Witness

by Mandasue Heller

  ‘Don’t be thinking you’re going straight to sleep.’ Suzie gave him a meaningful smile. ‘We’ve got a lot of catching up to do.’

  ‘If I have to,’ Rob sighed.

  Laughing, Suzie flicked soap suds at him and then quickly dried her hands before sitting on his lap and wrapping her arms around his neck.

  ‘Thanks for letting Holly stay,’ she said, as if she’d given him a choice in the matter. ‘I know it’s cramping your style having her here, but—’

  ‘Sshhh . . .’ Rob placed a finger over her lips. ‘I don’t want to talk about her any more tonight.’

  ‘OK,’ Suzie agreed. ‘Let’s talk about the agency instead. I’ve been thinking about what you said earlier, and I’m not sure I like the idea of letting you work while I sit at home doing nothing. I’ve put a lot of thought into this, and I really think I can make a success of it. But I don’t want it coming between us, so I was thinking . . . how about you come in on it with me?’

  Rob made a face as if that was an interesting prospect. But he had other things on his mind, so he said, ‘I’d rather talk about . . .’ He pulled her head down and whispered the rest, and Suzie leapt up and reached for his hand.

  ‘Come on, then, lover boy . . . what you waiting for?’

  Two long but very pleasurable hours later, when Suzie had, at last, fallen asleep, Rob slid his arm out from under her and, easing himself out of bed, pulled on her dressing gown before creeping downstairs.

  After quietly closing the kitchen door, he sat at the table and booted up Suzie’s laptop. When Harry had shut him down at the pub, refusing to give him the name he’d wanted, he had realized that his original plan might not have been such a good idea, after all. He’d greedily thought the killer would be happy to pay for Josie’s address, but, in hindsight, the man was more likely to have put a bullet in his head after getting the info, to prevent him from warning her or passing his name to the police. But something about Harry’s story regarding the other Holly overdosing as a baby was still niggling him, and he needed to figure out what his instincts were trying to tell him.

  37

  ‘What the fuck . . .? Josie? JOSIE!’

  Jolted from her sleep by a sharp kick in the leg, Josie cried out when pain shot through her body.

  ‘Never mind whingeing,’ Fiona barked. ‘Get the fuck out of my bin cupboard, you little tramp!’

  Unsure where she was, Josie gazed confusedly out at her from the cramped, foul-smelling interior of the cupboard.

  ‘Have you been in there since I gave you that?’ Fiona asked, staring in disgust at the now-empty vodka bottle lying next to Josie. Then, pulling a face when she saw the front of Josie’s coat, she said, ‘Ewww . . . is that puke?’

  Josie gazed down at herself and, smelling the vomit before she saw it, covered her mouth with a filthy hand when her stomach heaved.

  ‘Don’t you dare throw up again,’ Fiona warned, taking a step back and holding the cupboard door wide. ‘It’s gonna take me ages to clean that up as it is.’

  Josie’s head felt like it was stuffed with cotton wool, and her limbs felt like lead weights as she scrambled onto her knees and crawled out onto the path. It was dark, and Fiona was wearing a dressing gown and slippers, her hair sticking up around her head as if she’d just got out of bed.

  ‘What time is it?’ she croaked, rising unsteadily to her feet.

  ‘One a.m.,’ said Fiona.

  Confused as to why she was so angry, Josie rubbed her eyes, and said, ‘I haven’t been here long.’

  ‘You came here yesterday, so that’s more than twenty-four hours,’ Fiona corrected her. ‘If I hadn’t heard you rustling about just now and thought a fox was raiding the bins, you could have died in there.’

  When Josie gazed blankly back at her, Fiona sighed and folded her arms. ‘How many of those caps have you got left, or have you taken them all?’

  ‘I – I haven’t taken anything,’ Josie said, not remembering that at all.

  ‘Jeezus, Josie, it’s no wonder your daughter’s worried about you,’ Fiona tutted. ‘You need serious help.’

