Zoe Sharp - [Charlie Fox]

by Absence of Light (epub)

  “It’s a good system,” I agreed. The former Marine, it seemed, had a practical mind-set when it came to dealing with death.

  But then, I’d already worked that one out.

  “He’s the best at what he does,” Hope said as if reading my thoughts. Her face turned a little wistful. “That’s why I wanted to work with him.”

  “How long have you been doing this kind of stuff?”

  “Long enough.” It had been a casual question but she stiffened as if I’d implied she had no experience on which to base her claim.

  “I wasn’t casting aspersions,” I said mildly. “You have to admit, though, you don’t look old enough to drive.”

  “I’m twenty,” she said quickly. “That’s old enough, isn’t it?” She busied herself with packing away the dog’s water bowl and clipping the chew toy back onto her belt. Lemon watched her with that slightly anxious expression back on her face.

  Me and my mouth.

  “Look, I’m sorry - ” I began.

  “‘S OK. I ‘spose I just get that a lot,” she mumbled. “Hey, we really need to get back to work. Come on, Lem, you ready? Seek on then, girl. Seek on!”

  Lemon bounced away again, sniffed a circle in front of the next storefront and limbo’d through another impossible gap.

  As we moved off I glanced down but Hope was tidy and methodical. There was nothing left behind except the glittering shards of broken glass with the brighter sparks of diamonds among them.

  But maybe - just maybe - I couldn’t see quite as many as there were before. I would have asked her about that, but with perfect timing, Lemon chose that moment to reappear.

  She shoved her head through and then wriggled her tight-packed body out of the narrow gap. She stood alert and quivering, her gaze totally focused on Hope, and let out half a dozen rapid barks.

  Hope went rigid. Despite the heat of the day, all the hairs came up along my forearms.

  “A live find,” she mumbled for my benefit, although I hardly needed to be told. “Means she’s made a live find.”

  I glanced over, saw the pallor of her thin features, the tension in her body.

  “What colour do we spray for that?” I asked but she shook her head.

  “We don’t,” she said, reaching for her radio. “We wait.”

  Twelve

  The dig team turned up half an hour later, by which time we’d already checked the remaining stores on that side of the street.

  Lemon had shown little interest until she stopped abruptly and sat down again when she neared the end of the row. I was the one who ventured close enough to discover a family of three dead inside their flattened car. The child in the back was still strapped into his booster seat.

  Hope made sure she threw Lemon’s chew toy in the opposite direction as if she didn’t want the dog to see what it was she’d found. Maybe that was simply my take on things and it was Hope herself who didn’t want to see.

  All in all, it did not feel like a good time to ask about the gems lying in the street.

  The dig team was a mix of nationalities led by a redheaded figure I instantly recognised, despite his borrowed local police coveralls.

  “Well, well, Charlie,” Wilson said. “We meet again.”

  I shook the Glaswegian copper’s hand. “Couldn’t stay away, huh?”

  He grinned at me, but when his eyes shifted across to Hope I saw his eyebrows lift a notch.

  It was hard not to see what he saw - an impossibly young-looking girl and a Labrador who wasn’t helping matters by acting like a brainless family pet on a run in the park.

  “How are you liking the work with R&R then?” he asked.

  “Early days yet.”

  “Well, let me know if you get fed up, eh?”

  “Hang on. I thought you were after a job with Parker?”

  He grinned. “Just keeping my options open. I hear it’s quite a cushy number.”

  I thought of the near miss jumping for the Bell and gave him a wry smile. “It has its moments.”

  “Right then, we better get started,” he said. “Want to show us the spot?”

  Hope led him there with Lemon ambling beside her, the chew toy still clutched in her mouth and those remarkable green eyes unblinking. By the time they reached the place where Lemon had indicated, he was frowning.

  “You’re quite sure, eh?”

  Hope flushed and put a defensive hand on the dog’s head. “‘Course,” she said.

