“He’s not here. Not that it’s any of your business.”
“A lorry driver, for Christ’s sake. How the hell could you take up with a lorry driver?”
“Better than taking up with a snob. What’s wrong with lorry drivers? Or van drivers? Or taxi drivers?” She sighed. “Look, Rob, I’m too tired for this.”
“Sorry, you’re right. If he’s your idea of the perfect man, that’s fine.” He strove to lighten the mood. “So how are you? How are the children?”
“I’m fine, thanks. So are Lydia and Emma.” She emphasised the girls’ names. It was her way of reprimanding him for not using them. “Sorry, but I really must go.”
“Hey, why the rush? Sam’s our daughter, Marion.” He could feel himself growing angry at the brush-off and took a calming breath. “You sound tired, sweetheart.”
“I am, and I don’t want to fight with you—”
“I don’t either. I thought we should see Dylan Scott together, that’s all. You haven’t forgotten Sam, have you? She still means everything to you, doesn’t she?”
“Of course I haven’t forgotten her, for God’s sake. I just want you to leave me alone. You’re on the bloody phone every five minutes—”
“I’ve called twice this week.” He hated it when she swore. The beautiful young woman he’d married had never resorted to that sort of language. It was all Alan’s doing. The man loved to punctuate his conversations with obscenities. “That’s not every five minutes, is it?”
“It’s too much. You’re too much. I’m sorry you don’t like Alan, but that’s not my problem. You don’t have to live with him, do you? I’m putting the phone down now. I’ll call you if this Dylan Scott has anything interesting to say, okay?”
The connection was cut and Rob flung the phone across the room. It hit Rusty, who yelped in a mix of shock and anger before racing from the room.
Chapter Nine
Dylan reached Jack Fleming’s block of flats just after seven that evening. He’d called twice earlier in the day and had tried Jack’s number several times, but he hadn’t been home and wasn’t answering his phone.
This time, when he rang the bell for number 51, the main door was opened by a young blonde with what had to be silicone-enhanced breasts. False eyelashes too. The long legs and short skirt were real enough, though.
“Hi. I’m looking for Jack Fleming.”
She turned to holler down the hallway. “Jack? Someone to see you.”
She waited a moment then shrugged. “It’s the first door on the right.”
“Thanks.”
“You’re welcome.”
Dylan watched her walk down the road, hips swaying, ankles balanced on precarious heels. Only when she turned the corner and vanished from view did he wander inside and knock on the first door on the right. He waited. Nothing. He knocked again. And again. Finally, a man fresh out of the shower—judging by the wet hair, the damp T-shirt and the jeans he was still fastening—opened the door.
“Jack Fleming?” Of course it was. Dylan recognised him from the photos. In the flesh, he looked older but not that much older. “Dylan Scott. I was wondering if I could have a chat with you about Samantha Hunt.”
“Sam?” He couldn’t have looked more surprised if he’d tried.
“Yes.”
“You’d better come in then. Sorry—it’s a bit of a tip.”
Given the state of his own flat, Dylan was in no position to criticise. Music magazines were scattered everywhere. Two guitars hung from wall brackets. CDs covered an entire wall.
“Do you play?” Dylan nodded at the guitars.
“Yeah. A bit. I was in a band but it sort of disintegrated. Shame really.” He pushed a pile of magazines from the chair to the floor. “Have a seat. D’you want a coffee or summat?”
“No. You’re okay, thanks.” Dylan took the offered seat.
The flat wasn’t bad at all. Dylan would have done a swap with him. The block had been built about twenty years ago, and it still maintained a modern look. Walls—the sections that were visible—were a pale lemon colour and the carpets a grubby beige. Not bad, though.
Jack Fleming was more difficult to assess. Tall, thin and dark-haired. Badly bitten fingernails. Were guitarists supposed to bite their nails? His hands shook too. Drugs or nerves?
He was wearing a black T-shirt with a band’s name on the front—Devil’s Outriders—and tour dates on the back. Dylan had never heard of them and, judging by the size of the concert venues mentioned, they weren’t pulling in big crowds.
