Murder Undeniable : a gripping murder mystery

by Anita Waller

  ‘What?’ Robert stood. ‘But he left around half past eight this morning. I’m expecting him back sometime in the next hour.’

  ‘Can I ask your relationship to Mr Swift please?’ Tessa asked.

  ‘As long as you keep it to yourself, you can. I’m his partner. We’ve been together nearly three years, but Peter’s agent doesn’t want him to go public on it until he’s finished playing. Creates bad vibes on the terraces apparently, and the chants will be pretty nasty it seems. We will marry when he leaves football behind, but until then…’

  ‘So can you think where Peter will have gone? Has he ever done this before?’

  ‘Oh my god, no. He’s been with Stoke since he joined the academy at sixteen, he lives for that club.’ Robert took out his phone and listened intently. ‘Straight to voice mail.’

  Tessa stood, followed by Claire. ‘Thank you, Mr Newstead. When you hear from him, he must contact me.’ She handed him a business card. ‘He is in considerable danger, and I need to make sure he’s safe.’

  ‘What if he’s not safe now?’ His frowning face told of his worry.

  ‘He isn’t safe, Robert. I must speak to him as a matter of urgency.’

  Tessa rang the club and explained that Peter had set off for training that morning, and she wanted to know immediately if he should happen to turn up there.

  ‘You think he’s already in trouble, boss?’ Claire said quietly.

  ‘I do, Claire. We’ll head back to the station and see if anyone has come up with anything new.’

  They were two minutes away from the station when Marsden’s phone rang out. She listened intently for a few seconds, then told Claire to pull over.

  She continued to listen and then said, ‘Which hospital?’

  A further minute passed and then she thanked whoever she had spoken to, before disconnecting.

  ‘Okay, Claire, Northern General as quick as you can. Peter Swift has turned up, he’s been taken there by air ambulance. It seems a hiker found him at the bottom of a steep drop, trapped in his car. He couldn’t get out, his leg’s broken but he’s alive. He was conscious when they airlifted him away, so let’s try to get there quickly, before they put him under for any operations he might need.’

  ‘You’re all heart, boss,’ Claire said with a grin. ‘Hold tight.’

  Peter was a little drowsy; he had needed some industrial-strength painkillers.

  ‘I’d been there hours,’ he explained. ‘I thought I would die there. My phone was in my bag on the back seat and I couldn’t reach it. I kept sounding the horn, and in the end I think that’s what brought that feller to me. His dog kept licking my face.’

  ‘You lost control?’

  ‘You tend to lose control when you’ve got a laser beam blinding you. I had no vision, DI Marsden. The car carried on in a straight line, and I was on a bend. I went over the top. I don’t remember coming to a halt, so I think it must have knocked me out, the fall, but I came around eventually and that’s when I started hitting the horn.’

  ‘I’ve notified your club, and your partner, so they should be with you very shortly. However, you will be under guard while you’re in here. Somebody is trying to kill you, Peter, and I need to know who it is. I think you know. He’s already killed Oliver Merchant, Anthony Jackson and Isla Yardley.’

  ‘Oliver? But Oliver died in a…’ His voice faded away.

  ‘You’ve realised it’s a copy of your accident, have you? Losing control for no reason. I’ll bet my job on it being a laser beam that caused him to overturn that car. He didn’t survive, Peter.’

  ‘Did you say Isla?’

  ‘I did. She took a bullet, just like Mr Jackson. One of you has to start talking, I know you’re all hiding something.’

  Peter pressed the bell and a nurse arrived at his bedside within what seemed like a split second. ‘I’m in too much pain for this, nurse,’ he said. ‘I need to be on my own.’

  In no time at all, Tessa and Claire found themselves outside his room. They spoke to the PC who had been allocated the first shift of guard duty, and headed back to the car.

  ‘He’s not going to tell you anything, is he?’ Claire said.

  ‘Then we’ll find it out ourselves,’ Tessa responded.

  Chapter 25

  ‘This is a lovely house,’ Kat said, as the three of them stood peering through the wrought iron gates sealing the property off from the rest of the world. ‘I know we can’t get in, but I don’t think that matters. We’ve seen where the late Anthony lived, and it kind of sets him in my mind now.’

