Truth or Die

by Katerina Diamond

  ‘Is this what you’re upset about? The video?’

  Gary leaned forward and whispered, ‘Aren’t you? You’re covering for this guy.’

  ‘No, I won’t cover for him. He knows I will bring him in if needs be,’ Adrian said, letting go of Gary’s arm.

  ‘I’m not sure I believe that.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ Gary said. ‘I wish you hadn’t told me about him.’

  ‘First you’re angry because we didn’t tell you and now you’re angry because we did?’ Adrian said.

  ‘Did they really deserve this? Does anyone?’ Gary pointed at the screen where Coley’s body lay strapped to the desk, his back sliced open, what was left of his spine exposed.

  ‘Maybe. I don’t know. Maybe some people do deserve it,’ Adrian said.

  ‘If you really believe that then you’re not the person I thought you were.’

  ‘All I’m saying is that it’s not always black and white. If you had seen what they did to that man as a kid, then you would have thought twice about arresting him, too. They photographed most of the torture they put him through; we can go down to evidence and look at it, if you want? You wouldn’t want to punish him any more than he has been.’

  ‘But I would want to protect everyone else,’ Gary said.

  ‘He’s not a danger to everyone else,’ Adrian said, even though the video in front of him said otherwise. Who was Adrian trying to convince? ‘What else did you find on the computer?’

  ‘A lot of stuff. If Gillian Mitchell wasn’t actually in charge, then she was the next best thing. She had an external hard drive that was found when they searched her place. There were a lot of files on it that I hadn’t got from any of the other victims. I have to turn all this over into evidence once I catalogue it. I made a start last night, but I wanted to make sure you heard it from me first. And there’s something else I wanted to show you.’

  ‘Great.’

  Adrian could feel Gary’s disapproval and he didn’t like it. He understood and respected Gary’s point of view, but he didn’t like being at odds with him, even though he couldn’t change the way he felt any more than Gary could change his views.

  Gary put his laptop on an empty hot desk, the ones they used for visiting staff. He plonked himself in the chair and pulled up another video; it was the high street late at night. This time the footage came from a camera phone. The video followed a young man in a hood as he walked. The person holding the camera stopped and kept filming as the other man ran across the road. Adrian recognised the area in town and then he saw himself, just before the camera zoomed in on the younger man swiping an open claw across his face and then punching him to the ground. Adrian got up and threw a couple of swings himself before he gave chase, but then the video stopped.

  ‘That video is time- and date-stamped and completely exonerates you of any wrongdoing in the Watts attack. I suspect the DCI might want to release this to the press after we catch this Beacham guy, as there are still some people who are calling for your job.’

  ‘You should have started with this video.’ Adrian tried not to sound pissy.

  ‘There’s barely a glimpse of the guy’s face as his friend filmed him from behind, but I am trying to get an ID. Now let’s have a look for this bloody car.’ Gary typed in the reg number to see if there had been any notifications on it over the last few weeks. ‘I’ll get on to traffic and see if they have anything.’

  ‘I’ll check with the university and see if it’s on any of the campuses.’

  ‘I’ll do it,’ Gary said, the knot in centre of his forehead visibly tightening.

  ‘It’s fine, you’ve obviously got enough on your plate. Sorry if I expect too much of you.’

  Adrian felt guilty; maybe he did ask Gary for too much. He never usually seemed to mind; in fact, Adrian thought he liked it.

  ‘God, it’s not that. I’m just worried that you and Imogen are in over your heads. I don’t know why you think you can trust this Parker guy, but you shouldn’t. What he’s doing in those videos shows a complete lack of empathy or human feeling. He’s doing it because he enjoys it. Maybe it’s all about justice for now, but what happens when he runs out of bad people to dissect? Those urges don’t just go away.’

  ‘I know,’ Adrian admitted reluctantly.

  ‘And what happens when you decide to drag your heels so that he can get to the bad guys before you?’

  ‘What are you suggesting?’

