by Bo Brennan
“Cool. Where d’you want me to send it?”
She reeled off her private email address. “There’s no need to cc my work account, just send it straight to that one.”
When she heard someone else enter the toilets, India abruptly cut the call and pocketed her phone. She yanked the flush before consciously waiting a couple of seconds to open the cubicle door. Nisha Fisher was standing at the sink, retouching her lipstick in the mirror.
“I get the feeling you aren’t comfortable speaking with Officer Henderson in the room, detective,” she said.
India shrugged and proceeded to needlessly wash her hands. “There hasn’t been an opportunity to speak yet.”
“There’s not going to be either,” Nisha said, studying her in the mirror. “At least not about the things that interest you.”
India flicked the water from her hands and pulled a fistful of paper towels from the dispenser. “I don’t have any interests, Mrs Fisher.”
“But you do have something,” she said, and India’s eyes narrowed. Nisha Fisher slipped the lipstick into her jacket pocket and turned to face her. “You’re right to be cautious, detective. Officer Henderson is here to shut you down and shut you up. And if you start keying whatever information you’ve found into government systems, you can expect his full and undivided attention.”
“All I’m expecting right now is a wasted afternoon,” India said.
Nisha Fisher smiled and blotted her lipstick with a paper towel. “Then you need to raise your expectations, detective. I’m staying at The Metropole tonight. Dinner’s at seven and it’s on me.” India was about to decline when Nisha gave her an apologetic grimace. “It’s non-negotiable I’m afraid. Now then, enough of these silly charades,” she said, dropping the pout imprinted paper towel into the waste bin. “Let’s get back in there and waste some of the NCA’s time for a change.”
Chapter 25
The Metropole Hotel, Winchester
The glamorous Nisha Fisher had dressed appropriately for dinner in the five-star hotel’s à la carte restaurant. India came straight from work, arriving in a rumpled suit and Doc Marten boots, oblivious to the judgemental sneers of other diners.
Nisha perused the menu for an awfully long time before making her dinner choice. India picked the only dish she could pronounce. She had no idea what was coming, but when the miniscule portion of food finally arrived she didn’t know whether to eat it or photograph it.
“Looks simply divine,” Nisha said, draping a heavy cotton serviette across her lap.
“Hmm.” India poked a bloody sliver of meat with her fork. “What’s the beef between you and Doug Henderson?”
Nisha Fisher took a delicate mouthful of something green and leafy. “No beef,” she said, gently patting her lips with another serviette. “Occasionally there’s a conflict of interest between NCA practices and the work of the FMU. I fear today was one of those occasions.”
“What sort of conflict?”
“In a closed community where disputes are settled by Sharia councils, a desperate woman is a valuable commodity to the intelligence services. To the FMU, she’s a human being who deserves to be safe.”
“Was the victim in Witness Protection?” India asked, pouring herself a glass of iced water from the jug on the table.
“Without a name, I couldn’t tell you,” she said. “Of course, if I did have a name, I could make some incredibly discreet enquiries that couldn’t possibly lead back to you.”
India sipped her water, studying Nisha over the rim of her glass. “I don’t have one,” she said, placing her drink on the table. “Trying to identify her is what brought the NCA running in the first place.”
Nisha Fisher tilted her head and smiled. “After speaking with Herbie, I pulled your file,” she said. “It makes for interesting reading.”
India chuckled and stood up. “If that’s the best you’ve got, I’m out of here.”
Nisha clasped her arm “I wouldn’t recommend it. You’re lots of things, Detective Kane, but stupid isn’t one of them.” India glared at her hand, and Nisha raised her palms defensively. “Apologies. That was awfully uncouth of me. Your file makes it abundantly clear you are not a fan of physical contact. Sit down. Please.”
India slowly returned to her seat, under no illusions this woman was anything but the real deal. She wasn’t bluffing. Nisha Fisher knew things about her she shouldn’t. “Why am I here?”
