A Narrow Trajectory

by Faith Martin

  ‘Jake’s going to have a lot of questions,’ Steven said. ‘He must be feeling as if he’s been hit with a bloody great sledge hammer right about now.’

  Hillary sighed. ‘He’s going to feel a lot worse than that before all this is over,’ she predicted grimly.

  They took Jas to the local nick, where they all met up briefly in DI Taylor’s office to discuss strategy.

  ‘You know we won’t be able to hold her for long, right?’ the Bristol man said. ‘Once she demands her brief, and she will, she’ll be out in a couple of hours.’

  Steven nodded with a sigh. ‘Then we’d better be quick,’ he looked at Hillary. ‘I’ll start off, and see how it goes.’ Hillary nodded. Steven then glanced at Rollo. ‘You all right observing?’ There would be a room with a two-way mirror where the Superintendent could watch and listen.

  Rollo nodded briskly. ‘Sounds fine to me.’

  Jasmine Sudbury looked up as Steven and Hillary entered the room. Slouched in the chair, she looked a little shorter than the five feet seven that Hillary knew her to be. With a short dark cap of glossy dark brown hair and blue eyes, she was attractive enough. Only a second look revealed the cold hard glint in the eyes and the white tension lines around her eyes and at the corner of her mouth – a mouth that was now curving into a somewhat cocky little smile.

  ‘So, what’s going on? And what’s all this rubbish about immoral earnings?’ she demanded.

  Steven and Hillary both took seats, and the recording was started with the usual preliminaries. Steven opened the file in front of him and speed-read it. DI Taylor had managed to get together an impressive amount of detail on Jas, considering the short notice he’d been given.

  ‘It says here that you live in a very nice flat in Clifton, Miss Sudbury,’ Steven began mildly. ‘With a lovely view of the bridge, or so I’m told. Those sorts of views don’t come cheap.’

  Jas sighed and studied her nails, which were painted a bright pink. But underneath the insouciance Hillary could sense her tension. She could also tell that the other woman’s mind wasn’t really focused on the charges against her. And it wasn’t hard to guess what – or rather who – had distracted her.

  ‘I got a good deal,’ Jas said with a smile. ‘I knew the estate agent. You know what I mean?’ she smiled suggestively.

  ‘Oh, please.’ Steven sighed. ‘Tell me what you were doing at the train station this morning.’

  ‘Catching a train. What else?’

  ‘Which train?’ Steven pounced. ‘Tell me the destination, number and time of departure.’

  Jas’s eyes narrowed.

  ‘Come on, if you were really catching a train you would know where to and when it leaves. What train was coming in, or due, at that particular platform, Miss Sudbury?’

  Jas studied her nails in silence.

  Steven nodded. ‘I thought not. You were there to pick up girls, weren’t you, Miss Sudbury?’

  ‘You think I’m gay?’ Jas laughed and ran her eyes insultingly over Steven’s face and form. There was something cold and ugly in her eyes, and Hillary was glad that Jake wasn’t being allowed anywhere near this. At the moment he was being debriefed by a member of Brian Taylor’s team in an office a couple of floors above them, and he wasn’t going to be let within a country mile of his sister.

  ‘So what if I am?’ Jas shrugged. ‘If I remember rightly, that’s no longer illegal in this country.’

  ‘No. But procuring underage girls for the purposes of prostitution is,’ Steven said. ‘Come on Jas, don’t play games. You’re a smart girl.’ He knew, as well as Hillary, that they needed to find the right buttons to press, and quickly.

  ‘Sure I am,’ Jas said. ‘That’s why I know all this is a crock of shit. You really wanna make me say it?’ Jas laughed again, and in a fairly decent James Cagney impersonation, added, ‘You ain’t got nothing on me, copper, see?’

  She started to push her chair away.

  ‘Now …’

  ‘Sit down,’ Steven snapped.

  But Jas kept on rising. And Hillary, beneath the table, nudged her leg against his. She knew why he wasn’t getting anywhere, and she had a bloody good idea how she could change that. It was time to try another tactic.

  ‘Were you surprised to see your brother this morning, Miss Sudbury?’ she asked mildly.

  As expected, the intense blue eyes immediately fixed on her. Slowly, Jas sank back down and shrugged. ‘Jake? Yeah, but so what? I haven’t clapped eyes on him for years.’

