‘Your mum’s not always wrong,’ said Caro, pointing at April with her fork. ‘Anyway, the point is, the Suckers are here, they’re not going to disappear just because you go all mopey. We’ve got to pick ourselves up and come out fighting.’
‘Funny you should say that …’ said April, and filled Caro in on her meeting with Uncle Peter earlier that day. Caro’s eyes lit up at April’s description of the newspaper office.
‘Wow! And Peter’s serious about looking into Ravenwood?’
‘Well, the conspiracy part of it – he’s not buying the idea that there are vampires here, but he was certainly into the idea of finding out who’s behind the school.’
‘So we’re all chasing the Vampire Regent really,’ said Caro thoughtfully.
April pulled a face. ‘Sadly we still have no idea who he is.’
‘So let’s work it out,’ said Caro, putting down her fork and pulling out a notepad. ‘Who are the prime candidates?’
‘Well, you thought it was Davina’s dad, didn’t you?’
‘We know Nicholas Osbourne’s not a vampire, but that doesn’t mean he’s not involved in this. And it’s got to be someone like him, someone with power. Agropharm’s still in the frame too. Just because Davina’s dad isn’t one of the undead, doesn’t mean there aren’t Suckers behind it.’
‘Mr Sheldon?’ said April, then stopped dead. ‘Oh my God …’
She turned and scrabbled in her coat pocket, pulling out her phone.
‘What is it?’ asked Caro.
‘Hawk – Mr Sheldon. The other night I took a picture of him and my mum.’ She clicked to her pictures file and looked for the date.
‘There it is.’
April could feel her heart beating as it opened. It had been a snatched photo in a dark corridor and the camera on her phone wasn’t exactly cutting-edge, but it was clear enough.
They could see the front door and the coat-rack and the freshly painted walls, but where Mr Sheldon should have been, there was only a weird dark smudge, as if a child had taken a black crayon and scribbled him out. You couldn’t even see April’s mother standing behind him. It was like she was being obscured by thick fog.
‘No
way
…’ whispered Caro, her eyes wide. ‘I mean, we pretty much knew Hawk was a vamp, but to see it … it’s like – wow!’
April nodded.
‘Imagine how I feel, to think of him smarming up to my mum.’
‘Eww,’ said Caro, wrinkling her nose. ‘Still, it’s no big surprise, is it? Gabriel told you that the Suckers all report to him. He had to be a vampire – but does it make him the Regent?’
April shrugged. ‘Probably not. We’ve seen that he answers to other people, haven’t we? The Regent’s not going to let people push him around.’
‘Dr Tame?’
‘Don’t think so. He’s evil, but in a different way. Besides, Fiona checked him out, and she found photos of him everywhere.’
‘That new police inspector? What’s his name?’
‘No way. He’s hardly going to be able to do a press conference. He might be a vamp disciple, but he’s not a vampire.’
‘Maybe we’re not looking in the right places,’ said Caro. ‘Didn’t Gabriel say he was great at hiding? If that’s true, there’s a good chance we’ve never even seen him.’
April slumped back in her seat.
‘It’s hopeless, isn’t it?’
‘If only we’d found some sort of guidebook on getting rid of vampires at the V&A,’ said Caro. ‘You know, like,
How To Get Rid of Ants From Your Kitchen
.’
April didn’t laugh.
‘Hey, how do you get rid of ants, anyway? You follow them back to their nest and pour boiling water down the hole, don’t you?’
Caro shivered. ‘Really? Is that what you do?’ She pushed her plate away. ‘Ugh, I don’t much feel like eating all of a sudden.’
But April was still thinking. ‘So where is their nest?’ she said. ‘Where are they all crawling about at the moment?’
Caro looked confused.
‘The cemetery?’
‘
Duh
,’ said April. ‘Where’s the one place you can be sure to lay your hands on a vampire? Ravenwood.’
Caro gave a grim smile.
‘Better put the kettle on, then.’
Inspector Reece was waiting for April outside the café. He was standing by his car wearing a rumpled trenchcoat. He had bags under his eyes and looked like he could do with a decent night’s sleep. Caro gave a little wave and moved off back up the High Street. ‘I promised I’d meet my mum by the hairdressers,’ she said. ‘See you tomorrow, A?’
‘Yeah, see you. And thanks.’
‘No,’ said Caro, patting her stomach, ‘thank
you
.’
Reece gave April a wan smile.
‘I assumed you weren’t being attacked in the coffee shop, so I let you finish,’ he said.
‘Oh God, sorry,’ said April, blushing. ‘I forgot all about ringing you. How did you find me?’
‘We can find anyone within a few hundred metres if their phone is on, April,’ he said. ‘Even faster if they’re making calls.’
‘Oh. Well I really did think someone was following me, honestly Inspector Reece.’
‘Who was it?’
April hesitated. DI Reece might have been taken off her case, but he was still a policeman. She didn’t want to have to lie to him about her meeting with Gabriel.
‘I … I don’t know. Maybe it was no one. I didn’t wait to find out – I just jumped on a bus and came back here.’
Reece looked at her shrewdly. April had the unsettling feeling that he knew exactly where she’d really been.
‘Well you’re safe now, that’s the main thing,’ he said.
‘I’m really sorry, I didn’t mean to worry you.’
‘That’s okay, I wanted to talk to you anyway.’
‘Why is it that whenever we talk you end up giving me some bad news?’
Reece snorted.
‘Part of my job, I’m afraid,’ he said, walking slowly up the hill away from the café. ‘No one ever asks the police to give good news. Hence the dark uniforms, I suppose.’
They walked in silence until they reached Pond Square and sat down on a cold bench.
April looked at him sideways.
‘So what is it this time? I’m not sure I can take any more shocks.’
