School. What a joke. The head had written suggesting she go back, sit the exams next year. As if. She wasn’t a kid any more; she had a nipper of her own. What use was a bunch of poxy GCSEs?
She reached down, fumbling for a ciggie from her bag on the floor; swore as she brought out an empty pack. As she moved, she caught the spicy scent of Gould’s aftershave. Not surprising, really. He’d been all over her. She recalled some of the more hard-to-reach places, smiled; she’d certainly taught Sir a thing or two. Bastard had buggered off, then. Didn’t even walk her to the bus.
“Nat’ly! Nat’ly!” The girl sighed and rolled her eyes. Maxine Beck’s voice could dent concrete, never mind daydreams. “I’m off now, our kid. Get your ass in gear.”
Yeah, yeah.
“And you shouldn’t have the baby in bed with you. It’s not safe.”
Whatever.
Natalie counted the seconds until the front door slammed. Yep. Seven. You could set your watch by Maxine and her dull little routines. The bossy clack of heels on pavement would fade by thirty.
Natalie hit twelve before registering her mother’s words.
The girl’s bare feet skimmed freezing lino as she dashed across the landing, heart pounding. Halfway across the cheap carpet she halted, dizzy with relief, closing her eyes briefly and mouthing a silent thanks to any passing god. The baby was asleep, the top of her head just visible above the pink quilt. Her mum must have fed Zoë, then put her down before leaving the house.
Natalie took a calming breath to slow her racing heart. Maxine’s mean trick had forced her out of bed all right. Into a state of shock.
She tiptoed to the tiny cot and gently pulled back the covers. The macabre sight turned her insides to ice. She cupped a hand over her mouth to stem the bile rising in her throat, not able to make sense of what she saw.
Zoë wasn’t in the cot. It was a doll. A stupid doll.
Natalie flung it across the room, angrily snatched at the pillow, yanked the covers aside and up-ended the mattress. It had to be another mean trick, a nightmare hide-and-seek. But in her heart she knew Maxine wouldn’t be that malicious.
Her panic rose as her breathing quickened. She stared wildly round the room before turning back to the cot. All that remained was a white cotton sheet, a little crumpled and so very cold. Natalie lifted it to her cheek, inhaled the scent of her beautiful baby. She lost it, then. Screaming, unable to stop, she clamped her hands over her ears. She needed to think straight but couldn’t think at all over the appalling noise she was barely conscious of making.
In the street, the sound stopped Maxine in her stilettoed tracks. She was vaguely aware of furtive stares from passers-by, but no one else halted. Why would they? It’d just be the estate kids mucking about again. Except Maxine Beck knew it wasn’t. Her daughter’s anguish was clamouring in her ears. Rooted to the spot, she felt her blood run cold.
3
“How was I meant to know?”
Bev had been kicking her heels in the corridor while the guv did his best to placate Martha Kemp. He’d just emerged from the rape suite and it turned out the presenter wasn’t a media queen on the sniff for a scoop. She was Laura Kenyon’s mother.
Byford waited as Bev tried to get her head round the fact that Ms Kemp had kept the Happy Families card extremely close to her chest. “She didn’t say a word, guv.”
“Maybe she couldn’t get one in,” he suggested. “Cut her some slack, sergeant. She’s in shock. That’s her daughter in there.”
She shrugged. Kemp could still have said something. Bev felt she’d been deliberately wrong-footed, like it had been some sort of test. And she’d failed.
“Uniform had a hell of a job getting hold of her to break the news,” Byford said. “She wasn’t answering the door. A neighbour had a key. They found her on the bathroom floor. She’d got bladdered at some awards do. So she’s feeling guilty as sin on top of everything else.”
“Yeah, well, I’m not a mind reader.”
“Clearly. Or you’d have an idea why I’m here.”
