DI Mitchell Yorkshire Crime Thrillers: Book 1-3

by Oliver Davies

  “Ah-ha!” He plucked out a folder and opened it up, his face falling from excitement to disappointment and finally into a heavy frown I couldn’t quite read.

  “What is it?”

  Stephen held the folder up, showing me that there was only one sheet of paper in it. “There’s nothing here,” he said. “Just basic information about when he attended. Nothing else.”

  I rubbed my eyes tiredly. “So he’s smart enough not to take the file completely,” I said slowly. “But he’s gutted it of anything that would help us figure out whether he might be tied up in this.”

  Stephen looked a little dubious, but he conceded that it was a possibility with a nod.

  I held out a hand for the file and Stephen handed it over. He was right, there wasn’t anything to see. He’d attended the university around the time that Taylor had told me he had, and he’d studied History, which was Taylor’s subject. The only thing that might be useful was that there was an address listed there, which I took a picture of on my phone. Closing the folder, I ran a finger down the side with a frown.

  “Mitchell? Can we wrap it-?”

  “Look,” I said, pointing to the side of the folder. Stephen gave me a confused look but humoured me as he took the folder back and obediently looked where I’d pointed.

  “What am I looking at?” he said.

  “The cardboard’s been torn up. Think, Stephen. Where does the red tape on the folders usually-?”

  “Oh Christ,” Stephen said, nodding. He ran his finger over the torn bit of cardboard, exactly where the red tape would have been stuck. “He’s torn it off.”

  “Aye,” I said, pleased with myself. I took it back to take a picture of the side and then put it back in the cabinet. I’d taken pictures of a couple of other folders that looked like they might have some relevance, but none of them fitted exactly.

  We packed up efficiently, with Stephen eager to get home, and Dr Ngan turned up as we were finishing.

  “And did you find what you were looking for?” he asked politely.

  “Not really,” I said. “Have you got CCTV for the records room?”

  The man looked surprised. “I have no idea, I’m sorry, but I could enquire for you?”

  “Thanks, that’d be helpful.”

  We headed out, back to the car. I drove us home, Radio 2 playing in the background.

  “What now?”

  I glanced at Stephen. “Now, you head home to your missus and kids.”

  “Yeah, yeah, tomorrow, then?”

  I scrunched a hand through my hair, the curls gone flat, and sighed. “We’ll go see about this address of Will’s, and then check out the other couple of fellas that looked likely, I suppose.”

  Stephen grunted. “Okay.”

  We pulled up in the station and got out, heading inside to log the car back in and fetch our things. I hadn’t brought my car in today and was planning to run home, so I waved Stephen off when he hovered to wait for me.

  “See you tomorrow.”

  Stephen tipped an imaginary hat at me. “You will, for sure. You’re stuck with me now.”

  I snorted, shaking my head at him as he walked off with a grin. I headed down to the changing rooms and got ready. The light was beginning to fade into dusk, but that was alright. I’d got a high-viz jacket and a head torch if it got really dark.

  Running home, my feet pounding the pavement and transferring all that pent up frustration into motion, gave me the space in my head to turn things over. I was worried for Taylor and Abby, and worried for the other women this killer might target in their absence. I wasn’t confident that going to Will Seton’s listed address would lead us anywhere, nor that the other students on our new list would be who we were looking for, but we didn’t have much else to go on.

  We would have to make do with the leads we had until something more solid turned up.

  Fourteen

  Other than Will Seton, who had really only come to my attention through a coincidental encounter, the main student we were interested in, was still living here in York. For ease, Stephen and I headed over there first, pulling up outside a nice-looking terrace house with a row of colourful flowerpots outside the door, though the flowers had started to die off. There was a pumpkin that had been cleverly carved to look like the silhouette of a witch flying on a broomstick, and Stephen paused to take a picture.

  “Is that for evidence?” I asked wryly.

  Stephen shot me a sheepish smile. “Nope. Pumpkin inspiration for when we do the carving with the kids.”

