by S. Y. Robins
Oh God, Alfie. With a start, Hannah realised this must have something to do with Alfie. He asked for Jay the day he died; she had noticed Alfie was getting steadily bigger. With a sickening feeling, she realised he must have been buying steroids from Jay. Hannah recalled feeling so impressed he lost weight and gained muscle so quickly. It couldn’t just be Alfie. She thought back to all the strangers that came in, vanishing when meeting her eyes. They were all massive. It never happened to smaller, weedy guys or girls. Jay was a drug dealer. He was dealing illegal steroids to people. Hannah didn’t know her boyfriend at all. It seemed so obvious now; how he always vanished to do paperwork, but actually sent it all off. How he seemed to know all her male school friends, despite being older and from a different area. How he always had cash and didn’t mind closing early sometimes. He was making his money from the drugs, not the shop. The shop must have been a cover; he must have been using the shop to hide his dirty money! With a sick feeling, Hannah realised he was probably using Kupcake to hide his money too. She had been dating a drug-dealing, money-laundering murderer. But he was still a nice person. Why would someone stab him?
Feeling curious, Hannah grabbed as many papers and documents relating to the steroids as she could; the Kupcake invoices and the letters to the accountant could wait. This was far more important. Her senses heightened as she stuffed stolen papers into her bag, Hannah decided to turn detective; she had learned more in 5 minutes than the police had in weeks. If she could catch where all the drugs were coming from, maybe she could prevent another death like Alfie’s or Jay’s. Perhaps she could even find out who killed Jay; despite her discoveries, she still loved him and was devastated by the loss of his life. She could fix this, she knew it. Maybe she was completely wrong about the drugs and money-laundering. There was only one way to find out.
*** ***
The next day, Hannah dressed in her most inconspicuous clothing; she would be talking to some dangerous people and didn’t want anyone to recognise her. Grabbing her rucksack, armed with a photo of Jay, Hannah ran out of the house. Not knowing the names of the people she wanted to speak to, but knowing where they would be, Hannah headed to the DIY store. Guys her age took cars there to show off to one another in the car park. Jay had liked cars and sometimes came here to meet other petrol-heads and swap tips, tricks and ideas.
Feeling nervous, she sized up the nearest group of men. They all seemed huge to Hannah, but she decided they would know nothing; these men were covered in fat, not lean muscle. They were probably genuine car enthusiasts. She glanced at the next group, but quickly disregarded them too; they were teenagers, showing off their mother’s cars, too weedy to be taking anabolic steroids. They probably still had curfews and bedtimes. The third group looked the most promising as well as the most intimidating. These were the men she needed to talk to. Edging over, she could hear them talking about the gym. Bingo! Her new-found detective instinct kicked in. She had this.
“Hi!” She greeted them, in a falsely happy voice. “How are you?”
The men swapped suspicious glances, before seemingly deciding that Hannah was harmless. Although they all looked confused, she received a reply from the largest man.
“Good thanks,” one offered gruffly. “How about you? Are you lost?”
“Oh, I’m lovely thanks for asking; I came here looking for someone actually. Can I ask you for help? I won’t take up too much of your time.”
“What do you need?” The gruff voice asked, whilst the rest of the men looked intimidatingly at her.
“Well, I was meant to buy a car from some guy I met here a few weeks ago. His name is Jay. Have any of you seen him? I can’t get hold of him,” Hannah garbled, as she handed the photo around. “Please can you help?”
“Wait a minute. If you only met him here, why do you have his photo?” Asked another, eyebrows furrowed together in undisguised suspicion.
“I… er, got it from his Facebook page!” Hannah invented wildly. “I can’t get in touch with him and I really wanted that car. Have you seen him?” She repeated.
“No, we ain’t seen him, I think he owns a corner shop near the high street though. Works there sometimes, with his pretty little girlfriend,” came the reply.
