“So your father married Joan when you were—what?”
“I was eleven. I’d just started secondary school. And Joan’s lovely. You’d like her. Everyone likes her. And that reminds me, she’s invited you to Sunday lunch.”
“Really?” Angus was so touched that a lump of emotion wedged in his throat. He took a quick swig of whisky.
“Yes. Assuming you say yes, and assuming she doesn’t have a nervous breakdown at the thought of entertaining a sir beforehand, you’ll enjoy it. She’s a lot of fun, and she’s a good cook. None of your fancy stuff, mind.”
“I’d be honoured. Really, I’m touched. Thank her for me and tell her I’d be delighted to accept.”
“Yeah? I’ll tell her. I expect it’ll be roast beef with all the trimmings followed by a choice of apple pie and custard or trifle.”
“Sounds like heaven.” After too long living on fish and chips and receiving a dozen eggs and a tenner as payment for his gardening skills, it truly did.
“Dad’ll tell you about Molly,” Zac said. “You never knew her, did you?”
“No. I never knew her. I—” This was so difficult. “Your grandmother and I—we weren’t really a couple. It was just a—” He struggled for words.
“A one-night stand?”
“A little more than that, but not much.” Angus sighed. “We both agreed that an abortion would be best all round. I come from a privileged background so money wasn’t a problem. We decided she’d go to a top clinic, have an abortion and that, I thought, would be the end of it.”
“Women often change their minds at the last minute.” Zac spoke with the wisdom of someone twice his age. “These things happen, don’t they? Mum says regrets are like umbrellas in the wind. A waste of time.”
“She sounds like a sensible woman.”
“She is. She also said you’d be a lot more nervous about this meeting than I was.”
Angus chuckled. “She was right.”
The waiter sidled over and put two menus on the table. Zac grabbed one and quickly ran a finger down the choices. “I’m starving. Are you?”
Nerves had robbed Angus of his appetite so that he’d hardly eaten anything yesterday and couldn’t face breakfast this morning. Now, he was surprised to discover that he was hungry. “I am actually.”
His appetite had returned and the exhaustion had left him. Here he was, sitting down to have lunch with his grandson and daring to believe, finally, that the future was bright. Perhaps, after all, everything would be all right.
* * *
Ex-Detective Chief Inspector Frank Willoughby looked as smart as ever as he entered the pub. He walked tall, proud and erect. He smiled when he spotted Dylan, then signalled that he’d bring more drinks over.
It was odd to think back to the days when Frank had been his boss and they’d endured a mutual hatred for each other. Now, Dylan could think of no one else with whom he’d rather have lunch.
“Sorry I’m late.” Frank put two pints of beer on the table and took off his coat. “Bloody underground system. I got on the wrong train and couldn’t get back on track for ages.”
“I forget you northerners don’t have sophisticated means of travel.”
“Ha. You can shove the underground where the sun don’t shine.” Frank grinned. “That reminds me of the best punch line ever.”
“Go on.”
“We don’t have a back passage, doctor, so I shoved it in the bins instead.”
Dylan sniggered. “Probably not the best ever, but not bad.”
Frank took an appreciative swallow of his beer. “So how’s it going? How’s Bev?”
“Oh—’bearing up’ is the best phrase, I suppose. There’s not a lot else folk can do, is there? You have to get through it.”
“It’s a bugger. If you haven’t got your health, you haven’t got anything. Cancer—it’s a bugger.”
It was. A hateful, hateful disease.
“So what’s happening, Frank?” He’d rather talk of easier things—like blackmail and murder. “Has anything else turned up?”
“Dribs and drabs are coming to light on an almost daily basis. Joe Child was one murdering—”
“You’re telling me.” Dylan was furious with Child. “I still can’t believe he gave my name to Ben and Mark Fraser. They demand to know who’s sending them death threats, that’ll be Child, and who’s killed their brother, that’ll be Child again, and the bastard tosses my name into the bloody air.”
Fortunately, Davey Young had been laid to rest before the Fraser boys could find him. Young’s cover had finally been blown, thank God, and he’d never see the light of day again.
Frank was smiling at that. “As it is, he’s the one pushing up daises. And not before time. He was worth millions, you know. According to Doll, who denies all knowledge of her late husband’s wrongdoings, of course, they were planning to sell up and go abroad soon. She was hoping to be living beneath a hot foreign sun by Christmas. Naturally, she claims she had no idea how they were going to afford it. But yeah, he was worth millions. He had a different scam for every day of the week.”
“You’d think Gordon Riley would have had more sense than to keep paying him, wouldn’t you? Who the hell pays up for something that happened when they were a kid?”
“I suppose he thought he’d better hand over the cash and keep Child quiet in case people found out that Molly Johnson was the first of many. Child slipped up there. As far as we know, he only put two and two together when Leah went astray. He must have thought he was made for life when he could pin a biggie like that on Riley.”
“And instead, Riley walks into his office and puts a bullet through his head. Nice work.” Dylan approved wholeheartedly.
