Safe Read online

  Lauren was grateful for this. She had no idea how long Petra planned to leave her up here, or how long she could bear to be holed up in this hotel, but she was glad of the foresight anyway.

  Having closed the curtains and shut out the night, she flicked through the channels on the television. By weird coincidence, there was a repeat of the same Die Hard film she’d watched with Harry only a few days before. She clicked away from it, then went back.

  “OK, Harry. Here’s me working on my normal. I hope you’re proud of me.”

  Chapter 28

  “And don’t you look good?” Billy said, running his fingers through her newly cut hair. He had drawn her close, put one of his big hands on her bum and the other on her waist and kissed her possessively.

  “What have you been up to?” she asked him. “Did you miss me?”

  “Nah, of course I didn’t.”

  She laughed. This had become their routine whenever they’d been apart. “And so,” she said, her tone wheedling, “how do you fancy going shopping with me? I need a bag for Saturday night. I thought we might take in a film and have something to eat, and then, well, who knows?” She smiled up at him. She was tall, but he was taller and very broad. He made her feel tiny and fragile, which was not something she was used to feeling. Sometimes she liked it. Often she did not.

  Billy’s eyes gleamed, predatory and eager. “Why don’t we just cut to the ‘who knows’?” he asked.

  She giggled. “Because I’m hungry, because I need a bag for Saturday night.”

  “Don’t you have enough bags?”

  “You can never—”

  “Have enough bags or enough shoes, I know.” He lifted the hand from her waist and touched her hair again. “I like it,” he said. “It’s different.”

  “That’s because I went to a different hairdresser, I felt like a change. So let’s be going, the Colbert Centre stays open till eight, so we’ve got about an hour. That should be enough time. Then we’ll get a takeaway if you like, be home all the sooner.”

  He roared with laughter at that. “Sounds like a plan.”

  Later, much later, she woke up to find that he was not in bed beside her and that there were voices downstairs. One of them she recognized, but the other she did not.

  Slipping on her dressing gown, Petra padded to the top of the stairs. The visitors and Billy were in the kitchen, talking, not loudly but with an intensity that prickled at the back of her neck. She was considering whether she should go down and join them. If this was a business meeting, Billy would not be pleased if she did. When the kitchen door opened and the men came out, she took the risk of leaning over the banister, just enough that she could see Billy and the other two. She caught her breath. What the fuck is he doing here?

  She retreated back to the bedroom.

  Later, she stirred as Billy got back into bed beside her. “You OK?” She murmured sleepily. He responded by pulling her close to his side.

  Petra calmed her breathing and relaxed, as though drifting back into sleep. There was a tension in Billy’s body that took a long time to go. Whatever the meeting had been about, she figured it had not been positive. He was clearly upset, annoyed, even angry at something. When he finally went back to sleep, she opened her eyes and stared into the semi-darkness. She could have been mistaken, of course, but she didn’t think so. Although she had never been a serving officer in this region, she had taken the trouble to familiarize herself with everybody who held any kind of rank and she had definitely recognized the men. The first was an associate of Billy’s, Freddie Benson, who managed a casino for Gus Perrin. The other man, unless she was very much mistaken, was a police DCI.

  Chapter 29

  At first light, Clarke collected Hopkins and they followed DI Mark Reynolds out to the cottage that had become their crime scene.

  Clarke was not surprised when Hopkins told him that Ruby Messenger had indeed left during the night. She’d apparently gone down to the front desk and asked about train times, the night receptionist helping to go through the listings. She checked out just after five and went off to the station. Clarke was somewhat amused to find that she had looked at trains to Edinburgh, to Truro, and to Cardiff, so she was trying very hard to put him off the scent. He would put money on her going north.

  “It’s a bit bleak out here,” Hopkins commented, as they got out of the car. The wind was whipping off the ocean and sandblasting any patch of bare skin. A wide cordon stretched around the cottage and into the dunes and there were police officers and CSI still wandering around looking purposeful. Clarke was surprised there was no media presence, but then the local police were playing it down. The brief reports he had seen had suggested a suicide, tragic but explicable, rather than a major incident. He wondered how long they could keep the story going, then looked around at the emptiness surrounding this small outpost of human habitation and decided that it probably wouldn’t be too difficult to do, at least for a little while longer.

