‘Very wise.’
‘Now, I think it’s time you delivered the letter.’
‘No problem.’
Ending the call, she moved closer to the window and studied her sepia reflection in the glass, her face looked distorted by the rain that ran down the windowpane. Reaching out her left hand she traced the water down the glass as if she were trying to brush away the tears from her reflection. The anger rose from the pit of her stomach, pulsating through her body like a vile black orgasm. Her right hand tightened on the beads and seconds later the thread snapped and the pearls fell, sounding like a rain of frozen tears as they hit the wooden floor and scattered in all directions.
‘Hate you!’ she hissed at the face that stared back at her in the glass.
63
Marnie sat at the kitchen table, Bev opposite, her fingers tentatively exploring the lump on her head.
‘You sure you’re OK?’ Marnie asked.
‘I tried to stop the bugger but he just steamrollered me,’ Bev explained with a sigh.
‘Yeah well, he’s on his way to a cell now.’
‘I still can’t believe Rogers let you chase the guy on your own.’
‘Come on, Bev, you know the man can’t be trusted to follow a lead, so he’s hardly going to put himself in harm’s way.’
‘Bastard,’ Bev mumbled, her face sour with disgust.
‘I take it he’s still upstairs?’
‘Yeah, securing the crime scene,’ Bev snarled.
When they heard footsteps in the hall Marnie turned as Reese walked into the room looking anything but happy.
‘You OK, Bev?’ he asked as he dragged out a chair and sat down.
‘I’m fine, sir, just got a bit of a headache that’s all.’
Reese nodded before turning to Marnie. ‘So, what the hell happened here?’
‘The man who attacked Bev was hiding in the bathroom—’
‘Hang on, I thought Rogers was here?’ Reese asked, folding his arms.
‘He’s upstairs, playing detective,’ Marnie spoke the words before she had time to consider the implications.
Reese held her gaze for a moment before turning to Bev.
‘He arrived about two minutes after I got here and made me stand guard at the front door while he checked upstairs,’ she said.
‘And you arrived twenty minutes later?’ he asked, looking at Marnie.
Marnie nodded. ‘Bev met me at the front of the house and then DI Rogers appeared at the top of the stairs and lambasted us for “gossiping”.’
Reese’s eyes widened in surprise. “Gossiping?”
‘We went into the bedroom; the dead man was on the floor and then the DI told us to search the house and garden. I was in the process of checking one of the bedrooms and Bev headed to the bathroom.’
‘I’d just reached the door when it opened and the guy came blasting out,’ Bev explained.
‘So, this man had been hiding in the bloody bedroom while Rogers was dicking about upstairs?’ Reese’s face darkened as Bev reluctantly nodded.
‘So, who chased the nutter?’
‘DS Hammond went after him,’ Bev finished.
Reese turned his gaze back to Marnie. ‘Did Rogers assist?’
‘No,’ she replied without hesitation.
Instantly, Reese was back on his feet, he crossed the room and vanished from sight. ‘Rogers, get your arse down here – right now!’ he bellowed.
Back in the kitchen Bev winced and Marnie remained seated, her arms folded as Reese stormed back into the room closely followed by Rogers.
Reaching the table, the DCI turned and Rogers came to a halt snapping to attention.
‘I want to know why you didn’t chase this bastard?’ Reese demanded. ‘I want to know why you didn’t check the rest of the house,’ the DCI seemed to expand with anger. ‘I want to know what the fuck you are playing at!’
Colour flooded the DI’s face, he flicked a dark look at Marnie but Reese darted forwards. ‘Don’t you dare look to pass the buck over this, if it wasn’t for DS Hammond this animal would have escaped because all you did was stand around with your thumb up your arse!’
‘I was seeing to PC Harvey,’ Rogers mumbled.
Reese took a step back, his eyes laced with disgust. ‘So, while Hammond was chasing a possible killer you were getting the smelling salts out?’