She hadn’t given it a thought. Her entire focus was on Laura Kenyon, how soon she could talk to the girl. How soon she could elicit every fact while staying alert to every nuance. The Street Watch squad badly needed pointing in the right direction, any direction. There was an outside chance the girl had caught a glimpse of the attacker. It hadn’t happened yet; he’d been smart, or lucky. But grey cells died off and luck ran out. There was always a first time. A visual was probably too much to hope for but there was more than one way to skin a cat – even the most repulsive tom on the block. An accent, for instance, could give away loads; a distinctive smell; the way he wore his hair...
“You all right?” Byford asked. God knew what her face was doing. His was full of concern.
“Just thinking.”
“Don’t let me stop you.” Her look spoke volumes. “Let’s sit down a minute, sergeant.”
He indicated a heavy wooden bench lining one of the custard-coloured walls. Kilroy had been there, and his mate Elroy. And they’d carved their names with pride, and a blunt penknife. Bev traced the letters with a finger, reluctant to meet the big man’s gaze. He’d used the s-word, for one thing, and she didn’t like the way he said it. A quick glance confirmed her suspicions. She could read his eyebrows like a book. The left had almost disappeared into the hairline: something was bugging him.
She let the silence stand and sneaked a few more covert glances. She reckoned he’d aged a bit in the last couple of years. The grey flecks among the still-thick black hair were more snow-scatter than sprinkle. And the lines down the side of his mouth had become a permanent feature rather than the by-product of late nights and early mornings, often back to back. He was early fifties, nothing these days, but he’d had a health scare earlier in the year, had even toyed with the idea of early retirement.
That had sent shock waves rippling down Bev’s vertebrae. The guv was on her side, almost the only suit at Highgate that was. Without his metaphorical arm around her shoulder the world would be a much colder place. Not that he didn’t call a spade an earth mover, and not that he was afraid to tell her to her face what a lot of the Highgate neanderthals only whispered behind her back. Whatever the reason for the current uncharacteristic shilly-shallying, it was neither fear nor concern for her sometimes fragile self-esteem.
“It’ll probably all be over by the time you get there.”
Where? The only place she had the slightest intention of going was the room at the end of the corridor where Laura Kenyon was waiting to be interviewed. The guv still hadn’t looked her in the eye. She folded her arms, slumped back against the wall. She wasn’t going to make it easy for him. “Like I say, I’m no mind-reader.”
“I’m taking you off Street Watch.” He lifted a hand to quell a Morriss outburst. “Just till we know how this thing pans out. As I say, by the time you get there, it’ll probably be sorted.”
“What will?” Her gaze fixed on a peeling poster extolling safe sex. Given the state of her love life, any sex would be a fine thing. Oz had been giving her so much space lately she could rent rooms.
“We got a call-out. Looks like it could be a missing baby.”
Her heart skipped a beat as she abandoned the slouch. “Missing?” Her senses were on red alert. Baby-snatch, kidnap, abduction, call it what you like. A dictionary couldn’t come close to describing the horror, the emotional fall-out when a baby’s taken, a young life’s at stake. Priority didn’t get much higher. So why the shifty look?
“Uniform’s there,” Byford said. “Les called it in. He reckons there’s something fishy. Wants another pair of eyes.”
Les King. Laziest copper on the force. Christ, if Kingie thought it was fishy, there must be shoals of the bloody things. It was a time-waster. And there was none to spare. Byford knew it. She knew it. “With respect, guv...”
“Don’t even go there.” He stood, mentally elsewhere already.
“But...”
> “But nothing.” He handed her a slip of paper. “I want you to take a look.”
She clocked the address and snarled. Blake Way, Balsall Heath. Better known as Asbo Alley. What fun. She gave a theatrical sigh, tapped fingers on thigh.
“And you can stop that soon as you like.” Byford read bodies as well as minds.
“What I’d like is to talk to Laura Kenyon.”
“You should have thought about that before inserting yourself in her mother’s nostrils.”
“That is so unfair.”
“That’s life.” He shrugged half-heartedly. “Think yourself lucky she isn’t filing a complaint.”
