Black by Rose

by Andrew Barrett

  “I got you.”

  Slade slammed the door and jerked a thumb. Jagger selected drive and the Mercedes glided away.

  — Three —

  Eddie had a cigarette dangling from his mouth as he flicked through James Whitely’s report on the murder scene. His van idled on the driveway in front of a door that now had a West Yorkshire Police security sheet across it. As further protection, there was a WYP alarm installed too, the entry code stamped on a tag attached to the house keys.

  James had been thorough, spending two whole days there; occupied mainly with photography, views of each room, views of the dead woman, and views of the landing including Tony Lambert himself.

  And it seemed Eddie’s advice to him hadn’t been lost. He’d taken footwear impressions from the bannister rail, and had managed to get the slip marks off the landing floor with some degree of success. At least they all now knew it was a double murder. He shook his head at how close it came to being a murder-suicide, and he wondered what the consequences of that would have been. Apart from the murderer walking around free, laughing his bollocks off, there was a man and a woman in that house who would have been stigmatised. And who knew what effect a death certificate labelled as suicide instead of one labelled as homicide would have had on the wills and probate and insurance and all that other nonsense that leaves the grieving relatives worse off. And of course, what of the relatives? They at least knew their son wasn’t a weak-willed suicide “victim” who chose to take his poor wife with him; he was now a hero, and his portrait would hang in his local nick, and his grave would be tended.

  Amazing what a difference a “homi-” could make in place of a “sui-”.

  Eddie opened the window and flicked the cigarette end away. And in the rear-view mirror, he saw a neighbour walking up the driveway towards him. He closed his eyes, cursed himself for not just getting out of the van when he arrived and getting inside the house.

  “Hello again.”

  Eddie opened his eyes and looked at her. She was familiar, but he couldn’t quite place her.

  “You’re a detective, right?”

  “I couldn’t detect water in a swimming pool,” he said, still confused.

  “You don’t remember me, do you?”

  “Thanks for that.”

  “What?”

  “I hate that song. Hot Chocolate.”

  Now she looked confused. “You got me there.”

  “I thought you were quoting lyrics at me.” He stared at the folder still open on his lap, and slowly closed it. “It’s going to stay in my head all day now. Shit.”

  “Shall we start again?”

  “Are you a neighbour?”

  “Don’t think so,” she said, “why, where do you live?”

  Eddie blinked. “This is surreal.” He stopped the engine, climbed out with the folder and slid open the side door.

  “Are you here about the murders?”

  That stopped him dead. “No,” he said calmly, “I’m a decorator.”

  She laughed, even patted his shoulder and then stood back to let him get his kit out of the van. “No you’re not. I saw you here that day, when it all kicked off.”

  Ah. That’s who she was. The reporter. The one who was sorry for his loss. “I, er, I didn’t recognise you,” he said, clicking his fingers. “Suit, and outside broadcast truck.” He turned and really saw her properly for the first time. She was in a loose – but not too loose, he noted – T-shirt and jeans, a pair of scabby trainers too. Her hair was tied back but a good swath of it had broken loose and curled around her neck. “Moron?” he pointed at her.

  “Close. Moran, Kelly Moran.”

  “Ah, sorry ’bout that.”

  “I get it all the time.”

  Eddie raised an eyebrow.

  “Call me Kelly,” she smiled. “You are here about the murders though?”

  “Excuse me?”

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean to pry.”

  “Of course you did; you’re a reporter. I’ve worked with reporters before. You can’t help it; it’s your job.”

  “Hey, I’m human too.”

  “Only under the scales, dear.”

  “Ouch.”

  “Okay, look. I’m sorry. I am here about the deaths. And I don’t mean to be rude, but I have a lot to do.”

  “I thought it would have been sewn up by now.”

  “No you didn’t.” Eddie locked the van door.

  “What makes you say that?”

  He took out the evidence bag, shook out a set of keys and unlocked the steel shutter over the front door and swung it aside. “Because you’re here.”

