Cold Justice (33 page)

‘You came home to this, that’s lucky?’ Carter sat back and took a sweeping gaze around the café. ‘That was a smart move, and now you have plans to expand up another level?’

‘That’s right. They’ve just been approved now. I’m hoping to put a restaurant on the top.’

‘Well, good luck with that. How do you feel about Raymonds now? You said it was a hard thing to get over, what happened to Kensa and the way it was dealt with?’

‘I suppose a lot of time has passed.’ He shook his head.

‘So, you didn’t come back here hoping to get justice for Kensa?’

Simmons reddened and shook his head.

‘She knows she can always come in here and get a meal. I’ll always come if she needs me, but the past belongs there. I can’t change it. Raymonds did what he believed was right, no doubt. I have to live with my life and move on. I’ve learned to do that; I don’t want to be like Kensa or even Mawgan. I don’t want my past to ruin my future. I’m glad I went away and went through what I did. It almost destroyed me, it ruined my marriage, and I’m sad about that, but I have learned to exist with my past.’

‘Cam, what did your sister say happened that night at the house?’

He shook his head. He looked exhausted.

‘I never saw her again, she never came home that night. That was the night she left town.’

Lauren stood on the doorstep waiting for Russell to finish his business. She couldn’t trust him to go out on the common because he didn’t come back for hours. She leaned against the front door frame and watched as the sun came out and sent everything shimmering in the breeze. She took a deep breath and heard the scurry of canine feet on the tile floor. Russell came scampering past her and straight onto the driveway but stopped as he caught a scent and disappeared inside the undergrowth. She waited for him to reappear and then called him back into the house. She stopped by the carved newel post at the foot of the stairs and rested her hand there, feeling the carved faces of the animals that decorated it.

She wondered if Toby had touched the same post as he had stood where she did nearly fourteen years ago. He must have. She walked up the stairs and reached the landing. Lauren turned into the space there and stood and imagined what Toby would have seen.
Which room was his?
she wondered, and then realized it was probably the one she slept in. It could have been the one Ebony was in – doubtful that it would have been the other one because it was too near the bathroom. That would have been the guest room, guests came first. She turned the handle of her bedroom door and let the door push open while she stayed looking around, opening her eyes to see things Toby must have seen. This was probably never a place for children, it struck her. She remembered what Toby had told her – that his father never spent time with him if he could help it, that he paid for him to holiday with other people. That he only ever brought him down here that once after his mother left.

Why did he bring him that one time?
Lauren wondered. He couldn’t have known it would end so badly?

She stepped into her bedroom and walked around opening the wardrobes again, even though she’d done it when she arrived – she did it again, this time imagining Toby as he put his things away. The fifteen-year-old, excited about coming away with his father at long last. So happy that his exams were over and so in love with a local girl.

It made her heart ache. In her mind she saw Kensa and Toby together and it didn’t seem so strange. They must have both been skinny little things, holding hands, kissing. It must have seemed like the beginning of something wonderful. Lauren went to stand in front of the mirror on the chimneybreast. Snowdrops and garden flower tiles decorated the hearth and grate surround. She looked into her own eyes and she imagined Toby standing behind her, his arms encircling her the way he did when they fell asleep after sex, and she always felt so loved at that moment, so content, sometimes she’d say to herself – if it all ends now this is the way I’d like to go. She felt the sting on the bridge of her nose that told her she was going to cry, but she had exhausted her crying capabilities on her son. Samuel got all her tears.

Then she knew she’d been wrong to push Toby away just when he needed her most. It wasn’t Toby’s fault. It was the person’s who took Samuel from them. When she thought about Toby and Kensa, she understood that what they had felt was real too. The first love – the first cut – deep pain and sweetness that stays for ever. Kensa still had love in her eyes. Kensa didn’t know what happened that night. Kensa and Lauren were the two women who knew what Toby was really like. Lauren smiled into the mirror as Toby’s image smiled back at her. She felt a surge of strength. She phoned him.

‘Toby?’

‘Lauren.’

‘Are you okay, Toby?’

