I Know You (DI Emma Locke)

by Louise Mullins

  ‘You’ve evaluated her job skills, but what’s she like when she’s not at home or work or laid up in a hospital bed injured? How does she relate to people? How does she cope when under pressure?’

  ‘If you want to assess her personality type why don’t you just ask the Met for a copy of her psychological inventory?’

  ‘Because data protection insists her medical information remains confidential unless she commits an offence, which as far as we know she hasn’t. Unless you’ve already accessed the reports garnered during the IOPC’s internal investigation?’

  ‘Those unfortunately retain no relevant private information.’

  ‘You’re quoting from Maguire’s superior.’

  ‘Yes. But if you’ll let me get a word in edgeways, I did get a contradictory opinion of Sinead from her mother-in-law.’

  ‘That doesn’t count. They’re all witches.’

  He ignores me. ‘Cynthia “put up with her” for the sake of contact with her grandchildren. She found her “offish” and said that Sinead “would be nothing without Aeron,” her son. She thinks Sinead has a “dubious past.” She even went so far as to call her “aloof” and wait for it, “uncaring”.

  ‘Ooh, the bitchiness.’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘You’re just out of nappies, boyo. There’s a lot you haven’t seen yet.’

  He ignores my crass comment and says, ‘I did speak to Pierce though. He was under the illusion that I wanted to delve a bit deeper into the Tyrell case they were working on together before she and her family moved to Wales, something I got the impression he wasn’t keen on discussing.’

  ‘Why, what did he say?’

  ‘Well that’s just it. He kept diverting the conversation. It makes me question whether Sinead actually made the report against Pierce’s drug use or if someone wanted to remove him from the investigation into Tyrell’s murder.’

  ‘I suppose they could both have been set up. It’s rare. But it can happen. Not even the constabulary are immune to illegal behaviour, but do you really think one of their colleagues would stitch them up knowing the repercussions of getting caught?’

  ‘The fire at Evesham’s home resulting in his murder could be related to professional not personal circumstances.’

  Someone wanted to knock Evesham, Pierce, and Sinead off their perches?

  ‘Have you spoken to Inspector Rawlings yet?’

  ‘No. I’ll get back on the blower to the Met and organise a telephone interview with Rawlings to get his side of the story.’

  I glance at the clock on the wall. ‘Okay but make it after lunch. It’s almost time, so why don’t you go and grab us a coffee and a double cheeseburger meal each from McDonald’s while I go outside for a fag. I’ll meet you back in the office in twenty minutes.’

  He shakes his head and smiles.

  HONOUR

  Croydon, London

  I’m seated in front of my counsellor sipping cold tea she had to remind me to drink. She waits for me to respond but I’m focusing all my attention on taking a sip without spilling the liquid down my front. My hands haven’t stopped trembling since DS Maguire notified me of Natalie’s death and the tremor has grown worse since Marcus broke into my house. My counsellor says it’s a physiological reaction to stress. I put the cup down gently onto the coffee table beside me. ‘Secondary trauma?’

  ‘It’s common among people who’ve experienced something similarly traumatic to an event they’ve recently been confronted with. You had a reprieve of several weeks where you were beginning to come to terms with what happened to Steven and were intent on considering options that could help you to move forward. But you say you feel your hope has been dashed, that you don’t believe the police will find the culprit responsible now that you’re re-experiencing the grief you felt immediately after your son’s death.’

  ‘Murder. He didn’t die, Joy, he was killed. And what does re-experiencing even mean? I was just over-compensating for his loss before. Pretending I was starting to heal. I don’t think I’ll ever get over it.’

  ‘I don’t expect you will. But you can learn to live with it because Steven is still a part of you, of your life.’

  ‘My only son is gone.’

  ‘Not from your memory. You are still a mother. That doesn’t have to change. Visiting his plaque, laying fresh flowers beside him, cleaning the granite stone, polishing his photograph, tending to him, nurturing him… do you see what I mean?’

  ‘That makes me a parent?’

  ‘I’m interested to know how you think Dejuan feels about your shared loss. Have you spoken to Steven’s father since his brother contacted him at the prison to notify him that your son had died?’