  ‘H-Holly?’ Josie stuttered, the mention of her daughter breaking through the fog in her mind. ‘Has she been here?’

  ‘No, but I’ve had your mate on the phone asking questions while I was working, which was bad enough.’

  ‘What did you tell her?’ Josie asked, guessing that it must have been Suzie.

  ‘That I’d seen you and you were fine.’

  ‘Did – did she mention the police?’

  ‘No, she just wanted to know where you were, ’cos they’re worried about you,’ Fiona said. Then, her expression softening a little, she said, ‘Look, I know you’ve had a rough time of it, but you really need to sort yourself out. If social services get wind of this, they’ll have that girl of yours in a home before you can blink.’

  ‘You’re not going to report me, are you?’

  ‘I should. But, no . . . I won’t.’

  ‘Thank you,’ Josie said gratefully.

  ‘Just go home,’ said Fiona, her tone pitying now.

  Nodding, Josie reached into the cupboard and pulled out her bags, both of which were coated in vomit, before shuffling away.

  Fiona shook her head as she watched her go, and then closed the bin cupboard door and went back to her bed.

  The walk home seemed to take forever, and Josie’s legs felt like they were going to give out on her by the time she got there. The cold night air had cleared more of the fog from her brain, and she was acutely aware of her surroundings as she made her way through the estate.

  When she reached her road, she hesitated and looked around. She had half expected to see a load of police and forensic vehicles parked outside the flats and crime-scene tape blocking access at each end of the road, but all was quiet and no one was around. Relieved to think that Holly must still be safe, she slipped quietly into the flats.

  Apart from the drip of the bathroom tap, the flat was silent when she let herself in, but she held her breath and listened out for sounds of movement or breathing which would tell her if anybody was hiding. Relaxing when she’d heard nothing after a couple of minutes, she put down the vomit-stinking bags and double-locked and bolted the front door before slipping her coat off. A foil strip fell out of the pocket, and she frowned as she picked it up and read the print on the back: tramadol. Fiona had asked her if she’d taken all the caps. This must be what she’d meant, but Josie didn’t recall taking anything last night. Three of the five blisters in the strip were empty, so she assumed she must have taken them. Maybe that was why she’d slept so long and couldn’t remember a thing between arriving at Fiona’s and leaving?

  Glad that she still had some to ease the aches and pains, she checked Holly’s room. The bed was empty, and she guessed that Suzie must have invited her to stay another night. It wasn’t ideal, but it was better than Holly falling into the clutches of social services, as Fiona had warned her would happen if she didn’t sort herself out. But Suzie already knew too much, and the longer Holly was there, telling her God only knew what, the more risk there was of Suzie figuring things out and reporting her to the police. So, tomorrow morning, come hell or high water, Josie was going to get Holly out of there and take her far, far away from here.

  As she turned to leave the room, thinking that she should probably take a bath before going to bed, her eye was drawn to Holly’s partially open underwear drawer, and her heart leapt when she spotted the red cap and neck of the bottle of vodka she’d bought on the way home from hospital sticking out between the bras and knickers. She realized that Holly must have confiscated it to keep her from drinking any more, and that saddened her, but she knew she didn’t have as big a problem as Holly obviously thought she did. Still, she made a silent vow to cut down on her drinking as soon as they were settled in a new place and she had secured a new job.

  But that was then and this was now, and she needed a drink to help her sleep. So, forgetting about the
bath, Josie headed to her own room and poured a glassful.

  38

  Gee gazed out through the window of the cab as it carried him home. It was 2.30 a.m. and he had just finished his third shift manning the doors at the newly refurbished nightclub Zenith in the fashionable Northern Quarter. He had been working as a security guard at a shopping centre for the last two years, chasing petty shoplifters and directing shoppers to stores they could easily have found for themselves if they’d bothered to check the information boards. It had paid the rent, just about, but it had also bored the arse off him, and he’d been terrified that he would end up like the old codgers he’d worked alongside, who seemed proud to have devoted forty years to a job that rewarded them with shit pay and no chance of promotion. So when his mate had told him Zenith was advertising for door staff, he’d jumped at the chance to escape the life-sucking drudgery of the Arndale.

