Double Dealing (Detective Sergeant Catherine Bishop Series Book Two) (17 page)

33

Thomas set a plate of lasagne and salad in front of his sister, then sat opposite her and took a long swallow from a bottle of beer. Catherine eyed the plate.

  ‘Now you’re really scaring me.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘Spaghetti bolognese, lasagne? You’ll be making a soufflé next.’ She picked up her knife and fork and tucked in.

  ‘A what?’ Thomas frowned.

  ‘All right, maybe that’s a step too far.’ She chewed and swallowed. ‘This is lovely, thank you.’

  ‘You don’t need to sound so surprised.’ Thomas smiled. He reached into his trouser pocket and set a couple of twenty pound notes on the table. ‘Here. I know it’s not much, but when I get paid I’ll give you some more.’

She waved it away. ‘Don’t worry about it, use it to take Anna out. Not seeing her tonight?’

He drank again, then shook his head. ‘Didn’t want to seem too keen. Anyway, she was working late.’

With a rueful smile, Catherine said, ‘Better get used to it, Thomas, it happens quite often.’

  ‘I understand that. She seems dedicated.’

Catherine piled lettuce and lasagne onto her fork.

  ‘She is. Well, we have to be.’

  ‘Anna says you’re a good boss.’

  ‘I’m not really her boss.’ Catherine took a sip of water. ‘Anyway, she’s hardly going to tell you she hates me.’

  ‘You know when you got hurt?’ He raised a hand to his cheek. ‘Your nose and face, I mean. Does that sort of thing often happen?’

  ‘There’s always a risk, I suppose, but I wouldn’t say often. We’re usually going in to find out what’s happened when it’s all calmed down, not when it’s still kicking off. Uniform have that pleasure.’

  ‘I couldn’t do it. The things you must see . . .’ He shuddered. Catherine smiled, then blinked hard as the image of the battered face of the woman they’d found at Moon Pond shot through her mind, followed by Keeley Pearce’s smiling face. She opened her mouth, wanting to tell Thomas about it, to talk it through, share it. She couldn’t.

  ‘Are you worried about Anna getting hurt?’ she asked instead, cutting off another square of lasagne. Thomas fidgeted in his seat.

  ‘Not just Anna, but . . . yeah.’ Catherine shot him a knowing glance and he grinned.

  ‘You really like her, don’t you?’ She shook her head, amazed. ‘I never thought I’d see the day. Thomas Bishop falls in love. Women across the globe go into mourning.’

He laughed. ‘Don’t be daft, I hardly know her yet. I just don’t want to mess it up.’

  ‘Cook her a meal, she’ll be putty in your hands.’ She swallowed the last mouthful.

  ‘Only if she likes spaghetti or lasagne, that’s my full repertoire.’ He shrugged.

  ‘Serve the lasagne, then get her a jam doughnut for pudding. She’ll be bowled over.’ Catherine stood and took her plate over to the sink as her mobile began to ring in her pocket. She sighed, pulling it free.

  ‘Catherine.’ His voice was quiet, distracted.

  ‘Are you okay?’

There was a silence, then: ‘Do you fancy a drink?’

  Knight handed her the bottle of beer she’d asked for and slid into the booth beside her. The pub was out of town, quiet and old-fashioned with a log fire burning in a huge hearth and an elderly black Labrador snoozing in front of the bar. Opening a bag of salt and vinegar crisps, Knight offered them to her. She shook her head.

  ‘Are you okay?’ she asked again.

He chewed for a second, then said, ‘I think I’m going to be suspended.’

Catherine stared at him. ‘You’re serious, aren’t you?’

  ‘Shea seems determined to get rid of me. I’m sorry, Catherine, I shouldn’t have dragged you out here. You’ve got your own career to think about.’

  ‘Don’t worry about me.’

  ‘I wasn’t sure who else to talk to.’ He looked wretched. Catherine remembered the kindness he’d shown her since his arrival in Lincolnshire and reached out a hand, laying it on his forearm for a second. He glanced up. ‘I know Shea and Allan have talked to you. I’m not going to ask what they said, but they’ve got it into their heads that I covered up the photos Malc Hughes was sent, left them out of my investigation.’

