Jones shrugged. ‘I doubt it. He only came here that one time eleven years ago, when he filled out that form.’

  ‘But it says here that he paid in cash annually,’ Minter queried.

  ‘By post, he did. Yes,’ Jones said.

  ‘That’s a lot of cash to send in an envelope,’ Minter said.

  ‘£450, to be precise,’ said Jones. ‘But it came on time every year… Otherwise I would have chased him for payment earlier.’

  ‘And when did you last try chasing him?’

  ‘About three months ago,’ Jones said. ‘Like I said, the phone number was no longer recognised. Or maybe it was never even a proper number.’ He shrugged. ‘Who knows?’

  Minter tucked the evidence bag into his jacket pocket. ‘All right, well, thank you very much for your help. This has been very useful.’

  ‘So you think you’ll be able to find this sick bastard?’ Jones asked.

  ‘That’s the plan, Mr Jones,’ Minter replied. ‘That’s most definitely the plan.’

  Okeke decided to stick to her desk over lunchtime in case she got a call back from the rugby club; stupidly, she’d given the desk extension and not her mobile. She had just made it back to her desk with a sandwich from the canteen when she got the call she’d been waiting for.

  ‘Detective O…Okay-key?’

  ‘Samantha Okeke,’ she helped him. ‘Is that Julian Hollander?’

  ‘Yes, it is. You left a message for me to call you?’

  ‘Yes, I did. I presume you run the Norton Heath Rugby Club?’ she asked him.

  ‘I’m the club secretary,’ Hollander told her. ‘I handle the boring side of things, the paperwork.’ He had the kind of comedy nasal voice that Okeke associated with trainspotters and stamp collectors.

  ‘We’re chasing up on an old misper case –’ she began.

  ‘Misper?’ he interrupted.

  ‘Sorry, a missing person’s case,’ she explained. ‘We’re looking for a man who would have been in his mid thirties when he went missing. We believe he might have had something to do with your rugby club.’

  ‘How so?’ Hollander asked.

  ‘He had your club’s logo tattooed on his arm,’ Okeke said.

  ‘Ah… yes, some of our more enthusiastic members have been known to do that,’ Hollander said. ‘What’s the name?’

  ‘We don’t know,’ Okeke said.

  ‘You don’t know,’ he repeated. ‘Then I’m confused. How…?’

  ‘A body was recovered,’ Okeke explained. ‘Male, white, mid thirties. And that’s all we know about him so far – other than the tattoo, that is. He would have been a member of your club, maybe ten years ago, give or take. Do you keep a register of past members?’

  ‘Oh, crikey,’ Hollander said. ‘That’s dreadful. Well, we do have a subs register. Our members have to pay a small subscription every quarter to keep things ticking over. If your missing person was once a member of our club, I imagine his name should be in our paying-in book somewhere.’

  ‘You’ll need to look back a few years,’ Okeke reminded him. ‘I’m after someone who would have suddenly stopped making his payments. If he was an enthusiastic club member, then he might have been one of your regular players? Stopped turning up to practice sessions, perhaps?’

  ‘Members do come and go, Ms Okeke,’ Hollander told her.

  ‘But I presume they contact you to say they’re dropping their membership, right?’ she said.

  ‘Well, yes, usually,’ he agreed.

  ‘If a member stopped paying his subs…’ pressed Okeke, ‘I presume you would chase them down in the first instance? And make a note?’

  ‘I don’t chase them down… as you say, but, yes, I do make a note to tactfully press them the next time they turn up for a practice session. I can dig out our past yearbooks for you.’

  ‘Could you start with 2011, 2012. Maybe earlier… 2010?’ she asked.

  ‘Crikey. That’s before my time as club secretary, I’m afraid,’ he replied.

  ‘If you could take a look for me, though? Even if it’s just a list of lapsed members from those years. I appreciate that’s a bit of work for you.’

  ‘No, that’s all right. Anything I can do to help you find your man.’

  ‘That’s incredibly helpful. Thank you.’

  ‘I’ll crack on with that now,’ he said, and hung up.

  18

  ‘Don’t make me drag it out of you, Bill…’ said Charlotte. ‘I want to know everything.’

  Boyd ambled along the shingle in silence, wondering how to tell her. The beach was populated with enough people taking in the sun with their packed lunches that both Ozzie and Mia were confined to a lead walk.

