by Bettie Jane
Tower Bridge Trespass
Bettie Jane
Copyright © 2019 by Auburn Seal and Bettie Jane
All rights reserved.
No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
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This book is dedicated to the women who boldly protect each other, sometimes at great personal risk, because when we stick together, this world is a more just place to inhabit.
Contents
Prologue
Chapter 1
Chapter 2
Chapter 3
Chapter 4
Chapter 5
Chapter 6
Chapter 7
Chapter 8
Chapter 9
About Bettie Jane
Also by Bettie Jane
About Auburn Seal
Also by Auburn Seal
Roanoke Vanishing Sample
Prologue
The small, hidden chamber in the Victorian engine rooms of the Tower Bridge was especially cold on this clear night and Oliver tossed and turned, unable to sleep. The absence of clouds, however, would make for a view of the city he could watch for hours, so he left behind his currently useless, makeshift bed and ventured through the bowels of the bridge and climbed. His steps echoed in the empty staircase as he made his way to his favorite spot where he could see the ships and the lights of the city.
Once he was situated high atop the bridge, he smoked cigarettes and tried to enjoy the whisky that kept him warm. The small pile of cigarette butts grew higher, proportionate to the decreasing volume of the whisky bottle in his left hand. He was warm enough now from the drink that the cold barely touched him, besides the occasional welcome breeze.
His thoughts turned to his drunken father and absent mother, the reason for his stay at what he hoped was a temporary home. When his father was arrested two nights ago, the police wanted to leave Oliver in the care of his grandmother, but his father’s mother was mean. Oliver suspected that is where his father learned to be so cruel in the first place. He’d rather be on his own in the streets of London than face the drunken wrath of another adult.
Briefly, he wondered if he’d turn out to be like his father, especially since he had such a fondness for whisky already at twelve years old, but he shook his head in refusal—refusal to be anything like that wretched man that had left more bruises on Oliver’s heart than he had on his body. He’d left a lot of bruises on Oliver’s young body.
His thoughts were interrupted by a sound from the South Tower. He pressed out another cigarette butt on the steel floor and stood to investigate. He kicked the butts into the river far below and blew out the smoke in his lungs. Putting the cap back on the whisky bottle and stuffing it into his coat pocket, he walked quietly toward the unusual sound. Hearing anything or anyone up here, except for the occasional bird, was rare. The upper walkway was closed to foot traffic and had been for as long as Oliver could remember. He’d heard his father reference the prostitutes and the pickpockets that had once thrived here when it was still open to foot traffic, which is why Oliver chose to come here when he ran off. It took him a fair amount of effort to sneak in unobserved by either of the two tower guards that seemed to always be on duty.
When he rounded the corner inside the tower, he found himself at the top of the stairs. It was dark so he couldn’t see well, but there was a shape on the landing below him. He waited a moment for his eyes to adjust and then made his way carefully toward the motionless mound, stopping when he got to the unidentified bundle. He reached out a tentative hand and touched it. He didn’t expect to feel the soft, warm skin of a human, and he jumped back in shock.
Leaning against the wall, he pulled a lighter from his pocket and peered through the tiny bit of light.
Yes, definitely a person. A man. He didn’t seem to be breathing, and his eyes were open but glazed over. There was an angry, swollen knot on his forehead.
The tiny flame from the lighter went out as Oliver fled up the dark stairs two at a time. He wasn’t hanging around to figure out who this was or why he was dead. He half-walked, half-ran across the upper walkway and into the North Tower, then raced down the more familiar steps toward the secret room where his makeshift bed waited for him.
The cold darkness of that room seemed safer than being out in the open.
Once he was secured in his makeshift home, he guzzled the rest of the bottle of whisky and waited for sleep to come. Maybe the body would be gone tomorrow and he could pretend it was all a bad dream.
As he drifted off into a semi-drunken sleep, he heard footsteps outside his door. His heart sped up, his stomach clenched in fear, and he held his breath.
In the darkness, he heard the door squeak open, and not for the first time in his young life, he wished he were invisible.
1
Julia Barlow, founder and owner of Charing Cross Investigations, sat in the middle of her apartment on the bare wooden floor surrounded by towers of half unpacked boxes.
She’d spent all her energy over the last couple of months getting her office ready for its grand opening, which happened to coincide with the timing of her friend and business partner's wedding and honeymoon celebration.
She’d been up since five o’clock in the morning as part of her ongoing mission to carve out time to get her own personal residence into shape. Soon, she’d need to go downstairs to the ground floor to work in the office of CCI. She’d been sitting on the floor so long that her hips ached, so she stood up to stretch. Her half-eaten breakfast sat cold on the table along with the tea that she had forgotten about when she was distracted by yet another box.
Her gaze traveled over the boxy landscape of her new living room as she surveyed what was left to do. There was more to do than she cared to acknowledge, so she decided in that moment to call it quits for now and go downstairs to do the work that truly mattered.
