asked, my impatience getting the best of me.
The two officers shared a glance. “He’s in a coma, sir. They’re not sure if he’s going to wake up.”
I held back a curse, but only barely.
“We can only hope then,” I said grimly. “Was there any news on what he’d taken?”
“They weren’t sure yet. They were still analysing it,” the one said apologetically.
I sighed before giving the two DCs a nod. “Good job today. Get someone to catch you both up on what you missed today, and we’ll be back at it tomorrow. Go on home now.”
“Thanks, sir.”
They headed out, and I watched them, the neutrality I’d forced onto my face fading once they were gone. I felt a responsibility to act steady and collected in front of the DCs since they were all younger than I was, and Rashford had assigned them to me. I didn’t want to be that senior officer who wasn’t trusted, who blew his rocket at the slightest push, because I’d met plenty of those in my training days, and they soured the mood of the whole team.
Still, hearing that Victor might never recover was a blow. I took a seat at my desk again and gave myself a moment to process it all. There was still some hope that he could wake up, but it wasn’t looking good, and the last thing I wanted was another death added to this case’s body count.
“Darren?”
I started with a jerk before recognising Sam’s voice almost immediately and turning around with a tired smile. She gave me a soft look, and I wondered whether she’d heard about what happened today or if Stephen had filled her in.
“C’mon, old man, let’s get going,” she teased gently.
“What do I get?” I said, pulling myself back to my feet. I did feel old today, like the drizzle and the stress had needled its way into my bones.
“We can have pasta and wine at home. Cuddle Chance for a while, and then put him in the spare room,” she coaxed with a sly smile. “Maybe we’ll have a bit too much and fool around.”
“Aye?” I said, my smile turning into something more genuine. “Let’s make that ‘maybe’ a ‘definitely’, huh?”
“Only if you can keep up with me.” She grinned. “Race you to the changing rooms!”
She took off across the almost deserted office, startling one officer standing by the copy machine. He sent me a bewildered look, and I couldn’t help but laugh, hurrying after her. I couldn’t think of a better way to end a day like today than with Sam.
Nine
The next morning required an aspirin and enough coffee to fill a lorry’s petrol tank.
“Are you going to have any food with that?” Sam said, sounding amused.
“I don’t want to dilute it,” I said, not really serious. She snorted.
“The whole of the English Channel couldn’t dilute that stuff. I think you can manage a piece of toast.”
I munched on the piece she gave me, admittedly feeling a little better once the carbs hit my stomach. Chance watched me eat with large, hopeful eyes, and I chuckled, stroking his silky ears. He’d already had his breakfast, but he was still looking at my plate like we’d been starving him.
I’d skipped my usual run this morning, the fast one Sam and I had done yesterday evening, and the boozy night afterwards had left me worn out, which gave me some extra time to sit at the breakfast table and overthink things.
“What’s making you look like that?” Sam said.
She was putting in her earrings, which were the pale pink flower studs rimmed with silver that I’d got her for her last birthday. I smiled slightly to see them, to see her, and she smiled back, though there was a question in it. My smile faded.
“I was thinking about that text message,” I admitted. I’d filled Sam in on the threat I’d been sent, figuring that she ought to be told, especially since she was so important to me and could’ve been included in the blackmailer’s threat.
“Love, don’t dwell on it. It was a bluff, I’m sure. You called your mum last night, and she was fine, wasn’t she?”
“Aye, I know,” I said. I must not have been very convincing, because she wrapped her arms around me from behind, and I leaned into her shoulder. “You’ll be careful, though, won’t you? I warned my mum, so I’ve got to ask you too.”
“I’ll be fine, I promise. I know you’re a badass with your self-defence now, but I can look after myself too.”
I chuckled. “You’re definitely still a lot better than I am. I just… worry.”
“And I worry about you. That’s the sucky part of being in love.”
“It’s worth it.” I stood up to give her a kiss before checking my watch. I swore with a wince. “Atch, I’m late.”
“I’ll get the car out!” she called after me as I hurried off to pull on some trousers and get my teeth brushed. Stephen wouldn’t want to be stuck in a car with my stale coffee breath.
We managed to both drop Chance off at the daycare and make it to Hewford roughly on time. I jogged up the stairs, my sore legs protesting. Sam waved me off before we split ways, and I made my way over to Stephen’s desk. Some of the DCs had already arrived, I noticed, but it was still early, and the majority hadn’t yet. Stephen wasn’t here just yet, but I knew he’d be later today because he often dropped the kids off at school and pre-school on a Wednesday.
I idly checked my emails, only to hurriedly sit up straight when I saw an email from Keira. The email itself was empty, but there was an attachment that I fumbled to open up. I took it in with a frown, my eyes widening when I clocked what it was. A death certificate. It was for Jackson’s mum, named Louisa Lowe, who’d di
ed over ten years ago. It was just as her sister had said. So why hadn’t Jackson’s dad known? Or if he had known, why the hell had he lied to us about that?
It didn’t make any sense. I sat and looked at it for a minute longer, scrutinising the details, before I sent off a quick thank you to Keira and leaned back in my seat.
Figuring out what was going on there would have to wait for now since Stephen, some of the DCs and I were due round at Victor Roberts’ house today. I wanted to give the house a thorough look over so that we could either rule Victor as being important to the country lines crackdown project or not. There being an overdose so close to Max and Jackson’s seemed like it meant something, as did the fact that Victor had shown up at the pharmacy with injuries, but nothing was confirmed. It was possible that his black eye was due to his being blackmailed into taking part in the drug operation, but he also could’ve got it in a bar fight. We didn’t know yet. I didn’t have the time to spare going off on a tangent if it turned out that he wasn’t related to any of it, and if that was the case, I’d hand his case off to another officer at Hewford to deal with.
I had another email in my inbox from a couple of the DCs, which had been sent at a late hour last night. I appreciated the dedication but made a mental note to myself to tell the DCs in question not to overwork themselves. I might not be able to follow my own advice, but I didn’t want those in my team to get burnt out because they started burning the midnight oil too early in the case. We might need that later on, but not just yet.
The summary of the research they’d sent me was hugely helpful, though. They’d been the pair to volunteer to look into Victor’s past, and it seemed like it’d been a checkered one. He’d been in and out of prison, getting caught by us repeatedly. We’d given him warnings and fines for various acts of antisocial behaviour, as well as drunk and drug-driving, which had landed him a stint in jail. He was still doing community service work, or he should’ve been.
Country Lines (A DI Mitchell Yorkshire Crime Thriller Book 8) Page 9