Then She Was Gone (23 page)

‘What kind of club was this?’

‘From what we can gather, some kind of private club which had only a few members at first, but they became quite influential. Sort of like one of those things they have down south, you
know, MPs and prime ministers getting into positions of power because of who they know, et cetera. Not sure how successful it was, being in Liverpool and about as far from those places as
it’s possible to get, but it sounds like its members had a bit of a reputation. Connections from outside who could help them secure well-paid jobs, influential families smoothing any
exuberance
, from what we can tell. Besides Sam, the other member that we know about works in the legal department of some sort of investment bank or whatever it is.
We’re tracking down the others now.’

‘For what reason?’

It was a good question, one which Murphy didn’t really have an answer for. ‘Covering every angle,’ he said eventually, going for something safe as a response. ‘If
there’s something in his past which has caught up to him, seems right that we find out more about this university stuff. We’re also looking into the constituency where he was standing
for MP. See if there were any issues with locals, that sort of thing.’

‘Some headcase who didn’t like him?’

Murphy shrugged, holding his hands up in mid-air. ‘As I said, covering every angle. I agree, for what it’s worth. I don’t think it’ll be something as simple as that.
Seems much more personal.’

‘There’s also the matter of where he was during the weekend.’

Can’t argue with that, Murphy thought. ‘We’re working on it. That’s all I can tell you.’

‘It’s enough, I suppose,’ DCI Stephens replied, smoothing down her hair with one hand. ‘I’ll let Butler know, so he can update the press with whatever info he deems
appropriate.’

‘Happy not to have to deal with that at the moment. Just another headache.’

Murphy left soon afterwards, crossing back to his desk and slumping into his chair. Rossi gave him a look, but he just shook his head.

‘Got some good news if that helps?’ Rossi said, standing up and bringing a few leaves of paper around to his side of the desk. ‘We’ve tracked down a couple of the guys
from the club Simon Jackson told us about. Hopefully we’ll have the rest shortly.’

‘What do we know so far?’

‘Not a lot,’ Rossi replied, leaning against his desk and dropping the papers in front of him. ‘Just last known address, occupation, the surface stuff.’

‘This name rings a bell,’ Murphy said, pointing at a name in the middle of the list of eight. ‘Timothy Johnson?’

‘He went by Tim, apparently,’ Rossi replied, taking her phone out of her pocket. ‘Haven’t got to him yet. What are you thinking?’

‘Tim Johnson . . . not exactly an unusual name. Probably someone else.’

‘Google’s not exactly helping me out,’ Rossi said, giving him a quick glimpse of her phone and the results of a search. ‘I’m sure we’ll find out soon
enough.’

‘Paul Wright and James Morley,’ Murphy brought up their respective entries on his computer screen. ‘Both have minor records.’

‘That’ll be why we found them so fast. Both had cautions for public indecency, which gives you a bit more of an idea of what this club was really into.’

‘I can already tell I’m not going to be impressed,’ Murphy said, gritting his teeth together.

‘Let’s just say the two of them were close enough to invite someone else to get in between them and they were caught in public doing so.’

Murphy grimaced, reading between the lines was more than enough for him. ‘Right, great, and this was when?’

‘Seven years ago, whilst they were still at university. Which leads me onto another question . . . do we approach the uni about this? See if they can tell us any
more?’

‘Send Hale and Kirkham up there. I’m not sure we need to revisit that place any time soon. It’s not like we’re their favourite people to deal with.’

Rossi sniggered and sucked in a breath. ‘It’s been what, three or four years? I’m sure they’ve forgiven us for being the reason they were two psychology lecturers down
after we’d finished with them.’

‘Wasn’t exactly the best publicity for them,’ Murphy said, remembering the events which had occurred a few years earlier. ‘Plus, they were harbouring murderers. If you
ask me, it was their own fault. Probably should have done a more thorough check.’

‘What, make sure they hadn’t ticked the box which said “Have you knowingly killed, or planned to kill, a fellow human being?” I’m not sure even the CRB ask
that.’

Murphy joined Rossi in laughing. Sometimes, that’s all they could do to get through days such as these. ‘I suppose not. Anyway, I think we need to concentrate on the events taking
place now. I’m not sure what we’re going to achieve by bringing Sam Byrne’s uni days into this investigation. Unless something else comes up, of course.’

