by Nick Hollin
‘If she’s innocent then she won’t be in trouble,’ says Sam, making for the door. ‘Thank you for your time.’
‘What about my son’s justice?’ says Vicky, reaching out and grabbing Katie’s sleeve. Katie can tell she’s on the verge of breaking down again, unable to stop the tears, or the shaking of her hand. ‘You promised me.’
‘I promised you the truth,’ says Katie softly, looking across at the departing Sam before locking her eyes on Vicky again. ‘And I will get you that.’
Thirty-Two
Nathan walks back into the hotel room and finds Katie waiting for him, sitting on a chair, peering out of the window. She jumps to her feet and rushes across, about to throw her arms around his shoulders, when he holds up his good hand to stop her.
‘That’ll hurt,’ he says, wondering if he should have let her anyway.
‘I was worried,’ says Katie, retreating fast. ‘I thought you might…’ She glances down at his wrist, at the scars that show how close he’d come before to taking his own life.
‘So worried that you followed me?’ he asks.
‘What do you mean? I was with Sam and Richard. We went to see…’ She hesitates, and Nathan realises in an instant where she’s been.
‘You went to see Thomas Shaw’s mother, didn’t you?’ He squeezes his eyes shut, fighting his imagination, but the image of a distraught mother breaks through his defences. ‘How is she coping?’
‘As well as can be expected.’
‘I’m surprised she let you in.’ Now he’s looking at the bruises on Katie’s neck and reminding himself that things could be far worse than they are right now. ‘She must have known who you were.’
‘I think she let me in because she knows who I am, because she knows I won’t stop till I have the truth.’
‘Don’t we have the truth?’ Nathan asks, feeling his stomach drop.
‘Not the whole of it,’ says Katie, quickly. ‘There are things I still don’t understand. I still can’t see the connection, especially with Carl Watkins.’ She moves across the room and lowers her voice, even though they’re alone. ‘Thomas Shaw had a girlfriend. A secret girlfriend that he made his mum swear she wouldn’t tell anyone about.’ Her eyes widen and he can see the excitement that is so often there when possibilities present themselves during a case. ‘He told her that she was police.’
‘I see,’ says Nathan, trying to control his own emotions. ‘And you think it was Sam?’
‘I don’t know what to think with that woman,’ says Katie. ‘All I know is that she’s not telling us everything. Not even close.’
‘Where is she now?’
‘God knows. Wherever she goes to at night.’
‘Let’s head over to the station,’ says Nathan. ‘We need to look through Thomas Shaw’s personal effects.’
He sees the tension return to Katie’s face. ‘I’m not sure we can do that, given what’s happened.’
‘You mean you’re not sure I can, given that I killed the guy.’
‘I doubt either of us can.’
‘And yet you got to speak to the mother.’
‘I was with Sam. She seems to be able to do anything. It’s like the rules don’t apply to her.’
‘Or she just doesn’t care about breaking them.’
‘The question is, how far does that rule-breaking go?’ says Katie. ‘So, what is it you’re hoping to find at the station?’
‘It’s just a feeling,’ says Nathan, moving over to the window and looking down at the street below. It’s dark now, although there’s still a stream of traffic. Under the street lights he can see dozens of people walking along the pavement on both sides of the road. A few aren’t moving, but are waiting or watching at bus stops or in doorways, some clearly talking into their mobile phones or plugged into their music. Perhaps a few are the press, and have found out where Nathan and Katie are staying. Perhaps it was the press that had followed Nathan to his parents’ graves, and he’ll see the photos in the morning.
But Nathan is finding it hard to convince himself. ‘It’s not what I’m hoping to find,’ he says. ‘Far from it. I think you and I have the same gut feeling.’
Katie moves across to where he’s standing and places a hand lightly on his elbow. ‘Even if Shaw is innocent of the other murders, it wouldn’t make what you did any less justified. He was seconds away from murdering me!’
