Beyond Evil

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Sheldon arrived at Dixon’s home and jabbed at the doorbell, which sounded loud in the night. When Dixon answered the door, it looked like she had expected visitors. There was no surprise. She turned away from him without a word and walked into the house. She slumped onto a large leather recliner, and as she settled, Sheldon thought her eyes took too long to refocus on him. There was a large wine glass half-filled with a deep red liquid, and the bottle on the floor next to her was empty.

She saw him looking. ‘So, I’m getting pissed. So what? I’m entitled to celebrate.’ Her voice sounded bitter.

‘Celebrate what?’

‘What do you think? The end of my police career,’ she said, and she raised her glass. ‘A-fucking-men to that.’

Sheldon sat down on the sofa opposite, the soft leather squeaking as he made himself comfortable. He thought about offering some words of comfort, but she was right. It was all over, and she knew it.

‘Where is Mr Dixon?’ Sheldon asked.

Her lip curled. ‘Mr Dixon isn’t here anymore. He doesn’t like the way I do things. And do you know what, Sheldon; neither do I.’

‘So tell me,’ Sheldon said. ‘How do you do things?’

She didn’t answer, just stared into her glass instead.

‘Answer me something else then,’ Sheldon said.

She looked up.

‘Why did you want me to lead the investigation?’ he said. ‘You tried to keep me. Why?’

Dixon considered him for a few moments, and then she shook her head. ‘You don’t want to go there.’

‘But I do.’

‘You know the answer.’

‘I want to hear you say it.’

She took a gulp of wine, and then went to the room next door, coming back with another bottle, picking at the foil seal with the end of a corkscrew. Once she had opened the bottle, she refilled her glass and held the bottle out for Sheldon. ‘Do you want some?’

Sheldon shook his head.

She scowled. ‘Didn’t think you would,’ she said. ‘Too fucking pure and controlled. That’s always been your problem. Not enough fun away from the job.’

‘You don’t look like you are having fun to me.’

She leaned forward, wine spilling out of her glass onto the carpet. ‘Don’t be smart, Sheldon, it doesn’t suit you.’

‘So tell me,’ he said, his tone firmer. ‘Why did you appoint me as head of the investigation?’

‘Why do you think? Because I admired you? Is that what you think?’ she said, the words snapping out, becoming strident. ‘No, Sheldon, you have it all wrong.’ She laughed, but it was exaggerated, filled with drunken scorn. ‘I knew you would mess it up, and so I fought for you.’

‘So you wouldn’t get found out?’ he said. He had guessed that as a reason, but it didn’t lessen the feeling of betrayal, of humiliation, that he was the force joke. ‘Or was I just getting too close, by bringing in Lucy? You put me on leave to keep me away, hoping that the files would eventually become cold cases, and so that you could hold on until retirement, hoping that Gemma grows out of her little gang of misfits.’

Dixon looked like she had been slapped when he said Gemma’s name.

She took a drink. ‘I protected my daughter, that’s all. Is that a crime?’

Sheldon nodded slowly. ‘You know that it is, the way you did it.’

Dixon paused at that, and then her lip trembled, her eyes glassy, tears brimming onto her eyelids. She swallowed and gritted her teeth as she tried to maintain some control.

He felt like he ought to go over to her, to offer some support, but he couldn’t get over the fact that people had died, due to her actions.

‘When did it start?’ he said.

‘Huh?’

‘How long have you known about Gemma and Billy Privett and Alice Kenyon?’

She took a deep breath. ‘I didn’t know. That was the problem. I still don’t. I just know that Gemma is with people she shouldn’t be with. But what can I do? She’s twenty now, although she doesn’t look it. I followed her a few times, and I found out they were hanging around with Billy Privett. They were having parties there, just a couple of weeks before Alice died. As soon as I heard about Alice, I feared the worst, I suppose.’

‘Did you interfere with any of the evidence?’

She smiled a watery smile. ‘Are you going to caution me? Take me to the station?’

Sheldon didn’t respond.

‘The answer is no,’ she said eventually.

‘But Ted was getting closer, wasn’t he? He wouldn’t let the media forget about Alice. So you found your own way to silence him. You set him up with Lucy Crane.’

She nodded slowly. ‘She was locked up for shoplifting. I knew who she was, one of Henry Mason’s little gang. I saw her when she was brought into the nick. I told her I could make the case go away if she helped me keep Ted quiet. She was happy to go along with it, because she was part of the group. The set-up was her idea. She tipped off a local press photographer, but I put it in motion.’

‘It almost worked.’

She put her head back. ‘That was the beginning of the end. I hadn’t planned it. I just saw it, and I had the idea, and so I went with it. But they thought they had me then.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘Come on, Sheldon, what do you think? Henry’s gang. I had to tip them off about any drug searches, and the same with Billy Privett. Anything that might cause them problems, I had to pass it on. It was blackmail, but I was caught in it. Everything I had worked for was slipping away from me, and I couldn’t even hold on to my conscience. But what could I do?’

‘Why are you telling me all this? You know I’ll do something about it.’

‘Because I’ve been waiting for this day,’ she said. ‘I knew it would come. It’s almost like a release.’ She exhaled loudly. ‘I just wanted to protect my daughter, that’s all.’

‘People have died this week,’ Sheldon said. ‘Things might have been different if you had told me what you knew.’

‘I know that.’

‘How does that make you feel?’

Dixon looked at the glass, and then at the floor. ‘Like hell,’ she said.