by Sibel Hodge
"It's what makes me a good investigator," I said into her hair.
"And a crappy bride-to-be."
Okay, I wouldn't have put it so bluntly, but maybe she had a point.
She finally released me and thrust the magazine back toward my nose. "Promise me you'll look at them."
If I didn't promise, God knows what she'd do next. Probably a wedding spell in the middle of the high street for me. "Okay." I crossed my fingers behind my back.
"Did you have your fingers behind your back?" She gave me a knowing look.
I faked surprise. "Of course not!"
* * *
I dialed Romeo as I slid behind the wheel of my Toyota. It rang five times and went to his voicemail. "Er…hi, it's…Amber. How've you been? I hope you're okay. I…I need some help on a case I'm working on and wondered if we could meet. I'm investigating the disappearance of Chantal Langton and it might tie in to her missing friend, Liza Bennet. All righty, then. If you could…er…call me back, that would be great." I hung up and let out the breath that I hadn't even realized I was holding.
Next, I phoned Steven Shaw.
"Hi, Steven, I'm Amber Fox from Hi-Tec Insurance. I'm investigating Chantal's disappearance and I need to ask you some questions. Can we meet?"
"Er…sure. The police already asked me all sorts of stuff, though."
"I know. Her mum wanted me to look into it, too."
"Oh, okay, then. I'm at work at the moment. I've been trying to keep busy since…you know, since she went missing. I can't just sit at home and think about it all the time. Why don't you come here?"
"Where are you?"
"Burger Land. I'm the regional manager, but I use the office at the branch in town."
Oh, God, Dad would freak if he saw me in there again! Still, it might be an excuse to get another apple pie in. That would be number two of my five a day. "I'll be there in fifteen minutes."
As I pulled up in the car park, Hacker rang. "Yo," he said.
"Yo. What you got for me?"
"Okay, the CCTV at the train station is a no-go. The cameras in the car park weren't pointing in the direction of Chantal's car so you can't see who left it there."
"Bummer."
"Chantal took out five hundred pounds from her back account the day she went missing."
I thought about that. In the scheme of things, five hundred wasn't much. If she were running away, she'd want more than that. Judging by some of her clothes, I figured she could probably blow five hundred on one item, which meant it was highly unlikely she'd been running away of her own accord. "That's small change for her."
"She made one phone call the day she went missing to a phone number that's an unregistered pay-as-you-go phone. She's made no calls since."
"What's the number?" I rummaged around in my rucksack for a pen and pad. "Hang on." Had I left the pad at the office? I opened the glove box to find something to write on. A CD case? Nope. A chocolate Easter bunny that had melted into the shape of a heart that I'd meant to throw away ages ago. A map! Aha! I grabbed the map. "Fire away." I scribbled down the number he gave me.
"And the guy who's running the opposition group to City Park Complex is Alfie Cross. He's sixty-two, a retired security guard. He and most of his neighbors don't want a modern apartment complex in the middle of a street full of historic houses. He's already been cautioned by the police for vandalizing a sign outside Langton Developments' office."
"Interesting. What kind of vandalism?"
"He spray-painted the words Profit Over Heritage! on the sign at the entrance to their car park."
Hmmm. Hardly violent threats, but it was worth talking to him. Maybe some simple threats had escalated into something else. "Does he have a criminal record?"
"Yes. He had a fight with a guy in a pub about ten years ago. Broke his jaw, apparently. The court was lenient with him, though. If he completed an anger management course, he could do community service instead of jail time."
"Very lenient," I agreed.
"Then Alfie was on his way to the anger management course one day and got arrested. Apparently, a guy ran into Alfie's bike with his car and knocked him off. Alfie lost the plot, dragged the guy out of the car, and punched him a couple of times in the face."
I could just imagine the newspaper headlines: Man hits someone on the way to anger management course! "Great course, then. What a waste of taxpayers' money."
"Yep."
"Chantal was the architect on the City Park Complex project. Maybe Alfie held an extra-special grudge against her. Okay, what else?"