  Mark Reynolds was waiting for them by the side door and he pointed out the forensic pathway to Clarke and Hopkins. The crime scene manager took over from there and took the tour.

  “My God, so much blood,” Hopkins murmured. He knew she’d seen death before but nothing like this. Clarke sort of envied her that.

  He was comparing locations within the house to the crime scene photographs he had seen. Harry Prentice, slumped in the corner of the living room. Joe Messenger in the hallway between the living room and kitchen. The first officer attending had assumed he was dead until he had seen a tiny twitch of Joe’s fingers. The FOA had then quickly designated a pathway and made sure the paramedics came in via that route. He had picked the cleanest bit of kitchen floor in the hope that this would be less forensically important. In the hall, Clarke could see where the paramedics had knelt in Joe’s blood.

  “They never went into the living room,” Mark Reynolds told him. “It was pretty obvious that Prentice was dead. What is astonishing is that Messenger survived long enough to get to hospital and into intensive care.”

  “Whose idea was it to put him in that little back room?” Clarke wanted to know. Although nobody could fault the care Joe had received, he had not actually been in the main ICU.

  “Actually, that was one of the doctors. That side room has been used as an isolation unit before. The doctor knew it could be set up quickly and with the right equipment. We were worried in case somebody got wind of the fact that he wasn’t dead yet and came to have another go. The nurse you saw, she was one of the senior ICU nurses. They gave him every chance they could.”

  Clarke nodded. “I think Joe Messenger was collateral damage. But, no, I don’t expect they thought he’d survived the attack here. Kyle Sykes will not be pleased about that, not that he had much chance to speak to me. You saw the statement that Ruby Messenger made?”

  Reynolds nodded. “So that gives you confirmation of Sykes’s involvement. But is it enough? It proves he was there, that he went to collect Joe Messenger from his home, but does it prove he was here?”

  “That is the million-dollar question. We’ve got the word of a dying man that Sykes was at the cottage. What will that count for?”

  They left, knowing that they were in the way and that CSI needed to get on with processing the scene, but Clarke was glad to have observed it first-hand. Photographs only got you so far. He followed the forensic markers out to the perimeter and into the dunes. Lauren might have had hidden out here, then. But then what? Hopkins joined him. She’d got a map from somewhere.

  “That way, going left out the cottage, you come to a big fuck-off cliff.”

  Clarke looked at her. Small but tough and wiry, she was formidable in her own way, but she didn’t usually swear. It seemed out of character. “And in the other direction?”

  “Down that way is a pub and a caravan park, and a few other bits and pieces by the looks of it. And a track that leads back to the main road. They reckon that’s the way the girl would have gone.”

&nbs
p; “Makes sense. It looks like a long walk, though. And then what?” With Harry gone, who on earth would Lauren Sykes have turned to?

  Reynolds was waiting for them by the cars. They headed back to police headquarters. There would be a briefing when they returned. Last night’s had been to bring Clarke up to speed on what had happened at this end. This morning, he would be taking centre stage, explaining the Perrins and the Sykes and how they figured this whole mess began.

  “Come to the briefing,” he told Hopkins. “And then I want you to head back home, the team will need all the data from this end. I’ll clear it with Henderson that you act as liaison on this. That might mean coming back up here at some point, but more likely ensuring that information from the two teams is collated.”

  Hopkins nodded. It was only a few days ago, Clarke reflected, that she’d been sitting in Kyle Sykes’s conservatory looking distinctly uncomfortable. In that time, she seemed to have grown, settled. To have found her feet and her confidence.

  “If you were a seventeen-year-old girl, where would you have run to?”

  “Probably to my nan’s, but that doesn’t help much, does it?”

