BLOOD SECRETS a gripping crime thriller full of suspense Read Online Free PDF

anymore.’ Sheila gave a despondent sigh.
    ‘Okay. I’d like a photo of Teddy as well, please, as near to the time of the attack as possible.’
    ‘I have a couple ready, the police used them too. There’s a school photo from the previous November and a family one that Aunty Barbara took when she visited for New Year in 2000. We weren’t big on photos so they’re the most recent before Teddy was attacked.’
    Sheila went to a bookcase and found an A4 envelope. Swift decided to open it later.
    ‘Do you think you can find out who did this?’ Sheila had gone to stand behind her father, one hand on his shoulder.
    ‘I can try. If I can’t find anything significant, I’ll tell you that there’s not much point in continuing. I must add that if I am successful in identifying Teddy’s attacker, you’ll be opening yourselves up to a lot of new pain.’
    Bartlett rubbed at his face and covered his eyes for a moment. Sheila looked grim. Swift thought he saw a flicker of something like annoyance in her expression.
    Bartlett spoke first. ‘At least we would know something instead of always wondering why and who. We would have some sense of justice being done.’
    Sheila nodded. ‘I miss him so much, Mr Swift. I miss my Teddy every day. I still make a birthday cake for him every year, strawberries and vanilla with a teddy bear piped in chocolate icing. His favourite. I take it to him in Mayfields. They mash some up for him.’ She put a hand to her heart as she spoke emphatically. ‘This has been a terrible wound in our family.’
    Swift wondered if Sheila had heard those words spoken in a TV drama or police appeal. They sounded scripted.
    ‘You and Teddy were close, then,’ he said.
    ‘We were, yes. We did everything together, really. Mum used to say I was a mother hen, the way I was with Teddy. I used to iron his uniform, make his packed lunch, organise the dentist, and remind him to take his vitamins. I suppose because Mum wasn’t well, I had to step up.’
    She cast a wary glance at her father but Swift could see that the memory gave her satisfaction.
    ‘And Tim? Presumably you had to do a lot for him as well.’
    ‘Yes, of course, but Mum was better with him. In fact she focused mainly on Tim. He was her favourite. She called him “my little man.” I suppose that’s often the way with mothers and youngest children, especially boys.’
    Swift would have liked to be a fly on the wall in the household she was describing. He leaned forward.
    ‘Sheila, you were here with Teddy. As his big sister, almost a second mother to him, you knew him as well as anyone. Have you ever had any ideas about the reason for Teddy’s note, or recalled anyone Teddy had got mixed up with who might have wanted to harm him?’
    She shook her head slowly, clasping her hands together dramatically. Her father motioned her to sit down. She took a breath, her mouth twisting in distress.
    ‘The police asked me all that. I didn’t know then and I don’t know now. I just don’t know and I blame myself. I’ve lain awake so many nights, wondering what was going on with Teddy and why he couldn’t tell me. It hurt as well, you know, that he wrote that terrible note and couldn’t turn to me. I asked myself over and over what I missed, what on earth he was doing out in Epping Forest. There hasn’t been a day gone by since when I haven’t woken up hoping it was all a bad dream.’ There were tears in her eyes.
    Bartlett handed her a hanky, patting her shoulder. She dabbed at her eyes, her gulps for air mingling with sobs. Swift waited, then told her calmly that he would do what he could to establish what had happened. He made sure he had all the details he needed, secured the deposit and signed contract and said he’d be in touch. As he left, he heard Sheila urging her father to have a hot lunch, reminding him she’d left soup in the fridge. He had reached the end of the road, hunching his shoulders against the persistent drizzle, when his