“Barely. But we’ll be fine. The Easter fundraiser did well so that should keep us going until the next one in July. Thankfully, I have plenty of people willing to volunteer. They enjoy feeding the dogs, exercising them and grooming them. I don’t have to pay wages.” She gave a rueful smile. “I couldn’t afford to pay wages.”
“What about vet’s bills? They must be quite steep.”
“They are. No animal leaves here without being spayed or neutered, wormed and microchipped. It’s expensive, of course, but we’re lucky to have Jamie. He does all he can to keep the expense to a minimum.”
Dylan didn’t doubt it. “Ah yes, Jamie. I meant to mention him, Sue. I think, although I could be wrong, that he might be following you.”
She looked at Dylan as if he’d suddenly become fluent in Swahili.
“As I say, I could be wrong. I saw you when you were leaving the cemetery this morning,” he said. “Jamie was there too. He followed you out of the car park.”
She opened her mouth to speak but closed it. Her hands went into her pockets and then out again.
“I think I’ll have a coffee,” she said. “Are you sure you don’t want one, Dylan?”
“Quite sure. Thanks.”
She turned on the tap, and the sudden force sprayed water all over her and the kitchen window. “Damn.”
Dylan watched her. To say his words had shocked her was putting it mildly.
“I expect,” she said, “that Jamie worries about me now I’m alone here. He’s such a sweetie, but I’m sure that’s all there is to it. With Alek locked up, he’ll be looking out for me. I like him, I like him a lot, of course I do, and if I didn’t have Alek, well, who knows? But I’m sure he’s just being a bit protective.”
“Probably.” Dylan gave her a reassuring smile. “And as I said, I could be wrong. I just thought you should know you have an admirer, that’s all.”
She blushed to the roots of her hair. “I’m sure that’s nonsense.”
“Well, you’ve been warned. I wouldn’t be surprised if he didn’t pluck up courage to ask you out very soon. At least you’ll be ready for him.”
“Good grief.” She laughed at herself. “I don’t think I’m Jamie’s type. And anyway, he knows I’m waiting for Alek to come home, he knows there could be no one else for me.”
“I’m sure he does, but I thought I should mention it.”
They chatted some more, about safer subjects like the weather and the rubbish shown on TV these days.
“I’d better leave you to your accounts, Sue. It’s time I was off.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
Megan had been staring at the phone for a full thirty minutes. If it rang, it would probably bring on a full cardiac arrest. It was unlikely to do that, though. She’d spoken to her parents, her sister and one of her brothers already today, and Neil, who had a habit of calling at odd times, had given up trying to speak to her. Ever since their encounter by the canal, she’d ignored him and his calls.
Since last night’s meeting with Sonia, though, she knew she had to talk to him.
She mixed herself a gin and tonic that was heavy on gin and light on tonic and picked up the receiver. Before she could change her mind, she called his mobile. It was almost ten o’clock so, if he didn’t answer, she’d assume he’d had a busy day or an early start and had gone to—
“Megan?”
“Hello, Neil.” She took a big gulp of gin.
“Welcome back to the world of the sane,” he said.
Beneath the sarcasm, she detected anger. It helped, but not a lot. He was expecting her to apologise for her childish behaviour, but she couldn’t.
“You’ve been avoiding me,” he said. “Any particular reason?”
“For Christ’s sake, Neil, you were going to hit me.”
“Nonsense.”
“You were. You lifted your hand—”
“To touch your face. I’ve touched a lot more of you than that in the past. Why the hell would I hit you?”
She had no answer.
“And why didn’t you answer your door?” he asked.
“I wanted to be alone.”
Neil laughed. “In true Greta Garbo style.”
She was slowly starting to hate him.
“I saw Sonia last night,” she said.
Silence met her comment.
“You knew Dylan Scott had spoken to her, right? Do you know what she told him?”
“I’ve no idea. He didn’t say and I couldn’t ask, could I? Why?”