  ‘You sure you don’t want to have a look around?’ Mouse asked. ‘I can go back home and find out how to neutralise the gates and turn off the house alarm.’

  Kat grinned. ‘No, you’re okay, thanks, Mouse. I can live without getting inside. I don’t think it will tell us anything new anyway, the police will have gone through it carefully and taken anything away that could possibly help. No, it’s enough to fix this in my mind. We seem to have turned into private detectives, haven’t we?’ Kat added with a laugh.

  ‘Yes,’ Mouse and Doris chorused.

  ‘Private detectives working from a bedroom.’ Doris smiled. ‘I think we’re wasting our time here. Kat’s right, this house can tell us nothing, other than Anthony Jackson was a very rich man, and to be honest, do we need to know anything else about him?’

  All three turned away from the gates and headed back to Kat’s car.

  ‘I’ve been thinking,’ Mouse said. The other two groaned. ‘No, listen to me. Whoever that taxi driver was, he knew this area pretty well. He calculated exactly how to make us end up on the floor as he took the bends in the village – and they were right-angled bends for maximum effect – so he either lives here or he knows somebody very well who lives here. I need you to think carefully at this point, Kat.’

  ‘Can I think carefully when I get home? I’m driving.’

  In a fluid movement, Mouse reached forward and hit the volume button on the radio. ‘Shhh,’ she said. ‘They just mentioned Peter Swift.’

  Kat indicated and pulled to the side of the road. They listened without speaking, only turning to share looks of horror as the item ended.

  ‘That’s another one of the group. Anthony, Oliver, Isla and Peter.’

  ‘Peter survived, thank the Lord,’ Kat said.

  ‘Only by…’

  ‘The grace of God?’ Kat said, smiling at Mouse.

  ‘No, I was going to say the skin of his teeth if he went over any one of Derbyshire’s bloody stone walls. Bet his car’s a mess as well as him.’

  They drove the rest of the way in silence, although Mouse’s thoughts were on Australia. As were Kat’s. As were Doris’s.

  They sat around the table, each of them staring into the mug of tea in front of them.

  ‘Keith Lancaster,’ Mouse said. ‘The one in all of this who is out of the loop. We need to know why he headed off down under when he had such a good job with Anthony. But more than that, we need to know if he’s been back recently. Or is here now.’

  Mouse’s phone pealed out and she looked at the screen with a frown. ‘Overend? Who do I know called Overend?’ She was about to reject the call when her face cleared. ‘Oh,’ she said, ‘Mr Overend, good to hear from you.’

  There was a pause while she listened to the caller, then she said a series of yeses, before thanking him and disconnecting.

  ‘Insurance,’ she said with a smile. ‘The builders are moving into the house on Monday, and it should take about four weeks.’

  ‘Brilliant,’ Doris said. ‘Will you put it on the market straight away?’

  ‘I will. So now that’s in progress, we can maybe look around for another one for me.’

  ‘Don’t rush into anything,’ Kat warned. ‘You’re safe here, you and Nan.’

  Mouse nodded. ‘I won’t. I’m looking for something a bit more substantial, rather than a home I can share with other students, so I’ll take my time, I promise.’

 
They continued to sip at their tea, until once again Mouse broke the silence. ‘I’m going to ring him, this Keith Lancaster. If he answers, I’ll make something up about investigating the murders; I just need him fixed in Australia at the moment, to rule him out of being the actual murderer. If he’s not there, then I’ll start digging to track if he’s over here.’

  ‘You can do that?’

  ‘As long as I tread carefully. Very carefully. You can find everything out really. Want the codes to launch a nuclear missile?’

  Kat smiled, hoping Mouse wasn’t serious.

  It seemed that Keith Lancaster didn’t want to answer his phone; Mouse waited until she knew it would be daytime in Sydney, but there was no response. She tried three times but there was nothing. The landline and the mobile number seemed to be mocking her, telling her Lancaster’s life was nothing to do with her.

