Blood Ties: Obsession, secrets, desire and murder (A Jack Le Claire Mystery)
Page 25
“But Dad won’t like it.”
Lady Mallory’s voice was like a whiplash. “I don’t care what he thinks. I want justice.”
Dewar was looking from one to the other and had no idea what was going on. “I hate to rush you, but I’m not sure why you are here; perhaps you should explain?”
Louise Mallory held herself tight, hugging her fancy handbag in front of her like a shield. “Sorry. Please give me a moment.” Her voice was shaking, and Dewar was intrigued. What the hell was going on?
Trembling, she withdrew a white envelope from her bag. It was made of heavy, expensive vellum. She handed it to Dewar. “I’m sorry, but we couldn’t let it be like this.”
Dewar looked at Lady Mallory, who nodded toward the envelope. “Go ahead and open it. I’ve seen the contents, and, unpalatable though they may be, they do need to be investigated.”
The envelope was addressed to Eleanor. Intrigued, Dewar pulled a folded piece of paper from the envelope. She was trying to make out the words when Louise Mallory pulled it from her grasp. “No, don’t.”
The girl’s voice shook, and Dewar held herself still. She didn’t want to exacerbate the situation.
Lady Mallory’s voice was a lash that cut the air. “Louise, don’t be a bloody fool. Read it out and explain what you did. Get on with it.”
Louise Mallory flashed a glance at Dewar, and her words tumbled out. “I couldn’t let this be his legacy. My dad agreed…”
“Your father might be my son, but he is a total prat. So let us not use him as the barometer of what is right or wrong.” Lady Mallory’s words were snapped, her diction precise. “Just read it.”
The girl’s eyes teared up, and she fumbled as she unfolded the piece of paper. “Whilst Grandma was kneeling by Grandpa, I saw this on the table. I didn’t think. I just put it in my pocket. Then it seemed too late to tell Grandma, and, well, Dad said I shouldn’t.”
Eleanor’s eyes flashed. “My son decided that he wouldn’t like anyone to know why his father saw fit to take his own life. He didn’t consider that I might want the closure. I needed to know.” The air seemed to leave her, and she visibly deflated, reducing in stature, in vibrancy. She grabbed the letter from her granddaughter and passed it to Dewar. When she spoke, her voice was lower, less strident. “Read it, please. There is something nasty going on here.”
Dewar took the letter and read aloud.
Eleanor,
I am sorry about all of this, what I’ve done and what you will undoubtedly have to suffer. There is no other way out. Whilst I am alive, they will bleed us dry. It was the old problem, I’m afraid. There wasn’t anyone special this time. I kept my promise. But there were distractions, and I paid dearly for them. I thought if it was a business transaction it wouldn’t be like real adultery, and it wasn’t. It was worse, for I kept having to pay more and more, and you’re going to find out soon.
This is the only way of stopping this madness. Forgive me.
Hugh
Dewar looked at Lady Mallory. “I hesitate to ask, but – the old problem?”
The older women’s face was set, unsmiling. “Affairs. For years, he always had someone on the go.”
Louise Mallory gasped, and her grandmother leaned across and patted her hand. “Sorry, darling, but he was an unfaithful beast. It started as soon as we married. I didn’t let on I knew for the longest time. We rubbed along well together and, to be brutally frank, he gave me a very nice lifestyle. We had a massive row a few years ago, and I threatened to leave him. He broke down; it was quite touching. He said he would never have another relationship with anyone else again, and I guess he didn’t. I am assuming he just used prostitutes, and someone was blackmailing him or charging extortionate amounts.”
“Lady Mallory, my hat is off to you for how well you are taking this. May I ask why you decided to bring the letter to us now and not before?”
“I only realised it existed this morning. Explain, please, Louise.”
The shamefaced girl looked reluctant to say anything, but as the silence grew, she reddened and spoke, her voice a little hoarse. “I showed my dad the letter. He said best to keep quiet about it as it would only upset Grandma and be a terrible slur on Grandpa’s memory.”
