Dead and Gone (10 page)

‘How long will it be before you know more?’

‘I asked Mexican Pete that. He said it would be a week or two longer, but not to worry, she wasn’t planning on going anywhere.’

‘I imagine not,’ O’Donnell commented dryly. ‘By the way, that was excellent work by DC Andrews. But for her persistence, that poor woman’s body might have lain there undiscovered forever. I think a mention on her file is merited.’

‘I agree.’ Fleming looked over at Nash. ‘Do you want to tell her, Mike, or shall I?’

‘I think she’d appreciate it more if it came from you, as the senior officer.’

‘We’ll have to wait for that report before we can consider how to progress the case,’ O’Donnell commented. ‘In the meantime, what about the other stuff we’ve got outstanding?’

Nash shrugged. ‘I’m concerned about these computer scams. Fortunately, no more incidents have been reported in the last few weeks, but that’s not to say we won’t suddenly get another rash of them. So far, Viv’s made no headway trying to get help from our experts, other than a few phone calls. He’s tried liaising with them, and from the scraps of conversation I’ve heard, they could be talking Mandarin, for all I know. Mironova is
coordinating both inquiries, which will leave me free to head up the “workshop woman” investigation.’

‘Is that what they’re calling it?’ O’Donnell gathered up the paperwork Nash had supplied and placed it in her out-tray, signalling the end of the meeting. ‘We’ll meet again in a fortnight, unless there are any urgent developments in the meantime.’

Neil Ormondroyd was always first to arrive at the solicitors’ office in Bishopton. He glanced at the brass plate by the front door. Ormondroyd & Partners was a little deceptive as titles go, although there had once been a partner and a clerk. That had been in the days when Neil’s father had been the Ormondroyd, before Neil had qualified ten years ago; before everything had changed.

He really would have to get round to having a new plate made. But that would involve ordering new stationery and having the bank mandate changed. Then there would be all the official bodies to notify. The size of the task had deterred him, caused him to put it off time and again. But he would have to tackle it. The longer he deferred it, the more painful the reminder was. The reminder of things Neil would much rather forget.

All the legal work undertaken by Ormondroyd and the middle-aged woman who acted as secretary and receptionist was confined to civil matters, with Ormondroyd steering clear of criminal work. The most exciting aspect of his caseload was likely to be the titillating evidence from a divorce case.

As he opened the morning’s mail, Ormondroyd’s attention was not totally on the task. Part of his mind was still occupied with the memories his train of thought had stirred up. He worked his way through the pile, which contained no surprises until he came to an envelope near the bottom. Although the address was printed rather than handwritten, there was no company logo or franking mark. It was only when he removed the contents and
unfolded the letter and sheet of paper within that his attention was fully caught. He read it through, then returned to the beginning and read it again. Not that there could be any mistaking the meaning or the disappointment the content brought him.

Later, after his secretary had left for the day, Neil sat for a while at his desk staring at the letter and the enclosed invoice. The demand was for services rendered, but they hadn’t been. Not in the way Neil had hoped. Nevertheless, he took the chequebook for his private account from the desk and wrote out the sum, wincing slightly at the cost. It was money he could ill afford, certainly when the accompanying letter reported total failure. He addressed an envelope and enclosed the cheque.

He walked over to the filing cabinet, opened a drawer and lifted out a file and flicked through the first sheets containing information and computer prints from his research. He shook his head before replacing the folder, sighing heavily as he did so. He closed the cabinet, returned to his desk, pulled open the bottom drawer and took out a bottle of whisky and a small tumbler. He half-filled the glass and walked across the corridor to the other partner’s office. He unlocked the door and stood, leaning on the frame, sipping the spirit as he stared at the interior of the room.

This had been his office when he joined his father’s practice after leaving university. Following his father’s retirement, Neil had moved to the larger room; his old room remained vacant. Ormondroyd sighed, sadness in every line of his face. How different things might have been, if it hadn’t been for…. He shook his head as memory stirred.

The practice had grown to such an extent that the premises had become a little cramped, especially as the workload demanded two clerks. Much of the additional work was generated by the parallel expansion of their largest client, the Bishopton Investment Group.

B.I.G. had been the buzzword at the time. And then, back in 2010, it had all gone sour. As the group’s solicitor, Ormondroyd’s name had been on all the documentation. Although the Law
Society investigation had cleared him of all wrongdoing, and the police inquiry into the fraud also stated that he wasn’t implicated, the damage had been done. Word got about. Work began to drop off and clients left, one by one, never to return. The cruellest blow had been the loss of the money earned from the Bishopton account.