  She had no way of knowing if he was simply on vacation in Australia, so she decided to take the route of checking passenger lists for incoming flights. Again there was nothing. He hadn’t entered the UK, not under his own name. She hoped he wasn’t dead already.

  Mouse walked down to the summerhouse carrying the file Doris had prepared with everything she had been able to find out about Craig Adams, and her laptop.

  He was only twenty-two when he died. What on earth had he done so early on in his life to upset somebody so much they had shot him, she mused, her tongue sticking out between her teeth as she dropped deeply into her thoughts.

  He lived in Bakewell with his mother Sally, father not on the scene. There was an address, but it was the house he had lived at in 2002, so it was doubtful that Sally Adams would still be there.

  Mouse opened her laptop, and a minute later was checking the electoral role. Sally Adams was still at the same address. Mouse would talk to Kat, persuade her to drive them there, but felt it would be better to leave Nan at home; she would be safe with Leon.

  She pulled the photograph of his headstone towards her and studied it. It told her nothing really, but she just felt a sense of… something as she looked at it. Okay, so he had probably become involved with the wrong people, but did he have to die? And something would have died in Sally Adams with her son’s death. He hadn’t had any siblings at the time of his murder, and Mouse doubted any would have followed.

  With the file put tidily back in place – Doris’s words of keep it in the right order rang out clearly in Mouse’s mind – she sat back in the chair and closed her eyes for a moment.

  Kat appeared in the doorway carrying two cups of coffee.

  ‘Where’s Nan?’

  ‘I’ve just taken her a coffee. She’s up in her bedroom. She looked a bit tired, but she’s on her computer so I didn’t ask what she was doing. I probably wouldn’t have understood,’ she added with a grin.

  ‘Then shall we nip to Bakewell? I was going to suggest going Saturday and leaving Leon to keep an eye on Nan, but if she’s working in her room we could go now.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘To see a lady called Sally Adams, Craig Adams’s mother. I’m positive that whatever binds these eight people together, it’s connected with Craig Adams’s death, and maybe if we can talk to his mother she’ll be able to help, especially if we push the idea of her finally finding out who killed him.’

  ‘Finish your coffee and we’ll tell Nan, then go. He died fifteen years ago, it’s a bit of a stretch to think his mother will still be there.’

  ‘According to the electoral roll, she’s still there,’ Mouse confirmed. ‘I checked just a minute ago.’

  Kat looked at her under lowered lids. ‘I should know better by now than to query it, shouldn’t I?’

  Bakewell was busy, as always. It’s beauty, especially by the river, drew many visitors every day, and Mouse decided Kat was blessed to only live six miles away from such an awesome place.

  ‘I love it here, it’s got everything,’ Mouse said. ‘Loads of shops that aren’t phone shops, craft shops, the riverside, the ducks, amazing place.’

  ‘Then maybe this is where you need to be looking for a house to buy. It’s a cracking place, and the Monday market is superb. Busy little town every day though, not just market day. Have you given any thought to what you want to do?’

  ‘Not yet, something will happen that will tell me what to do next.’ Mouse nodded, as if agreeing with herself.

  Kat pulled up outside a small, stone-built terraced house; the bright yellow curtains both upstairs and downstairs gave it an air of being a much-loved house. She glanced at Mouse. ‘This is the address. What do we say?’

  ‘I think we tell the truth. We’re investigating Craig Adams’s death, and we’re looking for his mother. We’ll see what she says after that. We can’t let on we know she still lives here.’

  They got out of the car, and Kat checked her clerical collar was on straight. She led the way up the path and knocked on the door.

  There was no answer, and so Mouse knocked again.

  They saw movement of a yellow curtain, and waited patiently. Eventually the door was opened and a woman of around sixty spoke through the gap afforded by the chain being on.

  ‘Yes?’

  Kat hesitated. ‘I’m sorry to trouble you, but we’re looking for a lady who lived here at one time, a Mrs Sally Adams.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘We’re investigating the death of her son, Craig Adams.’ Kat held her breath.

  The door closed and they heard the sound of the chain being removed. This time the door opened fully.

  ‘Are you police? You’re wearing a dog collar.’

