Her Last Secret

by P L Kane

  ‘Hello … Yes, could you put me in touch with … the police in Granfield, please? Yes, this is an emergency.’

  That wiped the smile right off her face. Of course, Jake had no idea if her influence stretched all the way to that city – probably – but it was a better bet than Redmarket station.

  He didn’t go into details, just told them to get there as quickly as possible and also to send an ambulance to that location as well. Then all he could do was wait until they showed up.

  But wait, safe in the knowledge that this time he’d finally done right by his little girl.

  PART THREE

  Redmarket’s colourful origins, its early days, remain shrouded to some extent in mystery and rumour. Some say that the old religions were practised, pagan rituals and also rites adopted from invading forces such as the Anglo-Saxons or the Vikings. Some have also linked the town to witchcraft and Satanism, although all of this was thoroughly stamped out of course by the time Christianity became the prevalent religion in Britain. Nevertheless, it is interesting to speculate about what was going on in the formative years of the town, and the exciting events that might have happened back in the mists of time.

  Chapter 28

  Jake stared through the glass.

  Watching the monitors and the many machines that were keeping the man alive. The pumps breathing for him, the dials and drips. Katherine and Ed had been here earlier, visiting, but she’d had to take the lad out because he was so upset. Jake had spoken with Katherine for a little while, passing on what he’d found out about Matt – not medically, but what had been discovered outside of all that. To her there probably wasn’t anything outside of this, though.

  The investigation was still ongoing, Granfield police uncovering more and more about the web of corruption in Redmarket every single day – not that Sellars was helping any, keeping tight-lipped about the whole affair. Quite a lot of police had already been taken into custody, along with politicians close to her, and the day-to-day handling of operations had been temporarily taken over by the next city across. Remarkably, Channing was so far in the clear – hadn’t been recruited yet it seemed, regardless of all his friendships with people in high places. Perhaps the mayor thought he was better left out of it, or was keeping his talents in reserve … or just plain didn’t trust him? Or his smile? Maybe he’d known something was going on, but not what exactly.

  But Matt, he’d known about so much. Whether they’d been blackmailing him or not, or even threatening his family, money had been traced to a private account set up in his name. Or had that been part of the blackmail, set up without his knowledge?

  ‘Remember what I said, even if they can’t be bought everyone has a weak spot.’

  There was no evidence to suggest, however, that he’d known about Jordan’s involvement, or about her murder. Jake liked to think he didn’t anyway, that what the mayor had said about Matt back in the slaughterhouse was right. That it had been down to Ketley alone.

  After all, Matt had been the one who’d sent that text from the burner phone, which the Granfield coppers had found in a bin not far from his house. It had been Matt who’d pointed Jake at the mayor in the first place, had sent him the invitation. Might have been to put him right in the lion’s den, all part of a plan to manoeuvre him into position so Sellars could get rid of Jake once and for all. But, if that was the case, why help him at the end? Had that been the intention all along, was that why he’d brought the gun (which had been stolen from evidence apparently, part of a haul from a drugs bust)? Or had there been another reason, perhaps he was frightened for his own life? Or maybe his conscience had just got the better of him?

  ‘To unexpected outcomes.’

  One thing was for sure, Ketley wasn’t saying anything either – he’d died in the slaughterhouse. And Matt might as well have done, the blows to the head catastrophic. Once he’d lost consciousness that was it, he’d never come around again and there was minimal brain activity now. Even talk of turning off all that equipment.

  ‘There’s no time … Don’t you understand, there never was … Time’s run out!’

  Had Matt known how all this would go, but was just sick of the lying and the secrets? Wanted to blow the whole thing wide open, make sure his family were no longer under threat?

  Or had there been enough of his friend left that wanted to see Jake get justice once Matt discovered what had happened with Jordan? But when had he found out, after the numbers? Because of Jake’s investigations?

