Circle of Lies

by Paul J. Teague

  Will turned towards Charlotte, with a look of anguish. She tried to compose herself.

  ‘You know how short-staffed the police are these days. They can’t even be bothered to solve most of the petty crimes around here, let alone something that might have happened over thirty years ago. Maybe he moved out of the area? That seems the most likely thing to me.’

  ‘Perhaps,’ Daisy said, deep in thought. ‘I’m going to hire a car anyway, so I can dig a bit deeper. Thanks for driving me earlier Will, but I want my freedom.’

  ‘Do you want me to run you over to the car hire office on the industrial estate?’ Will asked.

  As Daisy looked at her watch, Will shrugged at Charlotte as if to say What else can I do?

  Daisy was their friend now, but Charlotte wondered how genial she’d be if she knew what they’d done to her half-brother.

  ‘I don’t suppose we could go fairly soon, could we? I’m going to call it a day with the family history research for now, but I would like to take a drive into Lancaster.’

  ‘No problem at all. I’ll fetch you that new towel, then I’ll be happy to run you over to the car hire place. I’ll nip into the cash and carry while we’re there.’

  Daisy and Will left the family accommodation, and Charlotte listened as they made their way down the stairs and out of the guest house.

  She sat at the kitchen table, her eyes scanning Will’s notes. She’d barely paid any attention to this new job of his. She knew he wasn’t entirely happy in the role he’d taken when they moved to Morecambe and that lecturing at the university would be a move up for him. It did feel a bit parochial, teaching at the same place he’d got his degree.

  As she was reading the job description that he’d left out on the table, she heard a knocking sound. It wasn’t unusual to hear guests banging and clattering around the place, but this caught her ear. It sounded like it was on one of the lower floors. She stood up and listened again.

  Charlotte walked out onto the landing and shouted down the stairs.

  ‘Will, is that you? Did you forget something?’

  She couldn’t hear anything from the guests. The entire guest house appeared to be empty. There were no TVs on in the rooms, which was the usual giveaway.

  The knocking started again. It seemed to be coming from the ground floor.

  Slowly, Charlotte walked down the stairs. They’d had a rat at the back of the property some months previously; she hoped they weren’t going to be troubled with vermin again. One rat in the wrong place and they were in deep trouble. Fortunately, it had fallen victim to some poison outside, and the issue had resolved itself since then.

  ‘Is anybody around?’ she asked, as she reached the ground floor and stepped into the hallway. ‘Isla, is that you?’

  There was no response. Charlotte walked into the kitchen and in her state of nervous tension, had a flashback to Isla lying there in a pool of blood after she’d been attacked by Jenna’s violent boyfriend, Pat Harris. She shuddered at the thought of it. The noise rang out again, from the direction of the cellar. If they’d got a rat down there, they needed to find out fast and get the thing killed.

  She reached out for a kitchen knife from the wooden block that was sitting on the worktop to her side. She had no idea what she was going to do with it, but it seemed like a sensible precaution, in case the rat jumped at her.

  Charlotte walked to the back of the hallway, to the white-painted door that led down to the cellar. The door creaked open, and she thrust her hand into the darkness, searching for the light switch. She found it and turned it on. The bulb that hung over the steep, stone staircase came on, then blew immediately. The stairs were dark but the second light, within the cellar, was still on.

  Carefully, step-by-step, she walked down the staircase, feeling the coldness from the stone walls creeping over her skin. She held tight to the wooden railing, taking care not to lose her footing.

  At the bottom of the steps, she had to take a right turn to get a full view of the cellar. She was beginning to wish she’d left it to Will to investigate. The thought of a rat being down there, or even a mouse, creeped her out.

  The bulb was low wattage, so it barely illuminated the boxes and numerous dusty items that were stored in the cellar. Generations of former owners had left out-of-date china, catering equipment and furnishings down there. Will and Charlotte had vowed to clean it out, but as the guest house had got busier, it had swiftly dropped down the list of things to do. The space was cluttered, musty and packed, but narrow pathways had been created between the piles of junk, so at least she could make her way through to check out the noise.

