The Know

by Martina Cole

  THE KNOW

  MARTINA COLE

  headline

  www.headline.co.uk

  Copyright © 2003 Martina Cole

  The right of Martina Cole to be identified as the Author of

  the Work has been asserted by her in accordance with the

  Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be

  reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted,

  in any form or by any means without the prior written

  permission of the publisher, nor be otherwise circulated

  in any form of binding or cover other than that in which

  it is published and without a similar condition being

  imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

  First published as an Ebook by Headline Publishing Group in 2008

  All characters in this publication are fictitious

  and any resemblance to real persons, living or dead,

  is purely coincidental.

  ISBN 978 0 7553 5078 0

  This Ebook produced by Jouve Digitalisation des Informations

  HEADLINE PUBLISHING GROUP

  An Hachette Livre UK Company

  338 Euston Road

  London NW1 3BH

  www.headline.co.uk

  www.hachettelivre.co.uk

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright Page

  About the Author

  Dedication

  Book One

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Book Two

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Epilogue

  Martina Cole is the No. 1 bestselling author of ten outstandingly successful novels. When The Know was first published in hardback it shot straight to No. 1 on the Sunday Times bestseller list and it topped the charts for seven weeks. It was also selected for the Richard & Judy book club as one of the Top Ten Best Reads of 2003. Martina Cole’s previous novels have all enjoyed similar success: Maura’s Game was the No. 1 bestselling paperback original title for 2002 and Faceless was a No. 1 Sunday Times bestseller. Dangerous Lady and The Jump have gone on to become hugely popular TV drama series and several of her other novels are in production for TV. Martina Cole has a son and daughter and she lives in Essex.

  Praise for Martina Cole’s bestsellers:

  ‘Martina Cole pulls no punches, writes as she sees it, refuses to patronise or condescend to either her characters or fans . . . And meanwhile sells more books than almost any other crime writer in the country’ Independent on Sunday

  ‘Distinctive and powerfully written fiction’ The Times

  ‘Intensely readable’ Guardian

  ‘Martina Cole again explores the shady criminal underworld, a setting she is fast making her own’ Sunday Express

  ‘The stuff of legend . . . It’s vicious, nasty and utterly compelling’ Mirror

  ‘Set to be another winner’ Woman’s Weekly

  For Jo and Lesley.

  Onwards and upwards, girls.

  Love and hugs.

  For Avril and Timmy Petherick

  (and Gra Geoff and Susan P).

  With love to you always,

  Minnie x

  Also for Adele King.

  It was such a privilege to have

  you as my friend and as Freddie’s

  godmother. I will never forget the

  kindness and the friendship I always had

  from you and Darley.

  Prologue

  As Joanie Brewer opened her front door the first thing she saw was police uniforms. She tried, unsuccessfully, to close the door. Something she had done before on many occasions.

  When a large foot was planted firmly on her front-door mat, she sighed.

  ‘He ain’t here, he just went out. But he was here all day with me, so whatever you want him for, he never done it.’

  ‘Joanie . . .’

  The plainclothes officer stared at her for a few seconds before dropping his eyes and staring down at her tiny feet encased in scruffy old mules: pink ostrich feathers and worn-down plastic heels. Her pretty face looked hard in the harsh electric light of her hallway. The faded blonde hair was scraped up on top of her head and her sharp features made her look almost feral. Devoid of her usual makeup Joanie looked older than her age; she looked what she was - used, worn out.

  Only her blue eyes showed any real emotion. They were desolate. She knew now why they were here. And she didn’t want to hear what they were going to tell her even as she knew she must.

  ‘I’m sorry, Joanie love, can we come in?’ said the plainclothes, DI Baxter.

  As she opened the chipped and battered front door wide her whole demeanour changed.

  ‘Better get it over with then, eh?’

  None of the three men could look at her. A dark-haired policewoman with high breasts and a disdainful expression on her face took Joanie’s arm gently, only to be shrugged off with such force she was nearly unbalanced.

  The atmosphere was taut with tension. None of them wanted to be here and all knew equally they were not wanted.

  In her front room Joanie felt a glimmer of satisfaction as she saw a look of collective shock register on their faces. The place was shabby but spotlessly clean. It was the forty-eight-inch TV set and the up-to-the-minute DVD system that had given them one up and she smiled to herself as she said, ‘All bought and paid for. I have the receipts in the kitchen.’

  No one said a word in reply.

