To Catch a Rabbit

by Helen Cadbury

  ‘I can’t.’ Sean said.

  ‘Yes, you can. You’ll be amazing.’

  ‘No, Lizzie, I’m totally fucking dyslexic.’

  ‘Oh, right.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘I’m sorry. I should have realised. The spelling on your flipchart was atrocious.’ She was smiling. She better not bloody laugh at him now. ‘That explains why you got taken off admin duties.’

  ‘I thought that was down to you.’

  She shook her head, offended, and was about to reply when he saw something coming up the lane beyond her. ‘What the hell’s that?’

  It only had one working headlight, so at first he thought it was a motorbike, but as it got closer, he could see it was a minibus. It had just made it through the gate when it stopped abruptly and the driver tried to put it into reverse, crunching the gears. The sharp-eyed officer at the entrance swung the gate shut as the minibus stalled and was trapped on the edge of the yard. Sean recognised the logo from the charity that used to do the transport for the special-school kids. He hoped Mackenzie had found it second-hand and not actually nicked it from disabled children, but he wouldn’t have put it past him.

  Within seconds, Rick was at the driver’s door, helping a man down with a firm grip to the upper arm, while Moon and another officer opened the side door and helped the passengers out. None of them made any attempt to run. They climbed down wearily and lined up, staring in horror at the barn, as Rick asked to see ID and the uniformed officer radioed for police transport to come and pick them up. Twenty people had been squeezed into the twelve-seater Variety Club Sunshine Bus. Mostly white, two Chinese and one tall African man. Sean watched as Charlie Moon approached him.

  ‘Mr Moyo?’ Moon said.

  The man pulled his gaze from the burning barn and Sean could see the fear in his eyes. ‘My wife? Please, is she all right?’

  ‘Yes, sir, she’s fine,’ said Moon. ‘Denton? Take this gentleman inside.’

  As Sean led the man towards the farmhouse, Mr Moyo caught sight of Mackenzie, waiting in the squad car.

  ‘Where are they taking him? They should ask him, where is my daughter? She was only fifteen.’

  ‘Was she small for her age?’ said Sean, gently.

  ‘Yes.’

  Like a child. There were men who would pay much more for a child. He hoped they weren’t too late.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  Karen phoned Jaz at home and told him that she’d found the Moyos in time for their appeal hearing and he might have some new clients waiting for him at Doncaster Central. Jaz asked more questions than she could answer but she told him he’d have to wait, she’d call him again when she could. Charlie assured her someone was getting on to social services to find out what had happened to the young girl they’d picked up in the raid at the All Star Massage Parlour. Karen could see him in Mackenzie’s office now, picking over sheets of paper in latex gloves.

  She wandered across the yard. Two of the police cars had left, carrying Burger, Stubbs and Mackenzie. The fires were out, but the smell of burnt rubber and paint lingered in the air. A tang of petrol caught in the back of her throat, mixed with the scent of steam and charcoal coming from the barn. She saw Sean standing alone, looking up at the stars as if he’d never seen so many.

  ‘Hello, Mrs Friedman.’

  ‘You’re a bit of a hero,’ Karen said.

  ‘I don’t feel like one.’

  ‘Why on earth not? You caught Johnny Mackenzie red-handed; he was about to destroy all the evidence in his office. Employee records, money, God knows what else on his hard drive. It’s fantastic for the Human Trafficking Service. He was the missing link.’

  ‘I put my own grandma in danger. I could have told Burger that the police were looking for Arieta, and then they wouldn’t have bothered Nan.’

  ‘Why didn’t you?’

  ‘They didn’t give me much of a chance and, I don’t know, I thought I could find something out.’

  ‘And did you?’

  ‘I think so. Mackenzie’s been branching out, setting up girls in caravans. Maybe he’s got more, parked all over South Yorkshire. Burger realised when we found the first victim; he recognised her from Stella’s massage parlour. He must have known that Mackenzie had poached the girl off his sister. I don’t know if he realised what Lee Stubbs was up to though.’

  ‘The young guy? He looked completely out of it.’

