by Andy Maslen
“I hope so, DS Cole. Those psychos out there make me look like a fucking new man, I tell you.”
*
After standing under the hot water for twenty minutes, she went into the bedroom and stood in front of the mirror on the outside of the wardrobe door. Jesus, Stel, where’ve your boobs gone? All this running is fine for your fitness, but you look like a boy. Right. Pie and chips in the canteen every day until there was a bit more flesh on her bones. KitKats and Mars Bars, too. Full-fat lattes and kebabs after the pub. Shit! The pub.
Every addict would tell you, it was best to stay away from places that served alcohol. Especially those whose raison d’être was to sell as much of the stuff as possible. Restaurants? OK, at a pinch. Cocktail bars and pubs? No way, José. But that was where they did half their business. Mooching in mid-afternoon when the hardened boozers were nursing their sixth or seventh “lunchtime” pint and ready to offer a bit of information about some stolen laptops or who was into kiddie porn for the price of a few more. Or sitting around with your team at the end of the shift, swapping war stories or comparing notes. Well, it was orange and soda from now on, or J2O, or one of those other kids’ drinks. The force was home to enough recovering alcoholics for this, at least, to be OK.
She got dressed. Functional, white Gap underwear, boot-cut jeans, white shirt, sky-blue knitted tank top, leather biker jacket, and a pair of low-heeled, leather ankle boots. She’d started out in CID wearing higher heels. But after catching one in a grating while chasing a suspect down an alley and going her length on the piss-soaked cobbles, she’d given up on that particular style of footwear, even if it did leave her, at five-three, the shortest member of the syndicate.
She loaded her jacket pockets with her gear, jamming her little helper well down into the right hip pocket, and went downstairs. She could hear little snuffles from Lola’s room where her precious child slept within arm’s length of her nanny, all paid for out of Richard’s life insurance.
She dawdled over her breakfast of bacon, eggs, fried tomatoes, toast and marmalade – start as we mean to go on, eh, Stel? – but it was still only five when she loaded her mug, plate, knife and fork into the dishwasher. She wasn’t due in until eight for her briefing with HR, then her return-to-work meeting with Collier.
She went into the spare bedroom. It had been her incident room. It contained a cheap desk from IKEA, a swivel chair and a filing cabinet in battleship-grey steel. One wall was covered with cork floor tiles, on which she’d pinned photographs, street plans and documents. No red woollen strings, though–that was strictly for TV super cops. She’d spent days on end in this little room, working her way through bottles of soft, fruity, seductive Pinot Grigio as she pored over witness statements and media reports. She’d accepted the verdict. She’d accepted Deacon’s guilt. Her therapist had helped her to move past her blazing desire for vengeance. She was a police officer. A detective inspector. A bloody good one. And wasn’t going to let Deacon destroy any more of her life. She would commemorate Richard’s life by being the best bloody detective London had ever seen. But still, she analysed.
The questions hung over her like a cloud of biting flies. Why had he done it? Was he on his phone? Was he drunk? High? What was he doing on that quiet residential street in Putney when she knew for a fact his normal stamping ground was over in east London, Shoreditch way? Or was it more than just a FATACC? Was it a deliberate attack? A killing? Had somebody hired Deacon or somehow coerced him into doing what he’d done? She’d not been able – or allowed – to enter Paddington Green until signed off ready for duty by the FMO, so she’d not been able to look at any of the official files. She knew Collier would have a fit if he discovered what she was planning, so the whole thing needed to be handled off the books.
She wandered over to the collaged cork tiles and stretched out her right hand. She trailed her fingertips, with their bitten nails, over a photograph in the centre of the display. It showed Richard, her partner of seven years, holding their beautiful baby girl when she was two-and-a-half months.
