by Adam Carter
Lin swam to her in two strokes and grabbed hold, threading her arm beneath Greel’s and encircling her chest, keeping Greel’s head upon her own chest while she glanced about for something to use to aid in their escape.
She found nothing.
The ceiling was coming quickly now and Lin readied herself to move. Snatching out her free hand, she grabbed one of the metal bars and pulled, desperate not to release her hold upon Greel, but the bar had no give to offer and Lin knew she would not break the bars in time. Water continued to churn about them and Lin forced Greel’s head above water, pressing both their faces to the bars. Water was covering their faces even now, and she attempted to shout for help, but her heart was pounding and her breath failed her.
And then the grille was no longer there and Lin felt a rough hand grab her, yanking the two detectives from the mire seemingly without effort. She collapsed to the ground, hacking up filthy water and shaking with a fear which now had the opportunity to settle upon her. She crouched on shaking limbs, hands upon the ground as she coughed a liquid wheeze. When she had her breathing somewhat under control, she turned her gaze upon Baronaire. Greel was in a similar state to Lin, although Baronaire was paying little attention to her.
“You all right?” he asked Lin.
“Sure,” Lin replied, keeping her answer brief; she didn’t feel she would be able to manage a full sentence just yet. “Eric?”
“I let him go. Considered going after him, just thought you might not appreciate it.”
Lin tried to smile, but even that was an effort. “Malcolm knows we’re onto him.”
“I know. I need to get you cleaned up so we can go after him again.” He cast a glance towards the other detective. “She even worth saving?”
“Give her a chance.”
Baronaire did not seem to understand why he should, but he accepted her answer because it was a favour she was asking. “Let’s get off the street,” he said. It was certainly a start in bringing down Derek Malcolm. Whatever happened from hereon in, to Detective Lin this one had just become personal.
CHAPTER SEVEN
The kettle had never been filled with so much water, since Baronaire didn’t drink anything and seldom entertained company. Rachael Webster had left Baronaire to make the tea while she had dug out every towel they had in the flat. They did not bring their work home, it was a rule they had set down when they had first started seeing one another; for Rachael to have brought her work home would have been disrespectful and she expected the same courtesy from Baronaire. However, even she could understand this was an emergency, and as she tended to the two shaking, shivering detectives, she knew Baronaire would not have been so eager to allow any of his other colleagues into his home. Detective Lin was his favourite officer to be partnered with, Rachael knew that well enough, but as she helped the Chinese detective rub herself down, her clothes drying by the fire, Rachael could not help feel a pang of jealousy. It was not a new feeling for her, and she knew it was foolish. But Detective Lin spent more time with Baronaire than Rachael herself did, and she was insanely envious.
Baronaire came in with the steaming mugs of tea and the two detectives reached for them eagerly, like hungry chicks watching their mother return to the nest. Rachael noted with some scorn that Baronaire also had some T-shirts and trousers draped across his arm. “They should hopefully fit,” he said, handing over the clothes. “Still better than sitting there in towels.”
Rachael knew it was obvious that the two women were going to have to borrow some of her clothes, yet there was still a part of her which flinched at the thought of having to lend them anything. She knew Baronaire had noticed her reaction, for his powers of deduction were without peer, although he was kind enough not to mention her faults.
“How are we going to get to Malcolm?” Lin asked. “If he knows we’re onto him he’ll be unreachable. Especially when he finds out we escaped.”
“Go after him?” Greel asked, incredulous. “You do what you like, I’m getting as far from London as I possibly can.”
“You’re running away?” Lin asked, surprised.
“Why wouldn’t I? I don’t owe you anything, Lin, and we tried it your way. It didn’t work.”
“So we try again.”
“We survived once, we won’t be so lucky again.”
“If she wants to run,” Baronaire cut in, “we can’t stop her, Lin.” His eyes were upon Greel, and Rachael had seen that look before. Baronaire was up to his mind games again, but that was how he always got the best results. “I’m staying to see this through though. We have two bodies linked to Malcolm, plus the entire drug trade which started all this.”
