by John Harvey
She looked away.
‘What happened then weren’t pretty. And then, a few days later, it’s all calmed down again. But tense. Something’s changed. Happened. Not with us. Outside. I don’t know what. But it’s like he’s expecting trouble. Take Danny and keep him safe, he tells me, out of the way. His brother, Taras, he’s bought this hotel in the Lakes, some kind of investment. Go up there for a bit, he says, help Taras, lay low till this trouble gets sorted.’ A lazy shrug of the shoulders. ‘You know the rest.’
When the phone went, they both jumped.
Letitia picked it up.
No trace of an accent, the voice was English, harsh and clear.
‘Off the road that goes north out of the town through St Helen’s. There’s a caravan site on your right, this side of the railway tunnel. Just past the edge of the woods. Tomorrow morning, be there, ten sharp. You and the boy.’
30
A few of the caravans looked as if they might be lived in year round, though signs of occupancy were few. Most stood empty, waiting for summer residents, short-term rentals, six hundred a week for a twin berth and counting. Along one side, a phalanx of empty concrete stands, weeds starting to push through, cracks appearing. Before the season there’d be a lick of paint, a few flowering shrubs, a stiff broom; the kiosk that now stood empty, partly boarded over, would be back in business, selling milk and bread, Calor gas, cereals, cheap DVDs and morning papers.
Off to one side, someone had been dismantling an old trailer, wheels and planks of splintered wood, the chassis bare and rusted over. Metal glinted for a moment in a sudden shaft of sun, bright through lowering skies.
Jack Kiley had called back first thing.
Anton Kosach was currently under investigation for his possible participation in money laundering. He was also suspected of involvement in people trafficking, prostitution and the illegal import and sale of arms. The works.
He had been targeted, questioned, never charged.
‘Nice guy,’ Kiley had remarked.
Cordon looked at his watch. Fifteen minutes shy of ten. The local east-west train disappeared into the tunnel on its way towards Warrior Square. Behind him, the trees at the wood’s edge leaned in together, tall and mostly bare. Dust kicked up as he walked and left a grey film across his shoes.
Crouching down towards the dismembered trailer, he selected a length of rusted iron and backed away towards the space between two empty caravans.
Minutes later, a car slowed and, without indicating, turned into the yard. A silver Merc with alloy wheels. No subtlety here.
Engine switched off, the driver sat for several moments before swinging his legs round and climbing out, the click of the car door behind him soft and precise. Broad shouldered, not tall, he was wearing a blue Nike zip-up jacket with loose-fitting black trousers, leather shoes. Late thirties, Cordon guessed, early forties, just starting to go to seed.
As he watched, the man double-checked his watch, lowered the zip on his jacket midway down.
Iron held down flat against his thigh, Cordon stepped into sight.
‘Who the fuck are you?’
‘Never mind.’
‘Where’s the woman? The boy?’
‘They’re not coming.’
‘They better fuckin’ be. S’posed to be here now.’
His face was flushed, cheeks swelling out.
Cordon walked towards him, taking his time. ‘You’re not listening,’ he said.
‘Don’t give me fuckin’ listening. You call ’em, get ’em here, or fuckin’ else.’
Cordon shook his head, the brittle edges of the iron biting into his hand.
Angling his head to one side, the man hawked phlegm and spat at the ground, then, as if making a decision, he arched suddenly forward, reaching round to the back of his jacket as if he might be going for a gun.
The one chance, likely the only one he was going to get, Cordon hit him with a fast swing, smack against the underside of the elbow with a crack that made him scream.
‘You bastard! You broke my fuckin’ arm.’
In for a penny, Cordon hit him again, the knee this time, and the man went down in a sprawling heap. Cordon pressed his foot down hard against the damaged leg and pulled the pistol from where it had been resting against the small of the man’s back. One click and he pocketed the magazine. The gun he hurled away as far as he could.
‘You’ll live to fuckin’ regret this.’
