Secrets (7 page)

And even while he wrestled with that conclusion, he couldn't help but wonder at how elaborate this ruse had been. It went, in his mind, from making little sense, to making none.

Prentiss came out and opened the car door, and crouched down beside the passenger seat. ‘We're going to need you to come back in and take a gander at the system,' he said. ‘It looks like someone wiped all the CCTV records for the past week, maybe longer. Do you have back ups?'

Bill shook his head. ‘The recording is on a loop,' he said. ‘The past ten days will be kept, the first of the ten drops off as a new day is recorded over the top. It's a digital system,' he said more hopefully. ‘I hear they can recover digital records even though they've been wiped or overwritten.'

Prentiss shrugged. ‘Let's hope so,' he said. ‘Apart from that I need you to come and look inside at the storage units, see if you can see what they might have got into. It all looks locked up tight.'

Bill nodded and got out of the car. ‘Why'd they have to hit him so hard? Tony wasn't a big lad, he'd have given them no bother.'

Prentiss gestured that he didn't know.

‘He should have been with me,' Bill said. ‘He offered to come out and I said to him, no, rules are one of us stays in the viewing room. One inside at all times, that's the rules.'

‘The rules your boss laid down?'

‘Company rules,' Bill said. ‘The day shift is the same. One person in the control room, one to go and patrol. We switch round every two or three patrols. Tony liked to watch the telly, so I generally did the two last walks. We never had trouble here. Worst we got were drunk teenagers and a couple of graffiti artists. And they got scared off when Fred barked at them.'

‘I don't know, Bill, I really don't. But the thing that strikes me is how bloody elaborate it was. Those two in the van … no one would go to that much trouble just so they'd be a diversion. It's like they already had them available, in the van, so someone thought they may as well put them to another use.'

Bill looked sideways at Prentiss. ‘I thought the same thing,' he said. ‘It seems like too much trouble to go to, just to get us out of the building.' He laughed harshly. ‘Didn't even work for that, did it?'

‘Not your fault, Bill. You mustn't even start to think that.'

‘Hard not to.'

Prentiss led the way to the back of the building and the storage units that had been in Bill's care. ‘There's no sign of forced entry anywhere, Bill. Anything you see that's different, that's unusual? CSI would like to know where's best to make a start as there's a hell of a lot to go through.'

Bill stood back and looked at the row of storage lockers. This had been one big room; the owners had sectioned it off with stud walling and put cage doors on the front, secured with padlocks, all of which appeared to be in place. There were a row of lock-ups along each wall and a double row down the middle of the big space. On the face of it, the lockers seemed solid and secure, but Bill knew the stud wall between was cardboard thin. A good punch and you could put your fist through it.

He began to walk down the row, patrolling now as he did every night; not that he'd ever expected to find anything wrong but just because that was what the job description said he had to do. Normally, he'd have tugged on each of the padlocks. He told Prentiss so and the officer handed him a pair of gloves.

‘Do what you usually do,' he said.

‘What if they've left prints?'

‘They won't have left prints,' Prentiss asserted.

Bill absorbed that. Slowly, he walked down the rows, glancing at the numbers on the front of each cage and that linked, somehow, to the computer records. He looked through the little window in the cage door, trying to remember how the stacks of boxes and shelves had looked earlier that day. He tugged at each of the locks, checking as he always did. Prentiss paced slowly behind.

The first row and there was nothing. The second row, again, all seemed to be as he expected. Bill turned back down the row of central cages and pulled the padlock on the first enclosure. He paused. Looked inside again. Had something been moved?

Not certain, he moved along the row, but something nagged at him that he couldn't quite place and once he'd finished checking that block, he headed back and looked again.

‘I'm not sure what it is,' he said. ‘But I'm sure something's been shifted about in there.'

‘OK.' Prentiss beckoned to the waiting CSI. ‘It's as good a place to start as any.'

Bill nodded and slowly checked the final block of cages, but the more he thought about it, the more he was certain only that particular one had been disturbed. He came back round to where the two CSI had now cut the lock and opened the door.

