Behind the Walls: A British Crime Thriller (A DCI Pilgrim Thriller Book 4)

by A L Fraine

  “Is everything okay? Can I help you?” Skye’s gaze tick-toked back and forth between them and the head.

  “These people want to speak with you privately. I think classroom 3b is free, if you want to take them there.”

  “Oh,” Skye said, as Jon showed her his warrant card.

  “We won’t be long, Miss Simpson. We just have a few questions for you.”

  “Um, okay, sure.”

  “I’ll take over your class,” Mrs Carr said, and then touched Skye on the arm. “If you need some time, it’s okay. We can cover you.”

  “Thanks, but um, I’m sure I’ll be fine.” She looked nervous as she waved them up the corridor. “It’s this way.”

  “Should I be worried,” Skye asked.

  Jon pulled a face. “Do you have anything you think you need to worry about?”

  “Um, no. I don’t think so.”

  “Then probably not.”

  “Okay,” Skye said, and led them into an empty classroom and closed the door behind them. “How can I help you?”

  “Thanks for seeing us,” Jon said, and introduced himself and Kate to her. “We just have a few questions for you related to the case we’re working on and hoped you might be able to help us out.”

  “I’ll try,” she replied.

  “Good, thank you. Let’s dive right in, shall we? Do you know Mark Cooper?”

  She frowned. “What’s this about?”

  Interesting, Jon thought. Rather than just say yes or no, she seemed to get immediately suspicious. He wondered why. “We’re a little concerned and think he might have got himself caught up with something. Do you know him?”

  She took a moment to answer but seemed to come to a conclusion about whatever she was going to say, and took a deep breath. “Yes, I know him. We’ve been friends for years. Why?”

  “His parents are a little worried about him.”

  “Really?” she scoffed at Jon’s statement. “I’d be shocked if they were. They hate him.”

  “Hate him?”

  “Yeah. Just because he’s gay. It’s bloody ridiculous. His dad’s the worst. He’s some kind of fundamentalist freak. It’s sick. How they can throw out and disown their own child like that is disgusting, and you come here saying they’re worried about him? I doubt that very much.”

  “His mother expressed concern,” Kate said.

  She grunted. “Did she?” Sky sighed. “Well, okay, she might be a little worried, I suppose. She’s tried to keep in touch as much as she can, I think, but his dad rules that house, not her, and he’d never have Mark back.”

  “So you know a bit about the family dynamic, then?” Jon asked.

  “Mark’s talked about it a few times, yeah. They have no idea what it’s done to him. It broke him when they threw him out.”

  “I bet,” Kate sympathised. “So, did he come to you?”

  “He’s relied on several friends over the last year or so, sleeping on their sofas and stuff.”

  “On yours?”

  “Occasionally,” Skye replied, her face neutral. She was still suspicious.

  “What can you tell me about Duncan?” Jon asked.

  “Duncan? Heh, well, you have done your research. Yeah, he’s dated Duncan on and off over the last year. I think Mark wanted something more serious, but he got a little obsessed with Duncan, and he seems to have backed off. The whole thing has been an off-and-on-again roller coaster.”

  “Obsessed?” Jon asked, curious.

  “Yeah. Mark would talk about him all the time, just constantly referring back to him. Saying Duncan wouldn’t do that, or Duncan likes this, you know? He was smitten.”

  “But Duncan didn’t return these feelings?” Kate asked.

  “I’ve never really met the man, but he didn’t seem quite as interested in Mark.”

  “So Mark was obsessed with him, would you say?” Jon said.

  “I think that’s probably true, yeah. I think he’s just stringing him along and using Mark whenever he feels like it. I’ve told Mark this, but… well, I think it might be starting to sink in a bit.”

  “What about Helen? Do you know her?”

  “I’ve met her a few times, yeah. She’s nice. She never judged Mark for who he was, she always just accepted him, and she kept in touch, too.”

  “And do you know where she is now?”

  “No, sorry. Why?”

  “Her mother reported her missing.” Jon watched Skye’s expression change to one of shock.

