Angie handed him a sheet of paper with the Latin wording of Tash’s tattoo written on it. He typed it laboriously into his computer.
‘Doesn’t make sense . . .’ He studied the screen. ‘No, wait. My fault – typo.’
‘When you’re ready,’ said Rory impatiently.
‘Got it,’ said Kyle. ‘“Clavos pedum, plagas duras, et tam graves impressuras circumplector cum affectu.” It apparently means, “The nails in Your feet, the hard blows and grievous marks—”’
‘“I embrace with love,”’ finished Francis for him.
‘You’re right,’ said Kyle, with raised eyebrows. ‘How did you know that?’
‘It’s from a seventeenth-century choral piece,’ said Francis. It had suddenly come to Francis why the words had seemed familiar on first reading – he’d sung it with the church choir.
‘Impressive, sir,’ said Angie.
Luckily, before Rory could contribute a snarky comment, the phone started ringing in the small cubicle off the incident room that Francis used as his office.
‘Get that, would you, Rory?’
Rory grimaced, but headed in the right direction.
Tony Hitchins came in carrying two takeaway coffees, with two wrapped toasted sandwiches balanced on top of them.
‘Here you go, Ange,’ he said, extending one of the coffees and sandwiches in her direction.
Rory had confided to him that he thought there was something more than a professional relationship between these two. Now Francis was beginning to wonder.
‘That other one for me, Tony?’
‘Fuck off, Kyle. I didn’t have any breakfast this morning.’
Kyle looked at his watch. ‘Careful, mate, you’ll start losing that hard-earned gut.’
Hitchins put his lunch down on his desk and dropped into his chair just as Rory reappeared in the doorway of Francis’s office. His expression was grim.
Francis nodded at him, feeling suddenly cold despite the heat.
‘What?’
‘Tash Brady’s dead,’ said Rory. He took a deep breath and shook his head. ‘They can’t explain it. She should have been getting better.’
‘No!’ Angie covered her eyes with one hand and Tony put down his half-eaten sandwich.
A death like this wasn’t supposed to affect the team, Francis thought. But they weren’t automatons. And they wouldn’t be able to do their job half as well if they didn’t care about the victims.
Rory came back into the incident room, eyes wide, shocked by the news.
‘They couldn’t save her. Her heartbeat became wildly irregular. They tried shocking her, but it didn’t work.’
There was silence, the team too stunned to speak.
Then Francis cleared his throat.
‘That means this is now a murder investigation. Everybody, redouble your efforts. Someone killed Tash Brady and I want them brought in.’
He went into his office. He needed to reassess the situation and set new priorities.
Rory knocked on the door jamb, then invited himself in without waiting for Francis to respond.
‘Boss, do you think it could have been Alex Mullins who attacked Tash?’
‘It’s too early to say, Rory. It’s a possibility, but it might just as easily have been a stranger. There was that other man on the CCTV, walking up the promenade behind her.’
‘Not that closely behind her.’
‘Closer than Alex. And even if Mullins was angry with her, and followed her to have it out, why would he have wounded her in that way?’
‘I don’t know – but the fact that they had a fight earlier puts him in the picture, doesn’t it? And if anyone has access to tattooing kit, it’s Alex Mullins.’
Francis didn’t reply. He was thinking about how Marni Mullins would respond to this suggestion.
But Rory took it as confirmation of his agreement that Alex Mullins looked the most likely candidate for the attack.
He was probably right.
‘Bring him in for questioning, and ask Tash Brady’s parents what they know about the relationship.’
10
Sunday, 13 August 2017
Rory
Rory pulled open one of a pair of double fire doors and turned the corner into the trauma unit’s main corridor. A red-faced nurse practically bowled him over.
‘You can’t come down here,’ she said, without stopping. ‘Please leave now.’
‘Police,’ said Rory.
She turned back to look at him. There were dark patches of sweat under both her armpits. ‘I’m sorry, but that makes no difference.’