  Well, Clarke thought, that is more or less what Lauren Sykes had done. Harry and Jean were known, even to the police, to be the closest thing to proper family Lauren had ever had. And everybody knew that Jean had been a lovely woman.

  * * *

  Lauren was having breakfast when her phone rang. She stared at it for a moment. It was Petra.

  “I’ve got to be quick — you OK?”

  “I guess so. When can I leave here?”

  “Not yet, we need to find a safe place. Look, if I can’t make it back this weekend, I’m going to book you in somewhere else. You’ll need to take a taxi and I’ll tell you where to go. So be ready, OK?”

  “How are you paying for this?” Lauren asked. It was something that had bothered her since yesterday when she’d seen Petra pay for the room with a credit card.

  “Same card as yesterday, and don’t worry it’s a legitimate card, registered to a legitimate address, just not my legitimate address.”

  “Something else borrowed from a friend, like the dogs and the cars?”

  “Exactly that. Look, I’ve got to go. I don’t know when I’ll be able to call again, so keep your head down, and rest up.”

  Lauren heard another sound, as though someone was moving in the background. Petra hung up. Lauren stared at the phone, willing it to ring again, even though she knew it wouldn’t. She felt in limbo, helpless and was overwhelmed by a sudden surge of anger. Why should she do anything this woman told her to? And how long could she bear to be incarcerated in this small and confining hotel room?

  It was Saturday. Most likely, the town would be packed. Perhaps she could go for a walk and get lost in the crowds . . .

  Lauren bit her lip, knowing that this was probably unwise, but then the bit of her brain that still asked What would Harry do? suggested that this would also be reconnaissance. When they had arrived, Petra had made sure she knew where the fire escapes and the exits were. So, Lauren figured she could go down the back stairs, and at least have a wander round the shopping centre that they’d been in the day before to familiarize herself with the area.

  Was that only yesterday? she wondered. It felt like so much longer.

  * * *

  When Billy came in, Petra was fiddling with her bag. “Have you seen my lipstick?”

  He pointed out two that were already sitting on the dressing table.

  “Not those, the one I wore last night.” She looked slyly at him through the mirror. “The one you said you liked. Ah — there it is.”

  He came over to her and stood behind her so she could see both of them reflected in the glass. She smiled at him and then leaned forward to apply the lipstick. He put his hands on her hips and pulled her back towards himself. But she could see his mind was occupied on something else.

  “You OK? You seem a bit out of it this morning. One drink too many last night, was it?” She leaned back against him for a moment and then freed herself and went over to the camera bag lying on the bed. He watched as she checked the lenses, unpacking and then packing everything again. He’d seen her do this dozens of times. It was her little ritual, taking things out, checking and putting them back, ticking them off her mental list.

  “All set for this evening?”

  “Yep, looks that way. The gallery is doing the live-stream video, so I don’t have to worry about that. I’m just doing stills, and any infill stuff that Carole wants me to do. She’ll tell me when I get there. It should be a good evening.”

  He grimaced. “If you like that sort of thing.”

  She sashayed over to him once more and put her hands on his shoulders. “Art with a capital ‘A’ not your bag?” she teased.

  “Art with any ‘a’ is not my bag.” He glanced over to her camera equipment once more.

  She knew that he was impressed by her talent, and that talent had really opened doors for her. She knew he was also impressed by her intelligence, and the fact that she looked after her body, and that she looked good with her hair done and lipstick on. She looked the part. She knew also that she wasn’t Billy’s normal type. He normally went for purely decorative — he wasn’t usually that bothered about his women being intelligent and decorative. Petra knew that Gus Perrin had been highly amused by Billy’s sudden interest in ‘Pat’. When things had got more serious between them, she knew that Gus had had her checked out. But that was OK, her legend had been well prepared. And it was close enough to the reality that she didn’t have any trouble remembering. In fact, it sometimes worried her that what she did have trouble remembering was who Petra really had been. Three years as Pat had been a long time.

