Single Handed (Gareth Dawson Series Book 3)

by Nathan Burrows

  “Shall we go somewhere more private? See what happens?”

  Laura had refused, stopping the hand that was being slid temptingly towards her breast. She had known the question would be coming at some point, and couldn’t deny the thought of sex was a very attractive idea. It had been far, far too long since she’d been intimate with someone. Then, out of nowhere, an image of Sam appeared in her head. Before the conversation with Gareth, she’d not thought about Sam for years, let alone see them in her mind’s eye. That’s what it would be like, Laura had thought. The way she had just been kissed was urgent. Almost insistent. Just like Sam used to kiss her all those years ago, and exactly how she had wanted Gareth to kiss her earlier that evening.

  “No,” Laura had said. “Sorry, not tonight.”

  “Are you seeing someone?”

  “Yes,” she had lied, flustered and tempted. Sorely tempted by the proposition. “I am.” Thoughts of Gareth swam through her mind. “Sorry, that shouldn’t have happened. Too much to drink.”

  “It felt to me like you were enjoying it?” Laura realised she was being examined. “You look like you enjoyed it. Where’s the harm in a bit of fun?” It was definitely Sam all over again. Wanting pleasure, but giving little in return.

  “I did,” Laura had replied, immediately regretting saying that. “I mean, yes. It was lovely, but I can’t.” Her hands trembling, she had reached for her handbag and fled the club, not looking back.

  “It was only a kiss,” she muttered again as she squeezed some toothpaste onto her brush. Laura brushed her teeth so hard that when she spat into the sink, there was red in the froth from her bleeding gums.

  Twenty minutes later, Laura was feeling almost normal. The paracetamol had kicked in, and the tight band around the back of her head had loosened. She made some toast, spreading Marmite liberally on the top of the wholemeal bread, and plugged her phone back in. When she’d got back to her flat in the small hours, she had just fallen into bed. A moment after she plugged it in, the phone buzzed back into life. Laura looked at the screen to see a couple of text messages and missed calls. All from Gareth. She prodded the screen to read the first message.

  I am such a chicken, it read. Laura checked the time of the message, realising that it had been sent not long after Gareth had got out of the taxi. Her phone must have died before he sent it. I really wanted to invite you in, but I bottled it. There’s wine in the fridge. Can you get the cab to turn around?

  Laura groaned and looked at the time of the missed call. It was twenty minutes after the first text, while she was queuing up outside the club to meet her friend. Then there was another missed call from Gareth, about twenty minutes after that. Even if her phone had been charged, she wouldn’t have heard it in the nightclub. The second text message was timed a couple of hours later, probably just before she’d done a runner from the club.

  Maybe not, then. Talk to you soon.

  Laura swore under her breath. She sipped her tea, wondering what the best thing to do was. It was Saturday, and Norwich City were playing at Carrow Road later, so Gareth would be at the football that afternoon. After the football, he normally went out in the city with his friends for a boozy lads’ night out. Deciding to act, she picked up her phone and called him.

  “Morning,” his gruff voice came down the line, and she wondered if she had woken him up. Laura glanced at the clock on her cooker. It was almost ten.

  “Morning, Gareth,” she said. “Listen, I’m so sorry I missed your texts last night. My phone died.” There was a silence on the other end of the line. She waited for a few seconds before continuing. “Are you there?”

  “Yeah, I am. You didn’t plug it in?”

  “No, I forgot and just went straight to bed when I got in.” It wasn’t a lie, technically. That is exactly what had happened. It was just there was a bit in between that she wasn’t telling Gareth about. “Listen, what are you doing tonight?”

  “City are at home, so I’ll be out with the boys. Why?”

  “I was thinking I could cook dinner for you, if you wanted?” Another silence. “Have you still got that bottle of wine?”

  “Nope, I drank it.”

  “All of it?”

  “Yep,” Gareth replied.

  “Ouch.”