“Part of me has to admire Child,” Frank said with a grin. “You have to agree that sending death threats and then getting paid protection money is a great little earner. And there’s proof he sent those notes to the Fraser boys. He got careless and left a partial print on one.”
“What about Christian Fraser’s murder?” Dylan asked.
“Child arrived at Tempo at around seven o’clock, as he did every week, and at first everyone thought he’d been there all night. He left around eight-thirty and managed to dodge all CCTV, except for a traffic camera on the Burnley Road. That captured him reasonably well.”
“It doesn’t prove—”
“It proves nothing,” Frank agreed. “But you know and I know that he killed him.”
“True.”
In a way, Dylan wished it mattered. He’d have given a lot to see Child’s face when he realised he was about to spend the rest of his days behind bars. On the other hand, the world was a far better place without him.
“As for being God’s right-hand man,” Frank said, “he loved it. Wielding such supposed knowledge, power and influence really appealed to him. I think he’d finally found his vocation. Of course, several people left him stacks of cash in their wills so that helped.”
Dylan had still expected there to be more to it. “No drugs business? No sex-trade involvement?”
“Nothing that required so much brain power. Child preferred to bully his way through life.”
“So what’s the state of play at St. Lawrence’s?” A month had passed since he found Riley and Leah at St. Lawrence’s, and forensics teams had been busy ever since. It was a long, slow process. Every day, the old care home was the lead story on TV news bulletins.
“There’s nothing you won’t know. Four bodies have been found in the grounds to date. Caroline’s been identified and one other girl. The other two, as yet, are unknown.” Frank took a large slug of beer. “Leah would have been on the list if you hadn’t got there in time.”
“I know. Another twenty-four hours and who knows what we would have found?”
“E
xactly what did lead you to that place?”
“Sheer bloody luck.” An alcohol-fuelled hunch. Nothing more. “And something Bev said. I was convinced Child and Riley were involved in something together. And obviously, I knew they went way back—way back to St. Lawrence’s. Bev was talking about how Luke had put a football through someone’s window and was heading back there the following morning to apologise and offer to pay. She said he was returning to the scene of the crime.” Dylan shrugged. “I knew—or suspected—that Child and Riley had raped young Molly at St. Lawrence’s. I thought perhaps I should return to the scene of the crime.”
“That’s what I used to love best about police work. The way the inconsequential little details make all the difference.”
“Lucky for Leah they do. The refuge was a great hunting ground for Riley, wasn’t it? Any young girls who ended up there were going to be troubled and vulnerable before he chose them. They wouldn’t have stood a chance.”
Dylan thought of his own kids and shivered. He prayed they’d both have more sense than to be taken in by anyone. Damn it, he’d make sure they did.
“Girls seem to go for the older man,” Frank said. “Especially the rich older man. I suppose the experience, the sophistication and the charm dazzles them. Also, kids of that age are often getting grief from protective parents. Perhaps they saw Riley as a benevolent father figure.”
“Probably. I know Leah said that young men seemed childish and immature once she’d met him. He fed her all the love-at-first-sight bollocks. She was expecting a night at the Savoy with a charming sophisticated man. She ended up being tied to a bed in a rat-infested hovel and used as an ashtray. Sick bastard.”
But Riley was dead. No other young girls would have to suffer at his hands, thank God.
“What about Riley’s business? Was that all it was cracked up to be?”
“Yes. Apart from the obvious, he was clean.” Frank said. “Probably due to bad experiences with his mother as a child, he despised women. He charmed them, promised them the earth, and the fact that they fell for it infuriated him. He had to hurt them. Sexually, he couldn’t manage anything unless he could see his victim in pain. The videos the sick bastard made were stored on a computer he used for nothing else.”
Dylan shuddered. Riley would have ended up in a mental institution but it was better for all concerned that Kennedy—Sir Angus Holmes—had made that unnecessary.
“It’s bloody frightening,” Frank said, “how he could charm the girls so easily until they were ready to drop at his feet. One video shows him removing a huge diamond ring from Caroline Aldridge’s finger.”
Caroline would have been easy prey. The poor kid had been born to selfish parents who didn’t give a damn about her. Her father had walked out when she was three, and there had been a succession of “uncles” until Taylor had married her mother. Riley, with his charm and his money, must have seemed like a fairy-tale hero to her. It was probably the first time she’d felt special and loved. Bastard. Caroline’s future hadn’t looked bright, but at least she’d had a future until Riley stole it from her.
“Years ago,” Frank said, “a friend’s young lad was asking me about my work as a copper. He’d have been about five or six years old at the time. He wanted to know how I’d fill my time when all the bad people had been caught. Christ, if only it were that simple. You think you’ve seen it all and then an evil bastard like Riley comes along.” He toyed with a cardboard beer mat. “I suppose you have to look on the bright side and know that countless girls have been saved from going through what poor Caroline and others went through.”
Frank was right. Nothing could make up for the cruel hand that fate had dealt Caroline, but others had been saved.
