M. Arlidge - Little Boy Blue

‘Thank you,’ Helen replied quickly. ‘Run down a list of forthcoming meets and then let’s discuss which ones to target.’

‘I’ll have it for you within the hour.’

‘Good.’

Helen paused, her ordeal nearly over, then said:

‘I don’t need to tell you how much coverage this murder is likely to get. So no talking out of school, no short cuts and any leads come straight to me. We do not rest until we have found Jake Elder’s killer, understood?’

The look on the faces of the team showed that they had got the message and they now hurried off to do her bidding. Helen was aware that her tone had been a little harsh, but she was not prepared to soft-soap anyone while they still lacked any tangible leads. The investigation was starting to take shape now – the victim identified, multiple strands of enquiry set in motion – but there was one key element of this killing that remained as impenetrable and mysterious as ever.

The motive.

He was rooted to the spot. He knew it was coming, but even so it was a shock. The newscaster was only relaying information that had been buzzing around internet chat rooms for hours, but hearing it relayed in her professional monotone was still disquieting.

Nobody else in the office seemed to be paying attention to the radio bulletin, but he drank in every word: ‘A popular S &M club… appealing for witnesses… the victim has not yet been formally identified.’ He knew the victim’s name of course, but did the police too? Was their ‘failure’ to identify him just a smokescreen as they pursued their enquiries or were they genuinely in the dark? He suddenly realized how much he needed to know.

He had been careful to conceal their connection, but who knew what they were able to access these days? Terrorism had a lot to answer for, providing the police with the perfect excuse to snoop on everything and everyone. He had never used the computer at home and had never contacted Jake via direct text, but even so he suddenly had the unnerving feeling that he hadn’t been careful enough.

The newscaster had moved on to local traffic and travel, but still he didn’t move. Things seemed to be moving fast now and he was suddenly aware of how much he had to lose. Would they suspect him? Or would his middle-class exterior and respectable job shield him from suspicion? He was too far into this, too stained by his actions, for this to unravel. There were two sides to him – but they were known only to him – and that was the way it had to stay.

He was so deep in thought that at first he didn’t notice his PA marching across the room towards him. He might have remained there for hours were it not for her sudden intrusion.

‘Your ten o’clock is here,’ she said testily.

He didn’t respond, didn’t trust himself to. Instead, he gathered up his files, nodded at her and walked purposefully away towards the meeting room.

The silence in the room was suffocating. Helen had given Moira and Mike Elder the basic facts of their son’s death, avoiding the more distressing details. She’d shouldered this unpleasant duty many times before and knew that if you hit people with too much too soon, you lose them. Assaulted by the shock, bowing under their grief, the bereaved just implode. It wasn’t fair to treat them like that and, besides, it served nobody’s purpose – she needed facts, not tears.

But, to Helen’s surprise, Jake’s parents had barely reacted at all to her carefully chosen words. Moira had shot a brief look at her husband, then joined him in staring at the floor. Their gaze remained doggedly turned in that direction and, though Helen provided a few gentle prompts, the couple stayed resolutely silent.

‘We have a full team working on this. As I said, your son was discovered at a nightclub in Banister Park and, once you’ve formally identified him, we can make arrangements for you to visit it, if you feel that would be helpful. Relatives sometimes find that it’s important to see the place where -’

‘What sort of club was it?’

Mike Elder’s voice was cracked and harsh. For a moment Helen wondered if it was a trick question – the news was already out there in radio bulletins and on the internet – then pushed that thought aside. They had probably driven all the way from Taunton in silence, their minds trying to grapple with their unexpected tragedy. It was no surprise that they were still processing the details.

‘It was an S &M club,’ Helen replied gently. There was no point dressing it up – they’d find out soon enough anyway.

Mike sniffed loudly, while his wife fiddled with the buttons on her cardigan.

‘It wasn’t a club he visited regularly, just somewhere he used now and then.’

‘I bet he did.’

Now it was Helen’s turn to be silent. Four words – four simple words – but they were said with such bitterness that for a moment Helen was speechless. She had encountered many emotions in the relatives’ room – despair, denial, fury – but she had seldom seen such distaste. She felt anger flare in her but, aware that the eyes of the Family Liaison Officer were on her, swallowed it down.

‘Can I ask you what you mean by that, Mike?’ she said.

‘I’m sure by now you know what my son was’ was the curt reply.

‘Obviously we’re aware that Jake worked as a professional dominator. That’s one of our main lines of enquiry, to see if he might have been attacked by someone he knew through his work.’

‘His work,’ Mike repeated, shaking his head ruefully, before casting a sardonic smile at his wife.

‘Can you tell me how much you knew about Jake’s professional life?’ Helen continued.

‘Too bloody much, but nothing that would help you.’

Helen was beginning to see why Jake had never got on with his parents, but resumed her questioning as patiently as she could.

‘His life in Southampton, then? Did you ever visit his flat? Meet up with him?’

‘This is our first visit to Southampton.’

Finally, Moira had spoken.

‘He moved away from Somerset when he was a young man. He threatened to come back and visit us, but… but he never made it.’

Was the use of the word ‘threatened’ deliberate? Helen was so bewildered by this interview that she couldn’t tell.

‘And you weren’t tempted to visit him here?’

‘It’s a long way to come and we can’t leave the animals,’ Moira replied quickly, trotting out her excuse with practised ease.

‘I see.’

‘Do you?’ Mike Elder now said, suddenly turning to look directly at Helen. ‘I can tell from your tone what you’re thinking, but you’ve got no right to look down your nose at us.’

Helen stared back, refusing to break eye contact. He was right, however – Helen was allowing her feelings to affect her judgement and was behaving in a manner that was unprofessional and unkind.

‘I’ve nothing but sympathy for you and your wife, believe me,’ she said quickly.

‘That may be, but it doesn’t change things. You might feel our son’s “lifestyle” was acceptable, but we didn’t. I don’t blame the boy entirely – we should have been tougher on him when he was small,’ he resumed, his wife flinching slightly as that barb landed. ‘But he made his choices and had to live by them. He was never interested in my opinion, but, for the avoidance of doubt, I’ll give it to you anyway. I thought what he did… was perverted. For the life of me, I could never understand why he wanted to surround himself with degenerates and freaks – he could never explain it himself, just said it was “who he was”. He thought we should accept him, but why should we accept something like that? He chose his path, we chose ours and, believe you me, they never met.’