by Val McDermid
He’d have liked to stay, but it was too dangerous. He’d go back to the motel and watch the fire take hold on the cameras. He wasn’t going to phone this one in. He didn’t want the fire brigade to arrive too soon, and someone was bound to spot it eventually. It would take a while – the house wasn’t overlooked at the back – and that suited Vance. Nothing less than complete gutting would do.
He walked briskly back to the car and drove sedately out of Tony Hill’s driveway.
After her second near-miss in half an hour, Carol admitted belatedly to herself that she probably shouldn’t be driving. But she’d had no choice. This was news that had to come from her. She couldn’t let her parents find out from a stranger. This was her responsibility in every sense and she had to shoulder it. She pulled off the motorway at the next services and ordered hot chocolate and a blueberry muffin to raise her blood sugars and combat the state of shock that still had her in its grip.
She stirred her drink compulsively, unable to remember ever feeling this bleak. After the rape, when she’d been convinced she couldn’t be a police officer any more, she’d thought it was impossible to descend any lower. But this was far worse. Before, she’d been determined to restore the damage done to her. This time, she could be as determined as she liked, but it wouldn’t bring back her brother or her friend.
Carol had never needed a wide circle of friends. She’d always been content with a small group of intimates, a handful of people she could trust with everything that mattered. Michael had always been one of those; with only a couple of years between them, they’d managed a closeness denied to many siblings. When he’d got together with Lucy, Carol had been afraid that she’d lose that straightforward sharing they’d always known. She’d been afraid that she and Lucy would become competitors for his attention. At first, it had been sticky. There were always going to be jagged edges between a senior cop and a defence brief. But the more they’d seen of each other, the clearer it became that they were kindred spirits. Their professional lives were both underpinned by a desire for justice; what divided them became less important as time passed. And so Lucy had ended up as one of that close circle. And now, in one day she had lost two of the people she loved most, and sent a third into exile.
She picked at her muffin, tearing it apart with agitated fingers. She’d never been so angry with Tony. He should have seen the possibility that Vance’s revenge would take as perverse a form as his previous crimes. There had never been anything straightforward about the way his mind had expressed itself. No reason to think prison would have changed that. It was obvious to her now, but she wasn’t the psychologist here. It should have been obvious to Tony from the get-go.
Carol finished her drink and got back on the road. Progress was horrendously slow. Nobody would choose to drive down the M1 on a Friday night unless they had to. The traffic congealed in unpredictable clots, then suddenly the jam would disperse and everyone would hammer the pedal to the metal till they hit the next blockage. The faces that were lit up by passing headlights were frazzled, enraged or bored. Nobody looked cheerful or happy to be there.
She’d just passed the turning for Nottingham when she remembered her poor old cat, Nelson. There was no way she’d be getting home tonight, and at seventeen, Nelson was too old to be left without fresh food and water overnight. Normally, she could have asked Tony to take care of him. But right now she never wanted to speak to Tony again. There was a spare key in her desk drawer, she thought. Paula could be relied on not to snoop if she had access to Carol’s flat. Once upon a time, she probably would have. Carol was pretty sure Paula had been a little bit in love with her for a long time. But being with Elinor had damped down those feelings. Now she could trust her just to feed the cat.
Wearily, she scrolled down to Paula’s number on the car’s computer screen and tapped the mouse. Paula answered on the second ring. ‘Chief,’ she said. ‘We’re all so sorry.’ There was no doubting her sincerity.
‘I know,’ Carol said. ‘I need you to do something for me.’
‘Anything. That goes for all of us. Anything we can do to help.’
‘I’m not going to make it home tonight. There’s a key to my flat in my desk drawer. I need you to feed Nelson.’
There was a momentary pause. ‘Just feed him?’
‘Food and water. There’s some cooked chicken and rice in the fridge in a plastic box. And dried food in a plastic bin on the floor.’
‘Carol … ’ Paula spoke gently. Carol was taken aback. She couldn’t remember Paula ever using her name.
