Two Little Boys: DI Ted Darling Book II

by L M Krier

  Find a new safe place. Another memory, he desperately told himself. That fleeting moment when he had Green down on his back. The feeling of total control, at last. In his head he saw every move he had made, in slow motion, analysing every part of the tackle which had succeeded.

  Slowly, he pulled back from the feeling of total panic and despair until he was in some degree of control of himself. He opened his eyes, swallowed his tea, and released the pause button.

  There was not much more to see. Danielson's erection, when it finally appeared, was fleeting, far too short-lived to do anything with. He released the boy from the handcuffs and bundled him back into his clothes. He then took a banknote out of his wallet to give to the boy, then all but pushed him out of the door. Then the film ended.

  The room looked similar to the one Ted had seen, both in the stills he had looked at earlier and when he visited the hotel. He would need to look again to be absolutely sure, and to take stills of this film with him for comparison. But it seemed as if they had the first of their evidence to hook one of the bigger fish.

  * * *

  Ted was looking forward to spending time with Willow that evening. It would be nice to have some human contact, with Trev away. He hoped she could give him some advice on what he should do to get him back.

  Willow arrived punctually, laden with Chinese takeaway bags containing a generous banquet for two. 'I hope you like Chinese,' she said, 'there's an awful lot of it.'

  'Love it,' Ted assured her, helping her to unpack and producing plates and chopsticks. He was always amazed at how much Willow could eat. She was a model, tall, with impossibly long, slim legs. Her slender figure was sporty rather than skeletal, kept that way by her passion for badminton, tennis, swimming, riding, skiing, and lots of other outdoor activities. There was never any sign that she had to starve herself into shape.

  Willow greeted each of the cats by name and was rewarded by a chorus of purrs. 'I was so sorry to hear about poor little John,' she said. 'I know Trev was absolutely devastated.'

  'I let him down, didn't I?' Ted asked her, as they sat down and began to eat. 'I should have been here more for him. Will he come back?'

  'Oh, Ted,' she said fondly, laying a hand on one of his. 'Of course he will, you silly man. He loves you. He's just finding it all a bit hard to cope with at the moment. He needs to go off and spread his wings a bit.'

  To his shame, Ted found his eyes filling with tears of relief at her words. To change the subject he said, 'I'm glad he's having some fun. He's travelled and lived abroad a lot, that's why he's so good at languages. His father's a diplomat, I don't know if you know that.'

  Willow put her chopsticks aside for a moment and took his hand. 'Ted, Trev is the absolute soul of discretion. He would never talk about your work or your relationship or anything like that. The only thing he has mentioned is that you're having bad nightmares. I just wonder if perhaps you rely too much on him for support, and if you should think about getting some professional help for whatever it is that's troubling you.'

  Ted's expression was anguished. He knew she was right. Trev had been his rock for the eleven years they had been together. His absence showed how much Ted needed him. No matter how desperately he wanted him back, Ted was still not sure he could find the courage to confront his demons with someone else.

  CHAPTER Thirty-seven

  As soon as he got a spare moment to himself at work the following morning, Ted got out his mobile to call his good friend and former boss, Jim Baker.

  Jim answered on the second ring, his familiar voice growling, 'Morning, Darling.'

  'Morning, Super,' Ted responded, their age-old joke working at last, now that Jim had finally climbed the career ladder to make Superintendent, after seeming to be stuck at DCI for years.

  'I was just going to call you, Ted,' Jim told him, before Ted could speak. He gave a small laugh which sounded embarrassed. 'The thing is, I've started this online dating lark. I've met someone I quite like and I wanted to ask your advice on inviting her round here and, well, just on how to go on from there, basically.'

  It was Ted's turn to laugh. 'You want to ask my advice on how to start a heterosexual relationship? Some mistake, surely?'

  'You're just so good with people, though. Everyone likes and respects you. I just wanted to know your secret.'

  Ted's short laugh this time was bitter. 'Not everyone, Jim. Trev's left me.'

  'What?' Jim asked incredulously. 'Are you serious? But you two were always so solid.'