‘I hope you’re right.’
Cordon rested the rusted end of iron against the man’s sweated forehead, oblivious to the pain in his eyes.
‘A message for Anton …’
‘I don’t know no fucking Anton.’
‘Then whoever sent you on his behalf. Steer clear. The woman and the boy. Well clear. This isn’t the way.’
Stepping quickly round him, Cordon freed the keys from where they’d been left in the Merc and launched them in a high, steepling arc, deep into the woods.
‘Bastard!’ the man shouted. ‘You’re gonna fuckin’ pay for this. Fuckin’ pay.’
Cordon thought, one way or another, he was probably right. Walking away, breath raw, his heart hammered inside his chest. This time he’d managed it without a scratch.
31
Late afternoon. Karen was on the M1, heading north. A pool car, unmarked, no more than a couple of years old, clutch tight as an old man’s chest. The traffic travelling out of the city was already beginning to bunch and stall. When they played their second Neil Diamond track within the hour, she switched off Magic FM and, slipping an Aretha CD into place, notched up the volume just a tad.
The call had come through that morning, high-pitched, hesitant, a definite accent — South Yorkshire, somewhere close? — a young woman sounding early twenties at best. Jayne Andrew. No s. Jayne with a y. An address in Mansfield. Wayne Simon, he’d been hanging round the Four Seasons shopping centre where she worked. Where she lived, too. No doubt, no doubt at all. Used to go out with him, didn’t she? Years back. Two or three, at least, must be. She’d been into the local police station and they’d said they’d have a word with security in the centre, drive by the house where she lived, but, far as she could tell, they never had. Told her to call the police in London, so that’s what she’d done. She hoped that was okay?
‘Fine,’ Karen had assured her. ‘You did the right thing.’
Ramsden, Costello, the rest of her team were out of the office, busy; she could have sent someone junior, but somehow she fancied it herself. As long as what the woman was claiming panned out and it wasn’t just another lonely fantasist, desperate for some attention, this was the best lead they’d had. And there was the weather — earlier there’d been scarcely a cloud worth its name overhead, the sky a pale but definite blue, all the promise of a lovely, late winter day. A still-distant harbinger of spring. Just right for a drive, an hour or more alone in the car with just the stereo for company. A change is gonna come, sang Aretha, and who was to say she was wrong?
Jayne Andrew was whey faced and small boned — petite, the word — four or five months’ pregnant and just beginning to show. Hair that had once been dyed blonde hung lank past her face; grey eyes, dark lashes, surprisingly long. She was wearing a loose top, stretch pants, slippers on her feet. She squinted at the identification Karen showed her without really seeing it and invited her inside.
The block of flats where she lived looked to have been built in the seventies: flat-fronted, flat-roofed, a rectangular box of identical units with a straggle of grass out front and cream-coloured exterior walls in sore need of several fresh coats of paint. Jayne Andrew’s flat was on the upper floor, neat and small, the furniture a mixture of what Karen assumed were hand-me-downs and newer stuff from Ikea.
‘Not working today?’
She shrugged. ‘Keep cutting back, don’t they? Three days a week at the moment, that’s all there is.’ She touched the curve of her belly. ‘Not as that’ll matter much pretty soon.’
�
�When’s the baby due?’
‘June. June 15th.’
‘And is this the dad?’ Karen pointed at the photograph framed above the television, a young man in military uniform, staring out.
‘That’s Ryan, yes. He’s with the Royal Engineers. A corporal.’
‘Nice-looking man. Handsome.’
Pride reflected in the younger woman’s eyes. ‘He’s in Afghanistan. Helmand.’ She pulled at a stray length of hair. ‘He’s always telling me, don’t worry, don’t worry, I’ll be fine. An’ I know he will. He’s careful, Ryan. Not like some of them — things he’s told me. But even so — you see these things on the news, you know, his family has been informed, and all them people linin’ the streets …’
She turned away to hide the prick of tears.