The B.I.G. receivership had happened shortly after Neil’s love life had hit a low ebb. The cause was the same in both cases: Linda Wilson. The rumour was that the directors had been waiting to confront Linda with evidence of her misdemeanours. However, before they could, she had fled the country. Had it not been for that, the woman would have been arrested, the money recovered, and life would have been so different for Ormondroyd and many others.

Instead, she was probably sunning herself in some tropical paradise, whilst he struggled to keep his business going. And to what purpose? Sometimes the effort seemed futile, for he had never married, had nobody to succeed him. He had hoped to marry, but his hopes had been dashed. Ormondroyd’s face twisted with pain and he drained the whisky in one swift gulp. The sharp liquid matched the bitterness of his loss and the memory of the woman who had betrayed him.

Neil closed and locked the door and wandered back to his own office. Before sitting down at the large, flat-topped desk, he took the letter to the shredder. Almost without thinking, he refilled his glass. He sat down and opened one of the desk drawers. As he had done many times before, he took out an envelope containing an old photo. It was of a young girl, a teenager, dressed in school uniform. Ormondroyd traced the outline of her beautiful features on the paper. This too he had done a hundred, a thousand times before, and, as always, with tears streaming down his cheeks.

Elsewhere, a young man stared at his computer screen and turned to his associate. ‘We have a problem.’

‘We don’t deal in problems; we deal in solutions.’

‘This is serious, not a matter for hackneyed 1980s selling clichés.’

‘Sorry, couldn’t resist it. What’s the problem? Is it the bank transfers?’

‘No. Someone’s been snooping around.’

‘That’s not a problem. I told you before; there’s no paperwork and without a paper trail we’ve nothing to worry about. Let them keep looking, they won’t find anything.’

‘You’re missing the point. I don’t mean someone’s been looking through files. At least not that sort of file.’ He tapped his screen. ‘I mean someone has been using a computer to do their search. I’d say that represented a problem, wouldn’t you?’

‘Ah, yes, I see what you mean. Do you want me to take a look?’

‘There’s no need for that; the triggers you put in place have already deflected our nosy parker. What concerns me is the identity of the snooper, so I want you to make sure it doesn’t happen again.’

‘Does it matter? If the triggers worked, let them try to their heart’s content.’

‘That’s all very well, but if they decide to combine physical and online surveillance, it could prove very awkward, and I think that’s exactly the sort of thing a solicitor would dream up, don’t you?’

‘So that’s who it is. I suppose given the connection, it had to be him. And in view of that, it does put another complexion on the problem. What do you suggest?’

‘I think it might be time to reactivate Ivan the Terrible.’

‘Phew! That’s a bit extreme. Are you certain? It would be very expensive – even if he’s available, which I can’t be sure about. Last I heard he was languishing in a gaol somewhere in central Africa.’

‘I’m sure even if Ivan himself isn’t free, he’ll have friends who would be happy to stand in for him if the price is right. And one thing we’re not short of is money.’

‘OK, I’ll get onto it right away.’

‘There’s one other thing. And it could be far more worrying
even than the legal eagle. This is only a rumour at present, but I heard something that might mean we need to give Ivan further work. Something along the lines of the last job he did. It seems there are others who might be getting suspicious, and they’re people we can’t deal with the same way. If that’s the case, we either stall them until we’ve time to plan our exit strategy, or risk losing everything. From what I hear, they’re bringing in an investigator: a woman.’

‘We have no proof that when this woman begins work she will find out anything. Others haven’t, so why panic over this one?’

‘She has a very good reputation. That’s why they use her.’

‘I still don’t see why you’re so worried.’

‘I wouldn’t be, except for the discovery at the holiday cottage. Suddenly there are a lot of people interested in the identity of the remains that were found there.’

‘The police, you mean? I don’t think for a minute they’ll connect that to what happened three years ago. For one thing, there was nothing left to identify the body, and by now I reckon it’ll be no more than a collection of bones.’

‘I’m not as confident as you, then. They can identify people, even if they’ve been dead hundreds of years. Do you remember that article about Richard III? They were able to get a DNA sample from that skeleton found in Leicester and test it against a known descendant. And that skeleton is centuries old.’

‘You’ve been watching too much television. And anyway, even if they did identify who was buried in the cottage, there’s nothing to trace it back to us.’

‘I still don’t think we should take chances with this woman, which is why I suggest we get Ivan working again. We can’t afford her finding out anything before we’re ready to go. How is that progressing?’

