by Liz Mistry
I push my foot against the ground and my swing moves back and forth. The movement doesn’t even make a breeze and I can’t be arsed. Too hot! The park’s nearly empty. Partly because it’s a weekday and partly because the crime scene tape around the top part of the park must be off-putting. There are a few mothers with their kids toddling around, some with pushchairs, some gripping plastic bags containing bread to feed he ducks. Don’t they know that could kill them? It’s not heaving like it is on a weekend, though. The traffic’s died down a bit on the main road. Rush hour’s over. I could go back to the house. It’ll be empty. Mo and Mum at work, the kids at school, but it’s nice to be outside.
‘Hi, Zarqa.’
I glance up scowling. It’s Claire and my heart sinks down to my boots. Can’t I have a little personal space? I don’t want to talk to anybody except Jo Jo, but then when I see how pale she looks, I relent. No point in being a bitch for the sake of it, besides, I think she was friends with Betsy. Maybe she’ll know what’s going on. ‘Hi. You okay?’’
She sits on the swing next to me, her hands tight round the chains like she thinks she might fall off as she rocks herself to and fro. She looks distraught, poor cow. Must be hard for her. There’s a sheen all over her face and I’m not sure if it’s sweat or oil. I’m just about to ask her if she’s heard owt when Mehmoona Bashir saunters over.
Mehmoona’s funny. I don’t know her very well, but she cracks me up. She doesn’t say much but when she does, it’s usually sarcastic and to the point. She leans against the metal pole, her phone in her hand, scrolling through Facebook no doubt.
‘Do you know there are one hundred and fifty-two messages on Betsy Reavley’s timeline?’ She angles her head to the side and pushes her sun specs onto her head. Her dip-dyed hair’s got a nicer colour than mine and I consider asking her where she got it done, but it’s too much effort.
Claire’s stopped swinging now. From the corner of my eye, I notice she’s staring up the park to where the crime scene tape is spread around the trees. I glance at Mehmoona and shrug. She nods and moves in front of Claire, blocking her view. ‘You left a message yet, Claire? She’s a friend of yours, isn’t she?’
Claire flinches like Mehmoona’s asked her to soak her face in acid and shakes her head. When she speaks, her voice trembles, ‘No. wouldn’t know what to say.’
And on the last word her voice sort of hitches and I think she’s gonna burst into tears. Fuck’s sake Jo Jo. If you’d just be on time, I wouldn’t have to deal with this shit. ‘Tell you what, we could help you. Me and Mehmoona. We could help you write something.’
Biting her lip, Claire shakes her head. ‘No, no… I’ll just leave it.’
But Mehmoona’s having none of it. ‘Get your phone out, girl. You’ll feel better after you’ve left a message. I know I did.’
Claire looks at Mehmoona. ‘You left one?’
Mehmoona shrugs. ‘Course.’ She turns to me, ‘You did too, didn’t you, Zarqa?’
‘Eh, well, actually no. I didn’t. Didn’t know what to say.’ Not into that sort of stuff. It’s all a load of bullshit.
Hands on hip, Mehmoona looks at each of us in turn. ‘Phones out, girls.’ Her tone leaves no room for dissent, so rather than have to summon up an argument, I take my phone out and Claire does too.
‘Right, all you need to do is say RIP or Miss you or Taken too soon or some such shit. Whap on a couple of emojis and you’ve done your bit. It’ll help her family feel better.’
Claire gulps and a tear rolls down her cheek. ‘Don’t think an emoji’s going do that, Mehmoona.’
I can’t help thinking she’s probably right, but still… better to do something than do nothing. I scroll through Facebook until I find Betsy’s timeline.
RIP Betsy, love Zarqa :(
‘There done.’
As Claire writes hers, I scroll down the few that are there.
Another angel in heaven. The stars will shine brighter, love Mehmoona
Bit poetic.
Gone but not forgotten, love Ben xxx
Will miss you, Jo Jo xx
Ping!
I’m sorry you’re gone, Claire :(
I look at her. ‘There. That wasn’t so hard was it?’
She shakes her head, but it’s like she’s been tortured and all I want to do is to get away from her misery. Jo Jo jumps the fence at the side. He’s clearly climbed the wall from the main road and run up to the park.