  ‘I know, but why would you do that?’

  ‘Because I took them?’

Catherine snorted. ‘That’s ridiculous.’

Knight shook his head. ‘They don’t think so. They think I killed Paul Hughes to get back at his dad, sent him the photos to gloat, then used the investigation to cover my tracks and divert the suspicion away from myself.’

  ‘I’ve never heard such crap. Kendrick told me Malc Hughes didn’t even receive the photos until after he was questioned, not to mention the fact that you were with a team of police officers all day when Paul was killed. Anyway, if they really thought that you were involved, you’d have been suspended by now.’

  ‘I doubt it’ll be long.’

Catherine shook her head, feeling helpless. ‘I don’t know what to say.’

  ‘You’ve seen the thing on my back. If Shea had, I’d be spending the night on remand.’

  ‘Look,’ she said. He was staring into the bottom of his glass of orange juice. ‘Jonathan,
I
don’t believe it, DCI Kendrick doesn’t believe it, and no one who’s ever worked with you would believe it either.’

He gave a bitter laugh. ‘Oh, wouldn’t they.’

  ‘What does that mean?’

  ‘I can think of a few ex-colleagues in London who would be only too pleased to have the chance to see the back of me once and for all. No pun intended.’ His hand drifted towards his shoulder blade again.

  ‘There are arseholes everywhere,’ Catherine said.

  ‘These are influential arseholes. A superintendent, a chief inspector . . .’

  ‘What happened?’

He frowned. ‘I shouldn’t have phoned you, I’m sorry. How are you?’ When she didn’t answer, he glanced around. ‘It’s a nice pub. Cosy and traditional.’

  ‘Jonathan . . .’

  ‘All right. There was an investigation into the death of a teenage boy. I didn’t like the way it was handled and I said so. They had it down as a gang killing, I thought his dad had done it. I still do. Anyway, I made some enemies.’

  ‘I don’t see what that has to do with the death of Paul Hughes?’

  ‘Maybe I’m just paranoid.’

  ‘Shea and Allan did ask me what I’d do if a DI’s job became vacant,’ Catherine told him. Knight smiled a little.

  ‘That was subtle of them,’ he said, sipping his drink.

  ‘I told them I didn’t know.’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘It’s the truth. I like being a sergeant.’

  ‘You don’t aspire to be the next Superintendent Stringer then?’

Catherine almost choked on her beer.

  ‘What do you think?’

He grinned.

  ‘Can’t see it somehow.’

She raised her beer bottle and he clinked his glass against it. They sat, enjoying their drinks, the silence comfortable rather than awkward now. After a while, Knight cleared his throat.

  ‘What?’ Catherine asked.

  ‘It’s just that . . . Jo Webber gave me her personal mobile number,’ he mumbled. She stared at him. Inspector Wallpaper volunteering more personal information? It had to be some sort of a record.

  ‘And have you phoned her?’

He fidgeted.

  ‘Not yet. I didn’t want to rush it.’

  ‘Rush it? You’re sitting here with me when you could be spending the evening with the most beautiful woman in the county?’ She drained her beer. ‘I’m going to nip to the loo. Phone her now, it’s only eight thirty. Pick her up and take her for a meal. I’ll even let you drop me off at home first.’

Knight smiled as she hurried off towards the back of the pub. Catherine seemed to be much more herself tonight, not that he could say he knew her well. The fragile, haunted look that had masked her face was disappearing. He’d been worried about her. At Claire’s funeral she’d been remote, desolate, her usual easy smile and humour having deserted her. He liked her, admired the way she had picked herself up in the few weeks that had passed since. She was determined to move on with her life, he could see that, and he respected her for it. Walking back into a station that had buzzed with gossip and rumour since Claire’s death couldn’t have been easy. He knew that the team were determined to help her through it in any way they could; they had told him as much. Anna, Dave, Simon, Chris, they’d all come up to him individually, shuffling their feet in embarrassment, asking how she was and when she was coming back. They all knew Claire hadn’t been worth the heartbreak, but that was easy for them to say.

  He waited for the call to connect.