  Charlotte jumped as she heard a shuffling noise in the far corner. The light didn’t quite reach that far, and she didn’t want to move any deeper through the pathways. Discarded furniture had been piled almost as high as the ceiling towards the back of the cellar. Her heart pounded as she imagined a rat appearing at head height.

  She felt ridiculous as she held out the kitchen knife in front of her, taking tiny steps closer to the source of the sound. As she stepped around the corner of a pile of tea chests, her eye caught the small basement window which opened out into the back yard where the car was kept. There were a couple of tables out there for the guests who wanted to smoke. They’d tried the window when they first moved in, checked it was closed, then forgot all about it. Where the glass pane had once been was now covered in black-painted wood, allowing no daylight into the cellar. Now, that now seemed a foolish thing to do; Charlotte could have used some natural light.

  Beneath the covered window was a box of papers which looked like it had been emptied out over the floor. Had a rat been gnawing at the storage containers down there? Cautious, she moved on, listening for any sounds of scratching.

  There was a narrow path running along the far end of the cellar, underneath the window, near where the papers were spread out. She’d have to step over them to check the very far end. She looked down as her feet touched the outer areas of the pile, which seemed to comprise paperwork and photographs. It was hard to see it all, in this shadowy side of the cellar.

  Charlotte placed the kitchen knife on the edge of the emptied tea chest so she could put out her hands to steady herself as he stepped over the heaped pile of papers. She couldn’t see any signs of gnawing or chewing; perhaps the sound she’d heard was just one of the tea chests falling to the ground?

  There was a movement directly ahead of her, and the sound of breathing. Something big was in the corner, much bigger than a mouse or a rat. It moved under the legs of a table.

  Charlotte turned quickly in the darkness, holding her breath in terror. She slid on the papers, desperately trying to find her footing, then fell, striking her head on a piece of furniture that jutted out. With a sob of fear, she scrambled to get up. She had to get out of there.

  As her hands fumbled to find something to haul herself up with, she sensed movement behind her, then the touch of a cold, human hand. She gasped as she turned around and saw a man grabbing hold of her.

  Chapter Thirty

  Charlotte remembered the kitchen knife, but it wasn’t within reach. She banged at the tea chest next to her head in the hope that it might shake the weapon from where she’d put it down, but instead of dropping to the floor it fell inside the wooden container.

  ‘Leave me alone,’ she shouted at the man, who was now trying to place his hands over her mouth to silence her.

  ‘Please be quiet, I’m not here to hurt you,’ he told her.

  Charlotte struggled on the floor, the man’s body looming over her. If he decided to attack her, she’d be helpless.

  She rolled to the side, but he reached out, trying to pin her to the ground. A claustrophobic sensation engulfed her, muffling her breath in the confines of the cellar. As she tried to get up, Charlotte struck her head on the side of the cellar wall. The sudden pain stopped her from struggling, and her assailant relaxed his grip.

  ‘I’m not going to hurt you, but please d
on’t shout for help,’ he whispered. ‘Not until I’ve explained why I’m here. If you still don’t believe me, call the police. I’ll be safer in a cell than I will if I have to go outside.’

  Charlotte placed her hand on her forehead to assess the level of damage. No blood; that was a start.

  ‘Who are you?’ she shouted at him. ‘And how the hell did you get down here?’

  ‘I’m Rex Emery,’ he replied. ‘I used to own this place.’

  Charlotte sat on the cold, damp cellar floor, stunned at his revelation.

  ‘But you’re supposed to be in prison, aren’t you?’

  ‘Sort of,’ he replied. ‘I’m due for release very soon; I’ve been in Haverigg open prison for the past few months. I made a run for it. My life is in danger. I can’t stay there.’

