The Truth-Teller's Lie (27 page)

23

4/8/06

‘HAS EITHER OF you seen Charlie?’ Simon was anxious enough to call out to Sellers and Gibbs, in a louder voice than he’d normally think of using, while they were still some metres away.

‘We were just coming to find you.’ Sellers stopped by the drinks machine outside the canteen. He reached into his pocket for change.

‘Something’s up with her,’ said Gibbs. ‘No idea what. I was talking to her before—’

‘Did you tell her Robert Haworth’s real name?’

‘Yeah, I started telling her—’

‘Shit!’ Simon rubbed the bridge of his nose, thinking. This was a serious problem. How much should he tell Sellers and Gibbs? Laurel and fucking Hardy, he thought. But he had to tell them.

‘. . . I’d got as far as telling her Haworth was born Robert Angilley, and she just walked off,’ Gibbs was saying. ‘Out of the building, got in her car and off she went. She didn’t look good. What’s going on?’

‘I couldn’t find her, couldn’t find any of you,’ said Simon. ‘Her mobile’s switched off. She never does that—you know Charlie, she’s never out of touch, and she never goes off without telling me where. So I phoned her sister.’

‘And?’ said Sellers.

‘It’s not good. This holiday she cut short, Spain, it was supposed to be.’

‘Supposed to be?’ said Gibbs. As far as he knew, that was where the sarge had been, where she’d flown back from when the Robert Haworth case started to get more complicated.

‘The hotel was no good, so she and Olivia sacked it and booked a new place: Silver Brae Chalets in Scotland.’

Sellers looked up, spilling hot chocolate on his fingers. ‘Shit!’ he said. ‘Silver Brae Chalets? The same one that’s run by Robert Haworth’s brother? I just jotted down the name, ten minutes ago.’

‘Same one,’ said Simon grimly. ‘Olivia reckons Charlie and Graham Angilley are . . . involved in some kind of relationship.’

‘She can’t have been there more than a day!’

‘I know.’ Simon saw no need to tell Sellers and Gibbs the rest of what Olivia Zailer had told him: that Charlie had invented a fictional boyfriend called Graham to make Simon jealous, that when she’d met a real Graham she’d leaped at the chance of making her lie true. All that was too much for him to think about right now.

He stuck to the relevant facts. ‘Naomi Jenkins gave us the business card for Silver Brae Chalets by mistake when she came in on Monday to report Haworth missing. She thought she was handing over her own business card. Charlie still had it after she’d gone—she showed it to me, mentioned that they had some kind of special offer on. Obviously when the hotel in Spain turned out to be a dump, she thought of the chalets.’

‘Hang on,’ said Gibbs, holding out his hand for Sellers’ drink. Sellers sighed, but gave it to him. ‘So Naomi Jenkins had Haworth’s brother’s business card? Did Jenkins know Haworth’s real name, then? Had she met his family?’

‘She’s not answering her mobile either,’ said Simon. ‘But I don’t think so. She was desperate for us to look for Haworth, to find him as quickly as possible. If she’d known he had a brother—or that he’d changed his name, for that matter—she’d have told us when she came in on Monday. She gave us everything she could to help us find him.’

‘She must have known,’ said Sellers. ‘It can’t be a coincidence. What, she just happens to be carrying the business card of her lover’s brother, even though she doesn’t know that’s who he is? Bullshit!’

Simon was nodding. ‘It’s not a coincidence. Far from it. I’ve just looked at the Silver Brae Chalets website. Guess who designed it?’

‘No idea,’ said Sellers.

Gibbs was quicker off the mark. ‘Naomi Jenkins’ best mate’s a website designer, her lodger.’

‘Got it in one,’ said Simon. ‘Yvon Cotchin. She did the Silver Brae Chalets website. She also designed one for Naomi Jenkins, for her sundial business.’ He waited, expecting to see dawning awareness on their faces, but all he saw was bewilderment. They hadn’t got there yet. They weren’t conspiracy-minded in the way Simon was, that was why.

‘Listen,’ he said. ‘Robert Haworth raped Prue Kelvey. We know that, it’s been proved. We also know he didn’t do all the rapes. He didn’t rape Naomi Jenkins or Sandy Freeguard, but someone did, someone Haworth was very probably working with, since the MO was almost identical.’

‘You’re saying it’s the brother, Graham Angilley?’ asked Sellers. He still hadn’t got his drink back.

‘I fucking hope I’m wrong, but I don’t think I am. If Angilley’s the other rapist, that’d explain how he knew so much about Naomi Jenkins. There’s personal information about her on her website, as well as her address, which is the same as her business’s address. I’m sure that’s how he chose her as a victim: from a list of Yvon Cotchin’s previous clients. If Cotchin did Jenkins’ website before she did Angilley’s, she might well have told him to have a look at some others she’d designed, as a sort of reference.’

