Stormfront

by R. S. Sutton

  First published in Great Britain in 2021 by

  The Book Guild Ltd

  9 Priory Business Park

  Wistow Road, Kibworth

  Leicestershire, LE8 0RX

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  Copyright © 2021 R S Sutton

  The right of R S Sutton to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Design and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in a retrieval system, in any form or by any means, without permission in writing from the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  This work is entirely fictitious and bears no resemblance to any persons living or dead.

  ISBN 978 1914471 636

  British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data.

  A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.

  Contents

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Twenty-One

  Twenty-Two

  Twenty-Three

  Twenty-Four

  Twenty-Five

  Twenty-Six

  Twenty-Seven

  One

  Apart from Elvis straying through an open window, reminding anyone who was still unsure that Heartbreak Hotel was at the end of Lonely Street, all was quiet along the esplanade. It was just turned six in the morning. The last mistimed streetlight gave up its rebellious struggle and switched off. A young couple crossed the road and jumped onto the sandy beach. Fresh in the passion of new love, they embraced between lingering kisses.

  Looking over the boy’s shoulder, the girl pulled away. ‘Someone’s dumped some rags in the water.’

  The boy half-turned and looked the fifty yards or so along the shoreline. ‘So what?’ He shrugged, pulling the girl closer. She held the flat of her hand against his chest and walked off.

  Getting closer, the mixture of faded colours resolved into a clearer picture. A leg was skewed up the sand as an arm bobbed around in the gentle waves. Swallowing hard, she slowed until, just a few yards away, she stood still, letting the water swirl around her shoes.

  ‘Dear God.’

  Face down, the body of a man had deep parallel gashes across his back, the last of which all but severed his head. Again she swallowed, but was unable to stop her shaking legs from edging closer. He wore a single deck shoe and the remains of a pair of jeans. What was left of a T-shirt clung to a broken arm.

  Her boyfriend stayed away, asking his obvious questions from a distance. The girl flashed anger as she looked back.

  ‘What the bloody hell do you think it is?’

  Feeling compassion for the body in front of her, and contempt for the boy’s stupid enquiries, she knelt in the shallows.

  ‘Stop acting like a bloody fairy, and get help.’

  Two

  Unable to work out how to change the ringtone, Valerie cursed as the aggravating chimes bounced around the walls. She was lying neck-deep in hot suds when the phone broke, or rather barged, into her consciousness. Moments of luxury were scarce, so she could do without the interruptions. She eased round and rubbed a small circle in the steamed-up porthole. Skimming an overhanging willow, a two-man scull glided past, the slender hull barely leaving a ripple as it disappeared. Apart from a pair of swans, the river was deserted. She turned back, laying on the folded towel that rested against the bath rim. It didn’t matter how much electricity she used, it was all, or mostly all, free.

  She lived in a houseboat on a short stretch of the Thames, with just two or three other boats as neighbours. Along with a nearby business park, the supply for the few houseboats had been rerouted. For some reason, best known to the developers, the contractor had been changed halfway through erecting new units. Valerie had been left with a connection to keep her going, for which there was no charge.

  ‘Because of all the upheaval, madam.’ The apologetic developer had come around in person to explain the situation.

  When the work had been finished, she wound up with one electricity supply through the meter to the lights and the other straight off the grid to the power circuits, including the greedy immersion heater. She did get the odd query from the guy who read the meter, but he was easily brushed off.

  ‘Only use the lights, and I have a log burner for heat, so I’m afraid I’m a bit of a disappointment to EDF.’

  ‘No worries, Miss,’ the meter reader had said, feeding the figures into his consumption monitor. ‘I get paid the same no matter what, not like the chief executive. Needs all ’is fingers to count ’is wages.’

  ‘And his bonus?’

  ‘Yeah.’ Closing his monitor, the man had scowled. ‘And ’is bleedin’ bonus.’

  Now, as usual, because she was in the bath, the phone was not about to stop.

  ‘Hell’s teeth and buckets of blood!’ Like a winter athlete descending the slalom course, a tablet of Lux negotiated a shapely breast before disappearing into the soapy abyss as Valerie left the most comfortable place she’d been in all morning. With water dripping from her naked body, she snatched the receiver from its cradle. ‘Yes?’

  ‘We got a big one,’ said an excited voice.

  ‘Who’s that? And we got a big one what?’

  ‘It’s Jane. We got a job.’

  ‘Dear God in heaven, what part of you’re fired are you having problems with?’ said Valerie, staring at the pool of water gathering around her feet. ‘I’ve got no money, can’t afford to pay you. You’ve got your P45, now take a hike, get your arse off to the job centre.’

  ‘But we’ve got a job and it’s a biggy.’ Catching the edge of excitement in Jane’s voice, she let her continue. ‘Should keep us going for up to a month… if we play it right. And the good news is you don’t have to pay me.’

  Valerie pushed out her bottom lip and blew at the cluster of soap bubbles on her nose. ‘Suppose you’re going to work for free?’