  Kat smiled. ‘No we’re not police. My name is Katerina, Kat for short, and I’m the deacon at Eyam church. This is my friend Beth.’ Kat removed her ID badge from around her neck and showed it to the lady.

  She examined it briefly, then handed it back. ‘I’m Sally Adams,’ she said. ‘You’d better come in.’

  ‘Can I offer you a drink?’ Sally had led them through to the kitchen, and indicated that they were to sit at the table. The oven was on, and it seemed she was baking. ‘I’m sorry to bring you in here but I’m baking for a cake sale, and these are nearly ready to come out.’

  ‘No problem,’ Kat said. ‘And I’m sure we could manage to drink a cup of tea,’ she added with a smile.

  Sally flicked the kettle switch, and joined them at the table. ‘What do you mean when you say you’re investigating Craig’s murder? You’re not the police.’

  ‘No, we’re kind of private investigators,’ Mouse said.

  ‘Okay. I’m asking because I had the police here yesterday hashing everything up again. A DI Marsden. She was nice, but I’m not convinced they’ll solve it any more than they solved it the first time they had a go. I lost my only son, and nobody’s paid for it.’

  ‘Not yet,’ Mouse said with confidence. ‘I went to his grave, pulled up a few weeds, gave it a bit of a tidy up, and told him we’d sort it out. And we will. Starting with a chat with you. We don’t want to know where he was on that last day, at least not from you, because he was an adult and I imagine you wouldn’t know.’

  Sally paused. ‘No, you’re right, of course. I didn’t know. He came home at lunchtime, which was a bit unusual, and that was the last time I saw him alive.’

  ‘What was he like, your Craig?’ Kat asked gently.

  ‘Primarily, he was kind. He would help the neighbours, go shopping for them, mow their lawns, that sort of thing, and I always felt I’d brought him up right, even if I did have to do it on my own. His father died just after he was born, an accident at work. He was doing some overtime because we were saving for a holiday, and he was on his own in the factory when some steel pipes rolled. He was crushed, died immediately so they told me.’

  ‘I’m so sorry,’ Kat said.

  ‘Thank you. It’s why Craig is buried in Eyam churchyard; his father is there, because he came from Eyam. When I die I will go in the same plot as Craig. His father’s plot is owned by his family. They insisted he
be buried there, and I didn’t have the gumption or the strength to argue.’

  ‘And you’ve never married anyone else?’

  Mouse would have applauded Kat if she could have; she had a fantastic way of empathising, and Sally Adams was responding.

  ‘No, never loved anyone else. Craig was enough for me. We had a lovely time until he reached sixteen or so. Then he seemed to change. Being a little bit naïve, I certainly didn’t initially recognise his behaviour as being connected with drugs, but it seems it was. His post-mortem revealed cocaine and marijuana. I knew it would, and it did occur to me at the time that maybe it wouldn’t be investigated as thoroughly as it might have been if drugs hadn’t been present.’

  Sally Adams stood as the kettle clicked off and made cups of tea. She handed out the drinks and re-joined Kat and Mouse at the table.

  ‘This was what I did that last day with Craig,’ she said, looking down at the cup she was cradling in her hands. ‘I made us a sandwich and a drink and we talked.’

  A timer pinged, and she jumped up, took out the tray of scones and switched off the oven. Once again she sat down.

  ‘Was it a nice talk? One to remember?’ Mouse asked, trying to imitate Kat’s gentleness.

  Sally picked up her cup and took a small sip before responding. ‘No, it wasn’t a nice talk. It was the point I realised the hope I held that he would stop with the drugs was never going to happen. He asked if I could give him two thousand pounds.’

  Kat and Mouse remained silent, understanding that something important had just been said.

  ‘He knew I had it, of course, I was paid compensation after my husband’s death, which I received. We bought this house out of it, and the rest sat in the bank. Most of it is still there. I asked Craig what he needed the money for, and he said he owed it to somebody. I didn’t argue, he was my son and he needed help. I went to the bank and withdrew the money. I pushed it with him to try to find out who he owed it to, and he told me he would tell me once it was paid. He stormed out of the house before we’d finished talking about it. I never saw him again.’