DEAD & BURIED a gripping crime thriller full of twists (12 page)

“How many escorts do you have?” He had no real idea what was involved or how a business like that would work.

“Currently I’m based in Manchester but I’m looking to expand. I have ten girls on my books permanently and others I can call on if we’re busy. It’s a lucrative little number, Tom. The hours are okay. I run things from my office day to day but I’m always on my phone if there’s a problem at night.”

“Do the men always expect . . . well, you know?”

Shez laughed. “Some just want a dinner partner or someone to talk to while they’re away from home. As long as they pay the bill, I don’t mind.”

“But there must be plenty of the other sort?”

“Oh yes. Those who mistake the word ‘escort’ for something else entirely, if you get my meaning. My girls know the score. They all know what’s required and how far to go. Most of them I hand-picked myself. It’s picking the punters that takes the skill.”

“So you’re perfectly reputable?”

She laughed out loud. “Yes, of course. I run an escort business. It’s all very tasteful and discreet. How dare you suggest anything else!” She slapped his arm.

“Have you sorted out your employee yet — Annette? The one who was dining at the Pennine Inn?”

“Yes, we’ve had words. She’s seen the error of her ways. It turns out it was a bad night anyway. The customer didn’t pay. Robert Silver dumped her in favour of a classy piece with an American accent.”

Calladine stared at her. “Do you happen to know the name of this classy piece?”

“No idea. Annette said she cocked her little finger and he went running. Dumped her and left her to pay the bill. A lesson learned, I think.”

“This customer of yours. Robert Silver, you said?”

She nodded. Not a name Calladine knew. But he could look it up. “My advice is, keep your distance.”

She put her hand on his. “I can look after myself, you know.”

Calladine didn’t doubt it. “It might be nothing, but the woman he met has been interviewed in relation to a case we’re investigating. Just be wary.”

“That doesn’t surprise me. Robert’s no angel. I always got the impression he had a dodgy past and some scary friends.”

“Any names?”

Shez shook her head. “It wouldn’t do to say. You being police. Some of those scary friends are clients,” she explained. “That’s how I met him. How far away is your place?”

“Not far.”

“Do you have booze at home?”

“Plenty in the fridge and I have a bottle of vodka — unopened since Christmas.”

“In that case, want to spend some quality time?” She leaned closer and kissed him on the lips.

Calladine hadn’t felt like this in a long time. He got to his feet and took her hand.

Chapter 14

Friday

“He’s cute.” Eliza King tickled Sam under his chin. “I’ll take him for a walk before I go in.”

“You don’t have to,” Calladine replied. “Tea and toast suit you?” He walked off into the kitchen. When he’d come back last night with Shez, he’d forgotten about Eliza King being here. Fortunately she’d been up in her room, flat out he hoped. Shez had left this morning before she’d surfaced.

“Did you sleep okay?”

She nodded. “I certainly did. It’s nice here. Far quieter than that pub. I’d have gone mad if I’d stayed there much longer.”

“It’s always suited me.”

“You live alone?”

Calladine called back from the kitchen. “Currently, yes.”

“No kids?”

“I’ve a grown-up daughter, Zoe. She lives with her partner in a new build on the edge of town.”

“Hard work, daughters. I’ve got two. The eldest is nineteen. Gives me no end of trouble, that one.”

“You don’t look old enough.” Calladine placed a mug of tea and plate of toast in front of her.

“It must be down to good genes or something. Because it’s nothing to do with lifestyle, believe me. I did everything young. I married, had the kids. I’m not apologising for it, it's how things are. I'm thirty-eight.”

“It must have been hard when your girls were little — working, climbing the promotion ladder.”

“I managed. But I’m suffering for it now.”

Talking about her family had touched a nerve. She went quiet. After a few minutes she grabbed a slice of toast and Sam’s lead and left. Calladine had hoped she might start to relax a little. But she was no better. The woman was a complicated mix of the volatile and the moody. Just the type he could do without. Calladine thanked his lucky stars they weren’t stuck with her. He checked his mobile. Nothing from Shez. She’d promised to text when she arrived back home, but there was a message from Imogen. Emily’s provider had sent over the list. Most of the calls were from friends or Ricky, but several were listed to an unregistered pay-as-you-go. It was the one that had called the ambulance for Wayne Davey.

The bullets were from the same gun, so it should come as no surprise. Emily must have known the caller. Why else would she agree to meet in an out of the way spot?

He tidied up and checked the fridge for food. He made a mental note to buy more milk and left for work. The weather was kind again so he walked. He was trying to pack in as much exercise as he could.