  Adrian knew what he was suggesting and it was a thought that had crossed his own mind. Where did this end? Wasn’t Adrian already complicit by not putting Parker away? What was worse was that he was making his friends complicit, too. His head hurt.

  ‘I’m saying that every time you let him cross a line, you cross a line yourself and who knows where that ends up? What if one day you start helping him?’ Gary said.

  ‘That’s not going to happen,’ Adrian insisted.

  ‘You’re on a slippery slope, my friend.’

  ‘Are you going to tell the DCI about him?’

  ‘And get you both fired, or worse? How is that going to help? I don’t need that on my conscience, thanks.’

  ‘You’re right. I don’t know what to do.’

  ‘There’s no way of knowing who is in these videos, they are all quite useless in terms of identification, so you got lucky there. The definition is very poor, but from what I can see the perpetrator has got generic clothes on, no identifying labels, average height and weight like the other suspects. This could be Beacham or Blackwell as far as we know,’ Gary consoled Adrian. ‘We just have to hope that your friend knows when to stop.’

  The only way Adrian could think of this ever working was if Parker came forward and handed himself in. What were the chances of that?

  Chapter Forty-One

  Imogen had never been to university herself and so walking through halls was reminiscent of a life she’d never had. She couldn’t imagine it for herself, being in close quarters with all these other people day and night. Growing up as an only child to a single mother meant she was not used to this amount of company. Imogen had never felt like she missed out and being here today confirmed that fact. Soon university would be a part of becoming a police officer; she was glad to have bypassed that.

  Adrian was trailing behind her, on the phone to his son who was in the middle of intensive revision for his exams. She knew Tom well, but not as Adrian’s girlfriend, and so what had been a fun and interesting friendship with her partner’s son was now looking like it might get extremely awkward. Adrian rightfully hadn’t told him yet and she wasn’t sure how he would react to the news. Did she even want him to know yet? Was this serious? It certainly had a weight about it, as relationships went – they already knew each other’s baggage, and so the usual small talk at the start of a relationship had never happened and they’d been thrust straight into stage three. After flirtation but without the usual ceremony of the first or second date, here they were.

  She waited patiently for him to hang up and then knocked on the door to the room next to Finn’s. A small, waspish blonde girl opened the door and peered through, her tight smile dropping when she saw it was two ‘older’ people looking very serious indeed. There was no need to pretend to be friendly.

  ‘Hi, we just wanted to ask you a few questions about your neighbour, Finn. If that’s OK?’

  ‘Um, sure. I don’t know him very well though,’ she said.

  Imogen wasn’t sure, but she thought the girl was blushing at the mention of Finn. She pulled out her notepad.

  ‘What’s your name, please?’ Adrian asked, anticipating Imogen’s next question.

  ‘I’m Heather Randall.’

  ‘Did you ever see Finn with this girl?’ Imogen said, holding up a picture of Caitlin Watts with her free hand.

  ‘Yes. A couple of times. He didn’t spend a lot of time in halls though, to be honest.’

  ‘Did he hang out with anyone in particular
here?’ Adrian asked.

  ‘He had a fight with the guy down there. I think his name is Scott.’ She pointed to a door at the end of the hall. ‘Number seven.’

  ‘Thank you.’ Imogen smiled at Heather, who shut the door as quickly as she had opened it. Imogen scribbled down everything the girl had said before they walked down the corridor to the room she had pointed at.

  Scott had music thumping and the unmistakeable aroma of weed permeated through the door. Adrian banged on it hard. The music stopped and after a few moments of clattering, the door opened. Scott had unruly curls that hung in front of his eyes; he was young-looking, they all were. Imogen had to face the fact that she wasn’t a teenager any more, even though in her mind she had never considered herself a grown-up.

  ‘What?’ Scott said.

  Imogen held up her warrant card; she didn’t need to, but all things considered she wanted to see the look on his face as it slipped into a panic about whether he looked stoned or not. He did look stoned. He looked very stoned.