  I shook my head in exasperation. “Come on.” He came over to the door with me, and I knocked smartly.

  It was fairly early, so I wasn’t surprised that it took a few minutes for someone to answer. The woman who opened the door was dressed in office wear and had a harried expression on her face which shifted into a frown when she saw us.

  “Hello?”

  I took out my badge, as did Stephen. “Hi, we’re looking for an Andy Smith, is he home?”

  She blinked. “Yeah, yeah, he’s in the kitchen,” she said, taking a couple of moments before she stepped back to let us in. “What’s this about? Is it his family or something?”

  I noted that she’d not jumped to thinking that Andy had done anything wrong, which either meant that she had no idea of his past, or that he’d been on the straight and narrow recently.

  “We’ll need to discuss that with him,” Stephen said evenly, and she nodded.

  “Well, I need to rush out. I’m late for work,” she said haltingly as she led the way down the narrow hall to the small, tidy kitchen at the back. “He’s in here. Andy, honey?”

  A beanstalk of a man with a mop of blond hair turned around and almost dropped the plate of toast he was holding. He slid it onto the counter and pressed a hand to his chest, sending us a sheepish grin.

  “God, you guys gave me a shock.” He looked over at the woman I assumed to be his girlfriend, since she wasn’t wearing a ring. “You couldn’t have warned me, love?”

  “I’ve gotta dash, I’m sorry,” she said apologetically to both us and Andy.

  Andy waved her off. “Go, go,” he said, before glancing to us. “That’s okay, right?”

  I nodded. “We may need to talk to you at a later date,” I said to her, before turning to Andy, “but for now we just need to talk to you.”

  The woman moved to kiss Andy on the cheek, still shooting us worried looks. “Call me if you need me, okay?” she told Andy quietly. “I can take a day off-”

  “No worries, go on, you’re running so late.” He tapped his watch, and she grimaced.

  She headed out, closing the front door behind her, and Andy’s face fell from the easy grin of earlier into something heavier. I noticed how well he’d concealed his emotions from his girlfriend, and from us and narrowed my eyes at him.

  “Come and sit through here,” he offered, his voice polite but flat. “Mind if I eat my toast?”

  Stephen waved his hand in permission, and we sat down in the sitting room while Andy chewed his toast, although he didn’t look like he was particularly hungry anymore.

  “Is this about my uni days?” he said finally, after a long pause. His leg was bouncing with apparent agitation, but his expression looked tired and almost resigned. “Or is it something else?”

  “What happened in your uni days exactly?” I asked, wanting to hear his take on it.

  Andy grimaced. He swallowed a mouthful of toast and then set his half-finished breakfast aside. He was only wearing a ratty t-shirt and a pair of boxers. He looked somewhat vulnerable when he put his face in his hands for a moment, before scrubbing his fingers through his sleep-rumpled hair.

  “I behaved awfully, is what happened,” he said flatly, looking at the floor rather than us. “Lindy doesn’t know the details, but she knows I didn’t get up to any good.” I assumed Lindy was the woman who’d just left, and I nodded for him to go on.

  “Look, I got myself addicted to alcohol. And I’m… it r
eally brought out the worst in me. I felt bad about myself, and I wanted to make everyone feel as terrible as I did, you know?” He looked up, briefly meeting our eyes. He breathed out a harsh breath. “I… stalked three other students while I was there. I wanted to scare them. I was sick of how everyone seemed to be having the time of their lives while I was-”

  He broke off, swallowing audibly. I watched him closely, not sure what to think exactly. He looked up, his shoulders straightening as he sat up.

  “I got help, okay? The uni kicked me out after one of the girls reported me. Rightly,” he added hastily. “Like, honestly, her ratting on me was the best thing that could’ve happened. My parents realised I was up to my neck in it and drowning and they got me help, after, you know, I did all the community service stuff.” His gaze flicked between us. “I haven’t done anything like that since. I’m in a good place. I don’t want to hurt anyone, alright?”

