‘We should be together.’
Lydia managed not to choke on her whisky, but it was a close-run thing. ‘What?’
‘You heard,’ Paul said calmly. ‘And don’t pretend to be surprised.’
‘I don’t think… I’m with Fleet. You know that.’ There was a great deal more that Lydia could say, but invoking her prior commitment seemed the politest option.
Paul shrugged. ‘It’s not like you’re married. And he’s police.’
‘I am aware,’ Lydia said drily.
He sat forward suddenly, hands clasped together on the table. Lydia felt the increase in animal magnetism and the answering tension in the pit of her stomach. She wondered if he was consciously able to control it, like she could with her Crow power. Charlie had thought that the Crows had the most power and were the only ones able to train it, to harness it. He had peddled the accepted view that the other Families were vastly diluted, their powers dimmed over the decades to an echo of what they had once been. But maybe he had been wrong.
‘I want you. I know you want me. I’ve proved that I’m loyal. What else is there?’
‘You’re being serious?’
‘The DCI is from a different world. You must know it’s not going to work out.’
‘You’re not in a position to comment on my relationship.’ Lydia pushed herself back in her chair. She had been leaning forward, toward Paul, and that had to stop.
‘I think I am. I know you.’
‘You knew me, once. A long time ago.’
‘Not that long. You can’t trust him. And I don’t want you to get hurt.’
‘Funnily enough, he says exactly the same thing about you.’
Chapter Twelve
Lydia hated the feeling that she was dancing to the Family’s tune, but it seemed that smoothing things over with Mark Kendal would be the quickest way to appease John and, by association, the rest of the old guard. She had always thought that being at the top meant you didn’t have to worry about what those below you thought or felt, but it didn’t seem to be the case. And if she didn’t want a revolt on her hands, she was going to have to work on her diplomacy skills.
She walked into Mark’s phone shop, the door setting off a loud buzzer. Racks of phone cases hung from the walls and a metal grill was across a glass case behind the cash desk, protecting the high cost items - the iPhones and laptops – from a quick theft. She had expected to find Mark himself standing behind that desk, but he was nowhere to be seen.
‘Hello?’ Lydia looked around a second time, just to be sure, but the shop really wasn’t big enough to hide a person. The cash desk was another glass case, this one without a grill, filled with boxes of phones and bling-tastic accessories. A multi-coloured LED sign loomed over the set-up and a desk fan turned semi-circles, making the hanging cases quiver in the draft. She waited for another minute, but Mark didn’t pop up from behind the desk or walk through the front door, carrying a takeaway coffee.
There wasn’t an obvious door to a backroom, but after letting her eyes adjust to the rows and rows of brightly coloured cases, Lydia realised that there was an exit in the corner. It was covered in cases like the wall, rendering it almost invisible. There was a recessed handle halfway up and Lydia pulled, expecting it to be locked. Consequently, it swung open faster than she had intended and a few cases fell to the floor. Stepping over the mess, Lydia entered a room cluttered with cardboard boxes. She had to squeeze through a narrow path between towering stacks of boxes labelled with Apple, Samsung, and brands she didn’t recognise. ‘Mr Kendal?’
The boxes wobbled dangerously as she moved. The guy should really tidy up his store room, it was a health and safety nightmare. Turning a corner, Lydia stopped thinking. Mark Kendal was lying on the floor in a pool of dark sticky blood. His head was caved in on one side, so thoroughly and deeply that yellowish matter was visible amongst the gore. Brain, Lydia’s mind supplied. That’s probably a bit of Mark’s brain.
Bile was in her mouth and she turned away to take a couple of breaths. She contained the urge to spit the foul taste onto the floor, it was a crime scene after all, and fished for a tissue instead. She pulled on nitrile gloves and approached the body, careful not to step in the blood. He was definitely dead, but she felt she ought to feel for a pulse, anyway. Mark Kendal’s neck was cold and the flesh, as she pressed it, had a strange texture. She was no pathologist, but he had been dead for a while.
