Where There’s A Will

by Coles, Linda

  “I should think not!” she said, sounding almost indignant, but Will knew he hadn’t offended.

  “What’s the plan for today, Birdie, after you’ve done your stretching?”

  She patted the bag that was on the seat next to her and said, “I’m going to get changed and I’m going to give you a hand.” She caught his eye in the rear-view mirror.

  “You’re going to give me a hand?” he asked. “At what exactly?”

  “What do you think, silly?” she said. “You’re going to the mortuary, I bet.” That stumped Will. He hadn’t told anyone since he’d only made the appointment just prior to setting off.

  “How do you know whether I’m going to the mortuary or not?”

  “Because there’s been a second body found and you’ll have been on the phone this morning if you had any sense, and since you’re a bright lad, you’ll have offered to go and take a look, see if you know him. Am I right?”

  There was no fooling Birdie, quick witted and quick thinking.

  “Well, you’ve got me there, but the thing is I’m going at nine-thirty and you won’t have finished your class. I’m meeting DI Mason there and I don’t think she’d let you in either.”

  “I know that, Will. I don’t expect her to, and I certainly don’t need to view the body. I’d have no clue as to who it might be. But I’m here to bounce things off when you get back in the car. Plus, if it is somebody else you know, you may just need a bit of a chat, maybe a coffee afterwards.” He watched as she turned to watch through the side window. Traffic was building and the journey slowed a little. She seemed intent on watching a woman push a buggy along the pavement, a toddler on foot beside her.

  “That is thoughtful of you, Birdie, but I don’t want to keep you.” He didn’t want to turn her generosity away, though he didn’t feel the need for any comfort either, not yet anyway.

  “You’re not keeping me from anything, and so what if my class is cut a little short. I can always carry on with my stretches at home later. Not that I will, though. It’s more important to lend you a hand. So, if you’ve got time, if you don’t mind waiting for me, obviously I’ll pay, then we can go on together.”

  Will couldn’t help smiling. “It sounds like you’ve already organised everything, Birdie,” he said. “I’d better go along with it – now I know your secret history, I’m very conscious of not upsetting you. You’ve already threatened to kill me once, if I reveal my source.”

  She winked at Will furtively, and he returned it with a light laugh. “Anyway,” she went on, “on that note, remember I mentioned to you I’d kept in touch with one of my fellow inmates, the one that was a little meek and mild? Killed her bloke with rat poison?”

  “I remember that well.” How could he not?

  “Well, I’ve tracked her down. Facebook is a marvellous tool you know.”

  “Really? Was she pleased to hear from you?”

  “Yes, she was actually. I thought it would be fun to catch up and see what she’s been doing, it’s been some years, and you’ll never guess what.”

  “What’s that?” he asked, playing along.

  “It turns out she doesn’t live far from here actually. She’s only in Leicester, so I thought I’d pay her a visit.”

  “That’s nice for you. Will you be going on the train?”

  “Lord, no. I thought I might get you to take me,” she said, “if you’re up for it. It would be a decent fare.”

  “It would be my pleasure. When are you going?”

  “We haven’t actually arranged a firm date yet, but I suspect it will be early next week. Neither of us are working now so there’s no point in waiting too long.”

  “Well, you let me know what day when you know. I’m sure I can squeeze you in.”

  It was only a few minutes into town and Will soon pulled up outside the Pilates studio.

  “What time do I need to be changed and ready for?” Birdie asked.

  Will checked the clock on the dashboard and made a quick calculation. “If you could be ready for, say, quarter past? The hard part is getting the parking space, hospitals are not renowned for having surplus.”

  “Right you are,” she said and proceeded to gather her things.

  Will, having forgotten his manners, hurriedly jumped out of his driver’s seat and went round to undo the rear door, but she was already out. “You don’t need to fuss with me,” she said. “I’ll see you shortly.” And with that he watched the black-Lycra-clad woman enter through the front door and head off for her shortened class.

