‘Mum, I have to go up to my office on urgent business so please don’t come in. I’ll be making important calls about my case and don’t want to be interrupted.’
‘OK, dear. Do you want a coffee?’
‘No thanks, I made one earlier. Hope you have a good day. Hannah, you are a very good girl and daddy loves you. This weekend we’re going to have some special time together.’
She waved her spoon at his head, then threw it across the room.
‘You have remembered that I need you or Maggie to stay at home with Hannah on Friday, for my bingo session?’ Penny asked as she selected some biscuits.
Jack paused at the door, wiping a milky cornflake off his jacket. He knew he should say something in the light of what Maggie had told him last night, but he couldn’t keep Ridley waiting.
‘OK... I’ll organise it. Is everything alright with you, Mum?’
‘Yes, why wouldn’t it be?’
‘Er, no reason — I’ve got to go.’
He legged it up the stairs two at a time, went into his office and closed the door. Ridley was standing with his back to him, looking out of the window. He had a woollen hat on.
‘You were very terse this morning,’ Ridley said quietly.
‘Terse? Jesus Christ, do you have any idea how much running around I have been doing on your behalf?’ Jack countered.
He sat down at his desk and swivelled around to face Ridley.
‘The first thing you should know is that you were not the target; you were for protection. The woman you knew as Sandra Raynor, aka Lorna Elliot, knew who you were and just needed it to look like she was in with the law. I think it was a pure coincidence that as a young, uniformed officer you had been part of the hunt for Anton Lord. I believe she was hunting down the men she felt were responsible for his disappearance, and probably his murder.’
Ridley sighed, perching himself on the edge of his desk. He was unshaven and looked very gaunt, his eyes red-rimmed.
‘I know that now. Let me show you something.’
Ridley unzipped his hoodie and took out a manila envelope. He slowly withdrew a photograph and passed it to Jack.
‘Recognise her?’
Jack took a few moments, unable to draw his eyes away from the horror.
‘Dear God, it’s hard to recognise her after what has been done to her face. But, yes, I know who she is.’
‘Her name is Daniella Foster.’
‘I just bloody said I knew who she was. She also had a date with you, and she also knew who you were; she recommended Lorna joined the dating agency, specifically to get to you, as she wanted protection but didn’t trust going to the police. Maybe she felt they had let her down with their poor investigation into her lover’s murder. Mrs Foster said she seemed very anxious and scared...’
‘Her body was found last night. Her cottage had been ransacked and she was presumably beaten to find out where Lorna Elliot had been staying.’
Jack frowned, then held up his hands. ‘Wait a minute. You don’t think that I had anything to do with her death, for God’s sake?’
‘Of course, I don’t, but I know you were there. I also know you visited Mrs Foster’s London flat in Pimlico.’
Jack shook his head. He could hardly believe what he was hearing. It felt as if everything he had been doing was a waste of his time. Ridley pulled out a second photograph and passed it to him.
‘This was reported early this morning. As you can see, the flat was ransacked — after you had been there, fortunately.’
Jack looked at the photograph and passed it back. He lifted up the briefcase and the envelope with the two computer sticks.
‘I found these, and that’s her laptop and her handbag. From her passport you can see she had been travelling back and forth to Moscow and to Monaco. You can take it all, because to be honest, I have had it up to here.’
Ridley held his hands up. ‘Jack, please let me try to explain. Because of your diligence you have been able to uncover these connections, whilst I had to be held under house arrest. But now...’ He took a deep breath.
‘But now what?’
‘I am truly grateful for everything you have done to date. This is now being handed over to the National Crime Agency because we believe that Lorna had uncovered a massive fraud and laundering facility in Russia, possibly being run by the men who killed Anton Lord. The FBI will also be investigating. Due to what has been going on in Ukraine and the mega-rich henchmen around Putin, it is a very complicated situation.’
‘I bet it is. So what about this man she refers to a few times, someone who lived in Monaco? I looked at all the information on the memory sticks, but I have no idea what it all means.’
‘I don’t know either,’ Ridley admitted. ‘It is possible she recognised someone living in Monaco and started to investigate. Lorna was clearly a very clever woman, and never gave up the hunt for whoever killed Anton, but at the same time she began to uncover further large-scale fraud and money laundering involving people connected to Putin. So, although she only intended to find Anton Lord’s killers, she ended up discovering a lot more.’
Jack swivelled in his desk chair, then pointed to the laptop.
‘She obviously never got over him as she used his name as a password.’
Ridley leant over and was about to close the laptop when Jack stopped him.
‘I just want to have a proper look at what’s on it. What made some bastard beat that poor soul to death? It must be explosive stuff.’
Ridley leant forward again and snapped the laptop shut.
‘I am taking this, Jack, and I don’t want you to get any more involved. I mean it. I am also going to take your car.’
‘What?’
‘It’s for your protection. I have had a tracker on it; that’s how I knew where you’d been.’
‘You had a tracker on me? When did you organise that? When I was parked in that bloody John Lewis car park?’
Jack got to his feet, intending to punch Ridley out, he was so angry. He then stepped back and lowered his hands to his sides. ‘You’ve lied to me from day one, used me like a puppet on a string, and I want some explanation. I trusted you, Goddammit. Jesus Christ, I’ve worked my arse off and now that poor woman is dead because of you, because of me doing your dirty work and you putting a tracker in my car. They must have fucking hacked it — and I led them straight to her!’
‘You don’t understand,’ Ridley said. ‘I was looking out for you and now I can take over... and that means right now.’
Ridley picked up the open briefcase and began taking everything from Jack’s desk and dropping it into the case. He stuffed in the photo album, the envelope with the memory sticks, and lastly the laptop. He then held up the YSL clutch bag, flipping it open using the elegant gold clasp with the designer initials. He then opened a folded black shopping bag and placed everything inside.
‘How am I supposed to get around if you take my car?’ Jack complained.
Without hesitating, Ridley took out Lorna’s wallet, removed a wedge of £50 notes and handed them to him.
‘Use this until I can sort out your compensation.’
‘Compensation? What’s that supposed to mean?’
‘Your car will be taken to a wrecker’s yard and destroyed. I don’t want anything leading back to you — it’s just a precaution.’
Ridley had now packed everything into the large shopping bag and started to head towards the door. Jack moved quickly to stand in front of it.
‘A precaution? Just you wait one second... You and your so-called house arrest team have just been using me.’
Ridley took a deep breath. ‘Jack, I don’t think anyone else could have uncovered the information we have, or identified who Sandra Raynor really was...’