Bryant shook the hand. Kim did not. ‘And you are?’
‘Mrs Pearson, Professor Milton’s assistant.’
Okay, clearly the professor was too busy to see them. If they learned nothing from his assistant they would be forced to insist.
‘May we ask you some questions about a project Professor Milton is working on?’ Bryant asked.
‘Very quickly,’ she answered. There was no offer to go elsewhere to speak more privately. The woman was clearly going to give them only a little time.
‘The professor is interested in an archaeological dig?’
Mrs Pearson nodded. ‘Yes, permission was granted a few days ago.’
‘What exactly is he looking for?’ Bryant asked.
‘Valuable coins, Detective.’
Kim raised an eyebrow. ‘In a field on the outskirts of Rowley Regis?’
Mrs Pearson sighed as though speaking to an errant toddler. ‘You are clearly ignorant of the richness of our immediate locale. Have you never heard of the Staffordshire hoard?’
Kim looked at Bryant. They both shook their heads.
Mrs Pearson made no attempt to hide her disdain. Clearly people outside of academia were philistines.
‘One of the most substantial finds of our time was discovered in a field in Lichfield a few years ago. More than three and a half thousand pieces of gold valued at just over three million pounds. Just recently a hoard of silver denarius coins dating back to 31 BC were discovered in Stoke on Trent.’
Kim was intrigued. ‘Who gets the money?’
‘Well, take the recent find in Bredon Hill, Worcestershire. A man with a metal detector found Roman gold, including coins, and both he and the farmer received over a million and a half.’
‘What makes the professor think there’s something in Rowley?’
Mrs Pearson shrugged. ‘Local legend, myth about a battle that took place in that area.’
‘Did he recently take a call from a woman named Teresa Wyatt?’
The woman thought for a moment. ‘Yes, I think so. She called a few times, insisting on speaking to Professor Milton. I think he called her back late one afternoon.’
Okay, Kim had had enough. There was something here and she was no longer content to speak to the monkey. She needed the organ grinder to recount the content of that conversation.
‘Thank you for your help, Mrs Pearson, but I think regardless of how busy the professor might be we need to speak to him immediately.’
Mrs Pearson looked puzzled then angry. ‘Now I have a question for you, Detective. Don’t you people talk to each other?’
‘Excuse me?’ Bryant asked.
‘Well you’re obviously not from the missing persons unit, otherwise you’d know.’
‘Know what, Mrs Pearson?’
She harrumphed and crossed her arms across her chest. ‘That Professor Milton has not been seen or heard of for more than forty-eight hours.’
Nine
Nicola Adamson closed her eyes against the foreboding that washed over her as she put the key into the lock of the penthouse apartment. Despite her gentle touch the sound still seemed to reverberate around the hall; as did most things at two thirty a.m.
Myra Downs in apartment 4C would be out any second to see who was making all the noise. Nicola could swear the retired accountant slept against the front door.
As expected she heard the familiar sound of her neighbour’s deadbolt sliding across the bottom of the door, but she managed to curl herself into her own apartment before the one-woman neighbourhood watch committee spotted her.
Even before she hit the light switch Nicola could feel the difference in her home. It had been taken over, invaded. Although the space was still hers, she was having to share it all. Again.
She removed her shoes and padded through the lounge quietly, headed for the kitchen. Despite the visitor in the spare room she tried to maintain her own habits, her own routine, her own life.
She took a lasagne from the fridge and placed it into the microwave. Work always made her hungry and this was her routine; get back from the club, warm up a meal while taking a shower, then a bite to eat with a glass of red wine before going to bed.
Having to share her home was not going to change that. Nevertheless, she tiptoed across to the bathroom. She was tired and in no mood for drama.
Once in the bathroom Nicola breathed a sigh of relief. Each door she closed behind her was a battle fought and won. She pictured herself inside a computer game where the object was to clear each room whilst outrunning the enemy.
That was unfair, she chided herself as she dropped the clothes in a pile beside the walk-in shower. She had to adjust the temperature dial, which irritated her. Until a week ago no adjustment had been necessary. The dial would have been right where she left it.
She closed her eyes and lifted her face to meet the steaming water. The needles felt good on her skin. She turned away from the spray and craned her neck back. Within seconds the power shower had soaked her long blonde hair. She reached behind to the metal rack but found an empty space. Dammit, the bottle had been placed on the floor again.
She reached down and picked it up. The force of the squeeze sent a stream of shampoo onto the shower glass. Again she swallowed down the irritation. Sharing her space shouldn’t be so difficult, but it bloody well was. It was what she’d had to do all her life.
She could feel the tension in her shoulders. Tonight had not been a good night for her.
She’d worked at The Roxburgh for the five years since her twentieth birthday and had loved every minute of it. She didn’t care if people thought her job was seedy or degrading. She loved to dance, enjoyed showing off her body and men paid a lot of money to watch her. She didn’t strip and there was no touching. It wasn’t that kind of club.
There were other clubs in the centre of Birmingham and every dancer at every one of them aspired to work at The Roxburgh. For Nicola it would be the only club at which she would ever work. She intended to retire from dancing when she reached thirty and pursue other interests. Her bank balance supported that plan.