“You’re not going to guilt trip me, Baronaire,” Greel said, “so don’t even try it.”
“I’m trying nothing. Just wondering what makes you think you’d get very far.”
“Malcolm wouldn’t bother sending anyone after me,” Greel said. “He has more important things to worry about.”
“I never suggested Malcolm would be sending anyone after you.”
Greel blinked. “I don’t follow.”
“We have two dead bodies,” Baronaire repeated, “and that’s even forgetting about the drugs. Which I haven’t, in case you’re wondering. And in the centre of it all there’s a bent detective who turns the other way and who’s been steering the investigation away from Malcolm all the while. You’re an accessory to murder, Greel, and once I’ve finished with Malcolm rest assured I’m coming after you.”
Greel shuddered, pulled her towel about her tighter. She said nothing and Rachael knew whatever Baronaire was talking about, he had her. For all his heightened senses and powers of mesmerisation, Baronaire’s greatest strength lay in being able to look into a person’s soul and turn their own sins against them. It was frightening to watch; Rachael never wanted to have to discover how it must feel to actually endure it.
Lin rose through the tense silence and said, “I should pop into the bedroom to change. Rachael, you want to show me the way?”
“Through that door,” Rachael replied, meeting Lin’s eyes squarely. She knew Lin was trying to leave Baronaire and Greel alone, but this was Rachael’s home and she wouldn’t budge if she didn’t want to. Besides, she could feel this was about to get interesting.
Lin finally broke the gaze and departed. Greel pulled her towel tightly against her again, her shaking hands clutching the hot mug. Rachael wondered whether she was considering making a run for it, maybe throwing the tea over Baronaire to slow him down. That would have been a very bad idea and Rachael was almost hoping she would do it anyway.
“What do you want?” Greel asked in a near-silent voice.
“World peace,” Baronaire said. “I’ll take your cooperation though.”
“We can’t go after Malcolm,” Greel protested, some of her strength returning now. “He’ll kill us. He knows us.”
“We’ll think of a way.”
Rachael suddenly saw a way out of this. She had been so filled with jealousy at Baronaire’s involvement with Lin, so filled with annoyance that there were two naked women draped in towels sitting in her living room, that she had failed to consider the obvious truth.
“Malcolm doesn’t know me.”
“No,” Baronaire said so sharply she knew he had already considered this, maybe even feared she would volunteer herself.
“Come on,” Rachael said, “it’d work.”
“We’re not involving you, Rach.”
“This is my living room. I am involved, Charles.”
“This is my work, Rach. I don’t give you a hand in yours, I’d appreciate it if you’d not interfere in mine.”
Rachael’s heart doubled its beat, her jaw trembled with barely suppressed rage, and it didn’t make the situation any better that Baronaire clearly understood he had said something monumentally stupid. She stared at him in silence, her fists clenched by her sides, her nails drawing blood as they dug into her skin. She knew he was fired up about this assign
ment, knew he was annoyed at having to bring his work home, but he had never before been insensitive about her work. It wasn’t as though she did what she did because she found it fulfilling employment or much liked the hours. The truth was she had tried to find other work since she had met Baronaire, but no one was hiring, and the only job she had been offered had been at a fast food place. She had asked Baronaire whether she should take it; the hours were the same as she currently worked, but the pay was lousy. They were saving as much as possible, however, and they had decided that she would continue with her work for the time being. Or at least she had decided and Baronaire had agreed. She wanted to feel as though she was contributing something, wanted to be an equal partner in their relationship, and Baronaire had voiced no qualm about her continuing for a while as she was.
Now it seemed he had been lying the whole time. Probably to spare her feelings, but it was still lying all the same.
