Northern Roulette (DCI Cooper Book 4)

by B Baskerville

  “First avenue – find the men on our shortlist. Second – work out who is at risk.” Cooper closed her file. “The mother, Beth Beaumont, is presumably a target. Go through these files and find out everyone who fostered the boys, no matter how short a time period they were in their care. He might have a grudge against them. I want the mother under surveillance. Paula, can you take care of that?”

  Keaton tipped her head. “I’ll arrange some plain clothes to keep an eye out.”

  As the team got to their feet they made moaning and groaning noises. Backs were straightened, and knees were massaged. They needed a boost.

  “One more thing,” Cooper said. “We started with a suspect field of tens of thousands: a white male with a football shirt. We’ve narrowed the field to three, which means we’re doing brilliantly. You’re doing brilliantly. Now let’s finish this.”

  - Chapter 40 -

  True to her word, Keaton had sent a car to keep an eye on Beth Beaumont. Northcutt had already updated her to say the sixty-four-year-old had a gentleman caller. When Keaton expressed concern, they assured her that Beth seemed to be on intimate terms with him. There was no way it was one of her many sons; at least they sincerely hoped he wasn’t.

  Cooper thanked Keaton for the update and was now looking for Martin or Tennessee in the hope they could give her some good news. Last she heard, Shane Beaumont had disappeared and Tyrone Douglas Beaumont was a ghost. There’d been no record of him since 1999. But just because the computer hadn’t spilled any new beans on their suspects didn’t mean they were at a dead end. The fact they were elusive meant the team were on to something. One of them was likely the murderer; the other two might have gone to ground because, like their brother Kevin, they had something else to hide. Why come forward to rule yourself out of a murder if it got you banged up regardless? If they’d heard about Kevin and were in a similar situation, they wouldn’t repeat his error and would be keeping their heads down.

  Right on cue, Tennessee entered holding a file and a can of RedBull. “I’ve managed to speak to eight separate people who fostered Shane Beaumont over the years.”

  “Christ, they really were bounced around, weren’t they?”

  “Just a bit.” Tennessee sat and opened the can of energy drink. The fizzing noise filled the otherwise quiet room. “I told them all that someone they fostered in the nineties was wanted in connection with a violent crime. I didn’t give specifics, but once their names hit the press, they’ll put two and two together.”

  “You told them to be vigilant?”

  “Lock the doors and all that jazz. Told them to dial 999 if they’re contacted by anyone they used to foster. Same advice if anyone tries to gain access to their home or if they suspect they’re being followed. Gave them my mobile too.”

  He popped two ibuprofen and took a swig from the can.

  “Make a start on Phillip and Tyrone’s foster parents. Make sure to ask if they’ve seen anyone they fostered a long time ago or even just thought they recognised someone. Maybe we get lucky and they’ve spotted one of the brothers.”

  “If we have a sighting, I’ll get a car out to them straight away, and I won’t be far behind ready to interview them.”

  Cooper slipped her boots off for a moment to rub her feet. She had to update Nixon before the end of the day and couldn’t face that with aching feet and a caffeine deficiency.

  On her way to Nixon’s office late in the afternoon, Cooper spied DI Neil Fuller bent over a drinking fountain. Once upon a time she thought he was rather fetching; now she couldn’t help but see all his rodent-like features. He straightened up and wiped his furry mouth on the back of his little rat hands. It didn’t help that his fingernails were currently a touch on the long side, and he smelled like something the cat would drag in. Somewhere between a garbage dump and rotten fish. A hint of feral dog too. She couldn’t blame him. He was working a case almost as challenging and upsetting as she was. Had he slept at all this week?

  A missing five-year-old made every parent with a shred of empathy pray for her safe return. They’d also thank the heavens it was someone else’s child and not their own. Cooper understood that sentiment; she’d come close to losing her own daughter once. As much as she wanted Summer Holt to be found unharmed, she was grateful it wasn’t Tina.

  “Neil. How are you holding up?”