  ‘How did you get in here?’ Charlotte asked, doing her best to remain calm. His body language wasn’t threatening, at least.

  ‘That window has been dodgy for years. I can’t believe nobody has mended it. If you give it four or five thumps from the outside, the arm jumps off its retainer, and you can get inside. It’s not the sort of thing you’d ever find out unless you’d locked yourself out. You might want to get that sorted, now you know about it.’

  ‘So are you on the run?’

  ‘Yes,’ said Rex. ‘I’m a wanted man. You can hand me over to the police if you want to, but please listen to what I have to say first.’

  ‘How long were you hoping to hide here? How long have you been down here?’

  Charlotte thought about the children being in the guest house on their own, potentially with… What was he, a kidnapper? She shuddered at the thought of exposing her daughter to a man on the run.

  ‘They’re trying to silence me,’ Rex continued. ‘If they get to me, they’ll kill me. I’m a sitting duck in the prison. They have people everywhere.’

  Charlotte could just make out his face in the darkness. He looked deadly serious. But didn’t all prisoners protest their innocence?

  ‘Who?’ Charlotte asked. ‘Who’s trying to hurt you?’

  ‘You’ve seen what’s happening already. I read it in the newspaper; that’s when I finally understood that they’re cleaning up their messes. When Barry McMillan died in this place, I knew exactly what was going on. Fred Walker too. They’d already got to Turnbull. He should have known better than to fall out with Edward Callow. I don’t know what even happened to Mason Jones. I hope he’s dead already. I hope that piece of filth dies of a long, slow and painful cancer. He deserves it.’

  ‘I can’t make head or tail of what you’re saying,’ Charlotte interrupted. ‘Slow down. None of this is making sense to me. What about Edward Callow? You didn’t mention his name. He’s connected with those men too, isn’t he?’

  ‘That man is the devil!’ Emery shouted. ‘I’d like to strangle him with my own bare hands and spit on his dead body. I want to look into his eyes as I take the last seconds of life from him, and I want him to know that it was me that did it. That man wrecked my life.’

  ‘This is all too complicated. Please, start from the beginning,’ Charlotte urged. She thought about what she and Nigel Davies had pieced together already. This man didn’t seem to be a danger to her. But he did appear to know more than anybody she’d spoken to so far.

  ‘Can I get up now? There are two stools over there; how about we move over towards the light so we can talk better?’

  Rex had released his grip on her hands after she’d struck her head, but he was still towering over her as if he might leap on her at any moment.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘You frightened the life out of me. I thought I’d be safe down here. I also thought the guest house was empty.’

  They both stood up, and Charlotte moved over towards the stools. With their padded, vinyl seats, they looked like they belonged to the seventies. Charlotte handed one to Rex, and they moved over to the bottom of the steps, into an area that was much better lit. He was balding and had heavy bags under his eyes. His dress was plain, but not prison clothing, as she’d expected from her limited experiences of such matters drawn from the TV. He looked tired and weary, but she could see the fear etched into his eyes.

  ‘You know I was jailed for kidnapping Piper Phillips and holding her in the upstairs roof space on this building?’

  Charlotte nodded.

  ‘She carved her name up there. I discovered it only the other day.’

  ‘I guess it’s true to say I was involved, but I did not kidnap that poor girl, nor was I responsible for holding her like that. My worst crime was a turning a blind eye, but I had no other choice.’

  Charlotte could get a better sense of the man now that his face was in the light. Whether it was the truth or a pack of lies, he looked like he believed what he was saying.

  ‘Then who took her?’

  ‘Mason Jones, the head teacher at her school. He was responsible for her welfare at school. He set it up so that she was sent on an errand during school time, and that’s when they snatched her. They held her in that loft space. I swear to God, I didn’t know she was there. They hired a room from me and told me to look the other way. And when they were finally convinced that man Craven was dead, Turnbull set his officers loose on me, and I got the blame for the whole thing. Those bastards threw me to the lions. The only consolation was that Turnbull got what he deserved. And now the others are getting what’s been coming to them too.’