  ‘He’s always been like that, not sure if it’s what he takes or just how he is.’ Sean Denton rubbed his arm. ‘Stubbs was picking his victims carefully. They’d all worked for his mother, except one. Stubbs didn’t want anyone to leave his mother, so he spiked them with pure heroin. He got to Flora, but not before he’d tried to get to Arieta. Trouble was, Arieta wasn’t a user. I think your brother stumbled on something he shouldn’t and Mackenzie pushed him over the edge of the quarry.’

  ‘It’s an interesting theory,’ Karen tucked a strand of hair behind her ear and pulled her coat closer around her.

  The barn was lit with the eerie coldness of arc lights. Sean said the forensic team was working on a trailer and a car. He looked startled.

  ‘Shit, I’ve done it again. I keep telling you stuff I probably shouldn’t.’

  ‘Don’t worry,’ she reached to touch his arm, but he winced. ‘Sorry.’

  She watched him limp across to the doorway of the barn, where he stood watching the action inside, his fingers resting on the incident tape. They all knew things they probably shouldn’t tell, and things they should. The pieces of the jigsaw were beginning to fall into place. She shivered inside her coat, wishing Charlie could give her a hug to warm her up, but she would have to wait. The secret burning inside her would have to wait too. Everyone around her was so busy. She looked back at the farmhouse and wondered if there was something she could do for Holly. She’d left Stacey holding her, rocking back and forth. The thought of doing something practical gave her a quick burst of energy and she headed for the kitchen.

  The paramedics had decided to move Florence to hospital. She was dehydrated and they wanted to get a monitor on the baby.

  ‘You’ve saved my wife,’ Mr Moyo shook Denton by the hand. ‘We will call the baby Sean, if it’s a boy.’ He was still waving as the ambulance doors were closed behind him.

  ‘I need a note-taker, Sean.’ Rick stood next to him as they both watched the red tail-lights getting smaller, heading towards the main road. ‘Stacey Holroyd’s got a few things she wants to get off her mind.’

  ‘Yeah?’ Sean said. ‘If you don’t mind rubbish spelling, I’m your man.’

  It was hot in the farmhouse kitchen. Someone had made toast and it gave a new edge to the smell of burning that Sean was beginning to get used to. The little girl was sitting in her mother’s lap, a buttery slice clutched in her fist.

  Mrs Friedman handed him a plate.

  ‘Here,’ she said. ‘You were looking envious.’ Her voice sounded different, as if the anxiety had gone out of it.

  He took the plate and sat down at the end of the long wooden table. Rick pulled up a chair opposite Stacey.

  ‘When you’re ready, Denton.’ He slid a pen in Sean’s direction.

  Sean caught the pen and tried to chew the toast faster, but his mouth was dry. Mrs Friedman took a blue and white mug off a hook on the dresser and filled it with water.

  ‘Let the poor boy catch his breath.’ Her voice was kind.

  ‘Karen?’ Stacey Holroyd spoke for the first time. She sounded like she’d been crying and her face was blotched with red. ‘Can you put Holly to bed for me? Go with your Aunty Karen, Holly, there’s a good girl.’

  The child looked up and held out her arms to be carried. Mrs Friedman gathered her up and the toast fell, to be caught by the waiting dog.

  ‘
Night, night, sweetheart!’ Stacey looked like she was going to cry again but once the door was closed, she cleared her throat and clasped her hands together on the table. ‘Are you going to arrest me?’

  ‘Why don’t you tell us what happened?’ Rick said gently. ‘PCSO Denton is going to take some notes. We may need you to come into a police station at some point, but you’re not under arrest. We’re just trying to understand what’s been going on.’

  She kept her eyes on her clenched hands and began to speak.

  ‘Phil was a lovely feller. Too good for me. But you know what? Nice doesn’t pay the bills.’

  Sean wasn’t sure if he was supposed to start writing.

  ‘Do you know where your husband is?’ Rick said.

  She looked up at Rick, a frown tightening between her plucked eyebrows. Sean looked at him too, trying to read his expression. It seemed an extraordinary question.

  ‘No,’ she said, ‘I don’t.’

  Sean picked up the pen and started to write.