  Her gaze was mocking, the words nonchalant, but there was something in her voice that sounded as if it was echoing in a deep well. Which was encouraging.

  Hillary nodded. ‘Since you walked away from your family without a word. Leaving them all to wonder and worry. But they shouldn’t have, should they? A girl like you – tough as old boots, right? Managed to get clean, and a whole new career, too.’

  Jas shrugged. ‘They never cared for me. Besides, Jakes’s mum wasn’t even my real mum anyway, and my dad … well, he’s a loser.’

  ‘And so’s Jake,’ Hillary said, allowing contempt to sound in her voice.

  Instantly, Jas’s eyes flashed. ‘He’s not! He’s a millionaire twenty times over!’

  Hillary shrugged. ‘He’s still a loser,’ she deliberately goaded. ‘What do you think he was doing with Darren Chivnor? You did recognize Chivnor, didn’t you?’ Hillary taunted.

  And beside her, she could feel Steven tense slightly.

  When he’d silently handed over control of the interview to her, he’d known that she would have a plan, or had seen an opening that he’d missed. But he hadn’t expected her to go quite so improvisational on him. And whilst he was happy to trust her, and see where she was going with all this, he rather suspected that, over in the observation room, Rollo Sale was probably having kittens about now.

  ‘Yeah, I know Darren,’ Jas said cautiously.

  ‘Back when you were in the life, in Oxford, yes?’ Hillary propounded. ‘One of Medcalfe’s girls, weren’t you?’

  Instantly Jas tensed. And so did Steven – and again, with good reason. They’d both agreed beforehand that mentioning Dale Medcalfe would be bound to shut down Jas faster than anything else could do. And whilst they might have hopes of eventually using her to gain insight into Dale and his organization, they knew it would take a lot of patience to coax anything even remotely worthwhile out of her. So why had Hillary just chucked that particular grenade into the mix?

  ‘Screw you,’ Jas said. ‘I ain’t saying nothing about Dale.’

  ‘No, I understand that,’ Hillary said smoothly. ‘And there’s really no need for you to. We already know that you started off as just one of his regular girls. Got into some trouble with drugs. But instead of all that bringing you down, you were strong enough to rise above it, weren’t you, Jas? Worked your way up, in fact. Came to the big man’s attention. So much so in fact, that he eventually set you up in your own gig down here – trolling for new talent, helping to run one of his houses.’ Oh, yes, Brian Taylor, once he knew where to look, had been very thorough.

  ‘So of course you’re not going to rat on your boss,’ Hillary continued, sounding weary and bored now. ‘As Acting Chief Superintendent Crayle here just said, you’re a smart girl.’

  In the observation room, both Rollo Sale and DI Taylor were on the edge of their seats, waiting to see where Hillary was going with this. Because even Taylor, who didn’t know her well, could see that Hillary Greene was clearly in charge of that room.

  ‘Unfortunately, though, we were talking about your brother, weren’t we? And he’s not as smart as you, as he?’ Hillary gave a shrug of her own.

  Jas was now sitting up very straight in her chair. And wasn’t smiling at all.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she demanded sharply.

  Hillary laughed lightly. ‘You’re still not asking the right questions, Jas,’ she taunted, her voice mock-reproving. ‘The question you should be asking is this. Just what was my dear brother
Jake doing with the likes of Darren Chivnor? And if you don’t like that one, perhaps you should ask yourself another. Why is a man as important as an Acting Chief Superintendent so interested in one of Dale Medcalfe’s top lieutenants? And why have we been keeping such a close eye on one Mr Jake Barnes?’

  Hillary leaned slowly forward in her seat, and over the table top speared the young girl with her eyes. ‘Because when you start getting answers to those questions, you’ll understand just what a loser your brother truly is.’

  Jas slowly went pale. ‘Oh shit. What did he do?’ she whispered.

  Hillary laughed. ‘What didn’t he do?’ She turned to Steven and gave a rueful shrug. Steven, playing up to her, spread his hands in a where-do-we-start gesture. He had no idea what was happening, but he knew a cue when he heard one.

  ‘Well, for a start, he began by trying to find you the old fashioned way,’ Hillary began. And started to sweat slightly. Because she knew she had to be careful now. Very careful. She needed to play Jas just right – and one miscalculation on her part could bring about disaster.