  “Oh, really? She’s gone? You’re sure?” The change in her demeanour was stark. She’d gone from suspicious and disinterested to shocked and concerned very quickly, which spoke volumes about how out of character this was for Helen.

  “As far as we can tell. We’re trying to find her, and we were hoping that Mark might know something.”

  “Well, I guess he might. I’m sorry, I didn’t know she was missing.” She looked a little upset actually, Jon thought.

  “She’s not answering her phone, apparently, which is unlike her, according to Mrs Cooper,” Kate said.

  “Yeah, that is unlike her. She always answered the phone to Mark.”

  “So, do you know where he is?” Jon pressed, keen to get an answer on this quickly.

  Skye sighed. “I do, yes. He’s at mine.”

  “Yours?”

  “He’s been sleeping on my sofa for a few days. Do you want me to take you to him?”

  23

  Driving across town and out towards Ashtead, Jon glanced into the rear-view mirror. Skye sat in the back, her elbow on the window ledge as she gazed out at the passing houses and greenery.

  Given her initial confrontational attitude, he wasn’t sure that she would have admitted to Mark being at her place if he hadn’t mentioned that Helen was missing.

  She was clearly protective of him, but that wasn’t very surprising, given his history with his family. He had to rely on his friends so much more than everyone else, and Skye was obviously a good friend.

  “You’re protective of him, aren’t you,” Jon said.

  Skye turned and met his gaze in the mirror. She shrugged. “Yeah, I guess. He’s not got many people looking out for him, so…”

  “You’re a good friend.”

  “Hmm,” she said, turning away. She was still keeping them at arm’s length. “It’s up here. Turn left.” She directed them through the village before they eventually pulled up at her house.

  Jon shared a brief glance with Kate before they got out and followed Skye up her garden path to the dark bricked semi on a quiet side street off one of the main roads through the village. He hoped that this particular lead would either come to a close with this visit or actually lead them somewhere constructive. The last thing he wanted was to get in here and find that Mark had disappeared again.

  However, that fear was soon dispelled when they found Mark sitting in the house watching TV, a crumb covered plate on the table before him. He turned the TV off and stood when Skye walked in, followed by Jon and Kate.

  “Glad you’re here,” Skye said, and gave him a weak smile.

  “Hey, what’s this all about?”

  Jon showed his ID and introduced himself and Kate. “We need to talk to you,” Jon said, as they all sat.

  “Okay, sure. What about?”

  “Well, firstly, did you know your sister’s gone missing?”

  “What?” Mark said, shocked. Skye sat beside him. She grabbed his hand and put her arm around his back. “When? When did she go missing?”

  “A few days ago. Your mother reported it to the Police yesterday.”

  “Oh my god. Are you sure? I mean, I spoke to her, just the other day.” He pulled his phone out. “Let me try her.”

  “Your mother’s already tried that,” Jon said.

  “Not this number, she hasn’t. She’s got another phone, just for me,” he said and hit dial.

  “Another phone?”

  He nodded. “Dad looks at her phone. He checks to make sure sh
e’s not calling or messaging me. So she’s got a pay-as-you-go that I can talk to her on.”

  “Clever. We’ll need that number before we go.”

  “Sure. It’s my old one. I used to have it to hide stuff from him too. It’s ringing.”

  After a moment, Mark ended the call. “It went to the answerphone.”

  He tried a few more times, but still, she didn’t answer.

  “Shit,” he cursed to himself. “Do you have any idea where she might be?”

  “Well, we found her purse in the basement of a house in Redhill. One that you rented for a few days.”

  “Oh, crap.” Mark sighed. “I’m sorry. Yeah, she saw me there, didn’t she? Oh shit, what was she doing going back there?”

  “She knew you lived there?”

  “Yeah, she knew. Crap.”

  “Why would she go there?” Jon asked. “I mean, apart from it being where you lived.”

  “Because of Duncan… Well, because of me, because I was trying to get close to him, and I thought that by staying in that house, I might… I don’t know. I just wanted to be near to him.”

  “To Duncan?”

