Page 158 of Too Close To Home

“And you expect us to believe you kept this for no reason?” Harrison said. “No idea what it is. No idea what it means.”

Andy didn’t answer.

Harrison sat back, studying him. Then he was about to go in and ask more, demand more. Go for the jugular, completely go off manual for interviewing when the solicitor decided it was then he should pipe up and remind everyone why he got paid.

“Inspector, unless you intend to charge my client, I’d suggest there are no longer sufficient grounds to justify his continued detention in relation to Emily Fisher.”

Of course, he was right. Harrison had nothing on Andy. Not to do with Emily Fisher. There was no charge. It wouldn’t stand.

Though he wasn’t innocent either.

“Don’t mistake this for the end of our interest in you.” Harrison nodded at the photographs. “We will be returning to those.”

The solicitor packed away his things. “Then we’re done here.”

Harrison finally looked at him. Gave a small nod. “For now.”

Then he reached forward and stopped the recording.

A uniformed officer took Andy back down to custody while out in the corridor, Calder fell into step beside Harrison, waiting for instructions.

Harrison handed the map to him. “Get this scanned properly. I want someone from intel to take a look. See if it matches anything local. Old sites, industrial land, anything fallen off the radar.”

Calder nodded. “I’ll get it over to them now.”

“And pull everything we’ve got on that steel works. Ownership, site plans, any disused units, outbuildings. I want to know what’s there. And what isn’t.”

“Yes, sir.”

“And put a car on Mitchell when he’s out. Low key. I want to know where he goes.”

“Surveillance?”

“For now, just eyes on,” Harrison got to his desk, or what he’d decided was his desk. “If he knows something, he’ll lead us to it.”

Calder nodded. “Got it.” He then eyed Harrison slipping into his coat. “Where you off to?”

“I’m going to speak to the father again. There’s a lot of noise coming out of Andy, but, like I said last night, rumours don’t appear out of nowhere.”

“And the barman, sir? Are we following that up? What Whitton said?”

Harrison exhaled slowly, swiping a hand over the back of his neck as he considered it. He’d had no choice but to log Jake’s information properly to get traction on it, which meant it was now in the system—picked over, discussed, judged. Jake Whitton, already a complication, was now neatly filed as something else in the eyes of the team. A distraction. A liability.

Worse.

Harrison knew how it went. He’d seen it in other stations, other teams. Men like Brodie, men who survived the way they had to, were rarely afforded the benefit of doubt. Their pasts became shorthand. Their choices, justifications. And Jake, tied to that, would be measured by the same yardstick.

He didn’t like it.

Didn’t like that he’d been the one to put it there.

“Put an officer on him,” he said at last. “Low level. I want eyes, not pressure. He’s got previous. If we push too hard, he’ll shut down.”

Calder nodded.

But Harrison’s thoughts moved on. To the file. To what had come back on Brodie Simmons. Fragmented, messy, and far more complicated than the version the team would reduce him to. A life built on survival, on bad decisions and worse circumstances, ending in patterns that were easy to judge and harder to understand. Yes, he was someone to keep eyes on. And Jake should know. If he didn’t already. Procedure said assign it. Pass it off. Let uniform handle it, keep the lines clean, keep the distance.

Harrison knew he wouldn’t.