“Was that your girlfriend who let me in?” he asked.
“Sal? No, she’s my sister.”
Silicon Girl had looked like no one’s sister.
“She chilled here last night,” Jack added.
Chilled here? Spent the night at the flat? It didn’t matter and there was no point getting sidetracked. Whether she was girlfriend or sister was irrelevant. Sam had been missing for ten months so Jack couldn’t be blamed if he’d met someone else.
“What do you want then? You said you wanted to talk to me about Sam? How do you mean?” Belatedly, or so it seemed to Dylan, he asked, “Who are you anyway?”
Dylan took a moment to think about that. He’d been planning to tell him the TV producer story, but Jack knew the family, and probably knew Hunt was employing him.
“I’d rather you didn’t broadcast this, Jack, but I’m a private investigator. Sam’s father has employed me to look into her disappearance.”
“Yeah?” Jack’s face lit up with hope and Dylan was pleased he’d been honest with him.
“What can you tell me about Sam?”
“What do you want to know?” He was either eager to talk or a competent actor.
“Anything and everything. How long have you known her?”
Jack threw himself down on the sofa without bothering to move the magazines first. “Two years. Just over.”
“Where did you meet?”
“At a wine bar in the Clough. Cassidy’s. It closed down within six months. Sam was there celebrating her birthday. She’s never been much of a drinker and when I met her, she was throwing up in the street.” A half smile touched his lips. “I bought her three or four strong coffees and we got chatting. We arranged to meet up for coffee the following day. I didn’t think she’d remember, but she did. Her dad had bought her a car for her birthday and, that night, she took me out in it.”
“A Porsche, wasn’t it?”
“Yeah. She loves it. Car mad, she is.” He stood and, hands deep in the pockets of baggy jeans, paced a bit. “She isn’t really into clothes and stuff. It’s all cars. And her dog, of course. Rusty. She’s fussy about who goes in her car but the dog’s allowed anywhere.”
As yet, Dylan had heard little bad about Samantha. The only questionable point was whether she’d been having an affair with a married man. An affair with her boss.
“How did she get along with her colleagues?” he asked.
“Great. They’re a good laugh. Bill used to treat her like a daughter.”
“What about her boss, James Carlton?”
“What about him?”
Unless Dylan was very much mistaken, he’d touched a nerve.
“Did she get on well with him?”
“As well as anyone gets on with their boss.”
“She liked him then?”
He opened his mouth then clamped it shut. After a couple of paces across the room, he said, “Yeah. He’s all right.”
Dylan was convinced Jack had been on the point of saying something more. Had he known she was having an affair with him?
“Some people believed she thought he was better than all right,” he said.
“Yeah. I know.”
“A wealthy bloke. Nice car. His own business. Good looking.” Dylan paused for effect. “He’d be quite appealing to some women, wouldn’t he?”
Jack smiled a secret smile at that. “Yeah. He would.”
“But not Sam?”
&nb
sp; “No. Not Sam. She’s got more sense.”
“Rumour says she hasn’t.”
“You don’t want to listen to rumours, mate.”
Dylan wanted to do exactly that. The only way forward was to listen to rumours.
He was convinced Jack knew something, but Dylan needed to win his trust so he didn’t push it. “What about her mother and stepfather?” he asked. “Does she get along well with them?”
“Yeah. Well, no, not really.”
“Oh? Her father thinks she does.” Hunt had told Dylan that she’d never really taken to Alan, and Alice had said she’d called him Slob, but there was no hint of any conflict with her mother. Alice had more or less confirmed that.
“Maybe he does. She thinks the world of her little sisters. If it wasn’t for them, she’d have nothing to do with them. She can’t stand that bloke her mum married.”
“Why?”
“Dunno really. She said he freaked her out. She reckoned the kids—her sisters—were always too quiet when he was around, like they were scared of him.” He sat again. “We sometimes took the kids out. To the park or summat like that. He seemed okay to me, but I only saw him to say hello and goodbye.”