  ‘No. The prison officer passed the message onto him via Shamar. He didn’t even bother to call and ask how I was, has made no effort to discuss the ongoing investigation with his brother. As far as I’m concerned, Dejuan can go and fuck himself with a prison issue pool cue.’

  ‘You said last week that your sister was a lifeline,’ she says, ignoring my mini-rant.

  ‘I haven’t spoken to Faith about how I feel regarding Natalie’s murder.’

  ‘Perhaps you should? You disguised your true feelings behind the appearance of being okay shortly after Steven was murdered, and we discussed the warning signs we would look out for. You remember what they were?’

  ‘Denying myself the time to appreciate the present, suicidal ideation, hopelessness, tiredness, achiness, coldness, shivering, sleeping in, and lack of appetite.’

  She glances noticeably at my crossed legs, palms flat against the armrests of my chair, tooth nibbling the inner side of my cheek. ‘And isolating yourself from others.’

  ‘By pushing people away, becoming defensive. I know.’

  ‘Honour, I’d like to feed back to you what I’m noticing right now because I’m concerned with the transference between us here. I’m picking up a progressive slide into negative thoughts.’

  ‘I’m done thinking up ways of doing myself in.’

  ‘That’s good to know.’ She smiles sadly.

  ‘I’ve got a new focus.’

  ‘I’m getting a sense of urgency.’

  ‘I can’t wait to leave to be honest with you.’ I pull out my phone and show her the Facebook group I set up last night while lying in bed, unable to sleep without the familiar snoring emanating down the hall from my son’s empty bedroom.

  ‘Kanesha gave me the idea. She told me to invent a hashtag and to make my posts personal but to aim them specifically at mothers to gain interest, and hopefully some decent leads.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  I recognise the high note in her voice. ‘I’m not distracting myself. It’s important Steven, Natalie, and Tyrell’s deaths aren’t forgotten, or ignored.’

  She skim-reads the ethos written on the home page of Trades Not Blades. ‘Your goal is to prevent knife and gun crime by raising awareness on the importance of education as a safeguard. I’d say that’s a hefty cause and one which will generate a lot of support from the community.’

  *

  I’m fastening my seatbelt, about to pull away from the doctor’s surgery with my counsellor’s worried voice still ringing in my ears: A little distraction is good so long as its aim isn’t to divert attention away from focusing on yourself, when my phone rings from inside my coat pocket. I don’t recognise the number, am not expecting to receive a call from Carmen.

  ‘Jerome. He’s gone. I thought he was with Keenan but apparently my brother’s been reported missing. The police visited Mum to tell her they’d opened the investigation, but she didn’t tell me. She was probably on a crack binge out selling all her electrical items for more rocks or smacked out of her fucking face so forgot to inform me. Look, have you seen or heard from Jerome at all?’

  From the sound of Carmen’s breathless voice, I imagine she’s running on automatic. Our civil ‘polite-ship’ for the sake of our kids has always been a brittle falsehood. Mentioning Jerom
e’s visit before Natalie’s unanticipated murder again would be a bad move. And accusing Jerome of criminal conduct, for the second time, suspecting he wasn’t only involved in gang culture but may also have been my recent intruder would be incredibly stupid. ‘No. I haven’t seen him. Where are you?’

  ‘At home. I’ve been calling everyone I can think of, but the phone Jerome contacted his uncle on to arrange to meet with is turned off and DS Maguire insinuated that it wasn’t Keenan he had been messaging.’

  She doesn’t mention why the detective spoke to her, but I assume it was to question Jerome to discover if he was my home invader. Why else?

  ‘Don’t move until I get there. We’ll go and look for him together.’

  ‘I don’t know. DS Maguire said not to leave the house in case he comes home while I’m out.’

  ‘I’m on my way.’

  I heard the panic in her voice. A background noise no one can identify unless they’ve been through the same fear and dread. I can put our differences aside if it means finding Jerome safe and well, but I can’t rid the gnawing anxiety that’s clawing its way through my stomach and flooding my heart and making me want to vomit.