  He couldn’t speak. He pressed his back to the wall, his mouth opening and his hands moving as if he wanted to spill every stress, frustration and dark thought, only he couldn’t. Then the tears came.

  The first responders to a child abduction were often haunted by the experience for years after the fact. There would be no happy ending, regardless of the outcome. If Summer turned up dead, Fuller would consider it a professional failure. He would question every move he made until his dying day, turning to either counselling or a vodka bottle. If Summer was found, she, her parents and Fuller would have to go on knowing what her abductor had done to her. They’d smile and be thankful; they’d say the right things to the press and treasure each day their family was together.

  But they’d always know.

  Little girls weren’t kidnapped because their captors wanted to take them to tea parties and petting zoos. They were taken because—

  Cooper swallowed. Her case was awful, but she was dealing with adults. It was always different when children were involved. Still, there was a third outcome, possibly the worst one: Summer could never be found at all. Every year new appeals and aged photographs guessing how Summer would look at age six, eight, ten, fifteen. Each press release showing the withering faces of two parents who lost their reason for being. A couple who couldn’t let go, or move on, forever stuck in perpetual purgatory.

  Yes, it was always different when children were involved.

  Fuller’s tears slowed. “I don’t know what to do.”

  She moved to take his hand, but he pulled it from her reach.

  “How do I tell them not to worry, that it’ll be fine?”

  “You don’t,” Cooper said. “You can’t make that promise. You can only promise to do your best, that every force in the goddamned country will do their best.”

  He bent over the fountain again, this time splashing the cool water over his reddening face.

  “Are you eating?” she asked.

  He raised an eyebrow and scanned Cooper’s skinny frame. “Are you?”

  A fair point, but Cooper was eating again following her father’s passing. It wasn’t just herself who required her to be fuelled and nourished; her family, her colleagues, the public, they all needed her to take care of herself.

  She moved to the other side of the corridor and placed a flimsy cup in the coffee dispenser. It wasn’t as good as the coffee in the canteen, and it wasn’t a patch on the nearest Starbucks, but it did the job. Shiny, black and bitter, it was the shared activity of all the people who drank it, from Africa to Europe to the Americas. A beverage that connected the tired and anxious the world over.

  “Here,” she said, handing Fuller the cup before taking another one to fill for herself. “Take half an hour. Drink that and get some fruit.”

  He shrugged his shoulders just as his phone began to chirp. “Fuller. Yeah. I’m on my way.” He ended the call and wiped his eyes, readying himself. “A possible sighting.”

  “Sounds positive.”

  “We’ve had a million possible sightings, Erica. Each one a false alarm.”

  Hopes raised. Hopes destroyed.

  He walked away, leaving drips of coffee like a trail of brown bread crumbs. Cooper took a moment before following the trail. Hansel and Gretel escaped the witch and made it back home. Perhaps Summer Holt could do the same.

  As she knocked on Nixon’s door, Cooper vowed to mention Fuller to him. The man needed help. She couldn’t take his caseload, but something needed to budge. He was shouldering a missing child and returning each night to an empty home. If Nixon didn’t do something, she feared Fuller would be found at the end of
a rope.

  - Chapter 41 -

  The feast began at seven p.m. on the dot. Cooper arranged for a delivery of tapas from Allard’s restaurant. Flatbreads, black pudding bonbons, belly pork and spiced meatballs covered every square inch of the dining table. The five diners – six if you counted the seagull – tucked in with gusto.

  “Blooming heck.” Julie removed her cardigan, took a sip of wine and soda and began to fan herself with a napkin. Evidently, the spiced meatballs were a touch too picante for her tastes. Cooper thought they were relatively mild.

  When the last of the bonbons disappeared and the drinks had been topped up, the group – sans seagull – moved to the living room. Tina and Josh sat side by side on the sofa, fingers interlaced but posture stiff. Julie took the other end of the couch, leaving Cooper and Atkinson in armchairs at opposite ends of the room. He felt far away, yet the house felt busy and cluttered. Five pairs of shoes by the door, five mobile phones strewn on various side tables, five drinks on coasters, five sets of body heat adding to the July warmth.