“To learn,” Nisha said, filling her own glass with wine and tilting the bottle India’s way. India shook her head. “You have an honour killing, detective. Don’t you want to know who and what you’re up against?”
“It’s been made pretty damn clear that I don’t have jack shit,” India said. “Henderson does.”
“But you won’t be leaving it there, will you? Standing by while some arrogant arse sweeps a mutilated young woman’s death under the carpet is so not your style.” Nisha Fisher lowered her voice and leant across the table, eyes gleaming. “Your reputation precedes you, detective. You have little regard for the rules at the best of times . . . but to play this game? You don’t even know the rules, and that could get you, and others, killed.”
The woman had her bang to rights. India swallowed hard, her mouth was parched. A couple of years ago, getting killed wouldn’t have been a problem. But now it was. She hadn’t changed – her priorities had. And being alive was currently one of them. She refilled her glass with water and took a long swig. “Tell me what I’m up against.”
Nisha Fisher pushed her plate aside and propped her elbows on the table. “My unit deals with approximately 1,500 forced marriage referrals every year. The most at risk are young women between the ages of sixteen and twenty-five.”
“Could fit,” India said nonchalantly. “Dr Fisher put the victim’s age between twenty-five and thirty-five.”
Nisha shrugged. “Makes no odds. The oldest victim we’ve assisted was seventy-one. The youngest was two.”
India baulked. “Two?”
Nisha let out a solemn sigh. “Age is no barrier to honour based violence I’m afraid.”
“But your husband also said there were none of the usual signs of spousal abuse he’d expect to see under those circumstances.”
“Perhaps not,” Nisha said coolly. “But at her age, sexually active, and with a type three genital mutilation, she was almost certainly married. At least, at some point. Deinfibulations and divorce are both cultural no-no’s,” she said, raising her brows pointedly. “Contemplating either could bring great dishonour to a family, and the injuries she displayed in death are indisputably honour based in nature.”
“Should I be looking for her husband?”
Nisha Fisher grinned. “You shouldn’t be looking for anybody, detective. But since you are, I feel duty bound to help.”
One side of India’s mouth quirked. “You’d better bring me up to speed on the whys and wherefores then.”
“Ah, this is where the standard rules of investigating go out the window, not that they ever mattered much to you,” she added cheerily. “Just because she was married, doesn’t mean her husband’s your primary suspect. Quite the opposite in fact. It can be a great honour for a male family member to be chosen to avenge his sisters’ or cousins’ dishonour and restore the family’s standing in the community. And bounty hunting these women is a lucrative bloody business, let me tell you.”
A family member. With everybody confusing Nazreem and Shayla, India was confident one of those shouldn’t be too hard to find. She was also fairly sure a picture of the person responsible would be sitting in her private email account when she got home. She cupped her chin in her hand, looking down at the untouched piece of art on her plate as Nisha merrily drained her glass. “You keep talking about ‘honour’,” India said, punctuating the word in the air. “But I still don’t know what it is.”
“Honour is a very peculiar thing, detective.” Nisha rolled her eyes as she refilled her glass with wine. India covered her gla
ss with her hand as Nisha tilted the bottle her way. “In basic terms, it’s how the family are perceived by those around them. A kind of respect thing, if you like. Any slight against it is viewed as a very serious matter.”
“Like what?”
“It depends on the individual family’s cultural perception of honour.” Nisha drew a deep breath and spread her hands. “Dishonour could simply be a young woman wearing western clothes, or listening to popular music. Kissing a boy or merely smiling his way. Disobeying your parents can bring about huge repercussions. For example, I married Herbie, so I’m dead to my family.” She shrugged and took a mouthful of wine. “In real terms, it’s a warped set of rules that Muslim women are expected to live, and die by. Here in the UK we average an honour killing a month, but that’s at the top end of the punishment scale. Hundreds of young women are subjected to honour based violence by family members every single day.”
