Past Due (11 page)

Peter became flustered. “How dare-”

“
The council runs regular sex discrimination seminars, Mr Barron. I’ll expect to see you signed up for the next one, okay?”

He didn’t know what to answer to that. His mouth opened and closed a few times and finally he nodded.

Frankie waited until they were in the car park again before she burst out laughing. “Okay, I officially owe you one. That was priceless.”

Will smiled.

“
But, if you ever ride to my rescue again, I’ll kick your arse, okay?”

“
I wasn’t riding to your rescue,” he corrected. “I was riding to his. I remember what you did to David Smith.”

“
He felt me up! What was I supposed to do?”

“
Well not breaking his arm would have been a start.”

“
Ah, but then you would never have been called to the scene and I’d never have met you.”

Will shook his head. “You are something else, Frankie.”

“
A good something, or a bad something?”

“
Good… mostly.”

Frankie tried to look unimpressed as she elbowed him in the ribs. “We taking my car?”

“
Sure. You got secret spy stuff in there? Missiles behind the headlights, an oil spray in the back, ejector seats?”

“
Uh, does a five year old SatNav count?”

He shook his head sadly. “This is going to be such a disappointment.”

Liz Garret lived in a small semi-detached house about a mile from the school. It was modest in size but immaculately kept. Frankie was willing to bet that in the summer the small front garden was a riot of colour.

Considering she was retired, Frankie had been expecting someone in their fifties at least but the woman who opened the door was probably not even 40.

“
Liz Garrett?”

“
Yes?”

Frankie introduced herself and Will and Liz ushered them into the house. Like the outside, it was immaculate. In the hallway there was a folded wheelchair and an oxygen tank but they were the only signs that someone here was ill. Frankie wondered how this woman managed the stairs with her sick husband.

Frankie felt as if she was back in her mother’s house, afraid to move in case she disturbed anything. She thought this woman might have developed a touch of Obsessive Compulsive Disorder as a coping mechanism.

Frankie explained why they were there and showed her the sketch of Bradley.

“
Oh yes, I remember him. Very bright boy that one but completely unwilling to apply himself. I think he scraped through his GCSEs with C grades without studying but he could easily have got all A grades with a little effort. It’s a real shame when they don’t use what they’ve got. Then you have the ones who work their socks off but you know they’ll never be any better than mediocre. It's such a shame.”

“
Do you happen to remember if Bradley had any friends?”

“
Friends…” she mused. “Not really, not good friends, but sometimes I’d see him with the twins.”

“
Do you remember their names?”

“
Sam Smith and Billy Bennett.” She smiled at their confused faces. “Twins was a nickname they earned.”

“
Because they looked so alike?”

“
Because they looked so different. Sam was tall, dark, athletic. Billy was fair, a foot shorter and skinny. You’d never expect them to be friends unless they were related; I assume the nickname twins sprung from there.”

“
Do you happen to remember if they had any hangouts outside of school?”

Liz shook her head. “No, I’m sorry. I heard Bradley’s parents died: I felt awful for the boy, he’d not long left school and to lose both parents so suddenly… it's an awful thing.”

“
Yes. Well, thank you for your time.”

Back in the car Frankie pulled her laptop out and searched an online phone directory for S. Smith. Not surprisingly there were quite a few.

“
We’ll need to go back to my house to do a proper search.” She told Will.

“
You can’t do it from there? Haven’t you heard of wireless?”

“
We've heard of it, we just don’t use it unless we have to. Anything sent wirelessly can be intercepted and all encryption can be broken eventually.”

Will was about to call her paranoid but she actually had a point. Then when he saw how much security she had at her home, he began to wonder if she actually was paranoid.

By the time they got to her house it was nearly 1pm so Frankie input the search parameters, name, age and hair colour into her computer and left it running.

“
I have to make a private call; stay here,” she ordered.

She went into the kitchen and dialled Alex.

His rich, warm voice sent shivers down her spine. “Frankie, how are you?”

“
Hi Alex. I’m fine, but I can’t really talk right now. I just wanted to ask if you kept a database of addresses for your customers, like a loyalty scheme or something.”

“
No addresses but we do keep an email database for promotions.”

Frankie smiled. “You’re seven hundred years old and have an email database yet my mother is sixty two and I’ve been trying for the last five years to teach her to use email.”

“
Maybe she needs a better teacher,” he teased.

“
Huh! Cheeky bastard.”

“
So you think Brad is on this list?”

“
Probably not but it’s worth a look.”

“
We don’t keep names, just emails, so I’ll look for a variation on his name for you.”

“
Thanks. Get back to me if you find anything.” She checked behind her to make sure Will hadn't come into the kitchen. “Alex,” she whispered, “if he has been changed, is there any way you can find his... sire? Is that the right word?”

“
Yes. There’s no database for that but I can ask around.”

“
Great. I’m trying to find old school friends like we spoke about. I’ll give you a call if I find anything.”

“
Will I see you tonight?”

“
I hope so. It’d be nice to have a few leads by then.”

“
We will crack this, Frankie.”

“
By tonight?”

Alex didn’t answer.

Frankie took a deep breath “I’d better get back to it. See you later.”

Will had crept closer to the living room door in the hope of hearing something. He hadn't caught a lot of that conversation but he’d heard enough to have his curiosity piqued.

