Web of Lies by Sally Rigby (classic novels for teens txt) 📗

‘Is there any chance we can stop off somewhere to pick me up something to eat? A burger from the drive-through would do the trick.’

‘We’re expected at the Blacks’ house at four.’

‘It’s only a slight detour and won’t take long. I can eat it on the way. Please.’

‘Okay.’

He drove them through the town centre and stopped at the first fast-food restaurant they came to. Luckily there wasn’t a queue.

He ordered her a burger, which she wolfed down in a couple of bites, and a coffee.

‘Thanks, I needed that after the night I had.’ She rested her head on the window.

‘What happened?’

‘I was out with friends clubbing, that’s what young people do on a Friday night.’

‘But we were together last night.’

She looked at him from under her lashes and laughed. ‘You crack me up. I didn’t go out until eleven. I know in your day people would go out early, but they don’t do that now.’

‘What do you mean my day? I’m not a geriatric.’ He couldn’t remember the last time he’d been dancing at a club, but he wasn’t going to admit that. He much preferred concerts or the theatre.

They arrived in Marston Trussell with time to spare, and stopped outside a semi-detached, cream pebble-dashed house with a white door and a gravel drive.

At exactly four, they walked up the short drive to the front door and, after knocking, an elderly man in his seventies appeared. He was wearing a shirt and tie, with a pair of suit trousers. The only concession to him being at home and not in an office was his tartan slippers.

Had he dressed up to meet them?

‘Mr Black? I’m Sebastian Clifford, I phoned you earlier. This is my colleague DC Bird.’

‘I’m always happy to help the police.’ He smiled at Birdie.

‘I’m not actually on duty today, sir. I’ve come with Sebastian to talk to you.’

‘Oh. Never mind. Come on in, my wife’s in the lounge.’

They walked into the nicely decorated house and followed him to a small living room with a brick-built fire in the centre of the wall facing them. His wife stood up from the sofa and smiled. She too was dressed nicely in a floral print dress which buttoned up the front.

‘Hello, Mrs Black. It was very kind of you and Mr Black to agree to speak to us,’ Seb said.

‘Please, call us Bert and Pearl.’

‘Are these all your family?’ Birdie said, gesturing to the walls which were covered in mounted photos.

‘Yes they are. We have four children, twelve grandchildren and three great-grandchildren. They’re scattered all over the world, as far away as New Zealand. We had planned to travel overseas to see them all, but …’ Her voice fell away.

‘We can still speak to them on the computer. It’s amazing what you can do nowadays. You can actually see them, and the picture is so good you feel like you can almost touch them,’ Mr Black said, putting his arm around her shoulders.

‘Except we can’t.’ She gave a sigh.

‘Please sit down,’ Mr Black gestured to the two rust-coloured easy chairs which were either side of the sofa. ‘You want to talk about Mr Witherspoon?’

‘Yes, if you don’t mind. Please could you tell us how you first got involved with him,’ Seb said.

‘We invested all our money with him after seeing his advert in the paper. We wanted to make sure we had enough money once we’d retired to do all those things we’d planned. Like travel. We’d sold our house when we downsized after the last of the children left home and had a large amount of money. The bank rates were appalling, so I contacted Donald to find out more.’

‘Did you know him before this?’ Seb asked

‘He was a member of the Rotary club I belonged to. We were acquaintances. He came around to see us and talked about investing and what we could do with our money, to give us the best return. He suggested we reinvested our dividends, to build up our capital sum, and said that we could change that at any time and also take out the lump sum we’d put in once the initial investment period was over.’

‘How much did you invest?’

‘A hundred thousand pounds. It was the money we had left after selling our house and buying this one. At first, we reinvested the dividends and when we retired we changed and received an income every month which we used to top up our state pensions.’

‘He seemed so nice,’ Mrs Black said. ‘He took us out to a fancy restaurant to celebrate when we signed all the papers. The Elm Tree, in Husbands Bosworth. I don’t know if it’s still there because we haven’t been since. He was charming, and we trusted him.’

‘Did you take any other financial advice?’ Birdie asked.

Mr Black hung his head. ‘I wish we had. But he was reputable, we knew him, and for years there were no issues at all, until …’ He paused.

‘What happened?’ Seb asked.

‘Six months before he died the payments stopped. He said there was a financial crisis in the Middle East and that we shouldn’t worry. He was working hard to sort out the situation.’

Seb shook his head. ‘And you believed him.’

‘Yes, we did. We then left it for a couple of months and after there were still no payments, I contacted him again and left a message on his voicemail. He didn’t call back. I tried several times with no joy, so in the end I sent an email saying that we want all of our money back. After that, he called. He apologised profusely and promised our money within two weeks. It didn’t happen. So, I contacted the FCA and told them what had happened. They said they would investigate and let me know what they’d found. They reported back that there were some anomalies … that was the word they used, and they would be taking matters further. But then he died.’

‘And we lost our money,’ Mrs Black said, a single