FALLEN IDOLS. Neil White

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      Tom considered how to answer that, and he did it by walking over to a television and turning it on.

      ‘We’ve got the evidence from Dumas’s phone,’ he said. ‘There are some texts.’ He went back to where he had left his papers. He shuffled through them until he found what he was looking for. ‘They make interesting reading, and for now we want the press off them.’

      He looked down at the piece of paper he was holding, and then began to read from them. There were some giggles, some chuckles. They were intimate, sexual. And it was immediately apparent that Dumas was having affairs with a number of women around the country.

      The worst part was the names given by Dumas in his phone address book. It wasn’t by name, but by location, as if he had ready company wherever he played. Liverpool. Manchester. Newcastle. And the texts these women sent made it clear that he had slept with them. Sometimes they weren’t alone. Laura felt that she was learning more than she needed to know about the sex life of a footballer.

      ‘How do we know these people are women?’ said a voice. As Laura looked, she saw it was the same person as before, pursuing the gay angle.

      Tom gave a small smile. ‘My eyes are getting old, but there’s no mistaking some of these.’

      And then he pressed play on a machine below the television.

      ‘These are all the pictures and video files from his phone.’

      The room went silent as the screen lit up with images. Then Laura could hear nervous shuffling as Tom scrolled through them.

      ‘This is Manchester.’ And onto the screen came a young brunette, shapely and naked. She was smiling, and it would have looked almost innocent had she not been naked and with her legs open for the camera.

      ‘And this is Newcastle,’ and it was much more of the same, except that there were pictures of her with a man, presumably Dumas. ‘There’s some moving footage of her,’ and then Tom flicked onto some grainy footage of a blonde rolling around on a bed, giggling and laughing, enjoying the party.

      Then Tom grew serious. ‘We have pictures and some movies for every contact in his address book, and we can see the face of every one, and we have a number for every one.’ Tom flicked forward to a picture of a naked girl. ‘Except for this girl.’

      As everyone looked at the image, Laura could sense the tension in the room.

      The image was of a naked woman, explicit and sexual, the image just from the shoulders down, her legs open, a sex toy in her hand. Laura guessed she was older than a teenager; her body was well-formed, with good shoulders and strong legs, but she didn’t have the spread of a woman in her thirties. The skin was still young and taut; it was obvious that she looked after herself.

      ‘We think these are more of the same woman,’ and more images flashed onto the screen. They were all similar, except that sometimes the sex toy was being used, sometimes it wasn’t.

      Laura thought there was something mechanical about the pictures, compared to the others. The other pictures were of young women having a good time, either posing for the camera or taking part with Dumas. It was a little black book, in digital, and it seemed that Dumas never went lonely. But the headless girl stopped anyone from telling whether she was enjoying it or not, and her poses looked stiff, formal.

      ‘There’s some video footage as well,’ and Tom forwarded to some more grainy footage.

      There were three sets, and it was obvious that this woman did not know she was being filmed. Laura guessed that she wouldn’t have said yes to it if Dumas had asked, and that made her different from the rest on the phone.

      The first was footage looking down Dumas’s body, at the top of a blonde head, and it was obvious what she was doing, her head moving backwards and forwards in rhythm. It looked like Dumas had grabbed the chance for a memento while her eyes were engaged elsewhere.

      The second was another shot down Dumas’s body, except this time the woman was facing away from him, on all fours, the rock of her body making it plain to everyone that they were having sex.

      The third was less sexual, and it lasted the longest.

      It was a shot into a bathroom, and Tom said that it was Dumas’s bathroom. It showed a shower cubicle, steam misting up the glass, and inside the shower was a woman. There was just over a minute of a woman standing under the showerhead, washing her hair or rinsing Dumas away.

      The steam probably stopped her seeing Dumas with his phone in his hand, but it also stopped everyone else from seeing what she looked like. All Laura could tell was that she was tall, with long hair, light in colour.

      Tom switched off the television.

      ‘We think that woman has something to do with Dumas’s murder.’ He started to pace, sensing how quiet the room had become. ‘The posed photographs were sent from a withheld number, the only ones on the phone that were. The movie files taken by Dumas have been given the file names London 1, London 2, and London 3, so we know she’s local, but it seems like she has tried to keep her identity secret.’

      ‘Maybe she was shy?’ someone said, and everyone laughed, breaking the tension. She didn’t seem that shy.

      Tom shook his head. ‘There’s something else.’ He picked up his piece of paper again. ‘We don’t know if they’re from the same person, but Dumas received a number of texts in the last few days, all from a withheld number.’ Tom looked around the room, making sure he had everyone’s attention. ‘And one of them, sent four days ago, told him to meet her yesterday outside Cafe Boheme on Old Compton Street.’

      A murmur spread around the room.

      ‘Does it say why?’ asked Laura.

      ‘The nearest hint we get is when he says no at first, and she answers back that either he goes public or she does.’

      ‘With what?’

      Tom shrugged. ‘If we knew that, we’d be knocking on doors right now. But she says that if he meets her, they might be able to sort it out.’

      Laura sighed. Blackmail, she thought. All of this for something as grubby as that.

      Tom flicked the television back on. The picture of the naked woman flashed back onto the screen. ‘We need to find this woman urgently,’ and then he sighed, scratching his head. ‘Releasing her picture to the press is going to be tricky, though.’

      Laughter rippled around the room.

      Tom looked at Laura. ‘Your press contact could be crucial. Keep on him, find out what you can.’ He looked around. ‘Everyone else knows what they have to do.’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘And as for me, I’ve got a fiancée to visit.’

       NINE

      I headed for Canary Wharf. The Docklands Light Railway twisted between the flyovers like a fairground ride, but I was able to avoid it, knowing that what I wanted wouldn’t be there.

      I’d had a bad night’s sleep. My father’s phone call kept on waking me up.

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