  ‘Bill? I checked the terms and conditions of being a couple… You’re supposed to be honest with me,’ she told him.

  He sighed. ‘The doctor insisted I drop in a sample to get a better idea of what we’re dealing with.’ He looked at Charlotte; her brows were locked together with concern. ‘The doctor mentioned the C-word,’ he admitted.

  Charlotte’s eyes clamped shut for a moment.

  ‘Yeah, it’s a bit of a bummer. No pun intended. But… it’s only possible. It could still all be fine. It’s not a certainty, by any stretch,’ he said, attempting a smile.

  ‘Oh no,’ she whispered.

  ‘He also said that, given my age, if it is bowel cancer… it would probably be very treatable.’ He smiled. ‘The doc said, “If you’re going to get cancer, this is a good one to get.”’

  Dr Ho had actually said nothing of the sort.

  ‘Worst case, it’s just a quick bit of colon editing,’ he added, ‘and the job’s a good ’un.’

  Charlotte took a deep breath. ‘When will you know, one way or the other?’

  ‘He said the turnaround for the test result would be pretty quick. A day, maybe two. They don’t mess about with this kind of thing.’

  He could see she was wrestling with tears. She noticed him studying her and flashed a stoic smile back at him.

  ‘I mean, it could just be irritable bowel syndrome. Or an infection, you know? Probably is,’ he said hopefully.

  Charlotte stopped walking and planted her feet in the shingle with a resolute clatter of stones. ‘Bill, we’re not going to do that. You’re not going to sugarcoat things for me, okay? It’s all right to be worried. And if it’s the worst case, then –’ she paused to steady her voice – ‘we’ll jolly well beat this fucker together.’

  Boyd smiled and cupped her chin in one hand. ‘God, I love it when you go all potty-mouthed on me.’

  She leant forward and kissed him. ‘It’s been a long wait finding a man like you, Bill. I’m damned if I’m going to let anything happen to you. Are we sharing this with Emma?’

  ‘Not yet,’ he replied. ‘I want to find out what we’re dealing with first. It could be something or nothing,’ he reminded her. ’A twisted bowel, constipation. A long overdue fart that’s been waiting to express itself…’

  ‘God help me.’ She punched him gently. ‘You can be so uncouth, Bill Boyd.’

  Boyd returned to his desk to find Okeke hovering around it like a wasp over a dustbin.

  ‘You look remarkably pleased with yourself,’ he noted.

  ‘I am,’ she replied. ‘We just got a possible ID for one of the John Does.’

  ‘Really?’ Boyd dropped his jacket over the back of his seat. ‘Do tell.’

  ‘Mark Meadows. Aged thirty-six when he went missing in 2011.’ She relayed to him the tattoo that Dr Palmer had found – the club crest for Norton Heath Rugby Club – and club secretary Julian Hollander’s swift help in coming back with a very short list of lapsed members.

  ‘Meadows is an unresolved misper. His wife raised the alert –’ she checked the notes in her hand – ‘in October 2011. There was no reason she could think of for him to disappear. There were none of the usual triggers: gambling debt, depression, stress. He just didn’t return home from work one day.’

  ‘Sounds promising,’ Boyd said.

  ‘More than promising. She confirmed he had the club tattoo and there’s more…’ She looked around the CID floor. ‘Where’s Minter gone, for God’s sake?’ she muttered.

  ‘Did he turn something up too?’

  She nodded.

  ‘Well, don’t keep me in suspense,’ said Boyd. ‘What is it?’

  ‘I should really let him tell you. It’s his find,’ Okeke said, glancing around again.

  Boyd rolled his eyes. ‘I promise he’ll still win a sticky bun. What’s he found?’

  ‘He’s got photo ID of the guy who rented the unit. A driving licence.’

  ‘Well, that’ll be faked, I assume,’ Boyd said.

  ‘Obviously. But the photo on it would have had to have been genuine, because he’d have needed to show it to Gareth Jones when he first went in to rent the unit.’ She held out a photocopy of the scanned licence.

  Boyd squinted at the tiny ID photo.

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘The quality of the image is shit.’

  He nodded. It was little more than a dark blob of smeared printer ink. ‘So, that’s our killer, eh?’ he mused aloud.

