Tick Tock: The gripping new crime thriller from the million copy bestseller

Copyright

Published by AVON

A Division of HarperCollinsPublishers Ltd

1 London Bridge Street

London SE1 9GF

www.harpercollins.co.uk

First published in Great Britain by HarperCollinsPublishers 2019

Copyright © Mel Sherratt 2019

Cover design © Henry Steadman 2019

Cover photographs © Henry Steadman 2019

Mel Sherratt asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.

A catalogue copy of this book is available from the British Library.

This novel is entirely a work of fiction. The names, characters and incidents portrayed in it are the work of the author’s imagination. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is entirely coincidental.

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this ebook on screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of HarperCollins.

Source ISBN: 9780008271077

Ebook Edition © May 2019 ISBN: 9780008271084

Version: 2019-04-24

Praise for Mel Sherratt:

‘An absolute masterpiece. Twisty, turny and full of surprises!’

Angela Marsons

‘Mel Sherratt’s books are as smart and edgy as her heroines’

Cara Hunter

‘Mel Sherratt is the new queen of gritty police procedurals’

C.L. Taylor

‘Twists and turns and delivers a satisfying shot of tension’

Rachel Abbott

‘Heart-stoppingly tense. I love Mel Sherratt’s writing’

Angela Clarke

‘Gripped me from the first page and didn’t let go until the heart-stopping conclusion!’

Robert Bryndza

‘A writer to watch out for’

Mandasue Heller

‘[Allendale] is a welcome addition to the fast-growing band of impressive women detectives entering crime fiction’

The Times

‘On a thriller cocktail list, Hush Hush would be a Bloody Mary with a perfect twist’

Fiona Barton

‘I love all Mel Sherratt’s books’

Ian Rankin

‘Mel Sherratt is a unique voice in detective fiction’

Mail on Sunday

Contents

Cover

Title page

Copyright

Praise for Mel Sherratt

2014

Chapter One: Five Years Later

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Chapter Nineteen

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Twenty-One

Chapter Twenty-Two

Chapter Twenty-Three

Chapter Twenty-Four

Chapter Twenty-Five

Chapter Twenty-Six

Chapter Twenty-Seven

Chapter Twenty-Eight

Chapter Twenty-Nine

Chapter Thirty

Chapter Thirty-One

Chapter Thirty-Two

Chapter Thirty-Three

Chapter Thirty-Four

Chapter Thirty-Five

Chapter Thirty-Six

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Chapter Thirty-Eight

Chapter Thirty-Nine

Chapter Forty

Chapter Forty-One

Chapter Forty-Two

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Four

Chapter Forty-Five

Chapter Forty-Six

Chapter Forty-Seven

Chapter Forty-Eight

Chapter Forty-Nine

Chapter Fifty

Chapter Fifty-One

Chapter Fifty-Two

Chapter Fifty-Three

Chapter Fifty-Four

Chapter Fifty-Five

Chapter Fifty-Six

Chapter Fifty-Seven

Chapter Fifty-Eight

Chapter Fifty-Nine

Chapter Sixty

Chapter Sixty-One

Chapter Sixty-Two

Chapter Sixty-Three

Chapter Sixty-Four

Chapter Sixty-Five

Chapter Sixty-Six

Chapter Sixty-Seven

Chapter Sixty-Eight

Chapter Sixty-Nine

Chapter Seventy

Chapter Seventy-One

Chapter Seventy-Two

Chapter Seventy-Three

Chapter Seventy-Four

Chapter Seventy-Five

Chapter Seventy-Six

Chapter Seventy-Seven

Chapter Seventy-Eight

Chapter Seventy-Nine

Chapter Eighty

Chapter Eighty-One

Author Note

A Letter From Mel

Acknowledgements

Keep Reading …

About the Author

The Grace Allendale Series

About the Publisher

2014

Melissa Wyatt ran along the lane, down towards the field she would cut across for the next part of her journey. She was in training for the London Marathon, only a few days away now. It was her first attempt, the furthest she’d ever run, but she knew she had the strength inside her to complete it.

She was now a firm believer that she could do anything once she put her mind to it. Even two years ago when she’d become a mum at thirty-one, she would never have thought it possible that she could run three miles, let alone twenty-six.

She’d started off slowly, a ruse to lose the baby fat. At first every session had been torture, but eventually her puffing and panting had ceased, and she’d begun to get into an even rhythm. It had only taken three months before she’d been hooked. Now there was no stopping her, because as well as keeping her fit, it had given her a new lease of life. It had lowered her stress levels, giving her a sense of peace.

