Behind Dead Eyes (18 page)

It
was hard to meet anywhere in the north-east in the evenings apart from in pubs. Nowhere else was open. Ian Bradshaw was already waiting for Tom at one of his watering holes on the outskirts of Durham city. The detective seemed pleased to see Helen again and they spent a few moments catching up with one another before they got down to business. Like Tom, Bradshaw hadn't seen Helen since the Sean Donnellan case, aside from a few moments at Mary Collier's funeral. Bradshaw proceeded to brief them about Lonely Lane and the negligent attitude of the time-serving police sergeant.

‘So Richard Bell was not exaggerating,' said Tom, ‘the place really is a magnet for nutters and perverts. It makes me think that anyone could have murdered Rebecca.'

‘Not necessarily,' Bradshaw told him. ‘Rebecca was killed two years ago and there have been no murders before it or since.'

‘Maybe the guy is just lying low,' offered Tom.

‘And maybe you're clutching at straws because you're working for Bell's family.'

Helen decided to interrupt before the two men became fractious. ‘Why is it called Lonely Lane?'

‘It dates back many years,' Tom said. ‘Married ladies used to meet their lovers there if they were feeling lonely … meaning they wanted sex. Even years ago the place was synonymous with adultery.'

‘Oh, I almost forgot.' Helen fished a photocopied article from her handbag and handed it to Tom. It was from her newspaper's archive and showed a man arriving at court for sentencing.

‘What's this?'

‘A case primarily about money laundering and tax evasion. There were all sorts of scams involving VAT avoidance and phantom employees on the payroll in pubs all over the city. This guy was sent down for a couple of years for cheating the system.' She pointed at the picture of a gloomy man heading into court. ‘He took the full rap himself, even though he couldn't have gained much directly compared to the owners and licensees, all of whom were seemingly unconnected. Their only common link was this man, who they all employed as a
consulting accountant
. The CPS was unable to build a strong enough case against any of the licensees individually and they were probably relatively blameless.'

‘Because they were front men,' Tom said.

‘Exactly.'

‘So who was the real beneficiary of this fraud?'

‘No one could prove it but the word on the street is they were all pubs controlled by Jimmy McCree. Licences were withdrawn and six pubs closed down. One of them was the Highwayman.'

‘So Councillor Jarvis's daughter was working in one of big Jimmy McCree's pubs,' said Tom, ‘and she probably never even knew it.'

‘I don't suppose the councillor knew it either,' said Helen.

‘But did Jimmy McCree?' asked Tom. ‘That's the million-dollar question.'

‘He had to,' said Bradshaw. ‘He must be permanently
worried about undercover cops infiltrating his empire. Everyone who works for him would be vetted, even casual bar staff.'

‘McCree has been cosying up to local politicians lately,' said Helen.

‘Then hold that thought,' said Tom, ‘it could lead us somewhere. McCree is linked to Joe Lynch, who is Frank Jarvis's successor as leader of the city council and Frank's daughter worked for him, albeit indirectly. That could of course just be a coincidence.'

‘The north-east is a small world,' Bradshaw reminded him.

‘Did you get anywhere with Sandra's university pals?' asked Tom.

‘I looked up a few but they all stuck to their original script. In her first term, Sandra Jarvis was a nice, kind, personable soul but when she came back after the Christmas break she seemed different. She was withdrawn and sullen, she missed lectures and tutorials and stopped going out with friends but she never gave a reason for this.'

‘No word about drugs?' Tom asked.

‘Not a dickie bird,' said Bradshaw, ‘but there was one thing that isn't in our case files – unless you found it today in Newcastle.'

‘What?'

‘Her other job.'

‘What other job?'

‘One of her mates told me Sandra volunteered at a centre that helps vulnerable kids. It was the first I'd heard of this, so I assumed Newcastle were looking into it as it's on their patch.'

‘There's nothing in the case files,' said Tom, ‘believe me, I read every bloody word. It took me all afternoon.'

‘How could that have been missed?' asked Bradshaw.

‘Cock-up or conspiracy?' wondered Tom.

‘That's what we need to find out. Apparently Sandra wanted to work with young offenders when she graduated.'

‘Rather her than me,' said Tom. ‘Where did she volunteer?'

‘Her friend reckons a number of places but she'd been helping out at one for troubled teenagers most recently.' He checked his notebook for the name. ‘Meadowlands.'

‘Why do these places always have such idyllic-sounding names?' asked Tom. ‘Bet it's a hell-hole.'

‘The kids there are some of the more challenging ones: young girls who got into drugs or prostitution, some of them have been abused by their own family members. Awful stuff, and all before the age of sixteen.'

