The Twisted Web (Detective Hannah Robbins Crime Series book 4)

by Rebecca Bradley

‘They’re never any trouble. In fact, I keep meaning to join in myself.’ He lowered his voice a fraction, though the bar was closed as it was still too early to open and there was no one to overhear him. ‘I have quite an interest in true-crime, you know.’ He lowered his voice even more, into a stage whisper. ‘I have quite a keen eye.’ He winked.

  Pasha shifted in her seat beside me and I knew she would be hiding a smirk.

  ‘Okay,’ I acknowledged. ‘So, nothing of note Wednesday night?’

  ‘Oh no, absolutely not. They really are the perfect group to have around. They come in, grab a table or two, order drinks, maybe some food and chat about their stuff.’ His fingers spread out in a fan against his breastbone, the tips of his fingers just tickling his throat. He seemed shocked that I should suggest there would be a problem.

  ‘What about other people in the bar?’ I asked.

  ‘In what way?’ His face creased in confusion. Small lines furrowing down between his eyebrows, crinkling his otherwise youthful face.

  Pasha picked up her mug from the table in front of us.

  ‘Did you see anyone in the bar that night that looked to be paying the book group, or Sebastian, particular attention? Negative attention,’ I clarified.

  The eagerness of a minute ago slipped off him like a silken coat as he remembered Sebastian Wade had been brutally murdered and left out in such a public way. His eyes darkened.

  ‘No.’ His voice was quiet now, but not the same hushed excited quiet. Now it was a sombre, apologetic tone. ‘I didn’t see anything that could help you, I’m afraid.’ His final admission, that he had nothing to offer the investigation. That this was real life and people were hurting. He couldn’t help.

  Often, people didn’t know when they saw something that was helpful. Because, at the time, it didn’t seep into their consciousness.

  I leaned into the conversation. ‘Look, Joel, you might know more than you realise. Let’s just run through the evening. What you saw and what you heard and let us decide if you know anything of substance or not, shall we?’

  He scrubbed at his face. Nodded.

  I pulled out my notepad and we walked through the events of the evening.

  20.

  The person who ran the book group was Andy Denning. A slim, quiet forty something.

  We were in his living room, a tidy place, which if I was honest, didn’t have the feel of a home. It was sparse, functional. There were no photographs or books, no newspapers or magazines, no cushions, nothing of comfort. The room held no emotion, no feeling. It was cold.

  Andy, though, was upset when he realised it was Sebastian who had been found in Market Square and dabbed tissues at his eyes. ‘He was a good guy,’ he said. ‘Popular. Why would someone do this to him?’

  I couldn’t tell him as we had no idea. That was why we were here. Andy looked genuinely shaken and I wondered if this, even at his age, was the first death he had encountered. It was unusual to get to your forties and not to know someone who had passed away. He wasn’t particularly helpful, he couldn’t think of a reason anyone would want to hurt Sebastian. He repeated that as the founder of the book club Sebastian was one of the most treasured people there and knew so much more about true-crime than the rest of them. And how awful it was that he was found the way he was. Did we really not leave him that way?

  I told him that we hadn’t. How anyone could believe police would walk away and leave a crime scene with a murder victim in it, open like that, and alone for anyone to walk into, was beyond me.

  ‘I thought the book club was yours?’ I queried him. ‘Joel at the bar said you were the one to speak with.’

  Andy nodded. ‘He would do. I took over the administration of the group as Sebastian got so frustrated with it all. He enjoyed the group and the books, but he wasn’t one for the background stuff, so when I joined I offered to take it on for him. He was more than happy to offload it. I keep track of all the members and send out the emails reminding everyone of what book we’re reading and what date we’re meeting each month.’

  ‘On that point then we need a list of the book club members,’ I said.

  Andy nodded, swiped at his face with the tissue again and stuffed it in his pocket. ‘Let me get a pen and paper,’ he said. He walked towards the television, stopped in front of it, paused, seemed to consider what he was doing then turned and rapidly left the room.

