Page 59 of Twisted Lies

She closed the door behind her, even though his booming voice carried straight through it when he was angry.

But he didn’t look angry, more a mixture of puzzled and amused.

‘Just had a call from Nick Morley’s lawyers: Fumble, Prickface and Dipshit.’

She laughed out loud and then sobered. She’d done nothing wrong. There was nothing in that article that was libellous. Nick Morley’s name had only been used once in the reference ‘Wife of’ and then she’d left well alone.

‘Yeah, I think it was Dipshit who called. Really nice guy – polite, friendly, professional.’

Frost folded her arms and waited. From the glint in his eye, her boss was playing with her.

‘Invited me out to lunch tomorrow at a fancy restaurant in Birmingham.’

Devious bastards, Frost thought, and arrogant too. There was nothing in her articles that was not fact. They knew they had no legal argument against her or the newspaper. But it was clear they were watching everything, and she must have been setting off their Google Alerts like a brass band over the last couple of days. She wasn’t surprised at their arrogance in thinking they could control the entire news cycle around their client. If they couldn’t shut her up legally, they were going to try and manipulate her boss.

‘And what did you tell them, Fitz?’ she asked, crossing her arms.

He patted his ample stomach with a smile.

‘I told Dipshit I was on a diet.’

Frost was still smiling when she left her boss’s office. She was glad he had turned down their offer for what she knew would have been a subtle, underhand attempt to persuade Fitz to block the articles. In refusing their meal offer, he had refused their request and she was free to continue her series.

But they had noticed what she was doing and the readers and comments that were being attracted. They could see that Trisha’s name was being mentioned on a daily basis.

Stick that in your pipe and smoke it, Goliath, she thought as she returned to her desk.Now what are you going to do?

Forty-Nine

‘Okay, so far I know that Jacko Birch started boxing competitively when he was sixteen years old,’ Penn said, interrupting Stacey from her furious keyboard tapping.

‘Hang on, let me just send this chaser email to the school about Jacob Powell. There, done. Continue,’ she said, giving him her full attention.

‘He was almost picked for the Olympic Games back in 2004 but just missed the list. He turned professional and entered the circuit early in 2005. Had reasonable success and won more than he lost for the first six or seven years, and then the tide turned. Almost overnight the balance shifted as he lost seventy per cent of his fights.’

‘Age and fatigue?’ Stacey asked.

‘Probably. He’d maybe passed his prime but couldn’t see it.’

‘Or just wanted to keep making the money,’ Stacey said. ‘Talking of which, where is that money? He and his family were hardly living a lavish lifestyle.’

‘Now that, Stacey, is a very good question. There’s no mention of him retiring. He lost a fight in the second round and just disappeared. No more mentions and no more fights.’

‘And a move to the Black Country with a new name.’

What did you do, Jacko Birch? Penn wondered as Stacey returned to tapping her keyboard.

‘You still trying to find a search engine for Deed Poll?’ he asked, taking his mug to the coffee machine.

‘How are we not able to just search their database?’ Stacey asked. ‘And by us I mean the police. We wouldn’t want any old Tom, Dick and Harry getting in there but surely…’

‘Deed poll records aren’t held in one place,’ Penn explained. ‘The National Archives in Richmond, Surrey, hold records dating back to the 1760s. The Supreme Court of Judicature keep records of enrolled deed polls for five to ten years, after which they’re logged in the National Archives, and any more recent deed poll enrolments from the year 2000 are held by the Royal Courts of Justice in London.’

She sat back and stared at him with her arms folded.

‘Stace, it’s not my fault you’ve hit… oooh, actually, I do have an idea. Search the archives of theLondon Gazette.’

‘Errr… why?’ Stacey asked. ‘Leanne doesn’t live in London.’