  ‘He saved my life,’ Jake had said to Katherine, who was also having trouble processing all of this. Remarkably, she was a lot calmer than she had been when she’d first found out, crying and screaming, an emotional wreck. When someone that buttoned-up loses it, they really lose it. Apart from a few tears, though, she was more or less back to that ‘prim and proper’ person Jake had seen at the funeral. ‘That has to count for something.’

  ‘But … but what he did … I just can’t …’

  He wanted to say what he’d been thinking at the time, ‘I guess you don’t really know anyone’, but that would just have been rubbing it in and this poor woman had suffered enough. They’d all suffered enough.

  ‘She makes her own decisions, her own choices …’

  ‘You’d be surprised how many grown women make the wrong ones.’

  Jake was aware of someone coming up behind him and turned.

  ‘Thought I’d find you here, but so much for the element of surprise. These blasted things.’ Sam nodded down at the metallic crutches she was using, her leg still in its cast. ‘I’m like Robo-lawyer … Though, it could have been worse.’ She looked beyond Jake inside the room in the ICU department, through the window he’d been pressed up against.

  ‘Yeah,’ said Jake. ‘Could’ve been worse.’

  There was silence for a moment or two, then Sam broke it. ‘I see you’ve been all over the news again. Hero dad avenging his daughter and all that.’

  ‘Thankfully it’s calming down a bit now. But I’m definitely no hero,’ was Jake’s response to that.

  ‘No, you’re a bloody idiot going off to that farm on your own without telling anyone. Without telling me.’

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said, and not for the first time. Though when he’d seen her just after the events at the abattoir he hadn’t been able to get much of a word in edgewise for the yelling. Then she’d surprised him by just giving him a massive hug and telling him she was glad he was okay.

  ‘Well … you’re flavour of the month with my firm, that’s for sure. We’re part of the team sorting all this mess out, and I will be too when I finally get discharged. I was speaking to the detectives they’ve put in charge this morning, Burton and Wright. And you’re pretty popular with Bobby Bannister and his folks as well.’

  Jake nodded. It was good news that he’d been released, no point in two young lives going to waste – although he still wasn’t sure what to make of the lad. Wasn’t sure how he felt about some of those things from Jordan’s diary. He realised he’d missed something and asked Sam to repeat it.

  ‘I said: so what next?’

  Jake wished that he could go back to when he hadn’t heard the question. He had absolutely no idea what to say to it. What next? He hadn’t even thought about that, everything had just been such a whirlwind.

  ‘I expect you’ll be heading back home soon, right?’ she ventured when he looked like he wasn’t going to answer. Home, he thought, rolling the word around in his head. Home.

  ‘I guess I should be heading back there at some point, but I’m in no rush to get to work. I’m still owed some time, so I think I’m going to take it.’

  ‘Good for you,’ said Sam with a smile. ‘And if you find yourself back in this neck of the woods while you’re doing that …’

  ‘But I thought … Aren’t you going to be snowed under with work? What you just said …’

  She shuffled about on the crutches, repositioning them under her armpits. ‘Never too busy for a spot
of brunch … or maybe even dinner?’

  ‘But, what about what happened with—’

  She shushed him. ‘Quit while you’re ahead, buddy. Besides, it’s just a dinner.’

  ‘Right,’ he said.

  ‘Since you brought it up, though … Do you have any plans to see her?’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Who do you think?’

  Jake was starting to feel a little awkward, discussing this just outside Matt’s room, given both what had happened to him and how he’d felt about Julie himself. He waved a hand for them to start walking down the corridor away from ICU.

  ‘I already said at the time and after, it was a mistake. Shouldn’t have happened; she was right about that. I was just … neither of us was in a good place.’

  ‘But you are planning on seeing her, aren’t you?’

  ‘I … We have … had a daughter together.’ He said it like that was both an answer and an explanation, but even Jake could see it was a pretty weak one.

  Sam looked down sadly, pretending to be watching the crutches as they propelled her along.

  ‘I owe it to Jules to at least tell her I’m going.’ Plus, thought Jake, he’d already decided he was going to tell her about Jordan’s hidey-hole, give her the diary. She’d be mad probably that he’d kept it from her, but might at least see that without it he’d never have found out the truth about her death.