"I checked out the Second Chance Clinic on the web. It's a free clinic for birth control. They also carry out terminations."
"So maybe Chantal was going there to get rid of her pregnancy."
"I checked their computers. There are no records of any appointments in the name of Chantal Langton."
"If something did happen to her during a procedure, they could easily cover it up in their computer records. I'll need to pay them a visit."
"You remember that Holbrook Clinic was written on the back of the business card you found in Chantal's room?"
"Uh-huh. Do they also carry out terminations?"
"I don't know what the hell they do. I checked out their website and it doesn't tell you much at all. Apparently they carry out 'unique treatments, tailor-made to suit qualified clientele.'"
"Huh? What's that supposed to mean?"
"Exactly. It's some kind of private clinic that does who knows what."
"It sounds a bit of a wide spectrum from a free clinic to this Holbrook Clinic. I mean, Chantal could afford to use a private clinic for a termination, so why did she have the card for a free clinic?"
"I don't know. I'll keep digging and see what I can come up with."
"Cool."
"Yo." That was Hacker's way of saying hello and goodbye. Maybe it was a Haitian thing.
"Yo." I hung up and made my way into Burger Land.
At the counter, I asked Pink Hair to get Steven Shaw. I saw Dad in the kitchen area behind, flipping burgers. When he spotted me, his eyes grew wide and he dropped a burger on the floor. He bent down to pick it up, and by the time his head popped up again, Pink Hair had led me to an office upstairs. I seriously hoped he wasn't going to serve up the burger to anyone.
"Here you go," she said, in between chewing gum so loudly it made my teeth cringe.
"Thanks," I said as she disappeared back to the restaurant floor.
I knocked on the door and went in.
Steven Shaw was tall and skinny. Gangly, like he was all arms and legs. He had delicate features and strawberry-blonde hair. Not ginger enough for him to be teased at school and not blonde enough to be considered cool. He wasn't the kind of ultra good-looking guy I'd imagined as Chantal's boyfriend. In fact, he was bordering on effeminate.
He stood up and leaned over his desk, giving me a weak handshake.
"Amber," I said.
"Steven…but then you…uh, know that already." He glanced around the room, blushing.
I sat down. He followed suit.
"What can you tell me about Chantal? I heard you two were going out but that she broke it off after Liza went missing."
"I loved her." His face paled and his eyes moistened with tears. "I wish I knew what had happened to her."
It didn't escape my attention that he'd referred to loving her in the past tense. Did he know something or was it just a slip of the tongue?
"We went out for two years and everything was going really well. I was…I was going to ask her to marry me." He pursed his lips together. "Then when Liza went missing, Chantal was just too upset about everything. She broke up with me a few weeks afterwards. She said she couldn't handle being in a relationship anymore. I tried to get her to come back, but she wouldn't."
"Did you see her at all after you broke up?"
"We met up for coffee a few times but it wasn't like a date or anything, unfortunately." Tears fell from his eyes. He quickly wip
ed them away.
"Had you seen her recently?"
"No." He averted his gaze from me and glanced down at the desk. His mouth gave an involuntary twitch.
Oooh, lie alert! "Not at all?" I prompted him.
He shook his head, eyes cast downwards, hands fiddling in his lap.
"Do you know if she was seeing someone else?"
That got his attention pretty quick. He looked up at me with wounded puppy-dog eyes. "No! She couldn't—I mean, she wouldn't. She told me she still loved me but she couldn't be with me until she knew what happened to Liza. She was down, depressed, but she wouldn't have got involved with someone else, I know it!" His breathing got faster, more agitated. "I just know it."
"Did you write her any letters?"
"No. I texted her, but I didn't write any letters."
"And you don't know what could've happened to her?"
This time he carried on holding eye contact, but his hands were trembling slightly. "No, I don't know."
"Did you know Liza Bennet?"
"Of course." He sniffed. "She was Chantal's best friend."
"Any idea what might've happened to her?"
"No."
