Missing Lies (Reissue)

by Chris Collett

  ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to wake you,’ said Mariner.

  But under the duvet she’d found his erection. ‘Like hell,’ she said. ‘What were you planning to do with this?’

  She guided him in, and as he moved rhythmically over her, she arched towards him, her arms raised, and the moonlight caught the silver strand of the bracelet on her wrist. Mariner stopped abruptly and Suzy tensed. He’d been honest with her from the start about his less-than-reliable functioning, and it was a moment she’d been dreading.

  ‘There’s something wrong,’ Mariner said.

  Suzy wriggled against him. ‘Feels all right to me,’ she said encouragingly, drawing him in deeper.

  ‘No,’ said Mariner, pulling back and rolling off her. ‘It isn’t. Oh, Christ, we’ve made a mistake.’

  * * *

  Tiffany was a couple of hours into her birthday night out and so far it wasn’t going well. She was beginning to think she must be giving off bad vibes or something. The others had both been hit on loads of times, but no matter how much she smiled or tried to get into a conversation, the men always ended up either drifting away or chatting to one of her friends instead.

  Now she was standing on the sidelines at the bar again, feeling stone-cold sober despite all the shots they’d plied her with, and increasingly despondent. She was annoyed with Lex and Sophie. They had promised they’d stick with her all night, but since a pair of hot guys had come along (one and his wingman, of course; it was never three) she’d been effectively abandoned. Now she was hot, miserable and dying for a fag. Catching Lex’s eye, she gestured as much. Her friend shook her head in disapproval. Tiffany was the only smoker among them too, but she couldn’t be expected to lose weight and give up smoking at the same time. She made her way out to the front of the club. It was pissing down outside and she hadn’t brought an umbrella — too cumbersome on a night out. Stepping out, she saw a man a little way along the street, standing under an awning. He momentarily lit up with a tell-tale glow as he drew on his cigarette. He must have seen her too. ‘Room for one more under here,’ he called.

  Tottering on her too-high heels, Tiffany scurried across to join him under the canopy. She winced from the pain in her wrist as she got out her cigarettes and was fumbling around for her lighter when she heard the strike of flint by her ear.

  ‘Here you go.’ His voice was vaguely familiar and as the lighter flared, she sort of recognised his face too. ‘You don’t remember me, do you?’ he said. He must have sensed her confusion and held out his arms. ‘I know. I don’t look the same without the kit.’

  ‘Oh . . . you’re from the hospital,’ Tiffany realised. A squall of rain gusted around them and he placed a protective hand on her back, drawing her in a little closer. She found it strangely intimate. He was too old for her, but he was fit in every sense of the word: quite tall, slim and good looking. He smelled nice too, of soap and aftershave. ‘How’s your wrist?’ he asked.

  ‘Actually, it really hurts,’ Tiffany confessed. ‘I took the splint off.’

  She held out her hand for him to see, and he took it between his, rubbing it gently with his thumbs, his cigarette gripped between his knuckles. His touch felt like an electric shock. ‘Hm, that might not have been the best idea.’ Releasing Tiffany’s hand again, he picked up a beer bottle from a ledge beside him and offered it to her. Tiffany didn’t really like beer but she took it anyway, because it was the cool thing to do. She tried not to grimace as she drank.

  As she handed it back, he took one last pull on his cigarette before dropping it on the pavement and flattening it with his heel. ‘Well, that’s me done for the night,’ he said.

  ‘Aren’t you coming back inside?’ said Tiffany, trying not to sound desperate. She wanted to see the look on Lex and Sophie’s faces when she went back in with him. He might dance with her, his body pressed up against hers.

  ‘No, I’m heading off,’ he said. ‘I think I’ll find somewhere a bit quieter.’

  Tiffany realised suddenly that it was exactly what she wanted to do. ‘I’ve had enough too,’ she said truthfully. ‘My friends have got off with a couple of blokes.’

  ‘And you’re left out? I can’t believe that, a lovely girl like you.’ He was gazing intently at her face, and quite unexpectedly he reached out and placed a hand on her neck, stroking her jawline. Then he leaned down and kissed her very gently on the lips. Tiffany thought her knees would give way.

