Good as Dead

by Mark Billingham

  Helen swallowed, took a few seconds. ‘Paul was … killed, and it was Thorne’s job to find out what happened.’

  ‘Like this, then?’

  ‘I suppose so, yes.’

  ‘So, did he?’

  ‘Well, actually I found out the truth myself.’ Helen shook her head, still not quite able to believe, a year on from it, that she had done the things she had. Taken such stupid risks. Putting herself close to gangs and killers like a kid poking at a wasps’ nest and tearing around like a lunatic while eight months pregnant with Alfie.

  She had felt proud of herself though, in the end, and vindicated because she knew how proud Paul would have been. It had helped her cope with the grief, and the guilt.

  ‘Well, perhaps I should be asking you to find out what happened to Amin,’ Akhtar said, grinning. ‘And Thorne should be sitting where you are.’

  ‘Sounds good to me,’ Helen said.

  Akhtar stood up and flicked the kettle on. There was a lightness to his movements suddenly, as he reached for mugs and spoons. A squareness in his shoulders. ‘Yesterday, when he suggested swapping places with you? That told me something very important about the kind of man he is. Told me he was the right man … ’

  Helen suddenly remembered talking to Thorne a year before, at Paul’s funeral. He had looked uncomfortable in a stiff collar and tie and had told her he was going to be a father. ‘One on the way,’ he had said. ‘Not as far gone as yours but … on the way.’ So just a couple of months, but that meant Thorne would have a baby of his own now.

  Yet still he had offered to take her place.

  When it came, Helen drank her tea and ate the biscuits that were given with it, feeling anything but proud. Because she knew that she would not have done the same.

  THIRTY-SIX

  With an insight gained solely from episodes of The Young Ones, Thorne still imagined that most students lived in glorious and chaotic squalor, with Che Guevara posters covering up the damp patches on the walls, washing-up growing mouldy in the sink and a note stuck to the fridge saying, ‘Don’t eat my yoghurt!’ It was an out-of-date stereotype, but comforting. It served to water down the envy Thorne felt for those less than half his age, with three years free to enjoy a plethora of sex and freedom from responsibility. It eased his regret at never having been one of them himself.

  Rahim Jaffer’s flat would have made most people envious.

  Jaffer lived a stone’s throw from the Old Vic theatre, on the ground floor of a converted warehouse just off The Cut in Waterloo. After a curt exchange over the intercom system and a short staring match on the doorstep, Jaffer had shown Thorne into a sitting room that would not have disgraced an up-market design magazine.

  ‘Nice,’ Thorne said.

  Jaffer said nothing.

  The white walls were broken up with rows of framed black-and-white photographs; portraits of people who, with the exception of Marlon Brando and Imran Khan, Thorne did not recognise. A lamp at the tip of a thin metal arc reached fifteen feet into the room from a marble block in the corner and hung above a coffee table shaped like a strand of DNA. Some Japanese designer, Thorne thought, though he could not remember the name. He was sure that nothing in the place had come in a flat-pack, and when he saw that all the electrical appliances were Bang & Olufsen – the TV, the stereo, even the absurdly shaped telephone – he remembered what Holland had told him about Peter Allen’s flat, though he could not imagine that it was quite as tastefully done as this.

  He sat down in a chrome and leather armchair that had clearly been bought for looks rather than comfort and watched as Rahim lounged on the matching sofa. The boy was wearing the same clothes Thorne had seen earlier in the day, though he had since dispensed with socks and the trainers had been replaced with soft red moccasins.

  ‘You feeling better yet, Rahim?’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘I spoke to your tutor.’

  ‘Why did you do that?’

  ‘Well, for some reason you weren’t answering your mobile,’ Thorne said. ‘So I tried the university. She was very helpful, actually. Told me you’d been feeling unwell. That you’d gone home early.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘That must have come on suddenly.’ Thorne shifted his position to try and get comfortable, then gave up. ‘Not long after we spoke, wasn’t it?’

  ‘Some kind of virus,’ Rahim said.