During the last five years she had become the most popular dancer at the venue. She received on average three requests for private dances per night and at two hundred pounds a time it was not to be sniffed at.
She knew she was the anti-Christ for some feminists and to that she raised her middle finger. Women’s liberation for her was about the right to choose and she chose to dance; not because she was some vacant crackhead needing the money, but because she enjoyed it.
Even as a child she had enjoyed performing. She had strived for that individuality, that uniqueness that would set her apart, that would make people notice her.
But tonight she had felt dissatisfied with her performance. There had been no complaints from her customers; the Cristal had flowed and two bottles of Dom Perignon had been bought by her last client, making her boss a very happy man.
But Nicola knew. She knew that tonight her mind had not been fully on her work. She had not felt that total submission of herself, her mind and body, to the performance. To her it was the difference between Best Actress or Best Support.
She washed the conditioner from her hair and stepped out of the shower. She towelled herself dry and snuggled into the robe, enjoying the sensation of the warm fabric against her skin. She tied the belt around her waist and stepped out of the bathroom.
She stopped dead. For a moment she had forgotten. Just for a moment.
‘Beth,’ she breathed.
‘Who else?’
Nicola headed to the kitchen. ‘Sorry if I woke you,’ she said, removing the lasagne from the microwave. She took out two plates and halved the meal.
She placed one plate at her own seat and the other opposite.
‘I ay hungry,’ Beth said.
Nicola tried not to cringe at Beth's broad Black Country dialect. It was a habit she herself had worked hard to overcome. As children they had both spoken that way but Beth had
made no effort to change.
‘Have you eaten today?’ Nicola asked and then silently reprimanded herself. Would she ever grow out of the habit of being the older twin? Even if it was only by a matter of minutes.
‘Yer don't want me here, do yer?’
Nicola stared down into the pasta. Suddenly her appetite was gone. The directness of her sister’s question did not surprise her and it was futile to lie. Beth knew her almost as well as she knew herself.
‘It’s not that I don’t want you here, it’s just that it’s been so long.’
‘And whose fault's that, dear sister?’
Nicola swallowed and took her plate to the sink. She dared not look. She could not face the accusation and hurt.
‘Do you have plans for tomorrow?’ she asked, steering their conversation to something less explosive.
‘Of course. Will yo be working again tomorrow night?’
Nicola said nothing. It was obvious that Beth disapproved of her lifestyle. ‘Why do yer degrade yerself like that?’
‘I enjoy what I do,’ Nicola defended. She hated that her voice had risen an octave.
‘But yer degree in Sociology. It’s a bloody waste.’
‘At least I have a degree,’ Nicola shot back and instantly regretted it. The silence between them was charged.
‘Well, yo took that dream away from me, didn't yer?’
Nicola knew that Beth blamed her for their estrangement but she could never bring herself to ask why.
Nicola stared into the sink, clutching the unit. ‘Why did you come back?’
Beth sighed heavily. ‘Where else would I go?’
Nicola silently nodded and the air between them calmed.
‘It’s all gonna start back up again, ain't it?’ Beth asked quietly.
Nicola heard the vulnerability in her sister’s voice and it made her heart ache. Some bonds could not be broken.
The dirty plate blurred before her eyes and the years without her sister bore down on her.
‘And how will yer protect me this time, big sis?’
Nicola wiped at her eyes and turned, reaching out to hold her twin but the bedroom door had already closed.
Nicola emptied the contents of the second plate. She spoke quietly towards the spare bedroom. ‘Beth, for whatever reason you hate me, I’m sorry. So very, very sorry.’
Ten
At seven a.m. Kim stood before the headstone and pulled the leather jacket tightly around herself. On top of the Rowley hill dominated by Powke Lane cemetery the wind howled around her. It was Saturday and she always made time for family on a Saturday, new case or not.
Grave markers still bore the debris of Christmas gifts left by the living guilty; wreaths reduced to skeletal twigs, poinsettias battered into wilted submission by the weather. A layer of frost glistened on top of the Imperial Red stone.
From the moment she’d found the simple wooden cross marking the space she had saved as much as she could from her two jobs and bought the stone. It had been installed two days after her eighteenth birthday.
Kim gazed at the sparse gold lettering, all she’d been able to afford back then; simply a name and two dates. As usual she was struck by the distance between the two years engraved, no more than a blink.
She kissed her fingers and placed them firmly against the cold stone. ‘Good night, sweet Mikey, sleep tight.’
The tears stung her eyes but she fought them back. They were the same words she had spoken right before the last breath had left his fragile, defeated body.
Kim put the memory safely back into the box and donned her helmet. She pushed the Kawasaki Ninja to the exit gate. There was something disrespectful about igniting the roar of the 1400 cc engine within the confines of the cemetery. A metre out and she spurred the machine into action.
At the bottom of the hill she pulled into an industrial estate awash with ‘To Let’ signs; a stark testament to the area’s industrial history and a suitably barren area from which to make the phone call.
Kim took out her phone. This was not a conversation that took place anywhere near Mikey’s grave. She would not allow his final resting place to be contaminated by evil. She had to protect him, even now.