Hannah blanched visibly. “That’s great, well, I’ll try there. Thanks then guys.” As she made to leave, she felt a hand on her arm. Turning with fright, she saw the man who held her had the photo in his hand. Don’t forget this, Hannah. We know who you are; be careful.”
“I just want to find out what happened to my boyfriend,” Hannah stated, chin up in defiance.
“Don’t ask us, we’re just here for the cars. If I were you, I’d go to the gym; your Jay was mixed in some terrible things. I’d ask the gym manager.”
The man let her go with a laugh, as Hannah ran away. The gym! Of course, why hadn’t she thought of trying there, first? Kicking herself for being so oblivious, she made her way to the gym, psyching herself up for her second interrogation. When she got there, she suddenly became scared; if the first set of men were massive, what would bodybuilders look like? Making her way through the lobby, dodging the receptionist, Hannah wandered around until she found the weights area. Going up to the largest man in the gym’s uniform, Hannah cleared her throat.
“Excuse me, are you the manager here?”
“Er, hi. Yes I am. Can I help? Inductions are down the hall,” he pointed.
“Oh, thanks. I was actually wondering if you wanted any Clenbuterol? I heard you might be interested,” Hannah lied.
“Ssh, stupid girl! Don’t say that here. Where did you hear that, who told you?” He snarled.
“I’m Hannah. I’m Jay’s girlfriend. He left me to carry on the business after he was stabbed,” Hannah said bravely, patting her bag deceivingly. “So, do you want anything?”
“Come with me. And keep your voice down!”
Hannah followed obligingly, keeping an eye out for quick escape routes, just in case. She wanted to find out what happened to Jay more than anything, but her senses were heightening; she did not feel safe.
“In here,” he snarled, pointing to a cupboard.
“You must be joking!” Hannah mocked, “You first.”
He led the way into the cupboard. Quick as a flash, Hannah closed the door, turning the key she found on the outside. Running away, she hoped nobody would recognise her for the second time that day.
When she got back to the shop, Hannah sobbed. Not from grief, but from frustration. Why did she think she could do this? Why did she think she was better than the police? She thought of all the crime novels she had ever read. What did the detectives all have in common? They looked at the situation from different angles.
“Think! Think Hannah, what do you know about the situation?” She muttered to herself.
She thought back over the details of Jay’s murder. He was dealing drugs to young guys desperate to bulk up. She’d been approaching this all wrong; she’d been going for the people taking the drugs. What if it wasn’t the user… but the dealer? Excited once more, Hannah ran into the office, tearing it apart for details of someone above Jay. Hannah got lucky. She found an address on one of the invoices for one of the Victorian manors in the nicer area of Newark. Looking at the address with a twinge, Hannah noticed the address was the same street as Alfie’s, although she couldn’t remember the number of his house.
Quickly leaving the shop, invoice clutched in her hand, Hannah practically ran the two miles to the address. Head fixed on her phone, looking at a map, Hannah did not notice footsteps echoing near her. Looking up, she saw a shiny number 72 on a door. This was it. Hannah walked up the front steps, and knocked on the door. Waiting for a response, the world went black.
Chapter Four
Hannah woke up, screaming. She had no idea where she was or what had happened. The last thing she remembered was knocking on the door of number 72. Now, here she was in a pitch-black room; she could feel her arms and legs tightly bound. There was no way of esc
aping.
Still, she reasoned with herself. There was always a bright side; it seemed she was on the right track looking for the supplier rather than the users. In doing so, she had probably found Jay’s killer. The dark side was; she was probably going to die herself, unable to share her triumph with another soul.
Hearing footsteps, Hannah tried to look around. She wanted to face her kidnapper, her resolve growing stronger with the oncoming footsteps.
“Hello?” She called. “Is someone there? Why am I here? Why have you kidnapped me? If you let me go now, I promise I won’t say anything.”
“Oh yes, a likely story,” came a male voice from the darkness. “Do you really think I’d believe that?”