  Thorne nodded then turned towards the stereo. ‘What was that you were listening to before?’ Rahim had turned the music off as soon as he’d shown Thorne in.

  ‘You wouldn’t know it.’

  ‘Probably not,’ Thorne said. ‘Didn’t sound like my kind of thing.’

  Rahim just looked at him. Thorne could see that he was nervous but nevertheless unwilling to make casual conversation. Bright enough to know that Thorne was not there for that.

  ‘You like music then? Go to a lot of clubs and stuff?’

  There was a moment’s hesitation. ‘Not really.’

  ‘Sure?’

  Rahim sat forward, said, ‘What’s this about?’ but it was clear from his expression that he already knew.

  ‘You were arrested as part of a raid on the Crystal Rose in Brewer Street five months ago,’ Thorne said. ‘Cautioned for possession of cocaine.’

  The boy was probably aiming for something like insouciance, but he could not control the nervous reflex. That soft red moccasin tapping fast against the floor. ‘So?’

  ‘So, were you there for the music?’

  ‘It’s a nice club,’ Rahim said. ‘I just went out with some friends.’

  Thorne leaned forward, happy to see that Rahim leaned that little bit further away as he did so. ‘I don’t give a toss about the drugs,’ he said. It was no longer a conversation, no longer casual. ‘What’s interesting is that it wasn’t even the drug squad that made the raid. It was actually part of a vice operation. They’d been tipped off that certain individuals were using the Crystal Rose as somewhere they could go to pick up underage boys.’ He waited, but Rahim just stared at the floor, both his feet now working together against the stripped and varnished boards. ‘I’m talking fourteen-or fifteen-year-olds here,’ Thorne said. ‘You understand? Nothing disgusting enough to get the “dirty paedo” brigade too hot under the collar, but, unfortunately for some of the customers, illegal enough to do time for, and these are the kind of men who really can’t risk a quiet stroll around the alleyways off Piccadilly Circus in the early hours. Professional types, you know what I’m saying, Rahim? Respectable. I mean, who in their right mind wants to risk getting ripped off, or having their head kicked in by some junkie, when all he wants is a quick hand-job from someone with nice smooth hands?

  ‘So, somewhere like that club you were in … well, it’s a godsend, don’t you reckon? The perfect place to find what they’re looking for without any hassles. A few drinks and a slow dance, and no need for money to change hands until they’re safely back in their nice comfy “bachelor” pads or hotel rooms. Then the really sad ones can kid themselves that whoever they’ve brought home with them actually wants to be there. They can do what the hell they like then and take their time about it. They can relax and take off their business suits … and fuck teenage boys like you to their hearts’ content.’

  Rahim eventually raised his eyes from the floor. Now, he looked as unwell as he had previously been pretending to be.

  ‘You remember what we talked about earlier,’ Thorne said. ‘So, bearing in mind that I’m pushed for time and that it’s Amin I’m really interested in … I was wondering what you might be able to tell me about that.’

  ‘Nothing,’ Rahim said.

  ‘Not good enough.’

  ‘I’m not underage.’

  ‘You were,’ Thorne said. ‘And so was Amin.’

  Rahim stood up. ‘I want you to go.’

  ‘Considering what you haven’t told your parents, I’m guessing that they don’t know about your arrest.’ Thorne stood up too, stepped towards Rah
im. ‘About the drugs.’

  ‘So tell them,’ Rahim said.

  ‘I will if I have to.’

  ‘I don’t care.’

  ‘Yes, you do.’ Thorne stared until the boy’s bravado began to fall away, until his head sank and it looked as though he might drop backwards on to the sofa. Thorne knew that he was being a bully. He had treated killers, rapists, better than this in the past, but then he had been granted the luxury of time, and a team behind him to gather evidence. He looked at the boy’s face and hated himself, but he could not afford to spare anyone’s feelings, and thinking about what Helen Weeks was going through, what Amin Akhtar had suffered, he fought the temptation to push Rahim against one of his tastefully decorated walls and press an arm across his throat until the boy told him what he knew.

  ‘We went to parties,’ Rahim said. ‘Me and Amin.’

  ‘What kind of parties?’