  “Ah. My turn to blush.”

  “Blush? I haven’t blushed.”

  “You blushed when you called me a moron.”

  He unlocked the front door and then said, “Excuse me.” As he pushed open the door a loud beeping came from inside. He stepped into the hall, and then stopped dead. “Fuck.”

  “You don’t know the code, do you?”

  “Now I’m blushing.”

  “That thing is going to be loud, isn’t it?”

  He nodded, took the keys out of the lock. “Ah!” And then he ran into the lounge. The beeping stopped and moments later he was back outside, collecting his things.

  “Okay, can I ask you something?”

  “If it’s to do with this,” nodded over his shoulder, “then you’re wasting your time.”

  “Why did they tell everyone it was a suicide when it was a double murder?”

  He stared at her. How the bloody hell did she know that?

  “There was too much police activity and for too long for it to be a straightforward suicide.”

  “And this week’s lottery numbers are?”

  She laughed and Eddie slid the van door closed.

  “I’m going to have to be careful what I think around you, aren’t I?”

  “So, can you tell me?”

  “I just do as I’m asked, Ms Moran.”

  “Kelly, please.”

  “Ms Moran, I can’t tell you anything. Sorry.”

  “How come you’re not in uniform today?”

  Eddie hauled his kit to the front door. “I work for a different department now.”

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  — One —

  It was twelve thirty and the wait had been horrible.

  But eventually, Michelle had exited Williams and Collins Accountancy and Bookkeeping and closed the door behind her. She worked part-time. Tyler liked to think he knew she was part-time because she was happier than the others who worked under The Vegetable Lady. It made the whole going to work experience a lot more tolerable, easier to dust off the day’s crap.

  Of course, he could have been wrong, but it didn’t matter; he would have waited until five or five-thirty, whatever time they closed. They had the flowers which meant Charlie worked there, and Michelle wouldn’t see those flowers go to waste. Besides, Michelle would want to know all about the date with Blake; every detail. And Tyler knew that Charlie hadn’t been in touch because there were no tears, and there were no daggers pointing at his chest, and because no one had called the police.

  Everything was tickety-boo.

  Michelle walked to a small car perhaps a hundred yards away and climbed aboard. Tyler started the BMW and prepared to follow her.

  * * *

  Twenty minutes later, Tyler had followed her to a small and picturesque village in North Leeds called Barwick-in-Elmet. It was a maze of tiny roads, and most of them seemed to terminate in the village square where a tall maypole took centre stage and cast a short shadow in the midday heat.

  Tyler wasn’t paying much attention to the maypole or to the surroundings though; he was intent on staying within sight of Michelle without seeming to follow her. It was difficult to do in the small lanes where very often there was room for only one car to pass.

  Eventually, Michelle turned down a two-lane road and promptly stopped at a row of old farm labourers’ c
ottages. Tyler carried along the road for twenty yards past the junction, parked, and stepped out of the car.

  * * *

  Michelle grabbed the flowers off the passenger seat and smelled them one last time. They were wonderful, and Charlie was a lucky girl. If only Ben were so romantic. She was lucky to get a Creme Egg and a fart out of him these days. But Blake seemed like a wonderful man; tall and muscular, well-dressed and a rock-star face. Wow.

  Daydreaming over with, Michelle got out of the car, locked it and headed up the path to Charlie’s front door. There were still milk bottles on the doorstep, and mail hanging out of the letterbox. These things didn’t attract Michelle’s attention; not yet anyway. First, she rang the bell, and waited patiently. There was no reply, but she thought she could hear movement inside.

  She rang the bell again and this time raised her hand to the glass and peered through the lounge window. Then she looked up at the first-floor windows.

  Now she was beginning to get a little worried, and it was then she noticed the milk and the mail. And then she looked towards the road, and saw Charlie’s car. “Strange,” she said.