  Five minds, each preoccupied.

  “Has everyone had enough to eat?” Cooper asked, breaking the silence.

  “Yes, Ms Cooper. It was delicious.” Josh rummaged in his jeans pocket and produced a crumpled twenty-pound note. “Dad said I have to contribute.”

  “Don’t be silly. Use it to go to the cinema or something.”

  “No, Dad said I had to—”

  “And if Reg asks, I’ll tell him you did. You two should go and do something fun. You’ve studied so hard recently.”

  Tina and Josh shared a smile, but it was a half-arsed one. Despite what Tina had told her and their best efforts at acting like nothing was up, Cooper saw straight through them. They’d been arguing about something again.

  “Actually,” Tina said. “I thought we could all do something together on Sunday.”

  “Oh?”

  “Steven.” As Tina said his name, five heads collectively angled their ears towards the kitchen door. A swoosh swoosh noise told them he was flapping his wings again. Feathered semaphore flags spelling out that he wasn’t a baby anymore. “It’s time.”

  “Really? Our feathered baby is ready to fly the nest?”

  “I think so,” Tina began, her face flushing with pride before she was cut off by her grandmother.

  “It’s about time.”

  Both Tina and Cooper flashed death stares at her.

  “Oh please, he’s been making a mess all over my kitchen.”

  “It’s Mum’s kitchen,” snapped Tina, her voice high-pitched and abrasive. “And he’s been here longer than you have.”

  It looked like Tina’s fingernails were digging into Josh’s knuckles. Wisely, he kept quiet while Tina set her face in a formidable expression, lips thin and eyes burning.

  “Are you going to let your daughter speak to me like that?”

  Cooper pinched her nose and looked at Atkinson. Silently, she tried to convey an apology. He sent a warm smile back in her direction and mouthed, “Families.”

  “It is my kitchen, Steven has been here longer than you have, and I did warn you about insulting him.”

  Julie looked horrified. “I should have turned him into a feather duster. You know in Lanzarote they’re considered vermin?”

  “You’re not in Lanzarote!” Tina stood, not letting go of Josh’s hand, forcing him to stand as well. She closed her eyes and took a deep breath, keeping her temper at bay. “Josh and I will be releasing Steven on Low Lights beach on Sunday afternoon. We’ll say goodbye, then get takeaway from The Waterfront. Justin, you are very welcome to join us.”

  “I wouldn’t miss it,” Atkinson said.

  “Grandma, you are not invited.” Tina stomped from the room, dragging Josh with her.

  The casino smelled of new money and cheap perfume. The sound of slot machines spewing pound coins like heavy rain on a tin roof. He sat in front of one, his eyes squinting against the glare of the lights and a blinding neon sign that blinked between yellow and green. He inserted a coin and pressed the button. Wheels span, numbers blurred, bells chimed.

  His mind was filled with images of his attack on Ronan Turnbull. The deception felt cunning, rolling up to his front door like that. The fight itself was thrilling. Years of pent up resentment and fears fuelled every punch into his face. As for finishing him off in front of somewhere so sacred— The God-botherers must have had a meltdown. But that feeling of intense excitement hadn’t lasted long, and he felt no freer now than when he formulated his plan a few weeks ago.

  Killing Ronan hadn’t killed the nightmares.

  The wheels slowed, settling on a red seven, a bell, and a watermelon. He’d lost. Not that it mattered.

  His heart thudded as a thin woman with protruding collar bones sauntered past. The red dress hung from angular shoulders, the fabric clinging to the curves of her fake tits and her lower back. Her skin was tanned, and a stripe of silver at her hairline betrayed her age. He wasn’t attracted to her. In fact, she enraged him.

  She looked just like Beth: sixties, skinny, colouring her hair and skin, spending more time on her nails than her children.

  Spending more money on drugs than on food for the bairns.

  He ground his teeth until a dull ache pulsated in his temples.

  She wasn’t Beth.

  But she could be.

  She could be a warm-up, a dress rehearsal.

