by Kate London
‘I’m sorry. I’m not good at this. I’m sure there’s clever things I should be saying, but I can’t think what they are. All I can think is that you must be feeling like this is terrible, so I’m telling you that what you’ve done so far, it’s not so bad.’
Ryan looked at Steve again. ‘Holding him. What’s that?’
Kieran shrugged. ‘False imprisonment, I guess.’
‘What’ll I get for that?’
‘Well, a lot less than you’d get for murder, so I’d steer clear of that one.’
There was a silence and then it rushed out of Kieran. His own hopes shaping themselves into sentences: this could work out OK. Tia would be found. Ryan would have mitigation.
‘Mitigation? What’s that?’
Kieran explained it: the judge would go easy. He was a juvenile, groomed by Shakiel, used as an unwitting informant by Perseus. Kieran had a sense that he was using the wrong words. He tried to make it simple, but he could see the happy ending and he couldn’t shut up. His brain was already elaborating on it. If he goes Queen’s Evidence, just think of all the help I can get him! He imagined Ryan happy. Perhaps the boy just needed someone batting for him. He knew what that felt like.
He said, ‘I know about your dad, Ryan.’
He thought of his own little boy, Connor, with a pang of tenderness for his love of elephants, and for Lizzie too with the animal yoghurts she had nipped out and bought for him to take to the hospital. He prayed she’d be able to get to him soon. Everyone needs someone batting for them.
His phone was ringing. He lifted it slowly out of his pocket and showed Ryan the screen.
Sarah Collins.
‘It’s the officer who’s looking for Tia,’ he said, dizzy with the closeness of possible success. For all her faults Sarah was a fucking good detective. She’d found the girl.
Ryan’s expression was solemn, his eyes wide, his face wary. ‘Answer it.’
Kieran swiped the screen and listened. He held up a thumb to Ryan and nodded. Ryan smiled slowly, still sceptical, still hoping.
Kieran said, ‘That’s great news. Would you send me a pic? Just so I can see her?’
*
Lizzie ordered another coffee and wished it was drinkable. She’d felt obliged to drink the last one and it sat coldly in her stomach. Her phone was a source of nothing but unease. She was eaten by fear. Anxiety about Connor – how was he? Shouldn’t she be at the hospital? – and fear about what was unravelling in the flat opposite. It was painful waiting for a text from Talulah. She didn’t dare call her in case she missed an update on the WhatsApp feed. They were coming regularly now. DCI Baillie had been blue-lighted to the Perseus offices.
Ryan was standing at the window. Kieran wished he wouldn’t do that. The phone in his hand vibrated and Tia’s picture appeared as a thumbnail on the screen. He passed Ryan the phone. Ryan glanced down and beamed.
Kieran said, ‘Now we’ve got to work out how to get you out of here.’
But Ryan was staring out of the window. He said, ‘Look at that pagan!’
Kieran moved next to him and, with a sinking heart, saw what he saw: a tall, thin man in a long coat walking the length of the road, checking house numbers.
Lizzie saw him too and knew instantly that it was King. Blending in would clearly be an affront to his dignity. He was dressed for the gunfight at the O.K. Corral: a long coat with a fur-trimmed collar pulled up. Hands in his pockets. He just had to show out. She updated the radio on the designated channel. King was on the opposite side of the road, approaching the flat. Already she was standing up, unzipping her jacket so she could access her kit. She had to cross and move up the pavement to get to him. She wished there was a more discreet way to do it. Nowadays even the guys in the tube station made her when she swiped through. How on earth had that happened? She was female, small, still in her twenties. Surely no one’s idea of how a cop looked?
Ryan saw him; the man who had killed his boy. Spence, who had hung out with him and never let him down and who had always had his back. Then, leaving the café and walking towards him: a woman. A fed, no fucking doubt about it. This man, Kieran, had lied to him, like they always did. Talking, talking, talking with all his bullshit words. Mitigation! What a big word for a lie. When this was over, he was going down for a long time. Taking Steve prisoner? Holding him at gunpoint? That was life, surely.