‘You all right?’ His greeting takes in all of us and I notice Mehmoona straightening up, sticking her tits out. Almost makes me laugh. Likes she’s got a chance. Then, I notice Razor and Goyley entering the enclosed park area through the small swing gate. Bloody hate those two. Why the fuck have they shown up? Thought I’d seen the back of them when they got expelled from school. They shouldn’t be in Manningham – that’s a riot just waiting to happen. Goyley throws himself down on the green ground covering.
‘Heard the bitch was stabbed… blood everywhere…’
Jo Jo opens his mouth to say something, but I jump in first. They’re less likely to be violent to me… dicks yeah… actually violent…? probably not. ‘Show a bit of respect, eh? We don’t know who’s gonna be next.’ As if in an afterthought, I smile my sweetest smile and bat my eyelashes. ‘Would be a shame if it were you, though, wouldn’t it?’
‘Ooooooooh!’ Razor says wiggling his fingers like a tosser in front of my face. ‘The paki’s threatening you, Goyle. You scared?’
Goyley jumps to his feet, pulls a knife from his back pocket, and gets in my face. The knife right at my throat. Shit! That escalated quick! I feel the point dig into my neck and instead of backing off like I know I should, I jut my chin out and say, ‘Piss off, tosser!’
Next to me I hear Jo Jo’s near silent groan and then Mehmoona’s speaking. ‘Smile, Goyle.’ She’s got her phone up taking a photo. ‘Might just send this to my mum if you don’t piss off. You do know she’s a copper, don’t you?’
Just to add to the circus, I hear barking from behind me and someone else is speaking. ‘Fucking drop the knife, Goyley, or I’ll set the dog on you.’
And for the first time in… forever… I’m happy to hear Karim’s voice. The dog’s straining at its lead now and snarling right at Goyley’s legs. For long seconds, the knife nips my skin. Then Razor does a slow hand clap. ‘Come on, Goyle. We’ll split.’
He turns to Mehmoona. ‘Delete it, sweetheart, or I’ll find out where you live… you get me?’
Smiling widely, Mehmoona inclines her head to Goyle. ‘I’m waiting.’
When Goyle steps back and pockets his knife, she holds her phone out so Razor can see the image of Goyle looking right at her, his knife pressing into my neck. Razor nods and she presses delete. ‘All gone.’
Razor studies her for a long moment. ‘I see you,’ he says and raises two fingers to his eyes and then swipes them towards Mehmoona. ‘You’re on my radar, bitch.’
Shoving his hands in his jean’s pocket, Razor turns to Karim, who juts his chin out in a fair imitation of a ‘fuck you’ stance. ‘You better watch out, paki boy. You won’t always have your dog with you.’
And he backs off, retracing his steps out of the kiddies’ playground and towards the boating lake, Goyley following.
In silence, we watch them go. My throat’s dry as owt. I swallow and accept the bottle of water Karim offers me. ‘Thanks. For the water and… well.’ I gesture towards the two retreating figures. And he nods.
Claire’s shaking, like it was her who was on the receiving end of Goyley’s charm. Silly cow looks like she’s gonna puke. Mehmoona’s face is unreadable and Jo Jo’s avoids looking at anyone.
Karim’s the first to speak. ‘D’ya think they did it? D’ya think they killed Betsy and Pratab?’
‘They got knives… I’d say it’s worth mentioning to the police,’ I say returning Karim’s water bottle to him. ‘You could tell your mum, Mehmoona.’
‘Sure. I’ll do that. Got to share an
y information we have. Don’t know which of us will be next, do we?’
With that sobering thought hanging between us, she turns to Claire. ‘Come on, girl. I’ll walk you home.’
Claire shakes her head, but we can all tell it’s half-hearted. As they leave, I turn to the boys. ‘So, anything exciting going down?’
CHAPTER 58
S ebastian Carlton had taken over the back wall of the incident room. He’d had Gus’ anonymous letters enlarged and, willfully ignoring the large printed sign saying,
Our newly painted walls
thank you for not using Blutak!
he had stuck them up in chronological order across the paintwork.