  Charlotte’s mind could barely keep up with all the information he was giving her. She was still unable to get the full picture; the fragments didn’t seem to fit together.

  ‘You mentioned this Craven fellow. What did he have to do with it?’

  ‘That man was a maniac. He once threatened my wife and daughter in the kitchen just above where we are now. The man was an animal. He was like a dog that had got a taste for blood and should have been put down. I sometimes wonder if he was the most dangerous one of all.’

  This man had also known Bruce Craven. It seemed incredible.

  ‘Who was Bruce Craven?’

  She didn’t know if she could trust what Rex was saying. It was best to keep her mouth shut about her own connection.

  ‘Some guy from the north-east who they found to do their dirty work. He used to work at that old holiday camp at Middleton Tower. It closed years ago. It was the perfect cover for him. He was a seasonal worker at the camp, and now and then they’d call him in to carry out a job. They call them sociopaths nowadays; back then we just called them nutters.’

  ‘So, Bruce Craven was working with Edward Callow and his group of investors, or whatever it was they were doing?’

  ‘Yes, he was hired muscle, a nasty piece of work. He was the reason I turned a blind eye to what was going on in that upstairs room. When you’ve got a local DCI involved and a man like Bruce Craven is threatening your wife and daughter, believe me, you don’t say no.’

  This was the Bruce that Charlotte and Will knew, and Jenna too.

  ‘Did you know Jenna Phillips?’ Charlotte asked.

  Rex nodded.

  ‘That poor woman; they put her through hell over the years. They’d got it into their heads that she somehow knew where Bruce Craven had gone. He just disappeared without a trace one day and nobody ever worked out where he’d gone. It threw them into a state of panic, because they thought some powerful property gangsters were moving in on their pitch. It was all very tense for a while. They used to hold their meetings in the lounge upstairs. This guest house was a popular meeting place once upon a time. They often made me leave the room, but I still got a sense of things through the closed door. They were a bad bunch, and they did a lot of terrible things. They did a terrible thing to me. Now they want me dead, just like all the others.’

  Now she was getting closer to the truth. ‘Why were they so adamant that Jenna knew something? She was just a student at the holiday camp. She was never involved in anything illegal.’

  ‘They intimidated her within an inch of her
life. I’m amazed that she’s still alive. But she never said a thing. Even when they took her daughter, she always maintained that she knew nothing. She’s a tough woman, I tell you. I’d have caved under less pressure.’

  ‘Why did they target her, though? She was just a bystander in all of this.’

  ‘They were convinced she must have known something about Bruce Craven’s disappearance. They always thought she was protecting somebody, but she never revealed who it was, if she did hold that secret. Whoever it was that got rid of Bruce Craven did the world a favour. But if Edward Callow ever finds out who it was, he’ll track them down and torture them. Then he’ll toss them out into the sea to rot.’

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Charlotte had to decide what she was going to do with Rex Emery, and fast. Her gut feeling had been right. This was all coming to rest at her doorstep, and goodness knows what would happen if things got out of hand.

  But as she sat there listening to Rex, she struggled with an overwhelming sense of guilt and anxiety. Had Jenna Phillips protected her family all this time, even at the expense of her own daughter? If she had, she could hardly blame her former friend for trying to extort money from them. She’d endured a parent’s worst nightmare because of what they’d done.

  She desperately wanted to jump on the train and see Jenna immediately, to discover the truth about what had gone on and to find out why, after all these years, her friend was still in so much danger. But more than anything, she wanted to flee with her family to somewhere safe, a place where she would never have to give a thought to Bruce Craven ever again.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked Rex Emery.

  ‘I want you to hide me,’ he replied. He must have thought about it already, from the way he didn’t beat about the bush with his answer.