‘In terms of distance, or on the evolutionary scale?’ Wilson smiled again, then shook his head. ‘Inspector, I know better than anyone what I was and what I did. But that was the old me, and no matter how much I regret the choices I made, I can’t undo them. Nothing you say here today will affect that one way or another.’
‘Fair enough.’ Bliss gave a thoughtful nod. ‘Tell me, then, Mr Wilson, what do you recall about your business dealings in Peterborough?’
‘You mean was I off my face too much to remember all the gory details?’
‘Something like that, yes.’ Bliss had to admit, he admired the man’s head-on approach.
‘Well, the answer to that is no. I used, but not hard. As for your question, ask me something specific and I’ll give you a specific answer.’
‘That’s what I like to hear. Tell me then, does the name Jodie Maybanks mean anything to you?’
Wilson frowned. ‘From my time in Peterborough? I’m not sure it does.’
‘She was a street girl. Early twenties.’
‘I dealt with a lot of those, Inspector. But yes, I do remember a girl called Jodie. I never knew her surname, so I can’t tell you if it was the same girl.’
‘I don’t suppose you got too close to your victims, eh?’
‘You don’t like me much, do you?’ Wilson continued to smile.
Bliss shook his head. ‘I don’t know you well enough to have an opinion either way. I don’t like what you are, that’s for sure.’
‘What I was, Inspector. What I was.’
‘Mr Wilson, you are responsible for untold horrors. The drugs you pushed literally destroyed lives. There are people dead because of you, people ruined for life because of you, people who steal and sell their bodies because of you. Because of your greed, your complete disregard for the misery you caused.’
‘You can’t know any of that.’
‘For certain, no. But in here,’ Bliss tapped a hand on his heart. ‘I know because I’ve seen the aftermath, the wreckage your kind leaves behind.’
Wilson’s cheeks flushed, the smile faltered. ‘But you can see for yourself what I’m doing now. I’m steering young people away from drugs. I’m giving something back.’
Bliss let his gaze harden. ‘You think you can ever compensate for the lives you’ve ruined? You’d have to live a thousand lives of your own.’
‘Well, I only have this one, Inspector. And I’m doing the best I can with it now.’
‘Do you think you can account for your whereabouts in June nineteen ninety?’ Bliss asked, letting it drop and moving back on track.
‘Not unless I was either banged up or out of the country. Why? Does this have something to do with this Jodie kid?’
‘That’s when she was killed. So, yes.’
The adviser sat back in his chair, wary now for the first time since Bliss had started speaking. ‘Okay, I think I can see where this is headed. Now let me tell you this, Inspector Bliss, whilst you may think I am responsible for the deaths of users down the years, I have never knowingly murdered someone. Not Jodie. Not anybody. You may be right, in fact you probably are, that I have blood on my hands. But not that way. Not deliberately.’
As much as he didn’t want to, Bliss believed the man. Wilson’s fierce denial appeared genuine. Still, Bliss figured it couldn’t hurt to finish what he’d gone there to do. ‘So, were you in jail in June nineteen ninety?’ he asked.
The man shook his head. ‘No. I was still living in Peterborough, and I’m reasonably certain that I wasn’t abroad that summer. I got pulled every few weeks or so, spent a few nights in a cell. But that far back… I can’t be positive where I was at any given date or time.’
‘So, that hardly removes you from the frame, does it?’
‘I suppose not. But like I said, I’m no murderer.’
‘We’ll see,’ Bliss said, abruptly getting to his feet. ‘I’ll have some checks run on you, Mr Wilson. If I can’t come up with anything that provides you with an alibi, we may have to have another chat.’
‘Won’t that be a pleasure?’
‘It’s a murder investigation, sir. It’s not supposed to be fun.’
‘Of course. I’m sorry. It’s just that it’s such a long, long time ago,’ Wilson said, his eyes glazed as if peering back into his past.
‘Yes, it is. But not for Jodie Maybanks. Her life ended there and then.’
Bliss turned and left the office without another word.
