Blood Guilt (26 page)

“We found him too. Or
rather, we heard him kicking and shouting from the boot of your car. He’s in
hospital as well.” Jim’s lips thinned into a smile, although his eyes were
troubled. “You crazy bastard. Do you have any idea of the shit storm you’ve
brought down on me and the whole department?”

Harlan couldn’t have
cared less about that. There was only one thing he really cared about right
then. “Have you found Ethan?”

“Not yet. We’re still
searching the caves. Apparently there’s mile after mile of them underneath the
woods.”

“What about bodies?
Have you found any more besides the one in the first cave?”

“So you saw that, did
you?”

Harlan gave a slight
nod.

A cleft appeared
between Jim’s eyebrows. “Pretty fucking gruesome, eh. Why the hell would he
keep it there?”

“I guess he got some
kind of kick out of it.”

“Yeah, that’s what our
psychologists said, except they used the word necrophilia.” The cleft deepened.
“You know me, Harlan. I’ve seen plenty in my time. Nothing much gets to me, but
this…I just can’t seem to wrap my head around it.” Jim heaved a sigh. “Anyway,
the answer to your question is no. But if there are any more down there the
dogs will sniff them out.” 

“What do you know about
the body?”

“Forensics are still
working on that. All I can tell you right now is it’s a male, aged eight or
nine, and he’s been dead for a good few years.”

“And what about the
Prophet?”

“Who?”

“The Prophet. That’s
Jones’s nickname for the fucker who knifed me. Is he talking?”

“Richard Nash. That’s
his actual name. He’s a real case. A forty-year old Geordie serial sex offender
with a drug habit.”

“What kind of drugs?”

“Whatever he can get
his hands on – speed, coke, heroin, prescription drugs. And no, he’s not
talking. In fact, he’s not said a fucking word since we brought him in. We’re
working on the bastard day and night.”

“What does his
rap-sheet look like?”

“Like every parent’s
worst nightmare. It starts when he was just a kid himself. Only days before his
sixteenth birthday, he lured an eight-year old boy out of a garden in Newcastle
with the promise of ice-cream. The boy was later found semi-conscious on a
nearby disused railway line. There was bruising on his throat and traces of
semen on his clothing. Nash had strangled him half to death and masturbated
over him. Several people had seen Nash walking with the boy, so he was soon
identified and arrested. He was charged with ABH and indecent assault. But some
idiot judge swallowed a psychiatrist’s opinion that the assault was out of
character and reduced the charges to lewd conduct.”

“Lewd conduct,” Harlan
said incredulously. “Why not just give him a slap on the wrist and send him on
his way?”

“That’s pretty much
what happened. Nash was given a two-year suspended borstal sentence. As soon as
it was over, he headed south to London and got a job as a labourer. He found
lodgings with a family with three children, one of whom was a nine-year old
boy. You don’t have to be a genius to work out what happened next. When the
boy’s parents learned that Nash was molesting him, they called the police. And
when Nash’s room was searched, they found a huge stash of child pornography
magazines, videos and photos he’d taken himself. Turns out Nash liked nothing
better than to go to Brighton on his days off and covertly photograph kids on
the beach. This time he was sent down. He did a two-year stretch.”

Harlan’s lips curled in
disgust. “Two fucking years.”

“I know. It’s a joke.
But it was enough to teach him to be cautious. After he got out, he worked as a
jobbing handyman, and managed to stay off our radar for a good few years. Then,
in 2001, a woman whose house he was working on caught him stealing jewellery.
The police searched his digs. They turned up a small amount of cocaine and a
boxful of toys.”

“Jones said Nash sold
toys on the streets.”

Jim shook his head.
“These were used toys. The woman identified several of them as belonging to her
kids.” His voice grew thick with import. “Get this, Nash admitted he’d been
stealing from the bedrooms of children at houses where he worked. He was always
careful only to take things that would’ve been assumed to be lost rather than
stolen – teddy bears, toy soldiers and cars, things like that. But it’s pretty
obvious now that he was working up the nerve to take not merely toys, but the
kids they belonged to as well.”