Nathan turns to look at Katie and feels a wave of emotion crash over him. He’s been holding it back, pretending that he can cope, that he doesn’t need her, but the truth is he’s never needed her more. As if reading his thoughts, she holds out a hand and he squeezes it tightly.
‘No matter how painful,’ he says, holding her gaze. ‘No matter the damage. We just have to find out the truth.’
Thirty-Three
After yet another sleepless night, Nathan and Katie are up early and driving to Superintendent Taylor’s home. Katie can’t remember having gone there before. In all honesty, she can’t remember giving much thought at all to the life her boss lived outside of the office. Everything was kept professional. Everything was about work. It was simpler that way. She looks across at Nathan and tells herself the same is true with him. They’re good together, but only when their very different personalities combine to solve crimes. Beyond that, she’s not so sure.
‘I’m amazed Taylor’s agreed to do this,’ says Nathan, staring out of the passenger side window.
‘He’s doing it because he believes in us,’ says Katie. ‘Despite all the arguments, he always has done. We get results.’
‘Sometimes they’re not the results we want,’ says Nathan, looking down at his hand again, the forefinger on his good hand bending slightly. She knows what he’s thinking, the pull of a finger on a trigger; he’s considering how that very simple movement has taken a man’s life.
‘You think this might prove Thomas Shaw was innocent?’ says Richard, leaning forward from the back seat. The doctor has been much more engaged since hearing about the possibility that he might not have been the motivation for the murders after all.
‘With regard to the death of Mike and Ben and your friend Nigel, perhaps,’ says Katie cautiously.
‘And Carl Watkins?’ asks the doctor.
‘I believe that’s different,’ says Katie.
‘A different killer?’ asks Richard.
‘We’re not discounting anything at the moment,’ she says, remembering the doubts she and Nathan had expressed about the doctor himself. ‘Or anyone.’
They’re instructed to park at the end of a long residential street. It’s barely a quarter past six in the morning, but there are still affluent-looking people walking dogs and healthy people jogging by. Katie, on the other hand, feels more unhealthy than she has in a long time, her body as worn out as her mind. She’s so tired that Taylor’s arrival takes her by surprise. He looks like he hasn’t slept either. Katie suspects that he didn’t even get the chance if he was hunting down what she’d asked him for. He’s wearing a black sweater and a pair of jeans. She could never have imagined him so ‘dressed down’, and guesses that’s the point. Taylor looks suitably uncomfortable as he looks up and down the street and climbs into the back seat.
‘I always knew you’d get me the sack,’ he says, sinking down in the seat.
‘Or another promotion,’ says Katie. ‘But that’s not really what we’re talking about here. We’re talking about catching a killer.’
‘I was under the impression that we already had. DCI Stocks certainly believes that, as do the Forensics lab, who’ve found traces of Thomas Shaw’s DNA at both Ben and Mike Peters’ houses.’
‘They’ve found what they were supposed to find,’ says Nathan. ‘I think Shaw was meant to be the fall guy all along. They knew we’d be coming back here with Dr Evans, and they wanted us to make the connection to the death of Shaw’s dad.’
‘But who are they?’ asks Taylor, with a sigh.
‘You might be holding the answer to their ident
ity in your hands,’ says Katie, having turned in her seat to face him. ‘If you managed to get what we asked for.’
‘It wasn’t easy. I got a printout. But there were hundreds of images on his phone, some of which I would rather not have seen.’ He swallows noisily, then dips his head forward as another runner jogs by. ‘Shaw most definitely wasn’t gay.’ Taylor reaches in his pocket and pulls out several sheets of A4, folded over and creased very precisely down the middle. ‘In fact, there were hardly any men on there, so I very much doubt you’ll find who you’re looking for.’
‘You’re assuming we’re looking for a man,’ says Nathan.
The superintendent does little to hide his surprise. ‘You think a woman could have committed these horrendous crimes?’
