A Place To Bury Strangers (Atticus Priest Book 2) Page 22

  She read the headline. “‘Police appeal for help in murder of local couple.’”

  “Keep reading.”

  “‘Enquiries remain ongoing following the discovery of two bodies in a Londonderry property last week. Saoirse-Monica Fairley and Seamus McCann were discovered by neighbours in their Drumcliff Avenue house after they had not been seen for several days. The couple were believed to have been shot to death. The RUC have revealed that Fairley and McCann had criminal convictions for drug offences, and officers believe that their murder might have been at the hands of local paramilitaries. Loyalist groups have been known to extort money from local criminals, while Republican groups have murdered those in an ongoing campaign against the drug trade.’” She gaped at the paper. “My God, Atticus. They killed them?”

  “Because they knew the police would assume it was the loyalists.”

  Mack’s mind was racing. The inquiry had jerked sharply off course, and she was instinctively aware that she was going to have to brief Beckton.

  “There’s one thing we need to know,” Atticus said. “Who took the photograph?”

  61

  Jessica parked in the same car park as before. She would need her warrant card to identify herself to Lamb, but, as she reached down into the mess in the footwell of the passenger seat and took her handbag, she found that the wallet with her ID was not there. She closed her eyes and tried to remember what she had done with it. She had definitely had it at the farm; she had shown it to York.

  She must have put it down somewhere. She would have to go back to get it.

  Never mind.

  She got out, locked up and made her way to Payne’s Hill. The rain was falling heavily, and run-off was pouring down the gutters on both sides of the street, the drains already full. She was soaked by the time she reached Jordan Lamb’s address, and it was a relief to be able to shelter under cover as she buzzed the intercom.

  There was no answer.

  She went back onto the pavement to see whether she would be able to get a look inside through the windows, but they were obscured by net curtains. She went back to the front door and buzzed the intercom again, holding her finger on the button for ten seconds.

  Still nothing.

  No Jordan Lamb and no Shayden Mullins.

  Jessica waited there for ten minutes before giving up.

  Neither young man was there.

  Jessica went back to her car and got inside. It was cold, and she turned on the engine so that she could run the heater. The wipers swept across the windscreen, squeaking as the worn blades brushed the water off the glass. Jessica rested her hands on the wheel and stared out at the Methodist chapel on the other side of the road, watching the kids from the nursery that was attached to it as they ran around their tiny outdoor space in their raincoats.

  She took out her phone and found the number for Ngozi Mullins. She dialled it and waited for the call to connect.

  “Hello?”

  “Mrs. Mullins?”

  “Yes.”

  “It’s DC Edwards.”

  “Oh,” she said. “I was just about to call you.”

  “Really? Why? Have you seen Shayden?”

  “He came home,” she said.

  Jessica sat a little straighter. “What?”

  “He’s very sorry for all the fuss he’s caused.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He went to Salisbury, like you said.”

  “Why?”

  “He wouldn’t say. I told him he was stupid—I think he actually listened to me for once. He’s very sorry.”

  “That’s good to hear. I’m going to need to talk to him, though.”

  “He’s asleep.”

  “It’s not urgent. Please ask him to call me when he wakes up.”

  “Why?”

  “The girl he came down to see has gone missing. I promised her father that I’d keep an eye out for her.”

  “She’s not with him,” Ngozi said.

  “No, I’m not saying she is. But he might have an idea where she’s gone. And, apart from that, he needs to know that he has to follow the conditions of his bail. I can speak to him on the phone or send someone around to bring him to the nick. It’s his choice.”

  “I’ll speak to him.”

  “Thank you, Mrs. Mullins.”

  Jessica ended the call and stared through the rain-slicked windscreen, the wipers beating backward and forward with a metronomic rhythm. She dialled Atticus’s number, but the call went to voicemail. She left a message explaining what she had found and that she would tell York when she went to pick up her warrant card, ended the call and slipped the phone into the cupholder.