  The policewoman looked through a door and saw the kitchen; she walked towards it, saying: ‘I’ll make some tea, eh?’

  No one answered. Joanie sat down and gestured for the others to do the same. ‘You’ve found her, haven’t you?’

  DI Baxter nodded.

  She was holding back tears now, and still none of the men could bear to look at her.

  ‘She’s dead then?’

  The detective nodded again.

  Joanie put her head into her hands and sobbed loudly, one harsh desolate sob before she forced herself to be calm. Wiping her eyes, she lifted her head and gazed around the room, battling her emotions as she had done all her life.

  She was fucked if she was going to cry in front of this lot. Her eyes lighted on a photograph on the mantelpiece. Her Kira’s last school photo, her blue eyes alive with merriment. She was a beautiful little girl, a dear child, and Joanie’s last. Born out of wedlock like the others, and loved more than any of them.

  Joanie could hear her heartbeat thundering in her ears and felt momentarily as if she was going to faint.

  ‘I told you she wouldn’t run away, but you never listened to a word I said, did you?’ It was an accusation. ‘My baby would never have left me. Never. But none of you would listen.’

  The detective took a child’s dress from a bag on his lap; it was small for an eleven year old’s. Kira had taken after Joanie. Tiny. Petite. Once the dress had been white with tiny blue flowers on it. Now it was soiled. Joanie knew exactly w
hat had happened to her child.

  ‘We found this with the body. We need you to—’

  She snatched it from him and held it to her face, but all she could smell was dirt - dirt and hatred. Not the flowery, sunshine smell of an eleven-year-old child on the brink of womanhood. A child with her whole life stretching ahead of her. In her mind’s eye she saw Kira once more, laughing and joking. She had been a good child, easy to rear.

  The tears came then, and with their arrival the WPC brought in the tea. Even in her distressed state Joanie was glad the girl had used the good mugs kept for visitors. It was important to her to have nice things around her.

  Especially now.

  They talked to her, she could see their mouths moving, but she could hear nothing. All she could hear inside her head was the sound of her child’s voice, as she called for her mummy and her mummy never came.

  She was rocking now, clutching the remnants of the dress and whispering over and over, ‘My baby. My baby.’

  One of the PCs said sadly, ‘Shall I get the quack?’

  The detective nodded and sipped his tea.

  For all Joanie Brewer was, and she was legendary down at the station, at this moment she was just a woman who had had a child brutally murdered.

  Bugger tea. He should have brought a bottle of hard, if not for himself then for the wreck of a woman before him.

  She wasn’t Joanie Brewer now, the prostitute, drunk, and all-round Mouth Almighty responsible for giving birth to a one-family crime wave. She was a bereaved mother grieving for a child who had been snatched from the street, used and abused and then disposed of like so much rubbish.

  He finished his tea in silence.

  Joanie was quiet now, staring into space, and he knew they would get nothing more from her today.

  Eventually the doctor arrived.

  Book One

  ‘Ladies, just a little more virginity, if you don’t mind.’

  - Sir Herbert Beerbohm Tree, 1853-1917

  For without are dogs, and sorcerers, and whoremongers, and murderers, and idolaters, and whosoever loveth and maketh a lie.

  - Revelation, 22:15

  Chapter One

  It was hot and Joanie Brewer turned up the fan in the tiny bedroom and rolled on more deodorant. The double bed took up nearly all the room and she had to climb across it to get to the overflowing dressing table for a quick puff on her Benson & Hedges Light. She also took a large gulp of vodka and Coke, the acid taste making her belch loudly.

  An overstuffed wardrobe spewed clothes everywhere, and the smell of Avon Musk hung heavy in the room. She really didn’t feel like going to work tonight. What she wanted was to sit outside the flats with all the other women and drink and smoke and gossip. It was lovely in the summer here, apart from the stench of rotten rubbish and unwashed kids; it was almost like being abroad. But then again, she mused, she had always had a good imagination. Tenerife it ain’t!

  She smiled to herself and applied another layer of No. 7 sugar-pink lipstick. If she had a good earn tonight she would take tomorrow off and enjoy herself. She was due a break anyway.

  She was listening to Bob Marley singing ‘No Woman No Cry’, and singing along softly as she carried on applying the thick makeup that was a prerequisite of her job. She made a point these days of not looking too closely at herself; gone was the time when she’d taken a real pride in her appearance. The life had caught up with her, and the money that had once been plentiful was now only adequate. In fact, if she wasn’t such a lazy bitch she might even consider getting a real job though it was a bit late in the day for anything like that; her criminal convictions would rule out most respectable avenues of work. It was a vicious circle really.

