‘Yeah, but still. Used to be Spurs, didn’t he?’ Thorne’s father rubbed his hands together. ‘Right, bring on the bloody Dutch.’
‘Should be a good game.’
‘Why don’t you come over here and watch it? I’ll get us a few beers in.’
‘On the table,’ Maureen shouted.
Thorne stood up. ‘I don’t know what I’ll be doing, Dad. Work, you know . . .’
They walked through to the kitchen and Thorne’s mother handed the carving knife to his father. He carved the first slice and said, ‘Nice and tender,’ same as he always did.
As they ate, Thorne’s mother twice pointed out to Thorne how many vegetables she was eating, that she was taking on board what he’d said about her diet being a bit healthier. Thorne said that mashed potatoes swimming in butter was not exactly what he’d meant by salad, but told her he was pleased to see she was making an effort.
‘You’ve got to take these things gradually,’ his father said.
‘Plus, I’ll only be having a small portion of pudding,’ his mother said.
Thorne’s father turned to him. ‘So, there you go, then. She’s making an effort, like you said.’ He stabbed at a roast potato. ‘You know we’re having trifle, don’t you?’
‘Mum told me,’ Thorne said.
‘I put sponge fingers in the bottom,’ his mother said. ‘You always liked them.’
‘Lovely,’ Thorne said.
‘Could you pass over the . . . stuff?’ Thorne’s father made a shaking motion with his hand. ‘The stuff you have with salt.’
‘Pepper?’
‘Yeah, pass the pepper.’
Thorne handed the shaker across. He glanced at his mother but she was focused on her food.
‘You need to take these things gradually,’ she said. ‘Not like I’m going to turn vegetarian overnight, is it? And these doctors know sod all anyway.’
It wasn’t until they’d almost finished that Maureen Thorne stood up and fetched the Sunday Mirror from the sideboard. She set it down and jabbed at the front page. She shook her head.
‘Horrible business.’
Jim Thorne peered across. ‘Horrible.’
Thorne had seen the paper already, had seen all of them. There had not been sufficient time for any of them to print the story that had broken earlier that morning in Dalston – a story they had been handed on a bloodstained plate – so most had chosen to run with yet more details on what they were assuming was the suicide of Grantleigh Figgis.
A photograph of the body being removed from Seacole House.
That leak, still gushing.
DRIVEN TO IT?
The paper had even managed to track down Kevin Scott, the young man who had accused Figgis of molesting him two years earlier. The caption beneath Scott’s picture simply said: Victim.
Whatever the police did or didn’t do at the time, this is the man who assaulted me, who took advantage of me. I’m really not surprised he did this to himself, not remotely. He was a very dangerous man and there was clearly a lot of rage bottled up in him. Rage and guilt . . .
‘I mean, what are you lot going to do now?’ Maureen asked.
Thorne put down his knife and fork.
‘About that missing lad?’
Thorne’s father looked up. ‘Maureen.’
‘If this bloke took him, and now he’s killed himself, where does that leave you? I say if, because, well, we don’t know, do we? What do you think, Tom?’
‘He can’t talk about it, Maureen. You know that.’
It was fairer to say that Thorne didn’t particularly want to talk about it, that he’d been looking forward to an afternoon listening to his father chunter on about engines while his mum rolled her eyes at him. To the few hours he would not have to spend thinking about murders and missing children.
‘Oh, course he can.’ Maureen waved her husband’s concern away.
‘Leave him alone.’
‘Come on, love . . .’
Yes, it might be pushing it to discuss an ongoing case with strangers in a pub, but Thorne could talk about the nuts and bolts with his parents if he felt like it. Most of it was plastered all over the papers anyway, and who were they going to tell, after all? His Auntie Eileen? His dad’s mate Victor, who was only really paying attention if someone was talking about famous maritime disasters?
‘They’re going to do a TV reconstruction,’ Thorne said. ‘Of the boy going missing.’
‘Kieron, is it?’
Thorne nodded. ‘For Crimewatch UK.’