Kieran’s attention had moved from the tall man in the coat to the young woman who was walking across the street towards him. Lizzie looked so vulnerable and so idiotically brave, and he heard himself telling her that the priority had to be stopping King getting into the flat. Why on earth had he said that?
Had the Met got a sniper in place? he wondered. Would they take Ryan out if he waved a gun at the window?
Ryan turned to him. ‘If you didn’t say nothing to no one, how come there’s a cop down there?’
The lie was instant.
‘It’s just a young woman. How do you know she’s a cop?’
From the brief incredulous look on Ryan’s face, Kieran was surprised he hadn’t already shot him. But instead he turned back to look out of the window and Kieran heard him answering quietly, almost to himself.
‘You’re just all liars.’
The gun was in his right hand, down by his thigh, and he was all intent, his body focused on the street like a cat watching a bird and twitching its tail. A handgun was hopeless at a distance, but the target was close and so was Lizzie.
No choice but to do what his guv’nor had told him to do all those years ago. He could hear MC speaking to the young man he had once been: shiny shoes, no dad at home to be proud of him, eager to make his mark with this man whom everyone admired.
Make one decision, then the next. Everything plays out in the end. Everything comes to a stop.
Kieran was older now than MC had been when he offered that advice. Still he was trying to live up to that ideal: to make it all come right through the sheer force of his will.
Lizzie, only a foot away from King, was doing her best to fake it. His heart went out to her. She’d put her hand up in greeting as though she knew King and was surprised to see him. King’s head tilted slightly to the side as if he was uncertain. His hands were in his pockets and Kieran wondered if he had a knife. Perhaps he had a gun too. Ryan was slipping the latch on the window. If he leant out, he would have a good shot. And so would any sniper. But the gun was still passive, still by his leg.
In the end, it wasn’t even really a decision. If there was a moment, this was it. Kieran lunged and Ryan turned, and the kick that threw Kieran across the room was faster than the thought that this time this was how it all came to a stop.
58
It was as if a starting pistol had been fired. Everything changed in an instant. The street was full of police, who swept Lizzie away. Not the usual dark uniforms of borough: specialist officers with blue baseball hats and babygros and firearms. King was caught up in the tsunami, face down in just seconds, handcuffed, arrested. Lizzie, freed suddenly of all responsibility, stood light-headed and watched her fellow officers, bewildered by their efficiency. How had they got so certain and clear about what to do when she no longer knew anything?
Three of them were running towards the door of the flat, firearms in hands. A blast and a puff of smoke and the flimsy door was on its hinges and the officers had disappeared through the opening, followed by others running too. A wind was blowing across the street, spreading out from above. Lizzie looked up. It was the red helicopter: the medics. Someone was shouting at her, ‘Get out the way!’ She turned and moved towards the lopsided door. The stairs up to whatever had happened. Don’t think about what that was. Just climb the narrow treads.
Voices.
She stood on the threshold of the cramped room. Steve, back against the wall, blood on his hands and on his cheek where he must have put a hand to his face. Ryan next to him, standing by the mantelpiece, hands cuffed to the back, motionless. Neither spoke. Neither looked at each other. Plas
tic wrappers for medical dressings were scattered on the floor. Lizzie’s eyes skated over the room, still hoping they would not settle on the thing they had glimpsed: Kieran on his back by the window, surrounded by uniforms. The window behind him was shattered, the wall and the remains of the pane splashed with blood, as if someone had thrown paint. Beyond him she could see the discarded revolver.
She moved towards him in slow motion and saw he was conscious, his eyes open, his breath audible: light and quick. One of the firearms officers was kneeling beside him, his hands pressed against his ribs as if he was trying to push him across the room. The officer’s hands were red, the dressing soaked, a slick of blood spreading out and seeping onto the floor. She heard a male voice. ‘Medics on the way, guv. Any second. Hang on in there.’ That was when the reality of it slipped into her and she found herself trying to get close to him and crying and being pushed back.