“She wouldn’t tell me who put him on to her, but it must have been Teresa Simmons, mustn’t it? It sure as hell wasn’t me, Neil. That’s what you thought, wasn’t it? You blamed me, didn’t you?”
“I had no idea how her name had come up. I certainly wasn’t blaming you.”
She didn’t believe him. That was why he’d acted so strangely down by the canal, why she’d been so frightened of him. It wasn’t what he’d said, it was the way he’d looked at her. Nothing would have convinced her he didn’t intend to drown her in the canal. It was dark so no one would have seen, and the wind would have covered her screams.
She carried the phone to the window and pulled the curtains across to shut out the night.
“It must have been Teresa, mustn’t it?” she said. “He must be doing a thorough job if he’s going down to Coventry to speak to people who no longer even work at the hospital.”
She realised, belatedly, that it was she who’d given him Teresa’s name. She hadn’t given him her address, though, as she didn’t have it, and she hadn’t believed for a second that Scott would follow it up.
“He lives in London,” Neil said. “Shepherd’s Bush to be precise.”
“How do you know?”
“I’ve done a little digging of my own.”
She shouldn’t have been surprised. Neil was a control freak. He was the most charming man on the planet when things were running along to his satisfaction. To him, people were toys. He pulled the strings and they danced like puppets. That was his plan anyway.
“It wouldn’t be far out of his way to call on Teresa,” he said. “What else did the lovely Sonia have to say for herself?”
“She wanted to know what I’d told Scott.” She brought to mind Sonia’s cruel, knowing smile. “I said I’d told the truth, that I was working alongside you that day, and she knew I was lying. She asked again what I told him, whether I’d told the truth or said we were working together all day.”
“What did you say to that?”
Megan emptied her glass and carried the phone to the kitchen to pour herself another. She’d wake up with a headache in the morning, she always did, but she was a long way past caring. “She just laughed and said she knew the truth. She also told me not to worry and assured me that our secret’s safe with her.”
“Bloody woman.”
“What did she mean, Neil? Exactly what does she know?”
“She knows nothing, that’s the whole point. She’s just a vindictive little shit stirrer. Christ, it’s no wonder that gruesome husband of hers knocks her about.”
“If she knows nothing, why the hell is she so confident that she does?”
“Forget her. She’s not worth the effort.”
“Right.” Megan wished she could. She wished she could forget she’d ever laid eyes on Neil Walsingham too. “That’s all I rang for. I thought you should know that I had nothing to do with anything Sonia may or may not have told Scott.”
“Fine. Thanks for calling. If you want to talk again, or to see me, you know where I am. I won’t offer to contact you because I’d hate to bring on another bout of insanity.”
Before she could reply, he cut the connection.
He wouldn’t offer? Offer? If it had been anyone else, and if she’d had more gin, she might have laughed at that. He was so bloody conceited, so bloody sure of his own attraction, that he thought he’d been doing her a favour by taking her to bed on rare occasions. Did he think she was that de
sperate for male company? Was she that desperate for male company?
No, she damn well wasn’t.
Chapter Thirty
By lunchtime the following day, having spent countless hours staring at recordings of the comings and goings on Darwen Road, Dylan had a grand total of four vehicles that appeared on film regularly enough to arouse his interest. It was depressingly pathetic but, thanks to a dearth of CCTV in the area, all he could do was clutch at straws.
He had registration details for a silver Rav4, an ancient Volkswagen Beetle, a blue Ford Mondeo, and a silver Ford Focus. He called DS Pike’s private mobile but, as Pikey didn’t answer, he left a message asking him to check out the cars.
With that done, and expecting nothing to come of it, he walked into the town centre for lunch. It was time for a spot of brainstorming.
Over scampi and chips, with his eye on a slice of lemon meringue pie for after, he tried to think what he was missing in this investigation. Information on the victim was the main thing. Carly Walsingham had been surprisingly short of real friends.
