Truth or Dare: Pre-order the nail-biting new Helen Grace thriller now

by M. J. Arlidge

  ‘I’m not saying that DI Grace hasn’t done good work in the past or that she hasn’t been a good leader, boss, even friend to you—’ Hudson let his gaze linger on Ellie McAndrew, who of all of them was the most likely to harbour doubts about participating in this coup. ‘But you have to live in the present. To deal with the situation in front of you. Change is coming and it’s coming fast. Perhaps today, perhaps tomorrow. As you are the most experienced officers in the team, I didn’t want you to be blind-sided. Nor did I want to be underhand. DI Grace will be called upon to account for her attitude, her actions, and it may be that you are asked to corroborate my version of events, specifically that she deliberately ignored a viable suspect and took great pleasure in belittling me and dismissing valid lines of enquiry.’

  There was no immediate reaction, but Hudson felt he was on safe enough ground to continue.

  ‘Now, maybe DI Grace will fight her corner, try to cling on, maybe she won’t, but either way, I wanted to outline to you how I see things going forward. And I wanted to ask for your support. Because I can’t achieve anything unless I have my best people with me.’

  He smiled warmly, receiving encouraging nods from Reid and Edwards in response. McAndrew, however, hardly reacted. She clearly understood the way the wind was blowing, but perhaps was finding it difficult to let go.

  ‘Change is hard, I get that,’ he continued in an emollient tone, ‘but it’s also natural and beneficial. People rise, people fall and everyone’s career has a shelf life. Helen Grace’s has come to an end and, whilst that’s sad, we have to look forward, to a better, brighter future. So, the only thing you have to ask yourself is whether you want to be on that train … or whether you want to go down with a sinking ship. It’s not an easy choice for you, I’m sure, but it is a clear one.’

  He let that notion settle for a moment, before adding:

  ‘Which is why I’m asking you to be courageous. To back me at this crucial moment for the team, for the station. Why I’m asking you to do the right thing.’

  Chapter 97

  ‘You’re lying to me, Robert.’

  The lawyer maintained eye contact, but didn’t respond to Helen’s accusation. He’d hardly said a word since entering the interview suite.

  ‘You love your boys to distraction, I know you do. And you live for the time you spend together. Yet suddenly yesterday you dump them on Alexia and rush off to the office, putting your work schedule ahead of their needs …’

  ‘It wasn’t what I wanted, of course it wasn’t, but I had no choice,’ he replied, reluctantly.

  ‘Why? I’ve spoken to the clerks and it wasn’t like there was any emergency. A case that suddenly needed fielding. Your appeal had been postponed, I hear, so—’

  ‘I’m just very behind because of all the stuff that’s been going on with Alexia. I’ve been distracted, I admit it. I’ve taken my eye off the ball and, as I’ve got a couple of big cases coming up, I felt I needed a bit of extra time to get on top of things …’

  ‘So how long were you at the office last night?’

  ‘Three or four hours?’

  ‘Any of the clerks see you?’

  ‘No, it was late. In early, out early, that’s how they work.’

  ‘You didn’t go anywhere else? To pick up some files? Get something to eat?’

  ‘No, I’ve told you, I was there all evening.’

  Helen let the lie float in the air for a moment, before replying, ‘You own a Mercedes S Class, don’t you?’

  ‘You know I do.’

  ‘Registration number OE18 RDY?’

  ‘Yes …’

  ‘It’s a prestige vehicle, very desirable. For affluent professionals like yourself, but also thieves …’

  ‘What’s your point, Helen? I’d like to get back to the boys.’

  ‘My point is that the S Class has a built-in transponder. A transponder that’s constantly sending out information about the car’s whereabouts, just in case it falls into the wrong hands …’

  And now for the first time, Downing looked uneasy.

  ‘Following your arrest, we ran a check on the vehicle’s movements. And guess what? Your car was in the city centre near your office, but only momentarily, then it moved on, heading out to Thornhill, where it was stationary for well over an hour. From there, the car returned to your wife’s house, but not before it was stationary for a while near the River Itchen. Now … you say you were at the office all night, so you can understand my confusion.’

