The smile finally disappeared. “I’m sorry,” he said again, and meant it this time. “I would never take advantage of a girl.”
“Oh yeah?” I said. “What about Clare?”
He stared at me blankly for a moment. “What are you talking about?”
“I’m talking about the ten grand, Jamie.”
He swallowed but before he could reply we heard footsteps approaching and the murmur of voices. An elderly couple appeared, dressed up to the nines, and stopped outside a door further up the corridor while they hunted for their key.
Jamie waited until the door had closed behind the couple, then jerked his head towards the room opposite Tess’s. “Look,” he muttered, “let’s talk about this inside, yeah?”
He produced his own key out of his jeans pocket and shoved it into the lock. Inside, the room was very similar to mine, maybe a touch smaller and the twin beds were both singles. I recognised Paxo’s leathers hanging on the wardrobe door.
Jamie caught my glance. “No-one wants to share with William,” he said by way of explanation. “He snores like an industrial buzz saw. It’s bad enough being in the same building.”
There was a little nervous catch to his voice as he spoke, as though he’d suddenly realised that by inviting me in like this he’d potentially put himself in harm’s way.
I leaned my shoulder against the wall next to the doorway, blocking his escape route.
“Why did you need the ten thousand, Jamie?”
“Oh, erm, well, I wanted to buy a new bike and—”
“Don’t,” I said. The single-word command worked much better on Jamie than it had done on Sean. He shut up like I’d just hit the mute button on the remote control.
“Clare’s already told me that you came to her in trouble and she agreed to lend you the money,” I said. “All I want to know is why you needed it. The truth. What’s Daz got on you?”
“
He broke off, realising he’d been suckered, and gave me a smile of self-derision.
“OK,” I said, folding my arms. “Who is it?”
He moved over to the bed and sat down nearly as heavily as Tess had done, putting his knees on his elbows and slowly rubbing his face with both hands.
“Look, I borrowed some money about a month ago from Eamonn.”
“Eamonn?” I said, trying to tone down the disbelief in my voice. “Everyone’s favourite philanthropist?”
He lifted his head, flushing. “Yeah, I know that might seem stupid to you, but he’s been an OK kind of a guy, y’know? Up ‘til then, anyway. I-I needed some dosh and Mum wouldn’t lend it to me. Eamonn overheard one of the rows we had about it and the next day he just handed it to me – in cash, just like that.”
“And you didn’t think to ask what he might want in return for this princely gesture?”
“Of course I did,” he said, scowling. “He just fobbed me off, y’know?”
“How long did it take him to change his mind?”
Jamie’s scowl deepened. “Couple of weeks,” he muttered. “He was apologetic at first, then started getting creepy about Mum, said as how he didn’t want this to hurt her.”
“In what way?”
“Fuck me, I don’t know! You think I wanted him to spell it out for me?”
“And that’s when you went to Clare.”
He nodded. “Yeah.”
“Why did you want Clare to meet you at Devil’s Bridge? Why not just go to the house?”
Jamie looked glum. “I didn’t want Dad to know about it and I didn’t know he wasn’t at home until—” he broke off, shrugged, “—well, afterwards.”
“And did Eamonn know about this?”
“Probably – through Mum.”
I was silent for a moment, considering. “I don’t suppose there’s any chance that Eamonn went after Clare – and Slick – because he wanted to keep you in his debt, is there?” I asked mildly.
Jamie’s head had begun to drop but now it snapped up. He jerked to his feet, suddenly restless. “No way,” he said, shaking his head like he could shudder the thought free. “No. Eamonn wasn’t even in the country last Sunday. He was somewhere in Europe – flew back into Manchester on Monday. Mum went over to collect him from the airport.”
I refrained from pointing out that Eamonn didn’t have to be driving the van himself in order to be responsible for it.
“So how did they know about the crash?”
“I spoke to Mum on Sunday night,” he muttered. “I told her then. She must have told Eamonn when she picked him up.”
“And they decided they’d see what they could nick from the house before Jacob got back,” I said.