  Stephen made a noise of acknowledgement beside me. He’d been taking notes of Andy’s confession, so I’d been free to study his expressions. I was inclined to believe his story of his apparent redemption, but I also remembered how his expression had so completely changed once Lindy left the house.

  “When you said you wanted to scare these students,” I said, deciding to start with the part that linked best to our case, “how did you go about that exactly?” There’d been some details in his case files, but I wanted to hear it from him.

  But Andy was frowning. “Look, I’ve told you my part. Why’re you here, really? Do you really think I’ve done something or what?”

  I gave him a hard look. “We’re asking the questions here, and we’d appreciate you answering them.”

  Stephen decided to take on a ‘good cop’ role and added more gently, “We’re just looking into a case, Mr Smith, and being thorough. We’re not here to get you into any trouble if you don’t give us a reason to.”

  Andy looked between us and nodded. “Okay, I guess I scared them by following them, you know, the classic stalker thing.” He grimaced, looking embarrassed. “I sent them scary letters, emails, texts if I could get their number. I made up lies about them and told their friends.” He was looking down at the floor again, his leg bouncing. “I tried to make them as miserable as me, really.”

  “Did you send them anything else?” I pressed. “Anything physical?” I didn’t want to ask leading questions, but I did need to know.

  He shot me a confused look and then nodded. “I sent weird presents, sometimes. Not nice things. Like, a knife once. Or chocolates that I’d put laxatives in.” His face was hot, and his shoulders hunched. “Look, I’m really sorry for what I did then, seriously. It was so messed up. I’ve not talked to any of them recently and I never will, okay?”

  I kept my face blank but sighed inwardly. No mention of dead animals, no sign he was holding something like that back, nothing that really suggested that this guy was anything other than a reformed creep.

  Stephen leaned forwards slightly, and Andy focused on him. “Did you ever think about taking it further?” Stephen said, his voice quiet.

  Andy blinked. “Further? Further than scaring them?” He pressed his lips together thinly and shrugged one shoulder. “Think about it? Yeah,” he admitted. “But I never would’ve. Not even back then, in the worst of it. I didn’t really- Well, I did want to hurt them, I guess, but I didn’t want to really hurt them. Just… scare them.”

  He looked genuinely upset and repulsed by his own actions, and I accepted his words with a nod.

  “I really have got help, moved on,” he said quickly, as if we’d misconstrue what he’d said. “Went to see a psychologist, went on meds for a while. I’m tee-total now, don’t touch alcohol. You can ask Lindy, or my parents, or-”

  I held up a hand, and he broke off. Looking over to Stephen, I gave him a shrug that meant ‘I don’t think this is useful,’ and he nodded back.

  “Alright,” I said to Andy, who was looking anxious. “Thanks for your time, Mr Smith, we appreciate you talking to us.”

  I stood up, and Andy looked surprised. “That’s it?” he said.

  “Aye,” I shrugged, before pausing. “You seemed to have gotten yourself together,” I said, “I don’t think you’re who we’re looking for. Keep it up, okay? You’ve got it good, and your Lindy seems nice.”

  Andy’s shoulders sunk in relief, and he gave me a hesitant grin. “Yeah, I know. She’s a keeper.”

  I gave him a nod, and we saw ourselves out, leaving Andy sitting on the sofa.

  “You believe him?” I asked Stephen in the car.

  “Yeah, reckon so,” he said, looking disappointed. “Which means we’re no further forward.” He put the car in gear and headed off down the road. “We off to see this Will bloke next, then?”

  “Might as well,” I agreed. “Though I don’t have high hopes. The address we’ve got is a few years old and is probably only his parents’ address, anyway.”

  “Hopefully they’ll know where he is, though.”

  I nodded in agreement, fiddling with the dials to get the heat turned up and then flicking the radio back on before settling back in my seat.

  The address in Will’s file had been on the other side of Yorkshire, and well up in the hills, so it would take us a couple of hours to get there, I reckoned. Stephen seemed happy to drive for the first half, and we stopped at the services around eleven to grab a bite to eat and swap over.

