by Lee Weeks
Lauren sighed deeply as she closed her eyes and hung on to the phone. ‘Toby, I am sorry. So sorry for all of us. I understand what you’re saying. I had hoped that we could turn our marriage round. We were so happy once. I thought we could be again but, I accept it if you say you love someone else. Do this last thing for me, Toby. Do it for your son. For yourself. Come down, Toby, and we can face this together.’
‘No, I can’t. I can’t face it. What good can I be?’
‘We still think Samuel is alive, Toby. It looks likely Kensa may have taken him, but she is mentally unhinged. She still holds a lot of affection for you. You could talk to her. It may be the only chance we have of getting Samuel back alive.’
Toby came off the phone and walked back into the lounge where Jeanie was waiting for him. She was sitting on the sofa and working on her laptop. She closed it as he approached. He sat thinking for a few minutes and then he looked up as she waited for him.
‘I’ve told Lauren that our marriage is over. I’ve told her I love Gareth. He makes me feel like I can be me. No more pretence, no more trying too hard. I want to be happy. I want Lauren to be happy.’
Jeanie nodded. ‘I understand. Was she okay?’
‘Lauren gets on with life. She’s not someone to buckle. She’ll pick herself up and carry on, no matter what. But, she has told me some home truths and said that I need to do more, everything I can, to try and find my son.’
‘What does she want you to do?’
‘She wants me to go down to Cornwall and face things. She thinks Kensa will talk to me.’ Toby was sweating at the thought of it.
Chapter 38
Carter and Willis left Cam’s café, crossed the road and headed towards the car park.
‘Cam’s story was something, wasn’t it? What do you make of it?’ asked Carter.
‘Some parts of his story are so sad, they have to be true,’
‘But?’
‘Cam Simmons definitely has something he’s not mentioning. He has a bit of a love triangle thing going on with the women.’
Carter walked up the steps to the Surfshack and cupped his hands as he looked through the glass. He knocked on the door. As he waited he heard a car start up and watched Raymonds appear from the car park and pull alongside. Carter held up his hand to him and Raymonds opened his window. He smiled.
‘Raymonds?’
‘I hear you’ve been asking about Kensa.’
‘Really? Who told you that?’
‘Well, let’s just say, if you want to know anything then come and ask me.’
‘Okay, well, where’s the report on the assault on her in 2000? Where are the photos of the injuries?’
‘Destroyed. We didn’t keep any of it – no charges were brought. What was the point?’
‘Tell me, then, who were the suspects?’
‘What suspects?’ He started to drive off. Carter stepped closer.
‘Local lads, men, at the time. Men who were at the party where sixteen-year-olds and under were getting off their faces. Men who spiked drinks and then followed their victims to a house where girls were raped. Those fucking men, Raymonds. Where are they?’
‘They don’t exist. It’s all been made up – it’s all lies.’
‘Oh really? How come I have their names then? How come one of them is your son? This is the beginning of the end of it all, Raymonds. There isn’t one sordid thing that’s happened in this village that you’re not at the heart of. Where were you when Martin Stokes was murdered earlier on today?’
‘I’ll be available with my lawyer any time you choose – I’m not going anywhere – I have nothing to hide. Come and find me when you’re ready, sonny.’
‘Be in the old police station ready to be interviewed at nine tomorrow morning.’
Raymonds drove off. Carter was shaking with anger.
‘We need to go up and make sure Lauren is okay, guv?’ Willis walked back towards the car. Carter didn’t speak as he got in, started it up and sent dust flying as he spun it around in the sand-covered car park. He took the steep hill up from the shops in first gear and kept the engine screaming. He hadn’t realized.
‘Bastard . . . sorry.’ He pushed the gear stick into second then third. ‘I won’t leave this village until we see that man destroyed.’
‘Raymonds must have had some noble intentions at one time, guv.’
‘Noble, my arse.’ He shook his head, took a deep breath. ‘Okay. I know one thing, Eb, cracks are beginning to appear beneath Raymonds’ feet. He’s losing control of his empire.’
