‘And they’re still cutting your budget, I’ll bet.’
‘You wouldn’t get many takers on that one.’
Ty sympathised with the detective’s predicament. He remembered all too well the frustration he’d felt when too many crimes prevented him from investigating any of them as thoroughly as he’d have liked. It would suit Far Reach Productions just fine if Juliette’s file finished up gathering dust at the bottom of someone’s in tray. Memories would fade and they’d be able to put a spin on it that left them smelling of roses. And Ty was well aware that in spite of Marcel’s innocence, a good PR team would have a field day with the circumstantial evidence that implicated him. His reputation would be in tatters. So too would that of Drew’s hotel.
‘Not on my watch,’ Ty muttered.
Mike reappeared, having just signed his statement. He looked excited rather than apprehensive now that it was all over. His sallow complexion had gained some colour and the hunch had left his shoulders. Ty figured his role would get blown up with each telling but couldn’t resent the kid his moment of glory.
‘All set?’ Ty clapped him on the back. ‘Ready to go?’
‘Sure.’
‘Thanks for your help,’ Vickery said.
‘Any time.’
Ty listened with half an ear to Mike’s excited chatter as he drove them back to Lambourn. What he really wanted to hear was his ring tone. He was waiting for a call back from Wright Landscaping. It came when he was five minutes away from Hopgood House.
‘Mr Maddox. Ben Wright, we spoke earlier.’
‘Yeah, thanks for getting back to me. Did you have a chance to check your records from ten years back?’
‘That’s why I’m calling.’ They were on the speakerphone, Mike listening to every word, his eyes wide with curiosity. ‘We had two part-time workers during that period. Students making a bit extra in their off time.’
‘Do you have their names?’ Ty asked, trying to curb his impatience.
‘One was Crispin Fuller.’ Crispin? ‘The other was a chap by the name of Guy Salter.’
Chapter Nineteen
‘Where are we going?’
The two women walked through the entrance hall and down the hotel’s front steps. There wasn’t a soul in sight. It was too early for the bar to be open for the lunchtime trade and everyone connected to the contest would be in the kitchen at this hour. Which, of course, was where Greta ought to be.
‘Won’t you be missed in the kitchen?’ Alexi asked.
‘That hardly seems important now,’ Greta replied, a note of regret in her voice. ‘But I called to say I was feeling unwell, in case you’re wondering.’
Alexi opened her car with the remote and slid behind the wheel. Greta climbed into the passenger side as Alexi jammed the key into the ignition and turned it. She stalled the engine twice before managing to engage reverse and back out of her space.
‘Where to?’ she asked.
‘We’re heading for Reading.’
She followed Greta’s instructions, giving up on trying to make conversation when she received only monosyllabic responses. Alexi almost smiled when she found herself wondering if there was a correct line of small talk when passing the time of day with a possible murderer.
‘Turn left here, then second right,’ Greta said when they approached the outskirts of Reading and stopped at a red light.
Alexi found herself driving deeper and deeper into a confusing rabbit warren of streets on a rundown council estate. Fortunately Greta appeared to know precisely where she was going. There were gangs of kids loitering about, watching her car’s progress with expressions of deep suspicion. A smattering of women pushed prams. They looked like little more than kids themselves.
‘Nice place,’ she said.
‘You have no idea.’ Greta pointed to a house. ‘Turn into this driveway.’
Alexi did so and cut the engine. It was a house that looked a little better kept than its neighbours. At least there wasn’t a car up on bricks in the drive and there was no rubbish in the front garden. Someone had tried to make something of the garden, as evidenced by a few hardy shrubs that struggled against the odds to survive.
Alexi followed Greta from the car. Greta opened the door to the house with her own key and stood back so Alexi could enter it ahead of her. She paused, wondering anew about the wisdom of coming here. Perhaps this time her journalistic curiosity really would be the death of her. And yet she still got the impression that Greta was more nervous than dangerous. Alexi remembered her phone in her bag, reassured by the knowledge that help was the press of a button away; always assuming the emergency services still responded to calls in this area. There were a few council estates in the country that had been deemed no-go areas because emergency service workers had been regularly attacked by the very people they’d been called out to help. This could well be one of them but at least she would definitely get a phone signal in such a densely populated area.