He’d also had printed copies of the images taken of Gus and Patti as well as the uploaded ones of both victims. Gus groaned. He’d get it in the neck if Bashir caught sight of that, but deep down he really couldn’t care less. He’d told her they needed an extra board across the back wall, but she’d insisted that Compo’s new-fangled interactive swipe board would suffice. Gus had argued his corner, but she’d been stubbornly insistent. Like Carlton, Gus liked to see things spread out. He liked to see as much of the information around him on walls, so he could dip in and out. It was the way he worked. He didn’t compartmentalise into handy little folders. He liked to see the whole picture.
It was strange seeing the anonymous letters all in a line like that. Usually the stuff they pinned on the walls were details about a victim or suspect, not anything personal to him or his team. In isolation he’d been able to downplay the seriousness of them. Now, all together like this, even he could see how sinister they were. There were six in total. Carlton had scribbled on multicoloured Post-it pads and dotted his observations and thoughts around the letters and now he had reclined his chair as far back as it would go, positioned another chair in front to elevate his legs and was studying his collage with his hands clasped around his middle and a half-eaten doughnut balanced on top of his belly. No wonder Carlton and Compo got on so well!
A pulse throbbed in Gus’ right temple reminding him of how charged he was. Every time he touched something, he expected it to burst into flames or, at the very least, give him an electric shock. He was desperate for action… yet there was little he could do right now. Two dead kids, a few anonymous letters, and no damn witnesses. The investigation was stalling. It was as if the heat was suffocating every clue he had. They could find no unusual links between Betsy and Pratab. And neither could they link the victims to Gus himself. The only common denominator was City Academy. Gus and Patti were both closely linked to it, and Betsy and Pratab had both attended the school… as did upwards of a thousand other kids and over a hundred staff. He was impatient for a breakthrough, and with City Academy the only link, Gus had set Taffy and Compo the task of trawling through Gus’ past cases.
Two recent cases had involved him with City Academy. The first was when a serial killing tattooist had targeted a parent from the school and the second was more recent when a house party had gone wrong resulting in the deaths of two children and with the perpetrator having links to the school. More recently, since he and Patti had begun their relationship, Gus had supported Patti through the suicide of one of her students and the arrest and imprisonment of a staff member for grooming one of the students. These may well be unrelated incidents, but Gus wanted Compo to use his skills to scratch beneath the surface on this one.
Gus moved closer and studied the display. Each letter had used the same form of address: My Dearest Detective Inspector Angus McGuire. Carlton had commented on this in his sloppy handwriting with a series of questions circling the greeting on a variety of neon sheets: Deliberately formal? Contrived? Use of language? My dearest – from a book/Internet? Use of ‘Angus’? Use of full title? – Knowledge of Gus as DI?
He’d commented on the use of the perfume Obsession to scent the letters. Adult fragrance? Significance of fragrance name?
Each letter had been signed off in exactly the same way: Watch this space!
Around these Carlton had repeated the process with the Post-its: Language – youthful? Implied threat? Warning? Link to Snapchat – usually a teen app? – distraction or clue?
Gus thought it was clear that the last two observations were pretty near the mark. Especially when combined with phrases like: ‘Your girlfriend’s pretty… very pretty!’ ‘…and your dog’s so sweet. Soooo tiny! I could squeeze and squeeze and squeeze him.’ ‘You must tell Patti that I love that blue dress…’ ‘Do you and Patti use social media much?’
Carlton lifted the doughnut off his wobbling belly and took a bite. Gus took it as a sign that the profiler was ready to impart some insight into the mind of the anonymous letter writer. ‘What you got, Prof?’
‘Well, you’ve certainly piqued someone’s interest, Gus. The question is whose.’
Give me strength. Gus struggled for calm rather than the ‘for fuck’s sake you’ve been staring at these for ages and that’s all you can come up with?’ Finally, he managed a nod. ‘You’re not wrong there.’
Carlton pushed his specs back up his nose and swung his feet off the chair sending a flurry of chocolate sprinkles from his doughnut onto the floor. Inconsequentially, Gus noticed that the Barbie plaster around the profiler’s specs was unravelling and had left a sticky black mark across the bridge of his nose. Carlton stood up and began pacing in front of the letters. Realising he’d just have to bide his time, Gus pulled a chair up, sat down, and waited. Carlton, as usual, would speak when he was ready.