They’d been given the go-ahead that morning, once the team had gathered back at the station and Boyle had asked more or less the same question as Thorne’s mother. What are you lot going to do now?
‘We’ve got a murder to investigate,’ Boyle had said. ‘Two murders if that funny-looking pathologist turns out to be right, but as far as Kieron Coyne goes, we’re still nowhere.’
Thorne’s mother was piling up the plates. ‘That the one Jill Dando’s doing now?’
‘I like her,’ Thorne’s father said.
‘The thing I always wonder, when I see those reconstructions on the telly, is how they find the actors for them. Where they come from.’
‘Same place they always come from,’ Thorne’s father said.
‘Not if it’s kids, though. And what about those ones where people are supposed to be serial killers or what have you? It’s hardly Shakespeare, or Casualty, is it? You think those actors put that on their CVs? “Third rapist from the left . . .”’
Thorne helped clear the table, then father and son took care of the washing up while Maureen carried her tea into the living room and watched half an hour of tennis, which she loved. The chat at the sink ran rather more along the lines Thorne had been expecting – the relative merits of BMW’s 3.2 straight-six and 4.4 litre V8 engines – and he was happy to have a break before sitting down again to pudding.
The relief was short-lived. As soon as his mother had begun spooning out the trifle, she said, ‘So, come on then. What’s happening with Jan? With the house?’
Thorne wondered how easily he could steer the conversation back to child abduction. ‘I saw Jan the other night, actually. It was . . . better than I was expecting.’
‘That’s good.’
‘Oh.’ His father waved his spoon around. ‘But you’re still . . . ?’
‘Yes, we are still getting divorced.’
‘Don’t be daft, Jim, of course they are.’
‘And I was looking at a few flats the other day,’ Thorne said. ‘In the paper.’
His father pulled a well-filled bowl towards him. ‘Oh, so the house is on the market, then. That’s good. Anyone been to view it yet?’
‘No. Not yet.’
‘Well, they will. It’s a perfectly good house, that.’
‘I mean it’s not on the market yet.’
His mother shook her head. ‘Oh, Tom.’
‘I’ve been a bit busy.’ He pointed to the paper that was still sitting on the table. ‘There hasn’t been a lot of time.’
‘It’s just getting a few estate agents round, that’s all. Actually, Eileen had a really good one when she sold her last place. I think I’ve still got his name somewhere.’
‘I’ll be fine, Mum. I’ll arrange it.’
‘You say that, but you’ve not been arranging things very well so far, have you?’ Thorne’s father licked cream from his fingers. ‘Now, me and your mum are more than happy to help, you know that, but we shouldn’t really have to, not when you’re thirty-five.’
‘I’m thirty-four,’ Thorne said.
His mother leaned across to lay a hand on his arm. ‘He’s thirty-five in a fortnight, aren’t you?’
‘I do know when my birthday is.’
‘You haven’t told me what you want yet.’
His father grinned, his mouth full of trifle. He swallowed and said, ‘I reckon a tasty new girlfriend might go down well.’
An hour or so later at th
e door, Thorne shook hands with his father then stepped back into the house as his mother marched forward and drew him into a fierce hug. She said, ‘I know you’ve got a lot on your plate, but don’t leave it so long next time.’
Thorne remembered his conversation with Hendricks outside that house in Dalston in the early hours. The way he’d made it sound as though an afternoon in St Albans with his mum and dad was a chore, that a post-mortem would be something preferable. Now, suddenly, he wished more than anything that he could go back into the house and simply curl up on his parents’ sofa for a while; that he could stay the night and wake up to the noise of his father coughing in the bathroom, his mother singing tunelessly along to Patsy Cline or Loretta Lynn.
His mother stepped away suddenly. ‘Oh, I need to give you that estate agent’s details.’
‘Mum, it’s—’ She was already heading back to the kitchen.
‘No point arguing,’ his dad said.
They could hear her talking to herself in the kitchen. ‘Now, where’s that sodding . . . ?’
Thorne and his father looked at each other.