  ‘What’s your full name and course, please?’ Imogen said.

  ‘Scott Joseph Woodlaw, I’m reading economics.’

  ‘Finn Blackwell. We heard you had an altercation with him,’ Imogen said.

  ‘That psycho? He tried to fucking choke me.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I didn’t know she was his girlfriend, that Caitlin girl, she certainly didn’t act like she was. She came in here for a … for some … help with something and he practically dragged her out and then started punching the shit out of me, then got me in a headlock,’ Scott explained. Caitlin had probably gone in there to get high without actually paying for her own supply.

  ‘Did you report it?’ Imogen asked.

  ‘No, I just stayed away from both of them. I used to keep my door open, but now I lock it. I haven’t seen him since. He ain’t right.’

  ‘What about this boy? Do you know him?’ Imogen said as she scrolled until she found a picture of Russ Beacham and then held it up to him.

  Scott shook his head. ‘No, never seen him before.’

  ‘We may need to talk to you again, Scott. You might want to ease off on the hash until we do,’ Adrian said with a little wink in Scott’s direction.

  A fleeting look of fear passed across the boy’s face, but he relaxed when he realised they weren’t going to do anything. He closed the door and Imogen turned to Adrian.

  ‘That doesn’t sound like the Finn we’ve got in holding.’

  ‘None of that means we can hold onto him for any longer though.’

  ‘No. We’re just going to have to find something else.’

  ‘I’ll find Gary when we get back and see if there is anything else we can use. We’re running out of avenues right now. Where the hell is Russ Beacham? If we didn’t have a photo of him I would almost swear he and Finn were the same person. How has Beacham stayed a ghost for so long?’

  Chapter Forty-Two

  Imogen couldn’t keep her eyes open in the station. Two hours’ light sleep really wasn’t enough. Everyone had been working round the clock to try to find out where Russ Beacham was before another body turned up. Adrian was still in with Gary, and she didn’t want to go and find them. It’s not that she needed a break from Adrian, but she was worried that she was getting too dependent on him; she had to remember how to work alone. Adrian could just relay any information to her when he got back. In the meantime she wanted a coffee and couldn’t face the tepid mud from the machine. There was a little cafe near the station. She could go and pick up some coffees and pastries for everyone before it closed; she could use the fresh air as well. Grabbing her bag, she left the station.

  Ten minutes later the cafe owners had put all the coffees in a box and the owner’s son was carrying it back for Imogen, when she saw a pregnant woman standing outside the station, pacing. She was clearly very anxious and looked as though she had been there some time. Imogen knew who it was. She waved to Constable Ben Jarvis who was standing near the entrance; he came over and took the box from the cafe owner’s son.

  ‘Hand these around will you? Can you put two black coffees on my desk and a couple of pastries before they all disappear? Thanks, Ben.’

  She tried desperately not to be flirtatious with him, remembering what Adrian had said to her previously about the way she was with him. She didn’t want to give him the wrong idea.

  ‘You’re a star. Thanks, DS Grey.’ He smiled.

  She waited for Ben to go back inside before approaching the woman.

  ‘Are you Abigail Lucas?’ Imogen asked.

  The woman looked startled and her eyes darted to the road; Imogen could see she was considering making a break for it.

  ‘I prefer Abbey, but yes.’

  Imogen spoke again. ‘I work with DS Adrian Miles. Do you need to see him?’

  Abbey paused before speaking to Imogen, obviously trying to decide if she could trust her or not. ‘I came to see him the other day about my husband. I just wanted an update.’

  ‘Do you want to come inside and I’ll see if I can find him for you?’ Imogen said.

  The woman clearly needed to sit down. She seemed exhausted and quite nervous.

  Imogen led her inside and took her to the family liaison room before pulling out her phone and texting the letters FLR to Adrian, hoping he would understand that she needed him to come to the family liaison room immediately. She watched the woman nervously scratching the back of her hand in a bid to control her nerves.