  She sighed heavily and dragged once more on her cigarette. In her wildest dreams she had never thought this would be her life, but it was and her natural resilience made her accept that fact. In repose she looked haggard, the deep lines on her face more pronounced, but there were still traces of the pretty girl she had once been. Suddenly, looking at her reflection, she wanted to cry. Instead she finished her drink and forced a smile.

  Now that was much more like it. If she wasn’t careful she would scare the punters off! She could hear Kira laughing in the lounge and instinctively she smiled too even though she couldn’t work out what was being said. Her youngest was a happy kid, always laughing and joking. Her son Jon Jon came into the room then with another large vodka and Coke.

  ‘Get that down the old Gregory, Mum. Need a lift?’

  Joanie shook her head.

  ‘That’s OK. I’m going in with Monika.’

  He laughed. ‘I meant, do you want a few Valium?’

  Joanie grinned.

  ‘I get worse, don’t I? No, thanks, and I would appreciate it if you didn’t go offering them about to all and sundry. You will get a capture, son, mark my words.’

  Jon Jon didn’t answer; he was too busy admiring himself in the dressing-table mirror.

  She took a deep drink and spluttered.

  ‘Bloody hell, Jon Jon, what’s in this - rocket fuel?’

  ‘Smirnoff Black Label. Carty gets it from the docks.’

  Joanie sipped the drink and smiled.

  ‘Just what I needed.’ She was telling the truth though her son wasn’t aware of that. He smiled back, and she looked at him and marvelled at this boy of hers. She knew how much he hated her work and yet he had brought her in a drink before she left the house since he was nine years old. Even though he had been ridiculed all through his schooldays because she was a brass, a tom, whatever epithet people wanted to call her, and hated what she did with a vengeance, he accepted the necessity for it and respected her as his mother.

  ‘Be in now, won’t you, for Kira? It’s Jeanette’s turn to go out, remember.’

  He nodded.

  ‘I don’t need you to keep reiterating everything, Mum. I always do me bit, don’t I?’ He left the room with the affronted dignity of a seventeen year old who knew far better than his own mother.

  For all the talk about him he was a good kid even if she was the only one who could see it. The police hated him; he was their first call for anything and everything that happened on the estate. Jon Jon was a little fucker when the fancy took him, but if they could see him reading! He read everything he could lay his hands on, and the words he knew! Joanie’s pride in her errant son knew no bounds.

  Her pride in all her children was unwavering despite the things that were said about the Brewers, herself included. She knew the talk and ignored it; they were just trying to survive like everyone else, and being the kind of person she was, Joanie let most of the gossip go over her head. It had never really bothered her - or at least that was what she pretended to people, making a joke of her job, being the first to mention it and consequently making herself a legend in her own lunchtime. She was also renowned around and about for being able to handle herself in a row, and that helped. She had chinned more than a few of her neighbours over the years and consequently people were wary of her and civil enough to her face. Why wouldn’t they be? She was a soft touch for a few quid and always lent a friendly ear; she could also keep things to herself and knew most of the local gossip, the truth behind it as well. But she never let on; Joanie knew she could cause more than a few rows if she ever opened her trap.

  She also ran every catalogue going and all the women bought from her, especially for Christmas and birthdays, so she also knew everyone’s financial status. Which was exactly what most of the tear ups had been over: non-payment of debts. Joanie prided herself on never owing a penny to anyone, and she did not like people taking advantage of her good nature.

  She also read Tarot cards for a small fee and that alone brought her status up in the community because everyone wanted to know if, or more importantly when, they would get away from this dump and what the state of their love life would be in the future. As most of the men hereabouts only lasted a few weeks her readings were in great demand. The thought made her s
mile. Women amazed her, ever the optimists. But then, as she knew herself, they had to be.

  All in all she had her own little niche here and she enjoyed it, as much as she could enjoy anything. Life, Joanie believed, was what you made it, and she made it as good as she could given the circumstances. Happiness, she had always told the kids, was just a state of mind.

  Slipping on a tight black mini-skirt and a black see-through blouse, she pushed her feet into impossibly high heels and strutted into the lounge, all tits, backcombed hair and perfume.