Jack was edgy, unsettled.
“When was the last time you saw Sam?” Dylan asked.
“The day before she vanished.”
Thursday. The evening Alice Turnbull saw Sam in the arms of another man, probably in the arms of her boss. Jack had to be lying.
“Where did you go? The pub? Cinema?”
“Nowhere. We only met up at lunchtime.”
Perhaps he wasn’t lying. It was difficult to tell. Something was bothering him but Dylan couldn’t fathom him out.
“You didn’t see her in the evening?” he asked.
“No. She had something else to do that night.”
“What was that?”
“Summat to do with work, I think.”
“You mean she was working overtime?”
“Summat like that.”
Again, Dylan had the feeling that Jack knew more than he was saying. But what? Could he have known Sam was having an affair with her boss? If he had known, how would he have taken it?
Sometimes you just had to ask outright.
“So the rumours that Sam was having an affair with her boss are completely unfounded?”
Jack’s head flew up and something shocked and angry flared in his eyes. “Yeah.”
Yet something had been going on. Somehow, and God alone knew how, Dylan needed to win Jack’s confidence.
“Is the offer of coffee still open?”
“Yeah, sure.” Jack headed for the small kitchen that led off the room. There was no door to it, just an archway. For all that, it looked clean and tidy. “How do you take it?” he called over his shoulder.
“Milk and two sugars if you’ve got it, please.”
Dylan wandered to the window and looked out. It had been another hot, overcast and humid day. The sound of distant thunder had been constant. Lights were on in the house opposite, but they’d probably been on all day. It really was that dark. The road was tidy, the street quiet. This ground floor flat looked out onto a well-cared-for if boring square of garden.
Jack put two big mugs of steaming coffee on the low table.
“Thanks.” It was difficult to know where to start. “Do you miss her, Jack?”
The question appeared to take him completely by surprise. Eyebrows shot up beneath his hair. “Yeah. Course I do.”
“If she walked in here now—?”
“I sure as hell wouldn’t be sitting here drinking coffee with you.”
Dylan smiled at that. “So are you going to help me find her?”
“Yeah. Of course.”
“Then talk to me, Jack. We both want the same thing. We both want to discover the truth behind her disappearance.”
“Anything could have happened to her, though,” Jack said, and the hands shook more violently.
“It could.” Perhaps he was frightened of finding out that she was dead. This way, the not knowing, was okay. He could tell himself she was alive and well somewhere. But after ten months, he must know that outcome was doubtful.
Or had Dylan got it wrong? Something made him want to trust Jack, just as something had made Sam trust him. Were they both gullible?
“I heard her dad went to see a medium,” Jack said. “She said Sam’s still alive. But what else is she going to say? It’s all fucking bollocks, isn’t it?”
“I think so.”
Jack was chewing on his fingernails. Or probably chewing on his fingers, given that there was very little actual nail left.
“Come on then, Jack. Talk to me. Start by telling me why you’re so nervous.”
“Who says I’m nervous?” He was thirty-two, ten years older than Sam, but he looked younger, especially when he wore his belligerent expression.
“I do.”
“I just don’t want no shit. I swear to God I didn’t do nothing to her.”
“Who says you did?” The statement came as a shock but Dylan kept his voice casual.
“The police. They thought she’d been done in or summat and I was number one suspect.” Amazingly, tears welled in his eyes. “As if I’d bloody hurt her. Bastards!”
“Why would they think you’d hurt her?”
“Christ knows. Well, yeah, I do know. When Sam first met me, I was on probation.” The admission came slowly, each word forced out. “I’d locked my ex-girlfriend in her flat after we’d had a row. She’d pissed me off.”
“Ah.”
“I told them to fuck off. Bastards.” He picked up his coffee and blew across the surface. “They burst in here and bloody searched the place. They didn’t waste no time asking questions.”
