Jackson licked heavy drops of rain from his top lip. ‘I promise – you will see, once the removal is complete. The CSM will keep us fully briefed, I assure you.’
Deans was escorted to a support group van and handed a thick blanket by a uniformed officer.
‘Stay in here,’ Jackson said. ‘I’m going to get you a brew. You can leave it if you want. It’s up to you.’ He walked away and Sarah Gold took his place at the open side door.
‘Can I come in?’ she asked.
Deans shrugged.
‘They say this could take hours,’ she said.
Deans stared ahead into space through the rapidly misting windscreen.
‘Don’t stay,’ Sarah said. ‘They’re not going to show us anything. Not yet.’
Deans raked his eyes towards her. ‘Have you got a car?’
‘Of course.’
‘Let’s go. I want to show you something.’
Chapter 37
They drove less than two hundred metres before Deans told Sarah to stop and turn the engine off.
‘Why are we here?’ she asked, looking up at the charred exterior of Ruby Mansell’s fire-damaged mansion.
‘I need to show you something.’
‘We can’t go inside there, it’s dangerous.’
‘Just follow me.’
Deans opened his door into the horizontal downpour and began walking around to the far side of the house.
‘Where are we going?’ Sarah asked, pulling her hood as far over her head as it would go.
Deans ducked beneath the overgrown shrubbery at the cliff edge. The ground was saturated and slippery. He held onto the crumbling dry-stone-wall and inched towards the rocky ledge. The frothing ocean pounded just feet below them.
‘Hold on to something firm and follow exactly where I step,’ he said.
They made slow progress, but eventually reached the small hole at the back of the cellar and rested on a rocky outcrop before venturing inside.
‘Andy, I don’t like this.’
‘Follow me,’ he said.
Deans crawled through the narrow gap and into the blackness of the cellar. A thick sooty sludge coated his hands and knees. The smell of scorched wood and damp masonry transported him back forty-eight hours.
Sarah clambered through the gap and joined him inside.
‘Argh, this is disgusting,’ she said. ‘My clothes are ruined.’
‘Have you got a torch?’ Deans asked.
‘Somewhere. Eww, this is horrible. Why have you brought me back here?’
‘Torch,’ Deans repeated.
Sarah fumbled inside her pocket and produced a small metal Maglite.
Deans took it and shone the beam around them. He focussed on the floorboards above their heads and pushed against a section that had partially burned away and was left hanging at a steep angle into the cellar.
‘We need to be quick,’ he said.
‘What are we doing here?’
Deans directed the beam into Sarah’s face, causing her to flinch. ‘Ow,’ she complained. ‘Watch what you’re doing with that.’
Heavy drops of blackened rain fell onto their heads through the gaps in the boards. Deans turned the light towards the shackles attached to the far wall.
‘Are you getting anything from being back here?’ he asked.
‘Just filthy and wet, thank you.’
Deans approached the cast iron restraints and lifted the severed section to look closer. He tracked the light towards the other side – the shackle that hadn’t been used to restrain Sarah. It was crusted with age. Deans rattled it.
‘Are you sure you’re getting no memory from this?’
Sarah didn’t respond. Deans could see that she was beginning to shake. He dug deep into trouser pocket and removed the small key that he had been carrying around since the hospital. He wiggled it inside the lock and twisted hard several times until the shackle sprang open with a loud metallic clack. He turned slowly to Sarah. ‘Come and have a look at this,’ he said.
She took reluctant steps until she was close enough to touch, and Deans then suddenly snatched her wrist and tugged her off her feet.
Sarah screamed and lashed out as Deans dragged her closer to the wall and shut the open clasp around her wrist in one swift movement.
Her screams were deafening in the confined space.
‘Call out as much as you like,’ Deans said calmly. ‘Nobody will hear you.’
Sarah was now hysterical and desperately fighting to release her wrist from the old rusted shackle.