  What if he’s not alright? What if he’s next? What if there’s a hit list they’re all on and each member of the gang is being taken down one at a time?

  DS MAGUIRE

  Croydon, London

  I’ve barely made it from the incident room to the corridor when Pierce accosts me. ‘Marcus wasn’t home.’

  ‘No shit, Sherlock.’ He gives me an inquisitive stare. ‘I didn’t expect Marcus to wait in to be arrested for unlawful entering, and certainly not when he’s already got a shoplifting conviction. He’s going straight to Feltham Young Offenders Institution, and he knows it. Plus, I visited him earlier and accused him of being involved in Steven’s murder. He would have scarpered the moment I left his flat.’

  ‘Uniform are footing it to see if he’s staying with any of his mates.’

  ‘I doubt he’s hanging round anywhere local.’ I take a breath. ‘No news from missing persons on Jerome’s whereabouts yet either.’

  ‘I doubt they’re together.’

  ‘So do I. I haven’t met one member of the CRO-020 crew, also known as the Croydon Boyz, who respects Marcus, least of all admits to liking him. But if Jerome’s not with him, it’s likely he is with his uncle Keenan as he doesn’t seem to know anyone else.’

  Although he is a member of a gang, so he’s probably got loads of mates he can stay with who’ll keep his residency on the low, Marcus and Leighton aren’t going to confide their contact details to us for fear of recrimination.

  ‘Nah, I can’t imagine Jerome and Marcus hiding out together somewhere for this long without one of them ending up—’

  ‘Don’t say it, Pierce. Don’t tempt fate.’

  I catch the glare in his eyes, a momentary lapse, his guard slipping. I ignore it, waiting for him to internally combust from the tirade of derogatory remarks he can’t release in front of our co-workers as I walk alongside him. We walk up the corridor to where the desk clerk sits, focused on the closed-circuit television screen on which the images from several motion sensor cameras flip back and forth as they detect movement in the various cavernous areas of the building. She turns her attention to the door, to me, as I’m about to push it open to leave, clicking her fingers with one hand and pointing to Pierce with the other. ‘Intel were looking for you both about three minutes ago.’

  I rush up to the first floor ahead of Pierce, hitting the stale scent of milk emanating from old plastic coffee cartons that have been left to ferment, noting several paper bags covered in pastry flakes crushed into the waste paper basket beneath Leanne’s desk, two feet from the radiator. ‘There you are,’ she says.

  ‘You didn’t look very hard. We were only in the incident room.’

  ‘I thought you’d already clocked off, at least that’s what I would have done had this not come in.’ I peer at the screen of her PC while Leanne reads the report aloud so that Pierce, despite staring broodily out of the window at the other end of the room, can hear what it says. ‘Marley, twenty-three years old, lives alone in a one-bedroom flat in Mr Mahajan’s tower block. We’ve just been given the heads-up the man’s selling gear through his letterbox and that he receives several deliveries on Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings at around 6 p.m.’

  ‘Call drugs squad then. I’m sure they’ll be more than happy to intercept a drop-off.’

  ‘He was friends with Tyrell,’ she says.

  ‘Carmen’s eldest son. The one that was stabbed to death four years ago,’ says Pierce, as if I’ve forgotten who he is.

  ‘So he’s working for a gang. Most local dealers are.’

  ‘Not just any gang,’ she says.

  ‘The Croydon Boyz.’

  She nods. ‘And check this.’ Leanne lunges forward, shoving the chair into the edge of the desk with a whack, using the mouse to scroll down the page and landing the cursor on a familiar name.

  ‘DS Sinead Nicholls, my predecessor, interviewed Marley in connection to Tyrell’s murder.’

  I look to Pierce whose face I swear has whitened though it would be difficult to tell considering his pasty complexion. ‘You partnered with Sinead for two years. You worked alongside her throughout her presence on the investigation into Tyrell’s murder. You’re the only member of the original team who worked the case still here. Why didn’t you tell me about the existence of Marley?’

