by Limey Lady
The thought stunned her. My Dad’s grandchildren: where on earth did that come from?
Dangerous thinking, especially about a complete stranger! And looks were deceptive; she knew that only too well. Just because he looked like an all-action hero didn’t mean he was any good at the deed.
And making me wait until November . . . what’s that all about!
‘Sod him,’ she said aloud, turning the ignition.
She'd go see Nina, who would be waiting for her. Nina always started submissively, wanting to be mauled and possessed. Later she'd switch, becoming quite the aggressor, growling like a tigress as she gnawed the insides of Heather's thighs. Sex with Nina was like acting the same parts in The Mousetrap, but that didn't mean it wasn't always incredibly good. Heather didn't have a scoring system for girls; if she had, Nina would score highly every time.
As for Rick, well . . .
She'd forget him. If he did bother to ring she'd chat, maybe try a little phone sex and see if he had the bottle to swap a few intimate snaps . . .
*****
‘How many times do I have to say it?’ Lockwood said irritably, ‘I am not your bloody serial killer.’
‘This is getting boring, Trevor.’ Wilfred probably didn’t need to try to raise a yawn. He looked all in. His eyes were red-rimmed and his hair was still wet from his latest, supposedly refreshing shower.
The profiler sat back and watched on the screen in the viewing room. There were several assorted officers in there with him, watching the action from this latest interview.
Or rather, they were watching the lack of action. When they’d first started viewing had been strictly rationed. As the sessions had gone on, interest had waned. They were down to the diehards now. There was no-one queuing outside, anxious for a space to become free.
Glancing to his right the profiler noticed Ayling, deep in conversation with that good-looking, persistent woman detective. She noticed his attention and, saying something that made Ayling laugh, she came and took a seat beside him.
‘So,’ she began brightly. ‘The expert opinion is . . .’
‘The jury’s still out.’
‘Come on, Michael. Don’t give me that. He’s nothing like your profile, is he?’
‘I’m not always right.’
‘Neither am I. But I’m betting Lockwood and our Mr Bastard aren’t one and the same.’
‘Not taking you.’
The woman (Waterman; that was her name) stayed where she was but switched her focus toward the screen. Michael admired her face a second longer before following suit.
‘He’s going this time,’ she said.
‘I though you just acquitted him.’
‘I acquitted him of being Mr Bastard. He’ll confess to something, though. They always do, faced with those two.’
The profiler shrugged and concentrated on the interview, which seem to be moving on now, albeit painfully slowly.
‘Tell us again about the gun,’ said Carlisle, his voice a low, even growl. ‘We know it’s American. And we know there are others just like it in town. So where did you get it?’
‘No comment.’
‘You can’t say that to us,’ Wilfred said patiently. ‘We’re not the newspapers.’
‘Aye,’ Carlisle agreed. ‘Save that for the newspapers . . . if you ever get to speak to them.’
‘They’re queuing up for you,’ Wilfred added. ‘We haven’t released a word, but they’ve sniffed it out. All this morning’s headlines had “Shipley” in them. They’re not mentioning your name. Not yet. But they’ve all already got it. You can count on that.’
‘Judith rang.’
Carlisle’s latest opening line brought chuckles from his unseen, unheard audience. The suspect was not going to like what was coming next.
‘If the papers even hint that she knew what you were up to, you’re dead,’ Carlisle went on. ‘She was not a happy bunny, although she seemed more concerned about money than anything else. She says all her cards have stopped working. And the bank referred her to you.’
‘The gun was for her,’ Lockwood said flatly.
‘What?’
‘The gun was for her. To use on her, I mean. Then I was probably going to shoot myself.’
Utter silence in the viewing room. The previously bored, cynical onlookers were suddenly agog.
‘Are you saying that you bought that gun for the specific purpose of killing your wife?’ asked Wilfred, speaking very carefully.
Lockwood nodded.
‘Out loud, please.’
‘Yes.’
‘Why would you want to kill your wife, Trevor?’
‘I had to stop her finding out.’
‘About what; the things you’ve been doing in Shipley?’
Lockwood laughed shortly. ‘That wasn’t smart, even for you.’
‘Find out about what, then?’
‘I couldn’t let her know about the money. What else?’
Wilfred leant towards him over the interview table. ‘Trevor, I’ve seen some of your bank statements. Is that what you mean?’
‘That’s part of it, yes.’
‘And Judith doesn’t know about the debts?’
‘She knows about most of the loans and mortgages. Not that she understands them.’
‘So there’s more? Things she doesn’t know about?’
‘Yes.’
‘What then?’
‘Not what you’re hoping for. There’s just a shitload of more debts.’