‘Another two weeks, three at the most and then everything will be ready. Then I can press the button and we can leave.’

‘That settles it; we’ll have to use Ivan. The chance of an impromptu audit is like a ticking time bomb. We’re so close now
we can’t afford to take the risk. If we take this one final precaution, we can proceed without fear of discovery until we’re out of harm’s way: a long way out of reach of the authorities.’

‘Good, I’m getting fed up with this country. I want sunshine, a beach and the luxury we’ve worked for.’

‘What about the woman?’

‘Talk to Ivan. See what he has to say. If needs be, get him to do what he did before. This time tell him to pick a place where she’ll never be found.’

‘We thought he had last time. It was pure bad luck that she was discovered. Where do you suggest?’

‘Another empty cottage would do. I suppose it doesn’t matter that much if they find the body as long as it’s after we’ve cleared out.’

‘What if they catch up with Ivan? What if he tells them who he’s working for? Or what if they follow the money trail?’

‘I’m rather counting on that happening. If they do that, it will implicate someone else. That will give us more time to take up our new life with our new identities. By the time they discover their mistake it will be far too late.’

‘OK, when I find Ivan, I’ll have a word and see if he can frighten the woman off. If not, I’ll tell him to go to the next level, but not to finalize things just yet. No point in doing it until absolutely necessary.’

‘Still a bit squeamish? I remember you felt that way before.’

‘Not squeamish, simply careful.’

It seemed as if Nash’s prayers were on their way to being answered. The first piece of positive news came in a phone call from the pathologist. ‘We’ve managed to extract a DNA sample from the skeleton found in the workshop. I’m sorry it’s taken so long, but the first two we extracted had been corrupted by the surrounding material. This is the only clean sample we’ve obtained thus far, and I’ll need at least one more to be absolutely certain we’ve got the DNA string one hundred per cent accurate. Hopefully, within the next few days we should be able to send
one for analysis.’

‘Thank you, Professor, now all we have to do is find a missing person who matches the dead woman’s description and….’

Nash’s voice tailed off.

‘Nash, are you there?’

‘Sorry, I just had a stray thought.’

Ramirez sighed. ‘Usually when you get stray thoughts like that, my mortuary cabinets start to fill up.’

‘Let me know when you have a viable sample and it’s ready for analysis, and thanks, Professor.’

Nash rang off and remained seated behind his desk, his eyes staring at the painting of York Minster, his mind occupied with the theory he was beginning to develop. It was almost twenty minutes before he walked into the outer office. ‘Viv, isn’t it today that the couple from the lettings agency are due back from holiday?’

‘Oh yes, do you want me to phone them?’

‘No, better to go round in person, and don’t leave without all the information you can get. They’re bound to be horrified by what went on at the cottage, but I’m more interested in the other victim in the workshop, so keep their minds concentrated on what we need to know.’

An hour later Pearce returned, frustration written across his face.

‘Problem?’ Nash asked.

‘Would you believe the office was closed? Closed, due to unforeseen circumstances, according to the notice in the window.’

‘Well, in that case, we’ll just have to wait until they reopen.’

Neil Ormondroyd had spent much of the week thinking of the women he’d loved – and lost. The pain of each was still raw, but now he had another worry. He wished he was more adept with computers. If he had been, he might have found out who was behind the crime he’d uncovered. He glanced down at the drawer where the decanter was secreted. No, that was becoming
too much of a habit. Besides, he still had one more client to see, a client who would only speak to him and had insisted on a late appointment, and whisky-laden breath was not a good advertisement.

As if on cue, there was a knock on the outer door. He opened it, to greet the caller. Ormondroyd shook the man’s gloved hand, noting the Slavic cast of his features. As the client followed Ormondroyd up the stairs, he removed a coil of thin wire from his pocket. Once inside the office, the caller placed his briefcase on the floor as Ormondroyd went to sit behind his desk. ‘How can I help you?’

One quick stride took the caller behind the solicitor. He dropped the wire over Ormondroyd’s head and tightened it. The struggle was swift, brutal and one-sided. ‘Nothing for me. You do nothing for me. I do to you.’

Ormondroyd convulsed, kicked, choked and then went limp. His assailant allowed the body to slump over the desk, blood from the deep gash already seeping onto the blotter. The killer walked to the filing cabinet and began searching the drawers. He took out a bulky folder and stuffed it in his briefcase along with Ormondroyd’s laptop. At the door he turned and said, ‘Thank you, Mr Ormondroyd.’