From further along the corridor, Rory could hear a woman crying hysterically. He wondered if it was Tash Brady’s mother.
It was time to pull rank. He dug out his warrant card.
‘I need to speak to the doctor in charge. Right now.’
The nurse sighed and gave him a malevolent look. ‘This way.’ She stalked down the corridor with short aggressive strides.
They passed the door to Tash’s room and Rory slowed down to peer inside. He saw a woman bent over the bed, clinging to her daughter’s body. A nurse was whispering something in her ear and another was silently gathering up the ephemera of a failed medical intervention.
‘Come on,’ snapped the nurse, making Rory feel like a rubbernecker.
He caught her eye. Neither of them wanted to be there.
A young woman in surgical scrubs came towards them. She looked half-dead with exhaustion, her feet practically dragging.
‘Miss Parry,’ said the nurse, ‘this man’s from the police.’
‘Thank you, nurse.’ Her tone was brusque and she looked Rory up and down, taking the measure of him. ‘Tanika Parry.’
‘I need to talk to the doctor in charge of Natasha Brady’s treatment.’
‘That was me.’
Rory quickly realised his blunder – people might talk about policemen looking younger, but for him it was medical staff.
‘Right . . . sorry.’ He glared at the nurse. She gave him a look like he’d pissed on her chips.
‘How can I help you?’ said Tanika Parry.
‘Can you explain what happened to Natasha? Last update we had was that her wounds weren’t life threatening.’
Parry gave him an intense stare. ‘I can only release medical details to the next of kin.’
Rory felt a muscle in his jaw tighten. He took a breath to relax it. No point getting angry.
‘Miss Parry, Tash Brady was brutally attacked. Now she’s dead. If the cause of death had anything to do with that assault, we’ll be looking at a murder charge.’
‘Patient confidentiality rules actually extend beyond a person’s death,’ said Parry.
Bleeding jobsworth.
‘Right, I’ll ask you straight. Was Tash Brady murdered – because if she was, it makes it my business.’
Tanika Parry sighed. ‘Come with me.’ She motioned for him to follow her into a side room.
Once the door was closed behind them, she sank down heavily onto one of the plastic chairs and pulled her hair back from her face, redoing her ponytail.
‘I don’t know why Natasha died,’ she said. She sounded upset. ‘Her wounds were severe but not life threatening. The cut in her side nicked her liver, but we were able to stem the bleeding effectively. We gave her a strong dose of antibiotics to counter any infections that might have entered her bloodstream.’
‘So why did she die?’
‘Through the night she developed bradycardia.’
‘Brady . . .?’
‘Her heart rate slowed right down. It got worse this morning and then she suffered a massive heart attack. We did all we could, but we couldn’t get her back.’
Rory waited a moment before going on. Tanika Parry got a
tissue out of her pocket and wiped her nose.
‘You have no idea why?’
Parry shook her head. ‘She should have been showing signs of improvement by now – but we were seeing some odd things in her bloods. For one thing, her sodium levels were way too high.’
‘Did something happen in the hospital?’ Could Alex Mullins be responsible in some way?
She gave him a blank look. ‘It’s too soon to know what went wrong. You’ll have to wait for the autopsy.’
‘I need to have a word with Natasha’s parents.’
Tanika Parry looked aghast. ‘Their daughter died less than two hours ago.’
‘And they’re going to want me to do everything in my power to find whoever killed her.’
Ten minutes later Richard and Kath Brady were shown into the side room where Rory was waiting. The stroppy nurse from before gave him another filthy look as she made the introductions. Didn’t she realise he was just doing his job, like she was doing hers? Or did she think he was just being unnecessarily nosy? She’d soon change her tune if someone murdered one of her family.
Rory watched Tash Brady’s parents come in, then dither before deciding where to sit down. They looked around the room, not sure what they were doing there.
‘Maybe we could get some tea, nurse?’ said Rory.