  He broke the kiss. ‘Look, my car is parked just down there and it’s a bloody awful night. Can I give you a lift anywhere?’ He held up his hands. ‘I’m perfectly safe, I promise. Hardly had anything to drink.’ He lifted up the beer bottle. ‘Especially if you polish this off for me.’

  Tiffany hesitated for only a moment. They’d found the creep who was preying on women; she’d heard it on the radio this morning. She gazed up into his handsome face and, for an instant, imagined them in bed together. It would be more than an inexperienced fumble with him; he’d really know what he was doing. Anticipation tingled warmly between her legs. ‘All right,’ she said. Taking the bottle from him, she drank what was left. There was more than she’d thought and drinking it quickly, she had to stifle a little burp afterwards. ‘I’ll be back in a minute,’ she said. ‘I should just go tell my friends.’

  ‘Sure,’ he said. ‘I’ll wait here.’

  Terrified that he might change his mind and leave without her, Tiffany hurried back into the club, past the bouncers. But once inside, the prospect of walking into the heaving, throbbing mass on the dance floor to try and explain to her friends defeated her. It was taking her too long. So instead she got out her phone. She felt a thrill of excitement anyway texting Lex to say: Met a gr8 man! Cu 2moro. After he’d made love to her, she would take a picture of him and send that. She might be a slow starter, but now they’d see that poor old Tiffany had made it worth the wait.

  * * *

  Mariner was pacing the living room in his boxers, his phone clamped to his ear. He’d tried West Mercia first, hoping that the crime scene photographer could email him through some of the pictures, but getting hold of him was proving impossible, so in desperation he’d phoned Stuart Croghan.

  ‘Jesus, it’s the middle of the night,’ Croghan grumbled, as if Mariner hadn’t noticed. ‘What’s the urgency?’

  ‘Have you started processing Dee Henderson and Leo Hayden yet?’ asked Mariner.

  ‘Yes, of course we have. I assumed you’d want to confirm everything as soon as possible. I haven’t got the report together yet, though. There’s a lot more to do.’

  ‘That doesn’t matter,’ said Mariner impatiently. ‘Have you removed their clothing?’

  ‘Yes. What is all this?’

  ‘Can you meet me there, at the mortuary? It’s urgent, I promise.’

  ‘It had bloody well better be,’ said Croghan.

  Suzy had appeared, wearing one of Mariner’s sweatshirts that came down to her thighs. ‘What’s going on?’

  His erection, which hadn’t altogether subsided, revived a little. God, he was going to regret this. ‘I’m sorry, really I am.’

  ‘Go,’ she said with a sigh. ‘But I’ll expect a good seeing-to when you get back.’

  ‘It’s a promise,’ he said, knowing that it was one he’d struggle to keep.

  * * *

  Mariner drove to the QE at breakneck speed through empty night-time streets. Arriving ahead of the pathologist, he was then forced to stand around waiting for him under the covered drop-off ramp outside the mortuary entrance, listening to the steady patter of rain on the steel roof. He used the waiting time to contact Superintendent Sharp and Vicky Jesson, asking them to meet him at Granville Lane in an hour. He wouldn’t be winning any popularity awards tonight, but that couldn’t be helped. Finally he saw Croghan’s Volvo estate approaching.

  ‘You need to calm down and stop obsessing,’ said Croghan. ‘All the hard work is done.’

  ‘That’s the problem,’ said Mariner. ‘I don’t th
ink it is.’

  The lights blinked dazzlingly on the steel and white surfaces as they went inside, and Mariner followed Croghan past the observation room and on into the mortuary.

  ‘So what is it that’s so vitally important it couldn’t wait until the morning?’ Croghan asked.

  ‘It is morning,’ said Mariner, indicating a clock that said twenty past two. ‘Leo Hayden was wearing a watch,’ he went on. ‘You remember removing it?’

  ‘I didn’t do it personally but one of my assistants will have taken care of it,’ said Croghan.

  ‘Do you remember which wrist it was on?’

  Croghan didn’t, but turning on a computer he called up a file in which every detail had been recorded, in photographs and in writing, while the body was being processed. ‘Hayden’s watch,’ he said, reading from the screen, ‘was on his left wrist.’ He clicked on a jpeg close-up of the timepiece. It was an old-fashioned one with a simple analogue face and a black leather strap.

