When She Was Good

by Robotham, Michael

  27

  Cyrus

  Lenny orders her breakfast from the same café every day – a delicatessen that makes proper porridge and scrambled eggs that are lighter than air. She picks up the order herself because she likes to stretch her legs on the ten-minute walk.

  I fall into step beside her. ‘I was going to buy you breakfast.’

  ‘Is it my birthday?’ she asks.

  ‘I’m catching up with a friend.’

  ‘Mmmmm.’

  ‘What’s happening with the Hamish Whitmore investigation?’

  ‘Wouldn’t know. It’s not my case. It’s not yours either.’

  She changes direction and crosses the road. The wind is gusting through the trees sending blossoms falling like late-winter snow flurries.

  ‘Hamish Whitmore believed that Eugene Green had an accomplice or was kidnapping children for someone else.’

  ‘On what evidence?’

  ‘The timelines. Some of his victims were kept alive for weeks. Green lived in a bedsit. He had to have somewhere else.’

  ‘Are you expecting me to answer?’

  ‘I’m seeking your opinion.’

  ‘Derelict houses. Air-raid shelters. Abandoned warehouses. Empty flats. Outhouses. Henhouses. He could have used any number of places to hold them.’

  ‘Police traced Green’s movements using petrol receipts and his mobile phone signals. These put him at the scene of the kidnappings but not where the bodies were eventually dumped. According to Bob Menken, they took Green back to each location and he acted like he was seeing them for the first time.’

  ‘His victims were dead by then. He didn’t care.’

  ‘A psychopath takes in every detail. Relives every moment.’

  Lenny hunches her shoulders and buries her hands deeper into her pockets, but I know she’s listening.

  ‘Most paedophiles prefer children of a certain sex and age range, but Green didn’t differentiate. He was kidnapping boys and girls, aged between six and fourteen. That’s highly unusual.’

  ‘You’re worried he wasn’t discerning enough.’

  ‘No!’ I say angrily. ‘I’m suggesting he had an accomplice, someone with different tastes.’

  We cut across another street, weaving between cars that have stopped at the traffic lights.

  ‘Not all child sex offenders are paedophiles and not all paedophiles are the same,’ I say. ‘Eugene Green was a socially awkward loner with very few friends; a situational molester, who regarded children as a substitute for what he couldn’t have: a normal relationship. Paedophiles like Green normally target children who are available, such as nieces and nephews or neighbours. Either that or they hang around playgrounds and swimming pools or volunteer at youth groups. They groom and seduce their victims.

  ‘I think his accomplice is more morally indiscriminate. Someone who abuses children in the same way that he abuses everybody else in his life. Someone who lies, cheats, steals and molests for the simple reason, why not? Someone like that doesn’t have the patience to groom a victim. He’s more likely to use force; and to torture and kill.’

  We’ve reached the delicatessen. Lenny’s order is ready on the counter, already stapled into a brown paper bag with the receipt attached. I’m waiting on the footpath when she emerges. She stabs the button of a traffic light.

  ‘One of the names on the whiteboard in Whitmore’s room was “Angel Face”.’

  ‘You promised me …’

  ‘I’m not looking for her,’ I say.

  ‘A name on a whiteboard is not proof of anything. Show me something concrete.’

  ‘The man who posed as a detective and visited Eileen Whitmore had a crescent scar above his right eye. Terry Boland’s sister and ex-wife both gave the same description of a man who visited them asking about Terry Boland. Looking for him. This was before the body was found. Afterwards, he visited again – this time looking for Angel Face.’

  ‘You think Boland was the accomplice?’

  ‘No. I think everybody assumed that Terry Boland had kidnapped Angel Face and sexually abused her, but I think it was the other way around – he was trying to save her.’

  ‘If that were true, he’d have taken her to the police.’

  ‘Not if he didn’t trust them.’

  The inference annoys her. We’re passing a homeless man sitting on a flattened cardboard box, wrapped in a soiled blanket so that only his face is visible. Lenny pauses and drops a handful of coins into his hat.

  ‘I think Hamish Whitmore discovered a link between Eugene Green and Terry Boland,’ I say.

