by Ryan Casey
“Brian.”
His ears pricked up. The voice was shakier than usual. Price stood by the door, his tie loose around his neck. He waited for Brian to speak. Brian held out.
“I was…” He rubbed his hands against one another as the rest of the office looked up at him, curious. “Could I have a word?”
Brian stayed in his seat, but some of the other officers were starting to whisper. He stood up. “Sure.”
Price led the way back to his office.
“We’ve just been clearing the loose ends up and getting everything back in order,” Price said. “Scott Watson’s still in custody, but we’re playing it cool with him. We’re very, very curious about how his prints just so happened to be all over the murder vehicle. Looks to me like Walters might’ve had a driver do his dirty work for him, but we’ve nothing to prove it yet. Robert Luther’s back at BetterLives, but we’re keeping an eye on him.” Price, his hand shaking, stuffed his whisky flask into his rucksack.
“What did Luther have to say?”
“Obviously he’s gutted. His best friend just turned out to be a nonce, then topped himself. In a bit of a haze. Went straight back to work.”
“And there’s no sign of any foul play on BetterLives’ part? No sign of any sort of cover-up of what Walters was up to?”
Price shrugged. “We’ve spoken to a few members of staff this morning, and they’re all as stunned as the rest of us. They’ve given us records, documents, all sorts. Looks like one bad egg using his privileges to his sick personal advantage. But we keep on investigating BetterLives. It all starts here, Brian.”
“Right.”
Price regarded him with narrowed eyes. “Look, I know what you think about me. I know you can’t forgive me for my misjudgement. But Brian, it’s just how it works. I made an error, and I’m paying for it. I can’t do anything more than apologise.” Price scratched his stubbly cheeks.
“What happens now?”
Price walked back to his chair and spun it around with one finger. “I finish my day’s work, and I go home to my family. I’ve done this for too many years. No doubt you’ll be in my shoes someday.”
Brian took a deep breath. “Actually, I came to hand in my notice. I’m…I’m leaving.”
Price’s jaw dropped. “You don’t have…But Brian, you’re a great detective. Why?”
“I need time to get my life back on track. My family–they are what matters. This whole thing has made me realise what I really value. The stuff with Walters and the kids, and y’know, what happened to Davey. It’s just made me realise how much I’d hate for him to have nobody to look out for him.”
“You’re a good man, Brian. The department will miss you.” He reached out his hand. “Thank you.”
Brian reluctantly placed his palm in Price’s, and they stared at each other for a moment. It was strange, being so intimate with Price. In his many years of working with the police, Brian had never seen Price’s defences broken down for such a prolonged period.
“I’m sorry it had to end this way for you, Detective Inspector,” Brian said.
Price grinned and tightened up his shoulders again, the redness returning to his nose. The doctored photographs had been taken down, meaning Price must have noticed. Good job he wasn’t in the office when that went down. “Don’t you fucking ‘Detective Inspector’ me,” he said. “It’s Dale.”
Brian smiled as he turned out of Dale Price’s office space. Dale. He didn’t look like a Dale, not one bit.
Brian grabbed his coat and slung it over his shoulders. He slipped the packed lunch Cassy had rustled up for him under his arm.
“Where d’you think you’re going?” Cassy asked as Brian strode towards the exit.
Brian grinned. “I’m going home to see my wife and my kid.”
He walked out of the office and into the open air.
Chapter Thirty Three
Brian shook his dusty curtains and wiped the condensation from the window. He always let it get so murky in here, to the point where it seemed beyond saving. But not today. Today, he had to get things right. He had the chance to make a good impression on Vanessa and Davey. The case was over, so he could focus on rebuilding things.
For a moment, the room almost looked nice. Almost.
He picked up the three used razor blades and empty whisky bottle from the floor and tossed them into an overflowing black bin bag, which was stretching at the sides with the weight of the litter. The thought of cutting himself sickened him. He’d spent the last hour or two cleaning, but now he was free. He’d enjoy his time off for a few weeks then get some easy job down at the shop, or maybe he’d go back to the police but something administrative. No more of this Detective Sergeant bull-crap.
On the floor by his black workbag, Brian found a bunch of newspaper clippings. Scott Watson, Robert Luther, BetterLives, an assortment of things related to the case. He shoved them into a cardboard box. He wouldn’t need them again.
He looked at his watch. Two p.m. He still had two hours to kill. What did unemployed men do? Sit around? He’d just about got away with sitting around on his extended leave, but most of those months were spent under a cloud of moping and feeling sorry for himself. Being happy and sitting around all day seemed mutually exclusive concepts.
He jumped back onto his bed and winced as something pointy stuck into his side from underneath his coat pocket. He reached in to see what the culprit was. The DVD recording that Michael Walters had handed him. Damn. He’d been so focused on getting things sorted that he’d pretty much forgotten about it. In the end, the DVD had become nothing more than a decoy. The fact that Walters had been hiding the DVD probably showed that he’d left the private party earlier than he’d originally claimed, or something like that. Must have known what his fate was going to be when the police watched it. That’d be why he killed himself. Good job, Walters–solved the case for us.