  Robert Downing stared at her, refusing to be intimidated, but Helen had him on the rack, staring right back.

  ‘You’ll perhaps be aware that a man was murdered in the Thornhill area last night. His name is Gary Bleecher, he’s a loan shark. Anyway, he was beaten to death in a vicious attack.’

  ‘Don’t know him.’

  ‘Never met the guy?’

  ‘Course not. I don’t need to borrow money. I don’t know this man, and I certainly wouldn’t have attacked him.’

  ‘So where did all those scratches come from?’

  Downing paused, instinctively glancing down at his hands.

  ‘You’re scratched on your face, your hands, and, despite your best attempts to conceal it, you clearly have significant bruising on your neck. So why don’t we skip the denials and cut to the chase. What happened last night, Robert?’

  ‘I don’t know this man,’ he muttered in response.

  ‘Doesn’t mean you didn’t kill him. I’m guessing it was a pretty violent struggle, perhaps he fought back, tried to strangle you. If I was in that situation, if I felt my life was in danger, I think I’d do pretty much anything to protect myself.’

  ‘It wasn’t me.’

  ‘Robert, look at me.’

  For a minute, Helen thought he hadn’t heard her. Then, slowly, he raised his gaze to meet hers.

  ‘You know me, you know my reputation. So you know this isn’t going to go away. I think you went to Thornhill last night. I think you murdered Gary Bleecher—’

  ‘No, I’d never do something like that. You must know that, Helen.’

  ‘So why were you there? Why drive all that way? What happened to you?’

  There was a long pause, Downing staring at the ceiling, the door, at the walls, anywhere except at Helen. Then, finally, he lowered his eyes and now, as he spoke, Helen was surprised to see tears in his eyes.

  ‘Look, I – I don’t want the boys to know about this, nor Alexia, but the honest truth is that – that I went to Thornhill to end my life. I’d reached the end of the road – emotionally, mentally, physically. I’ve tried to be a good dad, a good husband, but I’ve failed. Failed in every way—’

  His voice was quivering with emotion now, his whole body shaking.

  ‘So I drove as far away from the house, the office, my life, as I could. There are areas out there where no one goes, where you can be totally alone. And I sat there in my car for an hour, writing a note to the boys, to Alexia. There are several abandoned buildings there where I thought I might do it, but then some guys turned up – kids, skaters, druggies, I don’t know – so I changed my mind, drove to the woods near the river instead. I don’t know why I chose that spot, it was just somewhere familiar, somewhere I knew. I got the rope out of the car and I did it, I hung myself—’

  Now he gestured to the bruising, pulling down his tracksuit collar to reveal the full discolouration around his neck.

  ‘And if I’d got it right, I wouldn’t be here talking to you now.’ His eyes were brimming with tears now, but he soldiered on. ‘But I didn’t. The rope broke and I fell to the ground—’ He held up his damaged hands, touched his face. ‘And as I was lying there, I knew. Knew that I couldn’t do it, couldn’t leave my boys. In spite of everything, I had to make it work somehow …’

  He looked at Helen through misty eyes now, expecting sympathy. But Helen’s face betrayed no emotion.

  ‘It’s a sad story, Robert. And beautifully told. But I’m afraid I don’t believe
a word of it.’

  He continued to hold her gaze, but did Helen glimpse a flash of anger behind the tears?

  ‘You’re a man who has everything to live for, everything to fight for. A good job, lovely kids, a bright future. We’ve spoken to Alexia – I’ve spoken to her – on a number of occasions and she says you’ve been uncharacteristically bullish of late. Moreover, when you turned up last night, she said you were far from despairing. Angry, aggressive, perhaps even in shock, but certainly not suicidal.’

  ‘Well, she would say that, wouldn’t she?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘To blacken my name, of course. She’ll do everything in her power to drag my reputation through the gutter, so she can steal my boys from me—’

  ‘Is that why she hired Declan McManus to spy on you?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘We spoke before about McManus; you insisted he’d contacted you looking for work. But that wasn’t true, was it? The truth is that he’d found out about your drug habit and hoped to extort money from you …’

  ‘For God’s sake, Helen, what is this?’