  She nodded eagerly. ‘It probably isn’t going to be good enough for facial recognition software, though.’

  ‘Not even close,’ said Boyd. If real life was like fiction, some technical whiz would have whipped it away and managed to sharpen up the image with some hi-tech gizmo to produce something cleaner. But a smudged array of printer ink dots was all they had and it was unlikely to yield anything more.

  ‘Minter also picked up a registration form. Not a copy. The original,’ she told him.

  ‘Well, that’s better news, I suppose.’

  Okeke nodded. ‘It’s with Magnusson right now. She’s going to dust it for prints and swab it. She offered to run the swab over to Ellessey herself so they can run it for DNA. We might get lucky, you never know.’

  Boyd nodded. ‘Right. Good.’

  Okeke looked exasperated. Obviously, she’d been hoping for a more animated response from him. ‘You okay, guv?’ she asked.

  ‘Yup. I’m fine. Just flagging a bit today. That’s all,’ he replied.

  ‘Okay, well, we reached out to Mark Meadows’ wife…’ Okeke began just as Minter arrived with a fresh cup of coffee in hand.

  He took one look at the photocopy in Boyd’s hand and groaned with disappointment.

  ‘It’s my fault,’ Boyd said. ‘I pressed her. Go on, Okeke, you were saying… Mark Meadows’ wife?’

  ‘Okeke gave her a call, boss,’ Minter answered. ‘Hope you don’t mind?’

  He shook his head. That was why he’d nodded them through for promotion. Having two detectives with initiative was a godsend, especially at the moment.

  ‘So…’ Minter continued. ‘Me and Okeke are popping up to interview her tomorrow morning. Do you think we should take a FLO with us?’

  They were going to have to tell the poor woman that there was a body that could be her husband. Twelve years might have passed since he’d gone missing, but being an unresolved misper – rather than a resolved bereavement – tended to place grief in a state of suspended animation. It was probably going to be an emotional one.

  ‘Might be a good idea,’ he replied.

  19

  McGuire reviewed the pictures that Jay had printed out and brought into his office.

  ‘Good work, Jay,’ he said, running a finger along his top lip. ‘Love the one of him hefting his sprog out of the bumper car. Marvellous action shot. Nice composition.’

  Jay smiled. ‘Thanks, sir.’

  McGuire lifted a brow. ‘Sir? I remind you, we’re not a cavalry regiment.’ He settled back into his seat. It let out a soft creak. ‘Incidentally, I got a call from the trust to say that Tebbutt’s solicitor had been in touch first thing this morning. Mr Tebbutt’s decided to drop the claim.’

  ‘Nice one,’ grunted Jay. ‘Result, eh?’ he said, grinning.

  ‘Indeed. A result. The right result for our client, but…’

  Jay felt the smile freeze on his lips. He hadn’t been expecting a ‘but’.

  ‘Mr Tebbutt, I presume, must have suddenly realised his fraudulent claim was in danger of getting him into trouble. I do have to ask myself why he made a very timely and abrupt U-turn on the matter.’

  Jay had decided not to mention the altercation in the arcade. It had seemed like an unnecessary detail. He’d got the job done, got the pictures, and they were damned good ones.

  ‘According to Mr Tebbutt, you physically threatened him?’ McGuire said.

  ‘What? No!’ Jay replied.

  ‘Apparently there was some sort of an exchange between the two of you?’

  Jay nodded reluctantly. ‘He… uh… he caught sight of me taking a picture. He stormed over and accused me of being a perv taking photographs of kids at the arcade.’

  ‘I see.’ McGuire resumed stroking his lip. ‘To which you responded?’

  ‘I told him he was rumbled. I told him I had pictures of him driving bumper cars, lifting his kid up, playing Crazy Golf and stuff.’

  McGuire’s brows bounced impatiently, waiting for more.

  ‘I… uh… I said his claim was clearly fraudulent and he needed to bloody well pack it in.’

  ‘Ahh…’ said McGuire. He leant forward in his seat. ‘There are a couple of small learning moments here, Jay, and they’re worth pointing out… if I may?’

  ‘Sure.’

  ‘It’s covert surveillance you were doing, not overt. In other words, the trick is not to be spotted,’ McGuire explained.