She knew they could argue about it, shout one another down. She’d probably even end up winning and storming off. But Rachael had long ago discovered that shouting at people never solved an argument, and instead she said in as calm a voice as she could muster, “I’m going to take Greel into the bedroom when Lin comes out and get her dressed. You stay here with Lin, you obviously prefer her to me.”
Baronaire was about to argue, maybe even to shout, but she cut him off with a narrowing of her eyes and he looked away. Greel rose slowly in the silence, not knowing what to do, but Lin appeared in the doorway, dressed in the T-shirt and trousers, and Rachael took Greel by the elbow and led her into the bedroom.
Closing the door, Rachael inhaled deeply, knowing if she didn’t control her rage she was liable to explode or cry. She concentrated on finding some clean underwear for Greel to borrow – something more than Lin had been given – and said, “You have a first name?”
“Sara.”
Rachael was trying not to take this out on Greel, especially since Rachael didn’t care about bent detectives. She had been with enough police officers to know they were willing to bend the law whenever it suited their purposes; also, that Greel’s actions had got two people killed didn’t matter much.
“What’s this Malcolm guy got on you anyway?” she asked Greel.
“What do you care?”
“If we’re going to be working together I need to know what I’m getting myself in for.” She spoke stonily, her decision already made, her iron tone daring the detective to question her.
Greel merely shrugged. “Doesn’t really matter any more.”
“Might as well tell me then.”
Greel looked away, and there was an anger to her eyes with which Rachael was all too familiar. When she looked back to her, Rachael knew she was ready to tell her. “I was getting to the end of my shift. I’d had a bad day already but I was going to the theatre. I’ve never had any money, Webster; it’s not that I’m not good with money, I’ve just never had any to be good with. But I like the theatre. Don’t go very often, maybe once a year if I can, and I was going that night. Didn’t have anyone to go with of course, hadn’t been on a date for at least six months, and I was looking forward to it. The one shining light in an otherwise cesspool of a job.”
“I know something about that, and call me Rachael.”
Greel shrugged as though she didn’t care, but Rachael could see it was a front. “So I was all ready to go to the theatre. I finished up my work, clocked out and got the bus home. It was about half six in the evening by this time, I think, and I was already running late. This guy gets on and sits in the back row, starts hassling some woman. She keeps telling him to leave her alone, and he thinks he has some damn right to put his hands wherever he wants. Everyone’s ignoring him, not wanting to get involved. And I’m already late for the theatre.
“Eventually the girl starts screaming, and he grabs her, putting his hand over her mouth to stop her, and at last I get up, flash my badge and tell him to get the hell off the bus. He stares at me as though I’m pond-scum telling a duck to take a detour. He gets up from his seat, stares down at me from about a head taller, and says something stupid and threatening and banal, I can’t remember for the life of me what it was. Anyway, I get the bus stopped and I take him off. I’m only one stop away from mine at this point, so it really doesn’t bother me. Bus carries on and I’m stuck at the bus stop with this moron.
“I should have arrested him for assault, should have taken him to the station, but that would have involved a lot of paperwork, and he would have been out on the streets again by morning. The bus was already gone, taking the victim and all witnesses with it. And I had tickets to the theatre.
“So I told him to behave and walk the rest of the way home.
“Three weeks later the same guy’s brought into the station on a rape charge. Turns out he’s a serial rapist. If I’d taken him to the station when I should have they would have realised that and he wouldn’t have made it back to the streets. And in the three weeks between my setting him free and him being arrested he’d attacked someone else.” She looked Rachael directly in the eyes. There were no tears there, just anger at herself and her own greed. “The worst part of it all is that the show was great. I enjoyed every moment of it. One of the best nights of my life.”
“Malcolm found out, I take it,” Rachael said.
“Oh yes, Malcolm found out all right. And he’s never let me forget it since.”
That made sense. It certainly explained why Greel worked for this guy but had no money to show for it. He likely even promised her money for her continued services, but had no real incentive to ever pay her anything.
