‘Yeah, right,’ Linda said.
‘All right, maybe I did, a bit.’ Helen smiled. ‘Just not enough to want to go out shooting at things.’
‘I think you just had higher standards than I did,’ Linda said.
‘They’ve dropped a lot over the years.’ Helen tried to keep a straight face, but couldn’t manage it.
When Linda had finished laughing, she said, ‘Sorry you’ve been dragged into all this.’
‘Dragged myself into it, didn’t I?’
‘Still.’
‘I got spat at in the pub last night.’
Linda seemed genuinely appalled. ‘Who by?’
‘Gang of teenage gobshites by the toilets.’ Helen looked at her drink. ‘No big deal, really.’
‘Couldn’t you have arrested them?’
Helen had survived a three-day armed siege and faced down an assailant with a knife on more than one occasion. Last night though, in that piss-stinking hallway, she had been confronted with no more than naked animosity, and she had frozen. Like most other coppers, she was well-used to the hatred that a uniform or a warrant card could breed, but this had been something purely personal, and it had shaken her. ‘It wasn’t worth it,’ she said.
The woman at the bar ordered another drink, then got up and walked towards the toilets. She smiled at Helen as she passed the table and Helen smiled back.
‘You’d do the same, right?’ Linda asked. ‘You’d stand by Tom, right?’
‘What, if he did something, you mean?’
‘Well, not something like this . . . but let’s say he did something bad, turned out to be bent or whatever.’
The idea of Thorne being corrupt, at least in the way Linda was talking about, was not one Helen could ever entertain. But she knew there were things he had done which most people would find difficult to understand or condone. ‘Yes,’ she said, eventually. ‘I’d stand by him.’
Linda looked pleased. She leaned closer. ‘So, what’s going on with you and him, anyway?’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Well, he’s a bit older, isn’t he?’
‘He’s not exactly a pensioner, you know.’
‘Sorry. I was just saying.’
‘I think I know what I’m doing.’ It was something Helen had said to her sister more than once, with rather more edge than she was saying it now. ‘I bloody hope so, anyway.’
Linda touched her glass to Helen’s. ‘I think we’re both old enough and ugly enough.’
‘Let’s just go with old,’ Helen said.
‘Funny, but I don’t feel that old with you back here. Talking, whatever. Feels like we’re fifteen again.’
‘I think we’re both dressed a bit better.’
Linda smiled, emptied her glass. ‘Why did you come back?’
‘I told you on the first day.’
‘Really, though.’
‘I said. I thought you might need a friend.’
‘I did,’ Linda said. ‘I just never thought it would be you. You’ve been away for such a long time and it wasn’t like we kept in touch.’
‘I felt guilty for leaving.’ Helen felt the jitters in her belly. ‘I still feel guilty.’
‘Why?’
Now they were talking in whispers. ‘Why do you think?’
Linda’s hand drifted towards the bottle, but it was empty. ‘That was like a lifetime ago.’
‘I was a coward,’ Helen said.
‘That’s crap.’ Linda sounded angry, suddenly. ‘You took the chance and you got out, and if I’d had a chance I would have done exactly the same. I’d’ve been gone like a shot.’
‘I thought you’d hate me for it,’ Helen said. ‘Coming back here, I was scared to death. I thought you’d be the one to spit in my face—’ Helen stopped, aware that someone was standing at their table. She looked up to see the woman who had been at the bar.
‘Sorry to interrupt.’ The woman was in her early fifties. Her grey hair was cut stylishly short and a pair of bright red glasses dangled from a chain around her neck. ‘I just wanted to say that I know who you are and I understand what you’re going through. Honestly. So, if you ever want to talk . . . ’ She leaned forward and laid a business card on the table.
Helen moved to snatch it and recognised the logo of another huge-selling tabloid. ‘She doesn’t want to talk. Not to you, anyway.’
‘That’s a shame.’
‘So you can put your cheque book away.’
‘Can’t she speak for herself?’