“Oh, Lola,” she moaned under her breath. “Why did he kill Daddy and not stop? How did he get away with it? Mummy’s going to find out.” She leaned closer and placed a soft kiss on the photo. “Then Mummy’s going to see justice really done. And that means Mummy needs to be very clever.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Light Duties
FINALLY! STELLA LEFT the house at seven thirty, black leather gauntlets in one hand, helmet slung over the wrist of the same arm. She’d checked on Lola, who was still asleep, with Kristina snoring gently in the single bed beside her. Good as gold, compared to the stories she’s heard of babies driving their mothers half-mad with sleeplessness. She double-locked the door, then spent forty-five more seconds twisting the key against the stop and pulling on the brushed steel knob. Finally, muttering under her breath and biting her bottom lip, she turned away and went to the bike.
Ever since the hit and run, she’d not been able to even think of buying another car. But eventually, she’d realised that some form of personal transport was a necessity. Maybe for her eco-conscious girlfriends, public transport was good enough, but she valued her independence too much to stand around waiting for someone else to decide her needs mattered more than theirs.
She’d ridden bikes in her twenties. Hung out with guys who owned big Suzukis and Yamahas. Ended up buying herself a Harley-Davidson. Three months after the accident, and a newly car-phobic, thirty-two-year-old widow, she’d found herself hanging around outside a bike shop on Albert Embankment, staring through the window like a kid at a sweetshop. She might have stayed there all day had it not been for the hunky dude in a white T-shirt with a vintage Indian logo who wandered out and came to stand next to her. He swept his long, dark, but decidedly non-greasy hair away from his stubbled face.
“Pretty aren’t they?” he said.
“I don’t want pretty,” she said, giving him a trademark glare that her pre-marriage girlfriends said used to burn guys in nightclubs who only wanted a dance.
He blushed. “No, sorry, I didn’t mean because you’re a, you know–”
“Chick?”
“No! A woman, I was going to say. They are though, aren’t they? Pretty?”
Bless him. He was trying. And she did want a bike. And yes, they were pretty. Especially that one.
“Let’s go inside. I want to have a closer look.”
He led her inside, probably relieved this hard-core feminist hadn’t castrated him on the spot.
The row of second-hand bikes started innocently enough with some small-wheeled scooters that she seriously reckoned she could outrun on foot. One had flower stickers applied to the helmet space under the seat. No thank you, very much. Running from right to left, the machinery began to gain weight and sex appeal, at least for Stella. A couple of two-fifties, a three-seven-five … moving up to five-hundreds, and then the serious stuff.
A Triumph Speedmaster, looking like some custom hot rod built in a garage. Matte-black, big, blocky, black-and-chrome twin-pot engine. Eight-sixty-five ccs. A Honda Fireblade, resplendent in white, orange and red Repsol racing livery. A whisper under a thousand ccs. A silver Suzuki Hayabusa sports bike. Thirteen-forty ccs.
She pointed at the Triumph.
“I like that one.”
His brow crinkled. “It’s a nice bike, but quite powerful for–”
Oops! Caught out again. “For?”
“A beginner rider. Have you got a bike licence? Cos you can ride a scooter on a standard driving licence.”
She fixed him with a stare that had quieted football hooligans and drunks across half of London.
“One, I have a full bike licence. Two, my last ride was a Harley Sportster. Three, I want a test ride. Now. Please.”
Clearly out of his depth with Stella, the salesman ran a hand over his silky mane and tried one final time.
“OK, great. You’re the boss.”
First, she bought new riding gear. Matte-b
lack Bell open-face helmet, belted leather jacket – thick and protective but styled more like something you’d wear over trousers – black gloves and a pair of ankle boots.
After showing the guy her driving licence, including that precious symbol that indicated she was good for anything on two wheels, he had no option but to let her wheel the big black Triumph out of the shop.
“You bend it, you mend it,” were his parting words, as she slung her right leg over the broad saddle. She nodded. Twenty minutes later, she was back inside the showroom, signing finance forms.
And now she was riding the Triumph back to work. She thumbed the ignition switch. The big engine coughed and then roared into life before settling into its familiar off-kilter idle.
She toed the gear selector down into first with a satisfying clunk that she felt through the boot sole, then eased out the clutch, lifted her feet onto the foot pegs as she crossed the pavement, and slipped out into the traffic.