"Do you know what sort of story Liza was working on when she disappeared?"
Trembling stopped abruptly. Full eye contact. "No."
Okay, that part was the truth.
"Can you think of any other information that might help me find Chantal or find out what happened to Liza?"
He shook his head.
I stood. "Okay, thanks for your time."
He stood, too, looking pretty relieved the questions were over.
On the surface, it looked like Steven was a sensitive guy. A gentle giant who wouldn't hurt a fly.
But what was lurking underneath the surface?
CHAPTER FIVE
Romeo phoned as I was leaving Burger Land. "Hey, Amber."
"Hey back. How are you?"
"Pretty good. Busy with work. You?"
"Yep, I'm good. I—"
"You want to know about Chantal Langton and Liza Bennet?" Straight down to business. But then, what did I expect? I'd dumped him for Brad, and I still felt like a prize bitch.
"Yeah."
"Can we meet?" he asked.
"Tell me when and where and I'm all yours." Oh, God, why did I say that? It sounded like I was coming on to him. "Er…not literally, of course."
He ignored my faux pas. "Starbucks. Ten minutes?"
"I'm on my way."
Starbucks was like my second office, and I could find my way there blindfolded. I was the first one to arrive so I ordered a mochaccino, heavy on the whipped cream and chocolate sprinkles, and a latte for Romeo. I eyed the double-choc muffins with lust, then decided I'd probably eaten enough junk food for one day. At this rate, I wouldn't even be able to get into a wedding dress. I seriously needed to stop eating crap if I wanted to look good for the wedding. Right, that's it. I'm going on a no-junk-food diet.
Oh, shit! How was I supposed to tell Romeo I was getting married? Not that we'd actually decided on a date yet, although Brad kept pressing me to set one every chance he got. I wasn't the kind of girl who wanted a fairytale wedding. After everything that had happened between Brad and me and Romeo and me in the last few years, I was exhausted with it all, really. Okay, long story short—the last time Brad and I had been engaged, he'd disappeared on a secret SAS mission for three months without a word. As I sat there worrying about what the hell had happened to him, he was in some sweaty country, saving the world as we know it. Trying to get a message to me would've compromised his mission and his men, although I didn't know that at the time, and I spent those three months worrying myself sick. When he finally came back, I didn't want anything to do with him. I wouldn't see him or even talk to him. Eventually, after a lot of heartache, I'd got involved with Romeo, and he helped me get myself back together again—until the point when I was fired from my job as a police officer for shooting my boss in the ass (she so deserved it!), and Brad offered me a job as his insurance investigator. Brad had made it clear he'd stop at nothing to get me back. And now we were engaged again and…and what? Well, I guess I was worried history was going to repeat itself. So part of me wanted to just elope one day so I knew it would really happen. I didn't want all the months of planning and organizing a wedding, only to worry constantly about something getting in the way again and it not happening. The truth was, I had so many doubts and fears about getting married that it was hard to choose a single one that was the main reason for stopping me naming the date.
Romeo sat down at the table in front of me, jarring my thoughts back to the present. The sight of him took my breath away. Tall, sexy. Cinnamon skin and green eyes from his Spanish/Irish parents. Plus, he was one of the nicest guys in the world. We'd both worked on the Special Operations Team on the force, and before we'd got together romantically, we'd been great friends. I hadn't realized how much I'd missed him until now.
"Hey." He gave me a killer smile.
"Hey yourself." I smiled back, but it wobbled a bit on my face. "So…how've you been?"
"Pretty good. Work's crazy." He gave me a you-know-how-it-is shrug. "You?"
"Same."
"I've missed you." He pierced me with his eyes.
Okay, maybe I'd just wimp out and not tell him about my wedding. I know, I know, but how could I hurt him all over again? So what if I'd missed him, too? I still loved Romeo, I mean, it's not like you can just turn off your feelings like a tap, is it? But I loved Brad more, and deep down I knew I was meant to be with Brad.
"Sorry." He glanced away. "I shouldn't have said that."