  ‘Was it crystal meth? Were you really that far gone, Robert?’

  ‘No, of course not, I – I’d never …’ But suddenly he seemed to have lost his natural eloquence.

  ‘You see, I think this is how it works,’ Helen continued. ‘Amar Goj killed Declan McManus to get you off the hook, stealing his laptop and torching his files in the process. Suddenly you were in the clear; you could happily look forward to your day in court with Alexia, confident in the knowledge that she’d have nothing on you. But your salvation came at a price – and that price was Gary Bleecher.’

  ‘This is lunacy, sheer lunacy—’

  ‘I’m assuming someone was badly in debt to Bleecher, needed him gone. You had no connection to the loan shark, the murder wouldn’t be traced back to you or the instigator, except that Bleecher had a microchip on him, with details of all those who owed him money, details we’re currently poring over. It should reveal who had a motive for killing him and ultimately help us link the instigator of this murder back to you.’

  ‘No, no. This has nothing whatsoever to do with me.’

  ‘Oh, come on, Robert. Give it up. Your DNA will be all over Bleecher’s body. Blood, sweat, skin cells. You won’t be able to wriggle out of this one.’

  Downing shook his head repeatedly, violently, but said nothing.

  ‘I know you killed him. And I know why.’

  ‘Listen to yourself, Helen. This is beyond crazy. I don’t know the guy, I have no motive.’

  ‘But you do, we’ve established that. Following the break-up of your marriage, your drug use escalated. McManus knew that he had the power to destroy you—’

  ‘No.’ The word spun out of his mouth, hard, aggressive, definitive.

  ‘Alexia’s obviously already been telling tales, so I won’t deny that I was a user,’ he continued tersely. ‘Cocaine, ecstasy and the like. And yes, I may have had a few bad experiences after she left, but I am not an addict. I was never an addict. I had my issues, but I dealt with them. I got treatment and now I’m clean. I’ve been clean for weeks now, so no, I had no motive for killing anyone, for wanting anyone dead.’

  He sat back in his chair, his arms folded in defiance. Something he’d said, however, had piqued Helen’s interest, rendering his fervent denials irrelevant.

  ‘Can I ask where you got treatment?’

  Downing continued to stare at her, his eyes narrowing slightly.

  ‘Or rather who treated you?’

  There was a long, long pause, the silence in the room suddenly oppressive and claustrophobic, then the lawyer replied: ‘No comment.’

  Chapter 98

  ‘Excuse me, coming through …’

  Two startled secretaries stepped aside, making room for Helen to pass. She was running down the corridor, desperate not to waste another second. Reaching the lift bank, she punched the button, then seeing that the lift was stuck on the fifteenth floor, charged through the doors into the stairwell.

  Down, down, down, she flew, taking the steps five at a time. Colleagues saw her coming and made way – they had grown used to her over the years and knew not to impede her. In under a minute, she had reached the ground floor, bursting through the doors and racing towards the custody area.

  ‘Where’s the fire?’

  Anthony Parks was smiling at her, that customary twinkle in his eye, but Helen had no time for banter.

  ‘Robert Downing …’

  ‘What about him?’

  ‘Have you got his custody details to hand?’

  ‘Course. What’re you after?’

  ‘I want to know what he had on him when he was brought in.’

  ‘Not very much, if memory serves—’

  He busied himself, punching the keyboard with pudgy fingers.

  ‘Phone, car keys, wallet, a pair of reading glasses, that was about it.’

  ‘Anything else?’

  ‘No, nothing – though he did have some stuff in his car. The search team bagged that when they went through it this morning. I’ve got the details here …’

  Helen watched him intently as he typed.

  ‘Here we go. A road atlas, a hi-vis jacket, warning triangle …’

  ‘Anything personal, Anthony?’ Helen interrupted.