Hannah paused, momentarily distracted. The voice she heard was familiar; she associated it with playgrounds and her childhood, not being attacked and kidnapped. What was going on? Was she losing the plot? A light came on, dazzling Hannah, rendering her vision impaired for a short while. As the figure merged into focus, Hannah let out a whimper.
“No. It can’t be you. Anyone but you. I would never have thought…” Hannah broke off, voice wavering and tears spilling from her bright blue eyes. “Why have you kept me here? You know I wouldn’t have said anything, there’s still time to set me free,” she encouraged.
“Come on, Span. You’ve been running around trying to find out what happened to your boyfriend. So keen to clear his name from the filthy muck he was involved in. Of course you’d have said something,” the voice snarled.
The use of her nickname affected Hannah more than anything else he’d said so far. “Alfie used to call me that, Mr. Chamberlain,” she said, her voice strengthening with every word. “He was such a wonderful person; I always thought he must have been raised incredibly well. Maybe his good genes came from his mother, as his father appears to have abducted me. Where am I? Some kind of cellar?” Hannah spat, rage coursing through her veins now. How dare he do this to her? He knew what she’d been through. She had always liked the Chamberlains.
“I couldn’t have you going round trying to find out what happened to him, spreading your version of his reputation. I’ve been looking into him for a while. You must have known the kinds of things he was into, there’s no way you were that naïve.” Mr. Chamberlain spoke, matching Hannah in anger.
“What things? I wanted to bring justice to Jay’s death and his faceless, cowardly murderer. Was it you, Mr. Chamberlain? Did you kill him? Hannah demanded.
“Yes. Yes and I’d do it again!” Mr. Chamberlain cried. “Jay was a terrible, evil man. Alfie used to show me these pills he had. I didn’t want to interfere; most kids don’t show their parents anything, I was proud of Alfie for being able to come to me. I didn’t do anything at first; I was just happy he was happy, especially after hating the skin he was in for so long. The pills began to consume him; Alfie needed more. His regular dose never seemed to be enough, he even began to shake if he didn’t have his pills.”
Hannah grew silent, recognizing pain and blame in Mr. Chamberlain’s voice. She recognised it because she had felt it herself when Alfie died; she could see that he wished he had said and done more.
“I knew he was taking too many. I knew it. But I couldn’t do anything. What could I do? I began to watch Jay myself. It wasn’t just steroids this guy dealt. He was a big-time drug dealer; he had kids on every corner selling cocaine and marijuana. I knew he was nasty. Here he was, ruining my son’s life and tearing other families apart, by turning sons, brothers and cousins into drug addicts and dealers. That’s why he insisted on knowing everyone’s name; he made sure he knew everyone around him to protect himself.” He paused, giving Hannah time to think.
Was this true? It made sense; he did always know everyone around him, made an effort to learn everyone’s name and background. Hannah felt physically sick; she had not known her boyfriend at all. She thought he was innocent; a blameless victim in a savage stabbing. Nobody deserved to get their life taken away, but Jay was not the innocent man she thought he was.
“Span, I’m sorry. But I’m going to have to kill you too. You know too much. My wife is already a wreck; she’s lost her only son. Our lives have been torn apart. I don’t think she can face a jailed husband too. I’ll be quick; I promise.” Mr. Chamberlain edged towards Hannah; sorrow etched over his face.
“No!” Hannah cried. “Please tell me more about Jay? I didn’t know any of this; I can’t believe we’re talking about the same person. Please? As my last wish? My life has been torn apart too,” she pleaded, scared for her own life. She wanted Mr. Chamberlain to keep talking so she could think; there must be some way out of here. What would her beloved detectives do?
“Span, are you sure? Either way it will end the same, knowing might make this all hurt more. I wish you didn’t poke your nose in. I wish you didn’t look. You were running around; questions were being raised, and I can’t have people point fingers at me; I just can’t.” Mr. Chamberlain looked genuinely sorry. Hannah almost pitied him before remembering he was going to kill her.