“What made you change your mind?”
She glanced at her grandmother. “I went to see Grandma today. She was upset and well…”
Lady Mallory took up where she left off. “My husband’s funeral was yesterday. I was in a reflective mood this morning. Poor Louise got the worst of it, I’m afraid. I was trying to make sense of what happened, asking why Hugh would have done this, why he would have taken such a staggering step.”
“And I couldn’t bear to see Grandma so upset, questioning why Grandpa would have taken his own life, how he could have left her like that. I didn’t want her to blame herself, so I showed her the letter.”
“I was furious. How dare my son encourage her to keep something like that from me? Then I realised how important it was. Someone was blackmailing my husband. That led to his death, therefore they as good as put that bloody gun in his hand, and I want them punished.”
Cogs started connecting in Dewar’s mind, and another piece of the jigsaw fell into place. She needed to get back to the station.
#
Le Claire had gone outside for fresh air and strong coffee. He wanted to blow the remnants of Chapman from his mind before he got on with chasing down the Gillespies. They had Danny in the frame for organising the sex parties and potentially bringing the drugs in, plus Laura Brown had a connection to one of them. She’d been Danny’s lover, but was it him or Aidan Gillespie that she had gone to visit at the manor the night of Scott’s death? The ringing of his telephone cut short his musings. He saw it was Dewar.
“Hi, what’s up?”
“Lady Mallory came in looking for you. The granddaughter concealed a suicide letter from Sir Hugh. By the looks of it, he was paying for sex. He was worried about escalating demands for money, so I’m thinking the payments to the foundation may have something to do with this.”
“And Scott Hamlyn was also a donor.”
“Yes, should we try and make direct contact with the people in Panama?”
“No, I don’t want to scare them off. Look, I need the team to run deep searches on the Gillespies and get me a full brief on business interests, etc. In the meantime, how quickly can you get to London?”
“What?”
He just knew that she would hate it that she squeaked. “I need you over here. We’ll need to work alongside the Met, so I need someone else firmly in my corner. I don’t give a damn who gets the glory as long as we get our man, whoever the hell he is.”
“Okay, I can see if I can get across tonight; if not, it’ll be first thing tomorrow.”
“Fine, keep me posted.”
As he disconnected the call, he realised that he was already back outside the Met. Gareth Lewis had said there was a pass left for him at reception which would give him fairly wide access, and there would just be some papers to sign on the usual disclaimers and authorisation rights. The desk clerk had him sign in triplicate and then handed across his pass. “Here you are. I understand you’ll be working alongside DI Powers. I’ll give her a call.”
Chapter Thirty-Seven
Penny Powers was a good policewoman with a fine mind and tenacious attitude. However, the trait Le Claire currently valued most was that she wasn’t openly displaying a grudge against him. At least not in front of her team. Whatever the reason, he was grateful they could at least work together. He’d found a desk and logged into the secure system via remote access. Dewar had updated all the files, and he spent some time bringing himself up-to-date.
Penny clapped her hands together and called out, “Can you lot gather round, please? As I mentioned this morning, DCI Le Claire has an ongoing murder enquiry and a related sex-for-sale case where one of the suspects overlaps. They, and another person of
interest, have London connections and so the chief wants us to cooperate. Okay?” She glanced around and, apparently satisfied that there were no dissenting faces, gestured toward Le Claire. “The floor’s all yours, Jack.”
He saw the sharp glances at her familiar use of his Christian name. He didn’t recognise many of the team, and of those he did, previous contact had only been on a superficial level.
He moved to the centre of the room. “Thanks. You’ll have seen the briefing notes my DS sent across. There are various people we’re interested in with regard to the death of Scott Hamlyn. We are led to believe that two of them are in London at the moment. They are an Aidan Gillespie and his brother, Danny. They are now Jersey residents but lived in London until a year or so ago. Danny also had a past relationship with Hamlyn’s girlfriend, who is currently in intensive care. She was badly beaten a week after Hamlyn was killed.”