  ‘I didn’t know what to believe,’ Stacey spoke quietly, her eyes dropping to the table again, ‘when they said they’d found a body, a man, they said, who matched Phil’s description and they said they’d found his phone, I remember thinking, oh my God. I mean I was shocked but, something else, I think I was angry.’

  ‘Go on,’ Rick almost whispered it.

  ‘If he’d left me for some rich woman, like Johnny said, I could have understood. I wasn’t going to forgive him, but there would have been a reason. But to end up in some grotty caravan, a... a... what would you call it? A whorehouse? Whore-van, that other copper said. To end up like that.’ She paused, picking the skin off the side of her thumbnail. ‘Look, I’m sorry. I’m still trying to get my head round all this. What I mean is, if he’d gone of with another woman, I was going to be all right. Johnny was treating me like a lady. We had things that we could never have afforded before. Good riddance, I thought. But when I heard the copper saying all that stuff on the phone, like he was enjoying rubbing it in, that’s it, I was so angry.’

  Sean could imagine Burger’s lack of charm in breaking the news.

  ‘Anyway,’ Stacey continued, more quickly now as if she might change her mind if she hesitated too long, ‘we went to the morgue and there was this room with the body under a sheet and they pulled it back and for a second I saw Phil.’

  Rick held his hand up to stop her. Sean was relieved to have time to catch up. His hand was beginning to ache.

  ‘And Mr Mackenzie went with you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘And did he think it was Philip Holroyd?’

  ‘We both did, I think. And then as I looked at it, the face changed. It was swollen and messed up and a weird sort of colour but it wasn’t that. The hair was wrong, shorter than Phil’s and it had grey hairs in it. His ears were too big. I looked at Johnny, I remember, and he said, yes, that’s him and the woman turned to me and I said, yes. And that was it.’

  Sean was writing so fast he was afraid the biro was going to tear through the page.

  ‘Did you discuss it afterwards?’ Rick leaned forward as if willing her to meet his eye.

  ‘I was in a kind of trance. I remember later someone saying they’d want a DNA match and did we have anything of Phil’s? Johnny said he’d bring something, a jacket Phil had left up the farm; it would have his hair and skin he said. My phone kept ringing. It was Karen but I couldn’t speak to her. I kept putting it back in my pocket until eventually Johnny took it and switched it off.’

  ‘Did you see the jacket?’

  Stacey shook her head.

  ‘Did Phil own a grey, suit jacket?’

  ‘No. Phil’s never owned a suit in his life.’ She sighed and no one spoke. The tap dripped into the sink. As Sean wrote Stacey’s words on the pad, he heard someone moving about upstairs.

  ‘Did you have any idea who the man in the mortuary was?’

  She shook her head again. ‘I never asked. Johnny moved us in here, and I’ve been on tablets ever since. Nothing’s real.’ She waved her hand at the television screen on the wall and towards the dresser stacked with expensive looking china. ‘I’ve got all this. Everything I wanted. But all the time I’ve just been waiting for a knock on the door.’

  ‘Mrs Holroyd,’ Rick’s chair creaked as he shifted in his seat, ‘was your husband’s life insured?’

  ‘Yes.’ Her voice was almost inaudible. ‘My dad got him to start paying into a scheme when Holly was born.’

  She sank her face into her hands and started to sob. Rick pushed his chair back and stood up. He looked around and picked up a roll of kitchen towel, which he plonked down in front of her. He patted her shoulder, just once, as if he wasn’t sure it would help.

  ‘You’re doing very well,’ he said.

  She reached for the kitchen towel and tore off a sheet, dabbing at her face. Sean had got as far as when Holly was born when Rick began to speak again.

  ‘Did you know that John Mackenzie was operating brothels in several temporary vehicles?’

  ‘Several?’ she looked up. ‘No, I didn’t. Several?’

  Rick ran his finger down the bristles on his cheek. He said nothing.

  ‘Wait.’ Stacey seemed to catch her breath, to calm her own sobs. ‘There’s a trailer in the barn. I knew there was something wrong. It’s the one they were looking for, isn’t it? Where that Chinese girl died?’

  Sean wrote furiously while Rick waited for Stacey to say more.