Sandford phoned as they drove to Stokes’ farm. They parked up and saw him in the field where Stokes was killed. He waved and smiled when he saw Willis. He walked across to the gate, on a path of stepping pads.
Willis shook his hand over the top of the gate. It felt ages to her since she’d seen him, a different world. In reality it was just three weeks ago and in north London.
‘Leonards has just been,’ said Sandford. ‘He’s a nice bloke. We have come to a compromise. They’ve done what they can outside, for now. They’re prepared to wait twenty-four hours for me to finish my search and then they’ll move in.’
‘Generous.’
‘Yeah, not sure I would be that kind, if I was them, but I’ve told Leonard I’ll alert him of anything I find. They’re leaving the tents in place.’ Sandford turned and pointed towards the back of the field.
‘They’ve covered the area around the tractor, and where the fight took place, with a second tent so the horse has to stay unburied for now. It’s vital to preserve as much as we can from this bloody rain. One minute it’s bright sunshine, the next it’s two inches in an hour.’
‘How’s your search going?’ asked Willis.
‘No sign of anything that might indicate Samuel has been here. But I’ve sent samples back to see if we can find a match to anything on the suit or the mittens. We’ve cordoned off Martin Stokes’ bedroom from the rest of the house and searched everyone’s rooms and found nothing of interest. I’ve been going through Stokes’ paperwork. He wasn’t a computer man so he has a lot of ledgers here that are about the farm. He has all his stock accounted for. He has clear spread sheets to do with the sales in the farm shop but nothing to do with Kellis House.’
‘Why was he so adamant in his letters to Lauren and Toby that there were pre-existing arrangements that he wanted to honour if they weren’t written down?’
‘Someone had definitely been looking through his room before I got here. We’re in the process of taking DNA samples from everyone who’s been to the farm in the last week or so. We need to get one from Raymonds. I’m looking forward to getting a sample from him.’
‘Who have you seen here?’ asked Willis.
‘Mawgan mainly. I introduced myself when I turned round to see her in the field behind me. She seems to be the one doing all the work with the animals. She spends a good deal of her day in with the pigs or the cows. The farm covers a lot of acres. You see her going off on her tractor. She stares a lot, but then she’s got a lot on her mind. No time to grieve when you have a farm to run.’
‘What about Kensa? Either of the men who live in the cottage? Jago and Marky?’
‘No, not yet,’ Sandford said. ‘I met Towan briefly. He was in his dad’s room when I cordoned it off.’
‘Did he have anything in his hands?’
‘Not as far as I could see. I can’t be sure that no one will go into Stokes’ room while I’m gone – not unless we’re going to insist that they all leave the farm, and that’s pretty impossible with the work load and the animals.’
‘No, I’d prefer to have them where I can see them. We’ll catch up with you again later.’
They left Sandford and drove back towards Penhal. Willis phoned Robbo and put him on speaker phone. ‘Robbo, can you investigate the disappearance of Ella Simmons in the year 2000?’ she asked.
‘I’ll get Hector on it now. But local information’s got to be the best. What are people say
ing about it?’
‘Yeah, I’ll start asking but I won’t get anywhere,’ replied Willis. ‘You haven’t met the locals. Did Marky and Jago’s stories about where they went in Exeter pan out?’ she asked.
‘I’ve been looking at some interesting footage of them,’ answered Robbo, ‘and I’m waiting to see what comes of it. They were seen talking to some people who we know have trafficked kids in the past. Gordano services has been used as the switch point.’
‘Send us everything you have on this story, Robbo. I wouldn’t put anything past those two.’
‘Okay, will do. Who’s your number-one suspect for Samuel’s abduction at this point?’ asked Robbo.
‘It’s got to be Kensa Cooper,’ said Willis with a glance towards Carter, who nodded his agreement.
‘Have you brought her in for questioning?’ Robbo asked.
Carter answered, he was instantly irritated.