“Coppers can be a bit—abrupt. I know, I used to be one. I got kicked out.” He waited a moment for that to sink in. “Forget coppers. Tell me what you know, Jack.”
“What makes you think I know anything?”
“Just a hunch.” Dylan picked up his coffee and took a few sips. On the edge of his vision, he could see Jack drumming his fingers on the edge of the sofa.
“Okay,” Jack said at last. “That boss of hers, James Carlton. The business isn’t—or wasn’t—doing well. His wife ploughed all the money into it, you know that, do you? None of it was his. His dad used to have a business on the same site, but that was nothing, just small-time repairs. Anyway, Sam reckoned Carlton was gambling. She also reckoned he’d made a couple of dodgy insurance claims. Big claims.”
Dylan wasn’t in the least surprised to learn this gem. He’d thought James Carlton was a little too smooth to be true. “How big?”
“Big enough. You know the sort of cars he deals with, they don’t come cheap. Well, twice, in under a year, he claimed a load of cars had been stolen. That’s a lot of money.”
One hell of a lot of money. “What makes you think—or what made Sam think—they hadn’t been stolen?”
“The second time it happened was a night she’d been going to work late. There was nothing new in that. She was working on some flash car, can’t remember what it was, and took it for granted that she’d stay on a couple of hours to finish it. She reckoned Carlton was getting edgy that night. In the end, he practically had her chucked off the premises.”
“She didn’t confront him, did she?”
Jack shook his head. “What could she say? Without the proof, she couldn’t do anything, could she?”
“So she was trying to get close to Carlton to see what she could find out?”
“Yeah.” He took a swig of coffee.
The story was feasible. Just. Jack had known about the so-called affair she was having with Carlton. He’d known and hadn’t seemed to mind. If he’d been in on it all along—
“Why would she do that?” Dylan asked. “Why would she care?”
“She just did. It didn’t seem right to her, that’s all.”
It didn’t seem right to Dylan. And yes, i
n the same circumstances, he might have tried to find out more. There was a difference between a copper—ex-copper, he reminded himself—delving into people’s crimes and a twenty-two-year-old girl. He remembered the paperbacks he’d seen in Sam’s bedroom. All whodunits. Sam had probably believed she was the modern-day answer to Miss Marple.
What would Carlton have done if he’d found out she suspected him? If there was a lot of money at stake, not to mention a reputation and a business, there was no knowing what a man would do to avoid a prison sentence.
“Have you told the police any of this?” Dylan asked.
“I tried to, but they weren’t interested.”
“Why?”
“First off, I told them Sam had been with him the night before she vanished. Carlton said she hadn’t and they chose to believe him.” He pulled a face. “When someone else said that Carlton and Sam had seemed close, he said she’d been talking over her problems with him. He said she’d dumped me and I’d taken it badly. His story was that she’d gone to him asking for advice.” Jack finished his coffee and banged the mug down on a magazine. “He’s a lying shit.”
Quite probably. “Anything else?”
“Yeah.” Jack walked into the kitchen, opened and closed a drawer and returned with a small tape. “She tried my mobile on the Friday morning—the morning she vanished—and couldn’t get me. I was out driving. She left messages on my mobile and the landline. The mobile one’s gone—Vodafone deletes ’em after so long.”
He took a deep breath before removing the tape from his answer machine, inserting the new one and hitting the play message button. Even Dylan shivered as Sam’s voice filled the room.
“Christ, babe, you won’t believe what I’ve found out. It’s nothing to do with Slimeball Carlton, perhaps he’s telling the truth, but this is horrible. Look, I’m running late and can’t talk now. I’ll see you at lunchtime, okay? Bring me a sandwich, will you, and we’ll talk then.” Her voice dropped to almost a whisper. “We’ll talk about the other as well. Love you, babe. Bye.”
Looking into the disappearance of an unknown young woman was one thing. Hearing her voice, breathless and so alive, was something else entirely. Dylan swallowed a couple of times to lubricate his painfully dry throat.
Dead Silent (A Dylan Scott Mystery) Page 7