Lydia straightened up, thinking fast. Her phone was in her hand and she knew that she ought to phone the police. Instead, she took photos of the scene, working systematically around the body and the room. The urge to vomit passed as soon as she began analysing, which was a bonus. The injury was on the side of the head, not the back. That didn’t rule out somebody surprising him from behind, but it made it less likely. To Lydia’s untrained eye, it looked like a single, forceful blow. The murderer was either very strong or they used something very heavy. Lydia looked at the space and tried to judge whether a largish person would have had the room to get a decent arm swing. Next she tried to judge whether it had happened in this room, or whether the body had been moved after the event. The blood spread out from the head, with no drag marks or blood trail.
She crouched down and patted the body down, checking pockets and the hands for defensive wounds. The hands looked undamaged and although the fingernails were grubby, it looked like everyday dirt rather than blood. Mark’s wallet was in his front jeans pocket with a couple of credit cards, a donor card, and over a hundred in cash. Folded behind the donor card was another bank note. A ten-shilling note like the ones she had found in Charlie’s bedroom. It was soft and well creased, clearly folded and refolded many times. Without thinking too much about it, Lydia pocketed the ten-shilling note, and put the rest back. Mark was lying face down and Lydia slid his wallet into the back pocket of his jeans to avoid having to reach underneath again. Once had been bad enough.
* * *
Lydia emerged from the back room cautiously, but the shop was still deserted. She closed the door and wiped it down with her sleeve. There was a CCTV camera pointed at the cash desk, but a closer look showed that it had been sprayed with black paint. Whoever had been here first had already disabled it. There wasn’t a back door out of the shop so Lydia had no choice but to emerge from the front, onto the street. She moved quickly and mentally crossed her fingers that nobody was paying attention.
In one hand she could feel her coin, solid and reassuring, and in the other she held her phone. Her first thought had been to phone Fleet, but her second and third thoughts had followed fast. Mark had come to her for help and now he was dead. This was connected to her family. Her first duty had to be to protect them. Besides, Mark was past helping, now. What would Charlie do?
Pushing that unhelpful thought aside, Lydia moved through Camberwell as fast as she could without running.
* * *
Back at The Fork, Lydia went straight upstairs to find Jason, but the flat was empty. She sat on his bed for a few minutes, in case her presence would make him appear, but the room remained stubbornly empty. She still wanted to speak to Fleet, but before that she needed Family help. She called Aiden.
He must have been nearby, as he arrived in ten minutes. He was wearing shiny jogging trousers and a hoodie, his hair damp with sweat. ‘Sorry,’ he said, gesturing to himself. ‘Football.’
There was something to be said for clicking your fingers and having people drop everything to obey. Especially in an emergency. Out on the terrace and with the radio playing, Lydia ran through the details.
‘We need to clean it up,’ Aiden said.
‘I wiped everything down,’ Lydia said. ‘And the camera was blacked-out.’
‘The body is still there, though.’
‘Does that matter?’ Lydia was thinking about the police investigation. They hadn’t done this and she hadn’t left any evidence of finding the body, so now the Met could take over. That was fine.
Aiden was frowning at he
r. ‘You just found him?’
It hit her. Aiden thought ‘found him’ had been a euphemism. ‘Yes! Why would I have hurt him?’
‘Not my place to speculate,’ Aiden said quickly.
‘If I had, we have a way to clean up?’
‘Well, yeah.’ Aiden must have caught something in her expression, because he added, ‘Emergency use only.’
Lydia paced the terrace, thinking. After turning over the issue in her mind, she realised something important. ‘We should clean up, anyway.’
‘Right you are,’ Aiden already had his phone out. ‘I’ll speak to John.’
‘Uncle John?’ Lydia said, boggling.
‘Yeah, he’s got a friend of a friend. That’s who we use.’ He paused. ‘Can I ask why? I mean, if it wasn’t us?’
‘It wasn’t me,’ Lydia said, ‘but that doesn’t mean it wasn’t us. I still don’t know what is going on with every part of the Family. I don’t even know if you’re telling me the truth half the time.’