Graves was well named, a sombre man in his late forties with a quiet, authoritive way of speaking. “I don’t know much about Gillespie the Younger, but I’ve run across Aidan Gillespie, the elder brother, a few times.”
Le Claire was all ears. “There wasn’t anything in the records.”
“We never pinned anything on him. If you ask me, Aidan Gillespie has sailed close to the wind, may even have ventured onto the illegal side here and there, but I don’t see him as being an out-and-out no-gooder. He is a man who came from nothing, and it’s rare to do that without cutting a corner here and there.”
Penny interrupted. “Cutting corners and sailing close is one thing. The question here is whether Danny Gillespie is responsible for these Jersey crimes and whether his brother is involved, even at an awareness level.”
Le Claire agreed. “There are too many connections to ignore. But we have to prove it. Don’t we?”
Penny smiled. “Exactly, Jack – sorry, Le Claire.” Graves shot her a look, an interested what-is-going-on look that she ignored. “So what’s your plan?”
“Danny Gillespie runs a private club here in London. The word is that it is clean, well run and regulated.”
Graves butted in. “From what I’ve seen, Gillespie’s clubs stick to the rules and don’t appear to be up to any of the tricks you get from the lower-class places.”
Le Claire was interested. He hadn’t had cause to investigate any of the so-called lap-dancing clubs whilst he was in London, and Jersey certainly didn’t allow that sort of thing. People like his mother would be apoplectic and march on the Royal Square. No doubt joined by the likes of Sarah Hamlyn. He shuddered at the thought. “What tricks?”
Barnes, who was Graves’s younger sidekick, laughed. “You name it. The obvious one is obeying the rules in the club but having a setup nearby where the girls can offer extras. Drugs are big news. The worst are the forced situations.”
Le Claire frowned. “What, you mean like people trafficking?”
“It happens all the time. Girls are brought in from all over the place. What pisses me off is that you have these decent girls who they get hooked on some nasty stuff and have them working all hours, doing God only knows what to feed their habit. They end up with no money, no passport and no liberty. They basically become non-people. And it’s all over the place, not just the big clubs.”
“I don’t know everything Danny Gillespie has been up to, but for me to get a result here I need to handle this properly. My DS is going to be here tomorrow, and the cross-force formalities should have been dealt with by then. I’d like us all to get together and get a plan in place. Danny Gillespie needs to be taken in. It may not be murder, but he is definitely guilty of something.”
#
Le Claire sipped his ice-cold beer as he gazed around. The hotel didn’t have a restaurant, but this busy bar served pub-style food. He’d polished off a steak pie and chips and was now thinking about ordering dessert. A shadow fell across his table, and he looked up to see an unexpected face.
“Penny, this is a surprise. What are you doing here?”
She pulled out a chair and plonked herself down opposite him. “You didn’t say good night, so I thought I’d come and see you. Graves mentioned that you were staying here.”
“Can I get you a drink?”
“No thanks, I ordered a glass of wine as soon as I saw you. They’ll bring it to the table.”
Now that was being presumptuous, but he guessed he owed her some time. “How are you?”
“Fine. How have you settled back into Jersey?”
“It’s good. There have been challenging moments after being so used to working at the Met, but we’ve got some great professional teams in Jersey.”
There was a tiny pause before she spoke. “And how is Sasha? Still a yoga bunny?”
“Yes, she’s great.”
A waitress arrived with Penny’s wine. She maintained eye contact as she took a long draught of the pale liquid. She placed her glass on the table with a determined air. “I didn’t think I’d have the guts to say anything, but let’s get the elephant out of the room, shall we? Were you just leading me on? Did you ever have feelings for me?”
“I’m sorry. I thought we were friends. I didn’t mean you to think it was anything else.”
