Moving Target (A DCI Thatcher Yorkshire Crimes Book 6)

by Oliver Davies

  “I’ll- Yeah, there’s some paperwork that’s calling my name,” she said with a polite smile.

  I thanked her again, and she headed off, leaving us alone in the musty-smelling basement.

  “Mate, she was definitely crushing on you,” Stephen said, raising an eyebrow at me.

  “What? Oh.” My eyes widened. “Was that why she got all flustered? I thought she was worried she’d been boasting.”

  “Yeah, no.” He grinned and slapped me on the shoulder.

  It reassured me that he was willing to tell me and that he’d apparently been convinced by our earlier conversation that I had no intention whatsoever of cheating on Sam.

  We got back to work, scouting over the basement and picking through all the dusty possessions piled up around the place. I found another couple of o-rings sitting unused in a plastic box and stuck them in an evidence bag just in case. Tovar and her partner had surely looked this place over, but she clearly hadn’t had the time to pick through every single thing in the basement because much of the dust had been left undisturbed.

  An hour later, with the air full of floating dust motes and my nose feeling dry and blocked, we hadn’t turned up anything else.

  “Where do you think they were planning to take the dog?” Stephen wondered as he picked through the stuffed drawers of the wooden workbench.

  “No idea,” I sighed, leaning against the wall and brushing the dust from my hands. I was covered in it, and brushing a hand over my hair made bits fall in my eyes. “They clearly weren’t running an entire ring from down here, so I reckon they must have gone to a club somewhere.”

  “Like the one up in the hills?”

  “I don’t know if they actually had a pit up there, but they were definitely training and breeding a lot of dogs. A barnful of them.”

  “I guess there must have been some information on that computer upstairs.”

  “That would be my guess, too,” I agreed with a sigh.

  “They were certainly pretty desperate to bash it up.”

  “Aye.” I looked around the basement and coughed, the dust getting to my lungs. “I’m gonna go upstairs, get some fresh air.”

  “Go for it. I’ll finish up looking through this crap and be up in a minute.”

  “Good man, thanks.”

  I gratefully headed up the stairs, making my way to the kitchen to run water from the tap, splashing my face and eyes. I swilled water around my mouth to get the taste of dust off my tongue and knocked as much rubbish out of my hair as I could. My curls had a tendency to hold on to dust, though, and I knew I’d need a shower to get it all out properly.

  The water had gone icy by the time I was done, and my fingers were numb as I dried them on a mucky side towel. Stephen hadn’t come up the basement stairs yet, so I climbed up to the second floor to have a final poke around. I went to the office to have another look in there, glancing over the paperwork on the desk. It was mostly bills, tax returns, and bank statements from years back. Nothing of use.

  There was a bookshelf above the ruined computer, and I looked over the titles, unsurprised to see that at least half of them were about dogs. I picked up a couple and flicked through them, wondering whether there would be anything written or stored inside, but the books held nothing but faded pages with information about dog breeds and common diseases.

  My gaze fell on the printer as I put the book back, and I cocked my head at it. I still couldn’t hear Stephen downstairs, so with time to kill, I found the printer’s ‘on’ switch and got it up and running. It didn’t look either ancient or particularly new, and I wasn’t sure it’d have the technology for what I was thinking of. Hereford station certainly didn’t have the most up-to-date tech, but the computers there were capable of spitting out the last few documents they’d printed if you could find the right buttons.

  With the computer all smashed up, I thought it was worth a shot to try to find out what the printer had last been used for, and I got absorbed in flicking through the options on its little, pixelated screen.

  “What’re you up to?” Stephen said, making me jump so badly that I slammed my hip into the desk and bit back a shout. Stephen’s expression creased into apologetic concern. “Damn, mate, I’m sorry. I thought you’d have heard me come up the stairs. Big feet like mine, you know.”

  “Yep,” I said, rubbing my hip and already imagining the purple bruise there. The edge of the desk was painfully sharp as I’d just found out. “Not your fault. I was trying to get this thing to cooperate.”