  'I think the fashionable phrase is “taking time apart”. What it amounts to is Trev's in Berlin and I'm here, and he's not returning my calls.'

  'God, Ted, I'm so sorry. Is that what you wanted to talk to me about?'

  'Partly,' Ted said hesitantly. 'It's just … I really need to talk about some stuff. I wondered if you would listen and maybe advise me?'

  'Of course! Hell, you've listened to me crying on your shoulder often enough over the years. It's the least I can do, though I can't promise my advice will be any good. Do you want to come round tonight?'

  'Can't tonight, it's the kids' self-defence club and my judo session. With Trev away, I can't let the kids down, now more than ever,' Ted told him. 'What about tomorrow?'

  'Tomorrow's fine. I'll cook something. I'm practising, for this date. You can tell me honestly whether it's edible.'

  'Could we perhaps …' again Ted hesitated. 'Do you fancy going for a walk?'

  'A walk?' Jim sounded appalled at the prospect, as if it was an indecent proposal. 'I'm not much of a walker. If you want to be outdoors, we could perhaps go to a pub with a beer garden?'

  'Too crowded. I'm just not very good at talking about this stuff anywhere, and I honestly can't do it indoors.'

  'Sounds ominous. We could perhaps sit in the garden? ' Jim said tentatively. 'It's not overlooked and the neighbours won't hear anything. The old couple on one side are stone deaf and the young couple the other side are almost always out If they're not, they have their music on so loud I sometimes have to go round there with my policeman's hat on, to get them to turn it down.'

  They left it at that. Ted wondered if by tomorrow evening he would find the courage to talk. He had never spoken to anyone other than Trevor about the horrors that he constantly tried to blot out of his mind. But he realised that Willow was right. He needed to get himself sorted out if ever Trev was to come back and their relationship was to survive.

  He would usually have been able to work off the tensions at his judo session, after the self-defence club. But there was no one at the club who could match him like Trev did, so any practice session would be tame by his usual standards. Only head coach Bernard could outclass him but he hardly ever took to the mat lately, except to referee, because of a back injury.

  Ted needed to report to the Ice Queen about what he had seen on the video. He also wanted to remind her that he would be leaving in good time that evening because of the club. He was certainly not about to tell her that he and Trev were having difficulties, he just mentioned that his partner had gone to Berlin.

  'So what's the plan now with the chief super?' he asked her.

  'We just have a few more i's to dot and t's to cross and then I think we may be in a strong position to go down there and arrest him, at least on suspicion, on a number of serious charges. I take it you will want to come with me on that one?'

  'I think the response to that, ma'am, would be, with respect, try and stop me,' Ted risked with a grin.

  To his relief, the Ice Queen smiled back. Could there be a slight thawing in her attitude towards him? 'With four black belts, Inspector? I wouldn't dare.'

  Ted had phoned to tell Bernard that Trev was away tonight and to ask him if he could be there from the start for the junior session. Ted was perfectly capable of running the session by himself. However, anyone working with young people lately preferred always to have someone there as a witness, especially in sports where physical contact was unavoidable.

  Flip was
the first to ask where Trev was. Several of the other children were also concerned at the absence of the trainer they all adored. Ted did his best with them but he knew the sparkle was lacking when Trev was not on the mat with them.

  When the kids had finished, Ted was just limbering up eagerly for his own training session when his mobile phone rang from inside his shoes, which he always left just inside the door of the gym. Ted was the only one allowed to disregard the phone ban in the dojo, as everyone from Bernard down knew he was theoretically always on call. He went across to answer the phone.

  It was Kevin Turner. 'Ted, the Ice Queen wants us both in her office, now. I'm on my way to collect you. I know you're at the club and it's on my way.'

  Ted sighed. 'Give me five minutes to shower and change,' he said.

  'No can do. Her Majesty's orders were unequivocal. She wants us there now. I'm two minutes away, see you outside.'