* * *

“Something struck me on the way in,” Calladine said to the team when he got to the station. “The Pennine Inn has a CCTV camera at the entrance. It’s pointed down the drive. Would you check it, Imogen? See where Tanya Mallon’s car was parked up when it returned, and if possible who was driving. Also, would you check if anything is known about one Robert Silver.”

Joyce was on the office phone. “Sir, uniform have a young man downstairs. They’ve just picked him up on the Hobfield. It’s Kayne Archer.”

“DCI King?” Imogen looked towards his office.

“She’s not arrived yet. Last I saw she was walking Sam.”

“Will you speak to him?” Joyce asked.

“With pleasure. Let’s hope he’s got something useful to tell us.”

* * *

“How did it go then, you and Tom?”

“We’re meeting tomorrow. Before you get too excited it’s only the garden centre and a bit of lunch,” Monika said to Ruth. “It was being in the churchyard that did it. His parents’ grave could do with cheering up. I’m going to help him choose some plants.”

“You’re good for him, Monika. He might not realise it, but he needs you.”

“Yes, but do I need him?” Monika frowned. “He really hurt me, you know. I won’t go through that again, not even for him. You tell me he’s changed, but he seems like the same old Tom to me. Apart from how he looks, of course.”

“I think he’s learned his lesson. No excuse I know, but he’s a sucker for a pretty face. He knew Lydia wasn’t for keeps. She was using him to get a story. In the end it cost her her life and Tom feels guilty.”

“Well, I’ll give it a go. But I’m keeping it friendly. I’m not prepared to hop into bed like the old times. Not until he proves he’s a reformed character.”

“That’s fair enough.”

“What does he want — Reverend Philips?”

“He’s got a couple of questions.”

“You go in and I’ll walk Harry around until you’re finished.”

“He should be okay, he’s asleep.” Ruth clapped her hands gleefully. “Things are looking up.”

Monika had pushed baby Ireson around the graveyard several times before Ruth resurfaced.

“The reverend is long-winded. Harry been okay?”

“Not a peep.”

“Someone you knew?”

They were standing by Agnes Jackson’s grave. Fresh flowers had been left that morning.

“I’m puzzled, that’s all. She had no one, so who’s leaving these?”

“Soon find out.” Ruth ducked down and read the card that had been left. “
My one true love
,” she read. “There you are then — an old boyfriend.”

“Not Agnes. She lost her husband when she was in her fifties and was glad to be rid. She wouldn’t get involved again.”

Ruth took a closer look at the inscription on the headstone. “There are two of them in there. Agnes Jackson, who died a year ago and her mother, Doris, who died in 1969. Perhaps the flowers are meant for her.”

“I doubt it. How old would the old codger have to be? Agnes’s mother was sixty when she died.”

“It’s bugging you, isn’t it?”

“It’s weird, that’s all. If Agnes was still alive I could have asked her. I don’t know who would know now.”

“It could be a simple mix-up. A case of the wrong grave.” Ruth noted down the names and the dates. “I’ll ask the vicar later. He might be able to tell me something.”

* * *

Kayne Archer was shown to an interview room to wait. He was edgy. He kept looking round as if expecting to meet someone he didn’t want to see.

“She in yet?” Rocco asked Calladine as they watched him through the two way window.

“No — and she’d better not have done one with my dog either.”

“You think Archer is her informant?”

Calladine nodded.

“How does that work then? What can he possibly know about Costello?”

“I’m not sure that he knows anything, Rocco. All I do know is that he and his mates have upset someone. Costello? A rival firm making a play for the Hobfield? Who knows? He had a gun on him too. It’s gone to the Duggan. Julian should be able to tell us if it was the one that killed Emily and shot Wayne Davey.”

“She won’t like it if we muscle in.”

“In that case, Rocco, she should get in on time. Come on then. Let’s get this started.”

“Mr Archer,” Calladine began with a smile. “Careless of you, getting picked up like that. Didn’t you realise you were a marked man?”

Kayne Archer was tall and thick-set. His complexion was swarthy and pock-marked and he looked older than his nineteen years. He wore the regulation denims and hoodie of most of the crew off the estate. The hood was pulled over his head. He looked as though he didn’t want to be seen. Who could he be afraid of here in the nick?

“Davey and Garrett are dead,” he grunted.

“How do you know about Garrett?”

“Word’s out. Some rival gang got them both.”

Calladine smiled. “Rival to who? Costello? You must have got that wrong. Whoever killed your mates doesn’t have a beef with Costello. He rarely operates around here these days.