Out of curiosity, Brian pulled the DVD out of the white card holder and slipped it into the DVD slot in the bottom of his portable telly. He hit play, and blurry images moved across the screen, not quite in black and white but devoid of colour.
It started at three p.m. Nothing much happening: a recording of Luther’s office. Michael Walters coming in and out with papers. Luther writing something. Luther walking around the room. Brian yawned and slipped his hands behind his neck.
When it got to eight p.m., his attention picked up.
Walters, Luther, and a couple of other charity workers in the room, laughing and joking over a drink. The BetterLives party. If the facts added up, the guests would leave, Luther would rendezvous with Nicola Watson, she’d come back into his office soaking wet, and she’d leave. Michael Walters would probably follow her.
Nine p.m. A glimpse of someone in the corner of the room, slightly out of focus. Luther stepped up from his chair and disappeared. Brian fumbled around with the remote to rewind it, cursing as he accidentally changed the channel. He flicked back and rewound.
Sure enough, at nine p.m., Nicola Watson’s recognisable figure arrived at Luther’s office. Luther shot to his feet, hands against his face, as the other men looked on. Then, Nicola and Luther disappeared out of the room. Walters hung his head in the corner of the room and attempted to make conversation with the other men.
At 9:06, Robert Luther returned to the room, shaking his head and apologising to the other men. The party went on. Nicola would be heading to meet Danny. They’d smoke a few joints, and then Nicola would leave and return to BetterLives. She’d jump into the docklands and return to the office, only to be met with her death some time later.
Nothing much of interest happened in the following hour, so Brian hit fast-forward. At ten thirty, the first man left. Another one left shortly after him. Before he knew it, it was just Robert and Michael. Michael would leave the room soon. Luther would get a call from Nicola and bring her in, soaking wet. They’d spend some time there for a while.
But Michael and Luther stay
ed in the room. Ten minutes became fifteen. Fifteen became twenty. Luther rubbed his head in his hands. Michael slumped against the wall. Something didn’t seem right. They didn’t seem like lifelong friends or two men who had just enjoyed a company New Year gathering.
At last, Luther pulled his phone to his ear. This was it. This was where he left to save Nicola. This was where Michael left the room and waited, eavesdropping or knowing what she was about to say. Luther stood up, and Michael blocked his exit.
Something caught Brian’s eye.
He had to rewind the DVD to catch it properly, but it was definitely there. Luther, squaring up to Michael before he left the room and looking him directly in the eye, just for a few seconds.
Then he was gone.
Brian dropped the remote to the floor and fumbled for his phone. He keyed in Luther’s office number without even taking time to think.
One ring. Another ring.
“Hello, Robert Luther speaking, how may I help?”
Brian rubbed his eyes. “Luther…Robert, it’s Detective Sergeant McDone. How are you doing?”
“McDone. Not great, not great. Trying to get my head around things. Is everything okay?”
“Yeah, just I found the DVD that was removed from CityWatch. Michael Walters gave it to me before he…passed. There’s just a couple of things I need to clear up with you.”
The crackle of mobile static cut through the conversation.
“Of course. Such as?”
Brian closed his eyes. “Before you went down to save Nicola from the water, you and Michael exchanged words about something. Can you remember what they were?”
Luther let out a puff of air. “Maybe he’d cocked something up again? He could be a bugger with his spelling sometimes.”
Brian watched the images flicker behind the shaking static of the television, Luther squaring up to Michael. “No, no. I don’t think it was, Robert.”
“Is there something you’d like to talk about? I’ve got a free hour or so if you want to come down to BetterLives HQ and get things sorted?”
Brian looked at his watch again. An hour and forty-five minutes before he was due to meet Vanessa and Davey. He could make it there and back in that time, couldn’t he? “Sure. I’m sorry about this. It’s just a technicality or two.”
“It’s fine, Detective. I understand how it is.”
They said their farewells, and Brian put the phone down. He took another glance at the pause screen in front of him. Michael Walters had hidden this DVD. He’d claimed it was an accident, and he’d got the wrong DVDs.
He’d tried to hide something, and he’d killed himself because he knew it was about to be discovered.
As Brian slung his coat over his shoulders and grabbed his car keys, he couldn’t get a niggling idea out of his head. The look of malice in Luther’s eyes as he squared up to Walters.
Had Nicola managed to tell Robert about what Michael was up to after all?
Did Robert Luther know about the atrocities being committed in the name of BetterLives?
Brian’s head spun with thoughts as he revved up his car engine, but all of them led to the same final question.
Was Robert Luther willing to be wrongly arrested for the murder of Nicola Watson, rather than allow the truth about Michael Walters and BetterLives to come out?
Chapter Thirty Four
Brian arrived at BetterLives ten minutes later. Luther had a pot of tea ready to greet him as he entered his office. An unusual sobriety inhabited the place. Volunteer workers whispering to one another, holding up newspapers. “Charity at Centre of Child Abuse Scandal”, the Lancashire News already read. Sensationalist bastards. Always had been. They were quicker to turn on their supposed city saviours than Brian had expected. Perhaps the police weren’t the whipping boys for a change.