  “I sat in my underwear on the sofa and drank it straight from the bottle.” Laura suppressed a grin at the thought.

  “Oh. You’ll have to get another bottle, then. What do you want me to cook for you?”

  “I’ve not said I’m coming round yet. Like I said, I’m out with the boys.” She could tell from the tone of his voice that he was smiling.

  “Do you like roast pork?”

  “I’d prefer it to seafood.” He was definitely smiling now. “How about eight o’clock?”

  “Perfect. Don’t drink too much at the football, but grab a couple of bottles on the way over. Let’s just get smashed.” And you won’t be able to drive home.

  “Okay, see you then.”

  Laura put down the phone, a broad smile spreading across her face. She looked around her flat, realising that she was going to have to tidy it up a fair bit if Gareth was coming over. She walked into the bedroom and pulled the duvet from her bed, stripping the sheets and pillowcases. In the corner of the room was the lingerie she’d been wearing the night before. She scooped the lacy garments up and rolled them into one of the pillowcases before returning to the kitchen and shoving the whole lot into the washing machine.

  Just in case.

  31

  “Morning, Kate,” Malcolm said, glancing at his watch. “Just.” He was sitting in the main office of the police station while he waited for his computer to update itself, something which it did with depressing regularity and never quickly.

  “Morning, sir,” she replied with a grin. “I am in fact early. My shift doesn’t start until two. I just came in to go over some notes from an interview I did last Thursday.”

  “That was two days ago,” Malcolm replied. “Isn’t it a bit late to be writing them now?”

  “I’m not writing them,” she said, crossing to sit behind an empty desk. “I’m double checking them. CPS are pressing charges, so I’m double checking to make sure there’re no glaring typos.”

  “Which case?”

  “The alleged burglary in Costessey.” He looked at her closely and could see that she was pleased with herself. “It was the householder trying to pull the wool over the insurance company. So the CPS are doing him for wasting police time.”

  “Nice,” Malcolm replied. In some ways, catching people who treated the police like they were stupid was more satisfying than catching people who were just plain stupid themselves. “Did you get Gareth Dawson in?”

  “I did,” Kate said. “He’s quite sharp, isn’t he?”

  “He’s no fool,” Malcolm replied. “What did he spot that you didn’t?” Her smile faltered a touch, and Malcolm felt bad. “I mean, what did he confirm for you?”

  “Well, I knew something was off with the scene, but I wasn’t sure what. The vic was just a bit too eager, if you know what I mean.”

  “I know exactly what you mean, Kate. It’s called having a copper’s nose.”

  “If you say so, sir,” Kate replied, her smile returning. “It was the bloody lock on the back door. Gareth just looked at it and said, ‘I wouldn’t break the window, I’d just go in there’. That, and the glass all over the counter top on the inside.”

  “That’s where Gareth’s so useful. He looks at things differently.”

  “Anyway, the home owner soon rolled when I got him in.”

  “I’m sure he did, Kate,” Malcolm replied. “Now, talking of Gareth, I wanted to chat to you about his sister.”

  “Annette McGuire.”

  “Yes. I had another chat with my mate Jon Brandon down in London. The NCA aren’t interested in Philip anymore on account of the fact that he’s dead. When we were driving to the hospital, you said something about her not being quite right. Hav
e you had any more thoughts about that?”

  “Not really, sir,” Kate said. “Just a gut feeling, that was all. Why are you asking?”

  “I’m getting one myself. Do you remember that paedophile ring in Norwich a few years back?”

  “No, but I’ve read about it. Are you thinking something similar might be going on?”

  “It’s a possibility. There’re two scenarios I’m curious about.” He tried to wheel himself closer to her on his office chair, but the castors got jammed in the carpet so he had to pick it up instead. “First is that she was involved in procuring his victims for him. She works in children’s services, so would have access to vulnerable children’s details.” Malcolm watched as Kate frowned, considering the possibility.

  “Okay,” she replied a few seconds later. “What’s the other one?”