Rogers’s mouth opened and then he snapped it closed again, his face turning puce with a mixture of anger and shame.
‘Right, I want you standing guard at the end of the bloody drive,’ Reese barked.
‘But …’
‘You are not to be trusted,’ Reese jabbed out a finger, his hand shaking with fury.
Rogers fumed, spun on his heels and stormed from the room.
When Reese turned back to Marnie she could see the disbelief in his eyes as he shook his head. ‘Right, Bev, you stay here and take it easy, Marnie you’re with me,’ he walked from the room with Marnie close behind.
Bev watched them go before closing her eyes in an effort to steady her galloping heart.
64
Rowan looked around the room and tried to quell the feeling of fear that seemed to permanently swarm around her mind. When the man had come for, her she had screamed as he dragged her from the cellar and up the short flight of steps. She had tried to pull away but his hand had tightened on her arm until she gasped in pain.
‘Make a sound and I’ll break your fucking neck!’ he’d spat, pulling her along the hallway.
Rowan had tried to concentrate on the man but all she got was glimpses of his face, thinning hair that looked like rust, jowls wobbling as he pulled her out of the house. She remembered the smell of aftershave, sickly and sweet, then she had been locked into the rear of the van and the fear had closed around her as she cowered in the corner, the van swaying from side to side as they drove away.
Now, she looked around the threadbare room and tried to see an escape route, but the space had just the one door, the windows were pitted with crumbling plaster. Crossing the room, she tugged the handle, already resigned to the fact that it would be locked. Her hand fell away and her shoulders dropped as she realised that all that had happened was the fact that she had changed one prison for another. Then she thought of her father’s smiling face, she could see the encouragement shining in his eyes, willing her to remain calm, remain strong and he would find her.
Rowan’s face shifted and her eyes became infused with determination. She pictured the man who had taken her from the cellar, his grip had been firm but she suddenly recalled his eyes, eyes full of fear and panic. Then she thought of her dad’s eyes and her determination solidified into a solid block of anger.
‘The man is a weakling,’ her dad whispered in her mind. ‘He’s nothing, Rowan, a pathetic nobody.’ Rowan found herself nodding in agreement. ‘Remember what I taught you, remember the tricks,’ her father said.
‘The tricks,’ Rowan repeated.
She recalled the long summer days as they built the tree house, her father had spent time teaching his daughter the basics of self-defence and he had said that she was a natural. Rowan remembered smiling as she swiped her father’s legs from beneath him and he had fallen to the ground, his face split with a smile of satisfaction.
‘Remember what I taught you, to wait and watch for your chance, because bad guys always slip up and you will get your chance, sweetheart.’
She continued to nod listening to the words of wisdom, and then she turned and studied the room with fresh eyes. As with the cellar, the room contained a single bed though this time there was no chemical toilet, Rowan frowned and then she shrugged as if it was of no real concern. Her dad had served in the army for twelve years and she doubted whether he would be concerned with the lack of a toilet. Walking over to the bed she grabbed the headboard and gave it a shake, the wooden spindles rocked back and forth and Rowan Hall smiled as she went to work, her young mind emptying itself until all that remained was her hands tugg
ing and pulling at the wooden frame, her lips clamped together, her eyes lit with fervour.
‘I love you, Dad,’ she whispered as she tugged at the wood.
65
Reese wandered to the window and looked out over the garden. Marnie joined him and they both looked down at the rusting van on bricks. They were in the spare bedroom while Doc Kelly was taking a look at the body in the other room.
‘Things are happening too bloody fast,’ the DCI said. ‘First, we have Whitlow and Hamer – not to mention Chelsea Bold – and now this.’
‘How did you go on at the Phelps house?’ Marnie asked.
Reese gave her a grizzled smile. ‘Don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about Phelps or Rowan Hall.’
‘Will the Super draft in any help?’ Marnie asked.