  ‘Okay,’ said Sam softly.

  ‘But I can be here to pick you up when you get out, if you like? Give you a lift home?’

  She looked up then and beamed. ‘I’d like that.’

  ‘There’s one condition,’ he said to her.

  Sam frowned. ‘What’s that?’

  ‘You let me do it in the Audi.’

  She laughed and it was a nice sound, the best sound he’d heard in a long while.

  And before he knew it, Jake was laughing with her too.

  ***

  It had seemed like a good idea at the time.

  No, not a good idea – but the right thing to do. He’d thought it even as he was telling Sam, but here, now, he wasn’t so sure. Especially when Greg had been the one to answer the door to him.

  Greg’s car hadn’t been there, so Jake had assumed it was safe to knock, skirting past the few reporters who were still camped out here for some reason – though they hadn’t really bothered with him. There was only so much mileage left in this now, and even they were getting bored.

  However, as he’d soon found out when that prick opened up, Julie had taken the car out herself to run some errands. That had left Greg in the house, alone.

  ‘Do you mind if I … Can I wait for her? I’ve got something for her.’

  ‘I suppose,’ said Greg, who seemed even snappier than usual that day. Then Jake found out why. ‘But I’m on the phone, so …’

  Jake nodded, then was allowed into the hallway where he could see the phone there was off the hook, resting on the table. Greg jabbed a finger in the direction of the living room as the man picked up the phone again, and Jake could tell from what he was saying he was talking to his son. Something about a parking fine he’d got and how the lad didn’t have the money to pay it. Of course he didn’t, he was a student – they were always broke, weren’t they. In debt before they’d even started their courses these days; it was one of the things that was in Jake’s short film about them.

  He wandered around the living room while he waited; it didn’t seem right to sit down without Greg or Julie present. In spite of the fact it had once been his house, that he’d once had every right to sit. Those days were long gone, and you couldn’t get them back. He’d been a moron to think he could that night. But oh, it was incredibly tempting to wipe the smug grin off Greg’s face by telling him. If he didn’t think it would hurt Julie (not that she’d cared about hurting Jake when she slipped out and left that note), he’d do it.

  But she’d been right, it would be yet another marriage in the toilet. What was the point? And he was tired, so tired. It was time to move on with his life …

  When he spotted the paper and envelope on the couch, Jake couldn’t help catching the header. The car parking bill that had obviously arrived at this address instead of the uni one; the car and its driver was probably registered to there. That wasn’t the unusual thing, though. What was strange was it had come from Redmarket council. Jake paused, staring down at the letter.

  He picked it up then, noticed the date the fine was issued at the same time he heard Greg say on the phone: ‘Don’t worry, we’ll sort it out Billy-Boy.’

  Everything seemed to happen simultaneously in slow motion and speeded up time after that. Greg finished on the phone, and joined him in the living room, saying something about the fine and one day his son being able to clear up his own messes. Jake had turned, letter still in his hand, and Greg had caught the look in his eye – swallowed dryly.

  William. Billy-Boy. BB … Lightning strike!

  And suddenly he was on the man, dragging him in and shoving him down onto the couch. Greg tried to fight back, but Jake pinned him to the furniture – letter screwed up in his fist, being thrust in Greg’s face. ‘What did you do?’ he screamed at the man. ‘What did your son do?’

  Greg gaped at him, the first time Jake had ever seen real fear there – though whether it was because of what Jake was doing, or what he’d found out was unclear. ‘I-I don’t know what you’re talking about!’ he argued, but there was very little conviction in his voice.

  ‘The ticket!’ Jake was still screaming. ‘He wasn’t away at uni that night, was he? He was here … He was in fucking Redmarket!’

  ‘I …’ Greg shook his head, attempted to get up again but couldn’t.

  ‘You knew, didn’t you? You son of a bitch, you knew – and you covered for him!’

  Now Greg’s mouth was just opening and closing, like he was searching for words, and failing. Still in a state of shock.