  ‘Shit, shit, shit.’ Mariner pushed a hand through his hair in frustration.

  ‘What’s all this about?’ asked Croghan, studying Mariner’s face. ‘Fuck — you think we’ve got the wrong man, don’t you?’

  ‘Can you print that off for me?’ Mariner asked, waving at the photograph.

  ‘Of course.’ He did so, and Mariner was gone.

  ‘No problem,’ Croghan called after the closing door.

  * * *

  When Tiffany re-emerged from the club she thought for one horrible moment that he’d gone without her, but then she saw him a little way off up the street. She trotted to catch up with him, the scraping of her heels echoing around noisily.

  ‘All right?’ he said. ‘Did they mind you leaving without them?’

  ‘No, they’re fine.’ As she caught up with him, he took her good hand, lacing his fingers though hers, with a touch so soft and sensual it sent a shiver down the length of her spine. The rain had stopped now, and it felt good to be in the fresh air, but they seemed to walk for ever through the deserted streets to get to his car. Tiffany almost had to run to keep up with his long strides and her shoes were starting to rub painfully, blistering her heels. Just when she thought she’d have to ask him to stop, so she could take them off, they got to where his car was parked. It wasn’t a big, expensive one, as Tiffany had expected, but was more like a workman’s van.

  ‘It’s not mine,’ he said. ‘I’ve borrowed it. But it has its advantages.’

  Tiffany didn’t care. The beer had gone right to her head bringing all those shots along with it. What with that and the sudden burst of exercise, she felt woozy and light-headed — like she would be grateful to sit down anywhere. She practically fell against the van and he moved in, kissing her more fervently this time, his teeth biting down on her lip, and his pelvis grinding into hers. Tiffany had never seen a grown man’s cock — it was something else she was keen to add to her education tonight — and now she could feel his, swollen and hard, digging into her belly. Her inhibitions dampened by the alcohol, she reached down to grab it, but he caught hold of her sore wrist, making her yelp.

  ‘Patience,’ he said.

  Leading her round to the back of the van, he opened the doors and she saw the mattress inside. Drowsy and increasingly dizzy, Tiffany needed no encouragement to climb in. It was such a relief to lie down and kick off her shoes. He slid in alongside her closing the doors behind them, so that they lay on the mattress with the light from a street lamp streaming in through the windows. His hands were all over her then, yanking at her clothes, his breath coming in heavy bursts and a new determination on his face. In one abrupt movement he rolled her roughly onto her stomach, pushing her face into the cold mattress and wrenching her arms up behind her back. This wasn’t right. A bubble of panic rose in her chest and turning her head she tried to protest, but he slapped a hand over her mouth, and she found her lips were stuck fast. Snorting hard through her nose she began to feel faint. The front seams of her dress ripped with a crack, and cold air shrouded her body. She knew she had to make him stop, but her head was so heavy that she couldn’t focus. Through blurred vision she saw him unfastening his trousers, before everything swam and melted to black.

  * * *

  At Granville Lane, Mariner knew what he wanted, just not exactly where to look for it. He spent a frantic few minutes searching through the box files of evidence being readied for the CPS . . . until at last, he laid his hands on it. He was just loading the thing onto a computer when he heard the door bang behind him and both Sharp and Jesson arrived at the same time.

  ‘This had better bloody be important,’ said Jesson, testily. ‘You’ve just interrupted the best night’s sleep I’ve had in ages.’ Dropping into her office chair, she rolled it across the floor to where Mariner was sitting.

  ‘Ditto that,’ said Sharp, coming to sit on the desk just behind them.

  His eyes fixed on the computer monitor, Mariner pointed to the photograph on the desk beside him. ‘Take a look at that,’ he said.

  ‘It’s a watch,’ said Jesson, with exaggerated patience, as if she were talking to a child.

  ‘More specifically, it’s Leo Hayden’s watch,’ said Mariner. ‘The one that Stuart Croghan’s team removed from his wrist yesterday.’

  ‘And?’ said Sharp.

  Mariner said nothing but continued to study the screen as the film footage of the hospital staff car park ran through fast-forward. They all watched as Hayden’s Audi A3 drew up to the barrier, the driver’s window slid down and an arm reached out to swipe the pass card. Mariner hit freeze. ‘Look at the watch,’ he said.

