Eye Snatcher (7 page)

The receptionist, who had Janet on her nametag, didn’t even look up.

Brian tried his best not to sigh. “Janet, I’m Detective Inspector Brian McDone and this is Detective Sergeant Brad Richards. We’re here about a man who—”

“One moment, sir,” Janet snapped. She crossed off a few letters on a paper in front of her. “I need to finish this.”

Brian looked at Brad, his jaw dangling open. He wanted to snap. Wanted to tell the frumpy old cow to hurry the hell up, but he knew the best course with these rich bitches was just to be polite. Politeness might get Andy Wilkinson identified and captured in the next day or so. Any off behaviour with people in the Marriot, they could be waiting weeks.

Janet crossed off a few more things with her gold pen. Four rings were wrapped around her fingers, all way too expensive for Brian to think about affording. Thank God Hannah wasn’t materialistic like that.

She took a few minutes. Brad puffed out his lips a few times, wandered around in circles.

Then finally, she looked up.

The first thing Brian noticed about this woman was the way her eyes quickly, very quickly, scanned his body. The way her top lip curled as she did, like she’d made her mind up about Brian right there. “How can I help you?” she asked.

Brian resisted the urge to make his feelings known and forced the best smile he could. He placed the CCTV print offs and the mug shots of Andy Wilkinson on the counter. “This man. We saw him entering your hotel earlier today, as you can see in this photograph.”

The woman dragged them over. Lifted her pointed edged glasses up onto her nose and squinted at the photographs. She didn’t speak, though. Didn’t give anything away. Didn’t say a word.

“Well?” Brad said.

“Well what?” Janet asked, pushing the photographs back.

Brian’s throat tightened. “Have you seen him? Andy Wilkinson, he’s called. Big fan of his suits. He must’ve checked in here a few hours ago.”

Janet puffed her lips out. Clicked about at her computer. “I’ve not been on duty long. And we get a lot of people walking through these doors—”

“Just tell us if he’s checked in, Janet.”

Janet bolted a judgemental stare at Brad. Looked him up head to toe, too.

Brian’s heart thumped. He too looked at Brad.
Don’t push your luck
, he thought.
We need all the bloody help we can get here.

Janet tapped around on the mouse, made a little humming noise as the sounds of water splashing in the nearby swimming pool echoed through the reception area. “Andrew Wilkinson. No, no Andrew Wilkinsons. Sorry.”

“Do you have CCTV on desk that we could take a look at?”

Janet kept on tapping on her mouse. “I do. But I’m not in a position to reveal that information.”

Brian stared Janet in her beady brown eyes. He bit his lip, tried his best to diffuse the frustration bubbling inside him. “Then who is?”

Jean opened up her notepad again. Made a few little nonsensical scribbles. “My manager should be able to help you with that.”

“Then it’s about time you called that manager down here,” Brad said, his tone stern. “Wouldn’t want us to have to go ransacking through every room in here, would you?”

Janet looked up from her pad. “For your sakes, I wouldn’t like that. Searching around without a warrant. I’m not sure that’s a very wise career move, is it, gentlemen?”

Bitch. She had them cornered. Secretive posh fuck had them right where she wanted.

Brian took a deep breath of the perfume filled air. Some chlorine wafted through from the pool area. Time to try something else. A different approach. “Janet, I’m sorry for our shortness. My partner and I, we’re having a rough time. It’s a murder investigation. The boy at Whittingham Hospital—you might’ve heard on the internet in the last hour, I dunno. Andy Wilkinson’s whereabouts could really help us—”

“And as I told you, Andy Wilkinson has not checked into this hotel, and I’m not in a position to cave to your CCTV demands. You’ll have to consult my manager for that information. Or get a warrant.”

Brian squeezed the edge of the counter with his fingers and tried his best to keep his frustration from bubbling over. “And how do we speak to your manager?”

“She’s off sick,” Janet said. Took her glasses off. Turned around to organise a few papers.

Brad shook his head. Wandered off away from the counter.

“Right,” Brian said. “And when will we be able to speak to her?”

“Tomorrow,” Janet said. “Maybe it would be advisable to get a warrant after all.”

I’ll break your fucking business,
Brian thought. “I’ll do that, Janet. Thanks for all your cooperation.” He scooped up the photographs of Andy Wilkinson, blood boiling. Made sure he smacked his hand against a rather expensive looking pot ornament in the process before turning and walking towards the door.

