Bryant was not surprised that Woody had voiced the exact same concerns he had earlier that day. The man was astute, even from a distance. And even though some small part agreed with him he also knew that there was no one better to run this case.
‘But by the same token no one is as close to these events as she is. If she can’t provide insight to catch this bastard before he kills anyone else then the rest of us have no chance.’
Woody shook his head. ‘I’m not budging on this one, Bryant. You’re it until I find a replacement DI to head the case.’
Bryant groaned inwardly. His day was not getting any better.
‘Sir, you know I’ll do my best but I repeat that you are making a mistake. I know that you’re angry with her and part of you feels she’s let you down by losing control, but just think about what she’s had to face this week. Almost hitting someone doesn’t even come close to being equal with the emotional rollercoaster. I know you’re in a difficult position but without her on this case I fear that many more people will lose their lives.’
Woody shook his head. ‘Sorry, Bryant, but it’s out of my hands.’
Seventy-Nine
Alison entered the club feeling less out of place than she had the night before.
A pair of scissors and a cheese grater had scruffed up her Victoria Beckham jeans and her blouse had been replaced with a V-neck tee shirt. Her hair had been shaken out and hung loosely around her shoulders.
Surprisingly it was a whole different animal this time around. Although the place wasn’t heaving with people, there were just a few free tables and the others seemed to be occupied by couples enjoying a quiet drink to a Coldplay track in the background.
Tom looked up from the till, hesitated and then smiled.
‘Back again?’ he asked.
She nodded as she took a seat. ‘Although it’s much quieter tonight.’
He looked around. ‘Yes, my usual Wednesday night entertainment is otherwise indisposed.’
She frowned and then pretended to put two and two together.
‘Aaah, that musician who attacked—’
‘Yes,’ he interrupted. ‘But, please keep your voice down.’
‘Sorry,’ she said, realising the people at the table behind probably heard.
Damn it. She wasn’t here to get herself noticed. She was here to observe Tom.
Unlike police officers she had no experience of gut instinct or that special feeling for the truth. All she did was analyse actions, behaviour. She didn’t interview, interrogate or speak to many people directly. She had used all of her knowledge and experience to develop a profile for the killer of Jennifer Townes and she needed to see how closely this man came to fitting it.
‘Dry white wine?’ he asked.
‘Please,’ she answered, reaching for her handbag and she was pleased that this time he didn’t try to stop her. ‘And a bag of chicken crisps.’
He placed the drink and packet on the bar and took her money.
She noted his clean fingernails, remembered the pleasant smell of pine from the night before.
Clean and well groomed.
Check.
He glanced towards the other end of the bar as a couple had just entered, but Tilly miraculously appeared and began to serve them. Alison had read the statements of the bar owner and his staff member numerous times.
She opened the pack of crisps and turned slightly to the side. She took a couple, but one fell from her fingers before it reached her mouth.
‘Oops,’ she said, watching it fall to the ground.
‘So, that guy last night,’ he said, leaning forward, resting his forearms on the bar. ‘Your boyfriend?’
‘Oh no,’ she said.
‘Seemed like you were having a bit of a tiff over there.’
Observant.
Check.
‘He’s a colleague. Just a difference of opinion.’
‘And what is it that you do, Alison?’ he asked.
How did he know her name?
‘Your colleague said your name last night before he whisked you away and I never forget the name of a beautiful woman.’
She felt the heat flush into her cheeks.
Charming.
Check.
She ate another crisp and dropped one.
‘Teacher,’ she lied. ‘Maths,’ she added. It would have been her second career choice.
‘Hey, Tom,’ Tilly said, sidling over. ‘Stock requisition forms done and—’
‘Filed?’ he asked.
She smiled. ‘Of course. I know how you get.’
‘Okay, can you give Freda a call and see if she’s feeling better? If not, we need to get her covered.’
Tilly nodded and moved away.
Efficient and organised.
Check.
She ate a crisp and dropped one.
‘How about you?’ she asked. ‘How long have you owned this place?’
‘Three years,’ he answered proudly.
‘Since…’ she started to say, ‘you were twenty-six,’ but realised he hadn’t told her his age. ‘Since it went into liquidation from the previous owners?’
He nodded, giving no reaction to her slip-up.
She ate a crisp and dropped one.
‘Luckily for me they just wanted shot of it. I managed to do some decent deals with suppliers, made use of that business degree and managed to get the place into the black in two years.’
Educated.
Check.
Alison saw her opportunity.
‘I suppose having live entertainment has helped?’
He nodded. ‘As long as it’s the right kind.’
‘Like that guy, Curtis something?’ she asked dropping a few bits of crisp and then scrunching up the packet.
He took it from her and put it behind the bar. He nodded towards the corner. ‘Let’s talk over there.’
She stood as he came around to her side of the bar.
‘Really sorry to have made a bit of a mess round here,’ she said.
He shrugged. ‘Let’s hope Freda is back from sick leave tomorrow. Whole place needs a good clean.’
She couldn’t help feeling a little disappointed with his response as she picked up her glass and followed.