  “That she somehow got rid of him.”

  “Because he was being blackmailed?”

  “Yes.”

  “I’d say that one’s more likely. How would it work, though?”

  “Carbon monoxide in the scuba tanks would be how I would do it, but there would be a number of ways, I would imagine.”

  “I don’t see it, boss,” Kate replied, pressing her lips together. “She’s not a diver, so how would she put all that together? Plus, it would be dependent on us not finding him.”

  “But she was married to a diver,” Malcolm said, determined to think it through. “So she would have picked up quite a bit of knowledge over the years.” He tapped his pen on the desk. “And the fact we found any of him is luck on our part. Generally, floaters on the North Norfolk coast don’t come back.”

  “What do you want to do?”

  “I think maybe we should have another chat with her. We’ve got evidence of blackmail, so we could use that angle.”

  “It’s not really evidence,” Kate replied. “All it is is payments to a bank in Indonesia, and that could be for anything.”

  “Such as what?” Malcolm asked. He knew that Kate was making more sense than he was, but at the same time, he wanted to sound someone else out about his thoughts.

  “Services rendered? Pictures or videos of his little hobby which, by the way, Mrs McGuire doesn’t know anything about.”

  “We don’t know that for sure,” Malcolm said, “and if my first scenario has any truth to it, then she’s complicit.”

  “Maybe it’s both?”

  “Both scenarios?”

  “Yeah,” Kate replied. Malcolm watched as she paused for a moment, thinking. “How about she’s procuring children for him and someone’s found out? Maybe he’s got customers? One of them starts blackmailing him, and to make the problem go away she feeds Philip to the fishes. That would kill two birds with one stone, so to speak.”

  Malcolm got to his feet, a smile spreading across his face.

  “Very good, DC Hunter,” he said. “So, how do you want to proceed?”

  “How do I want to proceed?” Kate replied with an exaggerated frown. “This was your idea, boss.”

  “Okay, let’s play ‘rank, paper, scissors’,” Malcolm said, smirking. “Oh, I appear to have won. I’d like you to pop back round to have another chat with Mrs McGuire, see what you can find out.”

  “On what pretext?”

  “Seriously?”

  “I can’t exactly go round and tell her that we think her husband was a kiddie fiddler and, by the way, did she murder him?”

  Malcolm made sure that he kept a smile on his face as he replied.

  “Some bosses might take that the wrong way, DC Hunter,” Malcolm said, “and please don’t use the term kiddie fiddler.” He hardened his eyes, keeping the smile on his face. “Now get yourself round there under the pretext of investigating her husband’s death. See what you can get, but tread lightly until it’s time not to tread lightly.”

  Malcolm stood, returning his chair to its original position. He looked at Kate with his eyebrows raised.

  “Yes, sir,” she said, looking down at her lap. “Understood.”

  32

  Gareth sat back in his chair and rubbed an appreciative hand across his stomach.

  “Annette,” he said, looking at the empty plate in front of him, “that was fantastic. Thank you so much.”

  “I thought you’d want a bit of soakage for the football,” she replied. He smiled at her, relieved that at least today she seemed to be getting back to normal.

  “I can’t have too much to drink. Laura’s cooking for me later this evening.”

  “Gareth Dawson,” Annette said, laughing. “You cheeky bastard. You’re just going round people’s houses and letting them cook for you?”

  “You offered, sis,” Gareth replied, grinning at her, “as did Laura.”

  “Well, you can do the washing up, then. You know where the sink is.”

  Gareth got to his feet, picking up his plate and Annette’s. He walked over to the sink and turned on the tap. In his pocket, his phone started ringing. The ring tone was set to a loud shrill, and he put the plates down to get it out of his pocket. When he glanced at the screen, he could see it was Dave, so he rejected the call and put his phone on silent. Whatever Dave wanted could wait. He could give him a bell on the way down to Carrow Road.

