by DC Brockwell
The intercom crackled to life and a pleasant female voice asked who it was.
“Detective Constable Nasreen Maqsood, I have an appointment to meet with Theresa Gaffney,” she answered, hoping she hadn’t got the time wrong.
“Of course, detective,” came the voice. “I’ll buzz you in. We’re on the first floor.”
After the loud buzz, she entered, then walked up two flights of stairs, where there were three doors with company signs stuck on them to choose from. Picking the one with the Gentlemen4U logo on it, she knocked loudly.
A plump lady with dark curly hair and an attractive smile showing perfectly straight white teeth opened the door. “Detective Maqsood?”
She shook hands with the overweight lady. “Theresa?”
The woman stepped out of the way. “Yes, please come in.”
Inside, Nasreen saw how small the office was. There were two desks sat side by side, and both desks had two chairs in front of them, for escorts and/or clients, she guessed. On the walls were shelving units filled with files – stacks and stacks of files. It was a dingy room with only one window behind the desks; it made sense to have the desks where they were, to make the most of the natural light.
“Please, have a seat, detective.”
“Thank you.” Nasreen sat on a chair opposite.
As she waited for Theresa to seat herself, Nasreen noticed that she had a wedding ring on, and that on the wall to her left was a picture of her and her husband on their wedding day. The couple looked very happy.
“An indulgence of mine. I really should have it on my desk, but I like my clients to see I’m quite normal, happily married,” Theresa said. “Now, tell me what you need to know.”
“I’d like to know how all this works. I’m investigating a missing escort and I need to know more about this industry – how it operates, what happens… to gain a better understanding. And I’m not looking into your company or anything like that, so you don’t need to worry.”
“That’s fine, detective.”
“Please, call me Nas,” she said, hating formality. Her culture was very formal, which she’d rebelled against all those years earlier. She accepted British culture, and formality was so stuffy and unnecessary.
The woman nodded. “Okay, Nas, let me show you how it works for us.”
Theresa turned her monitor slightly to give Nasreen a better view. The plump lady then took her through how the website and booking process worked. Once a booking was made, the two parties could communicate through a website-provided email service. Nasreen thought it looked simple enough and she understood why they didn’t need a bigger office.
“This really is all the space we need,” Theresa said, as if reading her mind. “It’s only my partner and I in here. We have enough space to meet new customers and interview new escorts. All the work is done through the website, so there’s no need for lots of admin staff.”
“When you say partner, do you mean your husband? Or…?”
“No, business partner. My husband’s an investment banker.”
Nasreen needed to find out what happened on the actual dates. The website said the company had a strictly no sex policy, but she doubted that was really what happened.
“All I can tell you is that we, as a company, have a no-sex code,” Theresa said when Nasreen asked about it, “which we instil into our escorts from the get-go. Now, if you’re asking me if they disobey this policy… what can I say? Possibly. We don’t ask the details of the dates or keep tabs on our escorts’ whereabouts. If they end up going back to a client’s house and having sex, that’s up to them. They are two consenting adults. But that isn’t to say that we’re complacent about it – if we found out one of our escorts did have sex with a client, we would – under our policy guidelines – be obligated to terminate their employment with us.”
Nasreen could tell that the questioning was bothering Theresa. “Please, I’m not judging you, or the company. This is just fact-finding for me.”
Theresa sat back in her chair.
Deciding to take the conversation away from the day-to-day operations of the business, Nasreen asked, “Do you have the details we spoke about? The two missing escorts?” This was the real reason she’d come to visit.
Without hesitating, Theresa opened a drawer in her desk and pulled out two A4 files. They weren’t terribly thick with paper.
After Theresa had handed the files over, Nasreen opened the first and noted the name: Frederick Matthews. There was a missing persons form underneath his personal details page and she checked the date the report was filed – five and a half years earlier.
“Freddie was a lovely man, a real gentleman,” Theresa said, reminiscing. “The clients went mad for him; he was by far the most sought after of our escorts at the time. Then one day, he just disappeared on us. He went out on a date one night, then he was gone.”
“That’s what happened to Danny,” Nasreen said, then paused, realising that she’d been informal again. “I’m sorry. I’ll be honest with you – Danny’s an ex-boyfriend. He went missing over a fortnight ago and his case fell into my lap. After only a brief investigation, my boss shelved our inquiry, so now I’m investigating unofficially in my spare time.”
She felt Theresa’s palm on her arm.
“You poor thing, that’s awful but not unexpected. The police filed away Freddie’s case after two days too. They said they thought he’d moved away; they said it happens all the time. They checked his home, couldn’t see any evidence of a disturbance… No blood… Nothing like that. They spoke to our client, who said he’d left hers in the early hours, and she was the last person to see him. It was all very sad.”
“So, he wasn’t abducted at home, and neither was Danny. We think Danny was abducted in a park on his way home, in the early hours.”
“There’s a park near to Freddie’s too. The police checked it, apparently, but couldn’t find anything.”
“We found Danny’s blood by accident. Luck on my part, really.”
“They said they’d keep his case open, but nothing happened – just like with Julian fifteen years ago.”