‘What are you doing?’Her tears quickly changed to terror. ‘Oh, God. What’s happening? Help me. Help me,’ she screamed.
‘You tell me.’
‘What are you doing to me?’ Sarah’s wide eyes flicked between Deans and her imprisoned wrist.
‘Nothing you wouldn’t do to yourself.’
‘What … I don’t know what…’
Deans walked towards the hole in the wall leaving Sarah behind. ‘Do you think this would reach the water if I threw it from here?’
‘Oh, God, no! Please. No. Please don’t…’
Deans turned the torch onto her face. Her fear looked genuine, and so it should.
‘Aren’t you going to ask me how I got the key?’ he asked softly.
‘I don… I don’t… oh, please, please let me out of this.’
Deans held the key between his fingers so that Sarah could see it more clearly. He brought his hand back as if preparing to toss the key outside.
‘No,’ Sarah screamed, tugging the chain tight as she attempted to reach out.
‘Start talking,’ Deans said.
‘I don’t know what I can say,’ Sarah cried.
‘You can start by telling me how the key to that shackle made it into your property bag at the hospital.’
A small whimper escaped from her lips. ‘Wha—’
Deans looked outside through the hole again. ‘I’m fairly certain I can reach the water from here. If not, with those rocks, there is no way anyone is getting this key back. ‘
‘I’ve never seen it before,’ Sarah said breathlessly. ‘It couldn’t have been in my property.’
‘How do you suppose it got there then?’ Deans asked calmly.
‘I really don’t know,’ she sobbed. ‘You have to believe me.’
‘Do I? Do I have to believe you? What makes you think I have to do that?’
Sarah stopped struggling. Her body flopped into submission. ‘Why are you doing this?’ she snivelled.
Deans approached her, grabbed her other wrist, and squeezed with furious anger.
‘Ouch, you’re hurting me,’ she cried.
‘Am I? I’m sorry.’ He squeezed harder still.
Sarah screamed and attempted to pull her hand back.
Deans used all his force to keep it where he wanted it. ‘Talk,’ he snarled.
‘Andy…’ she cried frantically. ‘You are really hurting me.’
‘I said talk.’
He felt her resistance ease and released his pressure accordingly.
‘What were you going to do… fuck me to death,’ he sneered.
‘No… No. It’s not what you think.’
‘Really? How can it possibly not be what I think?’
‘I really don’t know what you’re saying,’ she wailed. ‘Please. Let me go. Please… please.’ Her voice wavered, as true fear came up from the pit of her stomach.
‘Who else is involved?’
Sarah’s constant weeping prevented any answer.
‘I said who else is involved?’ Deans screamed into her face.
‘I don’t know,’ Sarah screeched back in defiance. ‘I don’t know how the key got in with my things.’
Deans took a step backwards.
‘Is it Jackson?’
Sarah touched her face. ‘I don’t know,’ she blubbed. ‘Please…’
‘You gave me a bullshit story about being taken.’
‘No… it was the
truth,’ her voice faded away.
‘You set me up. You knew that if I couldn’t reach you in time, you had the key to let yourself go.’
‘No.’
‘You are part of the cult.’
‘No. No.’
‘You were hoping I’d get killed trying to rescue you.’
‘No.’
‘A slip off the rocks, maybe even burn to death inside the place where my wife was murdered.’
Sarah’s despairing eyes met with his for a second.
‘You’re just as much a part of this as Ranford and Babbage.’
‘I’m not.’ Dribble trickled down from the corner of her mouth and her eyes were puffed like a hundred bees had taken their anger out on them.
‘Bullshit. How does it feel now all of this is real?’
‘I’m not part of it. I promise.’ Her voice was resigned. Her fight diminished.
‘You already knew Annie Rowland. I could tell when we first went to her flat. You even defended her. And all that horse shit about being set up when Amy Poole’s exhibits vanished – it was you all along.’
‘No,’ Sarah wept into her lap.
‘Who else is helping you?’