Chapter 23
It was almost one thirty when Bliss, Chandler and Dunne met up at the Pizza Hut restaurant in the Boongate district of Peterborough. Boongate was home to both new and second-hand car dealerships, large trading estates, DIY stores, and a few fast food places. It was also home to the lunchtime buffet special.
Each of the three detectives took a large plate up to the hot food stand and helped themselves to a variety of pizza slices and pasta. When they were all settled back around their table, it was Bliss who got the ball rolling.
‘Milton Keynes was a complete bust,’ he told them. ‘The Murder Squad seem to have done a good, thorough job so far, but it doesn’t look as if they’re going to get even a sniff of a lead. No witnesses yet again. For a while I thought they were going to start looking at Alan Dean’s time here, but I think I managed to convince them it would be better for me to do any necessary digging around on my own manor.’
Bliss told them more of what he had learned about the murder.
‘Whoever took out Weller and Dean were very professional,’ Chandler said, sucking some tomato sauce from her fingers.
‘So a hitman and not a cop,’ Dunne said thoughtfully.
‘Why not one and the same?’
‘Much more likely to be hits paid for by a cop,’ Bliss suggested. ‘It’s not as if people like that are hard to find in our line of work.’
‘True. So how about this born-again do-gooder? Snake, the dealer? What’s the story there?’
‘I think that’s also going to be a dead end,’ Bliss admitted. ‘I’ll run him through the system, and pull him in if I think it’s necessary, but I think Wilson’s culpability ended with providing Jodie with her regular fix.’
‘Which makes him an accessory in my opinion,’ Dunne growled.
Bliss nodded. ‘Yeah. If only the law saw it that way. I’d have that bastard banged up for life.’
‘Well, my trip to Lincoln was equally fruitless,’ Chandler told them. ‘Weller kept a neat office and tidy records. Nothing came up, no names, no numbers.’
‘How was Mrs Weller?’ Bliss sipped from a chilled bottle of Stella. In addition to watching his salt intake he was also supposed to cut down on his alcohol consumption. Pizza and beer wasn’t quite what his ENT consultant had had in mind. Bliss was feeling much better now, though, the early morning vertigo a distant memory.
‘She was fine. Welcoming. Quiet, as you’d expect. Appreciating what we were doing for her and her husband, I think.’
‘Did you get the impression she’ll keep schtum?’
‘You mean will she try going around us to make an official appeal?’ Chandler shook her head. ‘I think she’s shrewd enough to realise that something is not quite right, and that it’s better if a lid is kept on it for the time being at least. Certainly I think she’ll speak to you first if she decides to go a different way.’
That was as much as Bliss could hope for. He’d got the same impression from talking to Allison Weller on the telephone. He glanced to his left. ‘Bobby? How did you get on?’
Taking a moment to fork some pasta into his mouth and chew it down, Dunne finally gave a slow shrug. ‘I managed to spend some time with Hendry. He works security over at the Wittering RAF base, and happened to be on duty this morning. I went at him casually, purely as a fellow officer. I asked him about the triple nine, the response and the follow up. A few casual remarks about Weller. I had no sense that his replies were guarded. He pretty much gave me what we read in the reports.’
‘H
e didn’t seem anxious, agitated in any way?’ Bliss asked.
‘Not at all. There was no sign he felt threatened by anyone or anything. If I didn’t know better, I’d say his involvement ended with that conversation he had with McAndrew.’
‘On the other hand, perhaps he feels safe because he’s keeping quiet,’ Chandler suggested. ‘I mean, we have to assume he was either bought off or frightened off all those years ago.’
Dunne was nodding. ‘I didn’t feel I could push it. I didn’t want him to get a sense of what was going on. As far as Hendry was concerned, I was following up on a minor report, that’s all.’
‘No, you handled it just right,’ Bliss told him. He didn’t like to second-guess his close colleagues. ‘It doesn’t look like Hendry is going anywhere, so he’ll keep. If things take off, then we can bring him in and go to work on him. Right now, it’s best that he suspects nothing.’
‘Tell the truth, he seemed like an okay bloke. I hope his part was as minor as we think Weller’s was.’