  ‘Jesus Christ! My daughter … My Jordan!’ Jake was half-bellowing, half-whispering the words, tears of anger, of pain, escaping.

  A bang then made both men jump, that reminded Jake of the gunshot which had saved him back at the slaughterhouse. Only this time it was the front door, Julie back home and rushing in when she heard the ruckus.

  ‘Jake! Jake let him go!’ Her hands were on him, trying to pull him back, pull him off Greg before he did something else. ‘What the hell are you …’

  He rose, frightened she was going to hurt herself more than anything – but what he really wanted to do right at that minute was throttle Greg. Put his hands around the man’s throat and choke the life out of him.

  ‘Are you … Have you gone mad?’ Julie was gazing at Jake, trying to comprehend what was going on, perhaps thinking this was about the night they’d spent together, that her marriage was over now. And it was, just not in the way she thought.

  Jake’s mind was in a whirl, he needed to call the police. Needed to get them here, get them over to William’s uni as well before his dad could warn him. He wasn’t going to get away with it – not this time.

  ‘What’s …’ Julie was still staring, needing an answer.

  So he gave her one. ‘Ask him,’ Jake snapped at her. ‘Go on, ask him, Julie. About how he lied, about how he covered everything up!’

  ‘I don’t …’ Her gaze now was flitting from Jake to Greg.

  ‘Ask him,’ Jake repeated. ‘Ask him about how his son murdered Jordan!’

  Chapter 29

  A different day, looking through a different window.

  This time through a two-way mirror in Redmarket police station. A room he was more than familiar with himself. Now, however, William Allaway was sitting on the side of the table Jake had previously occupied. William’s lawyer was next to him, a stuffed shirt from a different solicitor’s to Sam’s. The guy kept telling his client to keep his mouth shut, that he was only getting himself into more trouble, but the lad wasn’t really listening.

  It had been going on a few da
ys now, the questioning. Jake had been around for some of it, especially at the start – allowed as a courtesy to watch. If it had been up to Channing, he wouldn’t have been anywhere near the place, but luckily Sam had pulled a few strings with the detectives she’d been dealing with. One was with William right now, DI Wright – a woman he really wouldn’t want to get on the wrong side of. Dressed in a smart suit and blouse with straight auburn hair, she was making mincemeat of that boy, much to Channing’s chagrin. That man’s patented fake smile was nowhere to be seen, and he was uncharacteristically quiet as he sat next to the superior officer taking the lead.

  Wright was drawing the information out of William, pandering to his ego about how clever he’d been, thought of everything. Had even disabled the CCTV cameras in advance.

  ‘Wasn’t hard to make it look like vandals,’ William told her.

  ‘I’m sure,’ said Wright, nodding. ‘So, you knew Jordan was meeting up with her boyfriend and followed her.’

  ‘I wanted to talk to her before she met up with that drip Bannister,’ said William. ‘We had … unfinished business.’

  ‘But you knew before you … talked to her that if it didn’t go your way you were going to kill her.’

  ‘I hoped it wouldn’t come to that, but she just wouldn’t listen.’

  ‘So you made sure the cameras weren’t working, wore the gloves. Had the knife on your person?’ Wright looked up at William.

  ‘I loved her!’ said the boy, getting slightly agitated. ‘But she didn’t want to know.’

  ‘She was your sister, William.’

  ‘Step-sister. Doesn’t count.’

  ‘It does in the eyes of the law.’

  ‘I knew how I felt. I told her … But she … And then there was Bannister getting in the way.’

  ‘If you couldn’t have her, nobody else could, right? And you saw a way of framing Bobby at the same time.’

  ‘He’s so fucking stupid. Who sees a knife and grabs hold of it, puts their prints on it?’

  ‘Someone who was trying to help. Someone who loved Jordan and wasn’t thinking clearly. Certainly not in a pre-meditated way like you were.’ Wright flashed him a tight smile. ‘You see, I don’t think you even know what love is. You wanted to own Jordan, right? Possess her? That’s not the same thing.’