‘He’ll have to because we can’t carry on like this.’
Rowan saw how much it hurt Reese to admit that they were getting swamped.
He continued to stare through the window. ‘It doesn’t help when you have spineless bastards like Rogers on the team.’
Marnie kept silent, reluctant to bad mouth the DI even though she agreed with Reese’s assessment.
‘Ever the diplomat,’ Reese said, as if he could read her mind.
Marnie smiled and gave the slightest of shrugs. ‘Where do we go from here?’ she asked in an effort to change the subject.
Reese checked his watch. ‘When was the last time you got any sleep?’ he asked.
Marnie tried to think but the word “sleep” made her yawn and Reese turned towards her.
‘Get yourself home, Marnie, tomorrow we can tackle the guy you collared leaving the house.’
‘Wouldn’t it be better to see to it now?’
Reese thought for a moment before shaking his head. ‘No, let the bastard stew for a bit, besides it’s no use going in half-asleep, I want no fucks-up when we question the guy.’
Marnie yawned again, suddenly she felt tired out as the last of the adrenaline seeped from her system.
‘OK, what time do you want me the station?’
‘Get there at half-six and with a bit of luck we’ll catch the guy still half-asleep.’
Marnie took a step towards the door and then stopped. ‘When I ran out into the street he was standing on the kerb fuming.’
Reese frowned. ‘I don’t follow.’
‘It was as if he expected to find a car there waiting for him, he was cursing but not at me, not then,’ she explained.
Reese nodded. ‘Someone was keeping an eye on the place and then you turned up and the watcher did a runner leaving his mate in the shit?’
‘That’s what I think happened.’
Reese smiled. ‘Good, it might give us something to work with especially if this guy’s been shafted.’
‘Right, see you in the morning,’ she said, leaving the room and heading down the stairs.
Bev was standing at the front door looking out into the rain-soaked night.
‘What do you want me to do, boss?’ she asked.
Marnie slipped her hands into her pockets. ‘I’ve got a bottle of red in the fridge at home if you fancy helping me empty it?’
Bev smiled and nodded. ‘Count me in.’ Two minutes later, they were in the car, at the end of the drive they spotted Rogers loitering under one of the tall trees in an effort to stay out of the rain.
‘Tosser,’ Marnie mouthed the word as the DI glared in at them as they pulled out into the road and vanished from sight.
The rain continued to fall from the leaden sky.
66
Conway parked the car in the lay-by and looked out at the rain-swept view, the darkness pushing at the windscreen in a solid block. He tried to think but his head felt clogged with raw emotion, thinking about what the female copper had told him.
John was dead, attacked from behind by some backstabbing bastard and left in the garage to rot. He thought back to their time in the army, the tight spots they had been in and yet neither man had ever had to worry, knowing that they had one another’s back no matter how bad the situation.
Conway closed his eyes and the tears trickled free. When John had met his future wife and left the army, Conway had been happy for them both, relieved that his friend was out of harm’s way and had found a woman he truly loved.
Two years later, Rowan had been born and the Hall family had been set for a life of good memories, a life of holidays and Christmases spent together, of love and laughter. Every time he came home on leave, Conway had seen the way having a wife and daughter had impacted on John’s life. Gone was the natural look of distrust in John’s eyes, gone were the frown lines that had constantly furrowed his brow. The last time they had met had been a couple of years after Carol had died, Rowan had been thrilled to see him and John had looked healed after the horror of losing the woman he loved. Conway remembered looking in the bathroom mirror and his frown lines had grown deeper, his eyes harder; that was when he had decided it was time to come out of the army and try to build a life in the real world.
Conway opened his eyes and watched the rain pattern the windscreen, inside the anger continued to build as he thought about the cruel twists of fate that life pushed your way. He pictured John sprawled on the floor of the garage and the anger bloomed into fury but then an image of Rowan swept in, replacing the fury with a feeling of crushing failure.