  “D’you need me to threaten it? Give it a good talking to?”

  I laughed. “At this point, I’ll try anything.”

  “My usual resort for tech problems is to turn it off and on again. If that doesn’t work, give it a kick.”

  “I don’t think Adams would think much of that advice, but I’m ruddy tempted with this thing, I’ve gotta admit.”

  “What’re you trying to do exactly?” he asked.

  I explained the idea, feeling like it was a bit foolish when I said it out loud, but he nodded and looked intrigued. We went back to trying the printer settings, even though I felt like I’d tried every combination of buttons by now, but finally, we managed to find the right function.

  “Hallelujah,” I muttered when the printer finally whirred into action. It chuffed and clunked as it pulled the paper through before coughing it out.

  I picked it up, holding it where Stephen could see too, and it took me a moment to understand what I was looking at.

  “Gumtree adverts?”

  “Aye,” I said, my voice tight. “Just like that other incident.”

  “What?”

  “You know. The Staffy dog that was ‘free to a good home’? Tovar told me about it in the break room. It was listed on Gumtree, and then the owner changed their mind, only-”

  “The dog wasn’t anywhere to be found. Right, I remember you saying now.”

  I’d told Stephen about it right after he’d accused me of getting overly friendly with Tovar, but I resolutely didn’t think about that now. He’d already apologised.

  “What if the dog was brought here?” I said, continuing the line of thought I’d been on. “What if these dogs,” I jabbed the Gumtree print-out with my finger, “were next on the list?”

  “You think so?” Stephen said. He didn’t look entirely convinced, but he didn’t disagree either.

  “I suppose the Staffy stolen the other week could’ve been the one that was found here. It seemed like that one had been here for at least a little while, right? It’d been conditioned. Trained. You saw in the pictures how it reacted to other people.”

  “Right…” Stephen raised his eyebrows at me, waiting for me to go on.

  “So probably the Scotsons were already involved in the dogfighting world, and they’ve been bringing dogs through here, training them or moving them on elsewhere.”

  I frowned down at the Gumtree adverts, rubbing at the scruff on my chin. I hadn’t managed to shave this morning, and if Sam had been here, she would have playfully complained about getting bristly kissing. I dropped my hand and pulled my focus back to the job, determined not to let thoughts of missing her distract me.

  “It’s just a theory,” I said when Stephen didn’t immediately say anything. “I don’t know anything for sure, but I’d sure be interested in talking to the owner of the stolen dog and hearing a description of the person who picked it up. We could see whether the dog owner recognised the Staffy that was found here, too.”

  “Yeah, that sounds like a plan. We can see whether the description matches up with the one found in the Scotson’s basement.” He nodded slowly. “Look, it seems a bit of a leap to me, to be honest, Mitch. Considering how big York is, the chances of these things connecting seems a little small. It’d be seriously lucky, or unlucky, depending on how you’re looking at it.”

  “Aye, I hear you. But dogfighting is tight-knit from what I’ve read, and everyone tends to know each other. We already had suspicion
s that dogfighting folks have stolen the missing dog from the Gumtree advert because it was a Staffy, didn’t we? I don’t think it’s as outlandish as you’d think.”

  I folded up the print-out and tucked it safely into my pocket. Taking one last look around the office, I led the way down the stairs with Stephen following behind. I’d be glad to strip the clammy plastic gloves off my fingers once we left the house, but I was pleased with what we’d managed to find, even though Stephen hadn’t quite been won over by my theory yet. He was usually the cautious one of the two of us, balancing out my overactive imagination and tendency to run forwards headlong with his more methodical, steady approach.

  “We’ll look into it further and see what turns up, okay?” I said as we stepped out into the biting, January air. It was a bright day, but the wind had a vicious nip that snuck right down my collar and through the seams of my jacket.

  “Absolutely. I’m not dismissing the idea. I only want to be sure, you know?”