I reached out and touched his hand. "I'm the one who should be sorry. You know—"
He held up the hand I'd touched to stop me, shaking his head. "Don't say anything. It's better that way." He took a sip of latte. "So, you're investigating Chantal's disappearance?"
I nodded, relieved for the change of subject. "What have the police found out so far?"
He shook his head. "As you probably know, her car was abandoned at the train station but CCTV didn't catch anything. It was parked in a blind spot of the camera. CCTV inside the station wasn't working at the time, and none of the staff remember her buying a train ticket. Apparently, she was supposed to be meeting a friend the day she disappeared, although we questioned all of them and none had arranged to see her." He sat back in the chair, stretching out his long legs in front of him.
"What did you think of the ex-boyfriend, Steven Shaw?"
"He seems pretty harmless. He was working the day she disappeared."
"He lied to me about not seeing Chantal recently," I said. "He definitely knows more than he's telling."
"Interesting."
"James Langton's a wealthy guy, but since there've been no ransom demands, it doesn't seem like a kidnapping," I said. "Unless it went wrong."
Romeo nodded. "A kidnapping doesn't feel right to me. As you can imagine, Langton's made a few enemies over the years with members of the community opposing his developments. Quite a few people are pissed off with his latest City Park Complex project. They don't want their sleepy, quaint street turned into a vast housing complex."
"Which brings me to Alfie Cross. He organized an action group to try and stop the planning permission being granted. Maybe he held some kind of grudge and took things a bit further than a spot of vandalism to Langton's sign."
"We spoke to Alfie. He's a bit aggressive when it comes to saving his community, but I don't think he would've done anything to Chantal. He did some prison time for a couple of assaults in the past, but his alibi checks out. He was at a yoga retreat for two days when Chantal disappeared."
"A yoga retreat?" I snorted. "Aren't people who do yoga supposed to be all calm and Zen-like? Vandalizing property and assaulting people doesn't sound very calm."
"He's apparently turned over a new leaf since he did his time for assault." He paused, thinking. "Another development company, Sage Development,
was originally supposed to be buying the plot that's going to house the City Park Complex, but James Langton beat them to the punch, upping his offer for the land to a ridiculous figure. Sage Development weren't too happy about it."
"Are there any other business rivals not happy with Langton?" I spooned the froth from my mochaccino into my mouth.
"No, but there's a rumor that Langton Developments have lost a lot of money recently. With the recession going on in the last few years, they were overextended on some big developments. They've slashed all the prices on sales for their housing developments, but people just aren't buying new houses anymore. So with all the delays in cash flow, Langton Developments could be in some serious financial trouble if they don't pull something out of the bag in the next few months."
"So where did he get the money to buy the City Park Complex plot and build it if they're in trouble?" Which brought my thoughts back to Chantal's trust fund. If James Langton was short of cash and needed some to finance a new project that might save the company, three million quid would come in mighty handy. The timing of Chantal's disappearance was suspicious since she was due to get the money in ten days, and if something happened to her…well, the money reverted to Daddy Langton.
Romeo shrugged. "At the moment we have no cause to look into any of his possible financial problems, but I'm sure Hacker would be able to." He raised an eyebrow.
I filled Romeo in on the trust fund. "Hacker's working on James Langton's financial accounts at the moment."
"So, what, you think James killed Chantal to get his hands on the money?"
I shrugged. "It's possible. If his business really is in trouble, a three-million-pound cash injection could be just what he needs. But I think there's more going on." I showed him the love letter. "You can keep it, I've got a copy."
"Bloody search officers missed this." Romeo read it, shaking his head.
"And I think she could've been pregnant." I told him about the pregnancy test, the card for the Second Chance Clinic, and the Holbrook Clinic's name written on the back.
"Maybe Steven lied to you about not seeing her lately because they were still having sex and she got herself pregnant. The Second Chance Clinic works with a lot of prostitutes," Romeo said. "They offer birth control, STD screening and treatment, and terminations. I've never heard of the Holbrook Clinic."