The officer was female and pretty and had a firm hand on her shoulder. Their eyes met, and Lizzie glimpsed a mirror back into how she once was – young, fit as a whippet, confident. She heard Kieran: ‘Let her come.’ And the officer relaxed and looked over her shoulder and then back at Lizzie with a meaningful direction in her eyes, and Lizzie said, ‘Yeah, I know,’ because she understood and didn’t need to be told. Be calm. Be optimistic. Suddenly privileged in the police family that had created itself in an instant around the wounded officer, she wiped her face and moved towards Kieran. She tried for a smile and said, ‘Going to be all right.’
His face was white and sticky, his lips blue. She wasn’t sure how much he was understanding. Her eyes filled. She said, ‘Love you.’ He moved his head – almost a smile – and spoke with surprising clearness. ‘Don’t be ridiculous.’
She felt words and tears and regrets and desperate hope too brimming inside her. She said it again. ‘You’re going to be all right.’
And it was true. He would survive. Everything would be different.
He nodded and frowned. Then he turned his face away, not from her perhaps but from the pain. The doctors were there and she was moved back to free them to work. She stood for a while not able to think or focus. Kieran was being lifted onto the trolley bed. She followed. It was a Chinese dragon down the stairs, the procession of medics and officers, checking, monitoring, the thick plastic bag of blood carried high like a trophy won in battle.
The female officer approached her. ‘You want to go to the hospital?’
‘Yes, my son’s at the Free.’
It took a while to make sense of her request – that she wanted to go to her son, who was also Kieran’s son – and not to the Royal London where Kieran was being taken.
They blue-lighted her. The young female officer offered her name: Julia. After a brief stab at conversation, she gave up. Lizzie stared out of the passenger window and saw nothing.
59
Ryan was standing at the custody desk in a white paper forensic suit. He looked small, almost like he was in pyjamas. Sarah remembered his flat. The stale mingled smell of cannabis and fried food. The sofa with the dirty blanket in front of the telly and the picture of his murdered dad on the wall. She’d felt sorry for him, but even then he’d been concealing a knife. He was one of a thousand such kids in London. It could all work out in the end, or he could end up here facing a serious charge, or he could end up dead.
Seeing Sarah, he spoke in an impulsive rush.
‘I didn’t mean to do it. He rushed me. It went off by accident.’
A wave of bitterness passed through her. As if she had any power to save him now from what he had done!
It reminded her of every child she’d ever interviewed. Always an accident, or someone else’s fault, or it simply didn’t happen and they didn’t know what she was talking about. Her eyes flicked to the whiteboard, written in blue wipeable marker.
Ryan Kennedy Attempted murder
Juvenile Suicide watch
Attempted: Kieran was still alive.
She didn’t allow herself to hope. She tried not to think about the outcome at all.
Loretta was by Ryan’s side. The bright custody light wasn’t kind to her. Her eyes were hollow in her skull and her lined mouth was puckered, as if drawn tight by a string. She turned to Sarah and said, ‘Got me one back but lost me another.’
That was it: always expecting sympathy for your boy, never offering any for what he’d done.
Sarah shook her head. ‘I can’t talk to you about it.’
The custody sergeant nodded at her coldly: he wanted her gone. It was a tough job, handling a boy who’d shot an officer, and he needed as little complication as possible.
60
All the Perseus prisoners, including Jarral, had been moved to Atcham nick. From the outside the station was lit up as it would have been just a couple of years ago when it was still operational, but inside the staircases and offices carried a film of disuse and the newspapers that littered the abandoned desks were as yellow and brittle as dried leaves.
The investigation into events on Farrens Lane hadn’t caught up with Sarah yet, and she intended to keep working until they did.
Elaine had grabbed a corner office upstairs and established base camp. She’d wiped down a desk. There was a kettle, tea and coffee, biscuits. There were even commemorative mugs: silver transparencies of faces on heavy white china. The Marriage of the Prince of Wales and Lady Diana Spencer. Wednesday 29th July 1981.
‘Found them in a cupboard,’ Elaine said, handing Sarah an instant coffee. ‘Collectors’ items.’
