Cold Justice (Willis/Carter #4)(56)

‘I’m looking at all the cameras on that exit and along the motorway, seeing where they go. I’ll let you know as soon as I have it.’

‘Sorry, I have to take this,’ Willis interrupted as she looked at her phone and the name on the screen. ‘Hello, Lauren? Everything all right?’

‘Ebony, can you come back now? I’ve just seen the woman who was outside our flat in London.’

‘On my way.’

‘Just one more thing,’ said Robbo. ‘Before anyone else arrived, a yellow Fiat registered to Mawgan Stokes came in for petrol at Gordano. That was at seven thirty. The footage shows that while Mawgan goes in to pay for petrol, Kensa is opening the boot. We don’t see any more.’





Chapter 26


Jeanie rang the buzzer and waited. Toby Forbes-Wright came to the door. His breath smelled of stale wine, he was a mess. She noticed that he had on the same clothes as the day before. It was nine thirty. When Jeanie followed him into the lounge she knew he’d slept in there. The room was rank and stale. There was a blanket on the sofa.

‘You need to make sure you get a good night’s sleep, Toby.’

Jeanie followed him into the kitchen and filled up the kettle. She started washing up the dishes and stacked the empty wine bottles in a carrier bag to take out with her when she left. She heard the sound of him crying as she turned off the taps and finished washing the dishes.

She gave him a hug and he held on tightly to her. He didn’t want to let go. Jeanie patted his back as if he were a child while he sobbed. When he seemed to be drawing breath she pulled away. She’d seen it before – how sometimes such sorrow was confused with the need for sex. It was comfort.

‘I need to talk to you, Toby. We haven’t found Samuel but there have been some developments in Cornwall. I think it might be a good idea if you and I decamp and go down there. Lauren needs you.’

He started shaking his head before she’d even finished saying it.

‘No way. I feel safer here.’

‘Safer?’

‘Yes. Even walking back from Gareth’s was too much. I saw people staring at me. I can’t leave this flat again. I need you to bring me what I need to stay in here until it’s over.’

‘Toby, you’re under so much stress – I understand. But you need to remember the main thing here is finding Samuel alive.’

‘He’s dead. I feel it, I know it. He’s dead and it’s my fault. Lauren has left me and Gareth is making me feel hemmed in. I’ll have nothing left to live for soon. My dad will win in the end.’

‘Toby, listen to me. I’ve been doing this job a long time. I’ve seen all sorts of people react in all sorts of ways when they are in the middle of a crisis. I’ve lost count of the number of people who’ve said what you just said to me, and they didn’t want to face anything, but they did face it and they did come out of it. You have to help me, help Lauren. You have to help Samuel.’ He didn’t answer. ‘Go and have a shower and get some clean clothes on while I tidy up and make some scrambled egg for you. We’ll sit down together and we’ll make a plan.’

Toby shuffled off – he came back finished: showered and wearing a fresh T-shirt and clean tracksuit bottoms.

‘Better?’ Jeanie asked him as she placed some breakfast on the kitchen table for him.

‘I can’t eat anything. I overdid it last night.’

‘That’s the very cure for a hangover – scrambled egg, it soaks up the alcohol. Orange juice.’

He sat at the table and she handed him the juice.

He ate in silence while she tidied the kitchen. When she’d finished she suggested they had coffee and she sat down across from him at the table.

‘Toby, do you know a man named Raymonds? Do you remember him at all?’

Toby’s face had a little more colour than when Jeanie had first arrived that morning but he looked mottled and puffy with the hangover. He was sweating. He blinked nervously as he gave a small nod of the head.

‘What do you know of him?’

‘It was a long time ago in the house in Cornwall. The last time I ever went there. I was seeing this local girl called Kensa. There was a party on the beach and it got out of hand. A few of us went back to the house; my dad wasn’t going to be coming back that night. We thought we’d just chill out, raid the drinks cabinet. I knew it was risky when I said it. I told you, my dad and I didn’t have a relationship. I don’t know why he even took me to Cornwall that summer. He usually palmed me off on other people while he took his girlfriends.

‘I was in love with Kensa. We’d never done more than kiss. I wasn’t ready. Kensa was so brittle. She seemed so sad. I don’t know what went wrong that evening, I don’t know what I did to her but I woke up in the police station. I’ve tried so hard to remember things but there are large gaps.’

‘What had happened on the beach?’

‘Five of us hung round together. Me and Kensa, Ella Simmons, who was best friends with Mawgan Stokes, and Cam Simmons, Ella’s brother. It was a massive party, it was such a warm evening. Everything was just perfect and then it all seemed to go wrong. Locals came to cause trouble. They started fights. It was Marky Raymonds’ eighteenth. He was really aggressive. They’d been taking stuff. They were all off their faces.’