Touch

by Robert Innes

  “I better get home,” she said at last. “My flatmate will be worried about me.”

  “Do you want me to walk you home?” Peter asked her.

  “No. Thanks, but I think I need to be on my own for a bit,” she said. “Thank you, Peter. You’re a really good friend.” She leant in and kissed him on the cheek.

  Peter was grateful for the darkness around them as he felt himself blushing. He suddenly had no desire to ever wash the left-hand side of his face ever again.

  “You take care of yourself,” he said, the spot where she had kissed him still burning. “If you need to talk, I’m always here.”

  Sarah nodded and gave him a small smile before walking off down the street.

  Peter sighed as he watched her fade away into the darkness. When the sound of her heels had finally disappeared, he thought over her words. ‘You’re a really good friend.’

  “Great,” he said to himself. “Just what I need. Another friend.”

  “Penny for them?”

  Peter jumped and was surprised to see Ashley Pharaoh standing behind him.

  “How long have you been standing there?” Peter asked, as he felt his heartbeat slowly returning back to normal, though he was unsure if the speed of it was from Ashley startling him or Sarah kissing him.

  “Long enough,” Ashley said, grinning. “You and Sarah, eh? Isn’t today just full of surprises?”

  “It’s not like that,” Peter replied. “I was just giving her a shoulder to cry on. Her boyfriend was murdered today after all.”

  “Hey, I’m not judging,” Ashley said. He sat down on the wall next to Peter, towering over him. “Did the police speak to you?”

  “Yeah, a bit,” Peter replied. “They’ll probably want to question me again though. After all, me and Scott were hardly mates.”

  “Yeah, and you were also nowhere near him when he died,” Ashley reminded him. “Is it true what they’re saying? That he was stabbed?”

  “Apparently. And there wasn’t anyone around him. He was just in the middle of the pitch on his own. Where were you when it happened?”

  “Over the other side of the pitch by the goal being elbowed in the head by one of their bloody defence,” Ashley replied. “I didn’t even realise what had happened until the ref blew the whistle. Hey, one bit of good news though. Hattie’s trying to persuade the FA to disallow that second goal, so we might still be able to win.”

  The thought of the match being replayed had completely disappeared out of Peter’s mind since Sarah had kissed him. He merely nodded.

  “Yeah, I know,” Ashley said. “It seems like such a small thing after what’s happened today, but you know Scott would have been fighting for the match to have been replayed if it had happened to anyone else.”

  “Scott probably would have tried to carry on playing,” Peter said dryly. “He’d have just stepped over a dead body and tried to shoot while everyone else was distracted. Anything to make sure he was the top player.”

  Ashley chuckled. “True. Do you fancy a drink? I was halfway towards the pub then realised I’d left my wallet in the changing rooms. Do you think the police will let me grab it?”

  Peter shrugged. “Worth a shot.”

  He jumped down off the wall and they walked towards the stadium in silence. When they approached the main entrance, Ashley strode ahead.

  “Probably best if you wait for me. I’m sure they don’t want too many people contaminating the crime scene or whatever.”

  Peter nodded and propped himself up against the nearest wall while he waited. After a few moments, his eyes landed on a flyer that had come loose from the notice board. He wandered across and picked it up.

  “COUNTY CUP FINAL! HARMSCHAPEL vs CLACKTON. 17:30, HARMSCHAPEL STADIUM. IT ALL ENDS HERE…”

  Peter had read the flyer hundreds of times since the date for the final had been announced, though the words suddenly felt like they had a whole new meaning to them.

  He glanced around to look for a bin to put the flyer in and realised the closest was the wheelie bin by the fire exit.

  As he made his way around the corner, Peter suddenly became aware of raised voices. As he poked his head gingerly around the wall, he realised where the argument was coming from.

  Hattie Atkins and Paul Wainthropp were standing by the fire exit door. Hattie, as usual, had a roll up in her hand but she looked more furious than Peter had ever seen her. Paul looked equally as livid and was red in the face.