Sarah nodded. ‘Great, Elaine. Thanks.’
Elaine pointed her in the direction of the laptop on the desk.
‘Click on that. It might cheer you up.’
Sarah stared at the recording Elaine had managed to locate among the weeks of footage collected by Operation Perseus.
‘Well done. How did you manage to find it in less than twenty-four hours?’
Elaine shrugged. ‘Turns out we’re both good at finding things.’
Sarah shook her head. ‘I’m sorry, Elaine. I’m going to have to ask you to stop being kind. It’s really getting to me.’
Elaine nodded. ‘OK. I’ll stop.’
That was when Sarah started to cry.
Elaine offered a handkerchief from her bag.
‘You going to be OK?’
Sarah wiped her face. ‘Course I will. You able to interview with me?’
61
Elaine and Sarah sat opposite Jarral and his lawyer. Jarral had the look, or thought he had. Everything super-clean and a smell of pungent aftershave. Pointy suede shoes with gold buckles, a thin leather jacket over an open-necked shirt. Hair gelled up. He looked like a complete idiot but just what Sarah needed: a man who was transparent in his sensitivity to mockery. Touchy about his appearance and his respect.
She had asked Elaine to interview, but Jarral, by some instinct, addressed his answers to Sarah anyway, his tone as if he was talking to dirt on his shoe.
‘I’m not answering any further questions.’
Elaine – persuasive, fat, messy, kind – said, ‘Why’s that, Jarral?’
‘No comment.’
‘Is it honour? Is it a code?’
Again he replied to Sarah as if she had asked the question. ‘Honour? What would you know about that?’
Elaine smiled. ‘You’re loyal to Shakiel. That’s the code, right?’
‘No comment.’
‘He looks after you. You respect him. He’s the daddy.’ Elaine smiled again, self-deprecatingly. ‘I’m sorry. I’m not down with the kids. You’ll have to tell me. Being the daddy … is that still a thing?’
‘No comment.’
‘And it’s mutual … I mean, he respects you too. He looks after you.’
Jarral smirked, flattered in spite of the context: a windowless police interview room, a probable charge for the murder of a street prostitute. Sarah burned with contempt for him but Elaine spoke with no trace of irony.
‘You must b
e somebody to have gained the respect of a man like Shakiel.’
Jarral barely shook his head. His face carried a stupid prideful smile that barely concealed his pitiful vulnerability to the opinion of others.
Elaine said, ‘OK, I’m going to turn the tapes off now and play you a surveillance recording.’
It was a darkened interior, the front of a car on a night street. Hard to see clearly, the people not framed properly – an arm, a shoulder, a chest, a view through a side window of the flare of street light and an out-of-focus shop window. But if the visual was poor, the voices were distinct and identifiable: Shakiel and Steve.
Sarah pushed the transcript towards Jarral. She had a copy herself and read it as the two men spoke.
Shakiel:
I run this estate, been doing it for years.
UC Steve:
How come they never catch you?
Shakiel:
Even when I was a yute, they never could prove nothing.
UC Steve:
Mmm. You got to be careful.
Shakiel:
This shit? They catch you? You’re going down for a long time. That’s why I’m getting out.
UC Steve:
You’re getting out.
Shakiel:
Yeah. After this, I’m off ends. I’m gonna be so far from the street the feds won’t even see I’m black no more.
[Laughter.]
UC Steve:
What about the people you’re with …
Shakiel:
What d’you mean?
UC Steve:
You don’t worry about them? One of them being a snitch maybe? Or just being stupid. Take Jarral, he’s close to you. You don’t worry about him?
Shakiel:
Jarral? You’re kidding me, bruv. He’s not family. He’s useful, yes. Does a lot of things for me. Carrying, that kinda shit. Stuff I don’t want to get near. But he’s thick as shit. Jarral? Worried about him? He’s just my dog. He wouldn’t dare. I keep him as long as he’s useful. Don’t tell him nothing. Why would I? Who talks to their dog?