“I’m just tired of this, Kim. Every time we find out something new about Harry, it makes me feel sick.”
“He might’ve not had anything to do with this.”
“We’ll see.”
Geoff had pulled into a housing estate just near Woodlesford Train Station, and we slowed right down so as to not spook him. He stopped at a semi-detached house and pulled onto the driveway. I put my foot down again and blocked the driveway behind him and any hope he had of running. I got out of the car and started charging towards him.
“Geoff?” I asked.
“Oh God. Not here, please,” Geoff begged, looking up at the neighbour’s windows.
“Amelia, calm down,” Kim suggested.
“I will not calm down. My husband is dead, and apparently, Geoff here has information about that, but he’s holding it back,” I shouted.
“Listen, just come in. I’ll tell you everything I know. Please,” Geoff conceded, trying to defuse the situation.
I gave Kim a victorious smile, and she rolled her eyes at me for a change. Geoff nervously led us into his house, and it didn’t seem like anybody else was home. We were shown to the sitting room; it was incredibly old-fashioned. Decorative plates were hung on every free space on the walls, dotted with family photographs and the occasional clock. Kim and I sat down on one of the plastic-covered couches, and Geoff sat on the one across from us. This place didn’t look like he had money to burn; it already felt like this could have been Harry’s fault. Geoff’s hands were shaking violently.
“Calm down, Geoff. We just want to talk about Harry,” Kim said softly.
“I know you aren’t meant to speak ill of the dead, but that lad has left me up shit creek,” Geoff announced.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“He was a fiddler! He had his hand in the till!”
“Geoff, honestly. Just breathe and keep it simple. What are you talking about?”
“Fraud. He was taking money out of our client’s accounts and putting it in his own. Is that simple enough?”
I didn’t need to ask for evidence. I believed him. It was probably the only way that Harry thought of, and would allow him to pay the Broadheads back and pay off the supposed mother of his long-lost child. Not to mention all the bills from the IVF clinic and the new house. The sheer pressure he must have been under just to keep our heads above water must have been astounding. I wish he’d just come to me and told me about it; maybe we could have worked it out together. But I made that impossible for him, didn’t I? He was terrified that any misstep would end in me beating him up or trying to strangle him. I’d stopped seeing this as Harry’s mess, and instead, it was a mess of my own making. If I hadn’t treated him so poorly, he might have been comfortable enough to come and speak to me about all these issues. Instead, he buried them and continued the lie until it was too big to even look at.
“Why haven’t you gone to the police?” I asked.
“Are you kidding?” Geoff laughed, “Like they are going to believe me. It was my business; all the transactions were approved by me.”
“Why did you approve them if they were dodgy?” Kim asked.
“Because I trusted him,” Geoff said bitterly.
“Where was he sending the money?” I asked.
“A string of accounts. I tracked most of them down to a small bank in Leeds called Sterling and Fishwick.”
Because Harry never had a will, and I had to apply for probate, it’s sometimes difficult to find all the accounts that someone holds. I’d never seen an account registered to that bank on any of the paperwork. He must have been keeping it secret. I let out a huge sigh. Secret phones and bank accounts, I wasn’t even shocked anymore. The farther I went down this path, the more it just felt never-ending.
“Do you have an account number or something?” I asked.
“Yes. But you didn’t get this from me.”
“Fine.”
Geoff copied some numbers from a piece of paper and handed it to me. I put the scrap paper in my handbag and stood up, and Kim followed me up a second later.
“Unless there is anything else, we’ll leave you to it,” I said.
“No, nothing else,” Geoff said anxiously.
“Wasn’t that bad, was it?” I said sarcastically.
Kim and I both headed out of Geoff’s house and got back in the car. I started searching for ‘Sterling and Fishwick’ and found their closest branch. I started the navigation on my phone and pulled away.
“Are they just going to give you access to the account?” Kim asked.
“I have the probate documents on my phone. They legally have to if it was in Harry’s name,” I said.
“How much do you think he has in there?”
“I’m not sure. I wouldn’t put anything past him, to be honest.”
We were only in the car for a few minutes before we arrived. It was a tiny little bank that I’d not even heard of before, and there were only two counters inside. I walked over to the counter, and the cashier greeted me with a smile.
“Welcome to Sterling and Fishwick. How can I help?” she smiled.
“Hi,” I gulped, “so I’ve just been made aware my husband had an account here. Regrettably, he’s no longer with us, and I’d like access to it.”
“I’m so sorry to hear that. Unfortunately, we require some identification, and we will need to see your grant of probate.”