  Then she walked around the back of the cottage and peered into the kitchen. Nearby was a playground with kids shouting and screaming; everything seemed normal, yet something was wrong. It took a long time for Michelle to acknowledge that, but now that it was here, she shivered. She banged on the door this time, and could hear Panda squeaking in the kitchen, and then he appeared on the windowsill rubbing against the glass. “Where’s your mummy, Panda?” she said, stroking the glass. “Eh? Where’s mummy?”

  * * *

  Mummy was lying in bed with her hands over her ears, her mouth wide open in a silent scream, and tears tracing weird tracks down her screwed up face. Someone was at the front door and Charlie thought she was going to explode with fear. She felt sick. She was breathing quickly, shallowly, and she was sweating yet felt cold. She was screaming in her head so loudly she thought she was going mad, and when finally she took her hands away from her ears, there were strands of hair caught under the bloodied nails. The hair was the colour of ginger biscuits, and it was the colour chosen by Michelle.

  Michelle had started all this.

  And then the knocking and the banging at the front door stopped, and Charlie’s arms flopped by her sides and her breathing slowed a little. Her nose was still blocked and her eye, where he’d punched her, wasn’t working properly; she could only see slight blurs out of it. And she was sore and she daren’t go to the bathroom and she shivered and she wanted the blackness to come back; the cold yet homely blackness where nothing could touch her, and before she could think of anything else there was a knock at the back door.

  Charlie froze. And then the nerves bit deeply again and she screwed her face into a mask of fear and curled up into a ball, wishing the whole world would just leave her alone. She wanted to die.

  * * *

  There was no reply at the back door either.

  Michelle swallowed and suddenly became quite nervous. Something was definitely wrong. No way would Charlie go out and leave Panda all alone for very long. And the curtains round the front were still drawn and the mail and milk were uncollected. The phone was switched off – she’d tried before leaving work. And her car was still there, so she hadn’t gone out for a drive. “What the hell’s going on?”

  Michelle didn’t know what to do. She bit her lip and wandered back around to the front of the house, looked up at the curtains across the windows again. Perhaps she’s ill? No, Charlie is never ill. Perhaps she’s in the bath with her earphones in.

  It was possible, but she’d never leave all the curtains closed, never leave the mail in the door.

  Reluctantly, Michelle went back to her car and sat in silence wondering what to do. And then she felt guilty, because if Charlie was ill and was trying to rest in bed, she might have disturbed her. Michelle returned the bouquet to the passenger seat and started the car. She drove away. Had she looked in her rear-view mirror, she would have seen a good-looking man in a smart suit walking up the road to Charlie’s house.

  — Two —

  The OSU sergeant reversed the large police van right across the only view the press had of the blue van with the corpse inside. There were mutterings as the sergeant disappeared back to his men, but it allowed Ros to work largely unobserved. The last thing she wanted was to have gruesome pictures all over the tabloids.

  She began with photography of the van’s exterior, all four corners, before concentrating on the front driver’s side, its smashed window glass, and the shell casing that had rolled a few feet under the van. Once it was packaged, she could move on to opening the van door and making an assessment of how easy it might be to remove the body – and from which side.

  Her mind though, wandered often, and more than once she found herself with her hands on her hips looking at nothing in particular, mind slowly trundling back from thoughts of Brian and his knife.

  And there was always another thought that hurried back after its big brother, always late back into its box. It was of Eddie. And it was the reason she had gone to such extremes to make sure he came and worked for MCU after all her efforts to keep him out of her life.

  She opened the driver’s door gently, but despite the care, more glass fell inwards. He had wet himself and the van stank after a few hours of warm sunshine. Already the flies had begun congregating on the man’s head and several were crawling along his fingers, disappearing under the cuff of his sleeve. Ros shuddered.

  She pushed the door to and then took her camera around the other side, scene suit crinkling as she went. This door was locked, and she closed her eyes at the thought of leaning across him to unlock the damned thing. And then she wondered if the sliding door was unlocked, tried it and it slid back, allowing her to reach in and pop the button on the passenger door. Her glove came away reddened.