She shot him a sour look and left the room.
There was no doubt in Rory’s mind that Richard and Kath Brady were well off. Their clothes were undoubtedly expensive, even if they now looked the worse for wear. Watching a loved one die – it soon strips away your social pretensions.
Richard Brady helped his wife into a chair and then turned to Rory.
‘Who are you?’ His eyes were red-rimmed, but other than that his stiff carriage gave the impression of a man who kept his emotions on a tight leash.
‘Detective Sergeant Rory Mackay.’
Kath Brady let out a cry, then clamped a hand over her mouth. Her shoulders shook convulsively.
‘I’m sorry for your loss,’ said Rory. It was something he had to say often in his job, but that didn’t make confronting the bereaved with unpalatable truths any easier. ‘I just have a few questions I need to ask you.’
‘Is this really the time?’ said Richard Brady. ‘Perhaps you could send someone out to our home in a few days’ time, when . . .’ He glanced meaningfully down at his wife.
‘I just want to check a couple of things while your memories are fresh,’ said Rory, keeping his tone even. ‘Let’s sit down.’
He took a chair, and Richard Brady put a hand on his wife’s forearm reassuringly.
‘Please make this a quick as possible,’ he said.
Rory took out his notebook.
‘How old was your daughter, Mr Brady?’
‘Tash was seventeen. But you should know, she’s my wife’s daughter, my stepdaughter.’
‘How long had she been having a relationship with Alex Mullins?’
Kath Brady, momentarily in control, started to cry again loudly.
‘I have no idea,’ said Richard Brady. ‘Until yesterday, we had no idea of his existence.’
Rory looked up from his notes. ‘I was informed he was her boyfriend?’ That’s what the boss had said, anyway.
‘Secret boyfriend, it turns out.’
‘Why would that be?’ said Rory, as if it wasn’t already obvious to him. ‘Why would she feel the need to keep that information from you and your wife?’
‘Why do you bloody think?’ snapped Richard Brady. ‘Not quite . . .’ He tailed off, suddenly cautious about what he’d intended to say.
But Rory understood him perfectly. The Mullins family were hardly in the same social bracket as the Bradys, and Alex Mullins – with his long dreadlocks and whiff of patchouli – would hardly be the sort of boyfriend they wanted for their princess.
‘Do you have any idea at this point who might have attacked Natasha? Did she say anything in the last twenty-four hours that gave an indication of whether she knew the person?’
Richard Brady shook his head, but Kath Brady sniffed and stopped crying. She sat up straight and, wiping tears from her cheeks, she looked Rory directly in the eye.
‘That boy. You need to be looking at that mixed-race kid.’ She was referring to Alex Mullins – and it wasn’t acceptable. Rory cleared his throat loudly to remind her who she was talking to. She ignored him and carried on. ‘I caught him in her room, trying to attack her. He was fiddling with her heart monitor. I suspect he wanted to shut her up.’
‘Shut her up?’ prompted Rory.
‘Before she could tell us what he was really like. What he’d done.’
‘And what exactly had he done?’
‘He was in the room when she died . . .’ She tailed off, maybe not quite ready to make a direct accusation.
‘Where is he now?’
‘He ran off, didn’t he? Disappeared in all the confusion . . .’
‘Shhhh, darling,’ said her husband. He looked at his wife, then at Rory, but Rory was hard pressed to tell whether he believed what his wife was suggesting or not.
11
Sunday, 13 August 2017
Alex
It was dark by the time Alex walked, with shoulders hunched and arms wrapped round his chest, up Selborne Place to the corner of Lorna Road. Despite the heat, he had his hood up and his dreads tucked down the back of his sweat top. His head ached from crying, but he needed to think. His mother’s words echoed in his ears.
You need to get your story straight.