  ‘It’s not this one,’ said Jesson, looking again at the photograph.

  ‘And it’s on the wrong wrist,’ said Mariner. ‘Croghan took Leo Hayden’s watch off his left wrist. He’s just told me, from what’s recorded in the file. A man might own two watches, but he doesn’t wear them on different wrists and he doesn’t wear them at the same time.’

  ‘It could just have been an attempt to throw us off the scent,’ offered Vicky, but her voice lacked conviction.

  ‘Then why wear a watch at all? Why not just take it off?’ said Mariner. ‘We all assumed that it was Leo Hayden driving that car, but now I think we got it wrong.’

  ‘But the neighbour saw him leaving his house half an hour before,’ Jesson reminded him.

  ‘Did she, though?’ said Mariner. ‘She said herself that she wasn’t sure if Hayden saw her. She made the same assumption we did: it’s Hayden’s car, therefore the man driving it must be Hayden. Why wouldn’t she? But the farmer who found the car had to get up close to see if there was anyone inside, and only then did he see Hayden sitting at the wheel. That’s because the windows are tinted.’

  ‘But Hayden was in the driver’s seat on Titterstone Clee,’ said Sharp, peering over Mariner’s shoulder at the frozen image. ‘So who is it driving there?’

  ‘It’s our washerwoman,’ said Mariner. ‘Croghan hasn’t started on the post-mortem for Hayden yet, but when he does, I think he’s going to find that Leo Hayden was already dead when he was placed in the driver’s seat of his car. I think Hayden, along with Henderson and Coral Norman, was collateral. They all got in the way.’

  Jesson blew out her cheeks. ‘Bloody Nora, that’s a lot of collateral.’

  ‘But it explains why we’ve never received any clothing for Dee Henderson.’

  ‘Shit,’ said Sharp. ‘What you’re really saying is that our man is still out there.’

  ‘That’s the worst of it,’ said Mariner. ‘We need to get everybody back in, go over all the evidence again and pursue any outstanding leads. There’s something we’ve missed. And we need to do it straight away. If we don’t move fast, our washerwoman will think he’s got away with it, which will give him the confidence to kill again.’

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  June Davey was up early on Sunday morning and had assembled Tiffany’s presents and cards in a little pile in the living room, all ready for
when she got up. June was really pleased with what she’d bought and was certain Tiff would be chuffed to bits with her new phone. Ignoring the protests, June had also made Josh, Tiffany’s older brother, get up early so that they could wish Tiffany a happy birthday all together, as a family, like they always did. Right now he was out walking the dog.

  After the kids’ dad walked out on her, it had become extra important to do as much as they could together as a family and birthday celebrations were amongst the last rituals they still held to. Now June sat at the kitchen table leafing through an album of Tiffany’s baby photos (another birthday tradition). Looking at the tiny, new-born Tiffany, she welled up, remembering what a happy day it had been. She’d been convinced at the time that a second child would help to cement her marriage to Tiffany’s dad — never mind the ever increasing strain on their relationship. Even the labour with Tiffany had been an easy one. She’d popped out in less than two hours and started feeding straight away. June drained her tea cup. She was putting the kettle on for another when Josh got back.

  ‘Isn’t she up yet?’ he grumbled, leaning down to take off the dog’s lead. ‘I want to go over to Lee’s later.’

  ‘I’ll take her a drink,’ said June. ‘That might encourage her to come down. She was late in last night.’ So late that June hadn’t actually heard Tiffany come in, though she didn’t like to admit it to Josh. She felt guilty that, perhaps for the first time ever, she had fallen asleep before both her babies were safely tucked up in bed. She made a mug of tea and climbed the stairs to Tiffany’s room. She knocked gently on the door. ‘Tiffany? Tiff? I’ve brought you up some tea. Happy birthday, sweetheart.’

  June thought she heard the faintest murmured response, but when she opened the door, the first thing she saw was the empty bed. Then she realised that the room was exactly as it had been last night when Lex had called her up the stairs to come and appraise them before they went out. The moment popped back into her head.

  ‘What do you think?’ Lex had asked, as Tiffany stood admiring herself in the mirror.