‘Jim . . . do you know where my address book is?’
Jim Thorne shrugged and smiled. ‘Up the crack of my arse?’
FORTY-SEVEN
There weren’t too many Category A prisons that did not take security seriously, because there weren’t too many prisoners serving time as a result of neglecting to take their library books back. These prisons were home to some of the most dangerous and high-profile prisoners in the system, while a select few, like HMP Whitehill in Milton Keynes, had been designed specifically to house such offenders.
What had Boyle said the week before? Men with issues.
The prison’s two specialist units had been constructed with an eye to preventing violence among inmates as well as creating a more humane environment which might encourage them to change their behaviour. They were staffed by specially trained officers. There was air-conditioning to prevent the atmosphere from becoming overheated in any sense and interior walls made of toughened glass to create the impression of space. These two units had, rather unimaginatively, been christened Milton and Keynes, but were known informally by all those working there as Jekyll and Hyde.
It was no great surprise to discover which of these units was home to William Anthony Coyne.
Thorne knew what Billy Coyne looked like, of course. He had seen a picture in the man’s file, the day after his name had first been mentioned and his relationship to the missing child established. What they had believed that relationship to be at the time. Like most such photographs – washed-out, utilitarian – it gave something of a skewed impression. A face that was unsurprisingly blank, eyes dead as dolls’ and mouth grim-set. Glowering, shaven-headed in black and white above a catalogue of his offences, Coyne looked every inch the man those offences suggested that he was.
Violent, cold, remorseless . . .
The man sitting opposite Thorne now, tugging gently at the ragged cuff of a regulation grey sweatshirt, was a far cry from that, from the majority of those Thorne had encountered with hard time behind them and plenty still to serve. Animated, open . . . baby-faced, almost, with colour in his cheeks and a mop of dirty-blond hair curling across his forehead.
Jarring though the man’s appearance was and as comfortable in his surroundings as he seemed, Thorne was making no assumptions. He knew that very few people emerged from a long sentence unscathed in one way or another. He knew equally well that only a particular kind of individual was actually able to thrive in prison.
Billy Coyne seemed relaxed. He seemed amused.
He looked at his watch and tutted, as though someone had been keeping him waiting. ‘Thought you might have shown up yesterday.’ Coyne’s voice was surprisingly high and light, the London accent less pronounced than Thorne had been expecting. ‘I mean, when did Mr Meade meet his unfortunate end? Saturday night, wasn’t it?’
Thorne looked at him.
Coyne flashed a tobacco-stained smile and held up his hands, a picture of innocence. ‘It was in the paper.’
It was in several of them and Thorne had seen them all first thing that morning. He had stood for ten minutes or more, leafing through every tabloid on the display and annoying his local newsagent, before climbing into his car and struggling through the Monday rush hour towards the M1.
‘Which paper?’ Thorne asked.
‘Well, there aren’t too many copies of the Financial Times knocking about in here . . .’
No journalist’s name had appeared in connection with any of the stories Thorne had read. It was hardly a surprise considering that the stories, and the photographs that had accompanied them, had been obtained by trampling through a crime scene before the police had been called. The photographs were, so each paper had been keen to point out, the least shocking of those that had ‘come into our possession’. A cracked window, a patch of bloodstained carpet, a shoe kicked off as a young man had fought for his life.
‘You don’t seem awfully upset,’ Thorne said.
Coyne laughed. Really laughed. ‘Are you serious, mate? I’m fucking delighted. Why wouldn’t I be?’
‘Dean Meade deserved what he got, that what you’re saying?’
‘Too bloody right he did.’
‘Because he was Kieron’s dad and you’re not?’
The laughter died away quickly. ‘Because that’s what he said. It’s a very different thing.’
‘What he said?’
‘Especially now, after what’s happened. It’s . . . unforgivable.’
‘It’s not just what Dean Meade said.’ Thorne looked at him. ‘It’s what Cat says.’
Coyne shrugged, folded his arms. ‘Not to me, she hasn’t.’
