Guts for Garters

by Linda Regan

  ‘Any time you’re afraid,’ she told her, ‘just pick up the phone and ring me.’

  ‘You were going to tell us about the consignment of machetes that’s rumoured to be heading for this area?’ Alison said to Alysha.

  ‘Was I?’ Alysha answered.

  Georgia and Stephanie, in unison, threw Alison warning glances. Alison had specifically been instructed to keep it buttoned during this visit. It had taken them two years to win this girl’s trust. They had helped her out numerous times when she was in trouble, and kept her out of court when she’d been picked up soliciting or shoplifting. She had become their informant, and they had worked hard very hard to gain that trust. Nobody on this high rise gave the police the time of day; this girl was like gold dust. And here was the DCI’s mistress, on her first day back after months away, throwing her bloody weight about, and a possible spanner into a murder enquiry at the same time.

  Alysha turned to Georgia.

  ‘I need more than twenty,’ she said.

  Georgia opened her purse and gave her another clean, crisp twenty-pound note.

  Alysha looked at it, obviously weighing up the situation. After a few seconds she said, ‘I heard that Harisha Celik had fallen out with the murdered bloke. His name was Burak Kaya. He was one of the SLRs. They run the territory over near the Random, and are muscling around on this estate. Burak had upset Harisha. That’s what the word is round here.’ She flicked her eyes at Alison and then back to Georgia. ‘And them machetes are definitely down to Harisha Celik, that’s what I heard.’ She rubbed her fingers against her thumb again, as a sign she wanted more money.

  ‘Who’s running this patch, around the Aviary Estate? Georgia asked her, placing another twenty next to the kettle.

  Alysha picked it up and pushed it into her pocket immediately. ‘Ah, now that’s the problem,’ she said. ‘SLRs are moving on the patch, but another gang’s keeping them off. Could have been led by Burak Kaya, then,’ she suggested. ‘See, no one knows for sure. Couple of gangs from north the river are facing up with SLRs, maybe Burak was leading them. The EIBs, East Is Best, doing a lot of grass sales over here. They’re Chinese, they’re at war wiv the SLRs over the patch. So lots are trying to own it, but no one owns it, yet, far as I know. But I’ll keep my ear to the ground,’ she said.

  Stephanie’s phone broke into a rendition of ‘Stayin’ Alive’, at that very moment, and a second later ‘Onward, Christian Soldiers’ rang out from the top pocket of Georgia’s black leather jacket and a brass band boomed from Alison’s pocket. All three turned to each other. There was no doubt: three phones ringing in unison meant another body had been found.

  As soon as Alysha had closed the door behind the detectives, she pulled her pink and silver-covered iPhone from her pocket and furiously started texting. Have sent the feds after SLR n EIB. Seems theres another murder round ere. If u aint killed someone else find out what u can n get up ere asap. She then pressed Send to Panther, Tink, and Lox.

  Alysha put her phone back in her pocket, and her hand automatically went to her mouth. ‘Killed someone else’. Shit! Had she dropped her girls in it? They hadn’t meant him to die. Now if they got found out they would go down for years, and if that happened who would be there to keep the dealers away from the estate kids, and build the estate into a better place so those kids had chances? No one. The council didn’t understand or care. The feds said they cared, but they didn’t understand what surviving on a high-rise was like. The ACs had big plans, and they weren’t going to let a lowlife like Burak Kaya dying get in their way.

  Alysha sighed. She wondered what it was like to be famous, be someone like Rihanna, and have everything you wanted in life.

  Five

  It was a driver in a passing car who first noticed the smoke coming from the alleyway. She was a local and used to kids setting fire to bins around the estate, but the alleyway where the smoke was coming from was directly next to children’s play area; although the area was derelict, she decided to stop the car and check it out, just on the off-chance that there were young kids around.

  She wasn’t expecting to find what she did.

  Her name was Charlene Lewis. When Georgia, Stephanie and Alison arrived she was wrapped in an aluminium blanket, shivering with shock, sitting at the rear of the ambulance and needing help to hold the cup of sweet tea that a nearby resident had brought her. The Forensics team, kitted out in their usual bluebell attire, with their white masks covering their mouths were already busy.