Stella parked the bike in the underground car park beneath Paddington Green Police Station, enjoying the amplified blat of the exhaust as she passed the hard, sound-reflecting concrete walls. With the Triumph locked and levered onto the custom centre-stand she’d had fitted, Stella pushed through the door that led to the bare staircase up to the main floors.
After stowing her gear under her desk, on which someone had put a vase of daffodils, she went to the toilet to brush out her hair and apply a bit of lipstick.
At one minute to eight, she knocked on the door of Linda Heath, the occupational health manager, and went in. The woman behind the desk had cropped blonde hair and bright red lipstick. Her eyes popped wide as she looked up and saw Stella.
“Stella! Wow! You look great. Come in. Have a seat. Can I get you a coffee? Tea? Water?”
“It’s fine, thanks, Linda. I had a coffee before I left the house.”
Stella could feel about a million butterflies fighting to escape her stomach. Her palms were sweaty and she rubbed them on her jeans, hoping the woman who could help or hinder her re-entry into the Homicide Command wouldn’t see the nervous gesture. Fat chance!
“Everything OK?” Linda asked, her brow creasing with concern. She had a buff cardboard A4 folder in front of her on the immaculate desk. Now she placed her palms flat on top of it. A waft of her perfume made its way across the desk: sweet, light and floral. Girly.
“I’m fine. Really. Just, you know, it’s been a year and I’m a little–” What? Freaked out? Fucked up? “–you know…”
“Of course.” The frown of concern morphed effortlessly into a compassionate smile, head tilted ten degrees to the left, mouth curved into a half-smile-half-pout that said, I understand, you lost everything and drank your way to the bottom, now I’m here to offer a lifeline to the top again. “Well, how are you feeling?” She opened the folder. Stella craned her neck to see what was written on the top sheet. It was a questionnaire of some sort.
“In general? Or about coming back to work?”
“Oh, in general. We were all so sad when Adam,” she faltered, then regained her composure, “that is, Detective Chief Superintendent Collier, gave us the news about the accident.”
“I’m okay. I still miss Richard. But I go to meetings and I see a counsellor every month, so,” she shook her head, then shrugged, “on the road to recovery.”
Heath’s brow puckered for a second on “Richard”, then she replastered her professional smile of concern onto her face. “That’s good. You’re so brave. Now,” Linda’s voice took on a brisk, no-nonsense tone, “I have to run through a little form with you, and then we can move on to discuss your new duties.”
Stella frowned. Good. Now we start. “Wait. What? What do you mean, ‘new duties’?”
“Let’s do my little questionnaire first, and then all will be revealed,” she said, in a theatrical, stagey voice presumably meant to reassure Stella.
“First of all, the basics, just so everyone can be sure I interviewed the right officer. You are Detective Inspector Stella Kathryn Cole.”
“You know I am.”
“Yes, but as I said, for the record.”
“Yes.”
“Hmm. You didn’t take Richard’s name when you got married?”
“Obviously not. Is that relevant?”
“No, no,” Linda said brightly. “Very modern of you. Warrant number?”
Stella reeled off the letter and seven digits of her warrant number.
“Good! Well, at least we can be sure you are who you say you are. Let’s get down to it, shall we?”
The next ten minutes passed as Stella answered a set of questions about her attitude to returning to work, stress levels, and basic physical fitness. Then Linda straightened in her chair.
“Now, question five. How would you rate your mood, on a scale of one to ten, where one is extremely low and ten is perfectly happy?”
Stella leaned back in her chair and folded her arms across her chest.
“I beg your pardon?” she said, heart bumping against her ribs. Then, as Linda drew a breath to repeat her question, continued. “How am I feeling? How the fuck do you think I’m feeling?”
“Stella, please,” Linda said, placating now with a smile and the head cocked to one side. The other side, this time. “There’s no need for bad language, is there? I’m only doing my job. We have to see how ready you are for a return to what, as I’m sure you don’t need me to remind you, is a very stressful occupation. I mean, it’s not as if you’re a secretary, now is it?” Another smile. But was that a glint of steel behind those baby blues?