  ‘Paedophiles find each other.’

  ‘Boland wasn’t a paedophile.’

  ‘So you keep saying.’

  I hesitate, aware that I can’t mention Evie Cormac because her identity is protected.

  Lenny hasn’t finished. ‘You’re a perceptive man, Cyrus, quite brilliant at times, but you are too quick to jump to conclusions.’

  ‘I’m following the clues.’

  She sighs tiredly. ‘What’s the next number in this sequence? One, two, four, eight, sixteen …’

  ‘Thirty-two.’

  ‘It’s thirty-one.’

  I picture the sequence in my head, questioning her reasoning.

  ‘The answer is based on the Moser’s Circle Problem,’ she explains. ‘It’s normally used as a warning to maths students not to extrapolate patterns without proof. That’s what you’re doing – finding patterns without evidence.’

  Lenny pauses at another set of lights.

  ‘Here’s what I think,’ she says, ‘Hamish Whitmore and Bob Menken ran the sex crimes unit for Manchester Police for more than a decade. Their clean-up rate was the envy of every force in the country. Ninety per cent of suspects were convicted. But there were whispers. Complaints. Eugene Green’s defence barrister claimed that the evidence against his client was fabricated and DNA was planted.’

  ‘Green confessed.’

  ‘After being kept awake for thirty-six hours.’

  ‘That can’t happen any more.’

  Lenny laughs. ‘Don’t be a sap, Cyrus.’

  ‘You’re saying Whitmore was bent?’

  ‘I’m saying he bent the rules. I have no doubt that every offender he put away was guilty, but Hamish and his team made sure they didn’t wriggle out of it.’

  ‘Why would he risk his reputation by reinvestigating Eugene Green?’

  ‘Guilt is a corrosive emotion. Maybe he couldn’t sleep with the ghosts.’

  The remark is too flippant and delivered without conviction. Lenny isn’t being deliberately obstructive but there are protocols and chains of command that she has to follow.

  We’re almost back at the station. Lenny jogs up the steps ahead of me, unbuttoning her jacket.

  ‘What about the man with the crescent-shaped scar?’ I shout.

  ‘I’ll run it through the database and give the details to Xcalibre.’

  ‘This isn’t gang-related.’

  ‘And this isn’t your case.’

  Lenny barks at the desk sergeant: ‘If anyone else tries to interrupt my breakfast, have them arrested.’

  28

  Evie

  For those first few weeks, we stayed in motels and boarding houses, never more than one night at the same place. Once when we couldn’t find anywhere, Terry bashed open a padlock and we slept in the changing rooms of a football ground. Another night, he found an empty house, where the owners had gone on holiday. I felt like Goldilocks testing out the different beds.

  During the day, Terry worked on building sites as a casual labourer. He would drop me at the local shopping centre, where I could see a movie or visit the library or hang out in the amusement arcades. He taught me how to avoid truancy patrols and nosy security guards.

  One afternoon he collected me in an old car that smelled of diesel fumes and dogs.

  ‘Where is your bike?’ I asked.

  ‘I sold it.’

  ‘Why?’

&n
bsp; ‘They’ll be looking for it,’ he said, as though it didn’t matter. ‘I found us a house.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘I’ll show you.’

  Terry drove us through the heavy traffic until we arrived in an area where rich houses and poor houses were only a few streets apart. He stopped the car in a quiet alleyway where people kept their bins. He opened the boot and took out a large zip-up bag.

  ‘I’ll let you out as soon as we get into the house,’ he said. ‘Nobody can know you live with me.’

  I crawled into the bag and curled up, hugging my knees. Terry zipped it up and I heard the boot closing.

  Lying in the dark, smelling my own breath, I felt the car start up. We drove for a while and it stopped again. Terry lifted the bag and slung it over his shoulder.

  ‘Can I come out now?’ I asked.

  ‘Not yet,’ he whispered.

  ‘I can’t breathe.’

  ‘It won’t be long.’

  The bag swung against his back as he carried me up some steps. I heard the key turning and a door opening. He set me down and opened the zip. Fresh air washed over me. We were in a kitchen. He brushed the damp hair from my forehead and said he was sorry.