Pulling out the tobacco pouch, he rolled a cigarette with shaking hands before lighting the paper and taking a long pull, letting the smoke out on a shuddering sigh.
Then he pulled out his phone, finger tapping at the screen he typed the name Phelps into the search engine. Thirty seconds later, he had an image of the solicitor on the small screen, it had been taken at some charity event, the type of thing where the stinking rich made bids on certain items to raise cash for the needy. In the image, Phelps was smiling though when Conway checked his eyes he snarled as he recognised the look of a shark, someone hiding behind a façade and portraying himself as an upright citizen. He had headed out to the solicitor’s home only to find the copper in the cellar, a cellar that stank of human waste. Now, he was convinced that Rowan had been kept prisoner in the stinking room and the thought of her having to live in those squalid conditions raged through his mind.
But it was more than that, it was fury at what she had no doubt suffered at the hands of the smiling solicitor. Conway snarled as he crushed the burning cigarette in the palm of his left hand, feeling the heat flare as it burned the skin, the pain subsided but inside the rage increased.
He had to find Phelps, had to hope that Rowan was being kept alive and that God would allow him the time and energy to save her. He checked his watch and then clicked the seat back. Having spent so many years in the army he was used to shutting off his senses until the time came to act, though he was also acutely aware that time was limited, so he set the alarm on the phone and eased back in the seat.
Closing his eyes, he forced the parade of distressing images from his mind and slept.
67
Rae slammed the door to the house with such force that it shook in the frame. He stood in the hallway for a moment, his chest rising and falling in anger.
Stalking through the house, he made his way to the kitchen and stood looking out into the darkness, every few seconds his face twitched as if his brain were misfiring.
After visiting Chelsea in hospital, he had gone straight to see the solicitor but when he had seen the police car parked at the front of the office he had carried on along the road, his eyes locked on the rear-view mirror in disbelief as the squad car diminished in size.
The feeling of panic had squirmed in his guts as he tried to figure what the filth could want with Phelps. Then the paranoia had sent in, perhaps the solicitor had called them himself. Rae pictured the scene as he drove along the busy high street, Phelps spilling his guts, grassing him up, squealing like a small, fat pig on his way to the slaughter house. Rae had gasped and got his foot down in an effort to shake the dis
tressing image. The internal voice tried to convince him that Phelps wouldn’t be so stupid, but the chattering voice of madness was louder, strident in its certainty that Phelps was at this moment stabbing him in the back.
So, Rae had made his way straight to the solicitor’s house, his hands locked on the wheel, his eyes frantic. He had almost pulled onto the long drive and then at the last second, he had seen the Transit van with blacked-out windows parked at the front of the house, blue lights flashing, alongside a white van with the letters SOCO stencilled on the side. The panic he had been feeling quickly shifted into real fear as he spun the wheel and drove away.
Rae had spent the next hours driving around in a daze of confusion as he tried to fathom what had happened. He had found himself heading home and then the voice of paranoia had stopped him, taking great delight in pointing out that the police could well be waiting at the house.
To try and quell the feeling he had driven out of Kirkhead, heading out to the surrounding countryside, weaving his way along the narrow lanes and through the occasional village, the large houses set back well away from the ribbon of road.
Finding a lay-by, he had pulled up and tried to ring Acton but the phone had gone straight through to voicemail and Rae had snarled before trying again. On the fourth attempt, his hand had been shaking, his eyes bulging as he screamed into the phone.
‘Ring me right now, you useless cunt!’
Lighting a cigarette, he had thrust the door open and climbed out of the car, standing in the drizzling rain he had tilted his face to the sky, feeling the rain on his sweating brow. When the phone had rung he had flicked the cigarette away.
‘About fucking time,’ he had snarled, reaching into the car and grabbing the phone.
When he had seen Paul West’s name flashing on the screen, his face had creased in confusion.
‘What the fuck do you want?’ he’s barked.
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