by Anita Waller
‘We are.’
‘Good. I’ll get you that coffee.’
She returned a quarter of an hour later and handed over the coffee. ‘All quiet?’
‘Yes, ma’am. She only has you and her nan for visitors.’
‘It’ll get livelier,’ Kat smiled. ‘I understand Beth has two housemates who are itching to come to see her, but her nan has said no, not until she’s stronger. She’s getting stronger every day, so I reckon maybe tomorrow you’ll be having extra visitors.’
‘Are they pretty?’
Kat laughed. ‘Never met them, but if they’re anything like Beth, I’d say they’re stunning.’
‘Good. That’ll liven things up.’
‘You’re cheeky,’ Kat said, as she pushed through to Beth’s room.
Beth was still sleeping, but restless. Her head kept moving from one side to the other and Kat hoped she wasn’t experiencing a nightmare, one she couldn’t get out of.
She watched the bruised and battered face as she ate her sandwich, wondering whether to wake her; she was clearly in a stressful situation. Eventually she gave in, and touched Beth’s arm.
Her eyes flew open and the look of terror on her face was chilling.
‘Beth, Beth – wake up,’ Kat whispered softly, and Beth’s huge eyes turned towards her.
‘Oh God, Kat. It was so scary. He was making me clean up Anthony’s brains and blood.’
‘Who was, Beth?’
‘The taxi driver. I know him.’ She clutched on to Kat’s hand. ‘I just can’t remember why, yet.’
Kat stood and reached for a glass of water. ‘Have a sip of this. It’ll help you calm down.’
Beth sipped at the water and then gave a huge shudder. ‘I feel better now. It was just a nightmare.’
They sat quietly for a moment, and then Beth spoke quickly, as if she needed to get the words out before she lost her courage.
‘I won’t be doing it any more. It’s going to have to come out if they ever find out who killed Anthony – the escort bit, I mean. And that’s going to kill Nan. No amount of money is worth upsetting her.’
‘Do your housemates know?’
‘They know about the escort side, because they see me dressed up for the parties and stuff I go to, but they don’t know I charge for the overnight stays.’
‘Then why should it come out? If it ever does get to court, they can suggest what you were doing with Jackson, but all you have to say is that you just got on really well, you’re both consenting adults, and you had jointly decided to spend the night together. That’s not a crime, it’s quite a natural thing to do. Nobody else is going to stand up in court and admit to sleeping with you for money, are they?’
‘I still won’t be doing it again. The money I’ve stashed away will have to be it, now. I was doing it to raise money for a year’s trip around the world. No amount of money can erase seeing a man’s head blown apart.’
‘Will you be going to your nan’s house when they say you can go home?’
Beth shook her head. ‘Not an earthly. I’ve told them here that’s where I’m going, but somebody left me for dead. They might try again, and I don’t want Nan caught in the fallout from my stupidity. Likewise for the girls. I know it’s my house, but I’ll have to find somewhere else for the moment, somewhere else that nobody knows about. Can I tell you the location, Kat? You know… just in case.’
‘You can come to me. We have plenty of spare room, and Leon won’t mind. I can look after you until you’re fully well, then you can make some decisions. Maybe put your house visibly up for sale, then buy another?’
‘Stay with you? But that puts you in danger.’
‘Nobody will know.’
‘Oh, Reverend Rowe, you’re pretty naïve.’ Beth laughed. ‘But thank you. I’ll take you up on that offer provided your husband has the final say. It’s not fair if I just arrive on your doorstep. And I’ll tell Jo and Millie they’ll have to find somewhere else. They won’t like it, they won’t like me, but they’ll be safe away from the house. And staying with you will only be for as long as it takes me to get another home.’
‘You’ll be convalescent for a while, you’re not going to bounce back from this quickly. And we have lots of security on the house, so your safety won’t be an issue.’
‘Thank you, Kat,’ Beth said quietly. ‘Thank you.’