‘If we hound Kensa she will freak and we’ll never find him, and if we take her into custody, and she is Samuel’s carer, he will die. Simple as.’
‘That’s a big dilemma, isn’t it?’
‘Yes, Robbo,’ answered Carter. There was a pause as both sides of the telephone line understood that what was said next had to be said.
‘The public, and Bowie, are getting impatient, Dan, they want him found. They don’t want all these other things to distract you. There’ve been murmurings of possible disciplinary action over your handling of this Stokes murder. Raymonds has friends in high places.’
‘Yeah, we have a pretty good idea how he got those. His cousin, the pimp, made sure it was party central for VIPs down here.’
‘Bowie has been told to warn you off any investigation into the goings on in Kellis House.’
‘Even though it may have a direct link to Samuel’s abduction?’
‘Yes.’
Carter took a deep breath. He knew what would be happening there in MIT 17. Bowie would be going ballistic on a daily basis. Carter was not filing his reports on time; thank God Willis was getting hers in. The pressure on Bowie to answer questions he didn’t have a clue about would be unbearable and the rest of the team would be getting it in the neck.
‘No problem, Robbo. He remains my number-one priority. I’ll make sure DS Pascoe has all the help he needs with the Stokes murder and I’ll stay well clear of any historical stuff at Kellis House.’
Robbo signed off. Carter looked across at Willis. He smirked.
‘We have ruffled some influential feathers, Eb. But it’s all right. Don’t look so worried.’
‘What do you want to do?’
‘I want Sandford into Kellis House and I want it taken apart. We don’t know what kind of search was done before we got here. We don’t know whose orders Pascoe and the team are following. The only people we can rely on are ourselves, right?’
Willis didn’t answer. She was staring out into space as she ran things through in her head. Carter was used to waiting. She nodded.
‘I think we should bring Towan in for our first interview.’
‘Yes,’ answered Carter. ‘We’ll leave Raymonds to stew a little. I don’t want him to think he’s first in the queue for anything.
Chapter 39
Robbo finished the call to Carter and looked across at Pam, who was peering intently at her monitor. Her face was lit with the reflection from the screen; as it changed and she typed, her eyes read from left to right and it was reflected in her glasses.
‘I’ve contacted his last employer, the recruitment agency in Marylebone. It seems he was a rising star for a while but then partied too hard. There was mention of a drug dependency and he used up his three warnings. The manager I talked to said it was a sad outcome. They had him earmarked for a share in the company but he messed up. He ended up being a bad influence on the newer members in his team.’
‘So, do we have the connections in place in Gordano services?’ He looked across at Hector. ‘All set?’
Hector was watching his screen intently.
‘Just waiting for confirmation from the contact. They’re getting nervous. They don’t want to blow their own investigation: it’s been going for nearly a year. They don’t want any information leaked.’
‘Understandable. Tell them, these two will be taken out of the frame – they’re just a couple of amateurs.’ Pam stopped typing.
Hector continued his online conversation and then sat waiting, tapping his pencil tip on a notebook. Watching the screen.
‘Yes! And thank you kindly, sir.’ Hector tapped his reply as he talked. ‘We can watch the transaction on here. It’s about to start.’
Robbo and Pam dashed across to watch the footage.
‘This is shot from a haulage lorry,’ said Hector.
The filming started as the lorry was coming into the Gordano services and heading for the signs towards the lorry park. The date and time was running in the corner of the screen.
3/2/2014 time 21:31
‘Look, there’s Marky’s car. They must have moved from one car park to the other.’
From the camera angle they could make out the back end of Marky’s car tucked in between two lorries. There was a break as the film jumped; the lorry came to a standstill.
‘Here we go,’ said Robbo as they watched first Marky then Jago get out of the car and be approached by a man dressed in a cleaner’s uniform from the services. When he spoke his voice had been wiped so that they couldn’t hear the names being used.
‘He must be the undercover officer they have working at the station,’ said Robbo. Two men got out of their lorry and joined them. The undercover officer shook their hands.