Robert Luther’s eyes were dark underneath, his skin paler than when Brian had last seen him. Signs of a beard sprouted from his face, and he seemed strangely distant and detached.
“Take a seat, Detective.” He gestured towards the leather chair opposite the desk. It was the chair on those DVDs in which Michael Walters had sat. Luther stared at it for a few moments before shuffling some papers on his desk and sidling into his own chair. He rubbed his hands together and stared at his desk with a glassy glare.
“Firstly, I’d like to apologise,” Brian said. “I know it must have come as a shock to you to find out about your colleague.” Play the cool card. Test the water.
“Sixteen years. Sixteen years. That’s a long time. A long time to know someone and then to find this out about them. It’s just…” He shook his head and scratched his hands aggressively.
“It’s just I feel guilty. For not knowing. For all of this happening. If I’d have known, I’d have–” He dropped his head into his hands. “How did I not know? How could I not know?”
Brian cleared his throat. “I know this isn’t ideal, but did Michael ever give off any indications that maybe all wasn’t as it seemed? That maybe he had…well, let’s call them ‘alternative interests’, for the purposes of this conversation?”
Robert moved his hands away from his face. His hair drooped onto his forehead. “If you’d asked me that an hour ago, I might have said no. You see, that’s the thing. The more I think about Michael–the dates he had, the weird times he’d go disappearing away, the little off-hand comments he’d make–the more I think…you know?”
Brian nodded. “Do you…do you have any idea why Michael Walters might have removed the CCTV footage of your office?”
Luther’s eyebrows twitched.
“The CCTV footage of this office from the night of Nicola Watson’s murder. Why would he hide that?”
Luther shook his head slowly. “I–I don’t know. I really don’t know anymore.”
Fuck. He’d hit a loose end. He shouldn’t really be here anyway. Price didn’t know, and Cassy didn’t know. He looked at his watch–only an hour until Vanessa and Davey paid a visit. He was wasting his time here. The case was over. He had to let it go.
He pulled himself up from his chair and straightened out the bottom of his jacket. “Look, I’d better leave–”
“You don’t have to leave. I’m just…I appreciate you’re doing your job. Be honest with me if you have to be, Detective.”
Brian scratched the back of his neck. “It’s just there’s something I’m not getting with all of this, Robert. The argument–the exchange–between you and Michael before you left to meet Nicola Watson. I can’t help but feel…”
Robert’s bottom lip started to shake as his glazed eyes stared at Brian. “What?”
Brian took a deep breath. “I think you knew what was going on, didn’t you? I think Nicola Watson told you what Michael Walters was doing in the name of your charity, didn’t she?”
Robert Luther slumped his head back into his hands and brushed his fingertips through his hair.
“And I think you suspected it was Michael Walters who killed Nicola all along, didn’t you?”
Robert, digging his nails into his forehead, shook his head in defeat.
Brian edged around the desk. “I think you suspected it, and you knew, but rather than see your goody-two-shoes charity crumble, you waited, didn’t you? You waited and hoped things sorted themselves out? Waited for the wrong person to be arrested?”
Robert continued to shake his head in his hands, increasing in momentum as Brian approached.
“I think you sat in that prison cell prepared to go down for what Michael Walters had done because you couldn’t bear for that information about your charity to come out, could you? I bet when you heard Michael had been charged, you were disappointed. Deep down, all your legacy falling ap–”
“No!” Robert shouted. His eyes were bloodshot, and the corners of his mouth quivered. “No. These claims are completely unfounded. Now if I could politely ask you to leave. Please leave, Detective.” He pointed towards
the door.
“You knew, didn’t you? You knew?” Brian stepped closer to Luther. Luther’s faltering arm was still aimed at the door. “You can talk to me about it, Robert. You can talk to me.”
Every muscle in Robert Luther’s body went slack. He let out a long, deep breath. A tear rolled down his cheek. “Everything I worked for.”
Brian’s heart began to race. Holy shit. Ho-ly shit. “Thanks for your honesty, Robert.”
“What will it mean? For me? And for BetterLives? What will it mean?” He walked backwards and forward on the spot, rubbing his shaking arms, his face twitching. He was like a frantic animal just experimented on.
“We just have to see, Robert. We’ll just have to see how things go.”
Robert covered his face with his hands, and then pulled them away. He moved up to Brian with wide, tearful eyes. “I have files. I have everything. We can help you. I can help you.” He pulled a chain of keys out of his pocket and struggled to unlock his filing shelves. When he finally managed to turn the key, he began to throw books to the floor, tearing folders and files from their place with no real direction.
Brian noticed a bunch of papers on the floor, their pages slightly curled and a few chunks of paper missing from the top corner. Brian reached down and picked them up as Luther continued to hunt at a manic pace for whatever he was hunting.
Brian studied the papers. On the front, a seemingly incomprehensible list of dates:
28-1-09 - CCS.
04-4-09 - BCD.
Brian flicked through the pages. The same seemingly illogical pattern of numbers and letters sprawled down each side.
“This is my private cabinet,” Luther said, saliva flying out of his mouth. “Nobody goes in here but me. Not staff, not Michael–nobody. I can help you, Detective. Something in here will help you. There has to be something…”