‘What?’ She sounded more abrupt than she’d intended. But she didn’t think she could handle kindness right now.
‘The word is that Vance might have killed Michael and Lucy.’
‘That’s right.’
‘I don’t want to seem paranoid, but … well, I could take Nelson back to ours. You wouldn’t have to worry about him then.’
For a moment Carol couldn’t speak. Her throat seemed to close in a precursor to tears. ‘Thank you,’ she said, not sounding like herself at all.
‘No problem. Do you have a cat carrier?’
‘The cupboard under the stairs. You don’t mind?’
‘I’m glad there’s something I can do to help. If there’s anything else you need, just say. That goes for all of us,’ Paula said. ‘Even Sam.’
Carol almost smiled. ‘I’m on my way to tell my parents. I’ve no idea when I’ll be back. I’ll talk to you soon, Paula. Thank you.’
There was nothing more to be said and Paula was smart enough to know it. Carol drove on, turning over what she knew about Vance and his history. But nothing helpful surfaced. The last time she’d felt this powerless, she’d spent months trying to find solace in the bottom of a bottle. The one thing she did know right now was that she was determined she wasn’t going there again.
By the time she left the motorway, the traffic had thinned out. Her parents had retired to an Oxfordshire village a couple of years before, hoping to indulge their twin passions for gardening and bridge. Her father enjoyed watching the village cricket team and her mother had taken to the Women’s Institute with puzzling glee. They’d suddenly become caricatures of middle-class middle-Englanders. Neither Carol nor Michael had grown into adults who had anything in common with their parents, and last time she’d gone to stay, Carol had run out of things to say depressingly early in the visit.
On a Friday evening, the only sign of life in the village was light. The thatched pub was spotlit, and most of the houses round the green displayed the discreet glow of lamps from behind curtains and blinds. There were few street lights, and no huddled groups of adolescents lurking beneath them. The closest anyone here came to anti-social behaviour was making too much noise when putting the empties out for the recycle truck.
Carol turned down the narrow lane that led to her parents’ house. It was the last of three, and as she pulled up outside, her headlights caught the reflective markings of a police car tucked into a gateway a little further down the lane. Carol stilled the engine and got out, waiting for the Family Liaison Officer from the car to come and check her out.
The FLO appeared to be about Carol’s age, but that was where any similarity ended. She was a dumpy woman with dark hair shot through with wiry grey strands pulled back in an unflattering bun beneath her uniform hat. Her skin showed the remains of virulent acne and her eyes were set close together on either side of a sharp nose. But when she smiled, her face softened with kindness and Carol could see why she’d ended up doing a job that few officers relished. ‘DCI Jordan, is it?’ she said. ‘I’m PC Alice Flowers. I’ve been on station since half past four, and nobody’s been near the house. I could see the occupants moving around, so no need to worry that anything happened before you arrived.’ She had a faint Oxfordshire burr in her voice which was as reassuring as her smile. ‘I just want to say how sorry I am about your brother.’
Carol acknowledged her words with a tip of her head. ‘I’ve never been
very good at the death knock,’ she said.
‘That’s nothing to be ashamed of,’ Alice said. ‘Shall we get it over with, ma’am?’
Carol reached into the car and grabbed her coat, slipping it on and turning up the collar. She gave a sharp sigh. ‘Let’s do it,’ she said, squaring her shoulders. Please God, she could hold it together.
They walked up the flagged path between the box hedges that her father kept clipped to precisely knee-height. A wooden porch jutted over the path and Carol led the way. Alice stayed a couple of discreet steps behind her as she rang the doorbell. Silence, then a scuffle of feet, then a light snapped on over their heads.
The door opened and Carol’s mother appeared, looking like an older and less stylish version of her daughter. The look of mild curiosity on her face gave way to astonishment. ‘Carol! What a surprise. You should have phoned.’ She broke into a smile. Then, as she took in the expression on Carol’s face and spotted the uniformed officer behind her daughter, her face froze. Her hand flew to her mouth. ‘Carol?’ she said, her voice unsteady. ‘Carol, what’s happened?’