The call was answered on the third ring.
‘Nurse Taylor, please.’
The line went dead for a few seconds before she heard the familiar voice.
‘Hi, Lily, It’s Kim Stone.’
The nurse’s voice was warm. ‘Hi, Kim, it’s lovely to hear from you. I thought you might call today.’
The nurse said the same thing every time and yet it had never changed once. She’d made this call on the twelfth of each month for the last sixteen years.
‘How is she?’
‘She had a quiet Christmas but she seemed to enjoy the choir that visited ...’
‘Any violent episodes?’
‘No, not for a while now. Her medication is stable.’
‘Anything else?’
‘She asked about you again yesterday. Although she has no concept of dates, it’s almost like she knows when you’re about to call.’ The nurse paused. ‘You know, if you ever wanted to come and ...’
‘Thank you for your time, Lily.’
Kim had never visited and never would. Grantley psychiatric clinic had been home to her mother since Kim was six years old and it was where she belonged.
‘I’ll tell her you called.’
Kim thanked her again and hit the ‘end’ button. The nurse treated Kim’s monthly phone calls as a welfare check to see how her mother was doing and Kim had never informed her otherwise.
Only Kim knew that she made the call to ensure that the murdering, evil bitch was still safely behind bars.
Eleven
‘Righty, update folks. Kev, what do we know from Mispers?’
‘Professor Milton has just divorced for the third time. A bit like Simon Cowell, all his exes have nothing but good to say about him. No natural children of his own but step-father to five. No hostility noted.’
‘When did he go missing?’
‘Wednesday was the last time he was seen. His assistant at the college raised the alarm when he didn’t appear on Thursday morning. He hasn’t been in touch with any of his family members, which is apparently very strange.’
‘Anything to suggest he’s done this before?’
Dawson shook his head. ‘To hear the exes talk he’s a reincarnation of Gandhi; mild-mannered and gentle.’ Kev consulted his notes. ‘The latest ex spoke to him on Tuesday afternoon and he was excited that he finally had permission for the dig.’
‘I’ve been looking into that, Guv,’ Stacey offered. ‘The original application made by Professor Milton was two years ago. There've been more than twenty objections to the project; environmental, political, cultural. I ain’t got anything further on that yet.’
‘Keep trying, Stace. Bryant, do we know exactly when our victim spoke to the Professor?’
Bryant held out a piece of paper. ‘Courtney faxed me the telephone log. They spoke for twelve minutes on Wednesday at around five thirty.’
Kim crossed her arms. ‘Okay, so all we have so far is that our victim had a brief conversation with a university professor on Wednesday afternoon and now one of them is dead and the other is missing.’
A knock sounded on the door. A constable stood in the doorway.
‘What?’ she barked. She hated interruptions during briefing.
‘Marm, I have a gentleman at the desk who wants to speak to you.’
Kim looked at him as though he’d lost his mind.
‘I know, Marm, but he insists that he will only speak to you. He says he’s a professor ...’
Kim was out of her chair. ‘Bryant, with me,’ she said, stopping at the door. ‘Stace, find out whatever you can about this land.’
She headed out and took the stairs. Bryant almost kept pace with her.
In the reception she was greeted by a male with a full grey beard and a shock of wiry hair.
‘Professor Milton?’
He stopped wringing his hands long enough to offer a handshake. Kim took his hand briefly and then gave it back to him.
‘Please, come this way.’
Kim guided him through the corridor to interview room 1.
‘Bryant, place a call to Mispers so they don’t waste any more time. Is there anything we can get you?’
‘A sweet cup of tea.’
Bryant nodded and closed the door behind them.
‘A lot of people have been worried about you, Professor.’
She didn’t intend for the words to sound like a rebuke but she hated any waste of police time. Resources were scant enough.
He nodded his understanding. ‘I’m sorry, Detective. I didn’t know what to do. I only spoke to Mrs Pearson a few hours ago and she told me about your visit. She said I could trust you.’
Kim was surprised that the old harridan had formed that opinion of her.
‘Where have you been?’ she asked. It wasn’t the question that rolled around in her mouth but if Bryant had been beside her he would have urged caution. The male was clearly trembling and his hands had returned, like magnets, to each other.
‘Barmouth, at a bed and breakfast. I just had to get away.’
‘But on Wednesday you were over the moon. Mrs Pearson told us.’
He nodded as Bryant entered the room. His hands held a triangle of styrofoam. He sat and pushed one of the cups towards the professor.
Kim continued. ‘You spoke to a woman by the name of Teresa Wyatt on that day?’
Professor Milton looked confused. ‘Yes, Mrs Pearson mentioned that you asked about that but I’m not sure how it relates to what happened to me later.’
Kim had no idea what had happened to him later but she did know that Teresa Wyatt had turned up dead.
‘Can you tell us why Teresa Wyatt called you?’
‘Of course. She asked if I would be accepting any volunteers onto the project.’
‘What did you say?’
Silent Scream: An edge of your seat serial killer thriller (Detective Kim Stone crime thriller series Book 1) Page 4