  But of one thing she was sure – Jasmine Sudbury both loved and hated her stepbrother in equal, twisted measure. And from all that she’d learned about her from friends and family, it was clear that everything the girl had done with her life so far, had revolved around her feelings for him. The whole sorry catalogue of her teens had been an attempt to get him to notice her. Leaving home all those times had been done solely so that he would find her and bring her back. Forcing him to worry about her. Think about her. Look after her. But through it all, he’d never stood up and done what she so desperately wanted.

  He’d never claimed her as anything other than his little sister.

  And so had come the years of self-destruction, culminating in her most cruel revenge. Going missing without making contact. Not caring that her father and mother would suffer. Caring only that her brother would.

  And it was only by tapping into Jas’s mixed-up, angry, destructive and passionate nature that Hillary could hope to make her forget her fear of Dale Medcalfe and his retribution and over-ride her instinct for self-preservation.

  If only she could channel it just right.

  ‘When you dropped out of sight, he hired a PI firm to find you,’ Hillary carried on with a small, ironic shrug. ‘I don’t know why he bothered, personally, but he obviously thought you were worth it. Anyway, they failed, of course, because as we know now, you wanted to disappear. Not because you were dead, or had come to grief as everyone feared, but because you wanted to enjoy your new life. A life where you were the one who had all the power for once – a life where you got to live in a swanky apartment and wear nice clothes. After all, if your brother could make his fortune, why not you? And you liked that taste of the good life that Jake showed you all those years ago, didn’t you? The holidays abroad. The flash cars.’

  Jas stared at her. ‘What’s all this got to do with Jake now?’ She was clearly not going to be distracted, which meant that Hillary was on the right track.

  Further encouraged, she ploughed on. ‘Jake’s PIs learned enough to know that you’d been part of Medcalfe’s stable. And when you disappeared, Jake thought Medcalfe was responsible. And guess what?’

  Jas’s blue eyes widened. ‘Oh shit,’ she said again.

  ‘Exactly,’ Hillary said, nodding emphatically, and again allowing contempt to creep into her voice. ‘The fool was so determined to find you, so stupid as to think that you actually mattered, that he was willing to risk everything to find out what had happened to you. And to try and bring Medcalfe down for it,’ she said. She’d begun by flattering Jas’s monstrous ego, naturally. But she also knew that it was important to reinforce the possibility that Jake might secretly, romantically, love her after all. That was what Jas had always wanted, and to validate her hopes and dreams by acknowledging them could only reinforce her fantasy.

  Which was vital. Because the more convinced she became that Jake might possibly love her in the way that she craved, the more likely she was to want to save his neck.

  ‘Can you believe it? The stupid idiot thought that just because he got lucky with some penny ante dot com business, and then invested it in a real estate market where even a fool couldn’t lose money, he believed he had the balls to take on someone like Medcalfe!’ Hillary shook her head in disgust, and before Jas could protest, ploughed on. ‘Which is where Chivnor comes in. Jake approached him for information. Darren, needless to say, saw an opportunity to make some big money and took it. Mind you, he damned nearly knifed your brother once, in an Oxford park. And still the fool was so desperate to find you that he gave him another chance. Now how’s that for devotion?’

  ‘Did he hurt …’ Jas began urgently, then shook her head. ‘No. Jake was obviously all right.’

  ‘Sure he is. Well, for now,’ Hillary laughed. ‘Mind you, I don’t know how long that’ll last,’ she snorted scornfully. ‘Chivnor’s been feeding him information for months,’ Hillary lied smoothly. ‘Just dribs and drabs, rumours about your whereabouts, your old Johns, that sort of thing. Bleeding him for tens of thousands, the mug. But today our Darren was going for the big score. Unfortunately for him, we’ve been keeping our eye on Medcalfe for years, and so we know from our sources that Dale has started to get wise as to what Chivnor’s been up to,’ she lied again. ‘And you know Dale doesn’t like his thugs getting independent minded. And when he found out that Chivnor was speaking to a civilian consultant at Thames Valley…’ Hillary broke off as Jas gave a gasp. ‘Oh, did I forget to mention that Jake volunteered his services to us coppers?’

  ‘Oh, the fool!’ Jas hissed.