He crouched low and peered round the edge of the fence of the corner house. He would normally come into Lorna Road from the other end, from the town end, but he wasn’t taking any chances. He didn’t even really want to come here but he couldn’t think of anywhere else to go. If he went home, he’d have to face his parents – Marni with her endless questions and his father contradicting her at every opportunity. He wasn’t ready for that yet.
The street was quiet. Imposing Victorian terrace houses on the left, run-down and backing onto the railway track, and small, smug 1930s cottages on the right. The stubby streetlamps cast intermittent pools of orange light, but most of the road was in shadows. Most importantly, no sign of any police cars.
What the hell? Why was he acting like he was on the run?
He wasn’t on the run. He just needed time to himself before facing up to what had happened. Tash was dead. He shied away from the word, but it formed in his brain, kept forming in his brain, as it had done all afternoon. And the image of the doctors and nurses manhandling her in an effort to keep her alive. It was running on a loop – and he couldn’t clear his mind to think of anything else. Like getting his story straight, whatever that meant.
He stood up and walked down the road, trying not to hurry, nonchalantly crossing it at an angle so he was walking on the railway side of the road. There was no one around. Lights were on in a few of the houses, the blue flicker of televisions. A peal of laughter from somewhere in a back garden, music from somewhere else, but no pedestrians and no cars driving up and down. A quiet Sunday evening.
He didn’t need to check the house numbers as he walked and a few seconds later he slipped open a wrought-iron gate and walked up to the familiar front door. The black paint was chipped and peeling, and the doorbell didn’t work.
He knocked and waited, pushing unwanted thoughts away without success, scrunching his eyes against the tears that threatened to start flowing again.
‘Alex!’
Liv Templeton was his cousin. His mother’s sister, Sarah, was her mother. He’d spent a lot of time at the Templetons’ house as a child. Sometimes because his mother was working, but as often as not as a result of her chaotic lifestyle. It meant he and Liv were close. She’d been there for him through some of the roughest times.
She pulled him
inside, and wrapped him in a tight embrace as soon as the door had closed behind him. She knew.
‘It’s true, isn’t it?’ she said, letting go of him and taking in his swollen eyes and heavy limbs. ‘Tash’s dead?’
‘Who told you?’ said Alex.
‘Someone put it up on Facebook, bloody idiot. It got taken down pretty fast – I mean, how insensitive to her family – but then the news spread. Sally Ann told me.’
They went through to the living room. It was a typical student house, with sagging furniture, empty beer bottles on the hearth and a carpet that perpetually needed vacuuming.
Alex sank onto the sofa and put his head in his hands.
Liv dropped down to kneel in front of him. She put her hands on his forearms.
‘What happened?’
‘I don’t know, I don’t know.’ His feelings were threatening to overwhelm him. It felt as if he wanted to be sick but it was nearly twenty-four hours since he’d eaten anything. His gut twisted and his hands were shaking.
‘Sally Ann said you’d had a fight at the club.’
‘It was nothing to do with that,’ said Alex, sitting back abruptly so Liv’s hands fell away from his arms.
She stared at him, wide-eyed.
He couldn’t breathe. He bit on his bottom lip to try and regain control. Then he took a deep breath.
‘I mean it was. But only ’cause it meant she stormed off on her own. I tried to go after her and I couldn’t find her. Then she called in the morning. She was crying, saying she’d been attacked.’
‘Oh my God . . .’
‘If I’d found her, it wouldn’t have happened. It’s my fault.’
‘It’s not your fault, Alex. Don’t say that.’
‘It is.’ He was crying again.
Liv got up and sat down on the sofa next to him, putting her arms round him. They sat like that until Alex wrestled back control. He sniffed loudly, and Liv stretched forward to get a box of tissues off the table.
‘Your mum called,’ she said.
Alex scowled.
‘She’s worried . . .’ Liv faltered. ‘She’s desperate to know where you are. Can I call her and tell her you’re here?’
Her Last Breath: The new crime thriller from the international bestseller (Sullivan and Mullins) Page 6