  ‘Holly’s rabbit is a bit of a Houdini; he gets out all the time and he heads for the barn. You know there are people sleeping there? I think he’s after their food. I wouldn’t have gone in there otherwise. I always keep out of the business side of things. Anyway, I went to look for the rabbit. I’d never been in that barn before, so I had a look about and there was this trailer. I was just curious, so I looked under the cover to see what it was.’ She paused to blow her nose on another piece of kitchen towel. ‘It was like a chippy van. I was thinking it might be good to get it going again in the summer, out the back of the pub. Jackie might like it for barbies and that. Anyway when I asked Johnny about it, he went mental. It’s the only time he’s laid a hand on me, but it put the fear of God in me. I had to cancel my mum coming round for a week, because I couldn’t let anyone see what he’d done to my face.’

  Sean guessed Lizzie was in there now, dusting the tarp for prints, exploring Su-Mai’s trailer. If Stacey was telling the truth her prints would be on the tarp, his too. He hoped Johnny had left some of his own, enough to nail him as Su-Mai’s pimp.

  ‘Do you remember seeing any other vehicles in the barn?’ Rick asked.

  ‘I think there was a car and a couple of tractors. That big tractor was there.’ She looked up at Sean. It was the first time she’d acknowledged his presence. She hadn’t said a word about him saving her daughter’s life. He told himself she was probably too embarrassed.

  ‘Did you ask Johnny about the car?’ Rick walked slowly back around the table to his seat and sat down heavily. Sean thought he looked knackered. He wondered what Arieta had told him during their all-night chat.

  ‘You must be joking,’ Stacey said. ‘Not after he flipped his lid about the trailer. Anyway, I thought it was just some junk.’

  ‘Did you ever see him drive it?’

  ‘No, he always drives the Range Rover. He wouldn’t be seen dead in a green car, he thinks green’s unlucky.’

  Someone knocked on the door from the hallway.

  ‘Come in!’ Rick called.

  It was Karen Friedman.

  ‘I’m sorry to interrupt, but would it be okay for Stacey to come up and give Holly a goodnight kiss? She won’t settle.’

  ‘Aye, go on, we are more or less done here,’ Rick stood up again and offered Stacey a han
d. She let him help her up from the chair. ‘You’ve been a real help and now I think you should get some sleep. There’ll be an officer here all night and then maybe we could ask you to come in tomorrow and put this on tape. Would you do that?’

  Stacey nodded. ‘I don’t owe Johnny Mackenzie a bloody thing any more. He could have killed my daughter in that fire. I’ll tell you whatever you need to know.’

  ‘Thank you.’

  Sean put the pen down after she’d gone and waited for Rick to speak. Mrs Friedman was putting on her coat. She muttered something about getting out of their way and went outside into the yard.

  ‘So,’ Sean said when she was out of earshot, ‘if the body wasn’t Philip Holroyd, who was it and who killed who?’

  ‘Whom.’

  ‘What?’

  ‘Who killed whom,’ Rick said with a grin. ‘It’s more grammatical.’

  ‘Whatever.’ Sean wanted to know how Arieta was. Nan was sure to ask. But he wasn’t sure about the protocol. He tried to sound casual. ‘Did you get much from Arieta Osmani?’

  Rick’s smile faltered slightly. ‘Has Lizzie been sharing?’

  ‘Not exactly. I suppose it’s none of my business. Sorry.’

  ‘Look, you’re a lucky bastard, Sean. You’ve done some good stuff on this case, but you’ve also broken a few rules. I suppose on balance you and the Force are about even.’

  ‘So?’ He knew he was pushing his luck, but Rick was a mate, or so it seemed when they’d been out clubbing. When someone’s wiped the sick off your face it kind of bonds you. Or maybe it was the other way round. Maybe he was bonded to Rick in grateful servitude. Thinking about it made his brain fuzzy again. God, he was tired. ‘Fuck it, Rick. Is she okay? I understand if it’s off limits, but my nan’s going to ask and right now, I’ve put her through hell, so...’

  ‘All right! Keep your hair on!’ Rick sighed. ‘In answer to your original question about who killed whom; well, according to your little Kosovan friend, the victim was the driver of a green car very like the one that’s in that barn, but she doesn’t know his name and until we find the plates, neither do we.’