  ‘Parties with men, OK?’ He spat the words out. ‘Like the ones you were talking about. Respectable men.’

  ‘And these men paid you and Amin for sex?’

  Rahim nodded slowly. ‘Some boys did it because they needed drugs, but we just did it for the money. Our parents were not rich, do you understand? Most of the time the men were … clean, and we were looked after.’

  Most of the time.

  Thorne waited.

  ‘It was … exciting too,’ Rahim said. ‘We liked it, the fact that we were not like the other Asian kids, spending every minute swotting to be doctors and lawyers and all that. Living to keep their mothers and fathers happy. We were in control, you know?’

  ‘You really think so?’

  ‘It felt like that.’

  ‘Where did these parties take place?’ Thorne asked.

  Rahim hesitated. ‘Different places. The City. A penthouse on the river. Highgate sometimes.’

  ‘I need addresses.’

  ‘I can’t remember.’

  ‘Tell me about these men, Rahim.’

  ‘I’ve told you—’

  ‘You need to give me some names.’

  ‘No.’

  ‘For Christ’s sake,’ Thorne shouted, ‘one of these men might have killed Amin.’

  The boy shook his head and kept shaking it, and Thorne’s breathing grew more ragged with every refusal. He knew there was little point in dragging him down to an interview room, with no valid reason to hold him and even less chance of getting the answers he was looking for. Once again, he felt ready and willing to beat the information from him. The bruises would fade a damn sight quicker than grief, and Thorne would live with whatever consequences came his way. Then, as quickly as the urge for violence had come over him, it went again, as Thorne looked into Rahim Jaffer’s eyes and saw that he would be happy to take it.

  Would welcome it.

  Instead, Thorne lashed out at the brushed chrome shade of the lamp that hung low to the side of him. He sent it swinging and bouncing across the room on its spindly metal neck; the pool of light washing back and forth across the boy’s face as Thorne walked out of the door.

  THIRTY-SEVEN

  Peter Allen spent a lot more time in the pub these days. He had always liked a drink, but lately it had been less about enjoyment and more like a simple need to get wasted. To sink into the beer or the cider or whatever and lose himself. Ironic, he supposed, considering how he’d earned the money to pay for it.

  The Victoria on the Queensbridge Road wasn’t quite his local. That honour belonged to an old man’s boozer that stank of piss and brown ale, so he preferred to walk the extra ten minutes and drink with people who were a bit closer to his own age. Where there was a big TV if there was a match on and something to eat besides peanuts. This place wasn’t flashy like a Wetherspoons or what have you, and Allen guessed it had been there since before he was born, because there were frosted-glass windows and old-fashioned booths that made it feel like you were getting pissed up in a church or something. There were a few stroppy locals who tried to stare you out when you first walked in, but there was usually a decent game of pool to be had, as well as live music some Fridays and a wide selection of fruit machines to pour his shrapnel into.

  Best of all, it wasn’t one of those Paddy places with shamrocks and shit everywhere you looked.

  He’d started good and early, had a couple of cans at home before he’d gone out. But even after four pints of lager in the Vic, he was still sober enough come eight o’clock to be taking his third straight frame of pool off some shaven-headed squaddie type. The bloke had been winding him up since he walked through the door, looking and smiling and all that, and now Allen was enjoying making him look stupid.

  He’d actually lost the first frame when he’d knocked the black in accidentally and was forced to watch as Corporal Cock winked at his slag of a girlfriend in the corner and said, ‘Bad luck, mate.’ Then, it had been a toss-up between breaking his cue across the arsehole’s nose or sharpening his game up, and after thinking through his options Allen had decided to get his own back on the table. He reckoned it was probably the sensible thing to do, considering the terms of his licence. Besides, he knew he could always batter the bloke later on if he lost, or if winning didn’t prove satisfying enough.

  He sank the final black nice and slow, and was staring at the squaddie’s pig-ugly girlfriend before the ball even dropped. Giving her a nice, big smile. He winked and said, ‘Bad luck,’ and as he was walking back to the bar, it struck him that he could have been talking about the game, or just saying it was her bad luck to be shacked up with such a loser. A double-meaning kind of thing.