‘I’m sorry it’s been so hard for you, April,’ he said. ‘You’ve been asked to deal with an awful lot since you came here and I hesitated to add this to your burden.’
He paused to rub his eyes, as if he were suffering from a migraine.
‘But I still think you should see this.’
He reached inside his coat and pulled out a brown envelope. Inside were two date-stamped photographs. She peered at them for a moment, a look of confusion slowly turning to disbelief and anger.
‘Why didn’t you tell me?’ she whispered.
The photographs were from a traffic camera. They were grainy and the driver’s face was a blur, but you could see the car and the registration number as clear as day. Her mother’s car; she had been caught speeding. There was nothing particularly strange about that, but it was the date and time stamped on the pictures which was making April’s heart thump: the day, the time, her father died. The precise time when Silvia had sworn she was with April’s grandfather.
‘But this proves she was lying, doesn’t it?’ said April. ‘It changes my mum’s alibi.’
‘Not really,’ said Reece.
‘Why not? She lied! Aren’t you going to question her?’
‘You’re not getting it, April. This photo was taken at the exact time your father died, so your mother
couldn’t
have killed him. Okay, so she lied, but it doesn’t alter the fact that she has a water-tight alibi. Anyway’ – he shook his head – ‘I’m off the case. Not that there is really a case any more.’
April’s mouth opened.
‘My dad’s case is closed?’
He shrugged.
‘Not officially – officially it’s an on-going investigation, but off the record, all the manpower has been reassigned. Someone at the top doesn’t want it looked into any more. I don’t know if they’re just trying to sweep it under the carpet or … well, it’s not like we’re swamped with leads.’
‘That’s not fair! How can you let it happen? There must be someone you can speak to, get it reinvestigated?’
‘On what grounds, April?’ said Reece, anger in his voice. ‘I mean, if you have some compelling new evidence, then I’d be pleased to pass it on, but otherwise it appears as though my colleagues have their hands full with all the other deaths in Highgate!’
Reece rubbed his chin, the stubble rasping.
‘I’m sorry, April, I shouldn’t take this out on you. None of this is your fault and I can imagine you feel pretty let down by this investigation.’
April gave him a sad smile.
‘I don’t blame you, Inspector Reece. It just seems so wrong that the police can just give up on this.’ She looked across to the yellow door of her house, remembering that night, the police cars with their spinning lights, the paramedics … the blood. If the police – or whoever was in charge – could make something like that go away, then surely there was
nothing
they couldn’t hide.
‘Can’t you do anything?’
‘What do you expect me to do?’ said Reece wearily. ‘Give it all up, take a moral stand? Say “Either the case is re-opened or I’m walking?” It’s been tempting, I will say that much, but … there are elements in the police who would like all these cases
closed down. Maybe they’re corrupt, maybe there’s someone behind the scenes telling them what to do, I don’t know. But call me naïve, I still believe that the force needs decent people doing real police work. If we all left, what hope would there be?’
April nodded. ‘Sorry. I didn’t mean that you …’
He shook his head.
‘No, it’s fine. It’s not as if I haven’t had this same argument with myself dozens of times. But I do know that people who try fighting it too hard find themselves transferred to traffic duty. And people who shout too loud, who threaten the wrong people, they find things get dangerous. Very dangerous.’
April couldn’t take it all in.
‘But what does this mean, Mr Reece?’ she asked, holding up the photos. ‘Does it mean my mum is involved in all this?’
Reece shook his head.
‘Not at all. This proves she wasn’t there.’
He handed her the envelope.
‘But if I was you, I would want to know why she’s not telling you the truth.’
April slammed the front door and threw her coat on the banister.
‘Mother!’ she shouted, craning her neck up the stairs. ‘Mother, are you here?’
‘Yes, I’m here,’ said Silvia, stepping out of the living room. ‘And where the bloody hell have you been? I’ve been worried sick since your grandfather rang. How could you be so selfish?’
April walked over and thrust the paper at her mother.
‘What’s this?’ she frowned.
‘It’s a photo from a traffic camera showing you speeding. Look at the date.’
‘That’s the day …’
‘Yes. It’s the day Dad was killed.’
Silvia looked up.
‘So what’s the big fuss? The police must have called me and I was rushing home.’
‘No,’ said April, stabbing her finger at the photo. ‘Look at the time. That was the time you told the police – you told
me
– that you were with Gramps. You lied to me.’
Silvia stood there, not speaking, which only angered April more.
‘Is that it?’ she said. ‘No denial? No “you’ve got it wrong, April”?’
‘Deny what, April?’ she snapped. ‘What am I supposed to have done? So I wasn’t exactly where I said I was. I don’t tell you everything I do, and I don’t
have
to.’
‘But this was important! This isn’t about you sneaking off
for a facial, this is your alibi, the thing that proves you didn’t kill Dad.’
‘Is that what you thought? You really believed I could have killed him?’
April shook her head.
‘No, and that’s not what this is about. This is about trust. If you can’t even tell me the truth about where you were at the moment my dad was being murdered, how the hell am I supposed to believe anything else you say?’
‘As if you ever did.’
‘Oh grow up!’ yelled April. ‘I’m sick of you behaving like a teenager – no, in fact most of my friends are more mature than you.’
‘So what do you want from me?’
‘I want the
truth
, Mother! Where were you?’
Silvia looked away.
‘You don’t want to know.’
‘I do, of course I do! Because if you can’t give me a decent explanation, what can I do but think you’re hiding something?’
‘Like what?’
‘Like having something to do with Dad’s death.’
‘April, that’s ridiculous, I loved your father so much—’
‘Loved, past tense. You were such a bitch to him before he died.’
‘Don’t speak to me like that!’
‘Why not? It’s the truth and you know it. So why can’t you tell me where you really were that afternoon?’