  Hillary laughed again. ‘Haven’t I just been telling you that?’ she jeered. ‘He had some idea that he could hack our systems in his crusade to try and get you back. So, anyway, that’s basically where we’re at now,’ she concluded, with a huge yawn. ‘And you know Dale. He won’t take this lying down. Right about now, I imagine he’s putting your brother and Chivnor straight at the top of his shit list. And we all know what happens to them, don’t we, Jas?’

  Then she shrugged.

  ‘Still, I don’t suppose you care what happens to him. He’s not even your real brother, is he? Not blood, I mean, so—’

  ‘Shut up, shut up, SHUT UP!’ Jas screamed, lurching to her feet, the chair skittering away behind her. ‘You don’t know nothing, you horrible old bag!’

  Steven made to move, but Hillary put a warning hand on top of his. So they sat in silence for a while as Jasmine Sudbury paced about the room like a caged tigress.

  By now, Steven, who thoroughly appreciated her play, was holding his breath. As was Hillary. Eventually though, Jas picked up her chair and brought it back to the table and sat down in it.

  Then she looked at Hillary with a small, tight grin.

  ‘Don’t think I don’t know what you’re up to, you bitch,’ Jas warned her venomously. ‘You just want me to help you bring down Dale. And I can do it, too. I’ve kept my eyes and ears open all these years, and I know more than just the business stuff.’

  In the observation room, Rollo Sale drew in a heavy breath. ‘Bloody hell …’ he whispered under his breath.

  ‘But why should I risk my skin?’ she demanded. ‘Many coppers before you lot have tried to bring down Dale and crashed and burned. And if you try and fail … I’ll end up dead,’ she said bleakly.

  She was right. And Hillary debated strategy for a bare fraction, but instinctively knew that now was not the time to lie. Or to play games. Now was the time to go straight for the jugular. ‘And if you don’t help us bring him down, Jake’ll end up dead. You know it, and I know it. Have you really thought about that?’

  ‘I’ve lived without him all right these past few years,’ Jas stated. She sounded almost proud of the fact. And Steven Crayle felt his heart sink. She was just too cold. Too arid. Too far gone to reach. Why should a heartless wretch like this care for anything but her own precious skin?

&n
bsp; But Hillary had no intention of admitting defeat.

  ‘So you have,’ she said softly. ‘But then, you’ve always known that if you wanted to, you could see him again whenever you liked. Just get in your car and go park outside his house and get a glimpse of his face. Or you could pick up the phone, dial his number and hear his voice.’ She leaned forward on the table, her voice sad and mesmerising now. ‘But once he’s dead and gone, Jas, he’s dead and gone. You won’t be able to torment him, or make his life miserable. And any chance that you could make him love you – really and properly love you – will be dead and gone as well. A dead man can’t do anything, Jas. Except moulder and rot.’

  Slowly she leaned back in her chair and shrugged. ‘It’s up to you,’ she said, casting the final toss of the dice. ‘Do you really want to kill him, Jas?’

  For a long, long moment, Jasmine Sudbury glared at her. Then her eyes flickered. A brief spasm of some deep, dark emotion crossed her pinched, white face, and then she ducked her head.

  ‘What do you want me to do?’ she asked sullenly.

  When Hillary left the interview room a while later, Rollo was feeling like a limp dishrag. Steven was busily getting down on tape everything that Jasmine Sudbury knew about the outfit she worked for. Which seemed to be a lot. And as head of the new unit charged with cleaning out the sewers, it was clear that his first task of bringing down Dale Medcalfe was suddenly looking a whole lot more likely.

  Hillary nodded at Brian Taylor as he passed her in the doorway, then joined her new boss by the two-way mirror.

  ‘When he’s finished, I’m going to recommend that he brings in Sasha Yoo as well,’ Hillary said. ‘I’m sure that she has vital information about the Rebecca Tyde-Harris girl. And if she thinks that Jas is talking, she’ll scent blood in the water. Which might just be enough to shake something loose.’

  ‘You really think that she hates Medcalfe enough to turn state’s evidence against him?’

  ‘I do. Plus, I think she’s as mad as a hatter.’ Hillary thought back to Sasha Yoo, and her flat with the hidden, watching cameras. And contemplated all the violence the woman had inflicted on others over the years. And shuddered. ‘And don’t forget, we still have Chivnor on the hook. He didn’t get his money today, and if Steven and Jake can convince him that there’s still a chance he could get his hands on it – especially if he thinks there’s a good chance Medcalfe really will be going down … just think what damage he could do.’