The Mourner

by Susan Wilkins

  His face had crumpled into a scowl. ‘Robert Hollister’s putting his career on the line here.’ He drummed his index finger on the smooth, oak-veneered table to emphasize the point. ‘Given the circumstances, why the hell would he lie? He didn’t have to speak out.’

  She pursed her lips. ‘A private word with you is hardly speaking out.’

  ‘Fiona, the stupid woman killed herself. Tragic, but there it is. All the evidence points to it.’

  The Commissioner returned to his chair and settled back into it, resting his palms on the soft leather arms. Fixing his officers with a pensive smile, he prepared to wrap the discussion up. ‘These are difficult times. The spectre of privatization is not going to go away. It’s corroding the organization inside and out. You know this better than anyone, Fiona.’

  ‘Yes, sir, I do.’ Her mind skittered back to Alan Turnbull and his blatant attempt to set her up for a charge of misconduct in a public office – an attempt which had damn near succeeded.

  ‘We need our allies,’ intoned the Commissioner. ‘And Robert Hollister’s commitment to the public service ethic is solid. We get a change of government, he’ll become Home Secretary – that could help us a lot. A hell of a lot. So I’m asking myself the question: how is justice best served here?’

  Calder already knew his answer – protecting Hollister was about to become the Met’s priority. A thorough and proper investigation of Helen Warner’s death might put him in jeopardy, so that must be blocked.

  She glanced across at Slattery, saw the relief on his face. Did his ‘confidential conversation’ with Hollister really only take place yesterday? Or had he been in cahoots with the politician all along? She strongly suspected the latter. What was clear to her was that she’d reached an impasse. But the Commissioner wasn’t the only one weighing the interests of justice in his mind. Fiona Calder had asked herself the same question. And come up with a radically different answer.

  56

  Starting the day with paracetamol, a cigarette and strong coffee was becoming an unfortunate habit of Nicci’s. She’d tried to call Rory but he wasn’t picking up. It was hardly likely that he’d tell anyone what had happened, but she wanted to make sure they had their stories straight in case the police traced her 999 call. And then of course there was the victim herself, Yasmin. What would she say? Nicci had rung the hospital and left a message asking the charge nurse to remind the police that Yasmin would need protection. More than that she’d resolved to keep a low profile. It wasn’t her mess; she wasn’t carrying the can.

  On her way into the office she’d received a text from Delgado asking her to call him. Presumably he’d been following up her lead on Ethel’s murder. Or maybe not. Tottenham was close enough to his patch. Could he have heard anything? She knew she was being paranoid. Why would he? And why would he connect it with her? She reined in her unruly thoughts. It was just another day and she was going to work.

  As she stepped out of the lifts into SBA’s reception area the first person she saw was Alan Turnbull. He was chatting to Alicia, the receptionist, who was laughing and obviously enjoying his attentions. Nicci was hoping to slip by without being noticed, but Alicia put paid to that.

  ‘Morning, Nicci.’

  Nicci gave a nod and carried on walking, but Turnbull had already swivelled round and was beaming at her.

  He fell into step beside her. ‘I’m glad you’re bright and early. I was hoping for a private word.’

  Nicci’s mind was already whirling forward to the complications that could ensue if Kaz Phelps did indeed turn up at ten, as arranged, and bumped into Turnbull. Any inclination she might have to help Nicci would disappear like a fart in the wind.

  She glanced at him. ‘Haven’t got a lot of time right now. I’m late for an appointment.’

  He stopped in his tracks. ‘Listen, Nicci . . .’ His tone was friendly but emphatic enough to force her to stop too. ‘I think we need to lay a few ghosts to rest.’

  The smug bastard was just standing there, expecting her to listen to his bullshit. It was too much, her fragile temper snapped. ‘Ghosts? Mal Bradley you mean? His ghost should certainly haunt you.’

  ‘I was speaking figuratively, Nicci.’ He seemed impervious to her obvious disgust. He shook his head sadly. ‘No one regrets DC Bradley’s death more than me. It’s on my conscience, if that’s what you want to hear. I made an error of judgement. A serious error. But believe me, I’ve paid the price. All I’m asking for now is for us to put the past behind us. You were one of the best officers in my team.’

