Ben Cheetham - Blood Guilt

“Get in and I’ll tell you.”

Susan hesitated to do so, uneasy suspicion rippling over her face, her eyes flicking back and forth between Neil and Harlan, as though she was trying to work out if they were in some way in league together. With a slight shake of her head, she seemed to dismiss whatever she was thinking. She ducked into the backseat, but didn’t shut the door. Arms crossed, she waited to hear what Neil had to say. He stared at his lap, pale as a condemned man. His mouth opened and closed, but no words came out. “Tell her or I-” Harlan started to say.

“Okay, okay,” broke in Neil. With a tight breath, he lifted his gaze to meet Susan’s. Her thin lips grew thinner still, as he said, “There’s something about me I’ve been hiding from you. The thing is, Susie, I…erm…You know I said I was saving to buy a place of my own. Well I’m not. Not yet anyway. I am going to, but first I’ve got to pay off a debt. You see, I took out a loan from this guy, Gary Dawson.”

“How much?” Susan’s voice was calm, but an undercurrent of growing anger was perceptible.

“Only four thousand, but now I owe him nearly ten.”

“And do the police know about this?”

“No.”

“So you’ve lied to me and the police.”

“Yes, but only because there’s no need for them to know. This has got nothing to do with-”

Susan’s hand lashed out and Neil felt the same sting of her nails that Harlan had on more than one occasion. “Don’t say it,” she hissed. “Don’t you fuckin’ dare say my boy’s name.”

Tears spilled over Neil’s eyes. “But it’s the truth. Please, Susie, you’ve got to believe me.”

“How can I? If you’d told me about this right away after this all started, I might’ve been able to. But now…” Shaking her head, Susan repeated, “How can I?”

“Because I love you and I love Ethan and Kane.”

“If you really loved us, you’d have told the truth.”

“I was trying to protect you.”

“No!” Susan stabbed an accusatory finger at Neil. “You lied to protect your own pathetic hide. Remember what Detective Greenwood said — he said, somebody out there’s holding that vital piece of information that’s needed to solve the case, and they might not even realise it. So we need to know everything you know, no matter how insignificant you think it is. Do you remember that, Neil?”

Neil nodded desolately.

“How do you know it wasn’t this guy, this Gary Dawson, who took Ethan?”

“He wouldn’t do something like that.”

“Wouldn’t he? Maybe he’s using Ethan to force you to pay up.”

Neil shook his head. “He’s a loan-shark, not a child abductor. And anyway, he doesn’t need to force me to pay. I’m already handing over half my wage-packet to him.”

“Neil’s right,” put in Harlan. “I don’t know much about Dawson, but I do know it wouldn’t make any sense for him to kidnap Ethan — at least, not on account of a ten thousand pound debt.”

“So you don’t think this…this fucking nightmare has got anything to do with Neil’s debt.” Susan looked at Harlan with a conflicted gleam in her eyes that suggested she was caught between the desperate desire to find out what’d happened to Ethan, and an almost equally desperate hope that it had nothing to do with Neil.

“I didn’t say that.”

“It hasn’t,” said Neil, shrill with the need to be believed. “I swear on my life. I love you, Susie. I’d never do anything to hurt you. I know I’ve messed up big-time. I know I should’ve told the police, but I panicked at the thought that I might lose you.”

“You were right, you might have lost me,” said Susan. “But now you definitely have.”

More tears bubbled up and ran down Neil’s face. He clutched at Susan’s hand like a drowning man. “Please don’t do this. I’m so, so sorry. I’ll make this up to you.”

Susan shoved Neil’s hand away. “You can’t. Not unless you can bring back my little boy.” She leaned forward suddenly, her eyes like needles. “Can you do that?”

Neil’s voice matched the intensity of Susan’s gaze, as he said, “No, but I can try. I’ll do everything I can to prove how much I love you. Just give me a chance. I swear to God, I’ll either make this right or die trying.”

Seemingly stunned by the force of Neil’s words, her inner turmoil and uncertainty written in the shifting lines of her face, Susan hesitated to reply. She flinched at the shrill ring of Harlan’s phone. He snatched it out, and seeing Jim’s name on its screen, he said, “I’ve got to take this.” Giving Neil a warning look, as if to say, don’t even think about moving, he got out of the car. “I’ve been trying to call you,” he said into his phone. “Why aren’t you answering your phone?”

“I’ll tell you in a moment,” said Jim, sounding utterly worn out. “First you tell me why it’s so important that we get Price off the streets.”

Harlan told his ex-partner about Neil’s debt.

“Interesting.”

“I’d say it’s more than interesting.”

“Where’s Price now?”

“In my car.” When Harlan’s reply elicited a hiss of displeasure, he added, “And before you start getting shitty with me, I’m not forcing him to be there, he approached me to talk.”

“And what’s he told you?”

“Nothing much I didn’t already know. He claims he lied because he was afraid Susan would leave him.”

“That’s most probably true.”

Harlan’s eyebrows came together in a frown. “What makes you say that? Come on, Jim, out with it. What the hell’s going on?”

“First things first. Where are you?” When Harlan told him, Jim said, “Stay there. I’ll send someone to pick Price up.”

“Why can’t you come yourself?”

“Because I’m in Manchester.”

Harlan recalled that the police had been searching for connections between Ethan’s abduction and a boy who’d gone missing in Prestwich. What was his name? Jamie Sutton. Yes, that was it. He’d gone out riding his bike and never come home. “You’ve found the Sutton boy.”

“No. Another boy’s been abducted just a few miles from where Jamie Sutton went missing. His name’s Jack Holland, and he’s seven-years old.”

“Jesus. What happened?”

As though the words were heavy weights that had to be hauled out of him from a great depth, Jim said, “Jack and his fourteen-year old brother, Mark, were at some shops near their home. Mark went into one, leaving Jack playing on his scooter outside. When Mark left the shop approximately five minutes later, the scooter was still there but Jack wasn’t. Mark saw a white transit van driving fast away from the shops.”

“Did he get the reg?”

“No.”

“Did anyone else see anything?”

“If they did, we haven’t talked to them yet.”

“So you don’t know for sure that the kid was abducted. He could’ve just wandered off.”

“He could have, but I don’t think he did. I think he was abducted. I’ll go even further than that and say that I think he was abducted by the same person who took Ethan Reed.”

Harlan puffed his cheeks. “That’s a pretty big assumption to make based on what you’ve told me.”

“If it was based on that alone, yes, it would be. But there’s something I haven’t told you yet. Something about Jack Holland. Actually, maybe it’d be better if I just show you.”

“What do you mean, show me?”

“I’m sending you a picture of Jack Holland.”

Harlan’s phone beeped as the picture came through. When he saw it, his mouth fell open. Jack Holland had the same pale, delicate features, the same faraway blue eyes, even the same wavy, straw-blond hair as Ethan Reed. There were differences between the boys — Jack had a dark mole on his left cheek, and his face was perhaps a shade chubbier. But at a glance they could’ve been mistaken for identical twins. “Are they related? Jack and Ethan, I mean.”