When she was running, her mind could switch off from all the daily hassles. She could be herself again. Her son Joshua wouldn’t be throwing a tantrum because his TV programme had finished and there wasn’t time to watch another. Her husband Lloyd wouldn’t nag her because he couldn’t find something that he’d lost after putting it down somewhere ‘safe’. She wasn’t at the beck and call of staff and clients ready to interrupt her in a flash, unlike her day-to-day life as a customer services manager at the local building society. She was plain and simply Melissa.

At the bottom of the lane, she climbed over the stile at the side of the gate and ran into a small wooded area. She loved going through here. It was dark and somewhat eerie at this time in the morning.

As she clambered up the man-made steps and out into the open field, she wondered what to cook for tea. Maybe shepherd’s pie, if she remembered to get some mince out of the freezer. There would be no time to nip into the butcher’s to buy some fresh. It was going to be a late evening because she had staff training for an hour once the branch closed at five.

She was now coming into a hilly field, empty except for her. It was early; most people were still asleep. Melissa much preferred to run in the mornings than the evenings. There were fewer people about, and fewer cars too, which was good because the lanes were narrow. A creature of habit, she covered the same route for a few months before switching up to ensure her body became challenged.

At the top of the hill, she took a moment to catch her breath. Up here, she could see for miles. High-rise flats, factories intermingled with the odd strip of green, but mostly built up row upon row of houses. Manchester was a place she’d always call home.

After a minute’s rest, she began to run again. With a bit of luck, she’d be home before anyone in her household was awake. Oh, to have a coffee in peace before Josh was out of bed.

She was nearly at the other side of the field when she heard someone. Turning slightly as she ran, she saw a man running behind her. She slowed and stepped to one side to let him pass, and he drew level on the worn-down grass pathway.

When he threw a punch at her, she was taken by surprise. She gasped as he hit her again, stumbling backwards with the force and landing heavily on the ground.

Almost immediately the man was straddling her and his hands were around her neck.

She tried to push him off, but he was too strong.

She scratched at his hands, but he only squeezed harder. Struggling was useless, but she had to try. He seemed possessed, his face creased with rage.

As the light began to fade from the world, she wondered why she’d been singled out. What had she done to deserve death? Because he was killing her, wasn’t he? And she could do nothing about it.

ONE

Five Years Later

Tuesday

‘What makes you think he likes you?’ Courtney Piggott asked her friend Lauren Ansell as they walked across the field behind their school. ‘Just because he looked at you a certain way doesn’t mean anything.’

‘Of course it does!’ Lauren replied. ‘And I’ve fancied him for ages, so that look means he’s mine for the taking.’

‘You’re so weird,’ Courtney’s twin sister, Caitlin, said. ‘If you believe that, then—’

‘Girls!’

The three of them froze as they heard their PE teacher, Mr Carmichael, shouting to them.

‘I wish you’d exercise your feet as much as your mouths,’ he continued. ‘Hurry up now. Get a move on!’

The girls picked up their pace, jogging a few feet across the field until the teacher turned away from them again.

‘I hate cross-country.’ Caitlin came to a halt with a groan. ‘There should be laws against making us do this. It’s not cool – at all.’

Lauren tripped over her shoelace as they walked, almost falling but managing to right herself in time. ‘I’ll catch you up in a minute,’ she said, shooing her friends away before bending down to tie the laces again.

The twins continued through the gap in the hedge and out onto the lane.

‘I wish there was a short cut back to the school,’ Caitlin said as they walked.

In front of them were the rest of the class, in twos and threes, only the odd pupil running alone. They were the last of the group by a good minute or so, but neither of them was bothered about hurrying to catch up. Instead, they dawdled as they waited for Lauren.

‘Or a magic portal. If there was, we could sneak back and watch everyone else coming in.’ Courtney laughed.

‘Or Doctor Who’s TARDIS!’ Caitlin laughed back.

In front of them, their teacher beckoned them to hurry up as he disappeared around a corner, but still they went at their own pace. They had run this lane many times during their five years at Dunwood Academy. There was nothing to see but a high hedge either side, a space for one car to drive past at a time, which was why it was safe for students to run down, as not many drivers used it.

Ahead of them the twins could see the roof of the school buildings, the railings around it coming into view opposite a row of council bungalows for the elderly.

‘Where’s Lauren?’ Courtney shivered as a gust of wind came up the lane. ‘We’ll be in trouble if we’re not back soon.’

‘I thought she was behind us.’ Caitlin swivelled round, but they were on their own.