  Ted gave his apologies to Bernard and sprinted for the changing room. He was pleased he'd picked his boat shoes to walk down to the gym that evening, as he could simply slide his feet into them without undoing them. He just had time to drape his towel around his neck and pull on his leather jacket over his judogi, then stuff the rest of his clothes in his holdall.

  Kevin was waiting outside with the car's engine still running. 'She's going to love that look,' he laughed, as he let out the clutch and headed at speed for the station. There was not a copper in the division who didn't know his car so he was in no danger of getting pulled over.

  'I'm not even going to try getting dressed while you drive like a maniac,' Ted replied. 'She'll just have to take me as she finds me, if it really is as urgent as that.'

  To his surprise the Ice Queen was also in civvies, although in her case they comprised impeccably tailored trousers and a soft cashmere sweater. She barely looked twice at Ted's attire. Her face was grim.

  'To lose one witness is unlucky. To lose two, careless,' she began. 'Gentlemen, we are now in the position of having lost three on this one case. I had a call a short while ago. Anthony Ross was stabbed to death in prison earlier today.'

  'How the hell did that happen?' Kevin asked. He had been kept up to speed with Ross's attempts to make a deal in exchange for information. 'Who knew that he was trying for a deal?'

  'That's precisely what I wanted to ask both of you,' she replied, in a tone as icy as her nickname. 'It seems someone smuggled in a weapon, a sharpened piece of plastic so it passed through metal detectors. He was stabbed in the canteen at lunch time. They got him to hospital as fast as possible but he was dead on arrival. So the question, of course, is who knew enough about this whole affair to know what he was planning?'

  'I'm assuming that whoever is at the top of this chain will have been twitchy about the possibility of him trying to buy his own freedom with a deal,' Ted said. 'Perhaps this was just precautionary?'

  'The dateline is too coincidental for my liking,' she said.

  'What about the prison guards who brought him here?' Kevin suggested. 'Could they be in the pay of someone?' Like Ted, he didn't want to think that the leak had come from within their own nick.

  'Ma'am, if my contact is right and we have Spooks sniffing round, then it's no real surprise that they know as much as we do about this whole case,' Ted told her. 'And how do we know that those spying on the bad guys are not also spying on us, the good guys? I hate to sound melodramatic, but is it time to think about our own systems being bugged?'

  'I don't even want to have to think about that possibility,' she said firmly. 'I think, for now, we'll just have to put it down to the prison bush telegraph at its most efficient, or the well known fact that potential paedophiles are not everyone's favourite cell mates. Strange as it may seem, I think we now need to move forward as quickly as possible to bring Chief Superintendent Danielson into custody, for his own sake as much as that of the enquiry.'

  CHAPTER Thirty-eight

  Ted was on edge all next day, fretting about the evening to come and wondering if he would find the courage to talk. He was even uncharacteristically sharp with his team members during the morning briefing, pulling them up short on normal, harmless banter, hating himself when he saw the crestfallen look on young Steve's face in particular.

  He took himself off to his office for much of the time, to hide his growing anxiety and related bad mood. He promised himself he would make it up to the team but for now he was too anxious about the evening to come to be in the right frame of mind to do anything.

  Jim Baker lived in a large Victorian semi-detached, set well back from a tree-lined road in Didsbury. He lived alone but Ted knew he had a cleaner who went in several times a week and the house was spotless and tidy. Ted could see that this was going to be a full dress rehearsal for the coming date. There were vases of fresh flowers everywhere and the table was laid with candles and a small floral arrangement as a centre piece.

  Despite his own anxieties, Ted was keen to give encouragement so he smiled and said, 'That works for me. Yes, I will marry you.'

  Jim laughed uncomfortably. He and Ted had been friends for years but he was still awkward with Ted's sense of humour at times.

  'Would you like a drink? I haven't got any fresh limes but I've got dry ginger and some lime cordial left over from making snowballs at Christmas,' he said.

  Ted was a non-drinker. His usual tipple was a Gunner, a mix of ginger beer and ginger ale with freshly squeezed lime juice. Jim did his best whenever he visited but never quite got the hang of providing for non-drinkers. Ted nodded his thanks.