  “Yes. He’s been so cold with me again recently. I never know where I am with him.”

  “He’s leading you on,” Skye said. “I’ve told you, you need to forget about him. He’s no good for you. You’ll just end up getting hurt.”

  “I know. I know. And now it looks like my antics have hurt Helen too.”

  “She’s responsible for her own actions,” Skye said.

  “But if I hadn’t been staying there, it would never have happened. Oh, this is all messed up.”

  “Can you run us through it?” Kate asked.

  Mark sighed. “It’s just as I said. I wanted to be close to Duncan because he wasn’t taking my calls again. I know he see’s other people, I’ve seen him with a woman recently, but I can’t help it. It’s like, he’s got a hold over me. Anyway, I thought I’d stay in that house. It’s where he’s lived pretty much the whole time I’ve known him. I mean, I know he has another place, but I’ve never seen it. So we just hung out there, in Redhill. It’s kind of special to me. So I rented it.”

  “But only for a few days,” Jon said.

  “That’s my fault,” Skye admitted. “I went and saw him, and we had a long talk about what he was doing. I convinced him to come back to mine.” She turned to Mark, looking sorry for him. “Duncan is leading you on. He’s no good for you.”

  “I know. I just… it’s hard, you know?”

  “What about Polly? You didn’t pay her. You cancelled the cheque.”

  “Is that right?” Skye asked.

  “Money’s tight,” Mark protested. “I’ll pay her, I will. But I can’t pay her right now. I don’t have it. I didn’t want to cancel the cheque, but… It would bounce anyway if she tried to take the money.”

  “Oh, Mark,” Skye groaned. “You should have said.”

  “Sorry. Anyway, enough about me. We need to find Helen.”

  “Any ideas about that?” Kate asked.

  “I… I don’t know. No. No ideas. But, she must have been in the basement if her purse was found down there.”

  “That would be my guess, too,” Jon said. “It also suggests a struggle.”

  “Do you think she’s hurt?”

  “I hope not,” Jon replied, as he eyed Mark for a moment. “So, you hung out with Duncan a while, right?”

  “Yeah,” Mark replied.

  “So, what is he like?”

  Mark shrugged. “He’s… Well, I like him.”

  Jon nodded as his thoughts turned to the bodies in the walls. He needed to know how this all connected and wondered how to phrase the questions to get to what he wanted out of Mark. “Did he ever talk about the house he inherited from his mother?”

  “Oh,” Mark replied, looking off into the middle distance. “Um, yeah. He sold it, I think. Yeah, that was right. He rented it out to a guy. Cameron or Cody, was it?”

  “Corey,” Jon confirmed.

  “That’s right, yeah. They had a falling out. I think they were dating, actually. Oh yeah, now I remember. He was angry at Corey because he wouldn’t tell Duncan what he did for money. He suspected that Corey was into some dodgy stuff, like, criminal stuff, and confronted him about it. They argued and fell out, and then Corey moved out. Duncan sold the place after that.”

  “That’s right, to the Woods family.”

  “I guess. I don’t know if he ever told me who bought it… Heh, yeah, but he did tell me that his brother wanted it but didn’t get it.”

  “You know about Evan, then?”

  “Oh yeah. He’s a piece of work, alright. A real dipshit.”

  “Did he not like that you and Duncan were a couple?”

  “Oh, no, nothing like that. He wasn’t a bigot. He just had issues with Duncan being respectful to their family and the house. I think he had problems in the head too, from the fighting he’d been made to do.”

  “He suffers from PTSD,” Jon confirmed.

  “That’s right. I never liked him. He’s got a hell of a temper on him. I felt like I was walking on eggshells whenever I was around him.”

  “I see.”

  “So, um, what is this all about? Is it just Helen, because I don’t think Duncan had anything to do with her, really.”

  “It’s related to that, but no, Helen isn’t the main focus of our case. Someone else is heading up that line of enquiry.”

  “So, what is it about?”

  “I don’t really want to say too much right now,” Jon said. “But you’ve been very helpful.”

  “Sure. So, do you have any idea where Helen is?”