‘I’ve been giving that some thought,’ said Chandler, slashing the air with her knife. Not quite the mark of Zorro, but it was a definite flourish. ‘You know, it is possible they had no idea what they were into until it was too late. Maybe they were warned off initially by a more senior officer, a bit of gentle persuasion. It happens all the time – one cop doing someone a favour, bending the rules a little bit. Weller and Hendry could have swallowed some story, and only found out or were told later what they’d helped cover up.’
Bliss looked at her. Smiled. Penny liked to think the best of people. The perfect foil for his own misanthropic views. ‘I hope you’re right. I really do.’
‘Maybe they didn’t even know the full extent until the other night, when Jodie Maybanks’s remains were found.’
Bliss glanced out of the rain-beaded window. Traffic was building up by the roundabout, and the nearby garage forecourt was overflowing. Drivers in the line of vehicles steamed almost as much as their wheels, and those pumping petrol seemed glad to be out of it, albeit only briefly. He gave Chandler’s suggestion some thought, but this time he shook his head.
‘You’re forgetting one thing. The triple nine they attended was in Fletton. Even if the body had been unearthed there, it would still have been an impossible reach for Weller to tie its discovery in with what happened that night. No, if he knew or even suspected those remains were relevant to that accident report more than sixteen years ago, then he must have known about the cover-up. I’m not saying either he or Hendry had any part in the murder itself, only that Weller, at the very least, knew someone had died that night.’
Chandler nodded. ‘You’re probably right. I guess I was hoping for Allison Weller’s sake that her husband might come out of this clean.’
‘Yeah. She seemed like a very nice woman. I’m going to hate having to tell her about this.’ Bliss glanced at Dunne, looking to change the subject slightly. ‘So, did you get any time down in the catacombs?’
Dunne grimaced. ‘Yeah, time and a lungful of dust. Those files are thick with it. Nothing of interest so far, though. I’ll be diving back in this afternoon, but I’m not holding my breath.’ He chuckled at the pun.
‘So a complete waste of a morning,’ Bliss complained.
‘That’s hardly unusual, boss,’ Chandler pointed out. ‘I wish I had a quid for every hour I’ve spent chasing my tail.’
He nodded. ‘I know. I’m frustrated, that’s all. Putting a name to our Jane Doe was a major boost, but this business of us working on our own in the background is a bit more complicated than I thought it would be. Take this morning, for instance, we haven’t even discussed what our cover stories will be. Three of us working on three separate lines of investigation, none of which we can report back to the squad. None of which were actioned. Questions will be asked soon, tongues will start to wag. We need to deflect attention away from what we’re doing.’
‘So let’s come up with something credible. Shouldn’t be too hard for three major brains like us.’
Dunne continued eating, saying nothing. Bliss ran it through his mind. By later tonight or early tomorrow morning the squad would have everything actioned, witnesses spoken to, and the paperwork well under way. They would need further direction. Not only that, but Sykes would be breathing down his neck, looking to close the case completely.
‘We could give the squad Jodie Maybanks and Simon Palmer as their focus. We started the legwork with both, but there’s a lot more that could be done along those lines. It’s mostly procedure, but frankly if Sykes has his way it’ll only be for another couple of days, anyway.’
‘And we could trim the squad down,’ Dunne suggested, punctuating the air with his drink. ‘Sykes will love you for it, but better still it’ll suggest we’re winding the inquiry down as he wants. Skeleton staff for the basics, while the three of us do the business.’
Nodding eagerly, Bliss said, ‘That’d do it. Good thinking, Bobby.’
The big man shrugged. ‘It’s a gift.’
‘And a rare one, at that. I’ll also feel better about not wasting the time and talents of so many officers. By and large they have the essentials. The official essentials, that is. We three know what happened, as good as anyway. We know where it happened, and when. We also know how. All that’s missing is the who.’ He looked across at Chandler. ‘Agreed?’
‘Yep. Sounds about right to me. If there are any actions still outstanding, we can put a couple of uniforms on them. Have someone chase forensics, and a DC each for the life and times of Jodie Maybanks and Simon Palmer.’