‘Let’s see,’ says Katie, taking the papers from her boss. With all four of them huddled round, they start to go through the images taken from Thomas Shaw’s phone. She’s looking for the girlfriend, afraid they might see someone very familiar to them. For fear of that same person tracking them down, Katie has taken the battery out of the back of her mobile. It’s a slow process, and involves looking at images that are hard to figure out at first and then hard to forget when their blurred content has been determined. Looking at the dates, it’s obvious that Thomas Shaw was involved with a lot of women for a period up until six months earlier. After that point, there are no women. There appear to be no people in his life at all, other than a few shots of Shaw’s smiling mum. There are plenty of grinning and brooding selfies, lots of shots of Shaw shirtless down the gym, showing off the physique he clearly worked so hard for. Katie can’t help but hesitate at the shots showing his arms and hands, that so very nearly took her life. And she’s certain Nathan is looking at Shaw’s chest, at the point where the bullet entered.
They’re about to give up when Nathan tells her to stop. It’s a close-up selfie of Shaw behind the wheel of his car.
‘I think the woman we’re after was with him then,’ says Nathan, tapping the paper lightly with his forefinger.
‘Because he’s driving?’ asks Taylor. ‘It might be his mother taking the shot.’
‘I doubt his mother would make him look like that. She can be aggressive,’ says Katie, remembering her own confrontation with Vicky Shaw. ‘But he looks properly scared there.’
‘I thought you said it was a girlfriend? Would she scare him?’
‘I don’t know who she was to him. I only know she was supposed to be police.’
‘Yes,’ says Taylor, rubbing his unshaven chin. ‘I don’t know what I’m more upset about – the possibility that it’s true, the fact that you didn’t share that information with me immediately, or that you went behind my back to speak to Shaw’s mother in the first place. Her son tried to kill you, for goodness’ sake!’
Katie reaches for the bruises on her throat. ‘I hadn’t forgotten. And Vicky Shaw hasn’t forgotten that her son Thomas was the one that died instead. And yet she gave us a crucial lead, so let’s worry a little less about protocol and more about where this might be taking us.’
Taylor opens his mouth, no doubt to give her the usual dressing-down, reminding her of his rank and the need for respect, but he’s also recognised the truth in her words, returning his gaze to the printout. ‘So, what might this photo give us?’
‘We know the date the photo was taken,’ says Katie. ‘And we know the car it was taken in.’ She points at the distinctive black piping round the white leather seats of his Range Rover.
‘But we don’t know the location,’ says Taylor. ‘He took the geotagging off his phone.’
‘He was with his mum just an hour before,’ says Katie, pointing at the previous photo. ‘At her house. And the following image, taken half an hour later, is from his house.’
‘Taken in the hallway,’ says Nathan, nodding. It’s a location that Katie is certain he’ll never forget.
‘If he wasn’t alone,’ Katie continues, ‘then Shaw must have picked the other person up between his mum’s place and his own home. We can trace possible routes, get his car on the traffic cams, maybe get lucky.’
‘It’s a lot of work,’ says Taylor.
Katie smiles. ‘When have you ever been scared of that?’
‘I can’t get you in on the case,’ he says. ‘Not after what happened. But Sam Stone might be able to.’
‘No,’ says Katie quickly. ‘We don’t want her to know.’
‘Why not?’
‘I don’t trust her,’ says Nathan.
‘Any reason for that?’ asks Taylor, with a look that suggests he isn’t surprised. Then he lets out a little gasp. ‘You don’t think she’s Shaw’s policewoman girlfriend?’
‘I don’t know,’ says Katie, honestly. ‘I don’t think she’s averse to mixing with criminals. In fact, I know she’s not, but I’m afraid I can’t say any more about that for the moment.’
Superintendent Taylor is used to this from Katie and Nathan, but this time he appears even more deflated than normal by their unwillingness to share. Nevertheless, he gives a reluctant nod.
‘I’ll see what I can do with tracking Shaw’s movements.’