‘Andy, I promise—’ She was speaking like a punch-drunk boxer.
‘Too late for promises, princess. Tell me how you got into the cellar?’
‘I can’t. I was drugged.’
‘Bollocks.’
‘It’s true. I was making an enquiry…’ she stopped talking and rocked her head. ‘And then I’m being bundled to the floor. I can’t remember anything… until… hospital.’
‘Where were you making an enquiry?’
‘Sergeant Jackson asked me to check an address.’
‘What address?’
‘I can’t remember.’
‘This is a waste of time.’ Deans started for the gap in the wall.
‘Please,’ Sarah pleaded. ‘It was an address in Hemingsford.’
‘You’ll have to do better than that.’
‘I can take you to it, but I can’t remember what it was called.’
Deans squinted.
‘I’m being truthful.’
He looked deeply into her pathetic eyes.
‘Somebody planted that key in the bag so that you would find it,’ she snivelled.
‘Why? Why would they do that?’
Sarah looked up at him. ‘For this! To deflect attention from elsewhere. To make you weaker.’
‘How does this make me weaker?’
Her helpless eyes beseeched his. ‘Because together, we are a strong team.’
Deans looked away. He couldn’t deny they had been a good team, but was that because it was all part of the game she was playing.
‘I don’t remember wearing that jewellery… in the bag,’ she said.
‘But it is yours?’
‘Yes.’
‘Then how do you suppose it got there if you weren’t wearing it?’
‘Someone put it there.’
‘Who?’
She shook her head.
Deans licked moisture from his top lip. ‘Did anyone visit after me?’
Sarah rubbed her face with her free hand. ‘No. Yes.’ She gazed at Deans. ‘Only Sergeant Jackson.’
Deans lifted his head. ‘When?’
‘Later that night. He came back.’
‘Jackson visited you later that night?’
‘Yes.’
‘Why?’
‘He said it was a welfare check.’
Deans held his mouth and scanned his prisoner for a considered moment.
‘Will you take me to the address in Hemingsford?’ he asked.
‘Yes, yes. Andy, I promise, I am nothing to do with these monsters,’ she said desperately.
Deans closed his eyes, tilted his head and quietly said, ‘Maria, forgive me if I make the wrong choice.’
He crouched inches from Sarah’s head. The torchlight lit both of their faces from below.
‘I’m not afraid to die,’ he said through gritted teeth. ‘In fact, I welcome death. I will do anything… anything it takes to avenge my wife.’ He leaned forward and took the weight of Sarah’s arm from the tight chain. ‘I just wanted you to know that.’
He took the key, released her wrist and Sarah folded into his arms.
Chapter 38
Jackson peered at his watch as Deans and Sarah came through the door. He looked them up and down and noticed the change of clothing.
‘What time do you call this?’ he barked. ‘We’re trying to run a homicide investigation here, not a fucking dating agency.’
‘We were following a line of investigation,’ Deans said.
Jackson shook his head. ‘I am really quite staggered – considering…’
‘Any update from the dig?’ Deans glared.
‘Not yet.’ Jackson took a moment to take them both in. ‘Have you followed everything you needed to follow? Do you mind if we try to catch some baddies, or would you like me to put the investigation on hold for a little bit longer?’
Jesus! You are a tortured tosser. Deans looked over at Sarah. ‘Nah, I think we’ve satisfied that one.’
‘Right, I’ve got a job for—’
‘We’ve already made plans for this afternoon,’ Deans interrupted.
‘What plans?’ Jackson scowled.
‘We’re going back to the address you sent me to before I was attacked,’ Sarah said.
Jackson cut her a sharp stare.
‘Do you still have the address on the system?’ Deans asked him.
Jackson scratched the side of his nose. ‘Of course I do. HOLMES (Home Office Large Major Enquiry System) stores every line of enquiry – you know it does.’
‘Just checking.’ Deans held Jackson’s beady glaze. ‘Give us the details and we’ll be back before you know it.’