Stella breathed in deeply through her nose and let it out the same way, her eyes hard. She leaned forward and placed her elbows on the desk.
“Well, Linda, one year, four days and,” she checked her watch, “fourteen hours ago, some evil little fucker,” a pause to allow Linda to blink at the ‘bad language’, “called Edwin Deacon drove into my husband’s car on our own safe little road, and killed him. His head was smashed in by a pillar box. So, on a scale of one to ten, where one is ‘couldn’t give a shit’ and ten is ‘mightily pissed off, angry and occasionally so fucking sad I can’t stop crying’, I’d say, ten.”
Having delivered herself of this speech, she removed her elbows from the desk and slumped back in her chair. Linda smiled again. That infuriating expression, equal parts sympathy and professional patience.
“Oh, Stella, I do sympathise, really I do. I know you must be hurting terribly. If there’s to be any justice in our world, evil people like that man will all meet sticky ends. But we do, still, have to compete this questionnaire, I’m afraid, and it will make both our lives easier if we could run through the rest of the questions without any more melodrama. You see, here’s the thing.” She pointed one beautifully shaped and red-varnished fingernail at Stella. “I have to write an evaluation for DCS Collier. And if you seem unfit to return to work, I could recommend a further period of rest. So, let’s have a little bit less fucking-this and shitting-that and a bit more civility. Shall we? Now. Question six.”
Struggling to comprehend the last few words uttered by the neatly dressed woman opposite her, Stella heard her next question as an indistinct mumble. She was asking about her sleep patterns.
“Eight hours. Every night,” she answered. “Lola sleeps through, and the nanny’s always there if she wakes, so lucky me.”
She noticed that frown again. “Good,” Linda said, after a pause. “Us girls must get our beauty sleep, mustn’t we?”
Unconsciously, Stella reached up to twirl her ponytail through her fingers. She knew she needed a cut to restore her hair to its former sleekness. But booking appointments with hairdressers had slipped way down her list of priorities.
“It’s ‘we’,” she said.
Heath smiled and crinkled her brow. “I’m sorry?”
“It’s ‘We girls’, not ‘Us girls’.”
Two spots of pink blossomed high on Linda’s pale, creamy cheeks. “Goodness me! A detective and a g
rammar expert. What other hidden skills do we have?”
“Sorry. Old habits. My Mum was a stickler for correct English.”
As the questions came at her like bullets, Stella began daydreaming. Delegating the answers to that part of her brain trained to provide the right sort of information to officialdom, she thought back to her first murder.
A carpenter had been found in his workshop, face up on the floor with a one-inch chisel stabbed so deep into his right eye that only the worn handle remained visible. She’d turned away and vomited on the concrete floor of the converted garage, to the laughter of the other cops gathered round the gruesome scene. Bloodied but unbowed, she’d returned to the body, even going so far as to squat by the head and take photographs of the wound with her phone.
The wife and business partner both had solid alibis, and it was only after weeks of legwork that Stella had picked away at the wife’s version of events to unravel the story. The two of them had been having an affair and had decided to get rid of the husband, pocket the life insurance and move to Portugal. As with so many cases nowadays, the key piece of evidence was data on the wife’s mobile phone proving she couldn’t have been at her book group on the day claimed. Not for the whole evening, anyway.
The older detectives had been adamant the murderer wouldn’t be a woman. “They tend to go for poison, Stel,” her DS at the time, a stocky East Londoner called Brian Gentry, had said. “No way a woman’s going to have put a chisel through her old man’s eye is there? Too bloody brutal.”
The drinks had been on Brian the night they closed the case.
“Stella?”
“What?” Stella started out of her fantasy and refocused on Linda, who was eyeing her as if she’d wandered out of a lunatic asylum. “Are we done?”
“Yes. I just said. Do you have any questions for me before you go?”
“Just one. When do I get my reassignment to active duty form signed?”