  Nicci looked him up and down. He hadn’t changed a bit. Expensive tailored suit, silk tie, diamond-studded tiepin. Turnbull had a rich man’s tastes; perhaps that had always been his problem – it’s not easy to dress like that, to live the life he led, on a police officer’s salary. And he still thought he was a charmer. Was that his strategy now? To bewitch the SBA staff one by one, starting on the front desk with Alicia?

  She fixed him with an unremitting stare. ‘You hypocritical scumbag. You set us up. You set us all up. And you got Bradley killed.’ She took a step closer. ‘Put the past behind us? I’m fucked if I will.’

  As she strode off his voice floated after her: ‘Don’t make an enemy of me, Nicci. That would be foolish.’

  She spun round and gave him her middle finger.

  57

  Eddie Lunt had had a few memorable nights out in Glasgow over the years but he wasn’t really a drinking man. He enjoyed the odd jar. What interested him was food – haute cuisine or a burger, he wasn’t fussy. Didn’t matter what crap life threw at you, sitting down to a hearty feast always made you feel better. And breakfast was his favourite meal of the day.

  He’d found a place on Albion Street and had ordered the full Scottish – Stornoway black pudding, bacon, beef sausages, potato scone, mushrooms and two fried eggs. Plus toast and a large cappuccino.

  Since he’d arrived in Glasgow the previous evening he’d been busy. A meet-up with Alistair, his contact on the Herald, had put the wheels in motion. Back in his phone-hacking days he and Alistair had had an informal arrangement. But when the shit hit the fan and the police came knocking, he’d omitted to mention it. So Alistair owed him – big time.

  On the way up on the train he’d made a few calls. He’d con-firmed that Helen Warner did spend the night at Malmaison. He’d got a copy of her mobile phone records for the period of her visit, and her credit-card receipts. Checking the receipts against the hotel’s website and room tariffs he’d come to the conclusion that she must’ve eaten there too. The hotel boasted a cosy-looking brasserie. A good place for an intimate dinner? If he could get a breakdown of the hotel bill, that would tell him whether she’d dined alone.

  He’d decided to leave it to Alistair to dig up a copy. Asking one of his tame hackers to trawl for it might’ve been quicker, but Nicci’s instructions had been to keep a handle on expenses and the extra cost wasn’t really justified. He usually billed such items under miscellaneous. The accounts manager never questioned them and Simon Blake always signed them off. However, given Nicci’s hostility towards him, he had a point to prove – he wanted to show her he could get results, quickly and on a budget.

  Proving himself to Nicci wasn’t the only thing that had him galvanized. The apparent suicide of old Ray, his mate at the Labour Party, had made this whole thing personal. Eddie had worked in the underbelly of Fleet Street and Wapping for enough years to identify the whiff of skulduggery. And the Warner case stank of it.

  He’d spent some time trying to work out what information Ray could’ve had in his possession, more than common gossip, that might’ve got him killed. But Ray was a backroom boy. Eddie could find no specific link between him and Helen Warner.

  He was already tucking into his breakfast when Alistair arrived. The Scot shook his hand and sat down opposite.

  ‘What’ll it be, mate?’ Eddie beamed at him. ‘The full monty?’

  Alistair shook his head. ‘Just a coffee, thanks
.’ He was straight down to business, lifting a laptop out of his bag and clearing a space for it on the table.

  ‘You sure? This is ace.’

  The reporter’s resigned look turned to one of abject misery. ‘The wife’s got me on muesli and fruit. She says she doesn’t want me keeling over at fifty with a heart attack.’

  Eddie shrugged. They were both in their middle forties but he had to admit that, apart from his shaved, balding pate, Alistair was a lot fitter and slimmer than when they’d last met.

  He puffed out his cheeks, took a slurp of coffee. ‘I figure when your number’s up, your number’s up. Anyway, what you got for me?’

  Alistair was booting up his computer. ‘This girl that you think she met – middle twenties?’

  Mouth full of egg and toast, Eddie gave him a nod.

  ‘Well, I got CCTV from the hotel that shows Warner and another woman having a meal. But you take a look yourself, this woman’s older. Older than Warner, I’d say.’