Nasreen shifted the files so the older case was on top, then opened the folder and saw the name: Julian Edwards. He disappeared fifteen years and four months earlier. Again, his body wasn’t found; there was no sign of a disturbance in the home, no evidence of any description. He simply vanished one day.
Theresa explained what happened with Julian’s case. Again, the police came up empty and shelved the investigation soon after commencing it.
“I can’t help but think if they’d been children or teenagers, they’d have tried harder and kept the cases open longer, but because they worked in our industry, they don’t think it’s as important to find them.”
Nasreen noticed that Theresa had said “in our industry” and not “the sex industry”, which they were – it didn’t matter how she dressed it up, Gentlemen4U was still a part of the sex industry. Nasreen didn’t want to antagonise Theresa, however, so she refrained from commenting further.
It had been a very fruitful meeting, and Nasreen now had lots more to work with; she had a gut feeling that these two cases were somehow connected to Danny’s disappearance. Other people might laugh at her – it didn’t mean she was wrong. She was getting closer to finding Danny; she could feel it…
25
Lennox Garvey loved it when Beattie worked late.
She was busy on her computer when he walked in to count the day’s take, and she was wearing a pair of jeans and a very attractive white V-neck long-sleeved top, so low he could see part of her cleavage. Plus, her long red hair was down, splayed over her shoulders. She looked amazing.
This had become his favourite part of the day, especially over the last ten days: he’d seen Beattie most nights that he’d come to pick up the money.
“Evening, Bea,” he said, squeezing her shoulders as he brushed past her.
“Hi!” She turned in her swivel chair. “How’r
e you?”
“All the better for seeing you.” He smiled, setting his suitcase on the floor.
“Aw, you’re such a smoothie,” she said, her smile genuine.
He walked over to the wall safe, entered the code, opened the door, and took out the bundles of cash. When he’d placed the money on the desk, he stood and looked up at the picture of Beattie sitting by the pool. “I love that picture of you, up there.”
Beattie turned her chair and looked up. “Oh, that – seems like a lifetime ago now. Back when I was a hotty.” She said it in a musing kind of way.
“Still are, if you ask me,” he replied, suddenly realising what he’d said.
She smiled up at him. “That’s kind of you to say – you can come back again.”
He had to change the conversation. He was there to do a job, so he should sit down and count the money – stop flirting with the stunning owner of this blood bunker and get on with it. This was how it’d been for the last ten days, flirting with her, and he was sure he hadn’t imagined their moments together. There had been times when she had squeezed his shoulders for a bit longer than she’d needed. She’d even rubbed his hair one night and their eyes had locked twice for a lot longer than was normal.
He had to shake it off. She was married, and more importantly, she was Rothstein’s daughter. Lennox had been warned off her by her raging psychopath of a father, and he knew he had to toe the line; his life depended on it. Taking a deep breath, he sat down and started counting the money while she tapped away on her computer.
Halfway through counting fifties, she leaned back in her chair and stretched, her hand brushing his hair.
“Oh, I’m so sorry,” she said, embarrassed.
She was so close, and he tried not to smell her perfume as he told her to forget about it. Going back to counting the fifties, he focused on what he was doing. Fifty, a hundred, fifty, two hundred.
“Do you fancy a cup of tea?”
He looked up at her.
“I can make you one if you want?”
She was so gorgeous in that low-cut white top and those tight dark blue jeans… He wanted to rip her out of them… Stop it! He shook his head. “No thanks, Bea. I’ll be out of here soon, but I appreciate the offer.”
“You sure? It’s no trouble.”
There was something so sexy about the way she stood looking down at him. And he’d lost count… again. “Really, no thanks.”
He had to finish counting the money before she put him off again, or he’d never leave…
National Crime Agency Officer Steven Dyer had waited for Garvey to drive back down the country lane he’d driven up half an hour earlier. As the road he was on had no lights for miles, it was dark outside, which was good because that meant he would see Garvey’s headlights coming, giving him enough time to switch his motor and own lights off.
He tapped the steering wheel while he listened to a song on the radio. He didn’t know what song it was, not that he was listening. He felt the bass and drummed.
Following Garvey all day had been a laborious task, made all the more painful by pulling a double shift to help out one of his relief team; the officer who was supposed to take over from him couldn’t make it, so Steven had had to call Ashley and let her know he’d be working all night and not to wait up for him. Ashley wasn’t pleased.
He looked at his GPS again, hoping that the dirt track Garvey had driven up would somehow magically appear. It didn’t. Whatever was up there was hidden, a secret from cartographers – who, to be fair, probably didn’t think that whatever it was at the end of the dirt track was important enough to include. Steven was intrigued though.
Without radioing through his actions, he took out a small pair of binoculars, opened his car door, got out, and looked up the road into the darkness. With his eyes adjusting, he could barely make out the opening to the narrow track up ahead.
He hadn’t seen any cars coming along this stretch of road for at least twenty-five minutes; it was the perfect place to have a covert business of some sort, being all quiet and secluded. He was more than a little interested to find out what lay at the top of the track.