  “You have no idea what you’re talking about, do you?” Paul snarled at Hattie. “This is about more than the sodding match! Do you have any idea how much trouble we could be in?”

  “We?” Hattie replied carelessly, taking a long inhalation of her roll up. “I think you’ll find there is nothing to incriminate me in any of this.”

  “Oh, and I bet you made sure of it as well, didn’t you?” Paul replied with a smirk. “How can you pretend you cared about Scott? All you were interested in was making sure we won that match by any means necessary, no matter what happened otherwise!”

  “For God’s sake, Wainthropp,” Hattie said with disdain. “I thought you were better than this.”

  “They’re going to find out, you stupid woman! After everything that’s happened, are you really going to just throw me under the bus? I have proof you were involved, you know! If I go down, you’re coming down with me.”

  “Oh, how heart-warming. You do realise that Scott felt the same way about this match as I did? He was prepared to take the risk. It’s a shame you didn’t have his drive, his determination, or frankly, his talent.”

  “You evil old witch.” Paul said quietly. He looked absolutely disgusted.

  “I have work to do,” Hattie told him, throwing the cigarette on the ground. “Grow up and then maybe we can talk. Until then, I don’t want to see or hear from you. Is that clear?”

  “You can’t -”

  “Is that clear?”

  Paul jumped slightly at Hattie’s sudden bark. He narrowed his eyes at her as if he was suddenly seeing her in a new light for the first time, then turned on his heels and stormed away. Peter watched him disappear, then waited for Hattie to slam the fire exit door behind her before emerging from his hiding place, his mind whirring from what he had just heard. He did not have any idea about what they could have been talking about, but he was prepared to bet that whatever it was, they would not have been happy that they had been overheard.

  As he continued trying to work out what he had just witnessed, he lifted the lid of the wheelie bin and dropped the flyer into it but stopped when something strange caught his eye. Slowly, he reached into the bin and pulled out a large white bandage. As he stared at it, he suddenly realised that it was absolutely covered in blood. He flinched and threw it back into the bin, holding the lid open and staring at it. His mind wandered back to when he had come out of the door earlier that evening with Blake and they had seen Hattie disposing of something and then slam the lid down when she realised she had company.

  “There you are!” called Ashley from behind him. “I thought you’d stood me up.”

  Peter turned with a concerned look on his face as he closed the lid of the bin.

  “What’s up?” Ashley asked as he arrived by the side of him. “I found my wallet. That policeman wasn’t too happy, but I pointed out to him that my wallet wasn’t exactly going to provide them with much evidence and he let me grab it, once he’d checked through it. You still up for that drink?”

  “Too right,” murmured Peter. “There’s something really weird going on around here, Ashley. I think there’s stuff being hidden from us. And I’m going to find out what it is.”

  7

  Blake stared at the contents of Scott’s locker before reaching inside with a cloth that Sharon had given him. As he stared at the needle, he shook his head in disbelief.

  “Steroids?”

  “Looks like it,” Sharon said briskly. “If you’re saying that your victim was prone to mood swings, this is
probably the reason.”

  “Jesus,” Blake murmured. “So, he was injecting this stuff into himself?”

  “I’ll be able to see once I’ve examined him back at base,” Sharon said as she removed a pair of latex gloves from her hands. “But if it’s in his locker then I think it’s quite likely.”

  Blake gently placed the needle inside an evidence bag then watched as it was placed in a further bag and written on. “It would explain his violent disposition, I suppose.”

  “Not uncommon in the sporting world, I’m afraid,” Sharon told him. “Performance enhancers normally get tested for though, especially in these big competitions. I would wager that somewhere along the line there’s been some lack of proper procedure.”

  “Alright, thanks,” Blake said as he rubbed his eyes. He was starting to feel incredibly tired and hoped more than anything that he would be able to get a full night’s sleep without being bothered by nightmares. He could sense that it was starting to turn into the sort of case that he would need a clear head for.