First of all she was joking with this person, Alex. Much as he’d like to believe it was a woman he had a nasty feeling Alex was a man. Then something about him being older than her mother, very odd. And what was a sire? Were they talking about racehorses?

When he heard her end the call he slipped into the computer chair and looked up when she re-entered.

“
You have three results.” He told her.

There was only one William Bennett of the correct age so it was probably the right one. There were two Sam Smiths of the right age. One worked for RBS, the other was regional manager for Sainsbury’s.

“
We’ll find Billy first,” She checked the data. “He’s a self employed plumber.” She called his business phone number and his wife, Sally, told her he was installing a new boiler all day and gave them the address.

“
Okay. You hungry?”

Will nodded. “I could eat.”

“
Then let’s find a Subway then we’ll pay Billy Bennett a visit.

When she and Will got there he had finished the job and was cleaning up.

“
Sal told me you were coming,” he said, pulling his overalls off.

Frankie had expected her to call. The fact he didn’t run was a fairly good indication that he had nothing to hide.

“
So,” he turned to face them. “What can I do you for?”

“
We were told that you were friends with a Bradley James when he was at school.”

“
Brad? Yeah. Haven’t seen him for a few years now, though.”

“
When was the last time you saw him?”

Billy looked above their heads, off to the left, meaning most likely he was trying to remember, not construct a lie.

“
A few years ago now. I’d just started working for Jason and I stayed there for two years; been on my own for a year now, so about three years. Just ran into him in town. Didn’t recognise him immediately, he’d gone all gothic, black hair and eyeliner. Looked freaky. Anyway, we just said hello, said we were fine and went our separate ways.”

“
And you’ve had no contact since then?”

“
Nah. I thought about inviting him to my wedding but I couldn’t find an address for him.”

“
When you were in school together, did you or he have any places you liked to hang out?”

“
The park mainly.”

“
What about in the winter? Perhaps another friend's or relative's house, or a warehouse, garage, shed, anything like that.”

“
Mostly we’d go to my house. My parents were pretty cool about me having mates round. Brad’s parents weren’t… I think he was ashamed of them to be honest. Only other family he had was an aunt but I think she lived in London.”

Will spoke up. “Do you remember anywhere that he might use as a hideout? He might not have taken you there; perhaps he just mentioned it.”

“
There might have been something…” Billy leaned back against the sink, crossed his arms and frowned. It was clear from his expression he was trying to remember. It was a good minute until he spoke again. “Yeah, it was after the summer holiday, he said something about finding this cool place on the beach.”

“
Place?”

“
Yeah, he said it was a room, like a brick building but it was built into a hill or mound.”

“
Do you know which beach?” Frankie asked.

“
I didn’t ask and he didn’t tell, but I assumed it was by Silverknowles Golf Club - that was where we usually hung out when we went to the beach.”

“
Thank you for your time, Mr Bennett,” Frankie shook his hand. He was telling the truth. “Did you happen to stay in touch with Sam?”

“
Sammy? Sure, we’re in the same pool league.”

“
Do you know where we can find him?”

“
Right now?”

They both nodded.

“
He’d be at work. He works at the Royal Bank of Scotland branch on North West Circus Place.”

They said their goodbyes and Will and Frankie headed to the bank branch.

“
It’s kind of nice having company,” Frankie observed, although she could see herself soon getting tired of it. The first time they disagreed, for example.

“
I have to say I’m used to it, but it’s nice being with someone prettier than Mike McKay for a change.”

“
Aww, you’re such a charmer. How is your investigation coming?”

Will shook his head. “Slow. Your leads are the only real ones I’ve had.”

“
So that’s why you’ve attached yourself to me at the hip. You haven’t found anything?”

“
Lots. The SOCO guys say there’s fibres and prints all over the place but we’ve got nothing to match them to.”

“
So it’s either a chaotic killer or he knows he’s not in the system and doesn’t expect to be caught.”

“
Yep. So far he’s right.” He sighed.

“
Witnesses?”

“
None. I don’t want there to be another one, Frankie. I want to catch his guy.”

“
I know. But I really wish you wouldn’t.”

“
And I really wish you’d tell me what’s going on.”

“
I wish I could too.” Frankie parked up outside the bank and left a police sticker in the window.

Sam was seeing a client when they got to the bank and while Will wanted to charge in to the meeting, Frankie said they were happy to wait. It was at least an hour until sunset when Alex could come out and play. Frankie had the feeling she was going to need his help to ditch Will.

Alex had checked the email database for every variation of Bradley James he could think of but had come up empty. Of course he could be [email protected] or even King97@ yahoo.com but there was no way to tell.

When he was finished searching the database he called Joshua. At well over two thousand years old Josh was the oldest vampire Alex knew and he was very well connected. If anyone could find out who had changed Brad, it would be Josh. He answered on the first ring.

“
Alex, long time no see.”

“
Josh, how are you?”

“
I can’t complain. Life is good. That tip you gave me on Lycos by the way, I owe you one.”

Whilst vampires have trouble remaining calm if they’re together for too long, Alex had learned long ago that a vampire needed friends if he was to survive. The newborns often tried to prove themselves by taking on an old one like Alex or Josh. While both were stronger than a newborn, many vampires had been killed by surprise attacks and Alex had no intention of being among them.

Simple things like passing on overheard threats and sharing stock tips forged those bonds and meant you had favours to call in when you needed them.