Little Boy Blue: DI Helen Grace 5 (A DI Helen Grace Thriller) (5 page)

He was rooted to the spot. He knew it was coming, but even so it was a shock. The newscaster was only relaying information that had been buzzing around internet chat rooms for hours, but hearing it relayed in her professional monotone was still disquieting.

Nobody else in the office seemed to be paying attention to the radio bulletin, but he drank in every word: ‘A popular S&M club … appealing for witnesses … the victim has not yet been formally identified.’ He knew the victim’s name of course, but did the police too? Was their ‘failure’ to identify him just a smokescreen as they pursued their enquiries or were they genuinely in the dark? He suddenly realized how much he needed to know.

He had been careful to conceal their connection, but who knew what they were able to access these days? Terrorism had a lot to answer for, providing the police with the perfect excuse to snoop on everything and everyone. He had never used the computer at home and had never contacted Jake via direct text, but even so he suddenly had the unnerving feeling that he hadn’t been careful enough.

The newscaster had moved on to local traffic and travel, but still he didn’t move. Things seemed to be
moving fast now and he was suddenly aware of how much he had to lose. Would they suspect him? Or would his middle-class exterior and respectable job shield him from suspicion? He was too far into this, too stained by his actions, for this to unravel. There were two sides to him – but they were known only to him – and that was the way it
had
to stay.

He was so deep in thought that at first he didn’t notice his PA marching across the room towards him. He might have remained there for hours were it not for her sudden intrusion.

‘Your ten o’clock is here,’ she said testily.

He didn’t respond, didn’t trust himself to. Instead, he gathered up his files, nodded at her and walked purposefully away towards the meeting room.

The silence in the room was suffocating. Helen had given Moira and Mike Elder the basic facts of their son’s death, avoiding the more distressing details. She’d shouldered this unpleasant duty many times before and knew that if you hit people with too much too soon, you lose them. Assaulted by the shock, bowing under their grief, the bereaved just implode. It wasn’t fair to treat them like that and, besides, it served nobody’s purpose – she needed facts, not tears.

But, to Helen’s surprise, Jake’s parents had barely reacted at all to her carefully chosen words. Moira had shot a brief look at her husband, then joined him in staring at the floor. Their gaze remained doggedly turned in that direction and, though Helen provided a few gentle prompts, the couple stayed resolutely silent.

‘We have a full team working on this. As I said, your son was discovered at a nightclub in Banister Park and, once you’ve formally identified him, we can make arrangements for you to visit it, if you feel that would be helpful. Relatives sometimes find that it’s important to see the place where –’

‘What sort of club was it?’

Mike Elder’s voice was cracked and harsh. For a moment Helen wondered if it was a trick question – the
news was already out there in radio bulletins and on the internet – then pushed that thought aside. They had probably driven all the way from Taunton in silence, their minds trying to grapple with their unexpected tragedy. It was no surprise that they were still processing the details.

‘It was an S&M club,’ Helen replied gently. There was no point dressing it up – they’d find out soon enough anyway.

Mike sniffed loudly, while his wife fiddled with the buttons on her cardigan.

‘It wasn’t a club he visited regularly, just somewhere he used now and then.’

‘I bet he did.’

Now it was Helen’s turn to be silent. Four words – four simple words – but they were said with such bitterness that for a moment Helen was speechless. She had encountered many emotions in the relatives’ room – despair, denial, fury – but she had seldom seen such distaste. She felt anger flare in her but, aware that the eyes of the Family Liaison Officer were on her, swallowed it down.

‘Can I ask you what you mean by that, Mike?’ she said.

‘I’m sure by now you know what my son was’ was the curt reply.

‘Obviously we’re aware that Jake worked as a professional dominator. That’s one of our main lines of enquiry, to see if he might have been attacked by someone he knew through his work.’

‘His work,’ Mike repeated, shaking his head ruefully, before casting a sardonic smile at his wife.

‘Can you tell me how much you knew about Jake’s professional life?’ Helen continued.

‘Too bloody much, but nothing that would help you.’

Helen was beginning to see why Jake had never got on with his parents, but resumed her questioning as patiently as she could.

‘His life in Southampton, then? Did you ever visit his flat? Meet up with him?’