  Pasha looked at me and raised her eyebrows. I smiled in response. The poor man was a gibbering wreck. He didn’t know what to do with himself. Murder wasn’t a crime that many people experienced. If you were going to be close to a crime it was likely to be anything other than murder, depending of course, on your gender and age. Teenagers and young adults are more likely to have mobile phones stolen. Young men to be the victims of violence and so on and so on. Murder is something you think you’ll never encounter. You read about it and watch television dramas about it, but you never expect a real life experience. We scare people. It’s part of the job. We recognise that and allow for all the reactions that will come our way.

  Andy walked back into the room, a small notebook and pen in his hand. He gave us a weak smile that did not travel to his eyes. He sat down and started scribbling into the pad. We silently let him work. When he’d finished he tore out a sheet and handed it to me.

  ‘This is a list of all the members of the group.’

  ‘Is this all of them?’ I asked, with emphasis on all.

  ‘Of course. I keep meticulous records,’ he said.

  ‘Including past members?’ I clarified.

  ‘Oh.’ He looked perplexed. ‘No. I’ll need to download those for you. I can’t remember them all. I’ll send them to you, shall I? I’ll need to find them out first. My computer isn’t the most organised of places.’

  I agreed that we would indeed need the list as soon as he was able to send it to us and gave him my card with my contact details including my email address.

  Andy told us again that Sebastian was the vital beating heart of the club, with a very real passion for true-crime, what with him having that website and all that, he said.

  There were no bitter rivalries within the group. No romances. It was a book group, he repeated again.

  ‘We read a book in a month, then meet up and talk about it for an hour,’ he said.

  What on earth did we think was going to happen in a book group, he asked. He looked confused by the questions we were asking.

  I couldn’t answer him having never been to a book club meeting, simply because I never had the time, not because I didn’t read. I loved to read. Science fiction was my thing, escapism from my day to day. Obviously someone had something against Sebastian and it did have something to do with his interest in true-crime.

  Pasha asked him for his movements after the session ended. He said the group stayed at the bar for a few drinks and then everyone broke up and wandered away home. Some of the group stayed to be sociable but he left when the meeting finished because he had a headache that evening. He usually stayed but not that particular night.

  ‘So, Sebastian stayed behind?’ Pasha asked.

  ‘He did. He liked the company of those who enjoyed crime as he did.’

  ‘Do you know who saw him last?’

  Andy looked to the ceiling for the answer. ‘I don’t know, you’d have to speak to everyone who was there. I don’t know if they staggered their leaving or if they all left at once.’ He looked at us. ‘It had been a good meeting, everyone was in good spirits.’

  Pasha wrote down the details of everyone who stayed after the meeting for a drink.

  I turned the heating up in the car. The light drizzle outside made it feel cooler than it probably was. Pasha was on the phone to Martin, passing him half the list of members we needed to visit.

  Pasha hung up her call. ‘All done.’ She looked out the window at the house we had just left. ‘What did you think?’

  ‘Of him?’ I asked.

  ‘Yeah. He seemed…’ She trailed off.r />
  ‘He was a little odd. Then again, doing this every day, I tend to think those who have an interest in true-crime are a little odd. Real crime isn’t fun or interesting. It hurts. It’s painful and it’s devastating, as I think he just found out.’

  I rubbed at my arm. I was still having physiotherapy but it didn’t help the pain that lingered. That throbbed deep inside whenever I was cold, I was tired, if I had done too much, if I’d been too busy or if I’d put too much strain on it. It didn’t help with the way it needled at me when I wanted to forget it was there. How it reminded me of past events. A permanent reminder of that evening when I had got everything so wrong and discovered I was fallible. Real crime left its mark. Outside and in. It was easy for those who decided to take their magnifying glass to a case and examine it, but they would never know or never understand the pain and hurt caused by the crime.

  I dug my fingers into my arm. I needed my painkillers but I hated to take them in front of staff so it would have to wait until I was back in the office.