‘Do you think we might be able to speak to the girls there?' asked Helen.

‘That's going to be tricky,' Bradshaw told her, ‘reporters dealing with vulnerable young people.'

‘I'm not a reporter, Ian,' Tom reminded him, ‘I've been hired by the police to provide expert analysis.'

‘Fair enough,' conceded the detective.

‘That wasn't the only thing not in the case files,' Tom said. ‘The photograph of Sandra Jarvis buying her ticket at the train station is missing.'

‘You mean it's been removed?'

‘I don't know, possibly.'

‘Like you said, cock-up or conspiracy? It's probably just fallen out of the file. I'll ask them to find it for us.'

Despite his frustration at the lack of clear progress in either case, Tom felt energised somehow. He realised it was because he was no longer digging into the Sandra Jarvis or Rebecca Holt cases on his own. He was part of a team again;
the same team that had blown the lid off the Sean Donnellan and Michelle Summers cases, and their work had already begun to bear fruit. Ian had uncovered the sordid truth about Lonely Lane, following one brief chat with a police sergeant, then he had discovered Sandra's link to the Meadowlands care home. Helen meanwhile had found the reason for the closure of the Highwayman pub then given Tom an intriguing story about Frank Jarvis's private life. Tom felt as if he was moving three times faster now they were both on board.

‘What are you looking so smug about?' asked Helen.

‘Nothing,' he said.

The
foreman made Tom wear a hard hat and high-visibility vest in matching canary yellow before he would let him onto the site that morning. Freddie Holt was waiting for him there. He was standing on a large gantry erected on the edge of a former brewery which was being levelled for redevelopment.

‘You're the journalist,' observed Holt, but he was not interested in handshakes or pleasantries. Instead he said, ‘Take a look at this. What do you see?'

Tom Carney surveyed the huge expanse of land before him. Aside from rubble poking out of the mud where the brewery once stood, there wasn't much to see. ‘A derelict site.'

Freddie Holt sighed, ‘Is that all?'

Tom was beginning to get the picture but he felt no great desire to humour the older man. ‘A graveyard,' he offered facetiously, ‘the wreckage of a once proud industry.'

‘Opportunity!' the businessman corrected him. ‘That's what I see – but then I have a vision.'

‘What kind of vision?'

‘Give me one year,' Holt said, as if it was within Tom's power to do so, ‘and I will transform this wasteland into a thriving retail park with shops, cafés, restaurants and a multi-screen cinema and you know what that means?'

‘Profits?'

‘Jobs!' He gave Tom a disappointed look. ‘Hundreds of them for local people.'

‘Yeah but they're not real jobs, are they?' countered Tom. ‘They're McJobs.'

‘What?' The businessman either didn't understand the phrase or chose not to.

‘McJobs,' explained Tom, ‘you know,' and he mimicked an unenthusiastic tone, ‘as in,
Do you want fries with that?'
then reverted to his normal voice. ‘A McJob – low skill, low pay, no prospects, might as well work for McDonald's.'

‘Bullshit.' Holt scowled but he didn't offer a contradictory argument.

‘Sorry to rain on your parade,' Tom said, ‘but some of us don't buy it.'

‘When I look at this site I don't see the demise of a proud industry,' Holt was animated now, ‘I see an uncompetitive factory brought low by greedy unions and swept away by economic forces because of their unreasonable demands.'

‘You're not fond of them, are you?' asked Tom. ‘The unions. I've heard the stories.'

‘What stories?'

‘The men you use never go on strike,' Tom said. ‘There must be a reason for that.'

Freddie Holt eyed Tom suspiciously. ‘My secretary said you wanted to write an article about me,' he said, ‘but I won't contribute to a hatchet-job, if that's what you're planning.'

‘I won't be writing anything bad about your development,' Tom assured him.

‘You'd better not be.'

‘I'm here to talk to you about Rebecca.'

‘What?' The businessman was furious. ‘You said …'

‘I know what I said to your secretary and I'm sorry, but I didn't think you'd see me if I told her the truth.'

‘Well you were right about that,' said Holt. ‘Now see if you can guess what I'm going to do next.'

‘Throw me out presumably, which is fine if you want Richard Bell to be released.'

‘Released? What are you talking about? The bastard got life and I hope he rots in there.'

‘He's doing life alright, but on the flimsiest of evidence. His family have asked me to look into his case to see if it can be overturned.'

‘And you expect me to help you?' Holt's face was reddening.

Tom shook his head. ‘No, I expect you to convince me otherwise. I've told them I'll keep an open mind. If you can persuade me he's guilty then I'll leave him in there, as you say, to rot.'