‘This is our first visit to Southampton.’

Finally, Moira had spoken.

‘He moved away from Somerset when he was a young man. He threatened to come back and visit us, but … but he never made it.’

Was the use of the word ‘threatened’ deliberate? Helen was so bewildered by this interview that she couldn’t tell.

‘And you weren’t tempted to visit him here?’

‘It’s a long way to come and we can’t leave the animals,’ Moira replied quickly, trotting out her excuse with practised ease.

‘I see.’

‘Do you?’ Mike Elder now said, suddenly turning to look directly at Helen. ‘I can tell from your tone what you’re thinking, but you’ve got no right to look down your nose at us.’

Helen stared back, refusing to break eye contact. He was right, however – Helen
was
allowing her feelings to affect her judgement and was behaving in a manner that was unprofessional and unkind.

‘I’ve nothing but sympathy for you and your wife, believe me,’ she said quickly.

‘That may be, but it doesn’t change things. You might feel our son’s “lifestyle” was acceptable, but we didn’t. I don’t blame the boy entirely – we should have been tougher on him when he was small,’ he resumed, his wife flinching slightly as that barb landed. ‘But he made his choices and had to live by them. He was never interested in my opinion, but, for the avoidance of doubt, I’ll give it to you anyway. I thought what he did … was perverted. For the life of me, I could never understand why he wanted to surround himself with degenerates and freaks – he could never explain it himself, just said it was “who he was”. He thought we should accept him, but why should we accept something like that? He chose his path, we chose ours and, believe you me, they never met.’

It was said with something approaching pride and for a moment Helen thought she might actually slap him. She had never heard someone damn their own flesh and blood in such blunt terms.

‘We haven’t seen him in nearly ten years and we’re not going to be much help now, so let’s just get this over with, shall we? I don’t want to be here any more than you do.’

He rose abruptly, clearly keen to get the formal identification of his son over and done with. Moira followed suit, hurrying after her departing husband.

As she left, she glanced briefly back at Helen. After her husband’s harsh words, Helen had expected to see some embarrassment there, perhaps even contrition. But not a bit of it.

The look Moira now gave Helen was one of pure scorn.

Her fist slammed into the metal, rebounding off it violently. Without hesitating, she raised her arm again, ploughing her clenched fist into the unyielding surface. This time her impact was true and the metal buckled under the assault. Wincing, Helen withdrew her hand and stepped back to survey the damage. To her shame, she saw that she had left a large dent on the unfortunate locker door – a complement to the bloody knuckles on her right hand.

She turned away, furious with herself, but angrier still with Jake’s parents. They seemed so dismissive, so fixed in their view of him, yet if they had known their son
at all
, they would have known that he was kind, generous and loving. They refused to see that, remaining blinkered to the bitter end. What must it be like to live your life that way, Helen wondered, to sacrifice so much on the altar of your principles? Would it bring them happiness in the end? She suspected not.

Helen hadn’t trusted herself to return to the incident room straight away, so had been pacing the ladies’ locker room ever since, trying to quell her growing anger. Helen knew that indignation and fury were sometimes positives, driving you to work harder and faster, but this wasn’t like that. For the first time in years, Helen felt out
of control. She hadn’t slept at all, which didn’t help, but still she was surprised at how upset and disoriented she was by the morning’s events. She knew that, for Jake’s sake, she had to find a way to contain her emotions. She couldn’t run a major investigation in this state.

A sharp knocking sound made her look up. Seconds later, the door swung open and Charlie entered, clutching a thin file.

‘Sorry to disturb you. I looked for you in the interview suite and Gardam’s office but –’

‘No problem,’ Helen said quickly, slipping her grazed hand into her pocket. ‘What have you got?’

Charlie pulled a sheet of paper from the file, but hesitated now before replying. The look on her face suggested she knew Helen was upset and was perhaps debating whether to say anything. In the end caution won out and, dropping her eyes to the paper, she said:

‘We’ve made a bit of progress with Elder’s communications. He sometimes used texts and emails to set up his appointments, but his favoured method of communicating with his clients was Snapchat.’

‘Right.’