  They’d told Lauren to lie on the back seat of the car under a blanket and she wasn’t going to argue, not with the memory of the other woman’s body and that evil, gleaming knife blade so fresh in her mind. A sob rose in her throat and she swallowed it, pressing her lips together and blinking hard. It was her own fault that she was lying here, her filthy hair matted and stinking, her clothes even worse. The stench of her own body under the warm, scratchy blanket was unbearable. The two men in the front hadn’t spoken since the journey had begun, and the atmosphere in the darkened, speeding car was tense.

  She and Mark had been so stupid – the holidays, the clothes, the nights out. Their credit card bills were higher every month, but they’d been manageable until Mark had lost his job. Then there had been his bouts of drinking, the final argument . . . She sighed, not wanting to remember that, the threats and the mess on the kitchen floor. Vomit and whiskey, empty beer cans that she’d hauled out of the rubbish bin and thrown at her husband. She’d lost her temper, but then so had he, drunk and despairing. He’d stood there staring at her, his clothes filthy, vomit down the front of his shirt, mud clinging to his jeans. His elbow was badly grazed and bleeding, but Mark hadn’t even noticed, he was well past the point of feeling pain. Perhaps that was the point. When she had found out that he had spent a good chunk of the money she had been saving on drink, she’d flown at him, clutching his arms, shouting in his face. Then she had grabbed her suitcase, already packed for the weekend away that couldn’t now happen, and stormed out. One phone call was all that was needed, the chance that she sneered at before now seeming like a blessing. She could have gone to her parents for help, but she’d imagined the look of scorn on her mother’s face, the outrage and disbelief, and she couldn’t do it. Far better to take this route, a safe and quick way of paying off all their debts with even a little to spare.

  Of course, it hadn’t worked out like that. She’d known she was in trouble when she had rushed into the room and seen the two men’s panicked faces, the shovel and the body on the floor. She retched, bile flooding her throat as she remembered the woman’s ruined face. How could they have done it? She’d screamed at them, bent over the woman to see if she could help her. No chance. She’d tried to run then, to flee down the stairs, but they’d soon caught up with her. She didn’t know who their boss was, but they were obviously terrified of him, talking in hushed voices about what he would do when he found out Lauren had seen the dead woman.

  The car was slowing, and Lauren braced herself for whatever was going to happen next. She was numb; a detached, almost clinical feeling of helplessness. This was a film starring someone else, one she had no role in at all.

  Lauren held her breath as the car’s engine cut and she heard the doors open. She was completely at their mercy, her hands still cuffed behind her, the back doors of the vehicle locked. She heard the door nearest her feet open and the older man said, ‘Right, get out.’ The blanket was yanked away and she sat up slowly.

  ‘Where are we?’ she croaked.

  ‘It doesn’t matter. Get out.’

She scrabbled her way towards the door, trying to take in as much detail about her surroundings as she could without being obvious. Deciding she was taking too long, he lunged forward and grabbed a handful of her hair. Lauren let out a shriek and swung her feet at his shins. Swearing, he jumped back, then brought his hand around in a vicious slap across her face. She fell back, stunned for a second, her cheek burning, and blood starting to leak from her nose. He stood there, grinning down at her as she groaned.

  ‘Are you going to play nicely now? You should know better than to try to piss me around.’ She glared up at him. ‘Come on, out.’ She lay for a few seconds longer, turning her face towards the car seat and allowing some saliva to dribble from her lips. She was no expert, but she’d seen enough crime programmes on TV to know that leaving as much trace of yourself as you could was a good idea. Hopefully there would be some blood from her nose too. He grabbed her legs this time and hauled her out, set her on her feet and kept a tight hold of her upper arms.

  ‘Christ, you stink.’

The blood had reached her mouth.

  ‘What do you expect?’ Lauren snarled. ‘It’s not like I’ve been staying at the Hilton.’

He marched her forward. In front of them was a building that looked like a barn, red brick with several doors set at intervals along the side. Lauren frowned. Where were they? She’d seen another building behind them, two storeys with large windows on the top floor. It looked like a house; there was even a conservatory attached, then a low fence with a gate. The car had paused for a minute or two just before she was ordered out of it; perhaps that was when they had travelled through the gate?