Holt frowned suspiciously. ‘Why should I believe that?'

‘No reason, but you speaking to me is not going to secure Richard Bell's release and it may just prevent it.'

Freddie Holt hesitated for just a moment ‘Then we'll talk inside.' He jerked his head towards a large Portakabin then set off down the metal steps of the gantry, his heavy steel-toed boots clanging ominously with every stride.

Helen knocked on the apartment door and waited, then she knocked and waited some more. She was about to leave when she noticed the spy hole in the centre of the door and got the distinct feeling she was being watched through it. Sure enough, her patience was rewarded when the door opened a fraction but stayed on the chain. A woman in her early thirties peered through the gap at her. Tom had suggested Helen might be the best person to interview Amy Riordan and she had agreed, even though it had meant a
drive to Leeds. Tom was right. Amy was nervous enough with a woman standing on her doorstep, let alone a man.

‘Amy Riordan?' asked Helen and when the woman did not respond she went on, ‘I'm Helen Norton. I work for a local newspaper in Newcastle.' She stressed that part, for she assumed Amy would be less forthcoming if she thought she worked for a London tabloid. ‘I'm investigating the Richard Bell case.'

‘That case is long over,' said Amy, her voice barely audible, ‘why dig it all up again?'

‘Because there might be some doubt about the conviction.' It was the shortest explanation Helen could think of. ‘I've come quite a long way to speak with you and I was hoping we could talk about Richard.'

The woman shook her head. ‘No,' she told Helen, ‘I've nothing to say about him.' And before Helen could utter another word, the door was closed firmly in her face.

‘So you're interested in the truth, are you?' asked Freddie Holt once they were inside the Portakabin. ‘Well, here it is. Richard Bell beat my wife to death. It's that simple.'

‘Possibly,' said Tom, ‘but there were other suspects.'

‘Including me? Oh I've heard it all before, in and out of court,' he sighed, ‘and I have to put up with the gossip as well.
Freddie Holt knew his wife was shagging that bloke Bell so he killed her and framed the poor bugger for it
. Isn't that how it goes? I suppose I should be flattered people think I'm capable of something that cunning but Christ, it's fantasy, man!'

‘I tend to agree with you.'

‘You do?' Holt was clearly surprised by that.

‘Yes.'

‘Then why are you here?'

‘Because I want to know more about Rebecca,' said Tom, ‘other than the stuff they wrote in the paper.'

‘Most of which was bullshit,' said Holt indignantly, ‘particularly the stuff her supposed best friend said. Do you know that bitch Nicole actually wrote to me to say she was devastated by the article? The woman posed in her bloody underwear next to those words. She took that newspaper's money then had the nerve to beg me for forgiveness. She actually said the paper made it all up. Lying bitch!'

Tom decided there and then there would be little point in interviewing Naughty Nicole. ‘I hate to break the news to you, Mr Holt, but they probably did.'

‘Aye well, I wrote back to her; told her I hope she gets cancer and dies before she has time to enjoy that money.'

‘Was none of it true then, the stuff the newspapers wrote about you and Rebecca?'

Freddie Holt sighed, ‘Look I am not an idiot. I'm no Tom what's-his-name …' He paused to think for a moment before remembering ‘… Cruise. I realise it wasn't my looks that attracted Rebecca. I thought she felt safe with me, stable. She had no worries, didn't have to work, nothing. There's not many can say that these days,' he looked at Tom for confirmation, ‘is there?'

‘Maybe not,' he said.

‘I didn't even need kids. Mine are grown up.'

‘Did she want them?'

‘No, at least she said she didn't, but if she did want them we could have worked something out.' Freddie made it sound like a business contract that was open for negotiation. ‘All I wanted was for her to be happy. I fell and I fell hard. There's no fool like an old fool. I married a woman twenty years younger than me. What did I expect would happen?'

‘You sound angry.'

‘Of course I'm bloody angry!' He seemed to make a conscious effort to calm down before saying calmly, ‘And that's why I killed her.'

Tom said nothing, just stared back at Freddie Holt.

‘That's what you want to hear, isn't it? I got into one of my famous tempers and beat my unfaithful wife to death in a jealous rage? That would suit you, wouldn't it? It's about the only thing that would get that toe rag out of his life sentence – if I'd done it and I admitted it to you.'

‘So,' Tom asked, ‘did you?'

‘Kill her? Don't be fucking wet! Of course I didn't. I loved the bloody woman,' he was emotional, ‘still do and yes, I know how stupid that makes me sound but … I miss her. Or maybe I just miss the way she made me feel,' he offered. ‘Perhaps that amounts to the same thing.'

