Darren was like that. When the limelight wasn’t shining down on him, he got sulky. Oliver contemplated returning home and quickly changed his mind. Mum would only have more questions, and that wasn’t something he wanted to face right now.
Sucking in a breath, he turned toward the woods, and the path that wound back through the tall trees. He’d done this journey so many times before. This time would be no different.
Oliver adjusted his sling and started down the path. Just a short ten minutes and he would be at Darren’s. It was simple... And there was absolutely nothing for him to fear.
Chapter Eighteen
Melissa caught up to Drew in the hallway as he tried to slip away without the others noticing him. “Where are you off to?”
“I’ve got stuff to do,” he said evasively. Ignoring the curiosity in Melissa’s eyes.
“No, you don’t,” she said confidently.
“And you would know this how?” Drew said dryly, pausing in the hall as he slipped his coat on.
“Because I know you, Haskell. You haven’t changed a bit in all the years I was away. You’re still the same old boring bastard you always were.” There was a teasing note in her voice intended to take the sting out of her words, but there was still a part of Drew that felt the implied barb in her words.
“I didn’t think anybody cared what I did in my personal time,” he said. He cringed at the unintended harshness in his voice and watched as Melissa’s expression shifted to something more contemplative.
“You know I didn’t mean anything by that,” she said. Melissa sighed, and pushed her hand back through her blonde hair, causing it to fall over her face. “Sorry, I know I can be pretty full on. I sometimes forget that my tongue is sharper than a razor blade.” She smiled ruefully up at him, and Drew felt his irritation melt.
“It’s fine. I’m just tired.”
“You’re still not sleeping properly, are you?”
“How did you know?”
Melissa’s cocked an eyebrow at him. “You’re not the first officer to get his bell rung by an offender, Drew. I’ve had my fair share of traumas through the years.” For a split second her expression darkened, but the clouds that had momentarily passed behind her eyes were gone in an instant. “We should grab a drink, share war stories. You know, for old times’ sake.”
A rejection hovered on the tip of Drew’s tongue. It would be easier to turn her down flat, but doing that would mean another evening searching for a place to live.
“All right then,” he said, surprising himself and Melissa. “Just so we’re clear, you’re getting the first round in.”
“Really?” Her brow arched, and a hint of a smile hovered around her mouth. “I’m fine with that. Let me grab my coat, and I’m all yours.” She was gone before he could answer, and Drew wondered if he’d done the right thing. Perhaps it was nothing more than a mistake...
Melissa reappeared before he could change his mind completely. She took one look at his face and shook her head. “No chance, Haskell.”
“What?”
“You’re not worming out of this now. You’re coming, and I’m getting the pints in. Now get a move on.” Playfully, she shoved his shoulder, and Drew smiled despite himself.
“I’m going. I’m going,” he said, laughing, as she continued to shepherd him down the corridor and out of the station.
A short while later, Drew sat at a booth in the Wetherspoons pub at the Angel Hotel in Whitby. Christmas decorations gave the place a festive air, and Drew found the tension in his body slowly unwinding as he leaned back against the dark leather seats. When Melissa had asked him where he wanted to go, this place had stuck out in his mind after his visit to Whitby the weekend before. His search for a new spot to call home had taken him all over, but he’d found himself drawn back to Whitby over and over. Freya would have said it was a sign; he thought it had more to do with liking the fish and chips.
Melissa carried two glasses over to the table and set them down on the dark wooden surface. She pushed the pint of Sharp’s Doom Bar towards Drew, before she slipped into her seat opposite him.
“So, is this your local?” She glanced around, taking in their surroundings with a keen eye as she shrugged out of her dark jacket.
“Not exactly,” he said, eyeing the drink. He could already imagine how it would taste. The cold, lightly roasted malt flavour would drift over his tongue, and quench his thirst easily. “What is that?” He asked, raising an eyebrow at Melisa’s pale yellow pint.
“Cordial,” she said. “Lime, actually.” Noting the incredulous expression he wore, she shrugged. “I’m on-call.”
“Fair enough.” Clearly something had changed since he’d last known Melissa. When they’d been younger, she hadn’t exactly been the most responsible, and the number of times he’d had to confiscate her keys, and call a taxi just to stop her driving drunk had been too numerous to count. In the intervening years she’d spent in Southampton, something had obviously changed to break her of that nasty habit. But Drew knew better than to press her on it. If she wanted to tell him what had happened, she would do it in her own time.
“You still having nightmares?” Drew almost choked as she blurted out her question.
“Nightmares, what makes you think that?” He coughed to cover his surprise at her insightful questioning.
“Like I said back at the station, you’re not the only one who has run afoul of a bastard who wants to wear your guts for garters.” There was a raw edge to her voice that Drew couldn’t ignore.
“What happened to you?”
Melissa shook her head and glanced down at the roughly scarred surface of the table. “I’ve put it behind me now. It was a long time ago. I even went and had some counselling.”
Drew felt his eyebrows creep up his forehead in surprise. “You really have grown, haven’t you?”
Melissa screwed her face up and stuck her tongue out before she took a sip of her drink. “This stuff really is disgusting.”