Karen rested a hand on her shoulder and she flinched.
‘I don’t know about you,’ Karen said, stepping back, ‘but I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea.’
‘Yes, of course. Sorry, I didn’t think …’
‘Why don’t you let me …?’
‘No, no, You sit down. Please.’
Karen stood by the window instead. A short, bow-legged dog, some kind of bulldog cross, was waddling its way across the patchy grass below. A young woman in a puffa jacket, no more than late teens, surely, went past along the other side of the street, one child strapped into a buggy, another lagging behind. Over the crowded hotchpotch of rooftops, the sky was beginning to darken, the evening soon setting in.
The tea came in bright mugs, placed carefully on coasters. ‘I didn’t know if you wanted sugar …’
‘No, thanks. This is fine.’
They sat for a moment, awkwardly, one leaning forward, the other back. Jayne Andrew avoiding Karen’s gaze. The tea, as Karen’s grandmother might have said, looked as if it lacked the strength to stand.
‘Wayne Simon, how did you know him?’
‘Before, you mean?’
‘Yes, before.’
‘That were ages back. Before I met Ryan. I was out wi’ me mates. Sat’day night, you know. Wayne was there on his own, this pub we were all in. Up here working. Construction, what he did. Started chattin’ to us, just, you know, friendly like. I thought he were nice. Not loud or rough or anything.’ She looked directly at Karen for the first time. ‘When I heard what he’s supposed to have done. His wife and kiddie. I couldn’t believe it. Just couldn’t.’
‘Back then, though, you went out with him?’
‘For a while, yes. A few months, maybe, six at most. That were all.’
‘It was serious, though?’
‘He thought it were.’
‘And you didn’t know there was somebody else? Down in London?’
‘Course not.’
Karen swallowed down a mouthful of weak tea. ‘So what happened?’
‘Nothing. Nothing really. No row or anything. Not then. Wayne went back down to London when the job he was working was over. Like all of a sudden it didn’t matter.’
‘And you were upset?’
‘Not really. Like I said, it were always more serious for him’n for me.’ She pushed her hands up across her face. ‘Only set eyes on him the once after that till now. Just the once. Fetched up here, didn’t he? Out of the blue. Bangin’ on the door. Shoutin’ all kinds of things. Filthy things, some of them. Been drinking, mind you, but all the same. I was with Ryan by then and thank God he were out, cause Ryan’d’ve killed him. Still would, if he found out what was happening.’
‘And now, he’s been what? Making a commotion? More of the same?’
‘No. That’s it. He just stands there, right up against the shop window. One minute he’s there and when I look again he’s gone. As if I’m making it up, but I’m not. Most times I’m on the till, see, close by the door and there’s only the glass between us.’ She shivered. ‘The manager, he’s complained to security but that don’t seem to make any difference ’cause the next time you look he’s back again.’
‘And he doesn’t say anything?’
‘Just the once. I hadn’t even seen him, not that day, didn’t know he was there. An’ all of a sudden he comes up behind me. “How come,” he says, “you filthy slut, you whore, you’re carryin’ another man’s baby?” Whispers it, right in my ear. I started crying, couldn’t help it. Then when I dared look round he’d gone.’
She reached out for Karen’s hand.
‘I’m frightened. Frightened he’ll do something. Hurt me. Hurt my baby.’
Karen squeezed her hand. ‘It’s okay. I had a word with the local police on the way up. Maybe they weren’t taking this as seriously as they should. I’ll go and see them in person before I leave. Suggest a panic button. The minute you see Wayne again, if he approaches you, you activate that, it’ll go right through to the station. I’ll ask for a drive-by outside here every hour through the night. And see if we can’t get someone in plain clothes in the shopping centre to help out security.’ She squeezed the small hand again. ‘Nothing will happen. He’s not going to hurt you, I promise.’
‘But if he-’
‘I promise. You’ve got my word.’