‘But she didn't feel the same way?'

‘Evidently not.'

‘And you never suspected?'

‘I told you I was a fool,' Freddie said. ‘It does me no credit to admit it.'

‘That barrister for the defence,' Tom knew he was about to tread on delicate ground, ‘gave you a hard time, didn't he?'

‘Thought he could ruffle me, yes.'

‘But he didn't?'

‘It takes a lot to knock me sideways and Rebecca's death had already done that. He was talking nonsense.'

‘Because he said you had a better motive for killing your wife than Richard Bell.'

‘Yes.'

‘Why was that again?'

‘As if you don't know.' Holt gave Tom a dirty look but
continued regardless: ‘I was the jealous, controlling husband, wasn't I? The old, bald unattractive man with the beautiful
trophy wife,
as that bastard called her, like that was all she was to me. When I found out about Bell I killed her in a fit of jealous rage … except I carefully delayed that burst of temper until I could lure her down a lovers' lane then murder her in a cold, premeditated manner, which sort of weakened his argument.'

‘There was also the money?'

‘Come again?'

‘Your money. If she divorced you, she still would have ended up with some of your fortune, particularly if you couldn't prove adultery.'

‘Why would she need to leave me to get my money? I gave her everything she could ever want. She had her own credit cards and a separate bank account with an allowance. I never questioned anything she bought. She lived very well.'

‘But she was in love with Richard Bell.'

‘She was
screwing
Richard Bell, there's a difference. I don't think for one moment either of them would have left the marital home. I was supporting her and from what I heard his wife was carrying him. The two of them wouldn't have been much cop on their own, would they? He was a bit bloody useless, by all accounts.' It was clear he took some satisfaction from Richard Bell's lack of success outside of the bedroom. ‘Just a pretty boy really, though I hear he's not quite so pretty anymore.'

‘You heard about his slashed face?'

‘Oh yes,' said Holt, ‘and no, I didn't pay anyone to do that to him, though I can't say I was devastated when I read about it. I thought it was a form of justice, since looks are all he's got. Look, maybe I did leave myself open but we all have our
weak spots, Mr Carney. I loved Rebecca. Why can nobody else see that? They all think it was just about the sex or having the best-looking bird on your arm when you walk into a restaurant but it wasn't. I genuinely loved the girl. The lawyers,' he continued, ‘they all wanted me to get her to sign one of those … what-are-they-called … pre-nuptial agreements like they have in America but I mean …' he shook his head ‘… you can't ask your wife to sign something before you marry her in case it doesn't work out. If you do that you're bloody doomed from the start.'

‘I still can't see a man like you losing half his fortune and a good chunk of his business empire to a young wife who's been with him for a relatively short time.'

‘Look, Rebecca didn't know how much I was worth. She didn't even ask me, not the whole time we were together. She knew I was well off and it ran to millions but even fancy divorce lawyers would struggle to put a value on me.

‘I suppose at the back of my mind I knew she wouldn't have been with me if it wasn't for the money. She liked to be looked after, but I thought we had an understanding that included her not screwing another man when my back was turned. I thought she was different – but she was rotten, just like everybody else.'

Until that point Freddie Holt had been kind about his late wife, so the sudden departure from the script was quite shocking. ‘You think everyone is rotten?'

‘To the core, bonny lad.'

‘That's a bit extreme, isn't it?'

Holt shook his head calmly. ‘Not at all. It's self-preservation. Think about it. Everybody is out for themselves in the long run.'

‘What about people who do genuinely good things – selfless stuff that benefits other people but not them?'

He shook his head. ‘They do it so they can feel good about themselves,' he affirmed. ‘They like people saying how nice they are so it's just another form of self-interest.'

‘That's a pretty fucked-up world view.'

‘It's realistic pessimism,' Holt reasoned.

Tom knew it was none of his business but for some reason he was curious. ‘What about relationships, do you bother with any of that now?'

‘I'm through with all of that nonsense. I haven't got the time or the inclination.' Then he qualified his statement, as if he didn't want Tom to get the wrong idea. ‘Everything is still in working order and if I want a woman I have one but there's nothing to it. I don't even take them out anymore.'

‘You must know some obliging women.'

‘Escort girls.' He said it shamelessly, as if daring Tom to look shocked. ‘They know what you want and there's no pretence, you pay them, it's a business deal, the good ones even pretend you're something special for an hour or so, then you leave and you don't take any of their baggage with you. I'm a businessman and I respect the honesty of that transaction. You might be judging me right now but you haven't lived as long as me.'