She chugged the cold tea and grabbed her coat, her purse and her keys, locked the apartment behind her and made her way downstairs.
She certainly couldn't complain about her commute time. Her cozy flat was situated on the top floor of the building that she had been able to purchase with the help of her father. In the beginning, she’d only wanted enough space to start her investigation agency, but the project took on a life of its own and before it was all said and done, she was the proud owner of the entire building. She leased out several of the vacant shops to other tenants and Frankie and Mattie would soon be moving into the huge residential flat on the same floor as hers.
It had been surprisingly easy to fill the building with tenants, especially for Julia, since Frankie, her assistant/business partner, had been the point person for securing most of those leases. She was pleased to see that the numbers worked out such that the rent paid by all the tenants in the building covered the mortgage payment that she owed her father each month for the loan on the building.
He had insisted that it was only a gift and she didn't need to pay it back, which was rather unexpectedly generous, but she had a complicated relationship with her father. In the end she had decided for herself that she would make a payment every month to him. If she couldn't afford to make an entire payment, she would at least send him a partial one. As it turned out, she was already making enough from the rental income to be able to cover those payments to her father, plus have a little extra. She also determined to keep her day job at The Daily News.
Since she wasn't yet officially open for business at Charing Cross Investigations, maintaining her office hours and her position at the newspaper hadn't proven yet to be much of a challenge. She and Frankie had an agreement that once their agency office officially opened and work became a little bit more hectic, he would staff the office in the new building while she was at the paper in order to try to keep both business ventures running as efficiently as possible. Frankie would also be the one managing all of the tenants and taking care of any maintenance that needed to be done in the building. In return, he’d make a modest salary and live in the flat across from Julia rent-free.
Julia was pleasantly surprised at the ease in which she and Frankie had assumed a business partnership and also at how adept Frankie already was at the tasks that came with the position of property manager. This week was going to be full of pre-wedding celebrations, including a tea party in the evening that Mattie had planned for her bridesmaids, of which Julia was one. When Julia had planned the grand opening of Charing Cross Investigations, she’d planned it specifically so that the opening would coincide with Frankie's return from the honeymoon. She wanted to hit the ground running, and since her father had been very reasonable about the money that he’d lent her for the building, she found herself having the luxury of being able to dot all of her i’s and cross all of her t’s before they opened. Now with the wedding only a week out, she was feeling the impending pressure of her business being officially open in less than a month’s time.
Even with all her planning and all of her preparations, there was much to do in order to be ready, not the least of which was to get her own personal residence in shape. She wasn't even sleeping there yet but was still staying with Opal and Oscar at the Goodall residence. She planned to move in while Mattie and Frankie were on their honeymoon. She needed to purchase furniture and dishes and all of the other things required to get a household up and running. Given that this was the very first time she'd ever lived on her own, there was plenty she still needed to collect. She was mostly excited but slightly nervous at all of the changes that were coming her way.
Julia stood in front of the door that opened into Charing Cross Investigations and admired the sign that had been installed yesterday. The logo that she and Frankie decided on had a modern look with clean lines. Charing Cross was sprawled across the top of the design and underneath, spaced out so that it matched the width of Charing Cross, was the word Investigations. In smaller letters below the name of the agency was her name and then Frankie’s below hers. A smile formed on her face and traveled to her eyes. Even though she knew there was quite a lot of work left to do, she realized how much she’d accomplished in a short time.
With a sigh of satisfaction, she put a key in the lock and opened the door. She stepped inside to take it all in. The lobby of the office was done up very nicely with navy, wing-back chairs, a solid mahogany receptionist desk, and cozy lamps. In fact, it felt more like a library than it did an investigations agency. That had been an intentional part of her strategy. She wanted potential clients to walk in and feel welcome while surrounded by the soothing comfort that one finds in a library filled with books and knowledge. She looked around, inspired, and hoped that any potential clients would as well.
She started to close the door behind her and noticed the sound of footsteps coming down the hall towards her office door. The woman that approached her was especially tall and Julia used the brief moment before the woman reached her to practice noting useful details. Julia guessed the woman to be approximately 5 foot 10 inches. She was also very thin, probably not much more than eight stones, even soaking wet. She was well-dressed, her makeup and hair were immaculate, and she strode with a quiet purpose toward Julia.
"Hello, excuse me? Are you Julia Barlow? Of Charing Cross investigations?"
Who in the world even knew that Charing Cross Investigations existed yet? Let alone that Julia Barlow was the owner? She cleared her throat and tried to focus her thoughts.
Julia extended her hand and greeted the tall blonde woman.
"Yes, hello, I am Julia Barlow. This is Charing Cross Investigations, although we aren’t quite open for business yet. Our grand opening is in a few weeks. Can I help you?"