Leon sat at his desk watching a re-run of the murder of Anthony Jackson. He didn’t recognise anything about the man who had driven the taxi, not his clothes, his height, his stance. He didn’t believe in coincidence; his alleyway had been chosen for this action, but why?
Jackson had been trying for some time to infiltrate his supply area, but not with any conviction. More chancing his arm than anything. They hadn’t even bothered to warn him off, just ignored it. The Rowe/King partnership was solid and fair as long as there was no disruption to the financial side of their business.
Leon secretly admitted to it being something of a surprise that they lived in the same village, and if it hadn’t been for Kat wanting to play Miss Marple, he wouldn’t have known. Which brought him back in a roundabout way to his original thought – why kill him in the Rowe Pharmacy alleyway, and not his own home? Five more minutes and the taxi would have been on Jackson’s driveway.
Was there some reason they didn’t want him found for a while? And they must have known a pharmacy would have CCTV on all external doors. They certainly couldn’t have known it would be himself and Kat who would make the gruesome discovery, so who would normally have made it?
Neil.
Was that a clue? How would Neil finding them help anybody? He was a very minor player in the darker side of the business, and a reluctant one at that. Blackmail kept him in line and if he’d found them, his first reaction would have been to ring Leon before sending for an ambulance. He did nothing without permission.
Leon was sure Neil wasn’t in the mix.
Maybe the plan didn’t involve anybody finding them quickly. Whoever wanted them dead knew of the alleyway; they wanted to make sure they were dead by leaving them overnight with no assistance. That had to be it. The alleyway was a perfect place to dump bodies.
Leon rubbed his eyes. It was bloody ridiculous. Maybe he needed to go to the hospital with Kat, see what this Beth woman had to say. Perhaps she could throw some light on why it had happened where it had, although he rather suspected she was an innocent in all of this. According to Kat, the girl had only met Jackson for the first time that night.
He stood and paced around the room, his mind churning. He needed more protection around him. Just for a short while, until things settled down and he felt more secure.
Kat handed Leon the poached eggs on toast, and sat down opposite him. ‘I’ve something to tell you.’
‘Is it serious?’ he asked, trying to cope with the egg yolk going everywhere.
‘Yes. I’ve asked Beth to come and stay with us for a few weeks when she gets out of hospital.’
He looked up. ‘Oh, that is fairly serious.’
‘I know, but she can’t go home. She’s worried that whoever thought he was leaving her for dead will still want her that way, so she can’t go to her nan’s house, that would put Mrs Lester in danger. Beth has her own house where she was living with two housemates before this happened, but she’s now going to ask them to leave, to protect them, and she’s putting it on the market. She intends buying a new one, so she could potentially be here until she finds that new one.’
Leon put down his knife and fork. ‘Kat Rowe, if ever I’m in trouble, will you be my guardian angel?’
‘That goes without saying.’ She grinned. ‘So you’re not mad with me?’
‘For looking after somebody? I should think not. When will she be coming? And are you happy with our security?’
‘I should think she’ll be here in two or three days. She’s on the mend. And I think we’re secure enough but you’re the expert. Are we?’
‘Can she handle a
gun?’ Leon’s face was serious.
‘I wouldn’t have thought so. Luckily we don’t have one.’
‘Then she’d better learn quick. There will be a gun in this house if Beth Walters is in it. Deal-breaker, Kat.’
Kat let out a whoosh of air, and Leon returned to the problem of his rapidly cooling eggs on toast.
‘But…’ Kat could feel a stammer coming on. ‘But where would we keep the damn thing?’
‘Where will Beth be? In the sunshine room?’ The guest room was yellow and lifted the spirits gloriously.
Kat nodded.
‘Then it will be in the bedside cabinet by the side of her bed, in the drawer.’
Kat recognised defeat. ‘Okay, but don’t expect me to touch it.’
‘You will both sit down with me and I will teach you how to use it safely, and you will touch it. You can’t put your faith in a gun if you’ve never handled one. As I said, it’s a deal-breaker. You’re putting yourself at risk, Katerina, and I love you.’