With his Glock 17 sitting comfortably on his belt in the middle of his back, Steven felt safe, knowing that if he found trouble, all he needed to do was reach behind him to pull out the gun. He didn’t feel the need to unholster it just yet.
When he found the opening to the dirt track, he followed it…
With her cup of tea in hand, Beattie walked back into the office, where Lennox was still busy counting the money – this time all the twenty-pound notes. She sat back down on her desk chair and blew her cup of tea before taking a sip.
She’d found herself staying late these past few nights. When she’d not been attending functions, she made sure she had plenty to keep her occupied in the office. She really looked forward to Lennox’s visits, clearly a sign she was lonely – not that she ever felt lonely, as such.
Every night she’d been able to, she flirted with him when he visited to pick up the takings, and he had flirted back. They shared stories, laughed, flirted some more, and had even shared a drink or two at the bar on one occasion.
Lennox had phoned her father and told him that he’d bring the takings along in the morning, that he had some important “business” to take care of that was in her father’s best interests. With her husband out for the night at one of his pressing engagements, she and Lennox had stayed up until the early hours talking and laughing. Beattie had enjoyed herself immensely; he was a very interesting man.
She liked him a lot, but more than that… she really liked him; he was so attractive. There was nothing, however, she could do about it. Her father had been very clear what his feelings were on “poking the payroll”, as he put it. It wasn’t good for business, he’d told her on many an occasion.
Sighing, Beattie went back to her computer and looked at her monitor: on the screen was Nasreen Maqsood’s Facebook profile. Francesca hadn’t been wrong when she’d said Nasreen was pretty. She had lovely chiselled cheekbones, a great smile, and going by her muscular physique, she worked out. It even said that her hobbies included kickboxing. There were photos of Nasreen with a young girl – whom she took to be Nasreen’s daughter – and after reading the comments under the photos, she concluded that Nasreen’s daughter was called Mina and that she was four years old.
Beattie felt Lennox’s hands on her shoulders.
“I’m all done, Bea,” he said in his lovely Jamaican accent. “I’ll be back in tomorrow.”
“Okay, honey.” She turned the chair and stood up. “A pleasure, as always.”
There was an awkward silence.
Her eyes locked with his for an uncomfortable amount of time.
Lennox finally broke it off by looking away. “I’ll be off.”
Another awkward silence sat between them.
“Yeah, I’ll see you tomorrow.”
Once he’d left, she closed the door, and leaning against it, banged her head three times. She felt so stupid, like a little schoolgirl. Why was she feeling like this?
Frustrated, Beattie slumped on her chair and went back to her computer.
The more she researched Nasreen Maqsood, the more she felt she needed to manage the situation. After putting Nasreen’s name through Google, she’d sprung up on the screen in the form of several national newspapers covering a police investigation into the serial rapist Nasreen had helped apprehend. She was an up-and-coming detective, and Beattie didn’t want a person like Nasreen looking into Danny’s disappearance.
Picking up the receiver on her landline, Beattie dialled a familiar number. “Walter, when you get back tonight, I’ve got another assignment for you. I know I said I wanted you to find two New Bees, but something important has come up… I’ve got someone I want you to follow…”
Halfway up the dirt track, as he tried to avoid potholes and ditches, Steven Dyer saw the flash of headlights approaching through the trees and bushes.
/> He hid in the bushes while he waited for Garvey’s Shogun to pass, then he waited for two more minutes before walking back onto the path. Fuck! He’d lost his target. He was going to get no end of grief for this. While he was here, he decided he might as well find out what was at the end of the road.
He carried on walking along the uneven road, mindful of any possible vehicles approaching, until he saw lights up ahead. There was a fenced-off farmhouse three hundred metres away, and in the two upstairs floors of the house, the lights were on.
Wanting to get a closer look – and still covered by darkness – he walked around the fencing, hiding in the bushes. He could just about make out a barn in the distance, and from what he could hear, it sounded like someone was coming out of it.
With much difficulty, he tried to observe the person emerging from the barn. He could see it was a woman with long hair, although from this distance – and in this light – it was impossible to make out any distinguishing features. He watched her get closer as she walked towards the large house.
What was Garvey doing here? It looked like a normal farm to Steven, but if Garvey had been here, there had to be a reason. Steven felt, in his gut, that the farm held secrets, and he intended to find out what they were.
After a few more minutes, he decided to head back to his car. He wasn’t looking forward to telling HQ that he’d lost the target. In the grand scheme of things, losing Garvey didn’t matter – they’d always find him again. Steven would tell HQ to look into the farmhouse and find out who owned it. He was positive it was a potential lead…
26
Day 27
Tuesday, 6th February
Nasreen leaned back in her chair and rubbed her face. She was exhausted. Running an unofficial investigation in her spare time was taking its toll on her energy levels; she hadn’t been to a kickboxing session in almost a month; she hadn’t been to her mosque in ten days, and was neglecting Mina, leaving her in the care of their live-in nanny far more than was normal. Nasreen felt guilty about the latter, although she knew – deep down – that it was worth it. At best, she was trying to save Danny’s life. At the very least, she was going to find out what had happened to him.