  I explored the house, first downstairs and then climbing to the first floor. Terry followed me. ‘I’ll get us some furniture. Beds and a TV.’

  ‘We’ll need plates and saucepans.’

  ‘You should help me make a list.’

  Terry told me the rules.

  No going outside.

  No looking out of the windows.

  No answering the door.

  No playing loud music.

  No turning on the lights when he wasn’t at home.

  ‘I’m living alone, remember?’

  For a long while, I didn’t know what the house looked like from the outside. I had only ever seen the view from within, looking through cracks in the curtains and lowered blinds.

  ‘They’ll kill us if they find us,’ Terry said. ‘They’ll kill anyone who knows where we are.’

  In the days that followed, Terry came home with second-hand furniture, stuff he’d found in charity shops and skips. He also bought wood and tools and began building a secret room behind the wardrobe in his bedroom. A small wooden panel slid back and forth and fitted so perfectly you couldn’t tell it was even there. He built a box inside the room with a single mattress and hung a rechargeable lantern from a beam on the ceiling, which cast a circle of brightness that looked solid because the darkness was so dark.

  Soon, the room was full of my things – books and games and pencils and clothes.

  ‘You can’t leave your shit lying around the house,’ Terry told me. ‘No kid stuff or girlie things. Nothing to show that you live here.’

  ‘But I do live here.’

  ‘This isn’t living,’ he said softly. ‘This is hiding.’

  Terry got a job working as a bouncer at a nightclub in a place he called ‘the West End’. I don’t think it was a strip club because he didn’t mention punters or girls being touched. He worked nights and came home in the early hours. I was supposed to stay in the secret room when he wasn’t home, but I used to sneak out and watch TV or look out of the window while Terry was sleeping. Nobody saw me except for a boy, who lived across the road. He waved from his window. I didn’t wave back.

  I always made sure to be back in the secret room before Terry got home. Normally, I was asleep, but sometimes I heard him climbing the stairs and falling into bed. Snoring. He’d still be asleep when I crawled out in the morning and slipped under his covers, careful not to wake him. I lay against his back, pressing my face between his shoulder blades.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ he’d ask, rolling over to face me.

  ‘I got scared.’

  ‘You shouldn’t get into a man’s bed.’

  ‘You’re not a man.’

  ‘What am I?’

  ‘You’re Terry.’

  He kissed the top of my head. I tilted my face, thinking he might kiss me properly, but he never did. Instead, he talked about how one day I’d meet someone kind and gentle, who would make me feel safe.

  ‘You do that.’

  ‘I’m already married.’

  ‘You’re divorced.’

  ‘I’m too old. You’ll find someone your own age.’

  ‘What if I choose you?’

  He gave me a sad smile. ‘You need to pick someone who loves you more than I do.’

  ‘Don’t you love me?’

  ‘Yes, but not in that way.’

  ‘What way?’

  ‘That way.’

  I hugged him harder. ‘Nobody will ever marry me.’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I’m dirty inside.’

  ‘You’re not dirty. You’re a good girl. What those men did to you … they should go to Hell.’

  ‘Is there a Hell?’

  ‘I don’t know, but if there is any justice, there’s a place worse than Hell for people like that.’

  I wanted to believe him. I wanted him to marry me.

  ‘How old are you?’ I asked.

  ‘Thirty-eight. How old are you?’

  ‘Thirteen.’

  ‘You don’t look thirteen.’

  ‘Almost. Next birthday. November the sixth.’

  ‘Which means you’re twelve,’ said Terry, laughing. Then he arched an eyebrow. ‘Were you really born on November sixth?’

  I nodded, unsure if I’d said something wrong.

  ‘That’s my birthday!’ he said. ‘What are the odds?’

  ‘What are odds?’

  ‘The chance of something happening. Three hundred and sixty-five days in a year and we finish up sharing the same birthday. That’s pretty long odds.’

  I still didn’t understand, but I liked the idea that we shared a day because I don’t remember sharing anything like that before … not until I met Cyrus and I found someone else who had survived.