  I sent him a smile. “Of course. We’ll have a good poke around and see if anything interesting falls out of this case. But I’ve got a good gut feeling about this lead.”

  “Oh, well, if your gut is on board, I’m all for it.” Stephen chuckled.

  “Shut up.” I gave him a light shove, and he returned it.

  We bickered back and forth, levity returning between us for a brief while as we clambered into the car and set off back towards the station. I had plenty on my mind, and the list of things I needed to do was as long as my arm. It took some effort to keep my mind from repeatedly returning to the Scotson’s god-awful basement and the equipment that had been found there, equipment that was no better than torture gear but had been called something else in the name of sport. I knew that a case like this, when we were fighting something far bigger than ourselves, could suck me into a dark place if I let it, but for now, I stayed in the moment. Chatting with Stephen was always the best distraction from my tumultuous thoughts, and I felt especially grateful at that moment to have him as my work partner and as my friend.

  Seven

  I’d already planned out half of the day in advance, so by the time I’d run into work the next morning, I was raring to go. Stephen wasn’t in yet, which wasn’t surprising considering how early it still was, and I waited impatiently for him to show up.

  “Steady on, tiger,” he laughed when I tried to usher him away.

  “We can get coffee on the way to the rescue centre.”

  “Crikey, alright, alright,” he said, letting me herd him back down the stairs and into the car.

  I took the wheel since I was the most awake, with Stephen still yawning and rubbing sleep from his eyes.

  “Late night?” I asked him.

  “Nope. The kids both woke me up in the early hours. One nightmare and one too cold. We ended up with all four of us in bed.” He chuckled, shaking his head.

  “And that wasn’t too restful, I bet,” I said wryly.

  I thought a little sadly of my own cold bed, which had felt far too big ever since Sam had left. Sometimes we talked late into the evening, and I fell asleep with the tablet beside me.

  “Exactly. So I really do need that coffee, mate.”

  So did I, if I was honest. I’d been at the office late, making calls to organise appointments and researching further into all of this. I’d taken Rashford’s warning to be careful to heart, and the best way to be prepared was to know what I was dealing with.

  “Why are we going to the rescue centre again? To see the Staffy they rescued?”

  “Aye. I talked to Tovar, and this is where the dog was taken to after it was collected from that basement. We’re due to meet the owner there, the woman who lost her dog after putting it up on Gumtree. Her name’s Claire Foster. She cried on the phone when I called.”

  “I bet,” Stephen said gruffly.

  “When we see her, we can ask for a decent description of whoever took the dog off her, too.”

  “And if the dog’s hers and the description matches the folks from Dringhouses, we’ll know they’re connected,” Stephen summed up with a nod.

  “Exactly.”

  I focused on the road as I took us around a busy roundabout before pulling off to hit the Costa Coffee drive-through nearby. Stephen got an Americano, stronger than his usual latte, and I got a black coffee and an espresso. At least I’d fitted in a decent breakfast this morning, so the caffeine wouldn’t be hitting an empty stomach, but I badly needed the kick of energy.

  We got back on the road soon after, and it wasn’t long before we pulled up in the quiet car park of the animal rescue centre. I’d called ahead, so they’d know we were coming, and we went over to reception to introduce ourselves.

  “When are we meeting Claire?” Stephen leaned over to ask me. We were sitting in the waiting room whilst a member of staff was found to talk to us.

  “Another half-hour from now. I wanted to ask a bit more about the dog before she arrived. If they have anything upsetting to say, she shouldn’t be around to hear it.”

  “Thoughtful of you,” Stephen noted.

  “Also, they might have held back on the difficult details if Claire was standing with us when we asked, so it was strategic too.”

  “Uh-huh. You can’t fool me, Mitchell. I know you really care.” Stephen rolled his eyes at me.

  “You’ll never get me to admit it,” I said but couldn’t stop myself from smiling.