  ‘No,’ said Jane. ‘Government’s got another of their brilliant schemes going, massage the figures, make them look like they’re doing more than sitting on their butts while picking their friggin’ noses. You know, make us feel like our money is being used for something positive. All you’ve got to do is fill in some forms, or rather, all I’ve got to do is fill in some forms for you. I read somewhere that some pillock called it The Big Idea. Just got to be a man. Probably pay him six figures to come up with gems like that.’

  ‘For crying out loud, have they nothing better to do with my taxes?’

  ‘Tax? Never known you pay tax, least not while I’ve worked for you. The Valerie Stone creative bookkeeping system gets there first.’

  ‘Okay, okay,’ said Valerie, ‘I’ll be in as soon as I get dressed.’

  Towelling herself down, she smoothly brushed recently highlighted hair behind her ears. The stroking of a sharp antiperspirant concentrated her stare into the mirror, but a
s in the four preceding years, the solitary reflection mocked at the loneliness. There was no one looking over her shoulder.

  The drifting deodorant bought back the intense thoughts and feelings once again. But as usual she pushed them away and pulled on a white T-shirt. The yacht-club logo was faded to near obscurity, but a pair of brand-new Levi’s balanced the image. The man’s American leather flying jacket had been taken in, but not by so much that it spoilt the way it hung, and when it was finished it had only been necessary to reposition one of the badges. Lipstick and makeup were ignored as words from another world echoed around the cabin.

  ‘You can’t improve on perfection, Val.’ She could still see the smile that, at one time, enfolded her life.

  On her way out she stooped at the door. ‘I don’t need reminding,’ she said, pulling the cream envelope from between a B&Q sales leaflet and Red Cross appeal. From the prepaid stamp on the front to the green crest on the reverse, it was all too familiar. ‘It’s on standing order. Why do I have to look at it every month?’ She tossed it unopened onto the side table and dropped the flyers into the waste basket. What the envelope contained was a statement of where most of her income went every month.

  Clients stuck with defending divorce petitions, and the others wanting rid of their other half, seemed to be as cash-strapped as she was. ‘Pay you half now and half later,’ had become all too familiar. And the pay-you-later part of the deal often turned into picking up forms from the small claims court. With so little money to spare, the car hadn’t left the garage in six months.

  She glanced at the watch that never left her wrist, as she quickly walked along the towpath. Sunlight that had avoided the hawthorn on one side and long water reeds on the other, sparkled on the river. Up above on the bridge, it was only a short wait before a hybrid Routemaster lumbered towards her and slowed at Valerie’s outstretched hand. Grabbing the plastic-covered handle, she swung onto the platform and poured some silver into the driver’s bowl.

  ‘Gone up, I’m afraid, Miss,’ he said, scooping up the coins. ‘Need another five pence.’

  ‘Since when? I was only on the bus last week.’

  ‘This morning, I’m afraid.’ He drizzled the coins into their respective dispensers. ‘Still trying to memorise the new tariffs.’

  Valerie rummaged through pockets as an overweight mother, pulling a toddler and pushchair, pressed from behind. Finding one two-pence and two one-pence pieces, she smiled at the driver. ‘Sorry, not got another bean. Must have left my change in another jacket.’

  The driver winked. ‘It’s okay, you can owe me your body.’

  Moving down the bus, she could hear the mother with a now-crying child, and pushchair that refused to collapse, drop her fare into the metal bowl. ‘Don’t suppose you want my bleedin’ body?’

  No vast expanses of glass, no fancy door or slick signage. This was an office in a rundown part of town with a low, or as low as possible, rent. ‘Stone Detective Agency’ had been applied to the door in neat DIY lettering.

  ‘Hello, Jane.’ Valerie pushed firmly at the sticking door. She was directly off the street, no corridor, no anteroom, just straight into the one office with adjoining washroom and toilet. Accommodating two desks gave a cramped feeling that was not alleviated by the intense orange blinds. The computer, a sometimes-connected phone and a free Viking calendar were on Jane’s desk. Second-hand filing cabinets, finished in MOD green, were to one side. Valerie’s desk on the far side was clear except for a desk tidy. High on the wall behind, a narrow window let in a little extra light.

  At twenty-one, the pretty girl sitting by the window was six years Valerie’s junior. The blue eyes and petite nose were neatly complemented by baby-pink lipstick and natural blonde hair. The smell of pencil shavings hung in the air.

  ‘Morning, Miss Stone.’

  If ever there was such a thing as a rescue girl, then Jane was it. She had worked at her desk for the last two years. Two years of up-and-down wages since she had been liberated from the life of the damned, in pornography and prostitution. She was just sixteen when she had been carefully groomed by a piece of slime called Vinnie. Vinnie the pimp, Vinnie the porno film-maker, Vinnie the “anything to do with sex, drugs and money” merchant. Small time, but he had a few brain cells and managed to stay on the correct side of the big boys and on top of the ones under his greasy thumb. Early one cold morning, Valerie had arrived at her office to find Jane huddled up against the door.

  ‘Not today,’ she had said, pushing past with a key in one hand and half a pint of semi-skimmed in the other. Jane had looked up, revealing a swollen lip, bruised eye and hair caked with blood. ‘Christ almighty, what the bloody hell happened to you?!’