  ‘Boss?’ Pasha jolted me from my thoughts.

  ‘Sorry, I got lost there a minute. I just don’t understand the fascination with crime.’

  I looked at her. ‘Why did you join the police, Pasha?’

  She fiddled with her phone. Stared out of the window. Then back at her phone. It wasn’t usually a question that was difficult to answer.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ I said. ‘Shall we make a move, to our next group member.’

  ‘It’s okay,’ she rushed in. ‘It’s just it’s more personal than the usual, I want to help people, story.’

  ‘No.’ I was firm. ‘I don’t need to know, Pasha.’

  I didn’t want to make her uncomfortable by forcing her to disclose personal details to me because she felt the need to bond more with the team, to get closer to the boss when we had not quite got off on the right footing in the first place.

  Her face dropped as though I had admonished her.

  I looked her in the eyes. ‘It’s not that I don’t want to know, I don’t need to know right now. Tell me when it’s a good time for you.’ I held her gaze. Her eyes were slightly glassy with a sheen of unshed tears. ‘Okay?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Okay, then let’s go and talk to these book fans and see what they know.’

  22.

  This girl was only just old enough to be interviewed on her own without an appropriate adult, at seventeen years of age. Her dad had told us she was at work and we had tracked her down, her boss giving us space in the back room of the coffee shop to talk. His ruddy face was practically bursting with the need to know what Verity Shaw was involved with the police for.

  For her part, she looked slightly terrified.

  Pasha attempted to put her at her ease. Difficult in the tiny space we found ourselves in. The two of us were crowding her as the table and chairs for staff lunch breaks took up most of the space, the coats on the coat hooks extending out into the room. A damp smell invaded the room from the heavy material.

  ‘It’s okay, you’re not in trouble,’ Pasha calmly explained. ‘We just want to know about your book club and particularly about last night’s meeting.’

  Verity looked surprised. ‘The book club?’

  I gave her a look, raised my eyebrows at her.

  ‘Oh shit.’ She pushed herself backwards at the chairs. Her hands floundered behind her until she found one and pulled in under her, dropping onto the seat. ‘Oh no. It’s not one of us?’

  We didn’t speak. Gave her a moment.

  ‘No.’ It was little more than a whisper in the air. ‘I tweeted about it yesterday.’ She looked at us, horrified. ‘I didn’t recognise the photo. I joined in. I shared. I talked about them as though they weren’t real.’ A tear slid down her cheek. And yet she didn’t even know who it was.

  Pasha pulled out one of the other chairs, forcing me sideways. I sidestepped so she could sit beside Verity. She leaned towards her. ‘You weren’t to know,’ she soothed. ‘How could you?’

  A genuine question. Now we had to see if she would answer it.

  Instead she scrubbed at her face with the ball of her hand. Scrubbing away the tear tracks.

  We waited in silence to see if she would offer anything up. Silence was a tool you could use. People hated it. Tended to fill it. It made them uncomfortable and they would use their words to stuff the empty space rather than suffocate in the void.

  The sound of porcelain clattering came from behind the door. The gush of the coffee machine and the low hum of conversations seeped through under the gap below the door and through the thin cheap wood. But in here, the vacuum ballooned and was about to smother us.

  Instead of filling the empty space with answers Verity Shaw started to cry even more. She looked like a child. She was little more than a child.

  ‘What is it, Verity?’ I asked.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she mumbled through the tears. Hands up in front of her face suffocating the words. ‘I just can’t believe the man in the Market Square was someone I know.’ She cried even harder.

  I crouched down in front of her. ‘I’m sorry, Verity. We really need your help right now. You were one of the last people to see him alive. We need to know about the meeting. We need to know everything you can tell us about Sebastian Wade and who exactly was the last person to see him alive.’ And with that she cried even harder, all sounds of the coffee shop beyond forgotten.