Carlisle clearly felt he’d been quiet for too long. ‘Come on, Trevor, you’ve been up to your ears in debt for years,’ he grated. ’And a man like you knows you can easily get it written off. What happened to make you decide you needed a gun to sort everything out?’
Lockwood sighed. He looked twice as tired as his interrogators. As predicted, he was ready to crack.
‘If I tell you, will you promise to protect my wife and daughter?’
‘Protect them?’
Wilfred and Carlisle exchanged puzzled glances.
‘Of course we’ll protect them,’ Carlisle said. ‘If you explain exactly who they need protecting from.’
‘That’s the problem,’ said Lockwood. ‘There’s only so much I’m able to tell you.’
Chapter Twenty-Nine
(Thursday 25th September 2008)
Sister had been exceptionally obliging when Henry rang earlier. He’d mentioned Geoff’s “ongoing work commitments” and she’d immediately cleared him to visit outside regulation hours, volunteering a room where they could speak privately. He’d been suitably grateful; this wasn’t a conversation he was looking forward to and it would be best kept private.
Timing his arrival to make sure he didn’t bump into Penny, Henry felt unusually nervous when he reported to the station. In fact it was more than just nerves: he felt like a treacherous rat.
Several busy-looking nurses blinded him with smiles without actually asking if they could help. Then Sister hurried up, guessing who he was from his appearance.
‘We’re just getting Geoff ready,’ she said brightly. ‘This is his first time out of bed in quite a long while. We want him to look his best.’
‘Oh,’ said Henry. ‘Please don’t go to any trouble on my account. He can stay in bed for me.’
‘Don’t worry. We have it all arranged. If you’ll go with Louisa, we’ll bring him along in a few minutes.’
He followed the staff nurse twenty yards down the corridor and into an office with a foreign-sounding doctor’s name on the door. The doctor was obviously not in. His or her office was tiny with no windows and cramped with filing cabinets. Three-quarters of the remaining floor space was taken up by a cluttered desk.
‘You have this one,’ said Louisa, pulling out one of the two available chairs. ‘I’ll go hurry the patient along.’
She got to the door then paused, turning back without opening it.
‘I know Geoff’s been off for a long time,’ she said, ‘but he really l
oves his job. He talks about it all the time. I do hope you haven’t brought bad news.’
‘Oh no,’ Henry said, trying to look amazed at the very idea, ‘nothing like that.’
The staff nurse nodded and left.
Well I haven’t, he thought. Not necessarily.
Time passed slowly in the stuffy little office. Henry tried to amuse himself with the anatomical charts on the walls. Then he looked at his watch. Ten minutes late already. He was just starting to get impatient when the door reopened.
But it wasn’t Geoff. It was a woman in her thirties, dressed in the light blue uniform of a care worker.
‘You’d better not be here to upset my Geoffrey,’ she began, not bothering with introductions.
‘Er . . . Excuse me,’ Henry countered. ‘What . . .’
‘Not when he’s finally getting better,’ the care worker went on, rolling over his feeble objection. ‘Dr Strohl won’t accept it yet, but the rest of us all know. It’s still at a delicate stage though. We can’t allow any negativity at all. So only give him positives. Yes?’
‘Of course I’ll be positive. But . . .’
‘Good. I’m glad we understand each other.’
He stared at the closed door, beginning to feel outnumbered.
Another ten minutes (long enough for him to memorize the intricacies of the female muscular system) and the door opened again. This time it was Geoff in a wheelchair, pushed by Louisa and escorted by yet another care worker. Geoff was in his pale blue hospital pyjamas and looked very frail. His arms and legs were thin twigs. He was, however, doing his best to give an approximation of his old grin.
‘Henry,’ he said in a weak, old man’s voice, ‘how good of you to come.’
Henry automatically stuck out his right hand then cringed as Geoff struggled to respond.
‘Don’t worry about formalities,’ he said hastily.
But Geoff was worrying about them. His face creased with effort as he lifted his arm and proffered the withered claw of his right hand.
‘Couldn’t do that last week,’ he wheezed proudly. ‘There’s this guy from the Red Cross who comes to massage hands and feet. David. He can work wonders, especially when things are starting to improve.’
‘I’ll leave you to it,’ Louisa said brightly, abandoning the care worker.
‘Consider me the prisoner’s friend,’ the care worker said as Henry eyed her. ‘I’m here to ensure fair play.’
‘Thank you Val,’ said Geoff. ‘But it’s not really necessary. Henry and I go way back.’
Val glowered at Henry before departing in her turn.
‘Buzz if you need me,’ she said to Geoff. ‘And don’t take any bull-you-know-what.’
‘Well,’ Henry began, ‘alone at last.’