‘No problem,’ Rossi replied, standing up from the desk. ‘I’ll hand this stuff to someone else and get back to tracking down the woman from the CCTV. Have we got anything
from the apartment block yet?’

‘I don’t know, Graham was sorting that out.’ Murphy turned his chair and looked for DC Harris, spotting him talking to DC Hashem on the other side of the office. ‘Graham,
got a minute?’

DC Harris looked over and held up a finger. Murphy waited for a few seconds as DC Harris finished speaking to Hashem then wheeled over to his desk. Rossi had returned to her desk now, fiddling
with her chair before she sat down.

‘Where are we with the CCTV from the apartment block?’ Murphy said, turning his chair to face DC Harris. ‘Thought we’d have that by now.’

‘We have a slight problem with it,’ DC Harris said, moving his wheelchair back and forth. ‘Turns out it was non-operational from Thursday into Saturday.’

‘Really?’ Rossi said from across the desks. ‘Coincidence or had it been tampered with?’

‘Well, they thought it was just a technical issue, but obviously it might be something else now.’

‘When did this come up?’ Murphy said, gripping the sides of his chair a little harder.

‘This morning while you were out,’ DC Harris said, his wheelchair coming to a stop as he recognised the change in Murphy’s tone. ‘Don’t worry, I’ve sent
someone out to check up on it. See if we can get anything from it forensically.’

‘Good to know that now, but maybe I could be told about things sooner next time?’

DC Harris nodded, looking away from Murphy. ‘I was going to,’ he said in a low voice. ‘Just hadn’t had chance.’

‘That’s fine, but let’s try and keep everyone up to date with everything from now on. We’ve got a tough one here and things like CCTV being tampered with could be
important. I need to know about stuff like that straight away.’

‘Noted.’

Murphy nodded to himself then glanced over at Rossi. She was pretending not to be listening in to the conversation, but he knew she was taking in every word. Usually she wasn’t shy about
hiding her nosiness, but here she was pretending not to hear a thing.

It was another weird Rossi-moment to add to the list.

Sometimes, Murphy thought, the idea that there was something such as gut instinct was ridiculous. Other times, it didn’t seem so out of the ordinary.

Right then, his gut was telling him something about Rossi. He just wasn’t sure what it was.

There was a growing ball of dread in Rossi’s stomach. A knowledge that the path of her life was about to twist and turn, events spiralling out of her control. The clouds
turned grey above her, as if they were aware of what was about to happen.

The first droplets of rain began to fall as the familiar bright blue Peugeot pulled to a stop just in front of her. She waited for the driver to shut off the engine, then walked the few yards
towards the car. Rossi smiled tightly as the driver’s door opened and her brother appeared.

‘Didn’t think you were coming?’

‘Well, I didn’t think you were going to wait any longer for me,’ Vincenzo Rossi replied, shutting the door behind him and coming round the front of the car. ‘Seemed
pretty urgent.’

‘Well, we’ll soon find out if it is,’ Rossi replied, sneaking a glance at her brother’s face, studying it for any sign of tension. ‘You OK if we go to the
pub?’

‘Depends,’ Vincenzo said, loosening his tie a little. ‘Is this an elaborate sting, where a bunch of your mates are going to pull me over in a couple of hours and do me for
drink-driving?’

‘I think you’re safe, Cenzo.’ Rossi took the lead, moving with pace towards the pub a little way down the street. ‘It’d be a massive waste of police time and,
besides, I couldn’t exactly do that now, could I? Ma would kill me.’

‘True. She’d have you on slicing onion duty at the next get together. How is she anyway? Haven’t seen her or Paps for a while.’

‘Maybe you should go and see them then?’ Rossi said, pushing open the door to the pub and making her way inside. She reached the bar and spied a woman serving an old bloke further
down. Vincenzo stood at her side, digging around in his pockets for money she knew wouldn’t appear. ‘They’re serious about this restaurant thing, you know? Papa thinks it’ll
be good for them to have something to do in retirement. Keep telling them they’re in their sixties and could probably do without the stress, but you know what they’re like.’