  His body hadn’t fully adjusted to the switch from days to nights yet, but the work was way more exciting, the hours were shorter and the pay was better. But he had earned every penny of that extra pay tonight. The club had been packed, and it had been all hands on deck when a massive fight broke out on the dance floor. With blokes throwing wild punches, screaming girls pulling hair extensions clean out of other screaming girls’ heads, and tables and chairs flying all over the show, it was a miracle he and his colleagues hadn’t received any significant injuries. But just as they’d got that one under control and were ejecting the instigators, another far more serious fight had erupted on the pavement outside, this time involving two rival gangs.

  Outnumbered, and fearing for their own safety as well as that of their customers when they saw the array of weapons being brandished, Gee and the others had herded everyone back inside and locked the doors before calling the police. One of the guys had been caught by a machete before escaping, and Gee shuddered when he recalled the deep gash he’d seen in the man’s shoulder when they had cut his jacket and shirt off. The club’s designated first-aider had stemmed the blood as best she could until the police arrived and the man had walked to the ambulance – so he was going to be OK – but it had shaken Gee nevertheless.

  Still, he’d managed to avoid getting injured himself, so he figured he’d be fit to do it all again tomorrow night.

  As the cab neared his estate, Gee twisted his head when they passed the derelict church that had been used as a community centre for the estate’s residents until a council pen-pusher decided it was no longer cost-effective and closed it down. It had been boarded-up for a couple of years, and the land around it had become something of a rubbish dump for old mattresses, sofas and shopping trolleys, so Gee was curious to know why the BMW with blacked-out windows they had just passed was parked in the shadows of its driveway. He hadn’t seen the car around here before, and it looked like an expensive one, so he doubted it belonged to any of the estate residents.

  No longer able to see the Beemer when the cab turned the corner, Gee shrugged it off, figuring that the car probably belonged to some rich developer who was planning to buy the plot and erect more flats. It was a damn shame, because there were precious few old buildings left in the area, but there was no stopping progress, he supposed.

  Climbing out of the cab after paying his fare, Gee took out his keys and made his way inside the block. As tired as his body felt, his head was still wide awake, so he was going to take a shower when he got in, then pour himself a glass of Chivas from the bottle one of his mates had left behind after his last party, and roll a nice spliff before hitting the sack.

  As he climbed the communal stairs, he saw what looked like chunks of vomit on the steps. Grimacing, he sidestepped them and continued on up to his flat.

  ‘Reckon he clocked us?’ Austin Gordon asked, leaning forward in the passenger seat of the BMW to scan the road through the tinted windscreen.

  ‘So what if he did?’ Dom Cooper shrugged. ‘He’s a brother, so he ain’t gonna think nutt’n ’bout bred’rin chillin’ in a motor.’

  ‘I s’ppose,’ Austin conceded. ‘So what now?’

  ‘We wait till the lights go out, then go see what’s what,’ Dom murmured, his dark eyes glowing red as he sucked on his spliff.

  ‘D’ya reckon this dude knows anything?’

  ‘The old man seems to think so.’

  ‘What if he don’t?’

  ‘Then we’ll have a lickle chat and leave him be.’

  Dom grinned and passed the spliff over. Austin took a tiny toke on it before passing it back. He avoided coming to Manchester as a rule, and he felt jumpy enough already without clouding his mind with Skunk. He also wasn’t happy that there were only two of them here, because if something went wrong and they got separated, he’d be fucked for getting home.

  ‘Not long now,’ Dom said when he spotted another light going out along the row of houses he’d been watching.

  Austin rolled his head on his shoulders, trying to ease the tension that had gripped him when Harry Cox’s call had come through. His bird was due any day, and he’d promised to be at the birth, so he hoped this was going to be fast and easy.

  39

  Rob leaned forward in his seat and stared at the image on the laptop screen. It wasn’t the clearest of shots, because it had obviously been taken on a phone from a distance, and the woman in it had her face turned sideways on to the camera. But he was certain it was Josie.