  23

  We visited a couple of other book club members and obtained basic details from them. It was the same story from everyone. They didn’t see anyone of concern before or after the meeting. Sebastian hadn’t mentioned any worries. That night or in the run up, in the weeks preceding.

  I gathered the team together again once we had visited everyone that had been in attendance at the meeting. We had arranged for them all to attend the station at one point or another to obtain official witness statements.

  ‘They can’t believe he’s dead. “He’s the nicest person” and “who would want to kill him” was all they offered up,’ said Pasha. A sad smile. For all it was trotted out, it appeared to be a true sentiment.

  We still needed to talk to members of the book club who hadn’t been there that night but who still might know something of relevance. They were names now listed on HOLMES waiting to be actioned, but we had talked to those who had seen Sebastian last.

  ‘We haven’t come away with anything useful.’ I wrapped my hands around the mug of green tea I had made, grateful for the warmth. I was feeling the chill of the day. The constant drizzle outside made me feel cold. The heat from the mug seeped into the bones of my hand. ‘Everyone we spoke to said that Sebastian seemed to be his usual self. He didn’t mention he was concerned about anyone or that he’d had a run in with someone on the way in to the meeting or anything at all. No one mentioned problems on leaving the meeting. Just that Sebastian had a couple of drinks with them, then left to walk home to Nick.’

  I turned to Martin and Ross.

  ‘Same here, Boss,’ said Martin. ‘There were some shocked faces. Some upset and no real understanding of how or why this happened.’

  I nodded. ‘There are still a lot of people to talk to but it looks like we’re not going to get a solid lead from the book club.’

  Evie had her laptop open. She was poking about at her keyboard. ‘Evie?’ I asked.

  She looked up. ‘Sorry. Me?’

  I nodded again. Took a gulp of the tea. It tasted good. I needed it. ‘What do you have on his website? Anything yet?’

  ‘I’ve applied for access to his provider to get details of who visited his site and to be able to see his messages. See if anyone messaged him and threatened him. As soon as that authority comes through then we’ll know more.’ She looked down at her laptop screen. ‘I’ve been trawling through what’s visible to the public, his blog posts and comments left on those posts, and I don’t see anything of concern. He had a specific interest in crimes linked to Nottinghamshire, but would
talk and look at any true-crimes anywhere, countrywide, then worldwide if something caught his interest. He also reviewed the true-crime podcasts that have become popular over recent years. He was a big fan and wanted to set up a podcast of his own. He’d started to discuss with his followers what case he should or could investigate or follow for a potential podcast.’

  ‘And what were the possible cases he was looking at? Do we think this might be what got him killed?’ I asked.

  Evie rubbed the tip of her nose, bent over her laptop again and started scrolling down the page. ‘Let me find the couple of posts where he talks about it and I’ll tell you in a minute.’

  I let Evie work and focused back on the team. ‘We obviously have to wait for forensics to come back, but as you’re aware, it takes time. I looked to Aaron’s empty chair again. Prioritising the forensics submissions was usually his job. As well as missing my friend, I was missing a hard-working valuable member of my team and I desperately needed him back. I had to stop Baxter preventing his return.

  ‘Uniform have collected all the CCTV from the surrounding areas between the Copper Café and where Sebastian was dumped. It involves a drive and coverage is patchy, but we need to see if our offender or Sebastian pops up on it.’ I put my mug back down on the table.

  The list of actions at the start of an investigation was never-ending. It was good job we had the HOLMES and Theresa and Diane who kept it in order, because keeping track of it all would be difficult without it. Without them. Though I didn’t like to rely on it solely. I did believe in people and intuition.

  ‘There are a lot of witnesses still need statements taking. We have a lot to be doing. I hope you’ve all warned your loved ones that they won’t be seeing much of you over the next few days or weeks?’

  There were nods around the room. Ross had a wide grin on his face. He loved to get stuck into an investigation. No matter how many hours it took out of his life.

  ‘Boss?’ Evie piped up, respectful in front of the team.