Thus encouraged, she stepped directly into a living room that made her blink back her surprise. It was spotlessly clean and expensively and tastefully furnished.
‘Not what you were expecting?’ Greta asked, a challenging note in her voice.
‘I’m not sure what I expected, Greta, or what this house has to do with Juliette’s death.’
‘Come through to the kitchen and I’ll try to explain,’ Greta said.
***
‘Shit!’ Ty thumped the steering wheel. ‘I should have told her who I suspected was behind it and warned her.’
‘Told what? Who?’ Mike asked.
Ty ignored the younger man as he pressed the speed dial for Alexi. It went straight to voice mail and Ty left a terse message, asking Alexi to call him immediately.
‘Damn!’
Rather than waste time ringing Drew, Ty concentrated on getting to Hopgood House in record time. Needless to say, he was held up by a string of racehorses that seemed to take forever to get out of his way. One of them shied sideways all the way across the road and its jockey almost came to grief. Finally the road was clear and Ty floored the accelerator, mindless of the speed limit and the possibility of encountering more horses.
He pulled into Hopgood House’s car park with a squeal of tyres and saw Alexi’s space was empty. He swore as he leapt from his vehicle and took the three front steps in one stride.
‘Where’s Alexi?’ he asked, bursting into the kitchen and startling Cheryl.
‘Upstairs, working on her computer.’
‘Her car’s gone.’
‘Oh, is it? She said nothing to me and I didn’t see her go out.’ Cheryl’s face paled. ‘Is something wrong? You’re worrying me, Ty.’
‘Sorry, no time to explain. Where’s Greta?’
‘She’ll be in Marcel’s kitchen.’
Ty went out through the backdoor at a run. Cosmo was loitering there and followed behind Ty with a pathetic meow. Ty burst into the kitchen, where full lunchtime service was underway. His heart lurched when he saw that Greta was missing. Guy Salter was there though, monitoring the cameras. They were fixed, set to automatic, but he needed to be on hand to keep an eye on the feed in case anything went wrong. Ty ignored Marcel’s inquiring look and grabbed Guy’s arm.
‘Greta’s got Alexi,’ he said tersely.
‘Oh, shit! I wondered…I thought, when Marcel said she’d phoned to say she was ill, but I couldn’t get away.’
‘Come on, we have to find them.’
‘What the fuck’s going on?’ Marcel asked.
Ty ignored him, glad that he didn’t have to drag Guy along. He’d taken a chance on Guy Salter and had read him right. If Guy and Greta really were in this together then Guy wouldn’t still be hanging around the production if he thought Greta had kidnapped Alexi. Explanations as to why he’d got involved in covering up Greta’s crime would have to wait until they found Alexi.
‘Where would she have taken her?’ Ty asked as he and Guy ran to Ty’s car. Cosmo hopped in the moment Ty op
ened the door and occupied the back seat. ‘We’ll check Alexi’s place first but if she’s not there—’
‘I doubt they will be. Greta has a council house in Reading. She feels more in control when she’s on familiar turf.’
Ty had a dozen questions, even though most of the pieces had fallen into place during the visit to the school when he learned just how seriously humiliated Greta had been by Juliette’s spiteful actions. He’d bet his last penny that Juliette had cut Greta’s hair in retaliation for something. Greta took great pride in her hair. People with low self-esteem or poor body image often latched onto one good aspect of their appearance that liked about themselves. Juliette had shattered Greta’s pride in her hair only because she was spoiled and vindictive.
Ty wondered why Greta’s parents hadn’t done something to protect their daughter when they saw how upset she must have been. Perhaps Greta hadn’t told them what really happened. If the falling out with Juliette that resulted in her hair being forcibly hacked off was the result of a tussle over Guy Salter’s affections she probably hadn’t. Not the sort of detail to share with one’s parents, Ty supposed, even in this so-called enlightened age.