While they wait for Superintendent Taylor to get back to them, Katie drives Richard back to the hotel. He tells them he too hasn’t been sleeping, and she’s worried for his health. She leaves him in his room and then returns to the station to see exactly how involved in the case they’re allowing her to be. Nathan, on the other hand, knows he’ll be stopped from going inside, so he takes the car keys and drives off, telling Katie he needs more space to think. As she watches him go, she’s gripped by a sudden and unexplained anxiety and wants to rush in and call him on the mobile she’s given him. But then she’s not sure what she’d say. Is there something she needs to tell him? She turns towards the police station, aware of faces up at the window, watching her arrival, witnessing her fear. But she doesn’t see the face that she’s most afraid of, framed by a perfect bob haircut.
Thirty-Four
Nathan arrives at his destination after more than an hour on the road. He’d remembered the route from the first time. Still, it wasn’t easy to drive with his broken hand and he’s taken it slowly. Now that he’s arrived, he looks out at what remains an idyllic scene, with the twisted oak up on the hill and the derelict farmhouse. The only evidence of the crime that’s been discovered here is a sole police car parked up on the opposite side of the road from where Carl Watkins’ body was found and plenty of police tape strung around the area. Nathan moves over to the police car and the two young officers, who have already climbed out having seen him approach.
‘You can’t be here,’ says the younger of the two men. But he has a hand placed on his arm by the other. Someone who obviously recognises Nathan.
‘Well done,’ says the policeman, reaching out a hand. ‘You’ve done the world a service getting rid of that bastard.’ Nathan tentatively shakes his hand. The younger officer makes as if to do the same, then withdraws it. He’s keeping his distance. On the dashboard of the car Nathan can see a folded newspaper with his name in a headline. He might be seen as some kind of hero now, but most people won’t have forgotten what was written before.
‘Anything we can help you with?’ asks the older policeman.
‘I just wanted to look around,’ says Nathan. ‘To try and understand a bit more about the murder.’
‘I don’t care what Shaw’s reason was for taking out this one,’ says the older policeman, nodding towards where Carl Watkins’ body was found. ‘He had it coming to him. Mike, on the other hand…’
‘You knew him?’ asks Nathan, hearing the catch in the policeman’s voice.
‘I came to this late,’ says the constable, tapping his sleeve. ‘Hence the silver in the hair but not on the arms.’ He glances across at his colleague. ‘It’s not easy trying to keep up with these youngsters, and dealing with the flak. I met Mike at a couple of social functions. He gave me advice and support just when it was needed. And sometimes a kind
word is all you need.’
The policeman smiles. ‘I heard what you said about Mike to the press the other day. I mean, it was brave, you confronting them like that anyway, but to acknowledge Mike’s contribution to all those cases you’ve solved…’
‘He was one of the good guys,’ says Nathan, half turning away from the two men. ‘And both DS Rhodes and I will miss him greatly. Now, if you don’t mind.’
The policemen return to the car, no doubt watching out for press, for weirdos, for people wanting to turn the site of a known criminal’s death into a shrine. Nathan slips under the police tape and walks over to the edge of the ditch. He can see where they’ve dug the body out, a big hole for a big man. Or at least, he had been big before he’d started to rot away. Nathan looks at the tracks in the dirt where various vehicles have come and gone. There’s not much room at the end of the lane, and most will have had to reverse a long way to be able to turn and get out. When he considers his surroundings, all the places that would have been perfect to hide a body, Nathan still can’t understand why the killer chose here. Early on, at least, whoever it was had been trying to hide Watkins, and if they’d shifted him twenty feet into the undergrowth he probably wouldn’t have been found at all.
Perhaps they simply couldn’t do it, says Nathan quietly to himself. He’s picturing the size of Carl Watkins, and can’t help but picture Sam, and Katie, too. If it were either of them, could they have moved the body twenty feet? Could he?
Nathan closes his eyes with his back to the police car and considers what he knows. The answer to that question is simple: not enough. He pulls out his mobile and calls the incident room at the police station, hoping to speak to Katie. He has to wait a couple of minutes before she’s finally put on the line.