  He glanced at me as if hoping to glean some information about how seriously to take this. “Joe Marcus tells me she’s the best he’s seen in a long time,” I said without inflection.

  Wilson considered this and then nodded. “Good enough.”

  “Isn’t he coming - Joe, I mean?” Hope demanded.

  “Not for this one,” Wilson said. “Don’t worry yourself though. I like my own skin too much to risk losing it needlessly. I’ve had a bit of experience myself, so we’ll be careful, eh?”

  Once the dig team got started it seemed clear to me that they knew what they were doing. They scanned with a portable gas leak detector before the two-stroke masonry saw came out. The fourteen-inch circular blade soon created a gap large enough for a man to crawl through.

  The smallest of the diggers - a Japanese guy - was selected to go in. He wore a miner’s hard hat with an LED lamp, as well as a safety harness with rope attached. They paid out the rope as he ventured further inside just as if he’d been caving. In a way I suppose he was.

  Hope waited off to one side with Lemon. The girl’s tension had communicated itself to the dog and the chew toy was failing to distract either of them. Lemon was snuffling around in the dirt and picking up small pebbles in her soft mouth which she solemnly offered to Hope. Hope took each one, ignoring the coating of slobber and put it absently into her pocket as if she didn’t want to offend the dog by throwing away the gift. Her eyes were glued to the dig team as she wiped her hand down the side of her trousers.

  Eventually the rope went slack and they began slowly to reel it in. The Japanese guy emerged with a mixture of concrete and brick dust smeared into the sweat on his face.

  “I found a couple near the front wall of the main structure about ten yards back thataway. Man and a woman,” he called across in a strong California accent. He looked at Hope. “I’d guess they’ve been dead a while. I’m sorry.”

  Wilson’s gaze passed over me with a faint trace of scepticism before it landed on Hope. “Sorry, pal,” he said. “Luck of the game, I guess.”

  “But … that can’t be right.” She stumbled over the words. “Lem told me … there’s no way she’s wrong …”

  Wilson shrugged. “Well, we tried, eh?”

  Hope’s colour rose and fell fast as a traffic light. She moved nearer, put out a staying hand to the Japanese guy who’d just crawled from under the rubble. “You have to go again,” she pleaded. “Lemon don’t get it wrong. Once she’s had a sniff of something she can follow it anywhere. You have to … please.”

  The Japanese guy hesitated and looked to his team leader, alarmed not so much by her vehemence as the possibility she was about to burst into tears.

  “Hey, now,” Wilson said. He went to put a placatory hand on Hope’s arm but she jerked away from him. The habitual goofy smile on Lemon’s face disintegrated into a snarling growl as she jumped stiff-legged between them.

  Before I could intervene, Wilson jerked back instantly. He’d clearly encountered enough guard dogs in his time, both police and military, to be leery of them. Hope spun away with a wordless click of her fingers. Lemon followed as if attached to her leg by a very short chain, staring up at her handler and letting out a series of small high-pitched squeaks.

  I came up alongside Wilson and watched her rigid stance with concern.

  “Now what the feck was that all about, eh?” he asked softly.

  I had my suspicions but I wasn’t going to voice them. That would have raised too many questions, least of all about how I’d come
by my knowledge. I shook my head.

  “Supposing she is right? Do you want that on your conscience?” I waited a beat. “Do me a favour will you? You’re here now. Just get your guy to take one more look.”

  The Japanese guy who’d discovered the woman’s body was hovering, helmet in hand and the straps loosened on his harness. His eyes flicked between us, wary of the atmosphere. “I don’t mind going again, dude. Better to be sure, huh?”

  Wilson looked from one of us to the other and sighed. “How tight is it for space in there?”

  The Japanese guy shrugged. “Once you get past the cars it opens out a little onto what used to be the sidewalk,” he said. “We might need some help finding a way into the store itself, if we need to go that far.”