  Thirty-Two

  As luck would have it, it really didn’t take too long to find a parking space when Will visited the mortuary for the second time that week.. Will helped Birdie, who had thankfully changed and instead wore stylish drainpipe jeans and thick boots, out of the car. Aviator sunglasses perched on the end of her nose. He could never imagine her in elasticated waist trousers and a flowery shirt from a catalogue. He closed the door behind her and the two of them set off to a building Will was beginning to know quite well. He could see DI Mason talking on her phone and loitering by the door. She glanced their way and drew her call to a close.

  “Is that her?” asked Birdie.

  “That’s my contact, yes, DI Rochelle Mason.”

  “And what’s she like?”

  “Hard case is how I’d describe her,” said Will. “It’s not that she’s unpleasant or anything, she just keeps her cards close to her chest, a true poker player. But I can understand why. A real professional.”

  “You need someone that’s a bit looser around the mouth, don’t you, someone that will tell you a little bit more,” said Birdie.

  “Beggars can’t be choosers, though,” said Will. “She’s all I’ve got to work with. I’m sure she’ll come round. When she gets to know me.”

  As Will and Birdie reached the spot where Rochelle was standing, the DI finally looked up and acknowledged their arrival properly. She was wearing what appeared to be motorbike leathers, though Will couldn’t see a helmet.

  “Hello Will,” she said.

  “Hello Rochelle,” he said, nodding politely, “or should I call you DI Mason?”

  “I answer to both, from you,” she said and gave a half-smile which Will took as a good sign. “But who is this, aren’t you going to introduce us?” Rochelle looked quizzically at Birdie and nodded approvingly at her boots. They looked like they’d been buffed for hours.

  “I’m sorry,” he said. “This is my friend Birdie, Birdie Fox.”

  Something flickered in Rochelle’s eyes and was gone in an instant. “And is Birdie in any way connected to Refresh?” she asked.

  Will, not in the habit of lying, couldn’t exactly say she was, and the look on his face told Rochelle all she needed to know.

  “In that case, I’m going to have to ask you to wait outside,” she said, turning to Birdie.

  “No problem,” Birdie said brightly and hung back as the two headed off.

  Will knew what to expect. There would be a viewing room and he would see the victim’s face as the sheet was slowly pulled down, but he’d got an idea this morning. He just hoped it worked.

  “I’ll just see if they’re ready for us,” Rochelle said and headed off into a nearby room leaving Will to pace slowly in the corridor in his own. It wasn’t long before she came back and said, “They’re bringing him through now, you know the drill.”

  “Sadly, I do,” he said as a trolley was wheeled into the small room, the victim covered with a sheet.

  “Ready?” Rochelle asked.

  “Let’s get it over with,” he said, and she nodded to the mortuary assistant on the other side of the glass to come closer to the viewing window. Will stared for a moment, a little unsure, before saying, “I need a closer look. Can I go inside?”

  It was unusual but not unheard of and so Rochelle led the way and the two of them slipped inside and stood beside the body laid out on the trolley. Will peered closer. There was a lot of bruising around the u
pper part of his neck, and an odour he couldn’t quite place, damp almost, rather than stale or unwashed.

  “What is that smell?”

  DI Mason stayed non-committal; she wasn’t going to tell him anything. He stood silently for a moment longer then removed a pen from his inside jacket pocket like he’d seen detectives do on TV. Quick as a flash he flicked the sheet down, exposing the victim’s bare chest and terrible neck injuries. DI Mason was powerless to do anything in the moment, but as soon as she realised what had happened and what Will had now seen, she made her displeasure known.

  “What the—” she half-yelled.