  “Who’ve Norwich got this afternoon?” Annette asked. Gareth looked at her, surprised. His little sister had been to the football once in her life, before declaring it so boring that she’d rather watch a game of cricket.

  “Brighton and Hove Albion,” he replied. “Going to be a tough game with that new striker they’ve just bought.”

  As he washed and rinsed the plates, Gareth and Annette chatted about the football, and Norwich City’s slim chances of avoiding relegation at the end of the season. Even though she didn’t follow the game, Gareth was pleased to be having a normal conversation with her.

  “So, we need to win the last two games, and Southampton need to lose both of theirs. Otherwise, that’ll be it.” He dried his hands on a tea towel. “At least if we lose or draw today then the misery will be over.”

  “Maybe they’ll pull it out of the bag?” Annette said. “I might listen to it on the radio. Got nothing else planned.”

  Gareth started laughing, trying to imagine her listening to a football match on the radio.

  “My arse, you will,” he said. “You’d rather listen to the Archers. Seriously, what are you doing this afternoon?”

  He watched as Annette blew a breath out of her cheeks.

  “Paperwork, I think. Your Laura e-mailed me some stuff to fill out so that I can have him declared dead.”

  “Oh,” Gareth replied, ignoring the way Annette had referred to Laura. “Do you need a hand with it?”

  “No, it all looks pretty straightforward. I have to take out an advert in the paper and everything.”

  “I’m sure Laura will help if you need her to?”

  “Honestly, it’s fine. Anyway, talking about Laura, I thought you told me you went out for a meal with her last night?”

  “I did.”

  “But she’s cooking you dinner tonight?”

  “Yep.” Gareth looked at his sister who had her arms folded across her chest. It was a look he knew well.

  “And?”

  “And what?”

  “Sounds like it might be getting serious.”

  “It might be, I don’t know yet. I’m going to see how it goes.” He took a deep breath, not sure whether to change the subject. Annette had not long lost her husband and probably wasn’t in the best frame of mind to talk about how soon after losing a spouse you could start seeing someone else.

  “Come here, you big lump.” He looked up to see Annette had uncrossed her arms and was holding them out to her sides. Gareth put the tea towel down and walked over to hug her. “You’re always helping other people, Gareth,” Annette whispered in his ear as they embraced. “You’ve got to think about yourself once in a while as well.”

  As they disentangled their arms from each other, Garet
h’s phone started buzzing in his pocket. He fished it out and looked at the screen. It was Dave again. Muttering under his breath, Gareth answered the call.

  “Dave? It’s Saturday in case you hadn’t noticed?”

  “I know, boss,” Dave replied, his voice tinny on the line. “I need to chat to you though.”

  “Is it urgent?”

  “Yeah, kind of.”

  “Chat on the phone or face to face?” Gareth asked, knowing that Dave had an inherent distrust of phones. He’d hacked into enough of them to know how vulnerable they were. That was the reason he’d given Gareth for rarely using one.

  “In person, I think would be better.”

  “Well, it’ll have to wait until later. I’m just with Annette now, and then I’m going to the match.”

  “After the football? I’ll meet you in the Heartsease about half-five?”

  Gareth thought for a moment. The football should be over just after five, and the pub was pretty much on his way home.

  “Sure,” Gareth replied. “First one there gets a round in.”

  Gareth said goodbye to Dave and put his phone away. He turned to talk to Annette, who had gone back into the lounge to give him some privacy on the phone.

  “Everything okay?” she asked him.

  “Yeah, just work,” he replied. “Listen, thanks again for lunch. I’m going to head down to the ground.”

  “Okay, well, good luck.”

  “I think we’ll need it against that new striker.”

  “I didn’t mean at the football, Gareth,” Annette said, a wry smile on her face. “I meant later.”

  33

  Annette watched as Gareth made his way down the path, turning as he opened the gate to wave to her. She waved back, but the minute he was out of sight, she let the smile slip from her face. Her cheeks were aching from keeping it plastered on there for the last couple of hours.