‘She can’t have got very far, Cait,’ Courtney told her sister. ‘I bet she’s found a quicker way back and has left us.’

‘She’d better let us in on it if she has.’

They carried on for a few more steps and then Courtney stopped again.

‘We should go back for her.’

‘But we’ll get into trouble if we don’t finish soon.’

‘She should have caught up by now. It will only take a minute.’

With a heavy sigh, Caitlin followed her sister. They ran towards where they’d last seen Lauren, across the field and around the corner of trees.

Not noticing that her sister had stopped, Caitlin almost bumped into the back of her.

Courtney was pointing at a figure lying in the grass. ‘There’s something wrong.’

‘What do you mean?’

Caitlin followed behind her as they ran to their friend. The wind picking up across the open ground was the only thing they could hear. They drew level, their eyes widening with fear. Lauren was lying on her back, her blonde hair fanned out around her head.

‘She’s having us on, isn’t she?’ Caitlin said.

‘I don’t know,’ Courtney whispered. ‘Lauren?’

She prodded Lauren’s leg gently with her toes. Maybe that would make Lauren giggle if she was winding them up. But she didn’t move.

‘Lauren?’ Caitlin dropped to her knees. ‘Are you okay?’

It was then she noticed the glazed look in her friend’s eyes.

TWO

Leaving her home in Manchester hadn’t been as gut-wrenching as DS Grace Allendale had thought it was going to be. It had been more of a relief as she’d closed the door for the final time and handed the keys in at the estate agent’s. The house had begun to depress her. It never seemed to remind her of what she’d had, only of what she had lost. Starting afresh was what she’d needed.

Moving back to her hometown of Stoke-on-Trent had turned out in her favour, too. Despite her first case being personal, she’d settled into life at Bethesda Police Station. She was getting to know everyone eight months on, as well as the good and the bad of the area.

Stoke-on-Trent was a city of two halves in every meaning of the term. There were beautiful areas of vast countryside alongside barren inner-city areas that had been set for regeneration and then forgotten about. Abandoned factories of years gone by close to others that flourished, staying in the game by welcoming visitors and embracing social media coverage. It had several large housing estates owned by the city council and lanes with affluent property owners, their gardens stretching to acres. Empty shops in local towns sat next to family firms that had been in business for decades. Rough alongside smooth: wealth alongside poverty.

Grace never went with the adage that the wealthy were any better than the ones scraping around for pennies. She firmly believed there were shades of polite and ugly in every level of society. She’d seen compassion from a drug user at the lowest ebb of his life; she’d seen injuries of domestic abuse caused by a high-ranking politician. So much went on behind closed doors regardless of class.

Arriving back from a meeting with Allie Shenton, a colleague who oversaw six local community intelligence teams, she felt a buzz of activity as soon as she opened the door to the office where her team was located. Her phone went off and she slipped a hand inside her jacket pocket to retrieve it. It was her boss, DI Nick Carter.

Grace could see him sitting in his office. She raised her hand to show him she was here as she walked across to him. Something must have come in while she’d been out. Adrenaline began to pump through her, as had become natural.

‘We’ve had a call of a suspicious death at Dunwood Academy, over in Norton,’ Nick told her. ‘Female, sixteen years of age. Out on a cross-country run, got left behind. First thoughts were she’d had some kind of seizure. Two pupils found her; one ran to get help. By the time their teacher got to her, bruising had started to appear around her neck.’

Grace pulled a face. ‘Do they suspect foul play from anyone there? The teachers, or the pupils?’

‘I’m not sure. Can you task someone with getting everything ready here and then we can go in five?’

‘Will do.’ She headed back to her desk.

Perry Wright, one of two detective constables on her team, was sitting opposite her.

‘I’ve grabbed a pool car, Sarge,’ he said as she approached.

Grace nodded her appreciation. ‘Sam, are you okay setting up the incident room for us, please?’

‘Sure thing.’ DC Sam Markham nodded.

Since she’d first arrived at the station, Grace had learned that the staff in her team had jobs they preferred. Wanting to be in the thick of it all, it was usually Perry who came out to the enquiries with her. Grace liked that she had someone solid by her side. Although, while Perry was fit and bulky to Sam’s small and nimble, Sam could still pull a suspect down in a rugby tackle whenever necessary. At thirty-eight, she was two years older than Grace, and she came into her own as office manager: sorting things out, getting the details down, doing the minute things that could make or break a case. It worked, and Grace hadn’t felt a need to change things.