“Let me guess, he
wasn’t charged.”

“He got a small fine
for possession. But his business was ruined, so he was forced to head south
again. This time he didn’t make it as far as London. He stayed with a relative
in Birmingham. That’s when he met his first girlfriend.”

“Mary Webster?”

“No, but I’ll get to
her in a minute. Her name was Coralee Edmunds. She gave him bed and board in
return for working on her house, and they started sleeping together. They’d
only been together four or five months when she found child porn on his
computer. She called the police, and Nash ended up with a ten month jail
sentence. He served just over half of it.”

“Another joke. Nash
must’ve been laughing.”

“Apparently not. A
psychiatric report prepared for his parole hearing says he was suicidal with
remorse.”

“Remorse!” Contempt
hissed through Harlan’s voice. “Remorse that he’d been caught, not for what he
did.”

Nodding agreement, Jim
continued, “On his release, Nash stayed in an offender’s hostel in our own fair
city for a while. After that our knowledge of his movements becomes hazy. He
seems to have travelled around a lot, doing odd-jobs, often sleeping in
homeless shelters. We also know now that he became acquainted with William
Jones around this time. According to Jones, they met up several times over the
course of a couple of years to talk about photography and exchange photos.”

“They exchanged a lot
more than just photos,” said Harlan. “Jones is in this right up to his fat
neck. You know that some guy other than Nash went to the caravan and painted
Jamie.”

“Yes, but Jamie never
saw his face.”

“So fucking what? It
was Jones. You know that as well as I do.”

“It doesn’t matter what
I know, or think I know. If Jamie can’t ID Jones and Nash won’t give him up, we
need physical evidence to tie him to the crime. And as of now we’ve got nothing
– no fingerprints, no hair, no semen, no saliva.”

“What about the
painting?”

“We’re searching
Jones’s house for that.” Jim looked meaningfully at Harlan. “But it seems
somebody’s destroyed all his paintings.”

“There was no painting
of Jamie there. I’m sure of it. It must be somewhere else.”

“Obviously, but where?”

Harlan was silent, eyes
narrowed, thinking that five minutes alone with Jones would be enough for him
to find out.

“Whatever you’re
thinking, don’t,” said Jim, reading him. “You’re in deep enough shit already.
Trust me, we’re not gonna let the fucker off the hook.”

“I hope not. I really
fucking hope not.” Harlan’s voice cracked dryly. He took a sip of water. “So
tell me the rest of Nash’s story.”

“There’s not much left
to tell. After Jones was banged up, Nash dropped off the radar again. We’re
filling in the gap between those years, 2005 and the present.” 

“I’m guessing this is
where Mary Webster comes into the story.”

Jim nodded. “Mary
Webster’s an eighty-three year old spinster, all but bedridden with arthritis.
From what she’s told us, Nash has been her carer since late 2007.”

“Her carer? What the
hell does a guy like Nash know about caring for anybody but himself?”

“According to Miss
Webster, he’s the kindest, gentlest person she’s ever met.”

Harlan let out another
hiss of breath. “Has she been told what he’s done?”

“Yes, but she won’t
have a word of it. You know what these old women are like, deaf to everything
but what they want to hear. You can’t blame her, really. She’s got no family.
Lives in a big wreck of a house. Without Nash, she’ll more than likely have to
go into a care home.”

“How did Nash get to be
her carer in the first place?” 

“He came knocking on her
door, offering to do some repairs. They got chatting and he told her he needed
a place to live. She took him in, and he’s been there ever since.”

“Have you found
anything at her house?”

“The transit van was in
the garage. It’d been washed inside and out. Apart from that, we’ve found
nothing. If there was anything, Nash most probably got rid of it after Jamie
escaped.”