  “What now, Sir?” Mattison asked. “We’ve taken a statement from everybody on the team as well as Scott’s girlfriend.”

  Blake scratched the back of his head. “Let’s get back to the station and make sure we’ve got everything together for a meeting first thing tomorrow. We’ve got statements to go through, footage to examine and we need to know all the facts from Sharon first before we can really start trying to work out what’s happened.”

  “Lisa will have copied the footage from that camera by now,” Mattison said cheerfully. “It should all be ready for tomorrow morning.”

  “Oh, Lisa now, is it?” Patil sniped without looking up from her notepad.

  “Don’t start,” Mattison replied. “You don’t need to be jealous, you know. Just because an attractive new officer has joined us, there’s no reason to feel threatened.”

  Blake closed his eyes and shook his head at Mattison’s choice of words. As he expected, Patil snapped her notepad closed.

  “Attractive? I didn’t say anything about her being attractive, who mentioned her attractiveness? I never said I was threatened!”

  “You’re not blind though, are you?” Mattison replied, staring at her as if he did not understand why she was annoyed. “Of course she’s attractive, that’s why you’re feeling put out.”

  “Matti…” Blake said warningly.

  “Oh, I’m fully aware you think she’s attractive, Billy!” Patil snapped. “It was kind of difficult to miss when you’re constantly tripping over your tongue!”

  “I’m not!”

  But his argument was futile. Patil pushed past him and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind her.

  For a moment, the room was silent. Mattison turned to Blake and Sharon looking clueless.

  “What the hell is wrong with her?”

  “Oh, Matti,” Sharon chuckled. “Take my advice. Give her a little while and then go and grovel. Never admit to finding another woman attractive unless she’s a celebrity that you’ve got absolutely zero chance of ever meeting. Anyway, I’ll leave you to it. I’ll get back to you as soon as I can when I’ve done the post mortem, Blake.”

  “Thanks, Sharon,” Blake replied. When she had left, he turned to Mattison and shook his head.

  “You utter donut.”

  “What?” Mattison said, looking outraged.

  “Whether you know you’re doing it or not, you could not make it more obvious that you fancy Constable Fox.”

  “I don’t fancy her,” Mattison said, though his guilty expression suggested otherwise.

  “Okay,” Blake replied doubtfully. “Either way, I’m not entirely convinced she’s not holding a torch for you too.”

  “Really?” Mattison said, his eyes widening. “Did she say that? What did she say?”

  “Nothing,” Blake replied, tapping him on the head with his notepad. “And even if she did, it should be of no concern to you whatsoever. Now go on, get out. Go and fix the mess you’ve made. I’ll see you tomorrow morning.”

  Mattison nodded, looking slightly confused and left Blake alone in the changing room with his own thoughts. He quickly decided that he would finish compiling all of his notes in the morning. Hopefully the team would have some ideas for them to throw around at the meeting as to just how Scott had been killed. Blake did have a couple of vague ideas, but without any evidence to back anything up.

  He left some instructions with the night officers to keep trawling the locker rooms and the pitch for any clues and then left the stadium.

  The night sky was clear, and a cooling breeze blew around him leaving him feeling more relaxed. All he wanted was to get himself into bed next to Harrison and to have a good night’s sleep so that he could approach the case with a clear head the next morning.

  As he walked through Harmschapel, he glanced around. The streets were empty, as they usually were at this time of night. Despite this, Blake could not help but feel like somebody was following him. He stopped and looked around. The only movement in the street was an empty carrier bag blowing across the road. Blake peered back down the street. He had thought he could hear footsteps behind him, but now it had stopped.

  He shook his head and put it down to his tiredness, then continued walking down the road. Immediately, he heard the sound of footsteps again and stopped and turned around. The street was still deserted but now his heart was starting to thump in his chest. He did not know why, but he was suddenly starting to feel quite scared. All he could feel was that someone was watching him. Then, he jumped almost a foot in the air as there was the sound of a metal bin landing on the road and immediately a large ginger tom cat ran past him, its tail high up in the air. Blake let out a heavy sigh of relief and wandered around the corner to where the cat had appeared from.