‘I don’t need to tell you there’s been a bit of an escalation…’
Gus bit the inside of his lip. A bit of an escalation? Two dead kids, threatening letters, dumping the victim’s phone in his garden and a stalker was ‘a bit of an escalation?’ No, you got that right. You don’t need to tell me that. Trying to bite back the cutting response, Gus folded his arms across his chest and with an effort stopped his foot from tapping impatiently on the floor.
Carlton, hands linked behind his back, rocked back and forth on his heels and studied his display. ‘The language is contrived. It’s a disguise of sorts, an attempt to deflect our understanding of who the writer is. However, some of the vocabulary that’s slipped through makes me think, we’re talking about a relatively young person. The watch this space, the loved-up couple, all that… Say under twenty-five?
‘Of course, I’m combining that with the assumption which I think is sound, that the use of drone technology overlapping the teen murders and your being stalked points to a very definite link. If we take the drone technology. Compo tells me that these drones appear to have been ‘build it yourself’ sets, easily bought via the Internet, that have been adapted. He says a lot of skill would be needed for that. He’s already checking supply sites to see if we can find the supplier. Long shot and time consuming, in my opinion, but there can’t be that many drone experts in Bradford. However, with the Internet, they could have bought their parts from almost anywhere. If anyone can find this information, Compo’s your man.’
‘Although I agree with you that my stalker and these deaths must be linked, I’m going to need more than that. You got anything else? Surely anyone of any age could learn how to do the drone technology stuff?’
‘Yes, of course, you’re perfectly right. But it is a combination of things. The fact that the victims are teens themselves, the use of Snapchat to taunt their friends, the ease with which they uploaded the images of you and your delightful girlfriend to social media, but…’ He turned and looked at Gus. ‘Perhaps the most telling indicator is the fact that you, an observant and skilled police officer, have been observed for months and yet you’ve not noticed anything. That tells me your stalker was someone you didn’t view as a threat… a kid, a woman, someone you’re used to seeing hanging around.’
Gus thought back over the past few weeks. Had he seen anyone hanging around? He couldn’t say. Carlton was right, he hadn’t paid a lot of attention to people he didn’t perceive as possible threats
. The only people he’d seen regularly hanging around were Jerry and Dave and they could be discounted – neither the money, the ability, or the know how to devise something as complicated as this. Carlton was still speaking.
‘Another thing points towards the perp being younger… the fact that the two victims attend the same school and also the fact that the murder scenes are quite close together and took place quite late in the evening. Kids sneak out of their houses all the time, but they’re more likely to stay close to their homes when they do. Less chance of being noticed wandering around the city. Also, they showed a familiarity with the CCTV coverage.’
‘So, you think, they’re definitely linked, my stalker and the dead kids.’ Gus’ heart contracted. No matter how much logic told him that it was the killer that was responsible for Pratab’s and Betsy’s deaths, he couldn’t dodge the guilt that landed squarely on his shoulders. If he’d taken the anonymous letters more seriously earlier on, he might have been able to prevent two kids’ deaths.
Whipping his spectacles off his nose and sticking one leg in his mouth, Carlton frowned. ‘Yes. They’re linked…’ He made a strange sucking sound as he chewed the spectacle leg. ‘… but you can’t forget the forensic evidence and that’s what makes this case so fascinating.’ He turned and looked at Gus, his eyes shining as he did the strange rocking motion he did when excited. ‘There’s more than one killer, Gus. We’re looking for a team.’
Gus let the words sink in. He’d been well aware that the forensics pointed to two killers. He just hadn’t expected them to be teens. It made him feel queasy. What could prompt two kids to work together to kill another youngster? A thought struck him.
‘You think they’re both teens?’
Carlton grinned. ‘That’s what makes it so fascinating. I just don’t know. We haven’t enough victims to make any sort of real decision on that. The dynamics of the duo, to date are unconfirmed. I’ll keep working on it.’
Gus wanted to shake him. This wasn’t an academic question. This was real. Real people with families and friends now bereaved.