Penn had acted out of fear of Jasper pulling away from him and being vulnerable when all he was trying to do was dip his toe in the outside world and find his place.
Penn had realised too late that he had no right to stop him. He saw a long, honest heart-to-heart in their future, but right now he was just angry at himself for depriving his brother due to his own fears. He didn’t need to share his failure with anyone else.
He realised he’d been short with his colleague. ‘Sorry, Alison, just trying to crack this bloody password.’
He’d had the phone since 8.15 a.m., and he was no closer to getting into the front screen.
Eleven characters.
He’d tried hundreds of variations of dates, names, places and he was only grateful that the phone didn’t have a limited number of attempts. Trouble was, even with the information he had, there were quadrillions of possible permutations.
He sat back and closed his eyes, blocking out everything around him. He needed to think more about the man himself. He liked to play games, he was arrogant, he thought he could do whatever he wanted. He liked to play with people. He liked people to get close but not quite get him. He did things to amuse himself, acted purely for his own entertainment.
‘Alison, can you ping me that footage of Harte on his phone?’ he asked, having a sudden thought.
‘Yeah, sure,’ she said, pressing a few keys. ‘On its way.’
He opened the clip and watched it, then scrolled to the point where Harte was on his phone. He was smiling as he did whatever he was doing. His fingers worked busily. He finished and then glanced at the camera. He already knew the camera was there so that glance was unnecessary. It was almost an unconscious message to them. A bit like ‘there you go’. Or ‘that one’s for you’.
Penn felt an excitement in his stomach. Was this another game? Was he playing with them and had mistakenly given himself away?
He returned to the beginning of the footage and watched carefully.
Harte walks in.
Harte looks around as he heads towards the seat.
Harte sits down, relaxes, looks up at the camera.
Jack enters.
‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘Tea one sugar would be great.’
Jack nods and walks out.
Harte smiles and reaches for his phone.
Penn found himself at the beginning of what he’d already watched.
He pulled the cursor back to the start.
Harte walks in.
Looks around.
Takes a seat.
Looks at camera.
Jack enters.
‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘Tea one sugar would be great.’
Jack leaves.
Harte reaches for his phone.
Penn pulled the cursor back one more time.
Jack enters.
‘Can I get you a drink?’
‘Tea one sugar would be great.’
Jack leaves.
Penn reached for Harte’s phone and pressed the screen. The login page appeared as it had done a hundred times.
He typed in the words in lower case. Eleven characters.
teaonesugar
Alison was watching as the screen sprang into life.
‘Bloody hell, I’m in.’
Seventy-Three
‘Where the hell have you been, Inspector?’ Harte asked as she walked in the door, Bryant following her.
She ignored him.
‘For the purpose of the tape, Detective Inspector Stone has entered the room and will continue questioning the suspect.’
She nodded at Stacey who rose and left the room.
Harte didn’t even wait for the door to close.
‘Where were you that was so important you sent me a low-ranking, incompetent—’
‘DS Wood is neither low-ranking nor incompetent. I was dealing with the discovery of bones beneath the fountain of Wyley Court. Another project completed by yourself and Jenson Butler.’
‘Inspector, my client is not under arrest for anything other than—’
‘Your client asked me a question, Ms Swift, and I’m answering it, so settle down.’ She paused. ‘In addition, I checked on the progress of an excavation we’re carrying out at Clent.’
‘Inspector, I must—’
‘Still answering the question, Ms Swift. I was unaware of the detail required by your client, whether he wanted a brief summary or a blow-by-blow account of my day so far.’
She was not allowed to question him about other crimes while only being under arrest for the first, but she could make him aware that she had followed the crumbs and these were the sites she’d found. There was a blink that lasted longer than normal. Almost an acknowledgement.
‘Is that enough detail for you, Mr Harte?’
‘Yes, thank you.’
She took a breath and expelled it slowly. This was her only chance. He was under arrest for the abduction and murder of Lexi Walters, for which he’d been in custody for twenty-four hours. She had twenty minutes to go.
‘The time for games is over, Mr Harte. We’re not prepared to play anymore.’
She leaned forward, as close to his personal space as she could get.
He leaned back.
‘What did you do to Lexi Walters?’
‘I didn’t do anything.’
‘She crawled into that hole by herself?’
Kim could feel the set expression of her own face. His gaze met hers, and there was just the two of them in the room.
‘Did she try to escape before you’d finished ogling her? Had you not had your fill of voyeurism before she tried to get out of the prison you’d made for her?’
Harte’s eyes were burning into hers.
‘Was it an accident? Did you accidentally kill her while trying to subdue her?’
No answer and Kim hadn’t expected one. He was rattled. She could see that, but he wasn’t angry enough.
‘Did you sexually assault six-year-old Lexi Walters, Mr Harte?’
Nothing.
‘Did you allow Jenson Butler to sexually assault her? Was this some kind of sick, perverted partnership where you got to watch while he raped a child?’
Colour was flooding into his face.
‘Were you and Butler a tag team, taking it in turns to rape her? Is that why you’re both involved in the disposal? You had a deal, a pact that neither of you could break because you both are guilty? Are you covering for each other’s sick and disgusting games?’
Kim opened the file and pushed a photo of a smiling Lexi towards him. Next she pushed a photo of the skeleton as it had been arranged in the morgue.
Kate Swift looked away but not before Kim saw the horror on her face.
‘What did you do to take Lexi Walters from this to this?’
Harte’s muscles were jumping all over the place.
Kim hated the pictures in her head but she had to keep at him. The whole idea of baiting him was to lead him to say something that would incriminate him. She had to take away his control.
‘Did you and Butler allow other men to come and rape her? Did you all do it together? Was Lexi passed around like a toy? Was that beautiful little girl raped by a bunch of your paedophile friends as well as—?’
‘I never fucking raped her. I loved her,’ he shouted in Kim’s face.
The room fell into silence as everyone realised what he’d just said.