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‘No. None at all. They love him. He’s really popular. He’s always laughing and joking.’
‘Had he mentioned anything odd? Strange phone calls, maybe friends from his past turning up?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t think he kept in touch with anyone from school.’
‘His teen years?’ Kim pushed, but Katie’s face remained blank, confirming that she didn’t know about his time spent at Welton or the reason for him being there.
It was likely to come out in the press and that was soon enough. The woman had had enough shocks for one day.
Right now, there was nothing to suggest he’d done anything further. His job didn’t put him around children, and he was happily married, albeit to a much younger woman that he’d been seeing since her teens.
‘Had anything at all changed in his life recently?’ Kim asked, briefly considering Stacey’s theory of the victims being murdered before they committed a crime. She prided herself on always taking her team’s theories seriously, however outlandish.
‘Nothing at all. He was just happy and going about his life.’
As she’d thought.
‘Okay, Mrs Yates, thank you for talking to us at such a difficult—’
‘Oh, there was one small thing, but I don’t think it helps in any way, just Nathan being his normal generous self.’
‘Go on,’ Kim said, feeling the smallest of pits forming in her stomach.
‘He’d applied to be a volunteer at the local youth club.’
SIXTY-SEVEN
It was almost lunchtime when Bryant pulled into the car park of the West Midlands Hospital on Colman Hill. They were saved the bother of requesting the presence of Curtis Jones when he came striding out of the front door. A simple sports jacket did little to hide the nurse’s uniform beneath.
‘Just the man,’ Kim said, stepping into his path. ‘May we have a word?’
His smile faltered. ‘A quick one. I’m meeting a friend for lunch.’
‘We’ll try not to keep you. We understand you’re a member of the Black Country Angels vigilante group?’
The promise of a frown materialised. ‘How do you know that?’
‘We just do. Would you care to tell us why?’ she asked.
‘Why what? I haven’t done anything wrong, have I?’
‘Not that we know of, but there has to be a reason why you joined them. What prompted you?’
He shrugged. ‘My sense of community service.’
‘I’m gonna call bullshit on that,’ she said, raising an eyebrow. ‘People normally join up with vigilante groups because they feel a sense of injustice, that they’re trying to right a wrong.’
‘That’s them, not me,’ he said, looking over her shoulder and shifting from one foot to the other.
Her experience with Alison and her own powers of observation told her that this man wasn’t telling them the truth.
‘What happened to you, Curtis?’ Kim asked.
‘Nothing happened to me, Inspector.’
‘So, why are you…?’
‘If you really want the truth, I joined because of you. I joined because I don’t trust you lot to do your fucking jobs.’