  There was no reason for her to stay in the city, but she needed to pick up her warrant card before she headed home. She woke the car’s navigation and tapped in her postcode in London. The route was displayed, a two-hour drive that would take her north-east until she reached the M25. She enlarged the early part of the route and saw that she would pass just to the north of Broughton. It would only add a few minutes to her trip to divert to the south. She could stop at the farm, pick up her warrant card and be on her way.

  She tapped the screen to start the navigation, put the car into gear and pulled out.

  62

  Mack knew that they were going to have to tread carefully from now on. Atticus was too full of his own sense of brilliance to acknowledge that the inquiry had just become much more sensitive, but that had been Mack’s first thought. The fact that Salisbury’s sitting MP was now the prime suspect in a murder inquiry changed everything, and she knew, for the sake of her career, that she was going to have to proceed with the utmost caution. She had gone to speak to Beckton immediately after Atticus had dropped his bombshell, and had ended up in his office for the better part of half an hour. Beckton, like her, had instinctively grasped how the landscape had changed. She had watched as Beckton had passed through disbelief, then shock, then horror, eventually finishing somewhere—she guessed—that involved the knowledge that he was going to have to proceed with the most extravagant care in order to protect a career that had taken him years to build. He had suggested that she convene the full team in the MIR and had insisted upon attending himself.

  She had told Atticus to wait in her office while she was with Beckton and, when she returned to collect him, he was standing behind her desk with a piece of paper in his hand.

  Her stomach dropped. “What are you doing?”

  He looked up. “Sorry,” he said. “I was just clearing up, and I saw this.”

  He laid it on the desk. She saw that it was the divorce petition that had been served on her by Andy’s solicitors.

  “You didn’t think that might be private?”

  “He’s divorcing you?” he said.

  She was ready to tell him to mind his own business when she saw Beckton pass by the door in the direction of the MIR.

  “We’ll talk about this later,” she said.

  She beckoned him to come with her and followed the chief superintendent to the conference room. The team was waiting for them.

  Mack rapped her knuckles on the table to bring the room to order.

  “Settle down,” she said. “We’ve had a breakthrough. Atticus has identified one of the men in the photograph that we recovered from Alfred Burns’s flat. Atticus?”

  He stood up and ran through the identification that he had made of Miller, illustrating his conclusions by way of the printouts that he had shown to Mack and setting out the evidence that the MP was familiar with Alfred Burns.

  “And what do you think that means?” Mike Lewis asked.

  Atticus looked at Mack as if annoyed that he had to answer such an elementary question.

  “It means,” she said, “that there was a connection between Burns and Miller that most likely began in Northern Ireland and then continued after they returned to this country. It’s possible that Burns was blackmailing Miller with it.”

  “Likely,” Atticus corrected
. “The other two people in the photograph were murdered.”

  “And now Burns is dead, too,” Nigel Archer said.

  “Buried in a graveyard with the remains of five teenagers who shouldn’t be there,” Beckton said.

  Archer shook his head in disbelief. “And we think Miller is involved in that?”

  “I really hope not,” Beckton said.

  “It doesn’t look good, does it?” Archer said.

  “No,” Beckton said. “It does not.”

  “He at least has questions to answer,” Mack added.

  “Are we bringing him in?”

  “I don’t think we’re too far from that,” Beckton said. “I’ve spoken with Mack, and we’ve agreed that we should treat this with sensitivity until we know more. She’ll go and speak to him today, and if we feel that there’s a case to answer, we’ll arrest him and bring him back.”

  Robbie Best raised his finger. “Want me to come with you, boss?”

  “No thanks, Robbie,” Mack said. “Atticus connected the dots on this one. I want him to be there when I speak to him.”

  Best turned to Beckton. “What happened to sensitivity?”

  Beckton made no attempt to hide his discomfort. “You’re going to behave, aren’t you, Atticus?”