‘Now, most people assume that when Snapchats disappear, they disappear for good, but actually the phone companies store them. We pulled Elder’s this morning, along with his recent texts and emails, so we’ve now got pretty much every communication he sent or received in the last three months.’

‘And?’ Helen said, hurrying Charlie to the point.

‘Well, we cross-referenced them with mobile phones
that were transmitting in or near the Torture Rooms on the night Jake was killed and we’ve got a list of about twenty numbers.’

Helen took this in – their first small lead in a difficult case. As she did so, she saw Charlie’s eyes flit to the dented locker, before quickly returning to Helen once more. If there was a question implied there, Charlie hid it well.

‘Any links to anyone with a criminal record?’

‘Not yet, but we’re still processing them.’

‘Chase them all down,’ Helen replied impatiently. ‘Anything else?’

‘One regular texter who
wasn’t
in the vicinity was David Simons. He appears to have been in a serious relationship with Elder until fairly recently.’

Helen said nothing, her mind flitting back to the man she’d glimpsed in a city centre bar all those months ago.

‘How recently?’

‘Split up a couple of months back.’

‘Why?’

‘Lack of commitment from Jake, clinginess from David – judging by their lengthy emails on the subject.’

‘Where is Simons now?’

‘Los Angeles. He divides his time between the US and the UK. He’s been there the last four weeks. I’ve been trying to get hold of him, but …’

‘Get him over.’

‘Of course,’ Charlie replied, bristling slightly at Helen’s tone. ‘But I think we have to mark him off the list as a suspect, don’t you?’

There was something challenging in Charlie’s tone, but Helen decided not to rise to it. Instead, thanking her, she sent her on her way. Helen knew that she was being overly assertive, but the news that Jake’s boyfriend was long gone had sent her mood plummeting still further. Jake had seemed so happy when they last met, but Helen was suddenly struck by how lonely his life must have been.

No lover or friend had come forward to claim him, his parents wouldn’t have spat on him if he was on fire and even Helen had feigned ignorance of his identity to protect herself and her career. He had been abandoned in death by all those who should have cared for him and that was something those that remained would have to live with for the rest of their lives.

‘The victim lived and worked in Portswood. We’re still pinning down the precise details, but it appears that he earnt his living in the sex trade, working out of his flat as a professional dominator. Today we are asking anyone who’s encountered Jake Elder – in whatever capacity – to get in touch and help us with our enquiries.’

Emilia jotted down the details, chuckling at Gardam’s careful euphemism. Everyone present knew what he meant – he was appealing to the spankers to put aside their embarrassment and come forward.

‘Good luck with that,’ Emilia whispered to her neighbour, who raised a jaded eyebrow in response. Gardam was in cloud cuckoo land if he thought anyone in the BDSM community was going to willingly walk into a police station. A lot of them had criminal records, others had wives and families, and none of them would want to run the gauntlet of being judged by the small-minded sergeant on the front desk. Better let a killer walk free than endure that.

As Gardam continued, casually talking over his Media Liaison Officer’s attempt to direct proceedings, Emilia’s mind began to wonder. She already knew what her article would look like – she’d written it in her head on the way over – and there was little that Gardam could offer
that she hadn’t already been told. The real question – and the only reason she’d come to this briefing at all – was what role DI Grace would play in proceedings. She was not someone who embraced the fourth estate, preferring to leave that to her superiors, but still her absence from the press conference was intriguing.

Emilia was pretty sure she was the only person present who knew that Helen had used Jake’s services. She had stumbled on their connection during the Ella Matthews investigation and had immediately tried to use it to her advantage, threatening the unfortunate DI with exposure unless she gave her exclusive access to the investigation. Not surprisingly, Grace had fought back, calling her bluff by revealing her knowledge of Emilia’s illegal surveillance techniques. It had ended in a score draw, both relieved to have emerged unscathed, but it still stuck in Emilia’s craw.

She had never been a good loser and perhaps it was payback time. Helen Grace had kept her on a short leash for a while, but the boot was on the other foot now. Had Grace confessed her knowledge of the victim to her team? Was that why she wasn’t present? Or had she kept her secret close? Emilia intended to find out. Journalists always love an exclusive and this story – ‘the copper and the bondage freak’ – was going to be the best scoop she’d ever had.