Cloak of Silence (Jake Harding Adventures Book 1)

That didn’t go well, Jake told himself as the journalist disappeared from view along the path through the prickly pears.

The old man was wiry and probably stronger than he looked, but surely he couldn’t have made Zoë go if she didn’t want to, unless he had a gun of course. But even that wouldn’t explain why there was no trail that the dog could follow. But who else was there? Spyros had a perfect alibi and everyone else in the village was pretty harmless.

He gazed out at the view and the monastery below him; there was no way the monks would be involved.

Sitting back on the bench, he ran the various possibilities through his mind. There wasn’t an obvious alternative and he kept coming back to the Buzzard.

There was no hard evidence but a few things nagged at him. The way the Buzz had looked at Zoë at the taverna had been creepy, almost as if he knew her better than he really did. And turning up at the bench looking shifty on his way to the taverna. And of course there were the persistent rumours about him in the village.

But rumours and shifty looks didn’t add up to much; he needed something more positive. He jumped to his feet, and immediately saw the folder of Fun Run answer sheets lying accusingly on the bench. He looked at his watch and swore under his breath.

He met his mum and Rob when he’d run halfway back home. They were in the Defender coming fast towards him down the village street. Rob was driving, his tanned face set in grim concentration. Jake didn’t recognise his mum immediately, she looked so drawn and anxious and somehow smaller than usual. But her face lit up when she saw him and he saw her old dazzling smile back, just for an instant.

Rob stopped the vehicle and jerked his thumb to the rear door. His mum turned in her seat as he got in, now with an expression that asked where had he been.

‘I was worried about you,’ she said, and Jake wondered if she’d been crying.

‘I’m really sorry, mum.’ He put his hand on her shoulder and she placed her hand on his.

‘What were you doing?’ Rob asked, not sounding sympathetic.

‘I stayed on at the bench for a bit. I was thinking about Zoë and trying to figure out what might have happened to her.’

‘While I waited like a prat for you to turn up with the results,’ Rob said irritably as he turned the Land Rover.

‘We asked the kids if they’d seen you,’ his mum said. ‘One pair said they were last to leave and you were still there. They saw a man heading that way and described Bill Blizzard exactly.’ She looked straight ahead but squeezed his hand to make sure he was still there. ‘And when you didn’t come back, I feared the worst.’

‘Yeah, he turned up, but didn’t stay long,’ Jake said. ‘So you think he might’ve done something to Zoë?’

‘I…I don’t know anymore,’ his mum replied and squeezed his hand again before reaching in her pocket for a tissue.

They pulled up in the courtyard and his mum hurried into the house without another word.

Jake handed the folder to Rob. ‘I’ve sorted them out with the highest score on top,’ he said.

Their eyes met. ‘It’s tough for you, Jake, really tough. But try not to worry your mum needlessly, okay?’

‘Okay,’ Jake said quietly. It was tough on Rob and the others too and Jake wondered if Rob knew that his job and the whole future of Thunder Bay were on the line.

‘My mum obviously thinks it’s Bill Blizzard.’

‘He’s the only person around here who seems half likely.’

Jake went inside and found his mum in the study, working on the computer. He bent down and kissed her, which was not something he did much these days.

If she noticed she didn’t show it. ‘We had an email from Dexter, Zoë’s boyfriend,’ she said. ‘Dex has certainly not heard from her – he’s dreadfully upset.’

‘Mum, I’m just going out for a run. I’ll be about an hour.’

‘A run?’ she sounded surprised. ‘Take care and…’ she squinted at the clock in the corner of the screen, ‘…see you at 8:30.’

A few minutes later, Jake was jogging along the beach. It was warm with no wind and the low sun floodlighting the taverna terrace. The sound of talk and laughter along with bouzouki music from one of Spyros’s CDs made him wish that he and his parents were there having dinner, along with Zoë of course.

Spyros, serving behind the bar, noticed him and they exchanged waves. One of the customers leaning on the bar was the Buzzard.

When he reached the end of the beach he scrambled up the steep slope to the road. The monastery car park was deserted and he sprinted up the side opposite the hedge to the top corner, from where a path wound haphazardly up the gentle slope. It took him through a stand of Holm oaks and, as the hillside steepened, through an ancient olive grove. He slowed to a walk as he came out onto a gravel road that curved around the contour of the hill.

The villa lay not far along the road. The place looked deserted but he’d better be certain. He’d heard plenty of rumours in the village about the Buzzard, mostly about what had happened to his wife, who it seemed was Lebanese. His parents reckoned she had probably just got fed up with him and gone back to the Lebanon, but the villagers spoke of all sorts of scandalous stories, even hinting at murder. But the stories all agreed that he lived alone and never had visitors. Bill Blizzard ignored the wagging tongues and stared stonily at anyone who made reference to his private life.