‘Do we know anything about who these men are?’ asked Pam.
‘We just know they are a large Ukrainian outfit who smuggle just about anything.’
The men were dressed in dark jackets and wore peaked caps on their heads.
‘These two are brothers apparently.’
One of the brothers walked out of shot and came back with three bags. He handed them across to Marky and Jago and they placed them in the boot. There was five minutes of leaning into the boot as the goods were examined.
‘Now, where’s the exchange?’ muttered Robbo as they all held their breath and watched the screen.
‘Here we go,’ said Hector as Marky reached in the back seat of the car, pulled out a holdall and handed it over to one of the two men.
‘Freeze that, Hector,’ Robbo said as they examined it in close-up.
‘Is that Samuel in the bag? Samuel weighs twenty-four pounds. Pam, you got that ready?’
‘Yes.’ Pam went to her desk and pulled out a carrier bag with groceries in it. ‘This is exactly that, I made sure.’
Robbo took it off her and stood in front of the screen looking at the angle of Marky’s arm, the flex of his bicep. He handed it to each of the others in turn. ‘Are we agreed?’
‘One hundred per cent.’ They ran the rest of the film footage. ‘Even the way he’s passing it over,’ said Pam. ‘There’s nothing weighty in that bag, there’s certainly not a child. He’d have handed it over with a little more care.’
Hector ran the film on. One of the brothers put the bag onto the floor and opened it; he checked inside.
Deal done, Marky and Jago got back in the car.
Chapter 40
As Carter and Willis parked outside Kellis House, Robbo phoned them to give them the news about Marky and Jago. They got out of the car and rang the doorbell. Russell started barking at the sound. Lauren opened the door and looked expectantly at them both, but Willis shook her head.
‘He’s settled in, hasn’t he?’ Carter bent down to pat Russell.
‘A bit too much. He’s not going to want to go back to a balcony in Greenwich.’ Lauren walked back through to the kitchen.
‘How are you feeling now after the shock yesterday? Sorry you had to be the one to find him.’
‘I’m trying not to think about it. It still doesn’t seem real. I gue
ss because I’m so tired it seems like some part of an ongoing nightmare. Do you know who killed him?’
‘Not yet,’ Carter said. ‘But his murder will not be a priority for us. We’re leaving our Cornish colleagues to get to grips with that. We’re concentrating on any relevance it has to Samuel. How are you managing for supplies, got enough to eat? Drink? I can pick up some food for us to eat here this evening from the hotel, if you’d like?’
‘Is it any good?’
‘I’d like to say it’s not bad, but breakfast was pretty ropy.’
‘Then I’ll stick to making pasta. Ebony is an easy person to cook for, aren’t you, Eb?’
Carter laughed. ‘That’s for sure. It’s quantity rather than quality she likes – no offence meant about your cooking, mind.’
‘None taken.’
Carter sat at the table and Willis perched by the sink.
‘Well, how do you like this house, Lauren?’ asked Carter.
‘I don’t, really.’
‘No, neither do I. It’s the first time I’ve seen it,’ said Carter. ‘It’s very dark and Gothic-looking.’
‘I guess those were his tastes,’ answered Lauren.
‘Just walking through the hall there – are there any paintings that have women with clothes on?’
‘Nope – all bare-breasted.’
‘Must have been a strange place for Toby to come when he was young. He must have spent his teenage years staring at the walls.’
Lauren smiled. ‘There was a long gap between when he came here with his mum and when he came here again after she left,’ she said. ‘Literally years. I think the décor would have been very different in the beginning, when they first bought the place.’
‘Are there any photos around from that time?’ asked Carter. ‘Be good to see what’s been done up.’
‘None that I’ve seen.’ ‘We haven’t really had a good look on the top floor yet,’ said Lauren. ‘That was obviously his master bedroom. There’s a four-poster and swathes of red velvet and chintzy materials. It spans the whole of the top floor.’