  ‘Yeah, I know… but… he –’

  McGuire raised a finger to show he was not finished. ‘And if a target does spot you and, in this instance, thought you were a pervert taking photos of kids… then that is exactly what you should have pretended to be.’

  ‘Oh, I see.’

  McGuire’s mouth lifted slightly, a ghost of a smile to take the sting out of his words. ‘We’re in the business of observing, discreetly… not publicly rebuking, Jay.’

  ‘Right.’

  ‘That said… the trust will be happy he’s dropped his claim. So, all’s well that ends well.’

  Jay nodded, grateful that McGuire was taking that approach. ‘Thanks, McGuire.’

  He turned to leave the man’s office.

  ‘Jay?’

  He turned back to face him. ‘Yeah?’

  McGuire was thoughtfully stroking his top lip again. ‘How would you feel about going on a training course?’

  ‘Uh… yeah. That would be, yeah, great.’ Jay realised he should probably ask – in what? ‘What kind of –’

  ‘Spy craft,’ said McGuire, his crooked lips spreading into a broad smile.

  20

  ‘You really should put an air freshener back here,’ said Minter from the rear seat. ‘It reeks of stale fag smoke.’

  ‘No one sits back there… normally,’ Okeke replied as her beaten-up brown Datsun sped along the eastbound M25 as they headed for Dartford. ‘Except when I have to give my brother’s kids a lift somewhere.’

  ‘You make actual children sit back here? In this toxic mess?’ Minter asked, horrified.

  ‘They get used to it, or they walk,’ Okeke replied. ‘Now stop fidgeting and kicking my seat. Don’t make me pull over and smack the back of your legs.’

  The family liaison officer, PS Gayle Brown, who was in the front passenger seat, chuckled.

  ‘I didn’t know you were an auntie,’ said Minter.

  ‘Auntie Sammy,’ she said with a sigh. ‘Yeah. Best contraceptive ever, that, you know… Someone else’s kids.’

  ‘I hear you,’ said Brown. She adjusted the tight, fraying seat belt across her front. ‘I’ve made a solemn vow never to spawn any rug rats. Too messy, too noisy and too expensive.’

  Okeke had made a similar pledge at the start of her career. Having a baby on a PC’s wage would have been foolish. Especially if things hadn’t worked out and she’d ended up being a single mum. Of course, though, she had Jay and two steady wages coming in now. There was also the exciting prospect of a promotion to detective sergeant… It had started her thinking. With her internal body clock ticking away, maybe the question was worth revisiting… She knew Jay was keen to have a family at some point.

  ‘So what’s the situation with this Mrs Meadows?’ asked Brown. ‘Do we know how she is? How she’s likely to take the news?’

  ‘Her husband’s been missing for over a decade,’ answered Minter. ‘We don’t know if she’s with someone new or keeping a candle-lit vigil.’

  ‘How much info are you planning to share with her?’ asked Brown.

  ‘Only that a body’s been found,’ said Okeke. ‘That could possibly be her husband’s.’

  ‘No mention of his murder and dismemberment,’ added Minter. ‘We’ll keep it light on details.’

  Brown turned in her seat to look back at him. ‘Okay. Sounds good.’

  The answer as to whether Marjorie Meadows was going to need a bit of hand-holding and back-rubbing became quickly apparent. She’d moved on. The man who opened the door to them and introduced himself as Jim told them that he was her partner.

  ‘She’s in the front room. Can I make you guys some tea?’ he asked.

  Minter smiled. ‘I’ll have a coffee, if it’s going?’

  ‘No problem.’ Jim led them through into the living room.

  Marjorie Meadows was waiting for them. She got up off the sofa and shook hands with the three of them as they gave her their names.

  ‘You’re the lady I spoke to yesterday?’ she said to Okeke.

  ‘That’s right.’

  ‘Please, take a seat,’ she said, gesturing at the armchairs. ‘Jim’ll be through with the tea and biscuits in a minute.’

  Minter nodded at Okeke.

  ‘Mrs Meadows…’ Okeke began.

  ‘Just Marjorie,’ she cut in. ‘And I use my maiden name now. Barlow.’

  ‘Right.’ Okeke made a note of that. ‘So, as I mentioned yesterday afternoon, a body was recovered that we think may well be your missing husband, Mark.’