  ‘A couple of things. There was a book of photos, family snaps, I believe. And I think they found a bottle of pills in the glove compartment.’

  ‘What kind of pills?’

  Parks peered at his screen once more. Helen realized she was holding her breath, even as he eventually replied.

  ‘Naltrexone.’

  Helen breathed out, relief and excitement coursing through her body.

  ‘Where is it? Where’s the bottle?’

  ‘I’ve got it here, give me two ticks.’

  He walked off to the secure storage area, returning a moment later with a small bottle of pills, encased in a transparent bag.

  ‘Any good to you?’

  Helen snatched it from him, eagerly reading the label. And there was the answer to his question, in black and white. The name of the drug, the quantity and regularity of the dose and beneath it the name of the prescribing physician.

  Doctor Alex Blythe.

  Chapter 99

  ‘Yes or no? It’s a simple question.’

  Alex Blythe opened his mouth, but nothing came out. Initially hostile to her intrusion – he’d had to send one of his clients away mid-session – he now looked flabbergasted, stunned by the volley of questions being fired at him.

  ‘Look, if I have to pull you in to do this at Southampton Central, I will,’ Helen continued.

  The young psychiatrist clearly didn’t like the idea of that, finally finding his tongue.

  ‘Yes, Robert Downing was a patient of mine.’

  ‘For how long?’

  ‘Three months or so.’

  ‘Drug addiction?’

  A slight pause, a shred of resistance, of professional modesty, still remained. Blythe shot a troubled look down at his loyal springer spaniel, who stared happily up at him, then muttered: ‘Yes. He’d got himself hooked on crystal meth, couldn’t shake the habit. He’d even tried heroin on a couple of occasions – I think that’s what eventually scared him into seeking help.’

  ‘And Belinda Raeburn?’

  ‘Look, what’s all this about, inspector? I’m not comfort—’

  ‘Answer the question.’

  Her tone was cold and unyielding. Blythe blinked, unsettled, worried, before reluctantly responding: ‘Yes, she was with me for a couple of months, no more than that.’

  ‘And what was her issue?’

  ‘Well, there’s a very complicated name for it, but basically it’s love addiction. She was hooked on the adrenaline, the buzz, the joy of new relationships – that heady feeling you get when you realize that someone else shares your feelings.’

  ‘And did she happen to mention that
these new “loves” were underage?’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Fifteen-year-old girls, possibly even younger on occasion …’

  Now all resistance seemed to evaporate, the young psychiatrist stunned by what he was hearing.

  ‘No, of course not. She said they were young women, nineteen, twenty years old—’

  ‘Well, they weren’t. They were girls. One of whom was brutally murdered ten days ago.’

  ‘But – but surely you don’t suspect Belinda of—’

  ‘What about Amanda Davis?’

  He stared at her for a moment, wrong-footed by the sudden change of tack.

  ‘Was she a patient of yours too?’

  ‘Yes,’ he conceded, hollow now. ‘A long-term patient.’

  ‘What for?’

  ‘Well, Amanda – Amanda was an extreme case. Hyper sexuality linked to her bipolar condition. People popularly call it nymphomania, but there’s no such thing, not really. When she was in a downward spiral, she was very down, would hardly leave the house. But when she was in a manic phase, she was pretty much out of control. She’d always substituted sex for affection and during her manic upswing she would deliberately seek out extreme sexual encounters.’

  ‘In sex clubs?’

  ‘Clubs, dogging sites, swingers parties. During those phases, she would sleep with as many people as she could, do whatever they wanted, losing herself in the experience. Obviously, I counselled her against it, it wasn’t safe, but she found it very hard to kick the habit. Not least because she had a domineering husband who encouraged her wild behaviour.’

  ‘And what about Lilah Hill?’

  Alex Blythe broke off his account, staring at Helen as if she was practising some form of witchcraft, such was her ability to penetrate others’ secrets.

  ‘Yes, yes – but she’s a relatively new client. We’ve only scratched the surface of her issues.’

  ‘And what’s her form of addiction?’