He’d spoken to Kirsten Madeley, her best and oldest friend, but other than that, all Carly had were acquaintances. Dylan had spoken to neighbours, people Carly met at her children’s school, people she worked out with at a nearby gym and anyone else who might have come into contact with her. Not one of those conversations had lasted more than five minutes and not one of those people had told him anything more interesting than she was likeable, friendly and always willing to help. No one truly knew her.
She’d had her husband and her children, and she’d had Kaminski and a best friend in Birmingham. It didn’t seem a lot for the livewire he imagined Carly to be. Perhaps husband, children and lover were enough.
His phone trilled. It was a number he didn’t recognise. “Hello?”
“Mr. Scott? Dylan?”
He recognised the voice. “It is, yes.”
“Ah, my name’s Tinsley. James Tinsley. We met at the Pennine View Rescue Centre. I’m the vet employed at the centre.”
Dylan didn’t need the longwinded introduction, but it gave him time to gather his thoughts. “Jamie, hi. What can I do for you?”
“Actually, it’s more what I can do for you. I’m busy now, about to go into the surgery, but I wondered if you’d be free to meet later. There’s something I’d like to tell you about Aleksander Kaminski.”
“Suits me. What time?”
“Let me see. Sorry, I’m really busy today. I’ll be finished at the surgery around six this evening. Make that six-thirty. Then I’ll need to take Monty out for a good run.”
He paused, almost as if he expected Dylan to sympathise with his busy schedule.
“I don’t suppose,” Jamie said, “that you could meet me when I take the dog out? I usually drive out to Crown Point and walk him across the hill there. It’s not too far from you, is it? You do know it, don’t you?”
“Yes.” The bleak hillside was high above the town of Burnley and offered one of the best views in Lancashire. Dylan had been there to inspect a local attraction, the Singing Ringing Tree, a steel work of art that was supposed to sing when the wind rattled its carefully designed pipes. “Yes, I know it. What time suits you?”
“Shall we say seven-thirty? Or is that too late for you?”
“Seven-thirty it is.”
“Thank you. I appreciate it. If we meet in the car park, we can talk while we walk.”
“Okay, Jamie, I’ll see you later.”
Dylan ordered his lemon meringue and wondered what had possessed him to agree to a meeting on a barren hillside when Lancashire was being battered by strong winds and heavy rain. He was desperate for leads in this case, but there had to be limits.
He wasn’t confident that Tinsley would provide those leads. It was more likely that Sue had spoken to him and asked him to stop following her. Dylan would bet he’d be told to stop interfering.
Perhaps he was being more pessimistic than usual. Tinsley had said he had something to tell him about Aleksander Kaminski. Dylan was all ears.
He was drinking a strong coffee when his phone trilled into life again. He was popular this morning.
“Pikey? Thanks for getting back to me, mate. Did you get anything on those vehicles?”
“Good morning, Dylan, and how are you? Me? Oh, I’m good. Thank you so much for asking.”
Dylan chuckled. “I’m glad to hear it. So? Did you get those vehicles checked?”
“I did, but people are soon going to start asking me questions about—”
“I know, I know. And I appreciate it. This is the last, you have my word on that.”
“It had better be,” Pikey said. “Right, have you got a pen?”
“Yes. Fire away.”
Dylan jotted down the details of the vehicles’ owners with a growing sense of disappointment. The owners’ names and addresses meant nothing to him.
“I don’t think you’ll find a killer in that lot, mate,” Pikey said.
Sod it. As a private investigator, Dylan was a joke. He was no further forward than he’d been before he’d heard Carly Walsingham’s name mentioned.
“You’re probably right, Pikey. But thanks anyway. I appreciate it.”
When the call ended, he paid for his food, left the café and ambled through the town. He needed to think of a constructive way to pass the time until he met Tinsley this evening.
His phone trilled again, a reminder that he needed to change his ringtone. The display told him his mother was calling. That was one he could ignore.