His cheeks were hot. He needed to get outside. Outside and away from this shitty posh haven. Away from the hypnotic music, the perfume smells, the bitchy glances and—

“Brian, look at this.”

Brad’s voice came from Brian’s left.

Brian kept on walking towards the rotating doors. Went to go through them, back out to the shitty rain and wind.

“Don’t have time to screw about here. Best go get that warrant before—”

“Brian. Here. Now.”

Brad’s voice was stern. Stern enough to get Brian looking at him, walking over to him.

He was standing at a little window. A window that looked through to the pool area. Through there, Brian could hear splashing, see men in speedos that were in much better shape than him wading their way through the water.

“Come on, Brad. You can wait ‘til we get home to look at naked fellas.”

Brad tapped on the glass. Pointed at someone who was sitting in the mini jacuzzi, feet up.

Andy Wilkinson.

“Brought your trunks?” Brad asked.

When Andy Wilkinson saw Brian and Brad entering the shower area of the Marriot Hotel swimming pools, he had that look in his eyes like he was getting ready to run.

And then, realising there was nowhere to go, he just stopped and sighed like a rabbit trapped in the old proverbial headlights.

“Wise move,” Brad said, as he stepped up to him.

“Staying put is always a wise move where police are involved,” Brian said.

Andrew Wilkinson was naked but for his little black speedos. The shower area was steamy and empty but for the three of them. Brian had to be careful not to slip on the soaking floor with his shoes on. Didn’t want to make any more of an arse of himself. Besides, Evil Janet would be on their cases in no time, no doubt. They had to get this done with.

Andrew wrapped a blue towel over his muscular shoulder. “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“That’s funny,” Brian said, smiling at Brad. “Andy here doesn’t know what we’re talking about.”

“Doesn’t know a thing about Jean Betts?”

“How about her son? Little Sam Betts?”

Andy tried to step past Brian, but he put his arm on his shaven chest and pushed him right back.

“You’re not going anywhere, Andy. Not just yet.”

Andy looked at them both with wide, bloodshot eyes. “Look, nothing happened. It’s a private service. I—”

“Was it a private service when you fiddled little Damien Halshaw back at Bridgemoor High?”

Andy’s cheeks flushed as a fellow swimmer headed into the shower room then backed away when he saw the police. “Look, he wasn’t little.”

Brad tutted and rolled his eyes. “Oh Andy, you sick fuck.”

“I don’t—I don’t mean it like that,” Andy barked. “He was—he was sixteen. And it wasn’t like that. It wasn’t—”

“He’s a kid still, Andrew,” Brian said. “A little student kid of yours.” He stepped up to him, got a whiff of the steam from the scalding hot shower. “How did it work, hmm? You getting off over him for years? Just waiting for him to get legal so you could bend his little ass over that desk in after school detention and—”

“It wasn’t like that,” Andrew snapped. His cheeks were fully red now. Brian could see his heart thumping in his chest. “It… Nothing happened. Nothing untoward. I was cleared. This finished years ago.”

Brian looked at Brad and stuck his lip out. Nodded. “Right. He’s got a point.”

“Sure has. Finished years ago.”

Brian pulled out the CCTV snaps of Andy fleeing Jean’s house earlier. “So why’d you flee the scene of a crime when you saw us pulling up?”

Andy frowned at the photographs. Sweat gathered on his crinkled forehead. “Scene of… what crime?”

“Don’t bullshit us,” Brad said. “You don’t just go scooting off without a reason. Especially when a dead kid’s involved.”

“So why did you cycle away? And Wednesday night, you took off pretty late for a trip too. Wine trip, apparently. Although you didn’t come back with any wine. Care explaining that?”

“Wait,” Andy said. He lifted his hand. Shook his head, as if trying to catch up with the conversation. “A… a dead kid? What are you talking about?”

“Sam Betts,” Brad said. “Your whore’s little boy. Aged eleven. Found him disembowelled in the old Whittingham Hospital. Eyes scooped out of his skull like pickles from a jar. Little ass torn to pieces.”

Brian flinched at Brad’s descriptiveness, but it clearly had an impact on Andy. All the colour from his face drifted away and he went a deathly pale. “I thought… I just thought…”

“Just thought what, Andy?”

Andy gulped. His jaw shook. He looked up—looked right at Brian in his eyes. “Jean. Is she… Oh God. Is she okay?”

“Of course she isn’t okay. She’s so not okay that she even lied for you. Said you went to get some wine that night her kiddie went missing. Only you came back with nothing. So where were you?”

