‘Okay!’ Leo struggled again but less forcefully. The policemen were a wall in front of him and he would have said anything to get a glimpse of the man beyond. ‘Okay,’ he repeated and this time Leo held the inspector’s eye. Gradually the pressure across his chest began to ease. The constable drew back. The inspector, though, held his ground.
‘Cool!’ He showed Leo a finger. ‘Got it?’
Leo nodded. He shifted and there he was: Daniel’s stepfather, his cigarette packet crumpled at his feet and his nicotine-stained fingers massaging his throat. The man coughed. He hacked and he spat. He glared at Leo and Leo glared back.
‘Sit,’ said the DI. ‘Both of you.’ He dragged Leo towards a chair. The constable, less tenderly, assisted Blake.
‘Hey!’ Blake resisted but the policeman shoved him down, then slid the chair so Blake’s stomach impacted against the table. He took up position at Blake’s shoulder. Leo sensed the DI looming over his.
‘I could do you, you know,’ said Blake, spluttering. ‘Him and you both.’ He jabbed a thumb at Leo but spoke across his shoulder to the PC. ‘That’s assault. So much as touch me again and I’ll have you for ABH.’
The policeman said nothing. He stared at the opposite wall.
‘Settle down, Mr Blake,’ said Mathers. ‘I don’t think you really want to broach the subject of formal charges just yet, do you?’
Blake faced them. He glowered.
‘Now. The matter in hand. We’re listening. Mr Curtice here: he’s listening.’
Blake, tentatively, moved his gaze to meet Leo’s. He licked his lips. He made a motion to lean forward but, catching something in Leo’s expression, changed his mind. He propped his elbows on the surface and spread his fingers.
‘Curtice,’ Blake said. ‘Leo.’ He wetted his lips again. ‘I sent the notes. Okay? I admit it. But this business with your daughter… I swear to you I had nothing to do with it.’
Leo made no movement.
‘Please,’ said Blake and this time he did lean forward. ‘You need to tell them. You need to convince them I’m telling the truth. Because they won’t listen. They just won’t. I mean, you know what they’re like, right? You have to deal with them all the time. Right?’
Leo twitched and Blake flinched. Mathers, at Leo’s shoulder, edged closer.
‘Where is she?’ Leo’s voice, in his head, sounded distant. It seemed steady, under control, when Leo felt anything but. ‘Blake,’ he said. ‘I helped you. I helped Daniel, your family. Please. Just tell me where my daughter is.’
Blake was shaking his head as Leo spoke. ‘Listen to me. Please. You’re not—’
Leo held up a hand. ‘Even if she’s…’ Leo registered the horror spreading on Vincent Blake’s face. ‘You just need to tell us. Now.’ He had intended to sound intimidating. On the final word, however, Leo’s voice cracked.
There was silence. Leo, the men around him, watched Blake. Blake looked at each of them in turn, as though willing for someone in the room to admit the joke. He focused on Leo.
‘Curtice. This is me!’ He pressed his fingers to the faded logo on his sweater. ‘You know me,’ Blake was saying. ‘You know my family. You said it yourself. You were trying to help us! Why would you help us if you didn’t trust us?’
‘Not you,’ Leo hissed. ‘Never you!’
Blake shook his head. ‘I admitted it. Didn’t I? I wrote the notes. But that’s all. Honest! That’s all I did!’ He checked around again in desperation. ‘Okay,’ he said, and splayed his hands again. ‘Maybe I sent a mate of mine round to your house and all. But he didn’t do anything, did he? Gave your wife a bit of a scare but there was no harm done. Was there?’
Leo sat motionless. The man with the beard. The man Megan saw. Leo had forgotten all about him.
‘I told him you owed me money,’ Blake was saying. ‘I said to him, throw a brick into your living room or something. But he couldn’t even manage that, could he?’ Blake reclined slightly and muttered, as though revisiting some lingering grievance. ‘Twenty-mill units, he tells me. Your double glazing. Says he took a proper look but a brick would have bounced right off. But if he’d done it right, if he’d chucked it at one of the corners…’ He raised his eyes, seemed to realise he owed the room an explanation. ‘Glazing’s my trade,’ he said. ‘Pat’s, too: my useless mate. It’s how I got this.’ He fingered his crooked nose, the scar across it. ‘Cash-in-hand job. Almost lost a bloody eye. At least I get my disability now but I should probably be claiming for the undercover work too.’ He tested the room with a smile. It faltered. ‘The beach,’ he explained to Leo. ‘The day I followed you. I mean, I was wrapped up pretty tightly so I’m assuming my ugly mug’s how you…’
Leo made to cut him off and Blake held up his hands.
‘Whatever,’ he said. ‘It doesn’t matter. The point is, you’ve got me all wrong. The notes, the brick: I had my reasons. But that was it, Leo. Honest. That, for me, is where it stops.’
‘Why?’
‘Why what?’
‘You said you had your reasons. What were they?’
‘What does it matter? I told you what I did. I told you what I didn’t do. It’s not helping your kid, keeping me here like this.’
‘You’re lying. You can’t explain, which means you’re lying!’
‘No!’
‘Where is she? Tell me where she is!’ Leo half rose from his chair. He felt a hand settle lightly on each of his shoulders.
‘Mr Blake,’ said DI Mathers. ‘You said you wanted to talk to Mr Curtice. So far you haven’t told him anything you haven’t already said to us.’
Blake fiddled with something unseen. ‘No. Well. I said Curtice, didn’t I? I didn’t say you and Hulk Hogan over there too.’
‘Meaning what, Mr Blake?’
‘Meaning it’s none of your business!’
‘Mr Blake—’
‘Actually. You know what? I’m leaving. You’ve got no evidence. You haven’t charged me. You haven’t even arrested me!’ Blake stood and appeared surprised when the constable let him. He seemed to take heart – until the detective inspector cleared his throat.
‘Vincent Blake,’ he said. ‘I am arresting you on suspicion of murder.’
Blake’s eyes stretched wide. ‘Wait a minute,’ he said. ‘There’s no need for—’
‘You do not have to say anything unless you wish to do so—’
‘Wait! Just wait a minute!’
‘– but it may harm your defence if you do not mention, when questioned—’
‘OKAY!’
The room went quiet.
‘Okay,’ Blake said again, more softly this time, as though wary of severing the silence. ‘Here,’ he said. ‘Look.’ He sat down. ‘I’m cooperating. Okay?’
The inspector, at Leo’s side now, folded his arms.
‘But I’m not gonna say anything till we’re alone. Till you guarantee me nothing’s being recorded.’ Blake pointed at Leo. ‘And Curtice here,’ he said to Mathers, ‘is a solicitor. Which means I’m covered. Right? Leo? I’m covered, right?’
Leo had no idea what logic was playing in the man’s head. ‘Right,’ he said.
Mathers looked across the room towards his colleague. He considered Blake, then Leo, seated at the table. Then, with a grimace, he gestured for his junior to follow him out.
‘Hey,’ said Blake and the inspector, in the doorway, paused. Blake glanced warily at Leo. ‘Don’t go too far,’ he said.
‘Blake.’
Daniel’s stepfather had slid from his chair the moment the policemen had left the room. He bent, gathered his cigarette packet, and bore the remains back to the table.
