Imposition (DI Gardener 5)

“You never met him?” asked Reilly.

“No,” said Atkinson. “Not once. On the odd occasions I’ve been over to do a couple of small jobs there’s never been owt out of place.”

Gardener tipped his hat. “Well, thank you for your time. If we need anything else, we’ll be back.”

Out in the yard, people were still busy despite the cold. Gardener watched the women standing outside one of the stables busy talking to each other and their horses, feeding them all manner of fruits and vegetables.

“What do you think, Sean?”

“I’m not happy about the phantom accident.”

“Do you think Robbie was making it up?”

“Not sure,” replied Reilly. “Maybe she told him she had an accident to cover something else up.”

“In which case he’d be telling the truth, as far as he knew. But why lie to him?” Gardener asked. “She didn’t sound the type if you listen to what the Atkinsons say.”

“They weren’t married to her.”

“Fair point. I’m concerned about her finances. We need to jump on to that one as quickly as we can.”

“I wonder how much Robbie knows about them.”

&nbs

p; “How much she was really worth?”

“Money’s always a big motive.”

“Okay, Sean,” said Gardener. “Something to concentrate on in the incident room. Meanwhile, let’s have a talk with some of the staff.”

Chapter Seventeen

Ronald Critchley made himself a coffee before going back to the living room table. He sat down and opened his laptop. He needed to catch up on what had been happening in the outside world.

While the machine booted up, he glanced around. The place was old, big, a pig to heat, but he wasn’t there very often. At least it was clean and tidy.

Once the machine was up and running, he let the virus protector and the anti-malware do their stuff before setting to work, logging in to the dating site. It didn’t take him very long to catch up on the activity regarding his profile. He’d had fifteen views over the weekend, resulting in four winks, three of them adding him to their favourites. And one email he couldn’t wait to open.

“Oh yes,” said Critchley, rubbing his hands together. “You little beauty.”

He’d been after her for a while, and she’d finally taken the bait. Better than that, she’d actually sent him an email to see if he was interested in meeting up with her.

Was he?

Critchley thought she was stunning. She had uploaded more than one photo, so he checked them all out again. That had always made him laugh. There were women on here that actually expected to attract a man by leaving only one photo – some of them never even left that. How the hell did they think they were going to meet someone? Why would you join a dating website to go on a blind date?

But J was something else. No name, only an initial. He liked that. Added mystery to the game. She had the lot. Black shoulder-length hair, stylishly cut, beautiful blue eyes, wide mouth, white teeth. She had a figure to die for, dressed in the tightest black jeans he had ever seen, with a pale green low-cut top. Not too much make-up. Quite young. She was exactly the kind of girl that he went for.

Her profile said she was a professional in the fashion and beauty industry, earning north of fifty grand a year. He could certainly tell. She liked going out for meals in intimate surroundings; loved music and cinema. She exercised regularly. She had no animals or children. Smoking was a no-no. The tag line said she was “searching for that special man to spend the rest of her life with”. Could she be any better?

Every single photo was perfection. What he wouldn’t give for a taste of her. He’d played it cool from the beginning, nothing more than glancing at her photos twice a week, to start with. She had eventually taken notice of him, winked at him. He’d returned the gesture. She had logged in again, clicked the I’m interested tag.

Now he had an email. It would be rude not to reply. Critchley sniggered and cracked his knuckles.

“Well, well, well, J, welcome to the pleasure dome.”

Chapter Eighteen