In his office on the fourth floor, Byford watched through the window as Bev crossed the car park. Even from this distance, he could read the signs. The slumped shoulders and head down had nothing to do with heavy rain falling from a leaden sky; she was seriously pissed off. He sighed, absentmindedly tipping the dregs of a canteen coffee on to a parched cactus languishing on the windowsill. The plant was the latest in a long horticultural line of Morriss peace offerings. Indeed, had all the cacti flourished, he could have opened a garden centre. Was the choice of plant significant?
He gave it a passing thought, his focus still on the woman sending smoke signals from below. Detective Sergeant Beverley Morriss didn’t need to open her mouth these days. Learning to button it – which she had by no means mastered – never helped when she had one on her, so to speak. And she’d had several during the spat with Martha Kemp.
Byford rubbed his eyes as he recalled the radio presenter’s threat to have a word with her mate, Ronnie: Big Chief Constable Ronald Birt. Thank God she wasn’t pally with the Queen’s Constable as well. Kemp had taken exception to Bev’s slack attitude and sloppy appearance. There’d been no percentage in pointing out the sergeant’s early shout on a day off; that only explained the denims and trainers. Anyway, when Kemp was in full flow, on or off the air, The Mouth was unstoppable. Only an apparently reluctant agreement that a more senior officer would be assigned to her daughter’s interview had halted the diatribe.
Ms Kemp had looked suitably gratified, not to say smug, at what she perceived as a victory. In reality there’d been no agreement, reluctant or otherwise. Byford had already made the decision to take Bev off the interview. His wayward sergeant could and did ruffle feathers; she could also soothe entire flocks of birds. If a baby were missing, he could think of no better officer to deal with the family.
Especially the Becks. He was surprised Bev hadn’t picked up on the address. Still, it would register soon enough.
Right now she was alongside the Morriss-mobile, an ageing MG Midget that she loved even though its erratic performance occasionally drove her to distraction. Byford watched her waggle her fingers and mouth a greeting to someone out of his field of vision. Glossy curtains of chin-length Guinness-coloured hair drew back to reveal a warm smile that lit her entire face and widened the bluest eyes he’d ever seen. It had never occurred to him before but when Bev looked like that, she was almost beautiful.
The senior detective who’d shortly be questioning Laura Kenyon was currently trying to answer a few being put to him. DI Mike Powell was perched precariously on the muddy slope of a disused railway embankment off the main road into Moseley. Gnarled oaks provided a dense overhang of twisted branches glistening with slimy moss. Natural light struggled to penetrate the gloom, which explained the battery of police lights and a tableau that at first sight resembled a film set. The inspector had been carefully positioned camera-left. The scene of Laura Kenyon’s rape – almost certainly the latest in a series – provided a damp and dismal backdrop.
In the distance two white-suited figures were on their knees, steel cases full of fine-tooth combs, a steadily growing pile of small see-through bags on the ground beside them. It looked like a CSI shoot or something out of Doctor Who. As for the plastic bags, they could contain evidence or detritus; people had been dumping rubbish in the cutting for years. A few litter louts were probably among the motley crew of extras that had congregated at street level and were now lining a wire-mesh security fence, agog at the activity below. Clutching the fence and faces pressed against the wire, they could have been spectators at a zoo. Powell half-expected to be tossed a banana. A notice exhorting trespassers to keep out had earlier been ignored. Or maybe the rapist couldn’t read.
It was wet under the inspector’s expensive Italian loafers and fat raindrops were flattening his recently coiffed locks. The pose was both uncomfortable and fairly ungainly but Nick Lockwood, the BBC’s safest pair of hands in the Midlands, had been extremely persuasive. It helped that Mike Powell was as keen to get his face on the box as the old TV pro firing the questions was to put it there. Though at this precise moment Lockwood was itching to tighten his fingers round the inspector’s neck.
Powell wasn’t being deliberately obtuse; it came naturally. But on this occasion, he either didn’t have the information Lockwood was after or he couldn’t or wouldn’t give it. He’d hummed and hedged like a musical privet. Maybe the officers he’d put on house-to-house might come up with a whisper. He’d heard nothing yet.