‘Lauren, I’m so sorry I haven’t been honest with you.’ He took a deep breath. ‘There is someone else – I can’t live here without you and Samuel, but I also need Gareth in my life. He’s the man I work with. He’s become more than a good friend. I didn’t plan it. I didn’t want it. I always thought we’d be together for ever, you and I, and I’ve tried. I just can’t pretend any more.’

Lauren sighed deeply as she closed her eyes and hung on to the phone. ‘Toby, I am sorry. So sorry for all of us. I understand what you’re saying. I had hoped that we could turn our marriage round. We were so happy once. I thought we could be again but, I accept it if you say you love someone else. Do this last thing for me, Toby. Do it for your son. For yourself. Come down, Toby, and we can face this together.’

‘No, I can’t. I can’t face it. What good can I be?’

‘We still think Samuel is alive, Toby. It looks likely Kensa may have taken him, but she is mentally unhinged. She still holds a lot of affection for you. You could talk to her. It may be the only chance we have of getting Samuel back alive.’

Toby came off the phone and walked back into the lounge where Jeanie was waiting for him. She was sitting on the sofa and working on her laptop. She closed it as he approached. He sat thinking for a few minutes and then he looked up as she waited for him.

‘I’ve told Lauren that our marriage is over. I’ve told her I love Gareth. He makes me feel like I can be me. No more pretence, no more trying too hard. I want to be happy. I want Lauren to be happy.’

Jeanie nodded. ‘I understand. Was she okay?’

‘Lauren gets on with life. She’s not someone to buckle. She’ll pick herself up and carry on, no matter what. But, she has told me some home truths and said that I need to do more, everything I can, to try and find my son.’

‘What does she want you to do?’

‘She wants me to go down to Cornwall and face things. She thinks Kensa will talk to me.’ Toby was sweating at the thought of it.

Carter and Willis left Cam’s café, crossed the road and headed towards the car park.

‘Cam’s story was something, wasn’t it? What do you make of it?’ asked Carter.

‘Some parts of his story are so sad, they have to be true,’

‘But?’

‘Cam Simmons definitely has something he’s not mentioning. He has a bit of a love triangle thing going on with the women.’

Carter walked up the steps to the Surfshack and cupped his hands as he looked through the glass. He knocked on the door. As he waited he heard a car start up and watched Raymonds appear from the car park and pull alongside. Carter held up his hand to him and Raymonds opened his window. He smiled.

‘Raymonds?’

‘I hear you’ve been asking about Kensa.’

‘Really? Who told you that?’

‘Well, let’s just say, if you want to know anything then come and ask me.’

‘Okay, well, where’s the report on the assault on her in 2000? Where are the photos of the injuries?’

‘Destroyed. We didn’t keep any of it – no charges were brought. What was the point?’

‘Tell me, then, who were the suspects?’

‘What suspects?’ He started to drive off. Carter stepped closer.

‘Local lads, men, at the time. Men who were at the party where sixteen-year-olds and under were getting off their faces. Men who spiked drinks and then followed their victims to a house where girls were raped. Those fucking men, Raymonds. Where are they?’

‘They don’t exist. It’s all been made up – it’s all lies.’

‘Oh really? How come I have their names then? How come one of them is your son? This is the beginning of the end of it all, Raymonds. There isn’t one sordid thing that’s happened in this village that you’re not at the heart of. Where were you when Martin Stokes was murdered earlier on today?’

‘I’ll be available with my lawyer any time you choose – I’m not going anywhere – I have nothing to hide. Come and find me when you’re ready, sonny.’

‘Be in the old police station ready to be interviewed at nine tomorrow morning.’

Raymonds drove off. Carter was shaking with anger.

‘We need to go up and make sure Lauren is okay, guv?’ Willis walked back towards the car. Carter didn’t speak as he got in, started it up and sent dust flying as he spun it around in the sand-covered car park. He took the steep hill up from the shops in first gear and kept the engine screaming. He hadn’t realized.

‘Bastard . . . sorry.’ He pushed the gear stick into second then third. ‘I won’t leave this village until we see that man destroyed.’

‘Raymonds must have had some noble intentions at one time, guv.’

‘Noble, my arse.’ He shook his head, took a deep breath. ‘Okay. I know one thing, Eb, cracks are beginning to appear beneath Raymonds’ feet. He’s losing control of his empire.’

