done and grow up a little.’
His cheeks were rosier now and he had more of a boyish look about him. He looked more like fifteen, not his eighteen years. ‘I can’t make amends with him, he’s dead.’
‘That one, no, but anyone else you’ve hurt, there’s no time like the present to start being nicer.’
He nodded. Maybe some people could change. She genuinely hoped that Logan could. He was still so young and she didn’t want him to become a regular face at the station. She didn’t want him to turn into a Terry. She could see that there was still hope.
‘So you called him names. Can you tell me anything else? Did you see anyone following him?’
He shook his head.
‘Just going slightly off on a tangent, do you and your friends hang around at the graveyard?’ There was still a chance that the person outside the vicarage was nothing more than a childish prank, designed to scare the vicar.
‘No, I don’t personally. Me an’ my mates mostly hang around on the football field in the park. I remember playing dare with my friends at the graveyard, but that was when we were kids.’
Gina felt a smile forming behind her stern exterior. ‘When you were kids.’
‘You know, about fourteen, fifteen. We told scary stories about people being buried alive and their ghosts rising at Halloween.’ He paused for a moment. ‘That sounds bad with what happened. They were just stories – I think. Anyway, after we’d shit ourselves out, we’d normally run away after one of us pretended to see a ghost. That sort of stuff.’
‘Going back to Monday, can you tell us anything else?’
‘There is somethin’.’
‘Okay.’ Jacob glanced at Gina.
‘Can I have some Coke or a Fanta in a minute?’
Gina nodded.
‘He stays at this horrid place just off Beckett Street we call the tramp house, that’s where some of the homeless gather and bed down. It’s just a house that is fallin’ apart and ’asn’t been touched for a couple of years. We go there for laughs and we saw him arguing with a woman.’
‘Did you see her?’
‘No, we scarpered before she came out.’
‘What were they arguing about?’
‘She said he had ruined everything and to shut up. That was all I heard. Can I have that Coke now?’
‘PC Smith will be here in a moment, I’ll send it in with him. Thank you.’
‘Can I go home in a minute? I’ve told you everything I know.’
‘We need to check a couple of things first.’ There was still his young victim, Spencer Burrows to look into. ‘When you do go home, I don’t want to see you here again.’ She smiled at him.
‘You won’t.’
She jotted a note on her pad.
Who wanted Alex to shut up, and why?
Chapter Thirty-One
Cherie pulled onto the drive and swallowed as she turned her headlamps off. Christian had probably been calling non-stop and she hadn’t answered at all. She took a swig of water from the bottle in her glove compartment and got out of the car, leaving her bag in the boot. That could stay there. She hadn’t taken her phone; that was her very valid excuse. As far as she was aware it was still on the patio table in the back garden, turned onto silent. He peered through the window, grimacing at her every move as she slammed the car door closed.
As she reached the front door, he opened it. ‘Where have you been? The others have gone home.’
‘I went looking for Marcus.’
‘You came back to get the car and you didn’t even pop in to tell me what was happening? I’ve been beside myself. Marcus came back, he left his coat. He still couldn’t get hold of Penny.’ Christian paused. ‘So, where have you been all this time?’
She pushed past him and hurried out to the garden to grab her phone.
‘I tried to call.’
‘I left my phone when I left to look for Marcus. How was I to know he’d come back and gone home since?’ She went into their living room and stared out of the window into the garden.
He followed. ‘I can’t deal with this? What the hell is going on?’
‘What do you mean? I was worried about Marcus. He’d had a lot to drink and was beside himself over his row with Penny. That’s all there is to it.’
He shook his head and pursed his lips as he spun her around. ‘I’m sick of you treating me like I’m stupid. Even Joanna thinks something is going on between you, Penny, Marcus