Discarded by M. Hunter (the reading list .txt) 📕

Cormack’s body? Where better to hide a body than in another man’s grave? Nobody would ever be any the wiser unless Jean-Claude Ribery was exhumed. Loose end tied up. The current vicar said that Saltzing retired under something of a cloud when the truth started to emerge about the St Francis Home. What do you think?’

‘I think we need to exhume the coffin and check,’ Rick pipes up affirmatively. ‘It will prove the theory and tie this Saltzing to the mess.’

Jack is shaking his head incredulously, but I speak first. ‘We can’t just dig up a coffin and look inside. There’s an impact on the family of the deceased, an impact on the local community, and we’d need a court order, I would imagine.’

‘Yes, yes, and yes,’ Jack echoes. ‘There isn’t any concrete evidence to suggest that Cormack Fitzpatrick is buried there. The flowers and the date on the photograph aren’t enough. I will ask my boss at the NCA what we’d need, but unless we find something tangible, that grave remains undisturbed.’

Chapter Thirty-One Then

Basingstoke, Hampshire

‘Stop worrying about it; you’ll be fine,’ Precious told her, squeezing her hand reassuringly. ‘And relax. On the first night you won’t have to… to do anything; you’re just there for show.’

Joanna exhaled slowly and tightened her jaw into a smile of encouragement that she wasn’t feeling.

‘Remember how nervous you were before your first photoshoot, and I told you it would all be fine, didn’t I? Wasn’t yer Auntie Precious, right?’ She chuckled to herself, as if tonight’s party was perfectly normal, and nothing to be feared. ‘This won’t be much different, other than Grey won’t be popping about with his telescopic lens.’

Joanna could still recall the pure terror she’d felt the first time Precious had taken her to the film studio. The barn had stunk of animal faeces, and the tiled floor of the sectioned-off studio had been cold to walk on. Precious had promised she’d hang around in the barn and escort Joanna back to the caravan when the shoot was over. Joanna had naively begged her not to go, but it had been too much and Precious had let her mask of empathy slip. The wide-eyed angry glare had revealed the beast that lay dormant beneath the surface, and although it had peered out several times in the eighteen months that had passed, Joanna now knew the signs, and how to tame the beast.

‘I don’t want no more talk about nerves,’ Precious continued, standing and heading into the kitchen area, removing a bottle of wine from the shopping bag on the table and carrying it back to the table. ‘Now, I want you to pour us both a large glass of this to settle any remaining anxiety while I go and find us something pretty and sparkly to wear.’ She paused, running her fingers through Joanna’s hair. ‘Yer so lucky to have such long, smooth hair. It takes me hours to comb mine into anything nearly as straight as this. Hey, I know, why don’t we both wear wigs tonight? I can be blonde for once, and you can be…’

‘Violet,’ Joanna blurted, picturing the exact hairpiece she’d seen in Precious’s room when she’d been rifling through the drawers last week.

The excited grin and bounce in Precious’s step as she headed towards the bedroom confirmed she concurred with the selection. ‘We should dress first,’ she called back over her shoulder, ‘and fit the hair right before Grey comes calling for us.’

Joanna shuddered at mention of his name. Although he’d never laid a hand on her, she now recognised that lustful look in his eyes when he lowered the camera when he didn’t think she was looking. The fact that she was only eleven didn’t seem to matter to him.

‘You’ve no idea how beautiful you are, Kylie,’ he said yesterday, running his index finger the length of her arm.

They both knew he wasn’t allowed to do anything about his lust – Mr Brown would be livid – but Grey had made his intentions clear. If she was prepared to keep quiet, he was ready to make his move. He enjoyed reminding her that she still owed him for sparing her life that night in the woods.

She shuddered again, and brushed his imagined finger from her shoulder, like a scurrying spider. She’d never asked what happened to all the photographs he took – where they ended up; who’d requested them in the first place – and she knew better than to ask Precious and wake the beast within. But the question remained near the surface of her mind. She knew they weren’t just for Grey’s own gratification, though she was certain he enjoyed the experience more than he was probably supposed to.

Tonight’s party had been Precious’s idea too.

‘Parties are where the big money’s at, Kylie,’ she’d told her two nights ago. ‘You want to earn some serious cash? That’s how.’

That was the only reason Joanna had agreed to tag along tonight. All she knew was that Grey would collect them from the caravan at seven and drive them to wherever the party was being held. The exact location was only known to Grey, as far as Joanna knew, but what did it matter where it was? They wouldn’t be left alone long enough to disappear, so it could be in the far reaches of Timbuktu and it wouldn’t matter.

Precious hadn’t said how much she would earn for just attending, but if it was more than the ten pounds she earned per photoshoot then it would help supplement the secret stash she’d been building for close to a year. A pound here, two pounds there – not a lot, but small enough amounts that Precious wouldn’t notice. She hadn’t discussed her plan with Precious – the beast wouldn’t like it – but if she could squirrel away enough cash, she would be able to make a break for it, and maybe get far enough away that Grey and Mr Brown would simply