Aiden opened his mouth to argue.
‘Don’t take it personally,’ Lydia said, ‘I’m not a group hugger, I don’t trust easily, and most of the stuff I’ve found out over the last few months I don’t like. Which means I’m always waiting for the next horrible surprise.’
‘It wouldn’t be one of us,’ Aiden insisted, ‘not unless you ordered it.’
He sounded certain, but he was very young and a natural follower. Lydia wasn’t convinced every single Crow acted with the loyalty and unity Aiden seemed to believe. And there was a more worrying possibility. ‘Okay, let’s assume an outsider did this, we have a different problem. Someone murdered a local businessman with ties to us, someone of importance who was under our protection. That cannot stand.’
‘Yeah,’ Aiden nodded enthusiastically. ‘We’ve gotta pay those mother-’
Lydia held up a hand and he fell silent. ‘It’s two problems, really. First,’ she held up a finger. ‘If there are whispers in the Family that I’m not a worthy leader, this isn’t exactly going to make them go quiet. He wasn’t a Crow, but he was supposedly under our protection. That’s going to make the Family nervous. And second,’ she held up another finger. ‘If this was a deliberate act of aggression from outside the Family, we must assume they are looking for a reaction.’
‘And they’re gonna get one,’ Aiden said. ‘They’ll see they can’t fu-’
‘No,’ Lydia cut him off. ‘If we clean it up, put the rumour out that Mr Kendal has gone on holiday or something, we stall a murder investigation and buy ourselves some time to find out who we’re dealing with. And we starve them of the instant gratification. If they’re watching and hoping for a public embarrassment, they’ll be disappointed. And that might make them show themselves.’
‘Shouldn’t we be paying them back straight away? Showing that we’re not to be messed with?’
‘That’s exactly the reaction they are looking for. It’s got to be, unless it was a random robbery gone wrong from someone out of town or terminally stupid. And it didn’t look that way.’
‘You think they’ll just call up and confess?’
‘I think people are fundamentally impatient. And winning often just means being willing to wait longer than the other side.’ Lydia was excellent at waiting. It was the very first thing you learned to do as a PI.
‘If they want a reaction and don’t get one, what if they decide to try something else?’
Lydia smiled at him. ‘That’s what I’m counting on.’
* * *
‘We have a problem,’ Aiden said, sliding into the seat opposite Lydia.
‘This is getting to be a habit,’ Lydia said. ‘We need to be more careful.’
‘Cleaning service couldn’t operate. There were visitors in attendance’
‘Police?’
Aiden nodded.
‘Well, that’s that,’ Lydia leaned back in her seat. ‘It’s probably for the best.’ She should probably keep the lying and criminality to a bare minimum. Especially given that her boyfriend was a DCI in the Met. That was a strange thought. Fleet and ‘boyfriend’ in the same sentence. It didn’t feel right. He wasn’t a boy, that was for sure.
Aiden was fidgeting, rubbing at the scruff of beard on his jaw.
‘Spit it out.’
‘We can’t look weak.’
‘You mean I can’t look weak.’
Aiden swallowed. ‘I’ve been doing your bidding. You know I’m loyal, I just think…’
‘Not your job,’ Lydia said. ‘Leave that part to me. Speaking of which. We need to take a walk.’
Outside, Lydia waited until they were seated on a bench in Brunswick Park before continuing the conversation. She knew she was probably being paranoid, but she couldn’t shake the feeling that Mr Smith was still watching her, waiting to gather fresh leverage. She was grateful to him for healing her father and always would be, but that didn’t mean she wanted to jump back into his pocket. Especially now she could do real damage to her Family. She knew too much, now, to risk getting caught and that was a sobering thought.
Aiden was looking spooked, too. He rubbed at his goatee and kept putting his beanie hat on and off, as if unable to decide whether to wear it or not. His hand floated toward it for the third time. ‘Touch the hat and I’ll burn it,’ Lydia said, and he snatched his hand away.
She waited until a couple holding greasy bags from a fast food restaurant had passed by and turned to Aiden. ‘I asked you why Mark Kendal was important.’