  Georgia and Stephanie made their usual disappointed eye contact as they clocked Max Pettifer for the second time that day. He was squatting in the alleyway, studying the charred body, which wasn’t an easy sight.

  Stephanie jerked her head, very subtly, in Alison’s direction.

  Georgia took the hint and moved to beside Alison. Lowering her voice, she said, ‘No need for you to put yourself through this, it might not even be connected to our case. Why don’t I deal with it, and make some notes for you?’

  Alison stared at her.

  Georgia continued. ‘I really don’t recommend that you examine this body with us, not just newly back after what happened to your friend.’

  Stephanie, who was standing beside Georgia, quickly added, ‘Someone needs to talk to the witness and take her statement, why don’t you do that? You can phone it straight through to the DCI. We know he’s waiting to hear if there could be a connection with the boy this morning, as this is the edge of the SLR’s patch.’

  Alison turned to Stephanie. ‘Have you forgotten your rank? You address me as ma’am, and you don’t tell me how to run my investigation, Sergeant Green.’

  ‘She’s merely pointing out that a statement will have to be taken from the witness,’ Georgia said, jumping to Stephanie’s defence. ‘She’s also as concerned for your welfare as I am.’ She double-checked that no one was in hearing distance before adding sympathetically, ‘Don’t try and build Rome in a day, that’s all we’re saying. No one will judge you, certainly not me or Sergeant Green.’

  ‘Don’t patronise me,’ Alison said to her. ‘We are both senior investigating officers on this case, but having been a DI longer than you, that makes me the more senior. I also know myself a lot better than you do, so I will decide what’s best for me. She turned and started walking towards the corpse. ‘Shall we get on?’

  ‘Sorry I spoke,’ Georgia said catching Stephanie’s eye. ‘But, just to remind you,’ she raised her voice as Alison had walked off, ‘this body may be nothing to do with our case, so you’ll be putting yourself through all that for nothing.’ She paused, trying to choose her words carefully. It was like treading on bloody eggshells working with Alison, and every bit of shell she cracked would get reported straight back to Banham. How wrong had she been to think she would have an easier time with the DCI when Alison returned? Now there were two of them watching her every move.

  Alison turned and walked back to her.

  ‘I’m not patronising you either,’ Georgia said with a small smile. ‘Just keeping you up to date. Gang warfare around here has accelerated in the last few months. The force are fighting a losing battle, so the corpse may have nothing at all to do with our case. It may well be a completely different scenario, or another gang killing. So, we were thinking of you, we didn’t want you to put yourself through what might by a ghastly deja vu.’ She waited for Alison to answer. When she didn’t Georgia added, ‘But, of course, you make the decision.’

  ‘Thank you for your concern, but I am fine,’ Alison said curtly. She turned and walked towards the alley, but hovered at the wooden posts that marked its presence. She stood reading the sign that lay on the ground by the police cordons. It read, Trespassers enter at own risk.

  ‘She’s so fucking defensive,’ Georgia said, shaking her head to Stephanie.

  ‘Want some advice?’ Stephanie asked.

  ‘You’ll give it anyway?’ Georgia laughed.

  ‘Yes, I will,’ Stephanie grinned, nodded and then shoo
k her head. ‘Just let her muddle through, and if she can’t hack it, let the DCI be the one to tell her.’

  ‘Good morning, ladies. Not such a pleasant sight,’

  The sound of Max Pettifer’s voice, and the smile that extended far beyond his ill-fitting false teeth, was always enough to set Georgia’s head pounding. She pushed Alison to the back of her mind and focused on the job. Someone had just been burned to death and finding out why was what mattered now.

  ‘What have we got?’ she shouted as she climbed into a blue plastic forensic suit at the cordon.

  Max was poking a long instrument into the pink skin that looked like undercooked meat. Georgia could just see the woman’s head as she stared up the alleyway. It was mostly a pink, blistered mass, but she could still see the terrified eyes in the middle of the scorched and swollen face.