Ty called himself all sorts of an arrogant fool for not having warned Alexi of his suspicions. He’d had no definitive proof but would have placed a hefty bet on the camera footage having been doctored. He had hoped that by asking Alexi to scrutinise it again, she would see it independently of him. There was only one person who could have tampered with it. It seemed a stretch that Guy could be the same person Juliette had taken from Greta all those years ago but stranger things had been known to happen.
Careful not to jump to a conclusion that would fit the growing evidence against Greta and Guy, he asked for the name of the landscapers. They checked their records and his suspicions were confirmed. The three of them had been thrown together on this show a decade after the incident at the school and Greta didn’t have a forgiving nature, especially since Juliette hadn’t changed and wasn’t playing fair in the contest.
As predicted, there was no sign of Alexi’s car at her cottage.
‘Do you know where Greta’s house is?’ Ty asked curtly.
‘Yeah, head for Reading. I’ll direct you.’
He thought about calling Vickery. It was what he ought to do but would wait until he got to Greta’s house before he made a decision. The police would likely go in with lights flashing and sirens blaring. Greta had to be nervous and unstable but Ty had his doubts about her being a cold-blooded killer. A heavy police presence might change all that if she felt cornered and his Alexi was directly in the firing line. Not a chance he was prepared to take. He tried Alexi’s mobile and it went straight to voicemail again.
‘She didn’t kill Juliette, did she?’ Ty asked.
‘No.’ Guy shook his head. ‘They argued, a scuffle broke out and Juliette fell. She hit her head. That’s what killed her. It was an accident and I can prove it. I have it all on film.’
Ty took his eyes off the road for a moment and shot him an incredulous look. ‘Then why the hell didn’t you come forward and—’
‘I often used to film stuff in the courtyard, just in case the producers needed more background material. The contestants tend to be less guarded if they don’t actually know they’re being filmed. That’s how I started getting so much footage of Cosmo, when I was playing around with camera settings. The producers love it and told me to keep on going with the ad hoc stuff; especially Cosmo.’
‘Okay, we’ll come back to that.’ Ty blasted past a row of cars at just over ninety. ‘You and Greta were an item when you worked on the grounds at Eversham School.’
‘Yeah, Greta knew you’d figure it out if you went to the school. We talked about it last night.’ Guy exhaled slowly. ‘Our relationship was more than a case of teenage hormones, if that’s what you’re thinking. We were in love. Planned to move in together as soon as she finished school.’
Ty elevated one brow. ‘Some love if you cheated on her with Juliette.’
‘Hell, that wasn’t supposed to happen! I’ve spent the past ten years regretting it and paying the price.’ Guy sighed. ‘I mean, look at me. I’m no oil painting and find it hard to talk to women in social situations. Okay, I was a few pounds lighter back then and had more hair, but still nothing to write home about. But Greta and I…well, we hit it off from the word go. Young as we were, we both knew the score. She was out of place in that school and I was never going to make it as a film producer. We kept one another grounded. You don’t have to be beautiful and popular, we discovered, to be happy with what you are. Not if you have someone to share it with.’
‘Juliette,’ Ty reminded him.
‘Did you see what she looked like?’ Ty nodded. ‘She was all over me one day, making jokes about meeting me in the potting shed later. I didn’t take her seriously but when I got there, she was waiting for me and…well, it wasn’t my finest hour, I’ll admit that. But I was young, flattered and had testosterone flooding my bloodstream, like you do at that age. I wasn’t daft enough to think it was anything other than a one-off. I figured perhaps the other girls had dared her, or something. You know what teenage girls are like. Anyway, Greta wasn’t supposed to know and wouldn’t have, if Juliette hadn’t taken pleasure in making sure she caught us in the act.’
‘She set you up?’
‘Oh yeah, and ruined things between Greta and me. Greta wouldn’t speak to me after that and I’ve never been able to forget her. I’ve never stopped feeling bad about what I did to her, and never found anyone to measure up to her. I could use my position working on live TV to impress women. A lot of the guys do, but that’s not what I’m about. I want women to like me for myself, not for what they think I can do for them.’