  “Of course,” he said, as if affronted by the suggestion that anything else was possible.

  63

  Broad Chalke was one of the prettier villages in the vicinity of Salisbury, and the house that belonged to Colonel Richard Miller DSO was in its most pleasant lane. It was difficult to find, and it took directions from a villager to rescue them from a series of wrong turns. Mack pulled over in front of an iron gate that opened onto a gravelled courtyard. Atticus got out and looked over the roof of the car at the view. The house was gorgeous. It was constructed in Flemish brick on a limestone plinth with stone quoins, a hipped tiled roof with a large gable end and panelled brick chimney stacks at either side. Wisteria clambered up the frontage, white and purple flowers adding colour to the impressive façade. Weathered stone pilasters merged with the centuries-old brick to give a warm, inviting appearance.

  “Look at this place,” Mack said. “He didn’t get this on an MP’s salary.”

  “He set up a corporate intelligence operation after he left the army,” Atticus said. “He sold it for fifteen million before he went into politics.”

  “I’m in the wrong job,” she observed wryly.

  “You and me both.”

  She narrowed her eyes as she looked over at him. “Is there any point me telling you how we’re going to play this?”

  “As in will I keep my mouth shut? Not much point.”

  “Let me lead. Ask anything you think is relevant, but at least let me pretend that I’m in charge. Okay?”

  “It’s your case, Mack. I’m just here to help.”

  She smiled at him. “Thank you.”

  Atticus nodded and reached a hand out for the gate. “Ready?”

  She nodded. “Let’s see what he has to say for himself.”

  Atticus opened the gate and paused to allow Mack to lead the way across the courtyard, their feet crunching over the gravel. The house was even more delightful the closer they came to it. Wisteria grew up across the walls, and the front door was framed by rose bushes, the blooms absent for the season but the plants well tended.

  Mack knocked firmly on the door.

  It was opened by an older man wearing a pair of walking boots and with a Barbour jacket draped across the crook of his elbow.

  “Yes?”

  “Colonel Miller?”

  “That’s right,” he said. “Who are you?”

  Mack took out the wallet with her warrant card and held it open. “I’m Detective Chief Inspector Jones, and this is Atticus Priest. Do you think you could spare a few moments to have a chat with us?”

  Miller looked down at the warrant card, then up at Mack’s face, as if comparing one with the other.

  “I’m just about to go out for a walk,” he said. “What’s this about?”

  “Alfred Burns,” Mack said. “I’m sorry to impose, but it’s important.”

  Miller straightened up and gave a little harrumph of displeasure. Atticus could see that the irritation was an act, a reaction that he probably thought Mack might expect from a man of his position. It was a deflection, too, because Atticus caught the flicker of fear in the older man’s eyes.

  “Sir,” Mack pressed, “can we come inside?”

  “What’s happened?”

  “I’d rather not do this on the doorstep.”

  He opened the door wider and stepped aside. Mack went first, and Atticus followed. The entrance hall looked like something out of the Italian Renaissance. It was grand yet neatly proportioned, stone-flagged with columns; a table in the centre of the small space held a pitcher that was full of sweet-smelling lavender.

  “We’ll go into the winter sitting room,” Miller said. “This way.”

  He led them into a room that was dominated by four pieces of furniture: a vast sofa, two recessed oak bookcases on either side of a marble fireplace, and a fruitwood writing table. A fire had been lit in the grate and then banked; Miller took a poker and prodded the logs until the flames were revived, then tossed in fresh wood from a large tin bucket. He took the chair from the desk and turned it around, indicating that Mack and Atticus should sit on the sofa. They did. Mack reached into her handbag and took out her notebook and pen. Atticus watched the colonel carefully.

  “Thank you,” she said.

  “Now then. What’s this all about?”

  “As I said—Alfred Burns.”

  He shuffled on his chair. “Who?”

