In Plain Sight

Chapter 2

2

PC Theo Curwood brought the Volvo to just below sixty miles an hour before slowing to turn into the petrol station. Although the call hadn’t been given the highest level of priority, Theo was less than a mile from the scene when it had come in, and was otherwise having a pretty quiet night. He knew it was possible to peak at well over seventy on that stretch of road, but there was no immediate threat to life — and he didn’t fancy being responsible for one.

As he was pulling in, another call came across the radio announcing another robbery that had just occurred at a petrol station on Chancel Street.

Theo raised his eyebrows briefly, but wasn’t particularly shocked. It was often the case that robberies would follow in quick succession as a gang tried to get as many results as they could before going back underground for a while until things calmed down. It wasn’t unusual for a group of lads to come from out of town, hold up a few shops and disappear again within a few hours, before getting rid of their car and trying somewhere else a few weeks later.

The call asked for nearby units to attend the second robbery, which Theo knew would reduce the chances of a colleague attending this job with him. Late night single-crewing was becoming disappointingly frequent, and it was only a matter of time before an officer lost their life attending the wrong call on their own.

To the management bods, the fact that someone had been in this petrol station only minutes earlier wielding a firearm was irrelevant. To them, the immediate threat had now passed and there was no risk to life. Not at this particular petrol station, anyway.

He got out of the car and made his way into the shop, careful to avoid leaving his own fingerprints on the door. If he was honest, he didn’t see the point. There were probably hundreds of sets of prints all over the building, and he was pretty certain none of them belonged to the robbers.

He walked up to the counter and looked over the top of it, spotting a girl sitting with her knees tucked up to her chest, shaking and swaying from side to side.

‘You okay, love? Do you need medical assistance?’

She shook her head. ‘No. No. I’m fine.’

‘My name’s Theo, I’m a police officer. Are you able to stand up for me?’

Slowly, she got to her feet and tried to compose herself. ‘Trinity. Trinity Lloyd.’

‘That your name?’

She nodded again.

‘Okay, Trinity. Are you the person who phoned the police?’

Another nod.

‘Right. Is there anywhere we can go to sit down and have a chat? Maybe lock the front door as well. We don’t want any members of the public walking through a potential crime scene.’

Trinity did as she was told, walking over to the front doors and turning two latches, one at the top and one at the bottom, before leading Theo through into an office behind the counter area.

It seemed more like a dumping ground than a working office, the desk stacked high with papers, the top of a computer monitor just peering out above them.

‘So. Can you tell me what these people looked like?’ Theo asked.

‘No. They were wearing balaclavas.’

‘How many of them were there?’

‘Two. Although, thinking about it, there must have been a third one in the car because one got in the back and the other one got in the passenger side.’

‘Okay. And can you describe them for me?’ Theo asked, taking down notes. Normally, he’d sit down with a witness and go methodically through everything they’d seen and experienced, but Trinity seemed to be quite happy to lead the way and offer up what she could, so he decided he’d jot down what he could and formalise it later.

‘Not really, no. They were both dressed in black with black balaclavas.’

‘When you say dressed in black, what items of clothing were they?’

Trinity seemed to think about this for a moment. ‘Uh, one had like a black denim jacket and black trousers. The other one I think was a sort of jumper over black jeans. But I might be wrong about that. It all happened so quickly.’

Theo knew she almost certainly would be wrong — most witnesses were — and many felt they had to give as much information as possible, despite the fact their brains hadn’t actually registered any of it. As a result, people tended to inadvertently add detail or description which never existed — something which tended to make the police’s job a lot harder. Multiple witnesses were useful in finding common threads, but in a situation where only one person witnessed an event, it would be extremely difficult to put any weight on what they said unless it tallied with other evidence.

‘And did they say anything?’ he asked.

‘Yeah. One of them told me to give him the money, and the other one was just trying to get me to go faster. I think. I don’t really remember. I’m sorry.’

‘That’s okay, don’t worry about it. Do you remember any of the words or phrases they definitely used? Did they call each other by name?’

Trinity shook her head slowly. ‘No. I remember one of them said to get the bucket from underneath the counter. That was a bit weird as no-one knows about that except for staff.’

‘The bucket?’

‘Yeah. I know, it’s stupid. In some petrol stations there’s a hole in the counter. So when the till gets too full of notes, you roll them, put them in this little canister and drop them into the hole. Then they go down a chute into a secure area in the basement. Our boss decided we didn’t need to spend the money on safes and security systems, so ours just goes through the hole and into a big trough sort of thing under the counter.’

‘That sounds risky.’

‘It’s stupid. But that’s what he’s like. It was bound to happen at some point.’

Theo’s mind was already racing. Although he probably wouldn’t play any part in the ongoing investigation, he knew where he’d focus his priorities. To him, it sounded very much like an inside job. Someone knew the petrol station had lax security measures. Someone knew the cash canisters landed in a bucket under the counter. A disgruntled ex-employee, perhaps? They’d need to get a list of everyone who’d left the company in the past few years. He thought an insurance job was unlikely, especially as the insurance company would almost certainly reject their claim when they discovered how poor the owner’s security measures were.

‘Which one of them mentioned the bucket, do you remember?’ he asked.

Trinity shook her head. ‘No. They both spoke but I don’t know which was which. One was standing behind the other one and their balaclavas went over their mouths.’

‘And how tall were they?’

‘I dunno. I don’t even know how tall I am. They were both the same sort of height. Maybe the same as you? I don’t know. Sorry.’

‘That’s alright. But not abnormally tall or short or anything?’

‘Not that I noticed, no.’

‘Any other distinguishing features?’

‘I don’t think so. Sorry.’

He was about to tell her it was alright and she didn’t need to keep apologising when a call came in over his radio. Even though it was standard for officers to have an earpiece fitted, Theo found it uncomfortable and distracting and tended to have it clipped to his shoulder with the volume turned up, so he could hear if there was anything he needed to respond to without it getting in the way. It seemed Trinity’s hearing was sharper than his, though.

‘Catford Road? That’s one of ours,’ she said, commenting on the robbery that had just been phoned in and radioed out.

‘How do you mean?’ Theo asked.

‘The petrol station. It’s owned by the same person. He’s got three around Mildenheath. It can’t be a coincidence that they’ve done two of his in the same night.’

Theo had to agree, but knew that there was a possibility it was actually even worse than that.

‘When you say he’s got three sites, which one is the third?’ he asked, fearing the answer before she’d even said it.

‘Chancel Street. Why?’