His use of her full name told her just how serious he was, and she accepted defeat.
‘I give in,’ she said. ‘But as soon as Beth leaves, the gun goes. Do you want to tell me how you know so much about guns?’
‘The gun will go when she leaves. Brian and I used to go to a gun club at Bradwell in our early twenties, used to really enjoy it, but as the business grew we didn’t have time for it any more. I learned a lot though, so I’ll be passing some of that knowledge on to you two,’ he said, dripping some egg on to his shirt. He sighed. ‘And I’ll put a clean shirt on when I’ve finished breakfast.’
‘Erm… you might want to wash your chin as well.’
She stood and walked out of the kitchen feeling slightly shaky. Leon never laid down the law; normally she did pretty much what she wanted, and he would simply give a tolerant smile. But now it seemed he had put his foot down about them having his deal-breaking gun in the house.
A gun! The very thought scared her to bits. She couldn’t see the need, nobody would know Beth was with them, in the little plague village of Eyam. She took her jacket from the cloakroom and returned to plant a kiss on her husband’s head.
‘I’m going for a quiet quarter of an hour in church, and then I’m off to the hospital. Don’t forget to change your shirt.’
‘I won’t. Say a prayer for me.’
‘I always do,’ she retorted. ‘You need all the help you can get.’
If only you knew, Kat, if only you knew. His thoughts followed her out of the door.
She drove to the church and was relieved to see it empty. She was normally happy to see other people there, but she needed her own time with God. She lit one of the small tea lights for Beth and sat down on the front pew.
Kat let her mind roam, drank in the peace of the sanctuary, and left twenty minutes later, feeling refreshed. Although they hadn’t argued, she hated any sort of discord between her and Leon, and for him to be so insistent about an issue was unusual. She climbed into her car, and headed once again for Sheffield, hoping that Beth was getting somewhere near being discharged.
It was a long stressful journey followed by driving around and around an inadequate car park searching for a parking space, and she had the added strain of learning how to use a gun.
It never occurred to her to wonder where Leon was going to get the gun.
7
It was a different officer outside Beth’s room, and Kat handed him a coffee. ‘It’s got milk in, and here’s a couple of packets of sugar. You’ll have to stir it with your pen,’ she grinned at him.
‘Thank you, ma’am. I don’t take sugar anyway.’ He returned her smile.
She went into the room, and Beth was sitting in the chair.
‘Wow! That’s progress! And no drips. You’re feeling better?’
‘I am, much better. They’re talking about letting me go home Friday. Is it still okay for me to go with you?’
‘Of course it is. We’re putting you in what we call the sunshine room, so I’ll leave you to guess what colour we decorated it. It’s a lovely big room, and you take yourself off to it whenever you need to rest. There’s a television in it if you need to watch some mindless daytime stuff. In fact you treat our home as your home.’
Beth visibly relaxed. ‘That’s a relief. I told the doctor I could go to yours, and I think that swung it. He’ll confirm it Friday morning when I’ve had my blood pressure done, but it’s looking good.’
Kat brought a plastic chair around and sat at Beth’s side. ‘I’ll sit here until your nan comes. Does she know you’re coming to me?’
Beth shook her head. ‘Not yet. I’ll tell her later. I’ve spoken to Millie and Jo though. That didn’t go down well. I’ve told them I’m selling up, and there’s no rush to leave until the sale goes through. But it’s a disruption as they start their final year. They came to see me last night. It was a good visit, but I could tell they were worried. We’ve been together for a couple of years now. It did force me to make another decision though. I’m not going back to uni. Maybe sometime in the future I can complete the degree, but I’m a different person. I’ve had to grow up.’
‘Whoosh. That’s a massive decision to make. What will you do for a job?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe my own business. It occurred to me that if I rent a property, I’ll have quite a lot of money. It gives me breathing space to work out what I want to do.’ Beth looked down at her hands.
‘I’m always here if you want to talk through ideas, thoughts, you can be sure of that.’