‘You a reporter or something?’ he asked, frowning.
‘Goodness, no. Why’d you ask?’ she asked, taking a seat opposite.
‘You seem overly interested in Curtis.’
Alison stroked the stem of the wine glass. ‘That’s not really what I’m interested in,’ she said, looking away. ‘It’s just something to talk about but if you’d rather I left…’
‘No, it’s fine,’ he said, shaking his head. ‘It’s just like, I know the guy so…’
‘Yeah, that must be so weird. Any clues he was capable of something like this?’ she asked.
He rubbed at his forehead. ‘I’ve asked myself that a hundred times. I mean… some people thought he was a bit strange. Introverted, intense, but I just thought he was a creative type. He was a good guy who played his set with the same enthusiasm to a roomful or a handful. It was just about the music, I thought.’
‘Has it affected business?’
‘Not so much as you’d notice. Folks haven’t really put together that Jennifer worked here and that Beverly was here the last night too. Obviously the police know but…’
‘They been around much?’ she asked.
He shook his head. ‘They were here the morning after Beverly was attacked. Wanted to know if we’d seen anything but Tilly and I were cashing up out back when Curtis left, so there was nothing else to add.’
Alison swallowed down her rage at DCI Merton. Yeah, sounded like intense questioning for someone who completely fitted her profile.
She took another sip of her drink and moved in her chair. ‘Well, thanks for the chat but I must be—’
‘So soon?’ he asked, with a crooked smile. ‘I was hoping we could talk more, maybe grab a bite?…’
‘
Perhaps another time,’ she said, trying to keep her tone even.
She walked away from the table feeling his gaze upon her as she left. Oh, like she was going to leave this well-populated area with a man she suspected of rape and murder.
Again, she’d barely touched her drink and felt able to drive.
She knew as she headed to the car that she was going to have to do something but she didn’t know what. Who did she complain to? How were these things done? She didn’t want to get anyone into trouble, but this investigation had gone—
A hand on her shoulder startled her. ‘Wh-what?…’
Tom turned her to face him. ‘Are you sure you wouldn’t like to get that bite?’ he asked, the interest burning in his eyes.
The saliva had dried in her mouth, her heart hammered against her chest. His gaze was intense and dark.
She shook her head and glanced to his hand still gripping her arm.
‘I h-have to go,’ she said, pulling away.
He looked as though he wanted to challenge her more, but turned and returned to the bar. For just a second she had seen beyond the friendly, affable bar owner and now she wanted to get as far away from this place as she could.
Her thoughts came to an abrupt stop as something on the ground caught her eye.
She stopped walking and bent down as her heart thudded in her chest.
No way. It couldn’t be.
With trembling fingers, she took out her phone and found the contact she was after.
‘Alison, what the hell is it now?’ asked DCI Merton making no effort to hide his hostility.
‘Please, just give me a minute,’ she begged. ‘I’m at Elite and—’
‘Alison, I swear I just misheard you when you said where you were, because if I heard you right I’d be filling out a formal complaint to your superiors right now concerning your attempt to derail an ongoing investigation. Am I being clear?’ he hissed.
She couldn’t answer even though her mouth had fallen open. Would he really do that?
‘Do not call this number again,’ he said, ending the call.
Damn, damn, damn. Now what was she supposed to do?
She really needed help and there was only one person she could think of to call.
Eighty
Bryant headed out on to the rugby field as the rest of the team were finishing warm-ups. The opposing team from Hereford stood to the right and the two team captains stood somewhere in the middle.
He looked to Lenny for his position in the match and was given his answer in a finger sign.
Bryant knew the twenty-six-year-old captain wasn’t sure where to stick him in the team any more and sheer obstinacy on his part prevented him from bowing out gracefully and allowing a younger player to take his place.
Back in the day he’d played position of a three-quarter, normally reserved for the fastest players whose aim was to use the ball won by the forwards to motor through and score. The forwards were the heavier guys who set up and formed the base of the attacks by securing possession.
Tonight he was in the back row of the forwards called the flankers.
Damage limitation, Bryant realised and a good decision considering this was a game that would decide if they were to move up the league.
He nodded to his team mates as he began a couple of stretching exercises. There were still a couple of guys on the team from when he’d first started but he could tell their hearts weren’t in it so much any more. The bruises and cuts healed slower in your late forties, the aches and pains from a tough match lingered longer, but the guys still hung on having not yet found anything to replace this golden snatch of man time.
And he had his reasons, too. While he was running up and down the field trying to keep up with players half his age he was thinking of nothing but the game. The physical exertion and focus left no room for thoughts of the job, his family, his worries. Everything stayed in the dressing room with his clothes.
He groaned as he saw a player he recognised. A rough kid named Beasley in his late twenties with some kind of point to prove. At six foot three and shoulders across which you could run an A road, he wasn’t known for playing nice.
Bryant appraised the red-haired man wondering if he’d been hardened by the shit he’d taken at being one letter away from his doppelganger in the Harry Potter films.