  Loading QuickTime Player, Alistair found his first video clip and pressed play. ‘I’ve edited it down to the relevant bits.’

  Both men peered at the screen. The brasserie wasn’t particularly full. A waiter appeared, escorting Helen Warner and her companion to a corner table. They settled in their seats and were handed menus.

  Alistair pointed at the screen. ‘Now it’s coming up. You get a good view of the other one’s face. I don’t think it can be your girl.’

  Eddie leant forward, a forkful of sausage frozen mid-way between plate and open mouth. It took him a moment to recover enough to respond. ‘No, you’re right – it isn’t.’

  ‘Any idea who she is?’

  Eddie put his loaded fork down. ‘Yeah. Her name’s Paige Hollister.’

  58

  Kaz Phelps had never felt comfortable with dogs. The guard dogs her father had kept during her childhood had been brutal beasts. She and Joey had gone in fear of them and her little sister Natalie had been bitten when she was only a toddler.

  However, Buster was an amiable creature. He ambled around the enclosed garden in the middle of the square, took a dump, scratched up a patch of turf and did a circuit of the bushes, nose down, tail wagging.

  Julia had driven Kaz and the dog back to Onslow Square from the hospital in the early hours. Mike had opened the door to them with visible relief.

  Kaz had apologized although she didn’t explain. His face was more ashen than usual. She’d felt a pang of guilt for causing him worry.

  But he’d simply smiled and rubbed his stubbled chin. ‘Thought you’d done a bunk.’

  He had made her beans on toast and opened a can of cat food for Buster. They’d both crashed out on the sofa.

  With the warm body of the animal nestled beside her, Kaz had sunk into a heavy, dreamless sleep.

  The morning sun had long been seeping through the curtains when she was woken by the phone vibrating in her pocket with an incoming text from Nicci. The message was brief – their meeting was rearranged for noon at Julia’s house. There was no explanation, just an injunction to be there.

  Taking her phone out into the garden, Kaz had sat in the small arbour at the end and called the hospital. She was passed from pillar to post until she’d finally located the ward Yasmin was in.

  The voice that had come on the line was barely a whisper. ‘Yeah?’

  ‘Yasmin, it’s Kaz. You okay?’

  ‘As if you give a fuck.’ The tone was sour. Kaz put it down to shock and pain.

  ‘I’ll come and see you later. We can talk.’

  ‘Nah, stay away. I got cops crawling all over, asking fucking questions. And if Mr Kemal gets wind, I’m dead meat.’

  Kaz sighed, she felt more than responsible. ‘We’ll think of something, just—’

  ‘Nah, soon as I can, I’m outta here. Got a mate in Manchester.’

  ‘Will you be safe there?’

  Yasmin coughed, a dry painful rasp. ‘Whadda you care? Such a sweet deal I had ’til you come along. Try to do a mate a favour and this is how it ends up.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Yas.’

  ‘Not as fuckin’ sorry as me.’

  The phone went dead. Yasmin had hung up. Kaz had sat for a while trying to process her friend’s anger and self-pity. It was understandable, the product of fear. Still she felt indignant. The real source of Yasmin’s problems was her connection to the Kemals, but maybe it was naive to think she’d ever acknowledge that.

  It wasn’t until Mike had come out and suggested that Buster might be in need of an airing in the square that she’d managed to corral the conflicting feelings of guilt and grievance spinning round in her head. He’d handed her the pass key and a plastic bag. While she was gone he was going to prepare them a slap-up breakfast.

  It was a perfect summer morning – the day was set to be a scorcher – heat was already rising off the flagstone pavements. But the high leafy canopy of plane trees transformed the gardens into a cool oasis. Kaz wandered, clad only in T-shirt and jeans. She’d dutifully scooped up Buster’s poop with the plastic bag and deposited it in the designated bin. Then she slipped off her trainers and walked barefoot across the soft springy turf.

  A fellow dog-walker gave her a friendly nod. The simple acceptance of her right to be there, in this enclave of the rich, struck Kaz as faintly ironical. They were of a similar age. The young woman wore shorts with high-heeled sandals and was towing a small Tibetan Spaniel.