‘I haven’t eaten properly in a while, so I’m probably due a visit.’

Rossi finally got the barmaid’s attention and ordered for the two of them before Vincenzo had chance to say anything. A fiver didn’t cover the cost of the two pints, so she had to
scrabble around for some change in her jacket. Vincenzo took the drinks over to a table in the corner.

There was still a hint of the heartbreaker about Vincenzo, Rossi could see. The lines on his face were more prominent than she remembered, and there were more and more flecks of silver at his
temples, but that smile had been the cause of many a tearful girl appearing at the front door of their home when they were growing up. She had lost friends because of her brothers – good
friends at that – but that was just the way of things. Vincenzo wasn’t the worst of her five brothers – that had been Antonio – but he had a well-earned reputation in the
area they had lived. He had that twinkle in his eye still, but sitting across from him now, she also saw something else. The dark rings under his eyes, the wince as he lifted the pint glass to his
lips, the stare he kept giving the exit.

‘You all right?’ Rossi said, slipping her jacket off and placing it on the empty seat between them. ‘Seem a bit off today?’

‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ Vincenzo said, attempting a smile which did little to convince Rossi. ‘Tired, that’s all. Work has been ridiculous lately. It’s all good
though. What’s up with you? Not often you want to speak to me. Usually if you need one of the boys you go to Gino.’

‘It’s not me that needs anything,’ Rossi replied, taking a long swig from the pint in front of her. The lager was flat, only a whisper of head at the top of the glass, but she
barely noticed. ‘I wanted to talk to you about something.’

‘Sounds serious . . .’

‘Could well be. I’m not sure yet. Depends how this goes.’

Rossi watched Vincenzo closely as he drank from his own pint. There was no tremble to his hand, no shaking or nervousness she could pick up. He seemed bemused by her presence, but unwilling to
voice it.

‘You’re going to have to give me something more to go on here,’ Vincenzo said, fixing her with his blue-eyed stare. ‘Beginning to get a little worried.’

‘You were what, thirty-three, thirty-four when you went back to uni?’

‘Thirty-four. I wouldn’t use the word “back”, though. It wasn’t like I was ever there when I was younger. If you remember, I wasn’t the most likely Rossi to
ever do well academically. Took me a while to get into that mindset.’

‘You did well when you eventually got there,’ Rossi said, looking away from her brother. She played with a beer mat, rolling it around the table. ‘Keep in touch with anyone
from when you were there?’

‘Not really,’ Vincenzo replied, mumbling his way through the two words. ‘Long time ago, isn’t it? And I wasn’t exactly the same age as most of the people
there.’

‘I need you to be sure of this. Is there really no one you keep in contact with from back then? This is important.’

‘What’s this about, Laura?’ Vincenzo said, looking at her again. She held his gaze as she waited for him to speak. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking
about.’

‘Have you been following the news at all?’

There was the slightest bit of hesitation. ‘Yeah, course. You’re working on the case, I assume?’

‘Depends which one you’re talking about.’

‘Why don’t we drop the
stronzate
. What do you want to ask me? Because this is all starting to seem like a trap.’

‘Did you know Sam Byrne?’

‘No. There, you happy? I was at university at the same time as him, but that’s it. Nothing else.’

Rossi felt she knew when someone wasn’t telling her the truth and this was one of those times.

Her brother was lying to her.

‘Are you sure about that? Only I get the feeling you might have known him. What about Simon Jackson? Do you remember him?’

‘What is this?’ Vincenzo replied, sitting back and causing his seat to scrape against the floor. ‘I’m not going to sit here and be questioned like a criminal. I’m
your brother. You should show me a little respect.’

‘How about you show me a bit of respect and answer my questions. Truthfully.’

‘I’m not listening to this,’ Vincenzo said, standing up, his chair scraping back even further. ‘Tell Mama I was asking after her and that I’ll be over to see her
soon. Maybe you can get hold of me and apologise when you feel like it.’

Rossi watched her brother leave. Her hand shook as she lifted the half-empty glass in front of her, necking it in one go. She risked a look around her, making sure no eyes were on the corner of
the room where she was sitting.

There was a sense of losing control. That she was opening a box full of things she didn’t wanted to see. A box that couldn’t be closed.