‘Up at last,’ Geoff agreed. ‘Until now they’ve taken me everywhere in bed: scans; conductivity tests; X-rays; catheter insertions . . . This is a big adventure for me.’
‘Nurses seem to care for you. Quite strongly, come to think about it.’
‘They’re fantastic, all of them. They should sack half the administrators and pay the nurses and care workers double. That’d probably save a couple of billion, as well as giving them what they deserve.’
Then, seeing Henry’s expression: ‘Is “sack” a word I should be avoiding?’
‘We’ve passed six months,’ his boss said. ‘Your contract gives you that on full pay. Then it calls for a situation review.’
‘What can I say?’ Geoff hunched his skinny shoulders. ‘My neurologist still can’t give a prognosis, not good or bad. In fact he can’t honestly give me a diagnosis. In my heart, I know I’ll make it back behind my desk. But I’m buggered if I know when that will be. That improvement I mentioned isn’t rushing itself.’
‘Consensus seems to be things are improving though.’
‘Is that from the nurses?’
‘Yes old chap. And they’re the ones who know, aren’t they? Not the sawbones.’
‘Henry . . . cards on the table. You know I want to come back as soon as possible. I know you can’t keep paying me for doing nothing. And you’ll need more than a stopgap replacement, at least temporarily. I’ll go along with whatever you want from here. If it’s the end of the road, then so be it. I won’t hold any grudges.’
‘It’s easy for you to say that,’ said Henry, ‘when you’ve got all the females in the NHS on your side. Lord knows what would happen to me if the road ended today. They’d probably inject me full of tropical diseases.’
‘They wouldn’t do that. But they have laid on a large supply of enemas. I’m not quite sure why.’
Henry laughed. ‘How’s Supergirl bearing up?’
‘She’s being superb, as always.’
A cloud fluttered across the invalid’s face, despite his attempt at a smile.
‘Are you sure she’s okay?’
‘I’m as sure as I can be from in here.’ Geoff sighed. ‘She’s on a hen trip in Amsterdam at the moment.’
‘That doesn’t sound like Penny’s thing at all.’
‘I know it’s unusual but this has been as life-changing for her as it is for me. I’m doing my best to encourage her to . . . you know . . . get out and about a bit more. Have some sort of normality.’
Making snap decisions was one of Henry’s great strengths. He’d come here with a script pre-agreed with all the partners. Unilaterally ditching it, he said: ‘Okay, cards on the table. Let’s roll it on and review again come the end of March. By then you’ll be training for marathons; able to pencil a date in the diary and all that. Sounds good?’
Geoff’s eyes went misty.
‘It sounds incredibly generous.’
‘We’ll keep the salary going,’ Henry went on. ‘But we’ll have to withdraw the car for the time being. That shouldn’t bother Penny, should it?’
‘No. She only ever drives her own car. And it’ll be good for me. Save me some tax.’
‘Nothing wrong with the grey matter, I see.’ Henry chuckled. ‘That’s sorted then. If I write something up, are you okay to sign?’
‘Sure, as long as you don’t mind a witnessed squiggle. My hands are still a bit bunched up.’
‘Can you use a keyboard?’
‘I don’t know. I don’t have one to try.’
‘What if I bring you in a laptop? For personal use, I mean. Ultimately we might try to get you earning your corn on it, but not yet.’
‘Henry, if you can get me a laptop that gets into our systems, I’ll start earning my corn right away. Do you know how boring it is in here?’
‘What, with all those nurses to chase after? Pull the other one.’
They chatted a little longer but Geoff was visibly tiring. When they buzzed for assistance Louisa and Val appeared almost at once.
‘Well,’ said Val truculently. ‘How did it go?’
Geoff passed her Henry’s written agreement with a trembling hand.
‘Read it before I sign. And be a pet; witness my signature.’
‘Hmmm,’ she said. ‘It looks reasonable. If it wasn’t written by a lawyer, I’d be happy.’
‘Val’s the local union representative,’ he said to Henry.
‘Is she? I never would have guessed.’ Henry turned to the care worker. ‘Geoff is one of the very best contract experts I’ve ever met, quite possibly the best. Apart from not wanting to lose him, I wouldn’t be so stupid to try to trick him with a dodgy contract. That really would be a recipe for disaster.’
They parted with another awkward handshake and rather more genuine smiles from the NHS staff.
Walking back to the car park Henry felt considerably better than he had done walking in . . . much less of a rat and not at all treacherous.
Stuff the partners. He’d worry about them tomorrow.
*****
Pat eyed Sean across The Meeting Room Table and wished he’d had a hit of coke. This almost-married, almost-respectable lifestyle had its good points, but cutting down was a drag. And he
’d been wrong: coke was lots harder to quit than smoking.
Much fucking harder . . .
‘Kyle,’ Sean began.