‘Tell me about the school,’ Grace said to Perry as he drove them north to the scene of the crime. She relied on her team for their local knowledge, even though she was learning the different patches and area.

‘Dunwood Academy? A bit of a dive before government intervention. Certain kids were always getting into trouble and the school was underperforming on grades. But it’s doing much better at the moment. Plus, it’s on the edge of the Bennett Estate.’

‘Ah.’ Grace nodded. Perry didn’t need to say any more.

The Bennett Estate was the second largest estate in Stoke-on-Trent. Like a lot of social housing, it had a reputation for trouble and unruly tenants but, more often than not, Grace found that rumours were just that. This area, however, did live up to its status as a sink estate. She wasn’t being unkind when she reckoned 90 per cent of its residents didn’t work, 70 per cent were single parents and most of them were probably bringing up the next generation of crooks.

The school was on the edge of the city, meaning that it backed onto a considerable amount of countryside. But driving up to the block itself, you wouldn’t have reason to believe that. It was a deftly overpopulated area with homes on every available piece of land. Built in the mid-1940s, the estate was past its sell-by date in terms of today’s standards. Cars were parked everywhere owing to lack of space, on already narrow roads, which were a rat run for car chases.

Grace and Perry pulled into the already crowded car park. As they stepped out of the vehicle, there seemed to be orderly chaos everywhere Grace looked. Teachers were herding pupils into a main hallway. Parents had started to turn up, no doubt having been rung by frantic children wondering what was going on.

They passed a woman she assumed to be a member of staff trying to explain to a man that he needed to wait until his child’s name was crossed off her list and then someone would go and fetch him; Grace presumed this was to ensure they had a record of who was on the premises. Another woman was trying to stop a worried parent from barging through.

A uniformed officer was marking down names of people who were going into the school as part of their investigation. Grace knew they could contain the crime scene as it was away from the school site, but it would be handy in the days to come to show who had been where and doing what here as well.

Nick caught up with Grace and Perry after parking next to them.

‘I think we’ll go and see her first,’ he said. ‘Then we can speak to the girls who found her, the teachers who took the class and the headmaster. Eyes are on us.’

Grace nodded. A small crowd was gathering across the road from the entrance gate, a row of bungalows behind them. Already, there were a few people either speaking into or tapping away at their phones.

Nick pointed to a lane at the side of the school. It had been blocked by a marked vehicle parked horizontally across the tarmac, its lights flashing.

‘She’s a five-minute walk from here,’ he said. ‘Let’s go.’

THREE

Grace, Nick and Perry presented their warrant cards to another uniformed officer with a clipboard and, once he’d noted them down, began the sombre walk to the body. The school was at the end of a road that led to a single access lane. With hedges on both sides, and knowing what she was about to look at, Grace couldn’t help feeling claustrophobic. It was eerily quiet too, once they’d left behind the noise of the school. Grace shivered, even though the April day was mild.

After a steep incline, the entrance to the field loomed at them. There was another police car parked, its tailgate open. Inside were the items they were required to put on before going to the crime scene, to avoid contamination and help them catch only their killer’s DNA and vital evidence – forensic white suits and shoe covers, latex gloves and masks to cover their mouths.

They each dressed in the appropriate gear and turned off the lane, through a gap in the hedge. Grace looked in front of her; there were a few bushes scattered across the grassy landscape and a large hedge around the perimeter. To her left, she had a clear view across some of the city, seeing rows of houses and gardens, and a large football playing field with a changing hut.

If this death was suspicious, Grace mused, it would be the second murder investigation in Stoke-on-Trent since she’d arrived. Back in September, she had helped to catch a serial killer. The timing couldn’t have been more poignant, but then again, the killer was someone she had known, so it was no coincidence that their rampage coincided with her return to her birth town.

Since then, the city had been fairly quiet. There had been the usual assaults, domestics and some low-level crime, but nothing as big as her first case with her team.

They reached the tent. In the far distance, Grace could see a row of gardens from properties that backed onto the field. She doubted any surveillance would scope this far, but made a mental note to send someone to contact their owners anyway. Then she took a deep breath before following Nick.

It was unprofessional, she knew, but she couldn’t stop the tears welling in her eyes as she took in the young girl at her feet. She had long blonde hair and a heavy fringe. Her head was partly facing away from them, her eyes open and thankfully looking in the opposite direction.

The bruising around her neck was prominent now, popping up from above the collar of her sweatshirt. The uniform of leggings and long sleeves was different from the one Grace remembered from her school days: T-shirts and short skirts, and the mottled legs that weren’t a nice look when it was cold.