  All Jane could do at the time was groan in attempting to rise to her feet. She’d been well and truly worked over.

  Unable to find where Jane lived, if anywhere, Valerie spent the next two months taking her to hospital, the counselling centre, sexual health clinic, keeping her off the Smirnoff and generally looking after her, while telling Vinnie that if he came anywhere near her again she would enlighten the police as to his views on a suitable age for sex workers. It was down some side alley that Jane had been jumped, so whether it was Vinnie teaching her a lesson for keeping too much of her earnings to herself or a perverted customer, neither of them knew.

  ‘Honest to God, it wasn’t me,’ Vinnie had said, holding his hands up as Valerie pushed him into a corner. ‘Just ain’t my style.’

  So, for now, like a faithful puppy, Valerie seemed to have her for the foreseeable future. Wasn’t there some religion that said if you saved someone’s life, you were responsible for them from then onwards?

  ‘It should be the other way around,’ Valerie muttered, pushing the door shut with her backside.

  ‘What?’ Jane inclined her head. She was a girl that, only giving a half-smile, communicated a sparkling nature that was never far away.

  ‘Nothing, nothing. Go on then,’ said Valerie, ‘let’s have it, starting with your job.’

  ‘Like I said, Miss Stone, the Department-of-Whatever has decided to start another let’s-help-the-unemployed-get-a-leg-up-campaign.’ She picked up a slim buff file and dropped it onto Valerie’s desk.

  ‘This the form I have to fill in?’

  ‘No, no, I’ll do that; you can sign it later,’ said Jane. ‘This is the new job.’

  ‘Okay,’ said Valerie, pulling the few pages from the folder. ‘What’s it about? And what’s the money?’

  ‘The money’s good.’ Jane bubbled with her usual enthusiasm. ‘Some guy washed up on the south coast. The insurance company want us to look into it.’

  ‘Why us?’

  ‘Someone from Southern and East will be here soon – that’s the insurance company.’ Jane sat on the desk, rotating the papers. ‘They’ll fill us in.’

  ‘How much?’ Valerie pulled the pages back.

  Jane slid from the desk and closed the blind before pushing the bolt across the door. ‘Better get changed, she’ll be here soon. Tell you all about it.’

  Valerie took off her jacket, put it on the hook in the washroom, along with her T-shirt and jeans, then took a blouse and skirt from the coat hanger and laid them across the chair. Taking a suspender belt and stockings from a bag hooked behind her desk, she put them on.

  ‘Straight?’ she asked, nodding over her shoulder at the line of butterflies ascending each stockinged leg.

  ‘Yeah, yeah, sure.’ Jane screwed her face up in disapproval. ‘Ever considered coming into the twenty-first century?’

  Valerie buttoned up the blouse before sliding the zip up the black skirt. ‘What? Tights? You serious? I’m a woman, not Sir Walter bloody Raleigh.’ Hopping around on each foot in turn, she pulled at the burgundy high heels.

  Jane rushed to the window, flicked up the blinds and drew the bolt on the door in one slick movement as someo
ne made an attempt to get in.

  ‘Good morning. Come in, please.’ The perfected business manner greeted their visitor. ‘Think the door was stuck.’

  ‘Good morning.’ Peering into the office, the woman, smartly dressed in a navy suit and white blouse, removed a glove as she looked around. ‘Miss Stone?’ Before Valerie could answer, the woman held out a hand and, sitting down, neatly crossed her legs. Only after continuing the inspection of her surroundings did she release the handshake and look at Valerie. ‘Benson. Rosemary Benson.’ She handed a card across. ‘Southern and East. We heard about you from…’ She stopped and, removing the other glove, placed a Gucci handbag on the desk. ‘Well, it doesn’t matter where we heard about you. Let’s just say we know you can be discreet.

  ‘We have a Mr Alan Preston washed up on the beach at Weymouth. Boating accident, cut up by a propeller, or so it seems.’ Mrs Benson revolved a photo between her fingers. ‘Now we wouldn’t normally question this beyond ID, etcetera. But the only photo we seem to have of Mr Preston is this.’ She pushed a creased image across the desk. Valerie looked at the blurry picture of a few men sitting around a table outside a pub. ‘On the left.’ Mrs Benson reached across and tapped the photograph.

  ‘Is this it?’ said Valerie. ‘It could be almost anyone. Who identified the body?’

  Mrs Benson carried on with her fast, clipped delivery. ‘His personal assistant did the identification. Very cool, apparently, didn’t turn a hair. Just said yes, asked if she had to sign anything and left.’

  ‘DNA?’

  ‘Yes, it all checks out. The confirmation is in the file.’ Mrs Benson passed another photograph across. ‘His only living relative we think, brother.’ The eyes of a respectable-looking guy in his thirties stared confidently from the photo. ‘Normally we investigate any high-value accounts ourselves, but we’re up to our eyeballs in a company restructure and everyone, including the assessment department, has several weeks of work scheduled.’