Another saying of her grandmother’s started jinking round inside her head as she stepped back out on to the street, something about promises being like pie crusts, crumbling, she thought, at the merest touch.
She was back on the motorway, heading south, headlights spindling about her, when her mobile rang and she pulled over on to the hard shoulder.
Ramsden’s voice, off-pitch, urgent. ‘On your way back down? Might want to make a detour. Stansted. Something you ought to see.’
32
She had read it somewhere: the smell of a slaughterhouse, blood and piss and shit and fear. The sweet bite of vomit at the back of the throat.
For a moment, she swayed, eyes glazed.
She had seen death before, too many times, but not like this.
She had to force herself to look again, to see.
Kebab shop, she thought. That’s what it reminded her of. A kebab shop, late at night: walking home, two, three in the morning, head furred and thick from too much vodka, too many cigarettes, the overlapping stink of sweet chilli sauce and slowly turning meat; the man behind the counter, bored, tired, wiping his fingers down the front of his filthy apron before slicing the meat into veinous, bloodied strips. Except that these slabs of scored meat, hanging from the aluminium struts of the roof, had arms and legs and heads; the latter barely recognisable, burned, gouged, torn.
Bile caught in her mouth and she held it there while her body juddered before swallowing it back down.
Her head swam.
The belly of the nearest man hung down in folds, half covering his shrivelled cock and balls.
‘Outside,’ Ramsden said quietly, close behind. ‘Talk outside.’
He touched her arm at the elbow; started, gently, firmly, to steer her towards the doors.
As Karen stepped through into the air, Scene of Crime officers turned aside.
The light bit at her eyes.
The parking area, surrounded on three sides by multi-level storage units, was busy with police vehicles, ambulances, unmarked cars.
Karen counted, slowly, one to ten inside her head.
‘What do we know?’ she asked.
‘Found by a delivery team from the airport. Come to collect a container, evening flight to Ankara. Poor bastards, got more than they bargained for.’
‘The bodies. Any idea how long they’d been there?’
‘Best guess so far, early hours.’
‘This morning?’
‘Be a sight worse, else.’
He gave it a moment, watching her eyes. ‘Security comes round every couple of hours. Two men usually, sometimes one.’
‘This morning?’
‘Just the one.’
‘Handy.’
‘Nothing noted in the log. Call out now for him to come back in.’
Karen looked up at the CCTV cameras attached to several of
the buildings; another, mounted on a high stand, slowly revolving, centrally placed.
‘Funny thing,’ Ramsden said, following her gaze. ‘System went down, two thirty, thereabouts. This whole area. Malfunction. Didn’t get up and running till close on four.’
‘Coincidence?’
‘What’s that? An explanation waiting to happen? Don’t you soddin’ believe it.’
‘What then?’
‘Bloke in charge went off conveniently sick. A while before they could get someone else in to cover. Couple of uniforms, local, went round to his address. Nobody home. We’re still looking.’
‘Whoever worked them over,’ Karen said. ‘All that was done somewhere else. That’s what we’re assuming?’
Not really a question that demanded answering. Anything else, there would have been far more blood than there was: ceiling, walls, floor. And even there, that close to the airport, too great a risk of noise. Slow screams of a dying man. Three dying men. She realised she didn’t know exactly how they had died.
‘Two of them,’ Ramsden said when asked, ‘a bullet to the back of the head. Small calibre by the look of it, close range. After they’d been worked on, my guess, not before. Biggest of the three, apart from what’s been done to his face and hands, no obvious cause.’ He shrugged. ‘Maybe his heart just gave out.’
‘No way yet of knowing who they are?’
‘Not as yet. Once the computer guys get to work on the faces we’ll have a better idea what they looked like before all this. Run ’em through the system after that. See what pops.’
Nodding acknowledgement, Karen stepped away, slowly turned and looked up into the sky. A late plane, taking off, its lights curving gradually upwards into the night sky. Wherever it was heading, she wished she were on board, bound for wherever. Anywhere. Anywhere but here.