‘Fuck,’ said Sellers quietly.

‘Prue Kelvey and Sandy Freeguard—’ Gibbs began.

‘Sandy Freeguard’s a writer and has her own website, with personal information and photos, like Jenkins’. And the company Prue Kelvey worked for has an individual webpage for each member of staff, giving personal as well as professional information, and a photograph. That’s how Angilley and Haworth knew so much about them.’

‘Naomi Jenkins was raped before Kelvey and Freeguard,’ said Gibbs.

‘Exactly.’ Simon had followed the same deductive trail himself, minutes earlier. ‘She might have been the turning point for Angilley and Haworth. They’ve been selling tickets to live rapes since at least 2001. We know that from the date on survivor thirty-one’s story. However they selected their victims in the early days, I reckon it all changed when Angilley had the website done for the chalets. If Yvon Cotchin
did
tell him to look at some of her other work, including Naomi Jenkins’ site . . .’

‘Pretty big if,’ said Sellers. ‘What if the chalets’ site predated Jenkins’?’

‘I’ll check,’ said Simon. ‘But I don’t think it did. And that’s how Graham Angilley came to know about Naomi Jenkins. He must have realised that there were hundreds of other potential victims on the Internet, with their own websites. But he couldn’t only rape women Yvon Cotchin had designed sites for, could he? That’d be too obvious, too risky. So they branched out, he and Haworth—they started to look for any websites belonging to professional women . . .’

‘With photos, so they could check they fancied them,’ said Gibbs. ‘Sick cunts.’

Simon nodded. ‘Sandy Freeguard’s website was designed by Pegasus. And another company did the one for Kelvey’s firm—I’ve just spoken to the MD’s assistant on the phone.’

‘How does the sarge fit into this?’ asked Sellers. His fingers combed his pocket for more change, but found none. Gibbs had finished his drink and had a small, foamy, brown moustache to prove it.

‘I’ll get to that in a minute,’ said Simon, keen to put off thinking about that side of things for as long as he could. ‘Naomi Jenkins got the card for Silver Brae Chalets from Yvon Cotchin. She had no idea there was any connection to Robert Haworth.’

Sellers and Gibbs looked at him sceptically.

‘Think about it. Cotchin’s worked with Graham Angilley, effectively. She’s helped him set up his business. He’d be bound to send her a bunch of cards, so she could give them to people. Naomi took one, and thought—as anyone would—that Silver Brae Chalets was just a holiday place that her mate had done a website for. She had no idea her married boyfriend’s brother was the owner and manager . . .’ Simon’s words tailed off.

‘Or that the same brother was the bloke who’d kidnapped and raped her,’ said Gibbs.

‘That’s right. There have been no coincidences in this case, not a single one. Every part of the answer to this mess is connected to every other part: Jenkins, Haworth, Angilley, Cotchin, the business card . . .’

‘And now our skipper.’ Sellers looked worried.

‘Yeah,’ said Simon, speaking on a long out-breath. His chest felt as if it was full of concrete. ‘Charlie got the chalets’ card from Naomi Jenkins. She didn’t know Graham Angilley was anything to do with Robert Haworth, not until you told her Haworth’s real name.’ He looked at Gibbs.

‘Fucking hell. As soon as I told her, she must have thought what you did: that there’s a strong chance Angilley’s the other rapist. And if she’s been screwing him . . .’

‘That’s why she took off in such a hurry,’ said Simon. ‘She must be in a right state.’

‘I feel like shit now,’ said Gibbs. ‘I’ve been giving her a hard time.’

‘Not only her.’ Sellers raised his eyebrows at Simon.

‘Yeah, well. You two deserve it. She doesn’t.’

‘Fuck off! I’ve done nothing,’ said Sellers.

Simon had an active—some might say overactive—conscience. He knew when he’d done something wrong. There were no sins with Chris Gibbs’ name on them, last time he looked. There was a big fat file under the name Charlie Zailer.

‘I’m getting married in June. You’re both invited.
He
’s my best man.’ Gibbs jerked his head at Sellers. ‘And he’s off round the world with his secret shag the week before. I haven’t heard anything about a stag night. I’ll probably be sat in on my own the night before I sign my freedom away, watching Ant and fucking Dec, while he shakes the empty condom packets out of his suitcase . . .’

‘Give me a chance.’ Sellers looked sheepish. ‘I haven’t forgotten about your stag night. I’ve been busy, that’s all.’ Simon noticed his cheeks were slightly pink.