“I saw Leah last week,” Dylan said. “She seemed to be doing okay, but it was her birthday and her parents had gone overboard. A brand-new Mini, and driving lessons booked. The poor kid looked terrified. She’s got some therapist looking after her who, thankfully, suggested that the lessons be booked with a female instructor. Even so, it’s going to be a long time before she gets over Riley.”
“Bastard.”
Total bastard.
“I saw the not-so-lovely Doll too,” Dylan said. “I thought at the very least she’d been having an affair with John Taylor. Well, actually I thought she and him were involved in the girls’ disappearances. But no. It seems that son Gary had big gambling debts. He lost ten grand to Taylor in a poker game, and knowing he didn’t have the cash, and knowing his dad would kill him if he found out, he sent Doll to sort it out. Mind you, Doll probably offered payment in sexual favours.”
Frank pulled a face. “What a horrible thought.”
Dylan smiled. “Sorry. I’ll get us another round of drinks in and then we’ll order food, shall we?”
Frank glanced at his watch. “Good idea. I’ve got a couple of hours yet.”
Whoever said men couldn’t multitask was wrong. Dylan could order drinks and worry about what Bev had to face at the same time. He could wonder why the barmaid was smiling as if the world was her own personal playground and worry about Bev at the same time. He could carry drinks back to the table, ask Frank about the investigation and worry about Bev at the same time.
“Let’s have some lunch, Frank. I’m starving.”
* * *
After walking to the station with Frank and watching the train set off on its way to Dawson’s Clough, Dylan went to his office. He’d spent precious little time in it lately, but he had to. They had no idea how long Bev’s treatment would last or how her body would cope with it, and he needed to set aside some cash. He needed a few well-paying jobs.
He’d turned down two jobs in the past week. It had been easy to tell himself he’d been too busy finding Angus’s grandson, but the reality was that both jobs had involved spying on suspected errant spouses and he simply hadn’t been able to face it. Why couldn’t couples talk to each other and, more important, be honest with each other? If they wanted to enjoy affairs, why couldn’t they have the guts to admit to them?
He shuffled some papers around. He pinned a few receipts together. Given a little more enthusiasm, he could have put his accounts in some sort of order, but it was a job he hated. There would be plenty of time to panic when his accountant phoned to say it was time to submit a tax return.
He gazed out the window at the café on the opposite side of the road. Trade was brisk. People had little better to do than take a break from shopping to enjoy a coffee and a muffin.
His office phone trilled out and he snatched at it. Please God let it be a well-paying job. An interesting job. Let it be something to take his mind off Bev and the future they faced.
“Mr. Scott? Dylan Scott?”
“Yes. How can I help?”
“It’s payback time.”
He picked up a pen, ready to jot down pertinent details. “Sorry? Who is this?”
“You’re going to die, Dylan Scott.”
Before Dylan could say they were all going to die, the connection was cut.
There was no clue as to which particular idiot had made the call. The number had been withheld.
Bev had answered three strange phone calls. No one had said anything but she’d been convinced someone was on the other end. Coincidence?
“Sod it.” Dylan grabbed his jacket from the back of his chair and shrugged it on.
He didn’t have time to worry about crank calls. He was going home. Home to his wife and kids. Home to whatever the future was about to throw at them.
* * * * *
Detective Dylan Scott is surrounded by mystery.
See how it all began with the first three books
in the series, available now!
Dying Art
Dylan Scott vowed never to return to the dreary town of Dawson’s Clough. But one visit from a
beautiful ex-lover and he’s back in Lancashire, investigating a possible murder. The police think Prue Murphy died during a burglary gone wrong, but her sister isn’t so sure—and neither is Dylan. After all, the killer overlooked the only valuable thing in Prue’s flat.
So who could have wanted the quirky young woman dead, and why? Dylan’s search for answers takes him to France, where he discovers Prue’s family didn’t know her as well as they thought they did. And the more he digs, the more secrets he unearths—secrets someone would kill to keep buried...
Dead Calm
Detective Dylan Scott thinks cruising well above the Arctic Circle in November is nothing short of madness. He has zero interest in seeing the elusive aurora borealis, but agrees to the Norwegian holiday to keep his wife and mother happy. At least the biggest problem he’ll have to deal with is boredom. But that boredom quickly dissipates when the unpleasant elderly woman in the neighboring cabin is found dead.
Everyone thinks Hanna Larsen had a heart attack. Everyone except Dylan. Dylan is convinced there’s a killer aboard the Midnight Sun—a killer who may strike again...
Silent Witness
After his ex-wife bled to death in a bathtub covered in his fingerprints, the case against Aleksander Kaminski seemed open and shut. Though sentenced to life in prison, he swears he’s innocent, a claim supported by his current wife.
Private investigator Dylan Scott finds himself drawn back to dreary Lancashire in a search for justice. The evidence against Kaminski is damning, but having been unjustly jailed himself, Dylan is compelled to pursue the case; if there’s even a small chance the man is innocent, he has to help. The other obvious suspect—the victim’s second husband—has a watertight alibi. But Dylan has a strong hunch that as usual, there’s more going on than meets the eye in Dawson’s Clough.
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Deadly Shadows (A Dylan Scott Mystery) Page 31
