Free Hope Road by John Barlow Page B

eases the Saab down the hill.
    “What’re you doing here?” Steele says as the motor pulls up in front of the hotel.
    John gets out of the car, tilts his head back and exhales into the sky.
    “I’m looking for Freddy.”
    “Is that right? Been nosing about in there, have you? Talking to witnesses, messing with evidence?”
    “Last thing your boss said to me was go find Freddy. So here I am, looking.” Then, as an afterthought: “And why are you here? Ah, yes, cos I tipped you off.”
    “Don’t flatter yourself. You saved us all of half an hour.”
    His eyes are on the swirl of blue smoke that curls from the tip of John’s cigarette.
    “Want one?”
    “Your car,” Steele says, ignoring him. “Don’t forget, it was your car she was found in. I’d watch my step if I were you.”
    Oh, you’re not me, son.
    John removes a nonexistent strand of tobacco from the tip of his tongue, examines it, flicks it away.
    “Funny, don’t you think, the time between the two security videos?”
    Steele doesn’t rise to the bait.
    “I mean,” he continues, “it happens with the old tape systems. You take one out, put a new one in. Sometimes there’s a few minutes missing. But
eighteen
minutes?”
    They’ll have seen the videos by now, he reckons, especially with the resident Iron Maiden fan at the controls and happy to oblige. Fuller too, for that matter. The videos confirm their version of events.
    Baron comes out of the hotel.
    “What’s going on?”
    “He’s been here all the time, Sir,” says Steele. “Parked up the road, watching us.”
    “Is that right, Mr Ray?” He looks with disgust at the cigarette in John’s hand. “This is a murder investigation. And you’re hanging around outside? I’ve a good mind to arrest you.”
    John takes another drag. He couldn’t care less about Baron’s threats. The image of a half-conscious Donna getting pushed and slapped around in a deserted hotel corridor keeps returning to him, each time more vivid than the last. And the thought of what must have happened after that makes his nauseous. Money, sex, drugs… He’s seen death close up, the shocking simplicity of it, the metallic stink of fresh blood. Then nothing. A body going cold. And nothing else. The thought of it frightens him to the core of his soul.
    “May I go now, Sir?” he says, his contempt taking both policemen by surprise. “I need to find Freddy. He’s late for work.”
    “Freddy’s a murder suspect,” says Baron. “Think that’s something to joke about, you fucking smart alec?”
    John shakes his head. “It’s not Freddy. He didn’t kill her.”
    “So why has he disappeared?”
    “It’s not Freddy.”
    “We’ll know soon enough. A lot of money and a dead girl, Mr Ray. We’ll see.” He turns to leave. “Straight to us when you know where he is.”
    Baron disappears around the side of the hotel.
    “That reminds me,” says Steele, the beginnings of a smile on his pallid face. “Have you had any thoughts about that money in the Mondeo? Because
I’ve
had a few.”
    John leans on the Saab and smokes, stays calm.
    Steele’s mobile rings.
    “Yes, I’m outside now. Is he walking?”
    As he slips the phone back into his jacket pocket, a tall man turns the corner of York Road and walk towards them. It’s Bilyk, the one who made sure he was somewhere else while his partner was calmly beating Donna then dragging her outside. Who stayed there in the lounge half the night, tapping away on his laptop, until she was curled up in the boot of the Mondeo, dead.
    He seems confident, a bounce in his long stride, hair combed back but loose in the wind. A big man, full of himself.
    Steele makes a call and a moment later two uniforms are out in front of the hotel. He goes over and exchanges a few words with Bilyk. The Ukrainian concentrates as he listens, nodding, serious. Then he’s led to a patrol car and shown the back seat.
    John catches sight of Bilyk’s face in the window. The man who sat