‘Yeah—busy thinking about your cock, as usual,’ Gibbs fired back.

‘This can wait,’ said Simon. ‘We’ve got more important things to worry about than hiring strippers and tying you to a lamp post with no clothes on. We’re in deep shit here.’

‘So what do we do?’ asked Sellers. ‘Where’s the sarge gone?’

‘Olivia says Charlie left a message on her voicemail telling her to go round later, so she’s obviously planning to be at home this evening, even if she isn’t there now. I’ll go round and talk to her. In the meantime . . .’ Simon braced himself. They might both tell him to fuck off. He wouldn’t blame them if they did. ‘I know I shouldn’t ask, but . . . any chance you could keep this well away from the Snowman?’

Sellers’ eyes widened. ‘Oh, shit. Proust’s going to go ballistic when he . . . Oh,
shit.
The skipper and the prime suspect . . .’

‘She’ll have to be taken off the case,’ said Simon. ‘I’m going to try and persuade her to tell Proust herself. Shouldn’t be hard. She’s not stupid.’ He said this more to reassure himself than anything else. ‘She’s probably in shock and needs to be on her own for a bit to get her head round it.’ He didn’t want to think about what would happen if Proust found out before Charlie told him.

‘How can we keep it quiet?’ asked Gibbs. ‘Proust asks for the sarge every five minutes. What do we say?’

‘You won’t need to say anything, because you’ll be on your way to Scotland.’ To Simon’s amazement, neither Sellers nor Gibbs questioned his authority. ‘Bring Graham Angilley back with you, and Stephanie, his wife. I’ll deal with Proust. I’ll tell him Charlie’s gone to Yorkshire to talk to Sandy Freeguard, now that we’ve got a possible ID for the man who raped her. Proust won’t question it. You know what he’s like—he does his most energetic fault-finding first thing in the morning.’ Seeing their faces, he said, ‘Have you got any better ideas? If we tell him Charlie’s gone awol, we’ll make things worse for her, and that’s the last thing she needs.’

‘What’ll you be doing?’ asked Gibbs suspiciously. ‘While we’re in haggis country chasing a pervert?’

‘I’m going to talk to Yvon Cotchin, and then Naomi Jenkins if I can find her.’

Sellers shook his head. ‘If the Snowman finds out about this, all three of us’ll be giving fire-safety talks in primary schools before the week’s out.’

‘Let’s not shit ourselves before we have to,’ said Simon. ‘Charlie must know she’s put us in an impossible situation. I bet she’s back here within the hour. Check the Brown Cow before you set off to the chalets, just in case she’s in there. If she is, ring me.’

‘Yes, guv,’ said Gibbs sarcastically.

‘This isn’t a joke.’ Simon stared at his shoes. The idea that Charlie had been romantically involved with Graham Angilley—a man who was very probably a monster, a sadistic rapist—bothered Simon more than he could understand or explain. He felt almost as if it had happened to him, as if he’d been assaulted by Angilley. And if that was how he felt, he didn’t like to think how much worse it must be for Charlie.

A uniformed constable was walking purposefully towards them along the corridor. The conversation ended abruptly, and Simon, Sellers and Gibbs felt the silent conspiracy hanging in the air around them as PC Meakin got closer.

‘Sorry to interrupt,’ Meakin said, though all he was interrupting was an atmosphere of mute awkwardness. He addressed Simon. ‘There’s an Yvon Cotchin here to see you or Sergeant Zailer. I’ve stuck her in interview room two.’

‘Another coincidence,’ said Gibbs. ‘Saves you a trip.’

‘Did she say what she wants?’ Simon asked Meakin. Behind him he heard Sellers insisting, ‘I
was
going to arrange a bloody stag night for you, all right? I
am.
’

‘Her friend’s disappeared, she said. She’s worried about her because when she last saw her, the friend was pretty upset. That’s all I know.’

‘Cheers, Meakin,’ said Simon. ‘I’ll be there in a minute.’

Once the young constable had gone, he turned to Sellers and Gibbs. ‘Upset, disappeared—ring any bells?’

‘What are you saying?’

‘I don’t know.’ Simon’s first thought, on hearing what Meakin had to say, was too ludicrous and paranoid to be worth repeating. Sellers and Gibbs would think he was losing his grip. He decided to play it safe. ‘I’ve no idea,’ he said. ‘But if I were a betting man, I’d put money on this being something else that isn’t a coincidence.’

‘Why wouldn’t she tell me where she was going?’ asked Yvon Cotchin. ‘We’d sorted everything out, she wasn’t annoyed with me anymore, I know she wasn’t . . .’