  ‘Could I get some water?’ Abbey asked.

  Imogen stood up and poured her a cup from the water dispenser in the corner. The door opened and Adrian walked in, but it did nothing to decrease the tension in the air.

  ‘Detective Miles, I still haven’t heard from my husband and I have a bad feeling.’

  ‘I spoke with him a couple of days ago,’ Adrian said.

  ‘It’s unlike him to go this long without contacting me.’

  Imogen noticed Abbey shoot a questioning look at Adrian, obviously concerned about speaking freely in front of her.

  ‘I know about Parker. He saved my life and, for that, I owe him,’ Imogen said, removing the option for Adrian to try to lie to protect her. She had made her decisions, just like he had made his; she didn’t need him to try to cover for her.

  ‘I don’t know how much you know about what Parker is into,’ Adrian said to Abbey, ‘but he has uncovered a group of lecturers at the university who have been manipulating students, using unfavourable personal circumstances to control them.’

  ‘For what reason?’ Abbey asked, her eyes narrowing and shifting as though she were trying to understand what they were saying to her.

  ‘It seems as though they have some kind of point-scoring system depending on what they can convince their students to do,’ Adrian explained.

  ‘During the course of this investigation we found some emails from one of your old lecturers at the university to Robert Coley about you,’ Imogen said.

  ‘About me?’

  ‘Specifically about an incident that took place while you were a student at the university. I’m sure I don’t need to go into the details now. You know what I’m talking about.’

  ‘Which lecturer?’ Abbey said, losing colour from her face.

  ‘Helen Lassiter,’ Imogen said.

  ‘And what did she say about the incident?’ Abbey asked, her voice barely under control.

  ‘They were going to use it to try to coerce you into doing things,’ Imogen responded.

  ‘What kind of things?’

  ‘Petty crime, escalating into bigger things, maybe even murder by the end of it,’ Imogen said.

  ‘How much did she say about the … incident in the email?’ Abbey asked, immediately holding her breath afterwards, bracing herself for the conversation.

  ‘Enough.’

  ‘Who saw this email?’

  ‘If you’re worried about Parker, he probably did see it. They had been deleted from the computer around
the time of the professor’s death, but our tech managed to recover them. I take it Parker didn’t know about the attack on you?’ Adrian said.

  ‘No, he didn’t. I didn’t feel as though he needed to know. He’s got enough of his own issues to deal with,’ Abbey said, her voice shaking, the panic rising as her breaths got closer together. ‘That’s what all this is about? Why did they choose me?’

  ‘They didn’t just choose you, it was other students, too. We think that’s what Parker is doing now, trying to track the rest of them down,’ Adrian said.

  ‘Is there any chance that Helen Lassiter was involved in your attack? There doesn’t seem to be any mention of the perpetrator’s name in her emails, but it’s possible that your original assault was part of this – for want of a better word – game,’ Imogen explained.

  ‘What are you saying?’

  ‘Maybe your attacker was coerced into assaulting you in the same way they planned to coerce you into doing whatever Coley was going to make you do,’ Imogen said.

  ‘You think my teacher, someone I trusted, someone who was supposed to look out for me actually told someone to rape me? To score points as part of a game?’ Abbey’s tone contained a mixture of anger and distress.

  ‘If you tell us who it was, then we can investigate further. We might be able to get more information on who was behind it. It might lead us back to Parker,’ Adrian said.

  ‘If I thought it would help Parker then I would tell you, but I don’t think it will. I’m not willing to talk about it. I tried to report it at the time and it was ignored due to lack of evidence, and so I don’t see the point in dredging it up again now,’ Abbey said firmly, her face whiter than usual.

  Imogen couldn’t imagine what she must be feeling upon hearing this. Probably similar to how Adrian had felt upon learning that the false accusation against him was not just one misguided person’s decision but an action by committee.

  ‘We have reason to believe this game has been going on for several years. It’s possible whoever attacked you was doing so under her instruction,’ Adrian said.