  One of the rescue centre staff approached us a few minutes later, apologising for the delay. He took us over to the kennels to show us the dog in question, which was a stocky, red brindle Staffy, which meant that the short fur was a lovely chestnut colour.

  “The poor guy’s been through the wars. He’s scared of his own shadow right now and acting out because of it,” the staff member told us. His badge told me that his name was Julian.

  The Staffy did look terrified, huddled into the back of the kennel with his tail between his legs and his hackles up around his neck.

  “What would make a dog’s personality change like that over only a couple of weeks?”

  “He was picked up from a suspected dogfighting trainer, so it’s likely that he was subject to significant abuse,” Julian explained. I was all too aware of where the poor dog had come from, but I nodded along, and Julian continued.

  “Usually, the dogs don’t turn out like this, though, since they’re supposed to be hostile to other dogs and animals, not humans. The training was botched, I think, or this poor guy was too old and reacted badly. They go for much younger pups, but I suppose they wanted to have a go of it with this one.” He gestured to the trembling dog, his lips pressed tightly together in clear disgust.

  “So it was from training then, the fear he’s showing? You don’t think he was used in a fight?”

  I’d read about unwanted pet dogs being used to train pit fighters to hone the dogs killer instincts. The thought of a pet being condemned so callously like that, used as a fighting dog’s ‘first kill’, turned my stomach.

  “He wasn’t actually involved in a fight, I can tell you that for sure. He’s not injured enough for that. But you’re right. He could have been intended for the ring, not as a fighter but to train the real fighters. They might’ve been trying to harden him up and make him better bait by riling him, so that’s why he’s so wary. It’s a whole grim business.” Julian’s mouth twisted, and he gave a resigned shrug.

  “You do a great job here helping them,” Stephen said, his deep voice gentle.

  Julian gave him a small nod, and I realised that the young man looked upset. Maybe I’d pushed a little too hard with my questioning.

  “I’m sorry to ask about such horrible things so early in the morning. We’re due to be meeting Claire at the front of the building any minute now if you could show us over.”

  Julian gave a nod, seeming to perk up as he led us back towards the centre’s entrance. The hallways of this place were spotlessly clean, smelling like chemicals, and it felt strangely like
a hospital.

  “Is that the woman who might be the dog’s owner?”

  “Aye, fingers crossed.”

  I really hoped that the dog was Claire, and not just because it would prove my theory that the two incidents were linked. Seeing the shaking dog in the kennel broke my heart, and I badly wanted a happy ending for him and for Claire. It’d take time for him to trust humans again, and I knew the dog might never be the same, but the process would be so much easier with an owner the dog already knew and who loved him. Not to mention that if I was in Claire’s shoes, I’d feel awfully guilty for putting the advert up on Gumtree and letting the dog go, even though she had no bad intentions and no idea that this would happen.

  Claire had arrived early and was already at reception when we went over to meet her. She shook hands with all of us, looking nervous. Her fingers were clenched tightly around the handbag slung on over her shoulder, and there were dark circles under her eyes that couldn’t be entirely hidden with make-up. No doubt she’d been up in the night worrying. I felt a touch of guilt that she had to wait until today to see whether the dog was hers, but it’d already been getting late by the time I called her yesterday afternoon, and the rescue centre wouldn’t have been open to receive us.

  Still, I understood her keenness to see the dog, so we didn’t delay her with questions. Julian led the way back to the kennels, and Claire followed, her hands still clutching tightly at her handbag.

  “Where-?” she asked, her voice tight and barely audible over the dogs’ barking.

  “Here he is.”

  Julian had stopped in front of the dog’s kennel, and Claire hurried over, though her steps slowed as she approached. Stephen and I shared a tense look as we followed behind, close enough to hear Claire’s sharp intake of breath.

  “Lewie!” she choked out, crouching down in front of the kennel, her fingers clutching at the wire. Julian took a step forward, concern wrinkling his brow.

  “Be careful. He’s been through a rough time. He won’t be the same dog you knew.”