  29

  Cyrus

  The house is empty. Echoing. For a moment, I think Sacha might have gone, but her bag is still upstairs and Poppy is missing from the garden. Twenty minutes later they return. Poppy clatters over the wooden floor, drinking messily from her water bowl.

  ‘We went to the park,’ explains Sacha, her cheeks flushed with the cold. ‘Poppy knows everyone.’

  ‘It’s her hood.’

  ‘How many women do you chat up in the park?’

  ‘None.’

  ‘Really? They were all asking after you. They thought I must be your girlfriend.’ She grins flirtatiously. ‘The word “finally” came up quite a lot.’

  ‘I’ll have to explain you tomorrow.’

  Sacha laughs and it makes her look unburdened and more beautiful. I like her quick wit and easy charm and the way I feel nervous around her. I like how she tilts her head when she looks at me, as though puzzled, but interested in hearing more. I like how she becomes the centre of any room she steps into and how her voice has a lightness and her hands move as she talks. Should I consider her to be beautiful? Is that allowed any more, or am I objectifying her? If I was being completely honest, I’d say her face is a little too narrow and her nose slightly crooked, but I haven’t made a study of such things and would hate people dismantling me in such a way.

  She unbuttons her coat. I take it from her, inadvertently touching her hand, feeling the warmth and softness.

  ‘It’s quite the community,’ she says. ‘Everybody seems to know your business. I was told about the fire in your house and your brother.’ She falters for a moment. ‘You haven’t mentioned him before. Where is he now?’

  ‘At a secure psychiatric hospital about an hour north of here.’

  ‘Do you visit him?’ she asks.

  ‘Once a month,’ I say, glad she’s not Evie. ‘I went last Friday. It was his birthday.’

  ‘That’s nice,’ she replies brightly, her curiosity satisfied.

  Poppy chooses that moment to get up from her basket and
cross the kitchen floor. She nudges her head against my thigh and looks at her empty bowl and back to me.

  ‘She’s hungry,’ says Sacha.

  ‘No, she’s begging,’ I reply, getting a cup full of biscuits from a bag in the laundry.

  The doorbell rings.

  I check the spy hole. DI Bob Menken is standing on the doorstep, dressed in a boxy grey suit and an open-necked business shirt, chest hair peeking out.

  ‘I hope I’m not intruding,’ he says, glancing past me into the hallway.

  ‘Not at all. How did you find me?’

  ‘I’m a detective.’

  He makes it sound obvious.

  ‘Is this official business?’

  ‘Yes and no.’

  I step back and let him pass, pointing him towards the kitchen. The washing machine hums in the laundry. Sacha must have set it running.

  ‘You’re redecorating.’

  ‘I had a fire.’

  ‘Much damage?’

  ‘Enough.’

  He admires the kitchen and glances up the stairs. ‘Your place?’

  ‘My grandparents gave it to me.’

  ‘Lucky you. Mine gave me high cholesterol and ingrown toenails.’

  I let him wander a little more, waiting for him to get to the reason for his visit.

  ‘I wanted to apologise for the other day,’ he says. ‘I was a poor host. Rude. This business. Hamish dying. I was upset, but that’s no excuse.’

  ‘You didn’t come all this way to apologise.’

  ‘No.’

  Pulling back a wooden chair, he sits and undoes the buttons of his jacket. His soft gut hangs over the belt of his trousers.

  ‘After you left, I began thinking about the whole question of whether Eugene Green had an accomplice. Of course, we considered the possibility at the time, but when Green confessed it no longer seemed …’ He searches for the word and comes up with ‘urgent’.

  ‘Since you visited, I’ve gone back over the names Hamish sent to me. I came across a note – information provided by a prison snitch, who told his handler that a contract had been taken out on Eugene Green. That’s why Green was given extra security at the prison. Most nonces get separated from the main prison population, but Green was kept in solitary for his own safety and only allowed out for his therapy sessions and to attend prison art classes. The art classes were held in the rec room, which is near the prison gym. A man called Bernard Travis beat him to death with a bicycle seat that he’d taken from one of the stationary machines. It took the warders four minutes to reach Green. It was too late. Massive head trauma.’