“You feel bad about what happened,” Rachael told her. “Isn’t that enough?”
“I could have stopped it.”
“Life’s full of could haves, Detective. I could have gone into law like my folks wanted. Instead I came to London, the bright lights and busy streets and famous shops. Yeah, I could have been a doctor, and instead I’m a street whore.”
“You never hurt anyone.”
“Maybe not. Or maybe by not becoming a doctor I’ve let people die.”
“That’s stupid logic and you know it.”
“Yeah. Still can’t change the past though. Here.” She tossed Greel the underwear and the detective discarded the towel and dressed, having herself brought the T-shirt and trousers Baronaire had already provided. Rachael had turned away for the sake of decency, although her eyes shot back to the detective as she slipped the shirt on. Rachael had only caught a fleeting glimpse, but there were scars on Greel’s back. Long welts as though caused by a whip or belt.
Greel noticed her expression and said, “Can’t change the past, Webster.”
“What happened? Who beat you?”
“Does it matter?”
“Yes.”
Greel sighed. “Let’s just say Malcolm doesn’t like people saying no to him.”
“You refused? And he beat you?”
“Not personally. I’ve never met the guy. But what else was he going to do anyway? Run to the cops? That’s not his style. He knows he can finish me any time he likes, but he’s not going to do it. He prefers his own justice, sick and twisted that he is.”
“Then you stood up to him,” Rachael said. “You didn’t just keel over the moment he made contact and told you to be his puppet?”
“I may be scum, Webster, but I don’t deal drugs.”
“I don’t think you’re scum, Sara. And for God’s sake call me Rachael.”
“Oh hell, we’re not bonding are we?”
Rachael’s smile was tight. “Well you’ve calmed me down a bit so I’m more than willing to think so. Shall we go back and join the others?”
“Baronaire doesn’t want you doing this.”
“No.”
“And you’re still going to?”
“I use what skills I have. Limited that they may be. And I may be scum, Sara, but I don’t deal drugs.”
The two women stood in silence for several mome
nts, until finally Greel said, “You’re OK, Rachael.”
“For someone of questionable employment?”
“At least you’re upfront about what you do. You’re a stronger woman than I could ever be.”
“Then you need to trust yourself more.”
“That’s just it,” Greel said, and Rachael could see the coldness within the detective’s eyes. “I don’t trust myself at all.”
It was a sad admission, but at least it was at last the truth.
CHAPTER EIGHT
She knew she should not have been interfering in Baronaire’s work and that he had been right to have demanded she keep out of it, but if she couldn’t help the man she loved when he needed it, Rachael couldn’t see any reason in staying with him. She had never been in love before, never really believed in it. She had started selling herself for money simply because it was either that or starve to death. It was a short-term thing, something she would do a few times in order to build up some cash before moving to another area where no one could possibly know her. She would never mention to anyone what she had done, and no one would think to ask. When she was old and grey her grandchildren would adore her, and she them, and her family would never know the secret she would take to her grave.
And then she had met Baronaire and something in her had changed. Her life had been in danger and Baronaire had been assigned to look after her. At first she had hated him, hated the entire situation which had made her a prisoner just because someone else was trying to kill her. But that hatred had mellowed and the more she saw of Baronaire, the more she found his social ineptitude amusing, the more she had grown to like him. And then he had saved her life and she realised just how close she had come to death.
Rachael had not looked back since.
The early morning air was bitterly cold, especially since Rachael’s black skirt barely covered her hips. She wore black leather boots and a tight tank top, her arms entirely bare save for long white gloves Baronaire had insisted on her wearing. If her fingerprints were found, he had told her, they would have a devil of a time explaining away her presence to the investigation team. Rachael’s hair was worn loose and long, her eyelashes had been plucked, and she had been more than generous with her application of make-up. She carried a small handbag across one shoulder, supported by a long strap, and could not have looked more a common prostitute if she wanted.