  Suzie had told him that she’d searched for Josie on all the social media sites she could think of, but if she’d searched for Josie on Google as well, instead of focusing all her attention on the dead couple, she might have made the same discovery as Rob – and her mind would have been blown, just like his currently was.

  It had taken a while, because there were loads of women called Josie Evans on the Net, and Rob had waded through hundreds, if not thousands, of links to beauticians, florists, hairdressers and other businesses using the name. There were also numerous links to various social media profiles, but he ignored those, figuring that Suzie must already have checked them out.

  Bored and on the verge of giving up at 3 a.m., he had decided to try one last search, this time entering Holly’s name along with Josie’s. Annoyed with himself for not thinking to do that at the start when a stream of articles had appeared on the screen, he’d quickly read through them. They all confirmed what Harry had told him in the pub: that a two-year-old child called Holly Evans, daughter of former heroin addict Josie Evans, had died of an overdose after drinking the bottle of methadone her mother had left open on the table while taking a nap.

  The coroner had classed it as a tragic accident and Josie hadn’t been charged. Luckily for her, that story had been buried by news of the murder of Anna Hughes and Devon Prince five weeks later, and the subsequent search for Anna’s missing daughter, Charlotte – whose clothes had been recovered from the Rochdale canal, but whose body had never been found.

  The last article about Holly, the one that contained the photograph, was a short piece about her council-funded funeral. The date and venue had been kept strictly under wraps for Josie’s protection, but somebody had obviously found out about it and had managed to capture this image of Josie coming out of the crematorium escorted by a police officer and a woman who looked too official to be a family member.

  Rob was 99 per cent certain that the Josie he knew was the same one Harry had mentioned, and he was also sure that she had been connected to the murdered couple, as Suzie had theorized. A cross-reference of the two stories had revealed that Josie and Anna had actually been next-door neighbours, but Josie was believed to have gone into hiding before the murder after receiving death threats, so she wasn’t named as a person of interest.

  That all made sense to Rob, but one thing still didn’t quite fit: if Josie’s Holly was dead, how could she be here right now?

  The answer came to him in a flash. Of course! Josie must have given birth to this Holly after the death of the original one, and she’d given her the same name to keep the other one�
�s memory alive. It wasn’t something Rob would do, because he thought it a bit ghoulish. But women were a different species when it came to stuff like that.

  Tired by then, Rob decided to call it a night. He couldn’t wait to tell Suzie what he’d found out, but he would keep Harry well out of it. If she found out he’d lied about the interview and had actually gone looking for information that could have potentially put her little friend in danger, she would boot his arse out for good this time.

  After closing the laptop down, he got up and stretched. Tensing when he heard a scuffling noise outside the back door, he slowly lowered his arms and looked behind him. The blinds were drawn at the window, so if someone was out there they wouldn’t be able to see him. A block of carving knives stood on the counter to his left, and he slid the largest one out of its slot and gripped it firmly in his hand before creeping towards the back door.

  Before he reached it, there was a dull thud and the glass from the panel next to the door handle fell onto the tiled floor. A gloved hand snaked through the gap before he had time to react, and he watched in horror as the key was turned – the key he was forever warning Suzie to take out before she went to bed at night.

  The door opened and two hooded figures stepped inside; one white and holding a metal baseball bat, the other black and pointing a handgun at his face.

  ‘You must be Robert?’ the black man said, his deep voice sending a shiver down Rob’s spine.

  ‘Wh-what do you want?’ Rob stuttered, taking a step back, trying to put the table between them. ‘There’s no drugs or money in the house.’

  ‘Put the knife down,’ the man said, walking further into the room as his friend re-locked the back door before pocketing the key.

  Sweating, his mind whirring as he tried to think who he’d upset enough to send heavies after him, Rob said, ‘Has – has Angie sent you?’ as he placed the knife on the table. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt her,’ he went on, holding up his hands. ‘And I’ll pay back the money I took, I swear.’