The only known fact was the girl’s name and even Lockwood knew that was a no-no. A rape victim’s identity was rarely released to the media, even without the current three-line whip demanding anonymity that Martha Kemp had apparently issued. Powell hadn’t spoken to the woman, but he’d had an ear-bending from Byford who clearly had. What a nightmare: a female control freak with friends in high places.
Lockwood took advantage of Powell’s wandering thoughts, hoping his casual delivery of a loaded question would slip by unnoticed. “So there is a link with the previous attacks?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Can’t win them all. Lockwood bowled another. “So there isn’t a connection?”
“I didn’t say that either.” Powell regarded Lockwood with renewed interest. The man might look like a crumpled sofa but the journalist brain was sharp as a razor and equally cut-throat.
“So what are you saying?”
The newsman had let local radio and the print guys do their bit first so they wouldn’t be around to pick up any exclusive gems Powell might drop during Lockwood’s turn. It wasn’t working; this was more swine before pearls. Powell, or Blondie as he was commonly known among the hacks, wasn’t singing at all, let alone from the same crime sheet.
“At this preliminary stage in the inquiry, it’s not possible to indicate whether this incident is related to...”
Blah-de-blah-blah. Lockwood tuned out. Apart from a complete lack of anything worth using, at this rate he’d be lucky to hit Newsnight.
“Finito?” the inspector asked with a smile that bordered on smug.
“Yep,” Lockwood agreed. “That’s a wrap.” He’d wasted enough energy on this blond twat. He’d give Bev Morriss a bell; she didn’t do police-speak and often had something worth saying.
He’d been surprised not to see her out here. He sensed she wanted a collar particularly badly on this one. They’d bumped into each other quite a bit in the course of Operation Street Watch. He’d even financed a pinot or two in the Prince of Wales. It was a police pub, good for contacts. Lockwood made it his business to drink there regularly. When Bev Morriss was around it was pleasure as well. Off the record, he reckoned she was well fit and a fucking good cop. And she’d tossed the occasional snippet his grateful way. Question was, could he sweet-talk the delectable DS into parting with a quality steer?
Lockwood was still mulling it over as he reached the top of the slope and heard a string of expletives ring out from behind. The newsman didn’t actually see Powell’s tumble; the inspector was already down when Lockwood turned. Blondie had landed slap-bang in what looked suspiciously more pungent than a puddle of mud. The newsman watched as one of the SOCOs raced across to lend an arm.
A red-faced Powell flapped a hand in angry dismissal and immediately lost his footing again. Lockwood had to turn away. Shame
the camera hadn’t been running. The crap might wash off the fancy footwear eventually, but it’d be a bugger to get the stains out of what looked like a brand-new Barbour. As for the smell... Lockwood smiled. Had there been cattle around, he’d swear it was bullshit.
4
Travis was spouting Why does it always rain on me? Bev flicked off the CD with a finger and gave a heartfelt sigh. “You and me both, mate.” The downpour was now a deluge but she wasn’t talking weather; she’d turned into the Wordsworth estate. She was chasing a wild goose on Balsall Heath’s Little Gorbals, where you washed your motor on the way out. Assuming it still had wheels.
Way she saw it, the whole business was a non-starter. No one snatched babies on the Wordsworth. Girls popped them out like peas, swapped them for a pack of fags. With a bit of luck, she’d be back at Highgate within the hour. End of.
She peered through the windscreen, half-expecting to see animals in pairs forming an orderly queue outside the nearest ark. What she saw was an ugly, graffiti-scarred, derelict high-rise. Tennyson Tower’s smashed windows and rusty grilles dominated an ominous gunmetal sky. She lowered her sights. Blake Way? Was that the one off Keats Avenue? They all looked the naffing same to her: mean streets of redbrick council semis, with scrubby front gardens and grotty nets at grimy windows.
She took a right into Coleridge Drive. And what joker had come up with the names? Poor sodding poets would be turning in their urns, Grecian or otherwise. As for daffodils, you’d be lucky to spot one in March, never mind a bunch in mid-November.
Baby Love Page 2