  “I believe you served with him,” Mack said. “He was a soldier in the Royal Green Jackets, and I understand that at the time you were an officer in the same battalion. I checked the records—the battalion was on a resident tour of Northern Ireland, based in Londonderry.”

  He paused, then nodded. “That’s forty years ago.”

  “But you remember him?”

  “Yes,” he said. “He was badly injured in the Ballykelly bombing.”

  “That’s right,” Mack said. “He lost his leg.”

  “He did,” Miller said with a nod. “I remember. He was a bit of a rascal before that, as I recall. What’s he done now?”

  Mack reached into her bag again and took out an A4 envelope. She slid her finger into the open end and withdrew a printout of the photograph that Atticus had found on the drive in Burns’s flat. She laid it on the table; Atticus watched the colour leach out of the old man’s cheeks.

  “Right,” he said quietly. “I see.”

  “Have you seen that before?” Atticus asked him.

  Miller turned his head to glare at Atticus. “I have.”

  “Probably best if you told us about it.”

  Miller swallowed. Atticus saw discomfort, fear and anger. The old soldier had made his career on his reputation as a stern, straight-talking man with impeccable morals, and now, Atticus could see, he was frightened that the façade would be peeled away to reveal whatever rancidness had been concealed beneath.

  “That photograph shows a mistake I made as a young man. I’d rather not have to discuss it.”

  “I’m not sure you have that luxury,” Atticus said. “Burns blackmailed you with this, didn’t he?”

  “Alf…” Miller paused, a vein pulsing angrily in his temple. “Yes. He extorted me.” He waved a hand at the photograph. “You got that from him, I presume?”

  “We found it at his flat,” Mack said. “He didn’t give it to us.”

  “I don’t understand.”

  “He’s dead.”

  Atticus watched the man’s face carefully. It was difficult to decode his reaction: there was shock there, but, for once, he couldn’t tell whether it was because he had been found out or because it was an artful confection.

  “What?” he stammered. “How?”

  “He was murdered.”
r />   “What? Murdered? By whom?”

  “We don’t know the particulars yet,” Mack said. “His body was found buried in a shallow grave on Salisbury Plain.”

  “The story on the news?”

  “That’s right,” she said. “His was one of the bodies that we found. The second body, as it happens.”

  “My God.”

  The confusion on Miller’s face had curdled into fear. Atticus knew why that might be. It was obvious. With a blackmailer found dead, the finger of suspicion would point at the blackmailer’s target.

  “Excuse me.” He stood. “Could you… could you give me a moment?”

  He left the room before Mack or Atticus could say anything.

  Atticus got up, then spoke quietly. “Look around. See if you can find anything useful.”

  He went back into the hall. Miller was already out of sight, but Atticus heard the sound of a door opening and closing to his right. A short flight of stairs descended to a second hall, with doors to the right and left and one straight ahead. Atticus followed. The door to the left was open, revealing a breakfast room. The door straight ahead led into the kitchen and the door to the right to a cloakroom. Atticus looked inside and saw two more doors; the one to the right was closed and, through it, Atticus could hear the sound of running water. He waited, out of sight should the door to the WC be opened yet close enough to hear the sound of conversation over the noise of the running tap. He could only hear one voice—Miller’s—but he was too far away to discern any of what was being said.

  The tap was turned off, and the lock on the door turned. Atticus went back to the sitting room, where Mack was inspecting a photograph on the table. They shared another look, and she gave a tiny nod to indicate that Miller was returning.

  Atticus turned as Miller came back into the room. “I’m sorry,” he said. “That was a terrible shock.”

  The colonel had mastered the surprise that had apparently led to his dash to the bathroom. Atticus was sure that the reaction had not been manufactured, but now could not help but wonder whom he had been speaking to on the telephone and what had been said. The panic that had accompanied the news of Burns’s death had gone, to be replaced by something approaching acceptance; but of what? Atticus wasn’t sure.