‘She told me,’ Thorne said. ‘Told me all about it. Chapter and verse.’
‘Yeah, well, she’s all over the shop at the minute . . . doesn’t know what she’s saying. Not sure if you heard about it, but her little boy’s missing.’ Coyne nodded, smiled. ‘Our little boy.’
‘So you think Dean Meade was making it up and that Cat’s just understandably . . . confused. You still think you’re Kieron’s natural father.’
‘Until I hear otherwise. From Kieron’s mother.’
‘Have you spoken to her?’
Coyne shook his head. ‘She’ll call me when she wants to.’
‘You could always call her.’
‘I don’t think so,’ Coyne said. ‘She’s the one needs to pick up the phone.’ He had leaned forward and spoken quietly, as though sharing a confidence. As though his position on a delicate subject was one that only another man would understand. For one horrible moment, Thorne had thought that he might actually wink.
‘You had many visitors lately?’ Thorne asked.
‘No more than usual,’ Coyne said. ‘But I’m guessing you know that. I mean, you’ll already have checked, right?’
Thorne nodded. ‘I saw the list, but it’s just names. Doesn’t really tell us who they are.’
‘Family and friends,’ Coyne said. ‘Same as anybody else in here. Go ahead and check them all out.’
‘We might well.’
‘Fill your boots, mate, but you won’t find anything very interesting. I’m not denying that I’ve got a few mates with colourful pasts, but none of them are hitmen.’ Coyne shook his head. ‘I haven’t even got one of them mad cows desperate to marry a bloke who’s inside . . . you know, the ones who think being banged up makes you irresistible. I’m a bit disappointed, to be honest. Feel a bit left out.’
‘But you’re spoken for, aren’t you, Billy?’
Coyne shifted in his seat. Smiled and said, ‘That’s right, I am.’
Cat had certainly spoken up for him, insisting that the Billy Coyne she knew was not a naturally violent man. That the vicious assault and the attempted murder for which her partner was currently serving time were no more than unfortunate mistakes. Aberrations.
Did she really believe that, or was it a
lie she felt honour-bound to tell, to protect herself and her son?
Thorne thought it didn’t much matter.
‘I think we’d probably be wasting our time checking that list,’ Thorne said.
‘Up to you.’
‘Because it wouldn’t need to be someone who’d actually been in to see you, would it? We both know you could have had Dean Meade sorted with a single phone call, or put the word out through someone else in here. Called in a favour.’
Coyne stared at him, sniffed. ‘Oh, sorry, are you actually waiting for me to deny any of that?’
‘I’m not in any rush,’ Thorne said.
‘Listen, I could have put an advert in the paper and interviewed people who were handy with knives. I could have broken out of here for a few hours, hopped in a cab, carved that little wankstain up myself then broken back in. I could have done all sorts of things.’ Coyne rolled up the sleeves of his sweatshirt to reveal a tangle of tattoos on each arm. ‘But wouldn’t you be better off spending a bit less time worrying about who did everyone a favour by slicing up Dean Meade and a bit more trying to find the animal who took my son?’
‘Or Dean Meade’s son,’ Thorne said.
Coyne stiffened for a few seconds, then leaned back and rolled the tension from his shoulders. ‘Yeah, well, maybe one day we can sort all that shit out once and for all. You can find out who someone’s real father is with that DNA stuff now, can’t you? Just need a bit of blood or whatever and that shouldn’t be a problem.’ He smiled. ‘There was gallons of Dean Meade’s splashed all over his front room on Saturday night.’
Thorne stared at him.
There were those dead eyes.
‘That was in the paper, too,’ Coyne said.
FORTY-EIGHT
Maria’s first thought, when the school secretary had called, was that Josh had hurt himself. Her stomach had tightened imagining the blood, or the bone protruding through the skin; a rush to the hospital. Now, half an hour later, sitting anxious and ashamed in front of the headmistress, Maria found herself wishing she’d been right. A few stitches or a plaster cast signed by Josh’s classmates would have been so much easier to cope with than this.
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