Drew laughed, the sound rumbling up through his chest and out through his mouth before he could stop it. It had been so long since he’d laughed so heartily, and he felt a little rusty at it. He choked off self-consciously.
Lifting his gaze, he met Melissa’s contemplative expression. “It feels like an age since I heard you laugh so freely,” she said.
“It feels the same for me,” he said honestly. It didn’t exactly surprise him that he was being so honest with Melissa, she’d always had that effect on him. The ability to slip beneath his barriers and needle her way through to the heart of his problems. It was a skill, and one he wasn’t always pleased she’d mastered. “God, listen to me. I sound like some sort of old fool.”
“Nah,” she said abruptly. “Tell me how you got working with the head shrinker?”
Drew shrugged, awkwardness made it difficult for him to form the words. It felt wrong somehow to sit here and talk about Harriet behind her back. “She helped me with a case.”
“And what, she was just so good you kept going back for more?”
If it had been anyone else, Drew might have thought there was an inappropriate undertone to the question, but because it was Melissa, he shrugged. “Something like that.”
She shook her head, her blonde hair falling forward onto her face, concealing her from view as she studied the tabletop. “I’ve never understood that, you know,” she said. “The fascination with psychologists. I mean, yeah, they’re fine. And I’m not saying your psychologist isn’t smart, but what we do... well, it doesn’t need outside interference. We’ve always managed just fine without others sticking their nose in where it didn’t belong.”
Drew shifted in his chair defensively; just what was Melissa getting at? “You just don’t know Harriet, that’s all. If you knew her the way I did, you’d see she was an asset to the team.”
Melissa raised her hands in surrender. “I’m not arguing with you, Drew.”
“Then what are you saying?”
&n
bsp; She shrugged with one shoulder. “I’m just telling you to be careful is all. These things have a tendency to go tits up fast. The team is too new to handle any kind of bad press.”
Drew gripped his pint tightly. He could see her point, but he couldn’t bring himself to agree with her. Harriet was different, he was convinced of that. He needed to convince the rest of them of the same thing.
“I’m sure I just need to get to know her,” Melissa said abruptly. “Pay no mind to me, Drew. You remember what I’m like, always diving in where angels fear to tread.” She smiled winningly at him and raised her pint of lime towards his. “Here’s to working together again.”
They clinked glasses, and Drew studied her surreptitiously as she set the glass down and tucked her hair behind both ears. She seemed uneasy, as though something had changed between them. When she glanced up at him, Drew smiled to set her at ease.
“Do you remember how we left things?” the question came out so abruptly that Drew found himself suddenly in the spotlight.
“Well, yeah—I mean, I guess so.”
She nodded. “I wish we hadn’t just let it all go like that.”
His tongue felt thick in his mouth making it difficult to form words. Melissa smiled sadly. “You like her don’t you?”
“Who?”
“The head-shrinker…”
Drew’s phone vibrated, and he jarred his pint, causing the liquid to slop over the sides onto his fingers. “Shit,” he said gruffly, as he reached inside his jacket with his free hand.
“Saved by the bell,” Melissa said. Her brow crinkled as she pulled her own phone from her pocket and glanced down at the screen.
“It’s a message from the DCI,” she mouthed at him, as he lifted the phone out.
“The Monk is ringing me,” Drew said, answering the call before he pressed the phone to his ear.
“Something has come up,” the DCI said. “I know you’re off for the evening, but this isn’t something I can give to just anyone.”
Drew pushed his untouched pint away. “What do you need from me?”
“I want you and DI Appleton to head over to Darkby, it’s a small village near Thornton Dale. A woman has just reported her son missing. I’ve sent all the pertinent information to DI Appleton, and you should have the same once you get off the line.”
“How old is he?” Drew felt a hollow pit open in his stomach. Kids were never easy, especially missing kids. Emotions ran high, and when the shit hit the fan things tended to spiral out of control far too quickly.
Gregson sighed. “Just gone eleven.”
Drew watched the colour drain from Melissa’s face as she scanned the message she’d received. He pushed onto his feet, and she followed suit. “We’re not far away, sir,” Drew said.
“We?” the monk asked. “Is Dr Quinn there with you?”
“No, DI Appleton is,” Drew said, keeping the irritation from his voice. The way everybody else behaved, you’d swear he and Harriet were joined at the hip. “Should I call in Dr Quinn, sir?”
“I’ll do that,” Gregson said. “You just concentrate on getting to the house ASAP.” The line went dead before Drew could say another word.
“The preliminary report suggests the kid has been missing for four hours,” Melissa said, as she tugged her car keys from her pocket. “You want to come in my car?”
Drew nodded. “Fine by me,” he said. “That way I can get us up to speed on the details.”
Melissa’s expression was businesslike, as she led the way out of the Angel pub and across the road to where she’d left the car in the Sainsbury’s car park. “I hate when it’s kids,” she said through gritted teeth as she tugged the car door open.