  Wilson nodded. “I better come with you then, pal,” he said. “Give you a hand.”

  The Japanese guy pulled his harness tight again quickly, as if worried either of them might change his mind.

  We watched in silence as the two men adjusted their hard hats and knee pads. Wilson folded several body bags into his coveralls, knowing he’d need a couple and, I supposed, hoping he wouldn’t need more.

  Then they crawled carefully back through the gap they’d created. Even Hope edged closer again while Lemon plonked herself down in the dust and twisted round to nip at an itch on her back. Flies buzzed around our heads, their drone mixing with the distant chop of rescue, police and military helicopters.

  Two of the dig team held the men’s safety lines, letting them out steadily through their gloved fingers as the pair worked their way deeper inside. It struck me then that they weren’t actually safety lines at all - they were recovery lines, should the worst happen.

  And just as that cheery thought formed in my head, the ground began to tremble under our feet.

  Thirteen

  Somebody shouted, “Aftershock!” and there was a concerted rush away from what was left of the nearest buildings while we could still stand.

  The tremble became a shudder that grew in violence until it was like being back in the Hercules dropping through holes in the sky. I’d never experienced the feel of severe turbulence while still at ground level before. I half dropped to my knees before I was thrown the rest of the way. Around me the others flattened themselves too, an instinctive reaction.

  I lifted my head briefly to check on Hope’s position. She was well out in the open, crouched on knees and elbows as the training dictated. She had one hand wrapped round the back of her neck and the other latched through the dog’s collar. Lemon lay on her belly alongside, crowding in with her ears flat, trying to lick Hope’s face. I wasn’t sure if she was offering comfort by doing this, or taking it.

  The rumbling through the ground was like the biggest heaviest subway train passing directly beneath us. It must have had a load of carriages, too, because it went on and on for more than twenty seconds before it finally began to die away.

  I had to remind myself there was no subway and no train.

  Staggering to my feet, I struggled to get my balance now the earth was still.

  “Everybody OK?” I called. I got a series of cautious nods and waves by way of reply. I moved quickly over to where the safety lines snaked out from between the cars. To do so I had to hop across a crack in the road that I was damn sure hadn’t been there a few minutes previously. Wisps of dust or steam rose gently from it like an outward breath.

  “Wilson!” I shouted, ashamed that I didn’t know the other guy’s name. I listened a moment. Nothing. I turned to nearest member of the dig team. “Let’s get them out of there. Do they have their radios?”

  A handset was shoved at me. It was the same as mine, just tuned to a different frequency. I pressed the transmit button.

  “Wilson, this is Fox. You guys OK in there?”

  I half-expected an eerie silence but instead the Scot’s laconic tones came back to me right away.

  “Aye, but I’d appreciate you not stamping around out there in the big boots, pal,” he said, coughing. “That last one brought down a mite of debris, but we’re clear and Ken thinks we may have a way through, so looks like it’s done us a favour, eh? We’ll bag up the two dead and hook up our lines so you can pull them out - give us more room to work with. Three birds, one stone, eh?” He began coughing again.

  “Have that,” I said. “Standing by.”

  We waited until there was a jerk on his recovery line and then dig team began the slow and solemn process of hauling the first corpse out of the rubble.

  Wilson and the Japanese guy, Ken, appeared briefly at gap between the cars to help push the body bag the last few feet. Their clothing and faces were caked in dust. I unclipped Wilson’s line and passed it back to him.

  They repeated the process with the second body, which was larger and took more effort. We were all sweating in the heat by the time we were done. Wilson took off his helmet briefly to wipe his face.

  “All right, we’ll go take another look for this live one. Standard radio checks every five minutes,” he said to one of his team. He put a hand on the body bag we’d just pulled clear. “Let’s hope we don’t need another of these, eh?” And with that he disappeared back into the void.

  Between us we carried the bodies of the dead couple clear and laid them down gently. Two labels were written in clear characters, assigning each of them a Unique Reference Number that would stay with them until they were finally identified and reconciled.

