Chapter 9

Inspector Garcia brought his fist down hard on the desk as he put the phone receiver back on its cradle.

‘YES! I told you, John, I said they were hiding something.’

‘Just who would they be then boss?’ Asked his sergeant.

‘Young Betts and Mrs Wainwright. I knew they weren’t being straight with me I just had nothing to hold them on. Now I have. –Come on John let’s get down to the harbour’

‘I reckon Betts is going to want a solicitor this time boss. You made him a bit uncomfortable last time.’

‘He can have as many as he likes, this time we will be arresting them and if necessary charging them both.’

The two men hurried out of the office. As they reached the harbour, Joe Garcia felt disappointment wash over him. He pointed his sergeant in the direction of the berth. As he did so, he realised Bee Jay’s two masts were conspicuous by their absence. By the time they reached the empty berth, he was already imagining the remarks of the Scotland Yard detectives, ridiculing him and his police force. They made their way back to the police station via the harbour masters office. As he walked into his office, he steeled himself for the phone call to England.

‘Inspector Davies? I’m Inspector Garcia of the Gibraltar Police. I have bad news I’m afraid. Bee Jay II slipped her moorings and left the harbour about three hours ago. She was headed out towards Casablanca.’

‘I don’t believe I’m hearing this. We ask you to do one little thing, just hold them until we can pick them up. What kind of Mickey Mouse operation are you running there?’

‘Now hold on there, Davies. Until you called, we had no reason to hold them. Perhaps If you’d been a bit quicker with your request, we could have helped you. Now I’ll tell you what type of operation we run. We run the sort of operation that gets a full scene of crimes team onto that boat, simply because we suspected foul play. Of course, you may not want forensics from a Mickey Mouse operation like ours. We even have what we believe to be the weapon, complete with blood and human hair. I doubt you’ll want any of that from such an incompetent force as ours.’

‘Ah sorry Inspector, no offence meant. I was just a little angry. Now, what exactly have you got?’

Joe Garcia recounted the events of earlier in the day, including the interviews. He offered to forward all the forensic evidence.

‘Thank you, Inspector, I wonder could we rely on you to apprehend the suspects should they return.’

‘Of course, you can. It’s just sad that you weren’t a bit quicker off the mark so we could have held on to them.’

With points even, they disconnected the call.

The day after our arrival back in London Inspector Davies came to talk to Will he didn’t get anything new, other than Will’s insistence that Samantha was not party to the attempt on his life. He was still confused about what was real and what he’d imagined.

I gave him all the details I had about Samantha’s suspected affair and details of how to access Bee Jay’s tracker. He assured me that they would get to the bottom of the affair and would arrest the two suspects, as he put it, as soon as they could.

At first, I was quite happy that Will seemed to accept everything that was happening. The Will I knew would have been pushing to get back to work and asking me and everyone else to justify their actions. The new softer Will was easier to deal with but it worried me that he didn’t seem that eager to get back to normal. As the days went by, I noticed that he was putting less effort than I expected into his recovery. He seemed to be content to get around in his wheelchair. I found myself giving him more physical help. The people in the physiotherapy department showed me how to help him in and out of the wheelchair. It meant me leaning forward, and him putting his hands behind my neck. I would then straighten up, lifting him out of the chair. I did it a couple of times before I realised that it gave him an excellent view of my cleavage.

I’d made the mistake of moving into Will’s spare room, to save him the embarrassment of having a live in nurse. He didn’t need medical help just a little help to get around. I helped him get in and out of bed. I helped him get seated in the shower and I helped him in and out of his wheelchair. I soon became unhappy with the way things were going. I hated Samantha and Ryan for what they’d done to him. The man I loved was in there somewhere but all I could see was a man who seemed happy to be dependent on others. One evening as I helped him to bed, he pulled my head down and kissed me. I surprised myself by pulling away from him.

‘Will, what do you think you’re doing?’

‘Come on Steph, I need a woman. I know you want this.’

I slapped his face. ‘Who the hell are you and what have you done with Will Wainwright?’

He looked at me with a shocked expression as he rubbed his cheek.

‘Sorry, I thought ... I mean Dad said... ‘

‘You thought? You thought? I don’t think so. You haven’t been thinking since you came round in hospital. The Will Wainwright I know is fiercely independent, yet you are happy to let others do everything for you. I was happy to take over the running of some things until you were better, but the more I do the more you expect me to do. Now you just expect me to jump into bed with you because you want a woman. Well, it’s not going to happen, not like this. I’ve had enough, I quit.’

‘What do you mean you quit? You can’t quit. What about Sir George McMahon? He trusts you. You said you would handle that.’

I was tempted to tell him I could handle Sir George and most other things come to that the only thing I needed was the credit guarantees to get the banks to loan me enough money to do the deal on my own. If push came to shove sir George could probably secure enough credit for us to go ahead. Yes, I could do it on my own, but that would have hurt Will and that was not what I wanted to do.