“How do you know all this? What else did he do? What did he do with the money?” Hannah asked wildly. If this man had a shred of compassion left; Hannah was going to try and talk herself free. It was the only option she had left. She was nervous, but it had to work, there was no other choice.
“I posed as a supplier; I sold Jay the supply of drugs Alfie had built up. I wanted to see if he would buy it. He did. He got rid of the money through laundering,” Mr. Chamberlain said with exhaustion. “He was laundering money through the shop; I can’t see any other way he was achieving it. I’m assuming when you both went out, he paid for everything in cash? He wanted as little as possible to come back to him. He was clever; he had fingers in every pie. As well as street drugs, he had steroids. He killed my son, Span.” Mr. Chamberlain’s voice began to crack, and Hannah heard him sobbing.
“I’m so sorry, Mr. Chamberlain,” Hannah sniffed. “This is all too much for me, you’re right. He was an evil man. You did what you thought was right. To think I never knew what was going on, right under my nose. He was probably laundering money through my Kupcake business; everything I’ve earned from that is tainted now. He’s left me with nothing. Mr. Chamberlain, what do I do?” Hannah made it sound like she was sobbing too; she wanted him to think they were going through the same emotions. If he could relate to her on a personal, emotional level, he might let her go. He had been calling her Span all night, the more he opened up to her, the more chance she had of being set free.
“I’m so sorry about Alfie. He was an amazing person who always had the ability to smile. The light he left in this world will always counteract the darkness Jay left.” Hannah was laying it on slightly thicker now, in a final bid for freedom. Mr. Chamberlain’s shoulders had stooped; his posture that of a completely defeated man with nothing left. He looked small, exhausted.
She continued, “To think of all the lives Alfie touched in a positive way. You know we remained friends all through school? I used to see him almost daily. We’d joke and laugh like old times. I’ve known this family my whole life; I never would have thought it would be torn apart by someone else I knew. I’m so sorry, Mr. Chamberlain. I had no idea what was going on. I’m a victim in this as much as you are.”
At the word victim, his head snapped up. “Victim? You’ve lost your family, have you? You’ve lost a life you spent years moulding, shaping and guiding? Your greatest accomplishment? You lost your world? A son you taught everything to, sacrificed everything for? The only thing I didn’t give for that boy is my life. I blame myself every single day for not acting sooner. We’re not equals, Hannah. Please don’t try and pretend that we are. You know nothing of being a victim.” Mr. Chamberlain took a deep breath. “How dare you snoop? You would have known what an evil man Jay was after five minutes of asking around. Why did you need to know his killer? Why does he deserve justice? Why did you have to involve yourself, Hannah? You should have left this be.” His voice grew alo
ngside his rage. Hannah was terrified now; she had used the wrong word. It was over. Mr. Chamberlain continued to rage and shout. He was coming towards her with a knife. It had a serrated blade; probably the same one he used to kill Jay.
Hannah closed her eyes, waiting for the inevitable. Was it going to hurt? She didn’t know. Suddenly, she heard a loud crashing sound. She opened her eyes in shock. Jay? How was he here? Her brain barely had time to process what her eyes were seeing. Mr. Chamberlain had been knocked over, the knife kicked away from his hand by Jay. No. It wasn’t Jay. It was Adam! He had come to save her!
Hannah experienced a rush of gratitude, like nothing she had ever felt before. “Adam! Adam I’m here!” She cried, desperate for her arms and legs to be free once more.
Adam rushed over, taking care to make sure Mr. Chamberlain wasn’t getting back up. He grabbed the knife and cut Hannah’s restraints; ugly red grooves showing on her wrists where the ropes had cut in. They ran together to Adam’s car outside.
“How did you know I was there? How did you know to save me?” Hannah asked, bewildered.
“When I couldn’t get hold of you, I went to the shop. I figured it had all gotten too much for you. I wanted to make sure you were okay; I think of you as my sister now and I needed to look after you. When I got to the shop, you weren’t there. There was a letter on the floor with this address on it. I came here. I knew you were in trouble.”