36
Kevin plonked himself down on a corner of Paula’s desk. She didn’t even look up from the report she was skimming. ‘What?’ she said.
‘The cleaner from the motel, the one who reported the wet carpet? She cleans at the carpet warehouse in the evenings. I thought I’d take a run over there and see what she’s got to say. Do you fancy coming with me?’
‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ve nearly finished going through these door-to-doors, then I’m going round to the chief’s flat to collect her cat. He’ll be starving if I leave it much longer.’
‘Aw, come on, Paula,’ Kevin wheedled. ‘You know you’re better with women than I am.’
‘In every possible sense,’ Chris called over from her desk.
Kevin pretended to be offended. ‘At least I’m admitting it. She’s Turkish, Paula. She’s probably working off the books. I’ll scare her. You’ll get her to talk.’
Paula groaned. ‘I promised I’d pick up Nelson.’
‘Is Elinor in?’ Chris said.
‘She should be.’
‘I’ll do it, then,’ Chris said. ‘I’m going out anyway to talk to the street girls, see if any of them have seen anybody dodgy with the dead women. I’ll pick up the cat and drop him off with Elinor. I’d take him back to ours, but I don’t think the dogs would be very happy.’
‘Problem solved, then,’ Kevin said, relieved.
‘There’s a key to the flat in her desk drawer,’ Paula said, resigned to her fate. She reached for her jacket and followed Kevin.
The carpet warehouse was as cheerless as Christmas for one. The shutters were down over the big display windows at the front, but they eventually found a small door tucked away round the side. The light that should have illuminated it had burned out, which was probably a blessing in disguise. Kevin hammered on the locked door and eventually it was opened by a skinny woman with the blue-black skin of equatorial Africa. ‘What?’ she said.
‘We’re here to talk to Buket,’ Paula said.
‘Nobody here,’ the black woman said, shaking her head for emphasis.
‘Buket works here. She’s not in any trouble. We just need to talk to her.’
The woman half-turned her head. ‘Not here.’
‘We’re from the police,’ Paula said. ‘No trouble, I promise. But I need to talk to her. You have to let us in.’ Little white lies, the kind that just trip from a copper’s tongue after enough time in the job.
The woman stepped back suddenly and let the door swing open. ‘No trouble,’ she said, disappearing round an array of carpets on a giant metal frame. In the distance, they could hear the motor of a vacuum cleaner. The echoing vastness of the prefabricated metal warehouse competed with the sound absorbency of so much carpet to make it hard to figure out where the noise was coming from. They did their best to follow it and finally emerged in an open area where carpet samples mounted on boards were stacked in wooden holders. A small plump woman with a hijab was wielding an industrial cleaner with surprising energy.
Paula walked round into her eyeline and waved at her. The woman literally jumped in surprise, then fumbled with the power switch. The motor’s note died away, leaving a faint resonance. ‘Are you Buket?’ Paula asked.
The woman’s dark eyes widened and darted to each side as if seeking an escape. Kevin let her see him and gave what he hoped was a reassuring smile. ‘We’re not from Immigration,’ he said.
‘We don’t care if you’re here legally or if you’re being paid cash in hand,’ Paula said. ‘We are police officers, but there’s no reason to be afraid of us. Come on, let’s sit down.’ She pointed to a desk with a couple of customer chairs in front of it. Buket’s shoulders slumped and she let herself be led to a chair. Kevin had no idea how Paula did it, but it impressed him every time she led an unwilling witness to communication.
‘Are you Buket?’ Paula asked gently.
‘That is my name,’ the woman said.
‘And you also work at the Sunset Strip motel?’
Again, the darting eyes. Her olive skin seemed paler and she bit her lower lip. ‘I not want trouble.’
‘We’re not going to cause you trouble. We want to ask you about something that happened a little while ago at the motel. OK?’