Sandford phoned as they drove to Stokes’ farm. They parked up and saw him in the field where Stokes was killed. He waved and smiled when he saw Willis. He walked across to the gate, on a path of stepping pads.

Willis shook his hand over the top of the gate. It felt ages to her since she’d seen him, a different world. In reality it was just three weeks ago and in north London.

‘Leonards has just been,’ said Sandford. ‘He’s a nice bloke. We have come to a compromise. They’ve done what they can outside, for now. They’re prepared to wait twenty-four hours for me to finish my search and then they’ll move in.’

‘Generous.’

‘Yeah, not sure I would be that kind, if I was them, but I’ve told Leonard I’ll alert him of anything I find. They’re leaving the tents in place.’ Sandford turned and pointed towards the back of the field.

‘They’ve covered the area around the tractor, and where the fight took place, with a second tent so the horse has to stay unburied for now. It’s vital to preserve as much as we can from this bloody rain. One minute it’s bright sunshine, the next it’s two inches in an hour.’

‘How’s your search going?’ asked Willis.

‘No sign of anything that might indicate Samuel has been here. But I’ve sent samples back to see if we can find a match to anything on the suit or the mittens. We’ve cordoned off Martin Stokes’ bedroom from the rest of the house and searched everyone’s rooms and found nothing of interest. I’ve been going through Stokes’ paperwork. He wasn’t a computer man so he has a lot of ledgers here that are about the farm. He has all his stock accounted for. He has clear spread sheets to do with the sales in the farm shop but nothing to do with Kellis House.’

‘Why was he so adamant in his letters to Lauren and Toby that there were pre-existing arrangements that he wanted to honour if they weren’t written down?’

‘Someone had definitely been looking through his room before I got here. We’re in the process of taking DNA samples from everyone who’s been to the farm in the last week or so. We need to get one from Raymonds. I’m looking forward to getting a sample from him.’

‘Who have you seen here?’ asked Willis.

‘Mawgan mainly. I introduced myself when I turned round to see her in the field behind me. She seems to be the one doing all the work with the animals. She spends a good deal of her day in with the pigs or the cows. The farm covers a lot of acres. You see her going off on her tractor. She stares a lot, but then she’s got a lot on her mind. No time to grieve when you have a farm to run.’

‘What about Kensa? Either of the men who live in the cottage? Jago and Marky?’

‘No, not yet,’ Sandford said. ‘I met Towan briefly. He was in his dad’s room when I cordoned it off.’

‘Did he have anything in his hands?’

‘Not as far as I could see. I can’t be sure that no one will go into Stokes’ room while I’m gone – not unless we’re going to insist that they all leave the farm, and that’s pretty impossible with the work load and the animals.’

‘No, I’d prefer to have them where I can see them. We’ll catch up with you again later.’

They left Sandford and drove back towards Penhal. Willis phoned Robbo and put him on speaker phone. ‘Robbo, can you investigate the disappearance of Ella Simmons in the year 2000?’ she asked.

‘I’ll get Hector on it now. But local information’s got to be the best. What are people saying about it?’

‘Yeah, I’ll start asking but I won’t get anywhere,’ replied Willis. ‘You haven’t met the locals. Did Marky and Jago’s stories about where they went in Exeter pan out?’ she asked.

‘I’ve been looking at some interesting footage of them,’ answered Robbo, ‘and I’m waiting to see what comes of it. They were seen talking to some people who we know have trafficked kids in the past. Gordano services has been used as the switch point.’

‘Send us everything you have on this story, Robbo. I wouldn’t put anything past those two.’

‘Okay, will do. Who’s your number-one suspect for Samuel’s abduction at this point?’ asked Robbo.

‘It’s got to be Kensa Cooper,’ said Willis with a glance towards Carter, who nodded his agreement.

‘Have you brought her in for questioning?’ Robbo asked.

Carter answered, he was instantly irritated.

‘If we hound Kensa she will freak and we’ll never find him, and if we take her into custody, and she is Samuel’s carer, he will die. Simple as.’

‘That’s a big dilemma, isn’t it?’

‘Yes, Robbo,’ answered Carter. There was a pause as both sides of the telephone line understood that what was said next had to be said.