  Whilst the two dogs sniffed and pirouetted round each other, the woman smiled. ‘Good idea. So hot for shoe.’ Leaning her hand on the mottled bark of one of the great trees she pulled off her sandals and wiggled her toes in the grass. Her accent was definitely foreign, Middle Eastern maybe. Kaz couldn’t be sure.

  ‘Yeah,’ she agreed. ‘It’s gonna be a lovely day.’

  ‘You live here?’ The enquiry seemed casual enough. The woman flicked back her silky chestnut mane. She was sizing Kaz up, a definite flirtatiousness in her eye.

  ‘Staying with a friend.’

  The woman exhaled with pleasure, running her tongue over her lip. ‘Such a good place London. I like so much. So elegant.’

  Kaz gave her a rueful smile. It was certainly true of this part of London. The graceful Victorian terraces exuded style and wealth. Kaz wondered if she’d ever ventured further afield, beyond the designer shops and posh restaurants. It was doubtful. She looked the girl up and down – pretty enough in a pert, pop-princess way. But did she want to play games with some bored bi-curious rich kid? Not really. She had neither the time nor inclination.

  ‘See you around.’ Tilting an amused look in the girl’s direction, she strolled off after Buster.

  The dog was having a fine time darting in and out of the shrubbery. The notion that he could’ve been used to scare the Kemals seemed faintly absurd now. In retrospect, here in the quiet dappled shade of the gardens, the whole escapade felt vaguely unreal.

  Yasmin might be wishing that Kaz had never come knocking at her door, but the feeling was mutual. She just wanted to escape, return to her secure and ordinary art student life and become Clare O’Keeffe again. Her excursion back into the old world had scared her. The rage that had driven it had been so consuming. She’d been out of it, completely reckless and mental, like the old Kaz. Now that it had subsided, she felt exposed and jittery. And without the prop of booze or drugs she didn’t know how to come down. She took a deep breath and focused on the greenery. She needed to relax and let it all go.

  For the time being the Kemals would have enough on their plate dealing with the Old Bill. Would Yasmin tell the cops what they’d done to her? Pretty unlikely. They were serious organized criminals with a wide reach and a long memory. And sooner or later they’d be looking for Kaz.

  The decision to come to London had been rash and impulsive, born of shock and grief. If anyone could solve the conundrum of Helen’s death Nicci Armstrong might. So maybe she should just return the dog to Glynis then head back to her anonymous life north of the bord
er? That would be the sensible course.

  But then her restless thoughts homed in on Tevfik Kemal. She couldn’t help it. The arrogant scrote reckoned he could hurt Yasmin, or any woman for that matter, as if it were his God-given right. Not in Kaz’s book. No way. As her indignation rose again she began to feel pleased about what she’d done. Okay, she’d stuck her neck out, maybe a bit too far, but she’d taught that piece of shit a lesson he wouldn’t forget in a hurry. Him and his slimy father.

  The discordant emotions swirled in her brain and she couldn’t seem to make them stop. Deciding what to do next felt impossible. She had to force herself to calm down. Resolving to take one step at a time, she clipped the leash back on to Buster’s collar. The next step was breakfast.

  She stroked the dog’s head; the creature gazed up at her with its big sappy eyes. She could see why Glynis liked it; why, after all the mean and useless blokes she’d encountered in her life, she’d settled for Buster.

  Kaz was amusing herself with this thought as she opened the gate to leave the gardens. She didn’t immediately notice the man standing just outside the railings. He had a beard, wore a baseball cap over straggly hair and aviator shades.

  As the voice drifted in her direction the blood froze in Kaz’s veins.

  ‘Fuck me! I never thought I’d see you with a dog. You was always shit-scared of ’em.’

  Her eyes few up to his face. He took off the glasses, though there was no need. Smiling at her nonchalantly from under the brim of his cap was her brother Joey.

  59

  Nicci Armstrong sat at her desk, jittery from too much caffeine, staring at her laptop screen. She was on a Skype call with Eddie Lunt in Glasgow. His sweaty face was slightly pixelated, the connection wasn’t that good.

  He took a slurp of coffee and his staccato voice came through the speaker out of synch with his lips. ‘I got a series of edited clips.’

  ‘From the hotel CCTV?’

  There was a couple of seconds delay. ‘Yeah.’