‘Are you still here?’
The woman raised a perfectly manicured hand, evidently an experienced doorstepper. ‘I just think she deserves a chance to tell her side of the story, that’s all.’
Helen stood up fast. ‘Are you deaf?’ She saw the shock on the journalist’s face, watched it become fear and enjoyed the rush. ‘No, I thought not. Now, piss off and crawl back under your rock, before I come round this table and stick those stupid glasses up your bony arse.’
FORTY-EIGHT
Donna Howland would never have described herself as nosy, because it was one of those words that made you sound bad. ‘Curious’ was a better word, she reckoned. Interested. Some people just had the sort of jobs which gave you a chance to talk to people and to listen. Like hairdressers or taxi drivers. You made conversation, nothing wrong with that, was there?
All sorts of people came into Cupz, so she heard all sorts of things. You didn’t have to eavesdrop, because most of the time customers were happy to talk while you made their drinks or sandwiches and other times you couldn’t help but catch a snippet or two as you served at a nearby table or cleared the plates away.
She’d known this pair would be interesting as soon as they’d walked in.
She recognised the copper of course, and from what Paula had told her when she’d been in that morning, the other one had to be his mate, the one who was sleeping on her settee. Some kind of CSI type, worked on bodies. Couldn’t be two people in town who looked the same as him, could there?
Two teas, a chicken salad baguette and a toasted ham and cheese.
When the place was quiet, she liked to listen to music while she worked behind the counter. Cleaning up, restocking the fridge, whatever. A bit of Ed Sheeran, or maybe Rihanna if she fancied dancing. She didn’t want to disturb the customers, obviously, so she always wore headphones. She thought she probably looked like a right nutcase, nodding along, singing along now and again, when she forgot there was anyone around. It was easy enough to slip an earbud out though and maybe turn the music right down, if it looked like there might be something more interesting to listen to.
Donna tidied the shelves, then began to wipe the counter down, on the side nearest the table where the copper and his mate were sitting. Where the one with all the tattoos was making short work of his sandwich.
She reached into the front pocket of her apron and turned the volume down. She tucked away an errant strand of hair and plucked out an earbud. After catching a word or two, she turned the music off completely and kept on wiping, long after the counter was spotless.
She’d definitely have a good story to tell Paula next time she came in.
‘So, I’m him, right?’
‘It would be a hell of a twist, but let’s go with it for now,’ Hendricks said.
‘I burn the body just enough to open the skin, expose the muscles, organs, whatever.’
‘That’s the part they love best.’ Hendricks bit into his baguette and chewed. ‘Innards are like a slap-up dinner at the Ivy to your average beetle. Or a KFC bucket, if you happen to prefer something a bit more downmarket.’
‘Do I need to keep the body warm?’
‘Well, it’s half-burned already, remember, but yeah, it would be a good idea to try and keep it warm for a while afterwards, while the invasion takes
hold. They’ll feed and lay eggs quicker.’
‘The bin-bag would keep the heat in, right?’
‘Yeah, that would be perfect. You burn the body, transfer your colony across, then wrap it all up in a bag. Job done.’
‘Not forgetting to drop in the fag-end with Steve Bates’ DNA all over it.’
‘Wherever you’ve managed to get that from.’
‘I followed him, I watched him drop one in the gutter, whatever. I’m not too worried about explaining that.’
‘Fair enough.’
Thorne sipped his tea. ‘So, I just . . . pop them in, do I? All these insects.’
‘More or less,’ Hendricks said. ‘Pretty messy job though I would have thought, because you’ll need to dig well into what’s left, get the bugs in good and deep.’
‘I don’t get the impression he’s particularly squeamish,’ Thorne said.
‘You’d be surprised. It might be one thing doing . . . whatever it is he did to Jessica when she was alive, but some people can get very funny about dealing with bodies. Other way round for some of us, of course.’
‘So, where does he get them?’ Thorne asked. ‘All these flies and maggots. The different kinds of beetles.’