Andy lifted his hand to his face. Shook his head. “I… I just thought he’d… kids, you know. They—they go away sometimes. They run away.”

“For days on end?” Brian spat. “Give me a fucking break. And you’re still not being straight. The wine. What the fuck happened there?”

Andy lowered his hand and closed his eyes. “I, I… I went to get some. And—and then Jean called me. Said she’d found some. So I turned right back. I… I cycled back to her place.”

Brad raised his eyebrows. “Convenient.”

“Very,” Brian said.

“You can call her. Confirm it with her. I just…” He sounded out of breath. Like the wind had been knocked out of his system. “Oh God. Her kid. Her poor kid.”

He was either a very convincing actor or genuinely gutted.

Brian’s phone rang. He checked it—DC Finch. He prayed to God for some sort of slip in Jean’s story. Prayed to God that Andy Wilkinson was lying, that Jean Betts was lying, just so this case could get resolved quick and fast. He didn’t like it when cases lingered on. They did bad things to him. Turned him into a person he wasn’t fond of.

He held his breath. “Finch. Please tell me you’ve got something.”

“Caught up with Jean just before she got home. Says she remembers calling Andrew Wilkinson to tell him she found some wine under the stairs so he came straight back. What’s Han Solo’s version?”

Fuck. He scratched at his forehead. “Yeah. Yeah, same story here. Thanks, Finch. Later.”

He put the phone down. Nodded at Brad.

“Stay away from kids, Andy,” Brian said, as he stepped to the exit of the shower room where Andrew stood all on his own, water dripping from his ruffled hair.

Then, he stopped. “Anyway, what’s with the sudden change in tastes?”

Andy towel-dried his hair, kept looking nervously at Brian and Brad. “What?”

“Well, sixteen-year-old boys to women in their thirties. Escorts in their thirties. Quite a swing to have in the space of a few years.”

Andy lowered the towel. His lips quivered. “Look at me. I’m a shamed ex-teacher with a lot of money. Nobody comes near me because they just have to do a Google search and they find the lies. I need… I need some way. Some way to feel good about myself. Some way to release. Don’t we all?”

Brian pondered Andy’s words in his head. In an annoying kind of way, they made sense.

“Keep your snake in your trousers from now on,” Brian said, as he walked out of the showers and back towards the exit door. “Men like you don’t get lucky a third time.”

Brian and Brad made their way out of the Marriot, past snarling Janet through the cold wintry weather to the car.

They sat down. Sat back in the seats, both of them silent for a few minutes.

“It’s about time we clocked off for the day,” Brad said.

Brian checked his silver Rotary watch that Hannah had bought him for his last birthday. He’d had to get another hole pierced in it as he started putting on weight again. But hell—Hannah knew he was susceptible to a belly. He’d warned her of that in the past. And he was getting on a bit. Nearly twenty years on her, so it just made sense that he was the first to get fat with age.

Good job, too. He wasn’t fond of fat women.

The little hand on the watch pointed to five. His stomach sank. Home time.

“Nothing’s going to change overnight, Brian.”

Brian looked away from his watch. Started up the car and tried to brush off Brad’s remark. “Dunno what you’re talking about.”

“That look,” Brad said. “That look of ‘oh shit’ on your face.”

Brian reversed out and almost clipped the back of the car. “Dunno what you’re—”

“Just go home. Relax. Then we come back in with fresh eyes tomorrow. There’s still tracks to be searched. The coat we found—that might have something. Still things we don’t know. It’ll be a lot clearer tomorrow, I’m sure.”

Brian indicated and turned out of the Marriot, the rain blasting out again and the sky going dark. He thought about Sam Betts. Thought about his body, his mum, of Andy Wilkinson and the pictures of him on that CCTV.

He thought back to the dirt track. The farm track. Farmer Jack Selter.

As he went through the traffic lights and headed towards Brad’s place in Fulwood, he knew for a fact that his mind wasn’t letting this case drop for the night.

When Brian got home, he couldn’t shake the feeling of discontent lingering at the bottom of his stomach.

He walked up the pathway towards his semi-detached house on Conway Drive and looked around. The Wisdom’s plant pots had tumbled over again, spilled soil all down Brian’s driveway. Outside the grey-bricked semi of Brian and Hannah’s, a hanging basket filled with dead flowers swung from side to side in the breeze. Waste of cash, hanging baskets. Flowers in general for that matter. Sure, they looked colourful for a short while, but five quid worth of colourful just to go and die a few days later? Hardly worth it.