Page 41 of A Game of Lies

FRIDAY | LEO

Leo runs through the trees. He hadn’t planned to follow Jim and Foster (partly because no specialist wants a DS cramping their style, but mostly because he didn’t stand a hope in hell of keeping up with them) so he and George had instead turned their attention to the activities in the lake. The underwater search team had finished searching the reeds, and were in deeper water, the long line showing where they were submerged.

‘He seemed friendly,’ George said.

It was innocuous enough, but Leo shot her a look. He knew he’d been short with the dog-handler. It had surprised him, the rush of jealousy he’d felt when Jim had suggested meeting up with Ffion. He would have to work on that. Ffion was free to meet whoever she wanted.

In the lake, a diver had surfaced, signalling something to his colleague on shore, before releasing the air from his buoyancy jacket and sinking slowly back beneath the surface. Leo had felt a prickle at his neck as he’d pictured the dark depths of the lake-bed and imagined the weeds catching at the diver’s legs.

‘Do you want a coffee?’ George had nodded towards the major incident wagon.

Leo did, but not the instant stuff he’d tried this morning. Miles’s expensive coffee machine – and its accompanying tray of pastries – was calling. There was nothing Leo and George could do until – and unless – the search team found something, so the two of them had begun walking back to the car.

‘Talk-through with DS Brady?’ Jim’s voice crackled through the radio in Leo’s pocket. ‘Apologies, Control, I don’t have his shoulder number.’ His voice came in bursts, his breathing keeping time with his running feet.

Leo grabbed his radio. ‘DS Brady. Go ahead.’

‘Sarge, we’re on. Cottage in a clearing close to the lake – around a mile from where you briefed me. No access by road, as far as I can tell. Looks like whoever lives here keeps animals.’

Leo and George exchanged glances, then they ran.

As they sprint through the trees, Leo vows to get back in the gym, a habit he has lost since working more flexibly to spend time with Harris. The ground is uneven and every few metres his foot catches on a tree root or in a rabbit hole. George hangs back to make a call, but she catches him up quickly and runs lightly by his side, making easy work of it.

‘You look like you know where you’re going,’ she says.

‘I think so. There’s only one cottage that close to the water and I went there with Ffion during the Rhys Lloyd job. It should be just around this corner …’

Angharad Evans’s cottage is clad in wood. At first glance, Leo thinks Angharad has installed a living roof, but as they draw nearer he sees that the tiles have been overrun with emerald moss, as though the forest is slowly claiming back the house. Around the building is a sprawl of outbuildings and cages with mesh doors.

‘Angharad takes in rescue animals,’ Leo says. He sees a glimpse of what might be a badger. They slow to a walk and Leo pulls his T-shirt away from his neck for a breath of fresh air. He put on walking trousers this morning rather than his suit, knowing they’d be outside most of the day with the search teams, but he hadn’t anticipated a cross-country run. ‘Anything?’ he says, when he reaches Jim. Leo’s breath is heavy and ragged, while the dog-handler hasn’t broken a sweat.

‘Nothing in the outbuildings. We told the occupant to stay inside with the door locked till we searched the outside.’

‘We?’ Leo wonders if Jim means Foster, then he sees the quad bike parked at the end of the track that leads down from the mountain, and the rider leaning against it.

‘It was quicker than walking,’ Ffion says.

Leo feels acutely aware of his laboured breathing, and the line of sweat he knows will be around his hairline.

‘The MisPer was definitely here,’ Jim says. ‘I’ve never seen Foster so certain. He’s a bit distracted now, mind.’ He nods towards the animal pens.

Leo walks towards the cottage.

Angharad is tall, with long hair the colour of steel. Her weather-beaten face is a maze of tiny lines, but her forearms are strong and sinewy. She could be anything from forty to seventy, but Leo knows she is closer to the latter.

The tiny kitchen has stone walls and dark beams, and Leo ducks to avoid bashing his head. The room smells musty, like the mothballs Leo’s mum used in her jumper drawer.

Ffion leans against the oiled pine worktop. ‘Sut mae pethau, Angharad?’

Jim must have called Ffion, Leo supposes, to let her know where the search had ended up. The thought makes him disproportionately glum. A bit of him (the petty part) would like to send Ffion on an errand, but he knows enough about Angharad to know she prefers to deal with someone Welsh.

‘Prysur, fel arfer,’ Angharad says. She looks at Leo. ‘Busy,’ she translates, ‘as usual.’

‘We’re looking for a man in his thirties.’ Leo starts describing Ryan and the clothes they believe he is wearing, but Angharad cuts him off.

‘I haven’t seen anyone for a week or more. I’m working on a new project – I’m a translator for a Welsh publishing house – and I’ve been at my desk.’ She smiles. ‘I’m not one for company, as you’ve probably gathered.’

‘Has anything been disturbed?’ Ffion asks – the English for Leo’s benefit, presumably.

---