  Eddie was her defence if things got too hot at home.

  She hated herself for thinking that, really she did. Eddie was, in fact, a bloody good friend, and to use him like that – to label him as her defence – was a horrid thing to do. He was her… she shook her head. What was he? He was her best friend. He was almost her lover, very past tense. But he cared for her as she did for him. In fact, if it wasn’t for her stay in hospital, she was utterly sure they would still be together as a couple… wait – still?

  Yes, still, because they had been a couple of some sort before Jilly had died. But Ros had screwed that up and shoved it in the bin, now. Even so, she was sure she could count on him with the situation at home. The Brian situation.

  If only she could bring herself to tell him about it. Of course she couldn’t, who was she trying to kid? She’d shat on Eddie from a massive height, and now she wanted him to put on his armour and come to her rescue. “Silly bitch!” she said.

  The flies were having a ball in the hole in the side of the man’s head. His brains had congealed in the blood on the glass, had caused streaks down it, bits of hair stuck to the glass, and bits of glass stuck in his hair and in his face. His right eye had vanished, no idea where it was, just a gaping hole that moved in the midday sun as flies hopped about inside it, looking to deposit their eggs.

  It seemed this was the better side to pull him out of. And there was no way she was going to tape him and generally mess about with him while he was still slumped across the seats like that. It was much better, much neater to get him out, get him inside a tent so no one could see, and take all the necessary samples in the cool shade.

  And then she drifted back to what she’d said about Eddie being her protection. How presumptuous was that? Poor Eddie might not want to get involved with you, she thought. He might, and quite rightly, think you were using him as a shield against Brian. And whoa, what do you mean “if things get too hot at home”? What was last night exactly, a little warm? What is hot then? Is hot having a twelve-inch blade poking out of your back? Is that hot enough?

  No, I think having a k
nife held to your throat is quite hot enough.

  Yet there was something about Brian too; the way he seemed capable of manipulating her when she was at her weakest. Of course, he made her weak with his threats and his violence, but then he’d try to speak to her like a rational man having a debate about politics. He was mesmerising sometimes, and she felt compelled to take him at his word, compelled to blame herself. But wait a minute, she reasoned; didn’t you throw a bucket of cold water over him while he was asleep?

  I did, she conceded. But does that give him the justification to hold a fucking knife at my throat and speak to me as though he’s a psycho? Does it? I don’t think it does.

  Yet last night, she’d have said that it did give him the right, the justification – that he’d been goaded into it, and he was acting rationally. Something about him, the soft way he spoke to her, the words he used, he was like a hypnotist. Jesus.

  So, what do we do then?

  Move out? I don’t think so, it’s my house–

  But it’s not safe there.

  It’s safe! Just the man who also lives there is not safe.

  Better think of something, kiddo.

  “Need a hand?”

  Ros screamed, and almost put her gloved hands to her face – but was glad she didn’t as her fingers were covered in blood.

  “Sorry,” James said.

  Ros closed her eyes and took a moment to compose herself. “Yes, please. Tent.”

  — Three —

  Eddie sat in the lounge taking a closer look at James’s photographs. From a photographic point of view, they were quite good; nice use of bounce flash, a little over exposed in places, but good enough for court. From a scene examiner’s point of view, they were in the average bracket. There were standard quarter shots of each room, but there was no detail, no real close-up shots of, for example, the drag marks on the landing floor, the footwear mark on the bannister rail.

  Eddie lit a cigarette and threw the pictures to one side. If there was still anything left to be found, then he was going to have to begin from scratch. He didn’t wear a scene suit; he didn’t see the point because eighty-five per cent of him believed there was nothing more to be gained from this scene, it had given up all its secrets already, and the other fifteen per cent was just along for the ride. Okay, he reasoned, dropping ash on the floor and heeling it into the pile, there was still a slim chance that James had missed something in the original part of the exam – he was not perfect, after all.