  'Do you want to eat first or talk first? Jim asked.

  'Eat, definitely. I'm quite hungry and it smells good, whatever you've been cooking up.'

  Jim had made a great effort with the meal. Ted reassured him it would be perfectly acceptable for a first date. He sincerely hoped his old friend might be on the brink of finding someone who would be the soul mate and companion who had been lacking in his life.

  'All you have to do is be yourself, Jim,' Ted reassured him. 'Be honest, don't try to be what you're not. You're a nice man, and no, you're not my type. But seriously, if this woman can't see that, then you're wasting your time, frankly.'

  They lingered at the table over coffee. Ted was dreading the moment when he was going to have to start talking. Despite being built like an American fridge, Jim was surprisingly sensitive. He could see Ted's discomfort and was quite happy to wait until he felt ready to talk. He'd left the French doors from the dining room to the garden open invitingly.

  The garden was Jim's pride and joy and was looking lovely. Living by himself, he spent a lot of time out there, tending the flowers and mowing the lawn. Ted's own gardening skills were confined to growing a few fragrant lilies in pots, safely fenced away from the cats, to whom they were potentially lethal.

  When Ted was still hesitating, Jim picked up the coffee pot and suggested, ' Shall we go outside for a second cup? Might as well make the most of the nice weather.'

  Ted followed him out but couldn't sit down, instead prowling round the small patio area, pretending to look at various flowers, but in fact his mind was far away. Jim gently took his cup and saucer away from him and set it on the table.

  'Whenever you're ready, Ted,' he said quietly. 'No pressure.'

  Ted perched on the edge of a garden chair, leaning forward, looking down. His feet were planted wide apart, clasped hands between his knees. He looked poised for flight at any moment.

  'This case,' he began, clearing his throat. 'I've been finding it difficult. Having nightmares, flashbacks.'

  Jim just sat quietly, letting him talk in his own time.

  'I was raped. When I was a kid, when I first started secondary school,' Ted said finally, looking at the ground.

  'God, Ted!' Jim exclaimed. 'I'm so sorry, I had no idea. Little boys can be such bloody monsters.'

  Ted made a harsh noise which may have been a laugh. 'Not another boy,' he said. 'It was one of the masters. My swimming teacher, David Evans.'r />
  Jim said nothing. He had no idea what he could possibly say. Now Ted had started to talk, he sensed it was best just to sit quietly and let him continue.

  'It was about our second or third time at the baths. We'd just finished the lesson, had our showers, then gone back to our cubicles to change. Evans followed me into mine. He said I hadn't washed properly. He put his hand over my mouth, doubled me over, with my head rammed into a corner so I couldn't move, and raped me. It was brutal, but mercifully quick.

  'I was shocked rigid. I barely managed to get dressed and on to the bus taking us back to school. I had no idea what to do.'

  Ted seemed to have come to a halt, so Jim prompted gently, 'Did you tell anyone? Your family?'

  'My mother had already walked out on us by this time. There was just me and my dad. He had so much to deal with, after he broke his back in the mining accident, and he'd started to drink by then. I didn't want to worry him. He was always so good to me. He paid for all the martial arts lessons so I would never be bullied. When I told him I was gay he just hugged me, told me he loved me and that was that.

  'The next week at the baths, Evans tried the same trick again. He started to follow me into the cubicle. Then I remembered what all the martial arts lessons were about. I kicked him so hard he was off school for three days.

  'After that he never tried anything with me in private, but he made my life a living hell in public. I wasn't a natural swimmer, I was always nervous of the water, so he took delight in throwing me in at the deep end, holding me under water till I thought I was drowning. Sometimes he'd pull off my trunks in the water so I had to run back to the changing rooms in the buff.'

  'Did no one notice and do anything?' Jim asked.

  Again the harsh laugh. 'You know what boys are like, Jim. The others just laughed and mocked, glad it was me getting the hard time and not them. And in those days, there was just him in there with us. It went on like that for two years, then Evans left the school in rather a hurry. I didn't find out why till much later on.