India frowned. “If death is at the top end of the scale, presumably there would’ve been some sort of build up to this, other violent incidents. But that doesn’t fit with the PM report. She had no other injuries besides old fractures consistent with the genital mutilation.”
“Exactly.” Nisha Fisher raised her eyebrows and glass in jubilant revelation. “I think your girl knew something big, detective. And I think our friends at the National Crime Agency don’t want you, or anybody else, to know about it.”
Chapter 26
Friday, 9th March
Colt arched his back and opened one eye to find he wasn’t dreaming. He lifted the covers and groaned.
“Good morning,” India said, kissing her way up his body.
He smiled and threw the bed clothes aside. “It’s your birthday, babe, not mine.”
“Urgh, don’t remind me,” she said, slumping beside him and burying her face in his chest.
With a sigh, he slipped his arms around her and pulled her close, wishing he could take it all away. Wishing he could replace every one of her shitty birthday memories with a cause for celebration. If the day went his way, he would. He ran his hands up her back and lifted her head. “Move in.”
“You won’t get blowjobs for breakfast every morning.”
“I’m being serious. I love you, India.” He held her face in place when she tried to turn away. “I. Love. You.”
Her usually cold blue eyes burned as bright as the centre of a flame. “I know you do.”
“Good. Think about it.” He kissed her forehead and brushed the loose hair from her face. “I missed you last night. Where’d you get to?”
“Dinner with the Home Office,” she said, tossing her head back. “You were right by the way. Consider this your prize.” She held his gaze as her tongue traced the tattoo on his chest. His eyes rolled back in his head as his body clenched in all the right places. “Do you know Doug Henderson?” she suddenly asked.
Colt frowned down at her. “Where did that come from?”
“Well, do you?”
He pushed himself up on his elbows and fixed his eyes on hers, his body tensing for a different reason. “Yeah, I know him. Serious Organised Crime Agency, or was, before they got folded into the NCA. Is that who you had dinner with?”
She raised a brow, her eyes dancing with barely concealed delight. “Noooo,” she said, playfully twisting his nipple. “I had dinner with Nisha Fisher from the Forced Marriage Unit. Would it bother you if I’d had Doug?”
His body burned with a sudden rush of intemperate possessiveness. Yeah, it fucking would, he thought. “It would bother Maggie,” he said. “Doug’s been all over her like a tramp on chips since her divorce came through. What’re you asking about him for?”
“Now there’s a match made in heaven,” she said dully. “I only met him yesterday and I already want to slap him.”
Laughing, Colt fell back against the pillows. “Really? Whereabouts?”
“Winchester,” she said.
He rolled to his side, propping his head in his hand as he faced her. “What was he doing in Winchester?”
“I was gonna ask you the same.” She yawned and stretched languidly.
Colt drew a contented breath as he watched her supple body writhe. “No idea, babe,” he murmured, trailing his fingertips along the curve of her spine. “I’ll probably be seeing him later, though. I’ll ask him if you like.”
“No don’t,” she said sharply. “It’s fine. I was just wondering what he’s up to, that’s all.”
Colt glanced at the alarm clock and grinned. “You should be wondering what we can get up to in the next thirty minutes.”
She pressed her hand against his chest when he moved in to kiss her. “What does he do at the NCA?”
“Whatever he’s told to, the same as everybody else who works at the big house.”
“What’s he like as a person?”
“Pays his rent on time, likes candy, cats, and kids, but I don’t want him in our bed. He’s a good bloke, India,” he added when she scowled at him. “But he’s not as good as this.” In one fluid movement, he rolled her onto her back and covered her neck with his mouth, instantly reaching that sweet spot that turned her to molten lava. Her nails had scored his back before he was even inside her.
Chapter 27
Hampshire CID, Winchester
India peered at the gaping hole in her neat row of case files. Not only had the abduction and murder cases vanished from the leader board, but the accompanying files had also vanished from her desk.
It didn’t matter. Her best work happened at home.