  “I had to make sure it was who I thought it was,” he said, pointing to a small scar, thankful for obvious evidence he could use in his defence. The mortuary assistant hastily pulled the sheet back up, visibly shocked at Will’s actions, and Rochelle bustled him out of the viewing room and back out into the corridor. He could tell she was steaming mad at him, but it was too late now, he’d seen the message written on the lad’s young chest. To deflect the reprimand he knew was coming, he said, “It’s Bowie Marks. I haven’t seen him for a while, but that’s definitely Bowie.” Will locked eyes with Rochelle and waited for any more wrath to subside. By the time it had sunk in that he had given her a name, probably saved hours and hours of searching missing person records and done the police a huge favour, her anger deflated somewhat. She still had to say her piece, though it wasn’t as bad as it could have been.

  “Don’t you ever try something stupid like that again, do you hear me?” she said in a low, even voice. It told Will in no uncertain terms that she was pissed with him. “What good does that do you, now you’ve seen it?”

  “I don’t know yet,” he said, “but when someone is purposely killing disadvantaged people and leaving them like rubbish in Hunsbury Hill Park, I make it my business to help find out what’s going on.”

  “It’s not your business, Will. I appreciate the thought but leave it to us, leave it to the professionals. We’ve got the resources and the know-how, it’s what we do all day every day. You may have compromised an investigation now.”

  “My lips are sealed. You can trust me, Rochelle. It won’t be a problem, but now I know what you’re dealing with, I can listen to the gossip, I can be eyes and ears, I can find out what’s going on with the people living in our community, see if they know anything, if they’ve seen anything. People that won’t open up to the police. Like Jonesy for instance. You know as well as I do that he didn’t tell you the full story, but I got him to open up to me a bit.” It came out in one long stream, without even the tiniest gap for her to get a word in. Rochelle had to concede that what he was saying was true. Not everyone liked the police, particularly those that had been in trouble in the past, as she suspected Jonesy had. At least he’d got away from his ordeal safely. Whatever they were involved in, two victims now lay in the mortuary behind them.

  “Let’s get some air,” she said, trying to defuse the tension, and the two headed outside. “Tell me what he told you.”

  Will had no choice now, but it meant breaking Jonesy’s confidence – he just hoped his friend never found out. He told her about the nutjob on Ketamine and Jonesy’s suspicions of a woman being involved. DI Mason filed it away for later.

  “Thanks, that could be useful,” she conceded.

  Birdie was waiting. And watching. “Can I give you a lift back?” he asked Rochelle.

  “I’m good, thanks. I’ve got my bike today, hence the leathers,” she said, pointing to her legs.

  Will could see Birdie approaching as they slowly walked. He raised his hand in greeting and the pair stopped.

  “Birdie Fox, eh? You don’t half mix with some characters, Will,” Rochelle said before picking up her pace and heading off back to her motorbike, which was parked not far away.

  “You don’t know the half of it,” he called after her, then smiled as his new partner in crime stopped alongside him.

  “Went okay, then?”

  “Perfectly. Any clue what ‘touch move’ means?”

  “You obviously don’t play chess,” she said, linking an arm through his. “I knew I’d come in handy. Come on, I’ll explain on the way. Coffee time.”

  Thirty-Three

  Mayor Colin Hayhurst almost lost the contents of his stomach again when he heard it on the morning news. He’d only been sitting up at Hunsbury Hill the previous afternoon, eating cheese and crackers and drinking red wine from a bottle like a wino. He wondered about the timing – had somebody seen him there? Maybe the person that was blackmailing him knew his every move. Could they have been tailing him? It seemed a coincidence that not long after he’d left the park the second body was discovered. He wondered about the message, delivered by text, written on another victim: ‘Touch move’.

