Chapter Seventeen Cold Ground #2
“Your phone connected to the mast covering this area.” Harrison tapped the map with his pen. “The King’s Arms pub. It remained there from approximately six thirty until around eleven fifteen. At eleven thirty-three your handset connected to another mast.” He circled a location on the map. “Here.”
The woodland track.
The same place Harrison had stood with Jake Whitton two nights earlier.
Where he’d kissed him.
“Do you recognise this location, Andy?”
Andy didn’t look up.
He didn’t answer either.
Harrison tapped the map again. “That is the section of woodland where vehicles can drive off the road without being easily seen.” He paused. Waited. Then, “And it is also the location where Emily Fisher’s phone had been manually switched off.”
Andy bounced his knee under the table as if psyching himself up to crack. Experience had taught Harrison there was little point rushing to fill the following silence. Given enough of it, most people felt compelled to say something.
Then it burst out of him. “Told you I lost my phone!”
Harrison remained calm. “In your earlier account, Andy, you stated the handset had been smashed at work. Can you explain that to me?”
Andy scratched both hands over his scalp. “I thought it’d been smashed!”
“So why were you looking for it in the pub?”
Andy’s breathing quickened erratically. “I don’t know! Thought maybe it weren’t smashed. Maybe I dropped it somewhere. I don’t bloody know.”
Calder kept writing.
Harrison remained completely still.
“This isn’t my fault.” Andy flapped his hands. “I didn’t do owt.” He darted his gaze between Harrison and the solicitor like an animal looking for a way out. Then he slapped a hand on the table. “This is cause of him, int it?”
Harrison pooled his expression. “Who?”
Anger replaced Andy’s panic. “Jake bloody Whitton.”
Harrison waited. Then, “Can you explain what you mean by that.”
Andy laughed bitterly. “You ever notice how he’s always involved?
Always hanging around when summat happens?
He’s been after me for years. Ever since...
” He caught himself, then pressed on anyway.
“This is him. He’s set me up. Stole my phone, dumped it in the woods, took that girl... all so everyone’d believe him.”
Harrison folded his hands on the table. “So you’re saying Jake Whitton abducted Emily Fisher?”
“Aye.”
“And planted evidence to implicate you?”
“Aye.”
Harrison gave a slow nod, as though simply making sure he’d understood despite the surprise at this turn of events. “What reason would he have for doing that?”
“Because he’s obsessed. Thinks I took his sister.
I didn’t. Bloody didn’t. And you lot…” Andy flapped his hand at him, more than likely indicating to the entire Hartswick police force.
“You lot never look at him, though, do ya? Never look at his family. I said it then. Said it back then, and no one listened to me then.”
The solicitor leaned in again. “Andy, I strongly advise you to stop speaking.”
Andy sucked in a breath through his teeth, panic turning ugly. Mean. Spiteful. “It’s that family. I warned her. I did.”
“You warned who?” Harrison pressed.
“Robyn.”
“Warned her of what?”
“That everyone would find out.”
“Find out what?”
“About that kid of hers. Teddy.”
“What about him?”
Andy jabbed a finger at the interview table as if the proof sat there among the case files. “That he’s Donald Whitton’s.”
Calder paused his writing and looked up. Harrison kept his gaze trained on Andy. Waiting to see what else would snap. But Andy smiled, triumphantly. As if he knew he’d found the weak spot.
“Tha’s right.” Andy folded his arms. “Jake and Robyn’s dad’s the real father of that kid. Everybody knows it.” He gave a dismissive shrug. “Abused her. Probably him an’ all. That’s why he turned into a filthy fucking poof.”
“Andy.” His solicitor’s voice cut sharply across the room. “Y advice is that you stop answering questions until I’ve spoken to you privately.”
Andy didn’t even look at him.
“Father gets his own daughter pregnant. Happens more than folk think. Family buries it. Then all of a sudden there’s this baby.” He laughed bitterly. “Think we’re all stupid, don’t they?”
Harrison’s expression didn’t change despite his rampant heartbeat. “So your belief is that Robyn Whitton became pregnant by her own father.”
“Aye.”
“And that’s why she disappeared.”
“She knew what that family were.” Andy’s voice grew louder. “Knew what sort of filth that house were built on.”
“My client is speculating,” the solicitor interjected. “I advise him not to continue and take a break.”
“I don’t need a fucking break!” Andy snapped. “Cause that Jake?” He pointed across the table. “You think he could let all that come out? Him off chasing his fancy music career. Imagine the headlines.”
Harrison waited.
Andy mistook the silence for encouragement.
“Then she disappears and suddenly everyone’s looking at me.” He slapped the table. “Jake made sure of that. Needed someone else to carry it.”
Harrison spoke as evenly as before. “So you’re alleging Jake Whitton murdered his own sister.”
“I’m saying, look at it!” Andy’s eyes were wild. “Where’s Teddy’s dad, eh? Soon as she went missing, suddenly the father of the baby wants nowt to do with it. Wonder why, eh?”
Calder glanced at Harrison but kept writing.
“I told Jake.” Andy tapped his own chest. “Right to his face. Thirteen years ago. That’s why he nearly killed me.
Because he knew I were right.” He then snatched up the CCTV still of Emily Fisher, crushing it in his fist. “And now this.” He shook the crumpled photograph.
“Another chance to stitch me up. Make everyone think he were right all along. Clear his own name. Get his life back.” His mouth twisted.
“Cause let’s face it... living in that shit-hole above an off license weren’t the rock-star future he planned, were it? ”
The solicitor reached across and took the photograph from Andy’s grip. “My client is clearly distressed. I’m advising him not to answer further questions.”
Harrison watched him.
Carefully.
Because rumours like that didn’t appear out of nowhere. And sometimes the most dangerous thing about them…was that once they’d been spoken aloud, they were impossible to put back in the box.
Andy leaned back in the chair, chest heaving.
“Andy, those are serious allegations.”
“Aye, they are.” He folded his arms. “Funny how no one ever wants to look at them though.”