  ‘Can’t tell you anything at the moment,’ Max told her. ‘A lot to be done first.’ He slowly pushed himself up to standing. He was holding his mouth mask around his wrist. ‘So before you tire yourselves out questioning me, I can tell you nothing.’ He had that over-large smile across his face again. Georgia would have put money on the fact that his own teeth had been punched down his throat by someone he had upset. He definitely had the knack of rubbing everyone up the wrong way. Add the overgrown and pointed brows that framed his cold eyes, and it was easy to see why he had earned the nickname Max the Monster.

  ‘Now why did I know you’d say that,’ Georgia said, pulling on the plastic shoe covers that made her feel off-balance as she walked. She did up the zip on the overall, signed their names in the book that was handed to her by a member of the forensic team, and made her way over to the corpse, taking in large breaths of air as she moved. The body was still smoking and the air around smelt as if a summer barbecue had been in full swing. The cold and biting wind that blew sharply around them did little to clear the overbearing smell.

  She looked down at the nearly indistinguishable face; some of the cheekbones had come through the blistered skin. Georgia took a breath and blew it out. Stephanie had just arrived beside her and was looking somewhat queasy, which went to show just how bad this one was. Stephanie Green was the one officer in the whole team who could cope with any corpse, in any condition, and still manage lunch after. It wasn’t that she didn’t care; quite the opposite, she cared very much. She just never thought of herself, only what she could do to help, and those thoughts easily distanced her from what she faced on a regular basis. Today, for the first time, Georgia thought she was a little shaken.

  ‘OK?’ Georgia mouthed, quietly hoping that Alison would stay where she was, talking to a forensic officer at the end of the alleyway.

  Stephanie nodded, and then pointed to the handbag that lay about a foot away, and was being photographed by one of the forensic team. ‘Not a robbery then?’ she said to Georgia.

  They were both wearing the blue forensic gloves and both moved over to the exhibits officer.

  ‘When you’ve finished,’ Georgia said to him, studying the sticky mess of black plastic that was still warm and probably contained vital information to this girl’s life.

  The exhibits officer immediately handed the bag over. ‘I’ll need it back when you’re done,’ he told them.’

  Georgia carefully opened the bag and looked inside. She lifted out a condom.

  ‘Just one,’ Stephanie said, her notebook open and making notes. ‘She wasn’t a hooker then, or she would have had a supply of them.’ She smiled and looked up from her pad, ‘Unless business had been particularly good today.’

  ‘Then she would have had more money in her purse,’ Georgia said.

  ‘She could have had it about her person,’ Stephanie offered. ‘It could have been burned with her body.’

  ‘Possibility, but I doubt it.’

  ‘Me too.’

  Georgia picked up the half-melted phone and after testing it didn’t work, handed it to Stephanie. ‘Get that over to your ex-lover in TIU,’ she told her. ‘Ask for a list of everything they can get from it, and asap. Call history, texts, address book, all messages, everything that’s saveable.’

  ‘Will do,’ Stephanie nodded. As she pulled a see-through evidence bag from her pocket to wrap it in a loud thud drew their attention. They both turned around to see Alison Grainger lying face down on the ground by the cadaver.

  ‘Jesus, I expect she’ll find a way to blame us for this, too,’ Georgia muttered as Stephanie shook her head and threw her eyes northward.

  Georgia moved speedily to the end of the alleyway. ‘Paramedics over here,’ she shouted across to the ambulance attendants by the van. Joining Stephanie again she said quietly, ‘I’ll leave you to do the mothering and assure her she hasn’t shown herself up.’ They both fought back a small smirk. Then she noticed Max Pettifer had his phone in his hand and was about to film Alison, lying face down, with the paramedics who had just arrived at her side.

  ‘No way,’ she told him. ‘Just get on with your job, and let the paramedics do theirs. We need the result urgently.’

  ‘Just a bit of fun, for the office Christmas party,’ he said with a shake of his head and a chuckle.

  ‘Sick bastard,’ Georgia muttered as she made her way back down the alley and over to the witness.

  Charlene Lewis was mid-thirties, dyed black hair, pale white skin, and she wore thick glasses. She looked up as Georgia approached with her ID card in hand.