‘What do you hope to achieve by going to the address, other than putting both of your lives in danger?’
‘So you agree it’s a significant address?’ Deans said.
‘Well, if what Gold says is correct; then we must view it as a potentially hostile location.’ Jackson hesitated. ‘Let me come with you.’
‘No,’ Sarah quickly replied.
Deans put his hand up to stop Sarah saying anything else. ‘Yeah, okay,’ he said. ‘The more the merrier.’
Sarah turned her back on them and walked out of the room.
‘So,’ Jackson said, sidling up alongside Deans. ‘What are you expecting to find there?’
‘I don’t know, maybe the answers will find us.’
Deans deliberately sat behind Jackson’s driving seat with Sarah in the front passenger side of the car. From this position, he could see Jackson’s darting eyes in the mirror and Sarah’s reactions to any conversation. The hands-free ring-tone broke the frosty silence and Jackson answered.
‘DS Jackson,’ he said quickly. ‘I’m not alone and you are on hands-free.’
The caller instantly terminated the connection.
Deans twitched a brow and stared out of the side window, trapped in his thoughts.
They rounded a corner onto Hemingsford Quay with its string of festive lights hanging from lamppost to lamppost. If circumstances were different, if Hemingsford didn’t leave the bitter taste, this would be a tranquil place to spend Christmas holidays. Deans looked into the rear view mirror. Jackson’s eyes were trained back upon him.
They continued beyond the sea front promenade and came to a narrow street of pastel coloured cottages on either side of the road.
‘It was near here,’ Sarah said. Her voice wavered as she spoke.
‘I’ll put it in here,’ Jackson said, slowing to a stop behind a string of parked cars at the wide mouth of the lane. ‘You okay?’ he asked, noticing Sarah hugging herself.
‘Yes. I’m fine.’
Deans could see that she was not. Her hair was quivering from her trembling head.
They all stepped outside of the car and began down the na
rrow road that bisected the cottages on either side. It was obvious cars travelled down this road from the grooves worn into the road surface, but it must have been a tight squeeze. The terraced houses were tight and small with doorways Deans would have to duck to get beneath. Original fisherman’s cottages, Deans thought.
After a few more moments, Sarah stopped and pointed forwards. ‘There. It’s that one.’
‘Alright,’ Jackson said. ‘You stay here if you like; Deans and I will check it out.’
They approached the house and Deans looked behind; Sarah was leaning against the building at the start of the lane.
‘I’ll go around the back,’ Jackson said. ‘You check out what you can on this side.’
Jackson disappeared down a tiny side alley and Deans could see the waters of the estuary just a few feet away. He cupped his hands against the front window and looked inside. He could see straight through to the village on the other side of the estuary. The downstairs looked tidy and inhabited. Wow. What a place.
He checked behind. Sarah was no longer there.
They were at a kink in the lane and the colourful cottages continued along and out of sight. Deans wasn’t feeling anything untoward about the cottage and walked on. After a short distance, he came to an olde worlde pub by the water’s edge. He drew a deep breath and sighed. In another life. He turned back and found Jackson back at the front of the cottage.
‘Where has Sarah gone?’ Deans asked.
Jackson looked all around in a full circle. ‘I don’t know. Back to the car?’
Deans rubbed his face and groaned. ‘What was around the back?’
‘Nothing much, apart from stunning views over the estuary.’
‘Why did you send Sarah here in the first place?’ Deans asked.
‘Links to your mate, Scotty. This is his parent’s home.’
‘Do they still live here?’
‘That was what I was sending Sarah here to establish.’
Deans stepped closer into Jackson’s personal space. ‘Do you believe her account of what happened?’ he asked.
‘Why wouldn’t I? You saw her yourself at Mansell’s place.’
Deans’ lips parted and he started back towards the car.
‘Shall we knock on the door before we go?’ Jackson asked.
The Detective Deans Mystery Collection Page 66