  Picking out some coffee and a blueberry muffin, I found myself thinking about how many runs I’d done recently, before Stephen’s words from yesterday came back to me. He was seemingly not paying attention, but I bought the muffin almost out of defiance and munched it happily in the car.

  “Nice, huh?” Stephen said, watching me enjoy it.

  “Aye, and all for me,” I said, hoovering up the crumbs.

  He snorted. “I’m good with my bacon butty, ta for the offer, mate.”

  “You’re welcome,” I chuckled. He was still eating, and getting ketchup all down his chin, as I pulled back onto the motorway. We pulled off on an exit soon after and began to climb. The streets turned into little, winding roads with stone walls and more fields more full of sheep than buildings.

  “They’re way out in the country, if this is where his parents are,” Stephen noted, looking out of his side window and watching the bare landscape go by through glass still speckled with the rain that’d come down earlier.

  I nodded. “Even my old station wasn’t as remote as all this.”

  Stephen snorted. “You getting nostalgic, Mitchell? Maybe we can ask if they have any missing sheep you can track down.”

  I sent him an unimpressed look, and the brief distraction made me miss our next turn, which only made Stephen smugger. I muttered curses at him as I struggled to do a three-point turn in the tiny road. Then I pointedly turned the radio up when he tried to tease me further.

  We finally got up to the address, which belonged to an old house situated amongst a cluster of similar dwellings, too small to even be called a village, just an isolated high hamlet. At least a couple of the houses looked to be boarded up and abandoned.

  “Place looks friendly,” Stephen said dryly.

  “Mm,” I agreed, looking up at the old place, which looked dull and quiet.

  We got out of the car and headed up the front path to the door.

  “Can I help you?” an older looking man asked, when our knocking was answered.

  “We’re looking for a Will Seton, is he here?”

  The man’s eyes widened slightly, before he grunted and stepped back. “Y’better come in.”

  We trooped inside, into a drafty hallway that was only fractionally warmer than the outside had been. The grey-haired man led us into a living room, where an open fire was burning heartily, to my relief. A woman, about the same age as our host, was sitting in an armchair and drinking tea. Her only response to our arrival was a raise of her thin eyebrows.

  “This about Will?” she said.

 
; “Aye,” the man said. He gestured vaguely for us to take a seat which we did. Although the house had looked somewhat neglected on the outside, the inside was decorated with warm furnishings and smelled like baking bread.

  “Are you Will’s parents?” I asked, getting straight to the point.

  “Aye,” the man said. “Aidan, and this be my wife, Julie.”

  I introduced Stephen and myself, and I was about to begin asking questions when Julie cut me off.

  “Has something happened? To Will? Has he done something?”

  I paused. “Nothing has happened to him. We’re looking into a case and knowing his whereabouts would be helpful to him and us both .”

  Julie glanced over at Aidan, who was staring into the fire with an unfathomable expression on his drawn face.

  “We don’t know where he is,” Aidan said in a deep voice, like stones grating together. “He doesn’t call, and he doesn’t visit.”

  Julie nodded, her face downcast. “We haven’t seen him since he emptied out his room and left, drove off with nary a word.”

  Stephen and I shared a look. “Do you know where he might be living?”

  Aiden curled his lip. “If he doesn’t talk to us, how’d we know?”

  Julie hushed him gently. “Last we spoke, he was living in York,” she told us. “That was right after,” she trailed off.

  “Right after?” Stephen prompted.

  Julie blinked, her fingers rubbing against the side of her teacup. “Yes, that was following his expulsion.” She sighed quietly and took a sip of tea. The fire crackled in the background.

  “Can you give us that address?” I prompted.

  Julie hummed and nodded, standing up with a faint grimace as her knees clicked. We were left alone with Aidan, who seemed determined to pretend as if we weren’t there. I could hardly blame him. This seemed to be a difficult subject for them, that of their wayward son whose whereabouts they seemed to have no idea of.