‘Ordinary clothes moths as well, sometimes. Particularly fond of decomposing hair. That’s usually only on bodies found in the home though.’
‘Where did they come from, Phil?’
‘Sixty-four-thousand-dollar question.’
‘I can run to lunch.’
Hendricks put away his last mouthful, picked at the scraps of salad left on his plate. ‘He’s got to have bought them from somewhere.’
‘What, he just nipped down the nearest pet shop?’
‘You can laugh, mate, but some places keep a good stock of bugs. For people that have exotic pets . . . chameleons or iguanas.’
‘Carrion beetles? Be serious.’
‘Somewhere on the internet, then.’
‘Really?’
‘Come on, you really think there’s anything you can’t get if you know where to look or who to ask?’
‘Still . . . ’
‘He could easily be getting them through a third party, on the dark web, if he’s clever. Bitcoins, all that, and no questions asked. As good as untraceable.’
Thorne grunted. Since it had first been discovered a few years before, the Met had begun making inroads into the nefarious activities of the hidden, or dark web. The problem was that the better they got at uncovering the buying and selling of hard drugs, arms, hit men, people, the better those providing these services got at finding somewhere else to hide. If Hendricks was right and this was how the killer had sourced the insects he had needed to create a false time of death, Thorne might have rather more trouble proving it than he would have with an abandoned cigarette end.
‘You finished with that?’ Hendricks asked.
Thorne pushed his plate across. He had barely touched his sandwich, but still he was a lot less hungry than he had been when he sat down.
Driving back towards Polesford, Linda was even more geed up than she had been after escaping from the safe house, though the wine probably had more than a little to do with it. Helen slowed at a makeshift road sign and was waved through a foot of water by a uniformed officer in a high-vis jacket.
‘Seriously, you were great back there.’ It was the third time Linda had congratulated her. ‘You really gave that hard-faced cow what for.’
‘I shouldn’t have lost my rag.’
‘Don’t be daft, it was fantastic.’
‘It’s what I said to you in court. You’re only giving them what they want.’
‘Who cares?’ Linda drummed her palms against her legs, stared out of the window. ‘I swear to God, I really thought you were going to deck her.’
Helen had thought so too.
She nodded her thanks to the officer and accelerated away.
She was not proud of losing control, but could not feel too much regret at telling the journalist exactly what she’d thought of her. The sick feeling in her stomach, which had begun as she and Linda had marched out of the pub, that continued to spread, was because of where the anger had sprung from so suddenly.
What she and Linda had been talking about. The past they had been about to dredge up.
I know who you are and I know what you’re going through . . .
The fact that, just for a second or two, Helen had mistakenly thought the journalist was talking to her.
Linda continued to jabber, giggly and over-excited. She began raving about the countryside, pointing at skeletal trees or fields still brimming with brown water as though they were the most amazing things she’d ever seen. Steve, she told Helen, for all his faults, used to love getting out into countryside. It was one of the main reasons he’d moved to the area in the first place. Wayne on the other hand, the sow’s arse, was a very different kettle of fish who, despite being a local lad, had hated every bush and blade of grass. Had thought it was ‘boring’. Used to get ratty, she said, if she as much as suggested a walk or maybe a drive out somewhere for a picnic when the weather was decent.
‘Me and the kids left the miserable sod to it,’ Linda said. ‘Came on our own.’
Helen was about to mention similar conversations she’d had with Thorne, when her phone rang. She glanced across and touched the screen.
‘Are you on speaker?’ Sophie Carson asked.
‘I’m driving.’
‘Turn it off.’
Helen snatched the phone up from between the seats and disabled the speaker function. She slowed, though there was a line of traffic behind her, and began looking for somewhere to pull in.
‘OK . . . ’
‘What?’ Linda suddenly sounded rather more sober.
Helen listened. She said, ‘Right’ and ‘Where?’
A horn sounded behind them. Linda said, ‘Helen?’