  “Argh!”

  As soon as he had rounded the corner, he collided with somebody in a dark hoody. He recoiled as the figure pulled the hood down to reveal himself.

  “Oh,” said Tom. “It’s you.”

  “Why are you following me?” Blake asked, fully aware that he was sweating profusely.

  Tom stared at him. “Why would I follow you? I was on my way home.”

  Blake glanced around the street. “You didn’t see anybody?”

  Tom frowned. “No, though I can’t say I was looking that closely. What’s the matter with you?”

  “Nothing,” Blake replied. “I’m just…Anyway. I’m on my way home too. I’ll walk with you.”

  Tom raised a disdainful eyebrow. “Lucky me.”

  They walked in silence for a few moments. Blake was just thinking about how he could broach the subject of Tom’s attempt to kiss Harrison when Tom spoke first.

  “I take it that football player was murdered then?”

  “We’re investigating all possibilities,” Blake replied. “I can’t really talk about it.”

  “Mum’s devastated,” Tom continued. “She rather liked him. Mind you, she’s always liked them young. She never goes after the right people.”

  “Sounds like a family trait.”

  Tom stopped and turned to face him. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “I know you tried to kiss Harrison.”

  Tom narrowed his eyes and then shrugged. “Yeah, I did. So? He’s a good guy.”

  “Yeah, he is,” Blake replied. “He’s also my boyfriend.”

  “Well, it didn’t seem like you had much of a future when you were lying to him about having to go to the clinic.”

  Blake gave him a tight smile. He remembered all too well the moment he had gone to get himself checked out after discovering that he might have HIV and seeing Tom sitting behind the reception desk. “I made a mistake, I wasn’t sure how to handle it. We’ve worked through it.”

  “Is that right?” replied Tom as they started walking again. They had now reached the top of the street where they both lived. “I just happen to think that Harrison deserves to be treated better. From what he’d told me,
he’s given you nothing but his complete and utter devotion.”

  “I love Harrison,” Blake said sharply. “Nothing you do or say is going to change that. You’re a good-looking guy, Tom. You could probably have any guy you wanted, except that one. So, I’m going to say this to you now so that the message is loud and clear. Stay away from my boyfriend.”

  Tom glared at Blake, a muscle in his jaw twitching slightly. “Is that what the police can do these days? Hand out restraining orders left, right and centre?”

  “Not at all,” Blake replied. “I’m just giving you a friendly warning. I don’t like people who come along and destroy other people’s relationships. I’ve had it done to me before and I will not go through that again.”

  “Someone’s cheated on you before?” Tom said with a slight smile. “Gee. I wonder why.”

  “Blake?”

  They both turned to see Harrison standing in the doorway of Juniper Cottage, staring at them both with a concerned expression on his face. “What’s going on?” he said.

  “Nothing,” Blake replied. “We were just having a little chat, that’s all.”

  “Looked like more than a little chat to me,” Harrison said, walking towards them.

  “All good, Harrison,” Tom said, giving Blake a pat on the back. “Blake was just telling me how much he hates home wreckers. Fortunately, I’m not the sort of person who puts relationships at risk. I leave that to other people.”

  Blake shook his head in disbelief but before he could reply, the door to Juniper Cottage opened again and Jacqueline stepped out. “Oh, there you are, Tom! Hello, Blake, darling. Harrison was just giving me a stiff drink after the sad events of the match today. Such a waste.”

  “I didn’t know we had any stiff drink in,” Blake said lightly, with a final glance at Tom.

  “We went to the shop,” Harrison replied, still looking concerned. “There was an offer on brandy.”

  “I see. Well, if you’ll all excuse me, I’ve had a very long day and I’ve got an even longer one ahead of me tomorrow,” Blake said, walking towards the cottage. “I’ll see you later, Jacqueline.”