  He thought that was pretty clever.

  Despite waving a twenty at her for at least half a minute, the snotty cow behind the bar ignored him and carried on gassing with some twat in a suit, so he moved to the other end of the bar and squeezed into the first gap he could find. He started waving his money again, then turned at the sound of a payout on the fruit machine and saw a face he recognised.

  ‘Oi, knobhead!’

  The boy at the fruit machine turned, his eyes cold and dead, then grinned when he recognised Allen, who had raised his arm and was now making wanking gestures. He scooped out his winnings and sauntered across, then, ignoring the angry looks of those he jostled on the way, he pushed through the crowd at the bar to Allen’s side. He held out a fist. Said, ‘What you doing here?’

  Allen touched his fist to the boy’s. ‘Just getting hammered,’ he said.

  ‘Sweet … ’

  ‘What you drinking?’

  He hadn’t been particularly close to Johnno Bridges in Barndale. The kid was a Jock for a kick-off and Allen never really had much to do with the smackheads. On top of that, Bridges only ever hung out with the white kids, and while it wasn’t like Allen was any big fan of the blacks or the Pakis, he’d preferred to give the gangs a wide berth and keep himself to himself. Safer that way in the long run, he reckoned. All the same, Bridges had never seemed like too much of a prick whenever their paths had crossed. That was a pretty decent character reference considering some of the idiots they’d been banged up with and was certainly a good enough reason to buy him a drink.

  ‘How long you been out?’

  Bridges thought about it. ‘Not long after you. Couple of months, whatever.’ He reached into his pocket and produced a string of blue, plastic rosary beads. He dangled them in front of Allen and smiled, showing a row of crooked and missing teeth. ‘Secret signal,’ he said. ‘Come on then, let’s see ’em.’

  Allen nodded and produced his own beads from his jacket. All the boys at Barndale had been issued with them and it was accepted that, once released, they would always carry them. It was a way of acknowledging a shared history, establishing trust with one another on the outside.

  No different from those secret handshakes all the coppers and judges had, that’s what Allen reckoned.

  He slipped the rosary beads back into his pocket and watched Bridges sip his beer. He had very short, reddish hair and wore a dirty denim jacket
over jeans. His pupils were dilated and Allen could see that he had got himself high recently.

  ‘Still on the gear, then?’

  Bridges nodded slowly and raised his glass in a salute. ‘Nothing cut to shite with laxatives either.’

  ‘Where’s the money for that coming from?’

  Bridges nodded across towards the fruit machine. ‘Them.’

  ‘Piss off.’ It was the same kind of story Allen had tried on those two coppers earlier.

  ‘I swear,’ Bridges said. ‘I just drift around the pubs emptying those things once the punters have filled them up for me. I’ve got a mate works for the company, told me how to beat ’em.’

  ‘For real?’

  ‘Piece of piss, I’m telling you.’

  ‘Yeah, well tell me then.’

  Bridges put a finger to his lips and giggled.

  While Allen downed the rest of his drink, Bridges rummaged in his pockets then slammed a fistful of change down on the bar. Ignoring the coins that rolled on to the floor, he turned to Allen as though he’d just had a revolutionary idea. ‘Let’s make a night of it.’

  ‘What have you got in mind?’

  ‘Let’s get completely off our faces,’ Bridges said. ‘See if we can find a couple of birds who are up for it.’ He reached for his rosary beads again and waved them in front of Allen’s eyes like a hypnotist’s gold watch. ‘Come on … a great big “fuck you” to Barndale.’

  Allen stared at him. He was starting to feel the booze kick in himself, but Bridges looked well out of it, and bearing in mind the day Allen had had, the mood he was in after his visit from those two smartarse coppers, he certainly fancied getting into the same state himself.

  ‘Sounds good,’ he said.

  Pascoe and Donnelly sat drinking coffee in the small room behind the stage. There were no more than a couple of hours to go before the overnight team came back. One more phone call to Helen Weeks, a briefing for the new boys and girls and they would be away.