She glanced towards her guv’nor’s office to see Shit-Fer-Brains occupying his visitor’s chair, and cautiously unfolded the picture the sketch artist had sent to her private email address.
The Preston brothers’ depiction of the Central Bank robber was as far removed from cashier Melody Fletcher’s as one could conceivably get. For starters, he looked like a human being instead of a vegetable. The Preston boys said he was Pakistani, whereas Melody said he was white. The Preston boys gave him a long scar on his left cheek which dragged down his eye. Melody gave him no distinguishing features at all. She also claimed she’d never seen him before, or since, the day he stuck a sawn-off shotgun in her face. The Preston boys said different. They claimed the same man returned to abduct Nazreem Sinder from the bus stop directly outside the bank on Monday night.
If that was true, this man was a cold-blooded killer.
And he’d attempted to murder Shayla Begum – a case that still belonged to India.
Was it possible he was taking out the robbery witnesses as Jason Preston suggested? Could Shayla Begum have been a victim of mistaken identity? It was conceivable. A usually on the ball Gray had confused the two women.
India opened the Central Bank file and refreshed herself with the details. The robbery had also occurred on a Monday night. Right before closing. At precisely 5.28pm according to the time stamp on the bank’s grainy internal security camera footage. The hooded surveillance-aware robber’s face had remained completely off camera for the duration of the heist, and with no functioning cameras outside the bank to capture his fleeing image – it was the word of a traumatised pole-dancing cashier with buns of steel, against the stoned spawn of a crack whore.
Both afraid. One untruthful. Neither had anything immediately obvious to gain.
India leant back in her chair, gnawing on the end of her pencil. That wasn’t strictly true. The Preston boys had a get-out-of-jail-free card to gain, but would go direct to Young Offenders without passing go if they were bullshitting. She’d make sure of it. Melody Fletcher had compensation to gain from her personal injury claim against the bank. Money was always a huge motivator to lie, but her dismissal came after the fact – after she’d had a sawn-off shotgun shoved in her face. Her court case was more than warranted.
Money. India sat bolt upright in her chair. Shit, she’d had the answer for days.
Hauling her bag onto her lap, she rummaged around in its bottomless pit until she found the
evidence bag containing the wad of cash and drugs she’d confiscated from Jason Preston.
Fanning the crisp fifty pound notes on her desk she eyed the sequential serial numbers, her pulse quickening as she flipped to the page in the Central Bank file where the stolen banknotes were recorded.
She ran her index finger down the printout of serial numbers until she reached the starting sequence of ‘AC’ – the same as the notes on her desk – and then across the long string of numbers that followed. Her heart stuttered when she found her first match. And then the second. The third. All of them were there. The Preston boys weren’t lying. This wasn’t drug money. These notes came from the Central Bank robbery.
India clenched her jaw and looked at the clock. It was too early to pay bullshitter Melody Fletcher a visit at the club. And it was too risky to log the evidence and get the Preston boys in for a proper statement without alerting Henderson to a potential link in the cases. She needed more information first. And she knew exactly where to find it. She stuffed the evidence bag in the back of her desk drawer and quietly slipped out the door.
Headbourne Worthy, Hampshire
Inside, the church was smaller than she’d imagined, musty, dingy, and surprisingly devoid of worshippers.
Shayla Begum stood at the ornate gold and crimson altar, staring scornfully up at the crucifix. Christ stared serenely back at her.
Her skin prickled with resentment.
The life she’d spent praying for strength, courage, and the souls of those she’d loved and lost – both living and dead – was wasted. Futile. Gone. It was all a lie. There was no God.
The heavy clunk of the vestibule door startled her. Adrenaline surging, ready for fight or flight, she spun round. The priest stood motionless, gazing at her through disconcerted blue eyes. His gentle face roughened rapidly with dismay. He pressed one hand to his chest, the other to a pew, steadying himself as his knees buckled beneath him.