“I’ll be next. I need protection.”

Short and sweet. And avoiding an answer.

“Why? Who are you afraid of?”

“The whole bloody lot of them.” There was real fear in his eyes. “Costello, because he thinks I’m a grass. The firm who want to take over, because I’m in the way.”

“Costello has no interest in you.”

“He’ll come after me. He thinks I know things. He wants to shut me up.”

“Who have you been working for, Kayne?”

“I don’t know. This rival gang — whoever!”

Calladine knew that Archer wouldn’t feel comfortable talking to the police like this. He’d try his best to get away with saying very little. He was only here at all because it was safer than being on the street.

“I can’t help you if you don’t talk to me.”

Archer appeared to wrestle with this for a few moments.

“We could bail you — send you back out there and see what happens,” added Calladine.

“Costello wants the estate.”

“Why? Who told you that?”

“A bloke said he could use the three of us. We stood to make a lot of money.”

“Who is this man?”

“He works for Costello.”

“Are you sure about that?”

Archer nodded. “He knew things, about jobs Costello and him had worked on.”

“Tell me about the gun, Kayne. Start with where you got it from.”

“He gave it to me.”

“The bloke who works for Costello? Does he have a name?” Calladine asked. “And think carefully because it could make all the difference to where you spend the next few decades of your life.”

Archer’s head shot up. He looked Calladine in the eye. “I didn’t use it. I never shot anybody. No bullets, you see. We were going to do a trade for the weed, but things never got that far.”

“Not much use, is it, a gun without bullets. Who was this bloke who gave it to you?”

“I dunno.”

Calladine tried another tack. “You said Costello thinks you know things. What things, Kayne?”

The lad looked Calladine in the eye. “That’s just it — I don’t. It’s all one big scam. I was paid to contact the police. I was told to talk to a DI King. I was to make out that I knew stuff, something that’d stitch Costello up good and proper.”

That much Calladine could believe; it was why Eliza King was here. But who would gain from this charade?

“Who told you to do this, Kayne?”

“Never gave me no name. Said it didn’t matter.”

“The same bloke who gave you the gun?”

“No. It was a woman.”

“You’d been recruited by Costello’s people. Why double-cross him? You must have realised that was a dangerous game to play.”

“I thought I could handle it. She offered me a lot of money too.”

“Did you get paid?”

Archer shook his head. “Only a bit. I was supposed to get the remainder once it was done.”

“When did you know it was a scam?” Calladine asked.

“When I couldn’t contact her anymore.”

“Do you even know if there is such information?”

Another shake of the head.

“Who is she, Kayne?”

The lad stared at his hands, which he’d placed flat on the desk top. “I don’t know her. I’ve never even seen her. She always texted me.”

“Back to the bloke who recruited you and your mates. He gave you a gun. Handed it to you, I presume. So come on — what did he look like?”

Archer was back staring at his hands. He didn’t want to talk. But he wasn’t stupid. Calladine was counting on him realising that if he had any hope of walking away from this, he had no choice but to give the police what they wanted.

“He didn’t give me the gun. He left it for me. He put it in a carrier bag and left it on the common. In a bin.”

“When was this?”

“Same day Wayne got his kneecaps done.”

“So come on then, what did he look like?”

“Like I said, I didn’t see much of him. He was tall, thin and wore a suit.”

Calladine was getting frustrated. “That description could fit half the blokes in this town. I need more, Kayne. Is there anything that’s different about him?”

“He has half a finger missing.” Archer rubbed the little finger on his right hand.

“How does he contact you?”

“By mobile. He gave me one to use but I got rid of it. I don’t want anything to do with this anymore.”

“That was a stupid thing to do. The phone could have helped us find this man.”

“Never mind the phone. I need locking up for my own protection. I’ve got Costello’s goons after me for ducking out. Once they find out that I was working for that scary cow too, I’ll be a goner.”

Calladine could barely restrain his laughter — a scally off the Hobfield asking to be locked up!

“Can you tell me anything else about the woman?”

“Nowt except she’s careful.”

“Okay, Kayne. This is what we’ll do. A colleague of mine will want to talk to you. The DI King you mentioned. So we will keep you here. Get the lad a cup of tea,” Calladine told the uniformed officer.

Calladine and Rocco returned to the incident room. “You don’t think he shot Emily, sir?”

“No, Rocco. Archer is merely a pawn in this. It would appear that both sides are using him. But I still can’t get my head round the idea that Costello would want the Hobfield.”