Cold Blood by Jane Heafield (great books to read txt) 📕

‘You’re under arrest, Turner. That means game over with the monkey business.’

Turner laughed. He actually laughed. ‘You’re an idiot, detective. This won’t change what my people think. They’ll know we were only protecting them. And I’ll be going nowhere. Perverting the course of justice? Preventing the lawful burial of a dead body? And whatever other niche crimes you people come up with as safety nets in case people beat charges? They’re nothing. What, five years suspended for those charges? I won’t go to prison, and you won’t damage my power in this village. So, you fool, what exactly do you think you’ve achieved here?’

‘…our happy, blessed lives ruined in one fell swoop…’

59

Bennet parked by the woods overlooking Crabtree’s farmhouse. Every light in the building was on. Police and private cars clogged the area. Although the house had activity, primary interest was in the barrel-shaped corrugated metal structure a hundred metres beyond the farmhouse. The doors were open and the interior was floodlit. Inside and out was a throng of people, some in police uniform, others casually dressed, yet others in the plastic coveralls of crime-scene technicians. DCS Sutton had moved fast.

Bennet turned his phone on, called him and said, ‘I’m here.’ He flashed his lights.

‘I expected that. Meet me halfway,’ Sutton said, and hung up.

After arresting Richard Turner, Bennet had called Sutton and been sent a patrol car to collect the councillor. The superintendent had ordered Bennet to remain with the prisoner so he could also go to the station and provide a statement. But when officers arrived at the stable, they found Turner alone.

One of the plastic suits started walking towards him. Bennet strode down the incline. They met exactly halfway between the farmhouse and the woods.

‘I apologise for leaving Turner,’ Bennet said. ‘I’ll go to the station after this, if you like. I just wanted to see the scene.’

‘I can’t let you down there,’ Sutton said. Bennet nodded his understanding. ‘Good call about this place. Can’t promise it helps you much. You should have told me what you knew the moment you knew it.’

‘I know. Maybe I was worried you wouldn’t get a confession. Maybe I just wanted to hear it first. Maybe I was planning to hurt one of these people. I just don’t know why I acted this way. And I’ll take what’s coming because of it. Crabtree helpful?’

‘Oh yes. Eager to talk. We had to rush him to the station, he was that eager to start talking. And he showed us the burial site.’

‘And you’ve arrested the others on the recording?’

‘All but Lucas Turner. He wasn’t at home and we don’t know where he is. The others, the Keys as they call themselves, they were no problem. Awake and dressed and waiting for us. I think they were scared they’d get lynched by their own people. Because of that recording you played. That was quite a bizarre tactic, Mr Bennet. It could have been damaging to the case, except that so far everyone seems willing to accept their guilt. Time will tell. Why did you play it for the whole town?’

‘I tried to think of a good answer for you on the way here. I couldn’t find one. I can only put it down to a few days of having my head mixed up. With maybe a little bit of sticking it to Turner thrown in. You should have heard my original idea, before I knew about the audio recording. I thought about forcing Turner to call a village meeting. I’d get everyone in the town hall and have a sort of kangaroo court. Maybe build a wicker man to put the Keys in.’

Bennet grinned to show he was joking, but Sutton remained serious. ‘This became very personal to you. I’ve never been there, so I can’t judge. Your boss says you’re a very good detective and I believe him. So, like you say, this has been a glitch. Go home. We’ll worry about your statement tomorrow. Go back to your kid. I’ll keep you updated.’

Bennet hadn’t looked at Sutton throughout their conversation: his eyes were locked on the corrugated building. It wasn’t where Lorraine had died, but it might have been her final resting place. Somehow, that made it seem more horrifying than the ranch where she’d been slaughtered. But it was about more than that.

‘What have you found inside so far?’

‘Mound of tarpaulin he said was used to cover the motorhome. And there’s an area of churned soil we’re rooting through. That’s where the bodies lay. We’ve been finding all manner of items that had been in that motorhome.’

Now Bennet looked at the superintendent. ‘I need to know as soon as you do. Please. It’s my son’s mother.’

Sutton gave him a careful stare. ‘I know what’s concerning you, detective. But we don’t know anything for sure yet. We need to talk to all the others and we need to see what else we find at the crime scenes, and if anything changes once we can hammer away at Crabtree. At least that audio recording helps with the time frame. We know the film crew was at a local pub until just after 9pm on Sunday night, and the audio recording shows the bodies were found before 12.45 Monday morning. That gives us a time of death within just a few hours.’

Sutton had indeed fathomed Bennet’s worry. With the arrests made and evidence found and questions answered, light had been shed where there had been darkness and it all felt like a great leap forward. The surface of the mystery had been laid bare and it was too easy to get hypnotised by it, and ignore the black abyss at the core.

If the story they had was true, then a killer was still out there.

60

Since they couldn’t attend court on Friday because they’d been arrested late Thursday, Ronald Crabtree, Richard Turner and the rest of the Keys were due to appear at Southern Derbyshire Magistrates’