‘Thank you, Kat. I feel especially close to you, and I can’t say enough how grateful I am that it was you who saved me.’
‘I didn’t save you. The ambulance people did that. I simply found you and covered up your knickers.’ She smiled.
‘Covered up my knickers?’
‘They were on full view. Your beautiful dress was somewhere around your neck when I found you.’
Beth blanched. ‘Oh God, I wasn’t…?’
‘I don’t think so. Your knickers were in place, as was your bra. I think you slid down the rubbish bags in your silk dress. They saw the taxi arrive, the two gunshots, and the taxi leave. He clearly thought he’d killed you. Every part of the attack was on CCTV, and at no time was there any sexual assault.’
Relief was obvious on Beth’s face. ‘The police came again to talk to me after you’d gone yesterday, but I think they’ve given up on me. I can’t tell them anything. A DI Marsden left me with her card, in case anything does come back to me, but if it does I’ll be more inclined to follow it up myself.’
‘No.’ Kat spoke firmly. ‘We discuss everything. If you start with the vigilante stuff, I’ll put you in the cellar and not the sunshine room.’
‘You got a cellar?’
‘No.’
‘Okay. But if I remember anything, I promise I’ll tell you. There’s something so near to the edge of my memory…’
‘Don’t force it,’ Kat said. ‘It’ll be there when you least expect it. And then we’ll discuss talking to this policewoman.’
‘You shouting at me?’
‘I seem to be. You’re turning out to be pretty feisty, Beth Walters. Pack it in. or I’ll go back and blow out your candle.’
‘What?’
‘I had some time in church this morning, and I lit a candle for you. It can be blown out.’
Beth’s peal of laughter reverberated around the room. ‘Katerina Rowe, you’re a star. I’ve never had a candle lit for me before today.’
‘Tomorrow I might light three. You need all the help you can get,’ Kat said with a grin. ‘How did you know my name was Katerina?’
‘Nan told me.’
‘So shall we talk about your name? Mouse?’
Beth laughed. ‘My family have always called me Mouse. I’ve seen my baby photos, and the name definitely fitted. It’s kind of stuck.’
‘It’s lovely. Shows how loved you are. You have much family?’
‘My m
um’s sister and her family live in Broadstairs… you know, Kent.’
Kat nodded.
‘That’s about it. There’s just Nan and me in Sheffield now. It’s fine, and Nan is going to live forever. She says so. And now I have you. I feel happily close to you. We’re Kat and Mouse!’ She grinned at Kat as she said the words.
‘It’s possibly survivor syndrome.’
‘Survivor syndrome? What’s that?’
‘It’s when you connect with the person who saved you.’
‘You said you didn’t save me, the ambulance men did.’ Beth’s face was triumphant.
‘I saved your blushes. I saved you being ogled by every man there. Matching dress and knickers indeed.’
They dissolved into laughter just as the lady pushing the tea trolley opened the door.
Kat stood. ‘I’ll leave you in peace, Beth. Enjoy your cuppa, and God bless.’
She reached the door and Beth spoke. ‘Kat… call me Mouse.’
Tessa Marsden read through the scant few statements they had collected. Leon Rowe, Katerina Rowe, and the victim herself, Bethan Walters. There was nothing to help in any of them. Marsden needed Bethan to gain some more memory, to give them just one little clue to follow, but so far there had been nothing.
The CCTV from outside Steel had showed them arriving in a taxi with two other passengers. They had been chatting and laughing, so they clearly knew each other. Half an hour later, Jackson and Walters were seen getting into another taxi and driving off, and that was it. If they could track down the two people, maybe they could shed some light on the subject.
Marsden picked up the large picture the tech lads had printed from the CCTV, and put it in a folder before leaving the office. ‘Hannah! We’re going out and you’re driving.’
‘We’re going to Steel?’ Hannah asked.
‘We are if we can get through this bloody traffic,’ her boss grumbled.
‘Will it be open? It’s only three o’clock.’
‘Somebody will be there. They have to get ready for tonight, don’t they?’