  ‘With all due respect,’ says Leanne, trying to divert my attention, ‘he wasn’t here for half of it. He got knocked off the investigation when Sinead was suspended pending further enquiries by the IOPC. Isn’t that right, detective?’

  Even if I wasn’t a distrustful second-guessing sergeant, I’d still bet the twitch of his nose is an indication Leanne’s hit a sore spot. And I can’t wait to hear how Pierce managed to convince Rawlings to keep him off indefinite desk duty.

  SINEAD

  Newport, Wales

  Having left the hospital I’m now under strict instructions on what I can and cannot do. The list of don’ts is longer than my forearm. No strenuous activities for two weeks, including exercise and walking further than fifty yards. No TV. No internet. No staring at the screen of my phone for extended periods of time. No bright lights or loud noises. No reading. No cleaning, and therefore no work. I’m basically confined to the house to laze around and do nothing. I’ve taken to staring out of the window, my foot tapping the laminate in a drumbeat of restless discontent.

  Today Tulip wears his dark curly hair down. It falls midway to his elbows. He crosses the parking bays towards his beat-up Renault that looks evermore rusty and dented as each day passes. There are two bicycles he’s forced into the boot by removing the wheels, the handlebars of which look as though they’re going to snap as he slams a microwave on top of them then crushes a guitar into the now overloaded vehicle.

  I wonder how it still runs with the amount of abuse he gives it and am surprised when he turns the engine and it doesn’t. He tries several times to start the motor.

  The stuttering can be heard through the partway open window I’ve forced myself to gulp air through because the house feels cramped and stuffy since I decided not to stay in it longer than necessary. Last week I didn’t want to leave, now my home no longer feels safe enough to live in.

  I watch the woman from across the street drag her three-year-old son into the house, turn on her fat friend, and yell at her husband, before slamming the door on them both and wonder if she’s just discovered they’ve been having an affair. Not that they are. At least not that I’m aware of. I certainly haven’t noticed anything like that going on over there.

  People-watching has become a pastime. I invent stories to fit my neighbours because I’ve got sod all else to do. Confined and bored, I’m going out of my mind.

  I stare at the sky, the grey clouds, the light spattering of rain falling gently onto the ground and imagine what it mus
t be like to drown in your own misery.

  I remain perched on the wide windowsill.

  A short while later a Peugeot pulls up beside Tulip’s car and an elderly man I recognise as a regular visitor to the house he shares with his mother steps out of the vehicle with a set of jump leads to boost the battery once Tulip’s popped the bonnet. He sits and talks and turns the key, and at the point that I guess he’s flooded the engine it sparks to life with a whistle and a roar sending me sprawling backwards. I slam the window shut and snap the blind across the glass. The noise reminding me of the vehicle that ploughed into mine, triggering a wave of panic.

  I tell myself to ignore Tulip and his strange ways. Though I still can’t help wondering what he was doing taking photographs of my house, videoing the sky, sending those bloody annoying drones up and across the street at ridiculous hours of the night.

  DI Locke hasn’t replied to my voicemail, asking how far she’s got in her quest to find the blond man who owns the metallic-blue BMW. And I’m starting to worry she might never find him.

  When the landline rings, cutting through the silence with its offensive sharp noise, I’m just glad to have a caller. Something to break up the monotony of the day.

  ‘Cynthia?’ Aeron’s mum.

  ‘He told me you’d been attacked.’ That’s her way of acknowledging my ordeal and asking how I am without having to use the words.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ve been discharged from the hospital then.’

  ‘Uh, yes.’ If she detects the sarcastic note in my voice, she doesn’t mention it.

  ‘Who have you pissed off?’

  No, ‘do they know who did it?’ or ‘have the police caught him?’ but immediately jumping to conclusions, blaming me. I shouldn’t be surprised. Cynthia is as blunt as a hammered nail and as insensitive as drywall to a chisel.

  ‘Possibly the same man who drove into my car.’ A lie. The police and I know it’s not. ‘Aeron owed him money, so the man decided to unlawfully enter our home and punch me repeatedly in the head until I lost consciousness, hoping to bully Aeron into paying up.’