After a few seconds, his phone beeped to tell him he had a message. She never left messages. He guessed she was calling for a chat while she enjoyed a marijuana hit, but he played the message. It was difficult to claim he was too busy to listen.
“Dylan, there’s nothing to worry about, but I think you should be here. They’ve taken Freya into hospital. Her breathing’s a bit—difficult. As I said, there’s nothing at all to worry about, but Bev’s a bit, um, uptight.”
“Holy shit.”
He broke into a run. If there was one thing he hated, it was phone calls that started with There’s nothing to worry about but…What was there to do but sodding worry?
There was no one on the reception desk when he raced into the hotel. That suited him because he didn’t have time to explain. He shoved everything in his bag—it was too bad if he’d missed something—and ran down the stairs. There was still no one on the desk. He’d call them later. If they thought he’d done a runner without paying his bill, well, that was their problem. He had more important things to worry about.
He fired the Morgan and glanced at the fuel gauge. “Sod it.”
Why was there never a filling station around when you needed one? He’d have to find one before he reached the motorway. And why did every moron take to the road when you were in a hurry?
After ten minutes, he saw the welcome sign of a Shell garage. There wasn’t a free pump and he had to wait while the man in front filled his car, ambled inside the building, looked through the day’s newspapers and finally paid for his fuel. The chap strolled back to his car and fastened his seat belt with the speed of a three-year-old still learning to master buckles before pulling away.
Dylan filled the Morgan and ran inside to pay.
He got back in his car and drove toward the exit. In front of him, a driver was waiting for a gap in the traffic. One appeared, one big enough to get four double-decker buses out safely, but the car didn’t budge. A female driver, he noticed. Well, no surprise there. How the hell they could claim multitasking among their many talents, he had no idea. This one couldn’t even drive and think where she was going at the same time.
Another gap appeared. She edged forward six inches and changed her mind. Dylan gave his horn a fierce blast. She turned in her seat to look at him and promptly missed another gap.
“If you don’t get your bloody car out of my way, I won’t be responsible for my actions!”
The pedes
trian crossing lights fifty yards away changed to red. Thank God. The woman seemed satisfied that the road was clear of cars, boats, planes, stray dogs and sweet wrappers, and finally decided it was safe to pull out.
The motorway was only three miles away so, even if she was heading that way, he wouldn’t have to follow her for too long. They crawled along at a mind-numbing twenty-nine miles per hour until she pulled into a side street and Dylan was rid of her.
It was after three o’clock now. If the roads were incident free and he drove like a maniac, he’d be lucky to be in London by six.
As soon as he was on the motorway, he tried Bev’s phone. It went straight to voicemail so either she was talking to someone else or she’d switched it off. There were signs in hospitals asking people to switch off their phones but no one took a blind bit of notice.
Dylan left a message saying he’d be there was soon as he could and tried his mother’s phone. Hers rang out unanswered. All the polite notices in the world wouldn’t persuade her to switch off her phone. Perhaps she’d raided the hospital store, discovered a new drug of choice and was too high to answer. He left another message.
By six o’clock, he was still an hour away. All he’d had was a text message from his mother saying they were at Hammersmith Hospital, Freya was fine, Bev was a mess, and telling him not to rush as she didn’t have time to take him a bunch of grapes if he ended up in a hospital bed.
It was a little after seven o’clock when he finally pulled into the hospital’s car park.
The first person he saw was his mother. Outside the main entrance was a group of around twenty people, including one chap in a wheelchair, desperately puffing on cigarettes. His mother was in the midst of the addicts.
Either everything was okay and she was enjoying a relaxing smoke or the news was so bad she needed to be stoned to cope.
She spotted him and came to meet him.
“You made good time, love.” She gave him a quick hug. “I thought I’d wait out here for you. I can show you the way up to the ward.”
Silent Witness (A Dylan Scott Mystery) Page 21