Bliss finished off his lager. Deception was never easy to live with, but he was starting to feel a little better about the situation he found himself in.
One by one, the team members stood and informed the assembled group how far they had been able to take their actions. It was five twenty, Bliss and Chandler standing at the front as usual, Mia Strong beside them making relevant notations on the various whiteboard pages retrieved from the network. Bobby Dunne hovered in the background, as much as a man his size was able to hover. The investigation had been running for a week.
A nervous uniform cleared his throat twice before reading from his notebook. ‘The duty officer on the night of the triple nine, Sergeant Rhodes, is still stationed over at the Bridge Street Central nick. He called in sick last week, and then took seven days’ holiday. He must have gone away because we can’t contact him at home.’
‘What day did he call in sick?’
A quick check of the notes. ‘Wednesday morning, sir.’
Bliss nodded as if it were of little importance, though it was hugely significant. Rhodes may have either fled or been spirited away. Gone the way of Weller and Dean, perhaps. That would need to be checked out.
He surveyed the team once more. ‘Malcolm Twist, anyone?’ Twist had made the first emergency call the night Jodie Maybanks was run down.
‘Still trying, boss,’ DC Wallace replied. ‘Chicago PD are tracking him. Details by morning, so they reckon.’
‘That just leaves forensics.’ He turned to Mia. ‘DC Strong?’
‘Everything is back with us, boss. Unfortunately, there’s nothing we can use at this stage.’
Bliss tugged at his memory. ‘There were a few scraps of cloth found with the remains. Anything on that?’
‘Sacking and possibly a cotton top. The rest must have rotted away. I figure the remains were carried in the sack when they were moved from Fletton to Bretton Woods. Anything else of value was probably left behind in its original burial plot.’
That seemed a plausible explanation. Bliss gave a nod of appreciation. ‘And the steel rod removed from our victim’s leg? What do we have from Latents?’
Strong shook her head. ‘Not a thing. Smudges only, I’m afraid.’
Bliss sighed. It was disappointing, but not a complete surprise. They had no fresh crime scene to work with. ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘Listen up.’
He told them he was reducing t
he numbers on the team. There were a few groans of protest, but they all knew it was inevitable. Human resources were stretched to the limit right across the service, and whatever they might feel as a team or as individuals about the injustice of Jodie Maybanks’s passing, the fact was they were looking at a sixteen-year-old murder.
As Chandler released some team members back to normal duty and gave out actions to others, Bliss started back to his office with guilt pressing on him like a shadow. He was running the case this way for all the right reasons, but that didn’t stop him from feeling miserable about it.
Bliss was stopped by Sykes on his way back to his office. The super appeared harried. ‘Are we confident enough about the identity of our remains to go public?’ he asked.
They were standing in the main CID area, so the super’s manner was cordial.
‘Absolutely.’
‘And your investigation?’
Bliss thought about what had been discussed earlier. ‘Winding down,’ he said. ‘We’ve run through our options. There are a few loose ends to tie up before I’ll be happy putting it to bed, but essentially, we’re just about done.’
‘Good. In that case, I’ll relieve you of your media duties and make the announcement myself. I’ll make it clear that whilst the inquiry is ongoing, we do not expect to conclude it with an arrest.’
‘That’s certainly the way it appears.’ Bliss found it hard to lock eyes with Sykes. The man was enjoying himself, no doubt viewing the winding down of the case as a minor victory over Bliss.
‘Free up your team, Inspector. Make sure your… loose ends are bound tight sooner rather than later.’
‘Already ordered. It’s pretty much a formality from here on.’
‘A satisfactory conclusion, then,’ Sykes said, smiling and nodding.
‘If not being able to arrest and convict a killer can be deemed satisfactory, then yes. If not being able to deliver justice for Jodie Maybanks is satisfactory, then again, yes.’ This time Bliss did meet the other man’s eyes.
‘You know what I meant, Inspector.’ Sykes glanced around to see if they were being observed or could be overheard.
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