She stared at him for a moment and shook her head. “Friends? You confided in me. Nights when you should have been at home, you sat in bars like this with me. What was I supposed to think?” Her voice had lowered to an angry hiss. “How do you think I felt when Sasha walked in on us? I was humiliated. You just left me sitting there and ran after her. Next thing I know, I’m persona non grata, and you’ve resigned from the Met and gone back home to Jersey.”
Dread washed over him. “I’m sorry, but there has never been an ‘us’.” He had to speak frankly. “You just leaned over and kissed me, Pen. I was shocked, didn’t know what to do. I guess I’d just have tried to laugh it off, pretend you were joking. Then I saw Sasha. She’s my wife. I had to go after her. Try and make her understand.”
That hadn’t been easy. Sasha had gone looking for him because she was sick of his distance and what she’d seen as his emotional withdrawal from their marriage. He’d tried to let her know that there was nothing between him and Penny. She’d fired back that he was talking to another woman, confiding in her, and that was too much to take. She’d moved back to Jersey a week later, and he’d chased her like a puppy dog.
“You obviously managed to persuade her that she had nothing to worry about.”
“Not entirely. I was overwhelmed by what had happened with Chapman. There was so much I couldn’t talk about with her, confidential police stuff. We split up for a while and were headed for divorce. We’ve only just got back together.”
She looked sympathetic. “I am sorry, Jack.” She downed the rest of her wine and carefully set the glass down. “I better go before I do – or say – something I’ll regret, again. Sleep tight, Jack.”
He watched her walk away. He cared for Penny but had always known that it was as a fellow detective, a kindred spirit. Sasha was his love, his life, and he had to make sure she never had any further cause to doubt him.
#
Le Claire had risen with the sun and been at his desk before anyone else. He needed to speak with Penny as soon as she came in. He wanted to make sure everything was okay between them. They had a job to do, and no personal issues could intrude. Team members had come and gone, but there was still no Penny. He checked his watch. It was past 10:00 a.m., which meant that Dewar should arrive soon.
The door banged open, and Penny rushed into the room. “Morning. Damn rail strikes. I waited ages for my train, and then it was on a total go-slow. Christ, I need a coffee.”
She headed to the narrow kitchen area at the back of the room, and Le Claire followed her. She leaned against the counter as the kettle boiled, and her mouth lifted in a slight smile as she saw him. He took a deep breath. “Morning, Pen. Look, about last night. I want to make sure we’ll be okay. You know, to work together.”
“I am sorry.”
She held a hand up as if to ward off any further comment from him. “Let’s just leave it, huh?”
He went to speak when his phone buzzed with a text. He quickly checked it. “I’ll be back in a minute. My DS has arrived.”
Le Claire didn’t recognise Dewar when he saw her in the reception area. She wore a black fitted dress that showed off surprisingly long, slender legs. He didn’t think he had seen Dewar’s legs before, ever. Her mop of hair was neat and combed, and he could swear she even had some makeup on. A well-cut blazer kept the chill away and looked extremely professional. His surprise must have shown on his face.
Her words came out in a rush. “I didn’t think it was appropriate to wear uniform and, well, I didn’t want these London cops thinking we’re all country hicks in Jersey. So I went shopping yesterday. Don’t worry, I won’t let you down.” She looked so earnest he didn’t have the heart to say anything. This wasn’t a fashion show. Then he thought of Penny, even Graves and Barnes; there was a flashiness to all their dress, and he was glad that Dewar would at least feel that she fitted in.
His phone rang. It was Penny. He still had her number saved, and he idly wondered if that was a good thing or not. She was abrupt and to the point.
“We’ve got a case. A body has come in. Young girl, looks like an overdose. She’s covered in track marks. The ID apparently matches that of a girl reported missing in Jersey. Meet us in the morgue.”
Penny was waiting for them. The attendant led them into the coldly familiar area, where a body was laid out on one of the long metal worktables. The attendant moved forward and drew back the concealing sheet. She was pale, dark bruising vivid over the delicate facial area. Penny’s voice was as ice-cold as the room.