  “We’re following up some leads,” Jon replied, but inside, he knew there were relatively few at this point and wasn’t sure how or when they’d find her. “We’ll let you know if we hear anything.”

  Mark sighed before picking up his mobile. “I’ll try her again. You never know.”

  Jon nodded and stood up. “Thank you for your time, Mark.”

  He smiled at them and then looked suddenly shocked. “Hello?” he said. “Oh, this is Mark Cooper, who’s this? Oh, I see. Is Helen there?”

  Jon frowned at Mark, wondering what the hell was going on. Who was answering Helen’s phone?

  “I was just calling because, well, there’s a couple of detectives here. Um… hold on.” Mark pressed the phone to his chest. “What are your names again?”

  “Who are you speaking to?” Jon asked.

  “A detective. Mizaki or someone?”

  “Give me the phone,” Jon snapped, and reached his hand out.

  “Oh, um, okay,” Mark stammered and handed the phone to him.

  “DC Mizaki? Is that you?”

  “Jon, hi. You’re with Mark Cooper?”

  “Yes, where are you?”

  “At the house in Redhill. I think you had better get here. There’s something I need to show you.”

  24

  “You’re sure Ellie didn’t say anything else?” Kate asked.

  “Nope. She said we should just get there as quick as we could,” Jon replied as he sped through traffic, taking the opportunity to pop the lights and siren on. It wasn’t often he got to use the concealed lights on the pool car, but this was as good an opportunity as ever. “It sounded like she couldn’t really chat over the phone. She ended the call pretty quickly.”

  Something was up, he knew it. He could hear it in Ellie’s voice on the phone. They’d found something, something big, something juicy.

  “What do you think it is?” Kate asked, curiosity in her voice. She wanted to know what was going on just as much as he did.

  “More bodies in a wall, maybe?” Jon suggested.

  “Could be. Ellie wasn’t there for the ones at the Woods’ house. It would be a pretty major find.”

  “And it would mean that the case is ours,” Jon said, enjoying the idea that this would piss DI Tommy Taylor off something chronic. Yeah, that really
was a delicious thought.

  “Yeah. Which means Taylor can suck it.”

  “My thoughts exactly,” Jon agreed as he pressed on, making their way towards Redhill. “What did you think to what Mark had to say?”

  “Which bit?”

  “Any of it. He didn’t have much nice to say about Evan, did he?”

  “No, not really. I get it though. He’s an intimidating man, that’s for sure. Scary too. That level of obsession with his old house is a little intense. Makes you wonder what he knows.”

  “Mmm, I know what you mean,” Jon replied. “Do you think he did it?”

  “I don’t know. I really don’t. If I knew that, we wouldn’t be out here chasing ghosts.”

  “I guess not. So, what are you up to tonight?”

  “I’m seeing a friend, sorry,” Kate replied.

  “Harper?”

  “Yeah. Going for a drink and a catch-up.”

  “Great, sounds good. Hmm, I might have to take myself shopping, provided we don’t finish too late.”

  “I did mine the other day. Tesco twenty-four-hour shopping in Leatherhead. Nothing beats wandering around the empty aisles at one in the morning.”

  “Did you do it in your jammies?”

  “Heh, no. I’ve seen people walking around in their PJs, though. You see some interesting characters that late at night, that’s for sure.”

  “I bet,” Jon replied, as they came around the final corner, to find the usual collection of marked and unmarked police vehicles parked up outside Polly’s rental property, along with the reams of police tape, cordoning off the area. Jon pulled up and got out.

  “Right, let’s go and see what Ellie has for us.”

  “Look, there’s Polly,” Kate said, pointing to a woman talking to an officer on the cordon.

  “So it is,” Jon replied, and marched over. Polly stood at the police tape with a worrying frown. It seemed like she was chewing on the inside of her cheek.

  “Everything okay, Polly?” Jon asked.

  “No. Everything’s not okay, detective. They won’t let me through or tell me what’s going on. I thought it was just a forensics sweep, but then all these other officers turned up, along with that ambulance and fire truck. What the hell are they doing in there?”