  Behind him, a fight broke out at the entrance. Security had refused entry to a group of men dressed as Borat. They were young, out of shape, and their green mankinis were not appropriate clothing for fighting. After the third penis had fallen out, they made a hasty retreat, tucking their privates back behind the vivid fabric of their costumes. The door supervisors laughed, then moved aside for two stylish couples on a double date.

  When he turned, he’d lost his Beth substitute. He stood, craning his neck over the casino’s clientele. There she was, her red dress weaving between the green poker tables.

  Red and green should never be seen.

  He tore his eyes from her and made his way to a space at the roulette table. Three down, three to go. Red, he’d take Kerys; black, he’d go after Beth. This was no game of Russian roulette; there wasn’t a one in six chance of death. This was his game. He called it Northern Roulette, and someone would definitely die.

  - Chapter 42 -

  Cooper’s eyes were barely able to open, and the weight of her quilt felt like a warm cocoon. It was Sunday morning, and the faintest rose blush glowed through her bedroom curtains, telling her it wasn’t quite dawn. She checked her watch. It was four twenty-six in the morning.

  “Someone better had died,” she grumbled into her phone.

  “Ma’am, there’s a sandcastle shaped like a snake on Sandhaven beach.”

  Cooper didn’t recognise the voice and didn’t want to shoot the messenger. She flexed her jaw, peeling her tongue from the roof of her mouth. She was dehydrated.

  “Right. On my way.”

  “Local police have been dispatched from South Shields. They want to know if they should preserve the scene or—”

  “He buries them alive. Screw preserving the scene. Tell them to dig the victim out and if they’re still warm, begin CPR.”

  “Ma’am.”

  A beep signalled that the call had ended. Cooper looked to the other side of the bed where Atkinson slept soundly on his front.

  She watched his back rise and fall with peaceful breathes before nudging him. “Wake up. You’re going to get a call any second now.”

  He blinked at her with a confused expression, his eyes looking smaller without his glasses. “Are you the oracle?”

  He sat and stretched while Cooper began to dress. She had half her clothes on when Atkinson’s phone began to vibrate.

  Cooper parked near the Sand Dancer pub and trotted through the car park to access the beach. The water was calm: no breaking waves, no wind, no mist, no sea frets. The shallows shone like a mirror, reflect
ing the purples and burnt oranges in the sky above. The sand near the water’s edge was formed into parallel ripples, like miniature mountains and valleys. Cooper saw the birds first. Fifty or so sandpipers wading along the shoreline looking for insects or small crabs. Their stick legs and long, thin beaks perfectly suited to the task. Tynemouth Priory loomed on the other side of the mouth of the river. The aureate glow of the morning shone through holes in the old ruins. For a moment, it looked as if someone had left the lights on.

  When Cooper’s feet hit the soft sand, she was glad she chose boots over heels. She powerwalked towards the scene. An inner and outer perimeter had already been set up, and several men and women from South Shields Police stood in pairs, their heads bowed in conversation.

  As she approached the crime scene manager, she wondered what, or rather who, she would find. Who had been targeted this time? She knew Beth Beaumont was under surveillance, and they’d warned as many of the Beaumont children’s foster carers as they could to be vigilant. Another few steps and she saw the mound of sand more clearly. She could see deep gouge marks where the first responders had carved their way through the sand to get to the victim.

  “Cooper,” she said, introducing herself in breathless tones, her legs sapped of energy from the loose sand.

  The crime scene manager checked her ID and waved her through. Cooper braced herself but stopped when she saw an officer removing the perimeter tape.

  “What’s going on?” she asked the crime scene manager.

  “False alarm.” He pointed to a squat woman. She had rosy cheeks and a black bob with two thick streaks of grey at the front. “Sergeant Chakrabarti can tell you more, ma’am.”

  She rubbed the back of her neck and approached the woman, who stood with perfect posture and an air of confidence despite her short stature.

  “Sergeant Chakrabarti? I’m DCI Erica Cooper. Please call me Cooper. I’ve already heard too many ma’ams for this time of the morning.”