‘I don’t know anything,’ Buket said immediately.
Paula pressed on regardless. ‘One of the rooms you clean was very wet.’
Buket’s face cleared, as if she’d been given the all-clear after some hideous medical procedure. ‘The room was wet, yes. This is what you want to know?’
‘That’s right. Can you tell me about it?’
‘So much water. Towels are heavy and drip everywhere. Bathroom floor is wet, big puddles. Carpet near bathroom is so wet it goes—’ she made a liquid, sucking sound – ‘under feet. I tell manager, I not want trouble.’
‘Did it look like the bath had overflowed?’
Buket frowned. ‘Over …?’
‘Too much water from the bath?’
She nodded vigorously. ‘From the bath, yes. Water is clean, not dirty. Not from toilet. Nice smell.’
‘Can you remember which room it was?’
‘Five. I am sure.’
‘And did you see the people in room five at all? Did you perhaps see them leave in the morning?’
Buket shook her head. ‘I saw nobody from five. I see other people, but not from five. I leave it till last room in case sleep late, but when I go in, nobody is there.’
Paula looked at Kevin. ‘Can you think of anything else to ask Buket?’
‘Just her surname and address,’ he said, smiling at Buket but talking soft and fast. ‘We’ll need to get fingerprints and DNA to eliminate her when the forensics team get stuck in to room five. Good luck with that.’
There was something about working late on a Friday night that pissed off Detective Sergeant Alvin Ambrose more than any other. It was the end of the school week, the night when the kids could stay up a bit later. He liked to take them swimming on a Friday night. It made him feel like a normal dad, the kind of bloke who did things with his kids that didn’t get interrupted because of the stupid, the addicted and the drunk.
He was even more pissed off because he was stuck on his own in the CID room. Whatever Patterson’s agenda was right now, it still didn’t seem to include taking responsibility for the CID team he was supposed to lead. He’d walked away mid-afternoon, telling Ambrose to get on with it. Because there was so little doing, Ambrose had sent most of the team home, but on standby. Nobody knew where Vance would be spotted next or when. They had to be ready to roll at short notice when they had something definite to go at. He had officers out talking to prison staff who had been off-duty at the time of the escape, but other than that he couldn’t actually think of anything constructive to do.
The worst irony of all was that, in Ambrose’s experience, nothing worth working late for had e
ver happened on a Friday. He’d had great results over the years, spectacular arrests backed up with genuine confessions. But never on a Friday, for some reason. So there was a double resentment for Ambrose. That was before he even added on the bitterness of being at the beck and call of a bunch of mad bloody Geordies who couldn’t even speak proper English.
The reason he was chained to his desk was the trickling through of results from Northumbria Police’s search of Terry Gates’s house and the lock-up where he stored his market-stall gear. Ambrose had wanted to go up there himself to conduct the search, but his boss had said there was no need, that the cops in Newcastle knew how to conduct a search. Which translated to, ‘I don’t have the budget for you to go gallivanting.’
So here he was, waiting for the next pile of nothing from the North East. So far, Terry Gates had not lived up to Tony’s promise of carelessness. All of the paperwork that Northumbria Police had scanned in and emailed down to Ambrose had been connected to Gates’s own finances, either private or professional. There were two computers, however. One at the lock-up, which appeared to be solely for the business, and another, more modern machine at home which showed signs of attempts to clean up its hard disk. Both were on their way by secure courier; they would be with Ambrose in the morning. He’d tried to get hold of their local forensic computer expert, Gary Harcup, to put him on standby for the arrival of the computers, but so far Gary hadn’t got back to him. The fat twat was probably too busy playing some online game to have bothered checking his messages. After all, it was Friday night for geeks too.
Ambrose was wondering whether he could reasonably call it a day when the phone rang. ‘DS Ambrose,’ he sighed.
‘Aye, it’s Robinson Davy from Newcastle here,’ a voice as deep and sonorous as Ambrose’s own announced.