  Georgia perched on the end of the ambulance beside her after checking that she felt OK to talk.

  ‘In your own words, tell me what happened.’

  ‘I was going to pick up some shopping and then get my son. He’s been doing karate practice.’ The woman’s words were tumbling out. Georgia had seen and heard this high-pitched gabble many times with witnesses who had gone into shock.

  ‘I thought there was a bin on fire in the alleyway, so I stopped to check. I was in two minds whether to stop or not,’ She fiddled with the arm of her large glasses, lifting them back up her nose and then bringing them forward and repeating the same. ‘There wasn’t that much smoke, but I could see flames, further down the alley. It’s next to a kids’ play area,’ she said.

  ‘Take a deep breath and slow down,’ Georgia told her. ‘Did you see anybody running, or hurrying near the scene?’

  Charlene shook her head. ‘No, but I wasn’t really looking. I had been changing the music in the sound system when I spotted the fire. I literally caught the smoke at the side of my eyeline.’ She was still gabbling. ‘As I said, I wasn’t going to stop, but because there was a derelict play area next door, I thought I’d best make sure all was OK. God, did someone set someone on fire? They did, didn’t they?

  Tears tumbled from her eyes; the young female paramedic next to her moved in nearer with an outstretched hand bearing another hot cup of sweet tea. Charlene lifted a hand in refusal.

  ‘Tell me exactly what you saw when you got to the alley?’ Georgia pushed.

  She frowned fearfully, then spoke as if she had something stuck in her throat. ‘I saw a body on fire.’ Her eyes were like saucers through her large glasses as she looked at Georgia. ‘I started screaming for help.’ She was crying again, wiping away the tumbling tears with the back of her hand, but still talking in the gabbled tone. ‘I got my phone out and dialled 999. I was screaming, ‘Fire.’ She seemed to be gasping to get her breath now.

  ‘Take a deep breath,’ Georgia said, embarrassment creeping over her.

  ‘The girl was burning.’ Charlene sobbed. ‘I knew she was dead, but her body was still burning.’ She let out a heartfelt sob.

  The young female paramedic offered her the cup again. Charlene sipped from it, and then handed it back. ‘I didn’t know what to do. I phoned 999.’ She turned to Georgia. ‘Can I go now? I need to pick up my son.’

  ‘Very soon,’ Georgia said. ‘Thank you. You did really well. I’ll need you to give your details to my sergeant. And, I will need to speak to you again and take a statement.’

>   ‘But you need to call someone,’ the paramedic interrupted, looking at Georgia. ‘I’m afraid I can’t let you drive on your own, you’re in shock.’

  ‘And you are sure you don’t remember seeing anyone around?’ Georgia asked again.

  Charlene Lewis shook her head. ‘No.’

  By the time Georgia got back to the crime scene, Alison had been seated on another put-up chair.

  ‘Anything I can do to help?’ Georgia asked as sympathetically as she could muster.

  ‘You could stop sniggering,’ Alison said.

  ‘I hadn’t realised I was.’

  ‘DCI Banham’s on his way,’ Stephanie said to Georgia.

  ‘Jolly good,’ Georgia nodded. ‘Then let’s leave this to him. We’re on the border of the SLR turf and the Aviary Estate. We now know there is no ruling gang on the Aviary at the moment, but there are ongoing battles for it, and SLR are in that equation. We also know Burak Kaya was a lieutenant in the SLR, for what that is worth, but he could have been running with another gang. This death could be connected or not. We need to try and find out if this girl was involved in any way with any of the gangs around here. Do you agree?’ she asked Alison.

  ‘Yes,’ Alison nodded.

  ‘We have this girl’s bag, we have her phone; presuming we can trace her identity, we can proceed and talk to her family. Nothing we can do here until we know more?’ Georgia lifted her eyebrows questioningly at Alison.

  ‘No,’ Alison said.

  ‘How are you feeling?’ Georgia asked her.

  ‘I’ll be OK in a little while.’

  ‘Good,’ Georgia nodded. ‘Right, well, I’m going back to base. I’ll try and put some of this together before we present our findings to DCI Banham. Are you coming, or are staying to wait for the DCI?’