Helen indicated and pulled in suddenly, hard against a wide, wooden gate. She ignored the mimed abuse from the van driver who accelerated past. She said, ‘We’ll get there as soon as we can,’ and switched off the engine.
Linda said Helen’s name again, fear in it.
‘We need to get across to Bromsgrove,’ Helen said. ‘To the hospital.’
‘Oh, Jesus, is it one of the kids?’ Linda shook her head quickly. ‘No, Bromsgrove would be stupid—’
‘It’s Steve,’ Helen said. ‘It’s the nearest hospital to Hewell prison.’ She was thinking quickly, trying to work out the fastest route. ‘He tried to kill himself.’
FORTY-NINE
Thorne received Helen’s text as he was leaving Cupz, and, after a forty-mile journey, during which Hendricks bragged about several recent sexual conquests and repeatedly joked that the woman on Thorne’s sat-nav had a promising career as a dominatrix, they got to Bromsgrove hospital half an hour after Helen and Linda.
They arrived to find Helen and Linda alone in a grim, overheated waiting room. Thorne introduced Hendricks, then, after exchanging a practised look, he and Helen stepped outside into the hospital corridor.
‘He got hold of a ballpoint pen,’ Helen said. She mimed repeated jabs to her wrist. ‘Made quite a mess, by all accounts.’
‘Is he all right?’
‘Nobody seems keen to tell us very much, but I don’t think he’s in any danger.’
‘Was he ever?’
‘Not sure how quickly they found him.’
‘Depends if he wanted to be found,’ Thorne said. ‘How serious he was.’ He looked back through the waiting room’s small window. Hendricks and Linda were sitting opposite one another in silence. ‘How’s she doing?’
‘Well, she was frantic all the way here, but now she’s just furious.’
‘With Steve?’
Helen shook her head. ‘With everyone but Stev
e.’
‘And how are you doing?’ Thorne asked.
‘Me?’ Helen saw Linda glance up at the door and raise a hand. She waved back. ‘Come on, we should go back in.’ She reached out to touch Thorne’s arm. ‘Go and rescue Phil . . . ’
They walked back into the room and sat down to wait. Half a dozen mismatched armchairs were lined up against yellowing walls decorated with children’s drawings. A coffee machine stood in one corner and several more chairs were dotted around a low plastic table covered with used plastic cups and magazines. Thorne carried extra chairs across, sat down and examined the reading material. It wasn’t hard to work out why they had been donated.
Practical Boat Owner. Home Building & Renovating. Investors Chronicle.
‘Anyone want a drink?’ Thorne asked.
‘How do they let him get hold of a pen?’ Linda said. ‘A fucking pen.’ She gripped the arms of her chair and looked around for an answer nobody seemed eager to provide. ‘I mean, don’t they watch prisoners like Steve? Prisoners who are vulnerable?’
‘They should,’ Helen said. ‘I don’t know if he was actually on any kind of suicide watch though. If he’d given them any cause—’
‘There must be a system in place, surely.’
Helen nodded because there was little else she could do. She looked at Thorne.
‘Maybe it’s exactly what they wanted,’ Linda said. Thorne and the others could hear booze working in her voice, but her mood was very different to the one Helen had witnessed before taking the call from Sophie Carson. ‘It saves a lot of aggro, doesn’t it? A shedload of paperwork and the cost of a trial. Lots more money to pay coppers overtime with.’
‘I don’t think so,’ Helen said.
‘No? Happens a lot, when you think about it though. Shipman topped himself inside, didn’t he? Fred West, he was another one. You start to wonder if prison officers, coppers, whoever, are turning a blind eye.’ Linda was leaning forward, spitting out the words. ‘Here you go, mate, here’s a handy length of bedsheet, there’s a razor blade . . . you get on with it and we’ll sit over here and look the other way.’ She sat back, nodding. ‘Yeah, would have done everybody a favour, Steve doing that. Fuckers . . . ’
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