  Was it all right that she really was looking forward to Saturday night and the private view of Carole Josephs’s new sculptures? Looking forward to getting all poshed up in a new dress, new shoes and new bag and showing off her skills as a photographer? Her photos were destined for at least two top-flight magazines, the editors of which were buying her work on merit and not because Gus Perrin was involved. She seemed to have accidentally carved out a whole new career for herself and she was loath to have that ruined.

  Chapter 30

  Frankland reread the letter he had just opened and then ran a search on his computer. The database yielded reports from two police forces, one in the Midlands and one somewhere up north, and he skimmed the information, the action plans, the crime scene photographs and identified the SIO on each team. He had been aware of the Harry Prentice situation, and of the suspicions that Lauren Sykes might have something to do with the death of Charlie Perrin, but this was a major development.

  At the end of her letter, Petra had said something that concerned him deeply. “I have the feeling things are moving very fast, and I may have to ask for an emergency evac, at least for the girl but possibly for me as well.”

  Petra was one of the best undercover operatives he’d ever handled and it was not like her to get jittery. If she felt the tide was turning, then he really ought to take notice.

  * * *

  Feeling a long way from home, Clarke followed Hopkins and Mark Reynolds into the briefing room. Last night it had seemed larger, but that was probably down to the fact that there were twice as many people in here now. People with questions. Reynolds introduced him and Clarke took the floor. There was an empty board behind him, and a stack of paperwork and photographs on the desk at the side. Clarke scooped them up and began.

  “Victim number one: Harry Prentice; and victim number two: Joe Messenger. They’ve been part of Kyle Sykes’s organization for at least thirty years. Our understanding is that this current trouble begins with Lauren Sykes and the death of Charlie Perrin. You have to understand that at the moment his death is down as ‘accidental’, a consequence of playing with a firearm when drunk. But there are forensic indicators that this might not be the case. The rumour mill is definitely suggesting that Lauren
Sykes is implicated.

  “It seems she went to Harry Prentice for help. Lauren’s mother and Jean Prentice, Harry’s late wife, were known to be close and the Prentices continued to be close with Lauren after her mother died. Kyle Sykes is also implicated in the death of Lauren’s mother, though we were never able to prove that he killed her or even that he arranged for her to be killed. The fall guy for that is still in a secure psychiatric unit, as you’ll see from the briefing notes we prepared for you.”

  “What was Harry Prentice doing here? Your understanding is that the girl was definitely with him?”

  Clarke laid out what he knew about how Harry had come to know this place and the evidence that showed Lauren had been with him.

  Other questions followed about the Sykes organization and about Gus Perrin.

  “Imagine an iceberg,” Clarke said. “What’s above the water, for both organizations, is a portfolio of legitimate businesses built over three generations.” There was general laughter at that, but Clarke knew it was an apt analogy. “A business portfolio that includes everything from corner shops to casinos. If you look at appendix C, you will find a list of legitimate concerns that are either owned or partially owned by the Sykes or Perrin clans. You’ll notice that several of them are limited companies, and therefore their books are open to public access via Companies House. You’ll notice also that they both use the same firm of respected accountants. Benson Bryce have been in business as long as the Perrin and Sykes OCGs, the only difference is that we have no reason to believe Benson Bryce are engaged in illegal activity. And believe me, forensic accountants have looked at them every which way. They speculate that it behoves both OCGs to have a squeaky-clean surface image and that employing Benson Bryce helps give legitimacy to their respective organizations.”

  “You’re talking about three generations, that sounds extremely unusual,” Mark Reynolds speculated.

  “Not so unusual for crime families, but what is unusual is that the grandfathers in both cases decided that they needed to run a legitimate business alongside their illegal dealings. It makes perfect sense. Money can be laundered through the legitimate business and those chosen by the present family members all have a high and quick turnover, such as casinos, gymnasiums, golf clubs. It’s the spread that makes it so effective. There is no single route for dirty money to be cleaned. A large number of their investments go into the charity and social sectors and undoubtedly a lot of good comes out of that investment, which means that fewer questions are asked by members of the public, local governments, regulators and so on.”