Aiden looked down. ‘I told you.’
‘You said he supplied burners. But I found this.’ Lydia produced the ten-shilling note and held it in front of Aiden’s face. She wanted to see how much more lying Aiden was going to do.
‘Old money. That’s weird.’
‘Yeah,’ Lydia put it on the bench between them, keeping one finger resting lightly on the paper to stop it blowing away. ‘You seen one of these before?’
‘No,’ Aiden said, and his eyes slid left. ‘Why would he have that? Maybe he was into history.’
Lydia slid the note across the bench toward Aiden. ‘Pick it up.’
‘No!’ Aiden’s reaction was sudden and loud. At once he looked terrified. ‘I’m sorry. Please don’t.’
Lydia frowned. ‘Don’t what? Give you an old bank note? Tell me what the feathers is going on. Right now. I found a roll of these hidden in Charlie’s house.’
Aiden’s shoulders slumped. ‘They’re like a black spot.’
‘I’m not following.’
‘You know. When pirates are cursed, they have a black spot on their palm. It means they’re marked for death. Or if you look into the face of the night raven, it means you’ll die. Maybe not straight away, but you’re marked. No escape.’
‘Charlie used these to mark people?’
Aiden blinked slowly. He looked tired, but instead of making him look older, it emphasised the youth in his features. Lydia felt a lurch of sympathy. But she couldn’t let up. ‘I’m waiting, Aiden.’
He nodded. Resigned. ‘Let’s say someone had got on his bad side. Done something against the Family. Or against Charlie. You’d have a meeting with him, explain your case. And then you’d go home and find it in your pockets. Then you knew you hadn’t been successful.’
‘And that’s it? A bit of theatre so that people knew he was going to pop round and stab them in their sleep?’ Lydia felt anger at Charlie and it was a relief. The guilt she felt about handing him over to Mr Smith was never far from the surface and she craved validation that it had been justified.
‘Mostly,’ Aiden said, staring at the note like it was going to jump off the bench and bite him. ‘If he booked a removal, he had the operator leave one. Not always, but if he wanted to send a message.’
‘A removal?’
‘Renovations for non-permanent work, removals for permanent.’
‘Gotcha.’ Bloody crime bosses and their slang. ‘Why a ten-shilling note?’
‘He said the Crows ha
d always used coins but joked that it was because of inflation.’ Aiden shrugged. ‘I don’t know. He didn’t tell me everything.’
Well that was certainly true.
Chapter Thirteen
That evening, when Lydia arrived at his flat, Fleet was in a foul mood. She got two beers from the fridge and passed him one. ‘Bad day?’
He put it straight onto the counter and crossed his arms. Not a good sign.
‘When were you going to tell me?’
‘Tell you what?’
Fleet breathed deeply, like he was trying to hold onto his temper. ‘Camberwell is my manor. Did you think I wouldn’t find out?’
‘Give me a clue,’ Lydia said, playing for time.
He stuffed his hands into his pockets and held Lydia’s gaze with a look which could have stripped paint off a car.
‘Is this about Mark Kendal?’
‘I am practically on probation at my work. Didn’t you think to give me a heads up on this one?’
‘I only just heard,’ Lydia said. ‘What makes you think I had prior warning? And what do you mean probation? You just got a promotion.’
Fleet didn’t answer for a moment. He still looked frustrated but there was a weariness, too, like he couldn’t be bothered to hold onto his anger. ‘Not really. It was a sideways move,’ he said eventually. ‘The kind that buries me in meetings and keeps me behind a desk. I need to keep my nose clean and suck up to the brass or I’m never getting a decent case ever again.’
Lydia was stunned. ‘But, why? You’re brilliant at your job.’
A quick smile escaped. ‘Thank you. But I’m in my boss’s bad-books. Or her boss. Or both of them. It’s fine, they’ll get over it. I’m serving my time until they forget about punishing me or something else distracts them. But in the meantime, it would be nice to look halfway competent.’
The Copper Heart Page 10