Come get me, dickhead, Bryant thought. Cos I am just in the mood for you.
He took his position and waited for the whistle.
Immediately he could feel the rhythm of the game. There was a tension being passed around with the ball.
Within a few minutes he narrowly escaped a kicking in a maul, got a smack to the back of the head in a rolling maul and a kick to the shins in a ruck.
Oh yeah, a rough game was just what he needed right now, he thought, as Lenny called him forward.
A scrum was being formed following an accidental offside. He took his place in the front row ready to push against the other team to win the ball.
The scrum half fed the ball into the scrum and the hooker turned his foot to get possession. His team had the ball.
As he was released from the scrum an elbow caught him just above the right eye. The pain shot around the whole of his face as the skin split and he felt the coolness of the blood oozing down his cheek.
He wasn’t surprised to see Beasley’s grinning face as he followed the direction of the elbow.
‘What the fuck was?…’
That hadn’t been fair play. The damn scrum had finished.
‘Get off the field, old man,’ said Beasley.
Bryant lunged with his fist raised as the blood began to drip into his eye. ‘Say that again, you—’
‘Hey, hey, hey,’ said Lenny, stepping in front of him.
Beasley’s coach took the opportunity to guide him away.
‘What the hell, man?’ Lenny asked, blocking his view. ‘It was a fair—’
‘You’re joking. He’s a thug with a bloody shirt…’
‘Calm it, mate. This ain’t you. Yeah, he’s a shit but that was just rough play. You had a bad day or something?’
‘I’m fine,’ he snapped, wiping the blood away from his eye with the back of his hand.
‘Yeah, well go and be fine in the block. You’re playing no more tonight.’
‘Jesus, Lenny,’ he protested.
Lenny shook his head. ‘You’re off or I end the game. You ain’t right. Now go.’
‘Fuck, fuck, fuck,’ he spat as he stormed across the field to the changing room. He took off his shirt and used it to wipe the blood from his eye.
‘Had a bad day?’ he raged, throwing the shirt to the ground. Nah, he’d only spent the week watching the private life and past of his boss and friend being used as a knife to stab her with. He’d watched her bury her emotions to get the job done, to catch the sick bastard who was killing innocent people to prove a point. He’d watched her continue to lead a team and analyse evidence and facts, sifting and sorting clues, while quietly detaching herself in the midst of losing the thing that meant most to her. Privacy. And then he’d had to watch as she’d been removed from the case.
Yeah, it had been a bad fucking day at work. Was there really any other kind? Every single day he was forced to look at and analyse the despicable depths of humanity, see things that he couldn’t unsee, images that wedged in his brain and played over and over in his mind’s eye, torturing him and sickening him repeatedly, only to return late at night in his dreams.
He kicked his kit bag across the floor with force.
‘Fuck it, fuck it, fuck it,’ he screamed, as his teeth ground together.
He paced the changing room floor, his hands clenching into fists at his sides. He needed a target. He needed an outlet, somewhere to expel the rage that was surging like molten lava around his veins.
The knowledge.
The thoughts.
The images.
‘Nooooo,’ he cried out as his right fist hit the wall.
The p
ain was immediate and welcome but it didn’t clear his mind. Somewhere in there, mashed up with everything else he’d witnessed this week was the image of Billie Styles, viciously and brutally assaulted. Left for dead in the woods, subjected to unspeakable horror that would change her life for ever.
But that wasn’t the image that tortured him. That wasn’t the image that had followed him onto the rugby field. This one was more personal and closer to home and filled him with a rage that burned like a wildfire all the way to his soul.
A thirteen-year-old girl, abandoned by everyone, loved by no one, unprotected, frightened but trying not to be, taken into the woods and raped.
That was the image that would never leave him.
He dropped down to the bench, lowered his head. And cried.
Eighty-One
It was almost nine when Kim parked outside the yellow front door.
The rage was still surging around her body, ingrained in her blood, being kick-started by her heart every time it passed through.
‘You gonna behave yourself?’ she asked Barney as she knocked on the door she knew so well.
He looked up and looked back at the door, which she took for a yes.
Ted Morgan opened the door and smiled, just as he’d been doing since she was six years old and she’d first been sent to him for counselling.
‘You’re late,’ he said.
‘I’m sorry about the…’
‘I meant, I expected you earlier in the week,’ he said, standing aside. She stepped in, Barney followed and Ted closed the door behind them.
‘Where are we sitting?’ he asked.
‘Kitchen,’ she answered.
‘Aah, I see,’ he said.
‘See what?’ Kim asked, taking a seat at the dining table.
‘It’s that kind of chat,’ he said, filling the kettle. ‘It’ll be instant tonight,’ he said. ‘I’m not wasting Colombian Gold on a drink you’re probably not going to finish.’
‘Ted, have you finally lost it?’
He chuckled. ‘Oh, my dear, I’ll explain it to you later. First, tell me why you’re here,’ he said turning towards her.
‘You’ve seen the news?’
Dead Memories: An addictive and gripping crime thriller Page 19