Jake glanced up and down the road but since leaving the beach he hadn’t seen anyone. He pushed open the garden gate and walked up the path. It was a modern single storey building half hidden by dense planting. His senses were on high alert but there was no movement at any of the three windows that faced the road. Crime wasn’t a problem around here but the windows were protected by discreet burglar bars.

There was a bell push next to the front door and he heard the doorbell ring somewhere inside the house. He checked his watch; it was quarter to eight. It would take him ten minutes to run home, which left him just over half an hour here.

There was no response to his ring and after a minute he turned away, allowing himself a grim smile; he’d no idea what he would’ve said if someone had opened the door.

A tall fence enclosed the back garden and came up to the wall of the house on both sides. It might have stopped someone less agile but he was over it in a moment. There were two more windows in the side of the house, both with curtains drawn across them. The ground sloped quite steeply here and, from the corner of the house a concrete wall, a metre taller than he was, continued down the hill. He followed it around from the shadows at the side into the sunshine at the back of the property. A neatly tended garden extended down the hillside below the house, screened by a tall boarded fence. He carried on round to the further side where a flight of stone steps led up to the terrace level. He took one step at a time until he could see over the top of the wall, his heart thumping in his chest. He’d be in such trouble if he was caught.

Wow!

A swimming pool filled to the brim with sparkling water stretched across the width of the house with an infinity edge on the view side. The sun was not far from setting and lit up the whole back of the house which was one long stretch of floor to ceiling windows. Awesome and, best of all, deserted. He pushed open a gate in the glass balustrade and walked onto the terrace. The tiled roof of the house came down low creating a deep veranda that would be shaded for most of the day. The view was incredible with the blue water of the pool merging with the deep blue of the distant sea. He was sweating from his fast run up the hill and would have loved to peel off his tee-shirt, kick off his trainers and dive in.

He reluctantly turned his back on the pool and, with another glance at his watch, examined the house. Another five minutes had slipped by. The curtains were open and the low sun lit up the interior like a film set; a bedroom on the left, a living room in the centre and an open-plan kitchen on the right. Jake whistled: it was pretty cool. The tall French doors were all closed and locked. At each side of the house a room projected forward to the line of the veranda roof, enclosing the terrace on three sides. These rooms had windows with sills at knee height, one on the front looking out to the view and another on the side, looking onto the terrace. The curtains were closed but on the room on the right they were open a chink.

It seemed to be a study and was as cluttered as the other rooms were tidy. A desk stood under the back window which also had curtains drawn. The room was in semi-darkness, but a shaft of low sunlight through a gap in the curtains blazed a trail across the desk revealing a clutter of papers. This was the most promising of the rooms; he might actually find out something. The walls were covered in framed photographs and as Jake tried to look further into the room, he realised that the window moved in his hand.

He pulled and it opened a little before the slider at the bottom of the window engaged with a loud click. He slid his hand up through the narrow gap and got his fingertips to the metal bar. With a firm push it popped upwards off its pin and the window swung open.

He looked around guiltily before turning his attention back into the room.

Don’t be crazy, just push the window closed and head back home!

He checked his watch again and hesitated. Five to eight; he still had a good twenty minutes. The Buzz would still be at the taverna, so what was the risk?  And if he bottled out now, how would he face himself if Thunder Bay came to be sold?

He put his head and shoulders through the opening and stared around the room. His heart was thumping and his stomach felt icy. Pushing the curtains back further, he was able to make out more details. There was a computer on the desk and papers scattered around everywhere. The framed photographs must have been Bill Blizzard’s favourites from his long career as a photo-journalist. A new looking silver frame near the door glinted in the shaft of sunlight and Jake glanced at the photograph, before staring in amazement.

It couldn’t be. All caution gone, he stepped in over the low window sill. He walked across the room as if in a dream, unable to take his eye of the sunlit photograph. It was a head and shoulders photograph of a smiling, relaxed teenage girl with a cloud of dark hair around a pretty face. A face he knew very well indeed.

Zoë!

Jake stared at it dumbly, before his mind got itself into gear. It looked recent but when had it been taken? The background was blurred and gave away no clues. She wasn’t wearing earrings, but there was something else. Something obvious…of course, her hair! It was shoulder length: that photo had been taken sometime during the last week.

And here it was, in a silver frame on Bill Blizzard’s study wall. Was it some sort of bizarre trophy? The photos around it looked much older, groups of people, street scenes, landscapes, soldiers, tanks, a building on fire…

His eyes were drawn back to the picture of his sister. She looked happy enough. In fact her smile was so infectious he was about to smile himself when something, a small sound perhaps, made him look through the doorway into the next room.

A man was standing there, his face in darkness, but the ray of sunlight giving a dull gleam to the pistol he was pointing at Jake.

‘Put your hands up.’ His voice was quiet but loaded with menace. ‘Or you’re dead.’