That was pretty much
the answer Harlan had expected. After all, Nash had been in the process of
getting rid of evidence when he’d pounced on him. He closed his eyes
momentarily, thought about Ethan, and sighed. “Has Susan Reed been told what’s
happened?”

“She’s been told what
she needs to know – that we have a man in custody who we think was almost
certainly involved in her son’s abduction.”

“How’s she holding up?”

“Not too well, by all
accounts.”

Again, this was what
Harlan had expected to hear. Neil had been Susan’s support, her strength.
Without him, she had no one to lean on. A pain that no amount of drugs could
numb washed through Harlan as he pictured her waiting alone to hear news of
Ethan. “I take it you got nothing from him.”

“Who?”

“Neil Price.”

Jim shook his head.
“The only thing that guy’s guilty of is being terminally naïve. We released him
yesterday. Guess what the stupid little prick did.”

“Tried to see Susan.”

“Got it in one. He
showed up at her house, pleading for forgiveness. She called us and we slung
him straight back in the cells. Apparently he was sobbing like a baby.” Jim
shook his head. “You’ve got to feel sorry for him.”

Harlan didn’t feel
sorry for Neil. But he sympathised with him. The guy had made a mistake. Now he
was desperate for a chance to make amends. Harlan knew all about that. “You
were right, you are going soft in your old age.”

Smiling, Jim patted
Harlan’s shoulder. “I’d better get back to it. I’ll see you later.”

“Is that it?” said
Harlan, as Jim stood to leave. “Don’t you want a statement from me?”

“We don’t need to do
that right now. The doctor tells me you’re going to be in here a few more days
at least.”

Harlan’s eyebrows
lifted. “What’s going on, Jim? I thought Garrett would be jumping all over the
chance to bury me.”

“I’m sure he would be
if it was up to him, but things have changed.”

“Changed how?”

“Like I said, you’ve
brought a shit storm down on the whole department. Garrett got a phone call
this morning. Rumour has it it was from some Home Office bigwig. Whoever it
was, they made a big impression on Garrett. When he hung up, his face was white
as an old turd. Without a word to any of us, he stormed out the office and
drove off. I found out later that he went to see Jones. He was in with him
alone for over an hour.”

Harlan frowned with
realisation. “Garrett’s been ordered to hush up my involvement.”

“What else can it be?”

“But why?” There was no
hint of relief in Harlan’s voice, just curiosity. 

A touch of wryness
pulled down the corners of Jim’s lips. “It’s always the same with you Harlan.
You see everything but yourself. Think about it. Who you are, what you’ve done,
it scares the shit out of the politicians. They must know that if this gets
out, the public will see you the same way most of us in the department do.”

“And how’s that
exactly?”

“A hero.”

“A
hero
?”
Harlan’s mouth twisted on the word. He almost laughed. “The last thing I am is
a fucking hero.”

“Maybe, but most of
them don’t know you like I do. They don’t know what a suicidal nut job you
really are.” The wryness left Jim’s face. “All they know is you risked your
life to save that boy’s.”

“And beat a man half to
death in the process.”

“A convicted paedophile
who’d been questioned and released. Just imagine the fallout if you were jailed
for succeeding where we’d failed. Garrett’s future job prospects wouldn’t be
worth shit.”

“I might’ve killed
Jones. Nash too.”

“But you didn’t.” 

Harlan’s eyes dropped
away from Jim’s. His voice dropped too. “No, but I wanted to.”

Jim stared down at
Harlan a moment, a slight frown over his jaded cop’s eyes. Then he spoke in a
husky but gentle tone. “Get some rest. Heal that wound.”

“Anyway, I didn’t
succeed,” murmured Harlan. “Ethan’s still missing.”

“Not for much longer.
I’m going to crack that bastard Nash wide open. Believe me, by the time I’m
finished with him he’ll be spilling like a broken egg. And think on this,
Harlan: Nash kept Jamie Sutton alive for over four months. Ethan’s been missing
half that time.”