‘It belongs to an old woman,' he said. ‘I remember her. She came in about a year, eighteen months ago, picked up an old chair and then came back maybe six months ago and fetched a box. Just an old tin thing. I remember her because she got a taxi all the way from town and had it wait for her while she came in. It was before the day shift came on, that was what struck me, both times. She came early. I remember the fight she had with the driver of the black cab because she wanted to take the chair back in the cab and he said he didn't carry furniture.' Bill laughed. ‘She won that one. I got the impression she won most of her arguments, come to think of it.'

Prentiss nodded. ‘Can you find her address?'

‘I can't, it'll be on the computer at head office. The people who use these lockers, they have a key and a pass card. I scan the card and it comes up with their number, then I show them where the locker is. Actually, it's not usually me. Usually the day shift. Most people don't arrive in the middle of the night. The customer then lets themselves into the cage and they're responsible for locking up after themselves.

‘And what sort of people use the storage facility?' Prentiss asked.

‘Oh, all sorts. Mostly they leave stuff here for a month or so. The company lets them out in a three-month block, but usually it's, like, people who are moving house and there's a gap of some sort between the moves. The lock ups are quite small, so if you've got to store your furniture, it can mean hiring two or three of them, and for a three-month block even if you don't need it. It's not the cheapest around, but a lot of people like the fact there's always security around and that if they need to they can come any time. We get a lot of early starts on moving days, vans turning up here just before I go off shift and that, not so many at three in the morning.'

‘And that's when the old lady arrived?'

Bill nodded. ‘You remember that sort of thing. Not that I'd have forgotten her anyway. She was a right … character.'

They stood and watched as the CSI moved carefully inside. Everyone seemed a bit jumpy, Bill thought, but then, in their place and after what he'd seen in that van, he'd have been a bit jumpy. Thoughts of bombs and booby traps jostled in his head and he took an involuntary step or two back, then told himself not to be a daft sod. If something blew in here, he'd need to be a lot further away than he could reasonably get. The desire to leave was suddenly overwhelming. Bill took a deep breath.

‘You said you wanted me to look at the control room?'

Prentiss nodded. ‘See anything?' he asked the two CSI.

‘Looks like a box might have been moved. The dust's been disturbed back here.'

Prentiss nodded. ‘We'll leave you to it, then,' he said and, much to Bill's relief, led the way back upstairs.

A
lec and Naomi had gone out house hunting. Truthfully, neither of them really wanted to settle in this current location in the Northamptonshire countryside, beautiful though it was. It was just that bit too far from the sea for Alec's liking. They examined what Alec told her was a very nice looking bungalow in a quarter acre garden and while Naomi agreed that there seemed to be lots of space in the big rooms and the roses in the garden were lovely, the kitchen and one of the bedrooms smelt of cats and she wasn't convinced that even stripping out the carpets and scrubbing the boards would get rid of that particular stink. Napoleon forgot himself for a moment and hoovered eagerly at the new scents, then remembered he was supposed to be working and pressed himself close to Naomi's leg.

‘Who lived here?' she asked.

‘An elderly lady,' the estate agent told her.

And her cats, Naomi added silently.

‘And, yes, it does need work. We said that in our details.'

‘New kitchen and bathroom for a start,' Alec said.

‘Well, yes, but once it's done … she was a very elderly lady. Had to go into a home and then she died.'

So, what happened to the cats, Naomi thought.

‘And now the family want a quick sale, so hence the good price.'

‘Not so good once you take account of all the work that would have to be done,' Alec objected. ‘New kitchen, new bathroom and we'd have to install an en suite and the windows look like they haven't been painted in decades …'

‘I'm sure they would be open to offers,' the estate agent said firmly. ‘It's still a very good buy …'

Naomi tuned them out and listened to the sad little house. She could hear how large the rooms were and almost catch the sounds of the ghosts that had once loved this place. It could be lovely, she thought, but it was not for them. She wondered what was.

