The Sect (The Craig Crime Series) by Catriona King Page A

yes.”
    “Too late, you nodded.”
    “I was nodding at the possibility of finding something.”
    He moved to the cabinet and pointed at something they couldn’t see, his ability to spot emerging clues honed by years on the job.
    “There’s what looks like a smudge on the first outer sheet of cling-film. But don’t get excited, it mightn’t give us anything.”
    Craig patted him on the shoulder. “I have faith in you.”
    As he turned to leave Liam shook his head, like the grim reaper announcing the end was nigh.
    “You’ve done it now, mate. Gone and got his hopes up. Prepare to be hounded to death till we’ve solved the whole lot.”
     
    ****
     
    The Demesne Estate. 1 p.m.
     
    The report said that Sam Beech’s parents were actually parent singular; a mother, Sarah. She’d been abandoned by Sam’s father a decade earlier and, after a succession of partners whose motives had ranged from gaining a roof over their heads to having a punch bag on whom to take out their bad moods, she’d finally decided that Sam was all that she needed in life. But not, Craig speculated, before considerable damage had been done to her young son.
    He followed the twisting side roads till they reached the heart of East Belfast’s Demesne Estate and parked his elderly Audi, wondering if it would still have wheels when they emerged. The flat they wanted was two storeys up and of a type being demolished and replaced. The planners clearly hadn’t reached the Beeches yet.
    As Sarah Beech answered her front door her face paled anxiously, as if she’d been waiting for someone to call. She pulled the thin door open a sliver, yanking it wider when Craig took out his badge. The door’s weight made her fall back against the wall and he wasn’t surprised; she was a wisp of a malnourished woman, barely five-feet-one in the socks she stood in and weighing around six stone. Her son had been slight as well; the apple hadn’t fallen far from the tree and the worms had been at them both.
    “May we come in, Ms Beech? It’s about your son.”
    Any last shred of reticence evaporated and with a hopeful smile she waved them into a wood-chipped front room. Craig’s heart sank, knowing that it would be the last flicker of hope she would ever have and that he would be the one to snuff it out.
    There is no easy way to break bad news; people much wiser than him had researched the options for years. Standing or sitting, fast or slow, abrupt or soft, with questions answered or mystery maintained, they all inflicted a wound that would sting for years, before, if you were very lucky, it faded to a dull throb. Craig chose to do it fast and soft with Sarah Beech firmly in a seat. She looked barely strong enough to stand normally; grief might make her drop at their feet.
    For every way there is to break bad news there are even more ways for people to respond. All are chilling to the onlooker, but possibly the way in which Sarah Beech reacted was the worst. Although her mouth opened to ask them questions her eyes said that their answers couldn’t possibly be relevant to her. The police had obviously got it wrong; her Sammy was alive somewhere and any day now he would walk in through the door. She’d tell him off and run him a bath, then sit him in front of a DVD with his favourite takeaway.
    She shook her head as Craig was speaking, slightly so as not to offend; after all these nice men had come all the way to see her and she didn’t like to be rude. She wondered if they’d like some tea and rose to make a pot, but Liam steered her gently back to the sofa, his expression saying that her denial was cutting him to the bone.
    Craig answered every question gently, watching her face for some sign that she had already known that her son was dead. Not known in her heart like any mother would, but known in her mind because she’d been somehow involved in his demise. He hated the suspicion that made him watch and was thankful when he saw nothing to say yes. All