It had started to rain since they’d gone inside, and Drew could feel the rain as it trickled down the inside collar of his jacket. He waited until they were both in the car before he answered her. “He’s probably just stayed out too late, and forgot to call his mum,” Drew said. It was a simple answer, but there was a part of him that just didn’t believe it. He glanced down at the email he’d just received with the details of the case so far. There was no doubt in his mind that Oliver Poole’s mother had exhausted every avenue before calling the police. After all, a missing child was every parent’s worst nightmare, and most parents that Drew knew would have moved heaven and earth before admitting their child had become a devastating statistic.
“I hope so,” Melissa said, as she gunned the engine. The tyres squealed on the wet tarmac before they caught traction. “But when are we ever that lucky?”
Drew didn’t answer her, because the answer was far too depressing to admit out loud. Instead, he pulled his seatbelt across his chest and scrolled through the email as they drove through the darkness.
Chapter Nineteen
Harriet perched in the chair opposite DCI Gregson’s desk. He’d been oddly cordial to her, and it had set her senses on high alert.
“Why I really invited you here, well it’s a delicate matter,” he sighed and puffed out his doughy cheeks, seemingly incapable of meeting her direct gaze. He kept his eyes trained on the open set of files laid out before him.
“We haven’t had the easiest of beginnings,” Harriet said. “But I think the track record of my working with DI Haskell speaks for itself.” Harriet fought the urge to fold her arms over her chest. The DCI didn’t need to know just how defensive she felt. “I know the previous DCI wasn’t my biggest fan.”
Gregson’s laugh was mirthless, and he glanced up from the files. “I think you and I know that’s an understatement. He might have agreed to take you on because of the pressure coming down from on high, but he was happy when you turned him down.” Gregson shook his head. “Why do you think he left Haskell high and dry?”
Harriet hid her surprise behind a bland smile. She’d known the DCI didn’t like her, but she hadn’t known that he’d deliberately left Drew out of the loop in order to guarantee she wouldn’t agree to working with the team. It was beyond petty, but Harriet could also understand—at least on some level—why he’d wanted nothing to do with her.
“It was safer for him to keep you out of the loop, that way nobody knew his business, or exactly what he was up to.” Gregson sighed and shook his head. “Damn waste if you ask me.”
“You don’t agree with his actions?” Harriet quirked an eyebrow as she leaned back in the chair.
“He was off his bloody rocker. We’re not in the business of taking the law into our own hands here, Dr Quinn. If we were, there’d be a lot fewer scumbags taking up precious space in our prisons.” He cut off, and the tension he was carrying seemed to melt away. “And while I know my team are more than capable of handling anything that gets sent our way, I’m not so narrow-minded so as not to realise we’re better with you on board.” Colour spread up through his face, and Harriet had a feeling that his admission had cost him something.
“I appreciate that,” she said, a lump forming the back of her throat. Praise from somebody as hard-headed as DCI Gregson was praise indeed, and that fact was not lost on Harriet.
“Don’t thank me yet,” he said gruffly. “If you try to damage this team--”
“I wouldn’t dream of it,” Harriet said archly.
“If you bring us unnecessary scrutiny from the press, and it interferes with our ability to do our job, I will consider that damaging to the team.”
“I have no interest in the press,” Harriet said, an uneasy knot forming in the pit of her stomach.
He studied her for a moment, his gaze searching her face. Whatever he saw there must have satisfied him, because he shrugged, and glanced down at the desk. “Then let’s try to keep it that way,” Gregson said.
“I think I’ve got a right to know what has brought this on,” she said, tightening her grip on the arms of the chair.
“Suffice to say, not everybody is a fan of yours, Dr Quinn. And while that should be your business, I’ve got a feeling it will not play well for this team. So long as I know you’re
serious about your position here, and that you won’t intentionally endanger the team, or the work we do, then I’m willing to stand behind you.”
Harriet narrowed her eyes. “There’s something you’re not telling me,” she said.
“Your friend Dr Connors is not your biggest fan, is he?”
Harriet felt her mouth go dry, and her throat constricted. “What has Jonathan got to do with my working with the task force?”
“I’ve got a contact in the press, and she has informed me that your mentor plans to write a tell all story about you, and the work you do with the police.” Gregson’s gaze was hard and penetrating, and Harriet tried not to wilt beneath the weight of the accusation in his voice.
“Why would he do that?” Her voice was strangled, and she coughed to clear her throat. Gregson was a man of action, he wouldn’t take too kindly to seeing her flaunt any kind of weakness in front of him.
“You know him best, only you have the answer to that,” Gregson said, not unkindly. “But I want you to think long and hard about this; have you shared any kind of operational information with him?”
Harriet blinked rapidly. “I would never share sensitive information with him.”
Gregson glanced down at the desk. “Not even when you thought he was your ally?”
Harriet’s stomach lurched uncomfortably. There was a time when she’d believed Jonathan was a friend, when she’d confided professionally in him. He’d quickly shown his true colours, but had she told him enough to endanger any of the cases she’d worked on? Harriet pressed her hand against her head, as a headache formed behind her eyes.
“Are you all right, Dr Quinn?”
Hunting the Silence: The Yorkshire Murders (DI Haskell & Quinn Crime Thriller Series Book 4) Page 10