“I certainly hope so. I’m Esther Prudence, and my nephew has been missing for three days now. He went missing under difficult circumstances within his family. He was to be sent to his grandmother’s, but he ran away before that could happen. I am fearful for his safety, and I need help finding him."
Julia considered. She wasn't officially open for business, however this wouldn’t be the first time she’d accepted a case unofficially. Hired by her boyfriend inspector Jacob Gibbs’ aunt, Julia was instrumental in helping to solve the Gallows Murder, as the press was calling it. She wasn't opposed to taking on a case, depending on the circumstances, so she invited the woman in.
Julia led the woman through the lobby and into her large office with windows overlooking the bustling city street. She took a seat on her side of the desk and motioned toward the leather club chairs across from her.
"Please, do come in and have a seat. May I offer you a cuppa? It’ll take only a moment.”
"Yes, please that would be lovely."
“Make yourself comfortable. How do you feel about Earl Grey?"
“Oh yes, please, Earl Grey is wonderful. If it's not too much trouble I would like a splash of cream and a dollop of honey."
Julia smiled to herself, thinking fondly of Meredith, the president of the Piccadilly Ladies Club, and her penchant for drinking tea without milk and only with honey. Julia's preference, of course, was tea with milk. It was simply better that way and every respectable Brit agreed with her. To meet someone who combined both of those things into one cup felt like a sign from the universe.
"While I am preparing your tea, why don't you tell me a little bit about yourself and your nephew and how you heard about me?”
"Yes, thank you so much. As I said, my name is Esther. Esther Prudence. My brother’s name is Eric. Unfortunately for his son, my brother has a drinking problem to beat the band. Doubly unfortunate for my nephew, his mother ran off a year ago and none of us have heard from her since.”
"It sounds like your nephew has had a rough go of it."
"Oh my goodness, you don't know the half of it! Little Oliver is the sweetest little boy that you'll ever meet. He's so gentle and so sensitive and watching the changes in him over the past year since his mother left and his father’s drinking became worse has been utterly heartbreaking. When the police arrested my brother a few nights ago after a pub fight, they tried to take Oliver into police custody and relinquish temporary guardianship to my mother, Oliver's grandmother."
"They tried, did they? I take it your Oliver is an enterprising young man and managed to escape their grasp?"
Esther nodded, wringing her hands in her lap. "Yes, he is. Quite right. I don't blame him for even a moment for refusing to go to my mother’s house. After all, Eric learned his taste for the drink as well as his taste for violence and plain meanness from her. Oliver would've known that my mother would have blamed him for Eric's arrest, and she would've beat him possibly more severely than Eric would. My brother can do no wrong in my mother’s eyes. It’s frustrating that I wasn’t called in to take him, then perhaps he wouldn’t have run away.”
“Esther, do you have any idea where Oliver might have gone?"
"I've exhausted everything that I know of. I've asked his friends and their parents. I've checked with his neighbors. Nobody has seen him since the night he ran off. The night of Eric's arrest."
Julia tapped her finger on the desk while gathering her thoughts.
"How old is Oliver?"
"He's twelve. He’s rather small for his age. I think the other children in his school are quite mean to him. Since his mother ran off, I watched Oliver harden right in front of my eyes. I still see glimpses of the compassionate young child that's inside, but he walks around with a gruff exterior and
a chip on his shoulder now that didn't used to be there.”
Julia opened the desk drawer and pulled out a fresh notebook. She preferred to use a fresh notebook for each investigation that she worked on. Inside those notebooks she kept photographs and any notes or other little trinkets that she came across during the course of her investigation and then she’d keep everything together at the end of the investigation in a closed cases file. She and Frankie had debated the particulars of the filing system, but finally she won out. After all, she was the owner. He was a limited partner, but she was the tiebreaker in the event of an impasse.
She opened the notebook, scratched down Oliver's first name, then looked up at Esther.
"What is Oliver's last name, Esther?"
"Dickens," Esther replied. "Like the author."
Julia scratched the last name into her notebook then looked up at the tall, too thin woman who sat in front of her with nearly perfect posture.
"I see. Any relation?"
"Oh no, I don't think so. However, Oliver does quite enjoy reading Dickens’ novels. Several of my favorite memories of him as a young boy are him on my lap in front of a roaring fire. He would snuggle into me while I read him page after page. After his mother left, he stopped reading and had no interest anymore in letting me read to him."
"And you said nobody has heard from her since? Is it possible that their disappearances are related?”
"No, none of us has heard a peep from her.” Esther's face darkened and the tensing of her jaw told Julia that there wasn't any love lost between Esther and Oliver's mother.
"I don't have children of my own, but I've never been able to understand how Winnifred could've left that boy. I know Eric is difficult to live with, and she was always such a good mother to Oliver. If I hadn't seen the note she left for myself, I wouldn't have believed her abandonment possible. I don’t think they are connected, though. I think Winnifred ran off with another man and didn’t think another thought about the son and the life she left behind.”