  The rest of the dig team had been working to retrieve the family in the crushed car. There were already another couple of body bags laid out on the open ground and we put our burden alongside it, also with URN labels attached.

  From the size of one of the bags, I judged that was the child from the back seat. A member of the dig team crossed himself, lips moving in some silent prayer.

  I turned away, just in time to see a new group approaching, picking their way along the half-blocked road. Something about the way they moved had me reaching a hand for the SIG at my back, but then I stilled. The coveralls they wore were the same as the police officers I’d seen waiting to pick up Wilson at the airport. Even the moustaches and the aviator sunglasses looked the same, too. They were all armed. Old-fashioned leather holsters with a press-stud flap, making it impossible to gauge what lay inside.

  Again I checked on Hope’s location, made sure she was well back, and then waited for them to reach us, calling a casual hello before they got too close.

  They stopped, as I’d hoped they would, before they were among us. One man pushed forward, giving a desultory wave.

  “The aftershock came just after we landed,” he said, indicating some unseen helo off behind his group, hidden by the tumbled buildings. “We’re just checking everyone here is OK, yes?”

  He was middle-aged and slim apart from a protruding belly, but he was coping well with the heat and didn’t look out of breath having to pick his way over rough terrain.

  “We’re fine,” I said, noting the way his eyes slid to the body bags and the team members crouched by the gap between the cars with the two recovery lines stretching inside. “I didn’t know anyone else was working this sector.”

  He regarded me for a moment, his eyes impossible to read behind the aviators. “I’m Peck,” he said at last, motioning to the police insignia on the breast pocket of his coveralls. “Divisional commander.”

  His official ID was on a lanyard around his neck, with the plastic badge tucked out of the way into the pocket. I wore my own the same way and now I lifted it clear between two fingers.

  “Charlie Fox, R&R,” I said, adding pleasantly, holding it level for him to read. “And now you’ve seen mine I’m sure you won’t object to showing me yours?”

  Clearly he did object but there wasn’t much he could do to refuse. He freed his ID and would have flashed it briefly but I managed to snag it for a closer look. I matched the picture to the man in front of me and surreptitiously checked the laminated edges for tampering.

  “Thanks.
Sorry about that,” I said with a shrug as I handed it back. Only following orders, guv. “But I’m under strict instructions from Joe Marcus to verify everyone.”

  Marcus hadn’t mentioned anything of the sort, but the name had resonance for Peck, I could tell, even though he tried to hide his reaction behind a noncommittal grunt.

  “Of course,” he added quickly. “It would be my advice to you also.” He stepped around me and headed for the body bags. Now I’d confirmed he was there in an official capacity I didn’t see how I could reasonably object. I settled for being annoying rather than outright obstructive and ambled alongside him instead. That seemed to work.

  “Where did you find these people?” he asked.

  I let one of Wilson’s team fill him in as the final body from the car was laid with the others.

  When Peck spoke again his words might have been casual but his tone allowed little room for discussion. He pointed to the line of zipped bags and said, “I’d like to take a look.”

  Fourteen

  Commander Peck pulled down the zip on the first bag, revealing the woman from the car. She’d been in the passenger seat and closest to the falling masonry. Peck zipped the bag up again quickly and moved to the next. I glanced at the faces of Wilson’s people and saw from their horrified reactions that this was a long way from normal procedure.

  To everyone’s relief, I think, Peck passed over the child’s figure and unzipped the second bag. The man who’d been driving had survived a little longer and at least had a face Peck could frown over.

  I heard movement behind me. Hope was scrambling towards us.

  “Hey, what’s he doing?” she demanded. “Leave them alone.”

  Peck barely glanced at her. “It is my duty to make immediate identifications if that is possible,” he said. “This is my area and I have received many missing persons’ reports. Some of these persons may well be known to me.”