Hope Road by John Barlow

uniform chestnut brown a little less plausible, and the taut skin of his face and neck becomes ever more like that of a roast duck. Yet he passes for a younger man, and that, strangely for someone of his intelligence, is all that matters.
    He knows DI Baron well. First names, bottle of scotch at Christmas. And Baron was not in the least surprised to find Henry Moran waiting at Millgarth when they arrived back from Doncaster. Now the men are facing each other across a desk in an interview room. They’ve been here a while.
    “Right,” Baron says calmly. At his side is DC Steele, blank-faced as usual. “Let’s have it again. You left the room, and at that point she was still alive.”
    Freddy nods.
    “You see, I think she was already dead. Or dying.”
    “No,” he says, exhausted, arms on the table, big hands trembling.
    “Well, she was dead when she came
out
of that room. You hear me, Freddy? She was already dead.”
    “I heard.”
    “
So?
”
    “She were alive when I left her,” he says, doesn’t even glance at his lawyer.
    For his part, Moran looks on impassively. But this is dangerous. Freddy’s in deep shock, about an inch away from breaking down. Baron knows it. And if Freddy cracks now and blurts things out, he might mention the kind of details that’ll make a retraction difficult later. Baron knows that too.
    “Okay. There’s another way it might’ve happened. Her skull’s cracked, right on the temple. So this is what I’m thinking…” The Inspector pauses as if to gather his thoughts. “Your Ukrainian friends leave you alone in a hotel room with their private hooker. You fancy a bit for yourself. Nice looking girl, very nice, all alone with a big fella like you? But she says no. She says no, and you don’t like it. Decide to teach her a lesson.”
    Freddy looks up at Baron, face screwed up, eyes nearly closed. “What?”
    “You’re a strong bloke, Freddy. Look at the size of you, eh? Things get a bit physical, then you slip out of the room to join the others, leave her there on the floor. Where she fucking dies, Freddy, because she wouldn’t give you any!”
    “You cunt…”
    The table jumps as Freddy springs from his chair, arm swinging out, his hand swiping Baron across the face.
    Everybody on their feet. Baron backing off, blinking, a hand over his nose. Steele and Moran grabbing Freddy. Uniforms stream in through the door, pinning Freddy to the table, cuffs on in seconds.
    As they drag him out he’s gasping for air between heavy, audible sobs.
    Baron rubs his nose, watches as Freddy is led away.
    “Henry?”
    “What can I say, Steve?”
    The Inspector looks uncharacteristically happy.
    He moves across to the tape recorder, describes what’s just happened, and terminates the interview. “Reconvene in an hour, counsel?”
    Moran nods slowly.
***
    “Thanks for coming, Henry,” John says, getting up from one of the plastic chairs bolted to the floor in the entrance.
    “When the going gets tough, eh?” says Moran, pointing to the exit and walking towards it without stopping to greet John.
    Back in 1985, Henry Moran had been on the legal team that got Tony Ray acquitted on counterfeiting charges at the Old Bailey. The old Spaniard saw something that he liked in Moran’s humourless, taciturn manner, and Moran remained the Ray family solicitor for over a quarter of a century. After Joe was shot, John decided to start afresh, severing all ties with Moran, as much for his own sanity as anything. The two men haven’t spoken in nearly two years. But when Freddy was arrested at the race track, he knew exactly who to call.
    “Dead in the room,” Moran says as he makes his way to a quiet spot outside the station.
    “Who?”
    “The girl.”
    “The hotel room? No, she
walked
out of there,” John says, puzzled, lighting a cigarette. “I saw it.”
    “They did the walking for her. She never flexes her ankle joints. Pathologist saw the video. Dead giveaway apparently. No pun, etcetera.