  He didn’t feel like going into the office and debated taking a detour again, though not to the woodlands this time. But there was no chance of that, he couldn’t keep skiving off like he had yesterday afternoon, there was work to be done. This latest death troubled him even more than the first, and he knew now that things were only going to escalate unless he took action. He could hardly go to the police – they’d warned him against it – so there had to be another way. Colin tossed the situation through in his mind yet again, like he’d done so many times of recent, the lack of sleep beginning to show both in his eyes and in his mood. Babs had commented on it only last night when he’d finally arrived home half-drunk. She hadn’t been best pleased, and he’d made his excuses for an early night. Thankfully, she hadn’t wanted to join him. With so much time spent cogitating, he’d come to only one conclusion: his latest development. Somebody knew what he was up to. How though, he’d no clue. He debated calling an emergency meeting with the other two investors. Maybe they would have some advice or know what to do or who to turn to if the police were out of bounds. Was it worth a try? In doing so, he’d risk letting them in on his being blackmailed and not reporting it to the authorities, and then they themselves would become part of a bigger issue. If the police ever found out they all knew about the deaths, had been contacted by the kidnapper, they’d all go down for sure. Plus, he didn’t know how much he could trust them in this kind of situation. Did he have the confidence they wouldn’t overreact? Colin laid his head back on the headrest and closed his eyes while the driver made his way to Angel Square. When he felt the car finally pull up by the kerb, he resisted opening them for a moment longer. It was only when the driver prompted him and said, “Sir, we’re here,” that he knew he must leave.

  “Thank you,” he said finally and climbed out, but he waited for the car to pull away before heading inside to his office.

  It was a bright and airy modern building, so very different from the one they used to work in on George Row, which was both ornate and old, and had character. Now its original chamber was only ever used by the council as a meeting place. The new building felt like a modern university or Google headquarters. All it needed was a pinball in reception and a machine dispensing gobstoppers and you would never know the difference. He preferred the old office with its ancient leather chairs and polished wood desks.

  Colin climbed the stairs up to his office, taking each one slowly so as not to put any further pressure on his heart and lungs. By the time he reached the top, he’d made the decision to call his business partners and explain the situation. The stress was killing him, he had to do something. If things went downhill from there, so be it, but he couldn’t carry on the way he was. The worry and anxiety and missed sleep was getting him nowhere, and he certainly didn’t want any more dead bodies because of him. His conscience couldn’t cope.

  Once at his desk, he called Rodney first and told him he needed to meet urgently that evening at the usual location. He then called Brian, who agreed to meet him later too. In Colin’s head, it was a start to putting things right – he hoped. But what to tell them? Too much and it could backfire. Too little and he might as well not bother. A knock on the door br
oke into his thinking and he looked across to see the familiar ponytail bobbing towards him. It was Katherine, and in her hands she had yet another folder which she placed down in front of him.

  “For your signature,” she said without feeling or a ‘good morning’.

  “Thanks,” he managed before adding, “mine is a coffee when you make it.”

  Katherine left the room as quickly as she had entered, leaving him to attend to the documents. She never did deliver his requested cup of coffee and Colin never reminded her.

  Thirty-Four

  Birdie and Will chatted in the coffee shop in the hospital’s main building. They could have chosen any café in the town, but it seemed silly when they were on the premises not to use the one that was nearby, and a coffee was a coffee in Will’s book, though Birdie would disagree. The location suited them both and a steady flow of doctors, nurses, porters and hospital visitors sipped on hot drinks. It looked like any coffee shop in any hospital in any town. The two sat together in the back of the room, for privacy more than anything, not wanting anybody to overhear their conversation about dead bodies. Will had run through what had happened in the mortuary and Birdie hadn’t flinched when he’d explained what he’d done. In fact, she’d said she was impressed with him for doing such a thing in front of the detective inspector. He had some balls.

  “So, what do you think it means then, ‘touch move’?” Will asked. “Why would somebody write that on a dead body?”

  “Let me explain,” said Birdie, leaning forward conspiratorially. “It’s a term when you play chess, and it really means if a player deliberately touches the piece on the board when it’s their turn to do something, then they must move that piece once they’ve touched it. You have to move it if it’s legal to do so. So, what the killer could be saying is ‘I’ve done this because you made me, I touched the body therefore I have to kill it.’ That’s what I think anyway,” she said, shrugging her shoulders and sitting back in her chair. “I don’t know what else it could mean, and that seems the obvious answer to me.”