They returned to their car and, without bothering to ask her, Alec phoned and cancelled their next booked viewing.

‘It's not working, is it?' he said.

‘Not really. No. Maybe we should just go back home? Try and make it ours again.'

‘Do you think we could?'

She hesitated and then shook her head. ‘No. You know what's strange, Alec?'

‘What?'

‘The one place I keep thinking about, thinking maybe I could settle there was that little cottage down in Somerset.'

She could feel Alec's disbelieving stare. ‘I'd have thought that was one place you'd never want to go back to. Naomi, I nearly lost you there. I couldn't …'

‘Alec.' She laid a hand on his arm, stroking the smooth fabric of his shirt. ‘I know it isn't logical, but you know, I won that one. I scored a victory. It turned out all right. Since then, not much has. You know?'

She could almost hear the wheels turning as he processed that and tried to work it out. Alec started the car, signalled and pulled slowly away.

‘That last place stank of cats,' she said.

‘Yes, I noticed. The bowls and litter tray were still in the kitchen, four bowls so presumably four cats. And there was a book on the living room chair. It had been left open and there was a pair of glasses next to it and a cup on the table and hair brushes on the dressing table. It was as if she'd just walked out.'

‘I think she died there,' Naomi confirmed. ‘Despite what the agent said. People don't like to think about that, do they? Even though it's inevitable if a house has any age to it.' And if the death had been a violent one …

‘Alec, accept that cash offer for the house. I don't think we'll better it, not even if we wait.'

‘You could be right,' he said. ‘OK, love, I'll give them a call tonight. Want to do the Molly thing, now?'

‘We may as well,' she agreed. ‘Then let's do something fun. Go and see a film, find a park and feed the ducks. Anything really.'

He reached out, briefly, and clasped her hand. These sudden depressive moods had hit her recently and he could understand why. He felt the same. It was as though nothing would ever feel settled or safe ever again.

Molly opened the door to them and for a moment Alec thought she wasn't going to let them in.

‘Back so soon?' she said. ‘Two visits inside a week. Be careful, Alec, I might get used to it.'

She bent, then, to greet Napoleon. ‘Hello, dog. You are a fine fellow, aren't you? Never had a dog since I was a girl. We did far too much travelling about, but there was this old brown mutt I had as a child, followed me everywhere.'

‘Can we come in, Aunt Molly?'

‘Well, I suppose you can, yes. Kitchen all right for you, is it? Or are we going to get all fancy-pantsy and go into the drawing room?'

‘Just as you like, Molly,' Alec said. He gripped Naomi's hand, wishing he'd taken her back to the hotel. They followed Molly into the kitchen and sat down at the table while Molly first fussed with the kettle and then opened the kitchen drawer and set the glasses and bottle on the kitchen table. ‘I'll get another glass,' she said. ‘And I expect the dog will want some water.'

Naomi thanked her and Molly hmmd rather than harrumphed, which, Alec thought, was a good sign, of sorts.

‘Sorry,' Alec apologized softly as Molly went through to the other room to fetch a suitable glass.

‘What for? I know what she's like. I'm not exactly unprepared.'

Molly returned and set the glass down, poured three large measures and pushed Naomi's glass towards her. ‘It's by your right hand,' she said ‘You like brandy.'

It wasn't really a question.

Naomi raised her glass, Molly seemed to be hesitating about something. Naomi knew all about her usual toast but guessed it was something Molly would be unsure about sharing with a relative stranger. She chose words that were close enough in meaning to Molly's little ritual. ‘To absent friends,' she said. She sensed Molly relax, just a little.

‘Absent friends,' Molly agreed ‘The whole damned lot of them.'

Naomi sipped her drink. It was very fine brandy. It deserved far better than exile in a kitchen drawer. She was about to ask what it was when Molly interrupted with, ‘So, to what do I owe the pleasure this time?'

Alec drew a deep breath. ‘I went to see the investigating officers.'