‘You put yourself forward for this show when you heard Greta and Juliette had made the finals, I assume.’ Guy nodded. ‘You also knew they had unfinished business and that it would be a good opportunity to plead your case with Greta.’
‘Right.’ Guy curled his upper lip. ‘Greta recognised me immediately. We talked, I explained and she finally forgave me. Juliette, on the other hand, breezed past me like I didn’t exist. Well, why would I for her? There was nothing I could do to help her win the show. She didn’t remember me or my name. I don’t think she ever knew my surname and I was glad about that. I figured if she did know who I was she’d find some way to use my relationship with Greta to put Greta down on camera.’
‘But you jeopardised Greta’s chances just by being on the show and trusting to luck that Juliette had a bad memory.’
‘Nah, I knew the chances of Juliette knowing me were practically nil. It was a risk worth taking just to get back with Greta again.’
Ty slowed his breakneck speed when they turned into the road Guy indicated and he saw Alexi’s distinctive Mini parked in a driveway. Several kids loitered around it, eyeing the hubcaps. Ty was glad that Cosmo had hitched a ride with him.
‘Save the rest.’ Ty stopped behind Alexi’s car and thought for a moment. ‘Do I need reinforcements?’
‘No, best not. They’ll only spook her. I don’t think she’ll do anything stupid. Especially not if I’m there to reassure her.’
‘I’m relying on you,’ Ty said. ‘If anything’s happened to Alexi then…’
Ty let Cosmo out of the car and the cat instinctively went into guard mode. He arched his back and hissed at the kids, who rapidly retreated. Dreading what they might find inside the house, Ty was about to ask Guy’s advice on the best way to approach the situation. But Guy took matters into his own hands by simply ringing the doorbell.
To Ty’s utter astonishment, the door was opened by Alexi.
‘Come on in,’ she said. ‘We wondered when you two would show up.’
***
Ty squeezed her hand. ‘You okay?’ he asked.
‘You knew,’ she replied accusingly. ‘You might have warned me.’
‘Sorry, I didn’t anticipate this. I thought you’d be s
afe. We’ll talk about it later. Where’s Greta?’
‘In the kitchen.’
Ty looked surprised when he saw that the two of them had been drinking tea and sharing a packet of chocolate digestives. Guy went straight to Greta and hugged her.
‘What have you done now?’ he asked, shaking his head at her. ‘I can’t leave you alone for five minutes.’
‘I told you they’d figure it out,’ she said, sobbing into Guy’s shoulder.
‘We always knew it was possible and agreed if it happened we’d tell the truth. You didn’t need to kidnap anyone.’
‘I didn’t. Alexi agreed to come here with me.’ Ty sent Alexi a look that told her he thought she was out of her mind. ‘I just thought if she saw this place, understood a bit about how I was brought up, it might help her to see things my way.’
Guy stroked her hair, which appeared to calm Greta. ‘No harm done.’ He paused as his gaze fell upon the antiseptic ointment and plasters on the table. ‘Is there?’
‘Just a silly accident that I had,’ Alexi said, lifting her hand. ‘I dropped a mug and cut my finger when I picked up the pieces. Greta helped me clean it up.’
‘You sure that’s all it was?’ Ty asked, scowling.
‘Yes. I was clumsy.’
‘Let’s have some more tea,’ Guy said, reaching for the kettle. ‘Then we’ll tell them everything, love.’
Alexi had already heard some of it from Greta and assumed Ty had been similarly enlightened by Guy. They waited in uneasy silence for the kettle to boil. Ty squeezed her hand but Alexi already knew him well enough to sense that she was in for a right tongue-lashing when he got her alone. Bring it on! They might be an item but she was still very much her own person and made her own decisions. Besides, she had been right. Greta hadn’t done anything the least bit threatening.
‘My parents lived in this house all their working life,’ Greta said a short time later, nursing a fresh mug of tea between both hands. ‘That’s what I wanted Alexi to understand and why I brought her here. Imagining sink housing estates and actually setting foot in them are two very different animals. Anyway, the point I’m trying to make is that it was hardly the most prepossessing start but I rose above it and went to that posh school every day from this address.’
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