Child's Play (17 page)

‘Oh, inspector, do give me your card.' Harries disrupted her train – make that plane – of thought. The Portman voice was near perfect. ‘I'll be sure to call. Has it got your home number?'

She masked a smile. So that's what had rattled Dave's cage. Portman's harmless bit of flirting. Given Jude Fox's winning way with words, two could play at that game. ‘Silly me, Dave,' she simpered, held his gaze, ‘that took a second or two to sink in.' She didn't add ‘like seeing your dentist at the butcher's' and hadn't adopted the teacher's husky tones, but Dave had clearly cottoned on.

‘Touché.'

‘As opposed to touch-ee?' Eyebrow raised, she scraped back her chair. ‘I'm off. Catch you later.'

Harries watched Sarah leave, her head high, shoulders back. ‘Whip the cuffs on any time you like, boss,' he muttered under his breath. Sighing, he pushed the plate plus congealed contents across the table. He'd give his right arm if she said the word. Actually, no, he'd need both arms to sweep her off her feet. He gave a wry smile. Like that was going to happen. He knew the arguments, of course: Sarah was The Boss, he a lowly DC, nearly a decade younger and work relationships rarely – for want of a better word – worked. Either the brass frowned on them or station comics dined out in style on the material.

And yet … He grabbed his jacket, headed towards the door. He fancied the pants off her. More than that, her cool analytical brain fascinated him. So where was she coming from? He knew she'd not had a partner since the solicitor guy. And equally convinced she wasn't as frigid as some of the blokes made out. He couldn't believe she went in for one-night stands. Or trod the celibate path. Maybe she just didn't fancy him. Get real. He'd read the signals. OK, subtle signs. He knew she valued his opinion as a cop, and on the social side, he made her laugh, helped her chill. He'd just have to persist without being pushy.

‘Penny for them, Dave?'

Glancing up, he saw Paul Wood approaching along the corridor.
It'll cost you more than that, mate.
‘You'd need a mortgage, sarge.'

Shona Bruce was having a quick nose through Luke Holden's letterbox. ‘Bloody hell.' The detective glanced up at her partner. ‘Call an ambulance, Beth.'

The rented Selly Oak bed-sit was like thousands of others across the city. Except for the smell. It certainly wasn't gas, Shona was dead sure of that. Scrambling to her feet, she slipped a phone out of her pocket. ‘I'll ring the DI.'

‘What do you mean not well? He was at a funeral.' The logic sounded flawed and the volume loud even to Sarah.

Standing in the DI's doorway, Hunt raised a palm. ‘Hey, I'm just the messenger, ma'am.'

‘Sorry, John. Carry on.' The ear-bashing wasn't intentional, the edge in her voice down to concern.

‘Don't know much more. He took ill in church and a mate drove him home. The mate just rang. Reckons the chief might not make it in for a few days.'

She frowned. Baker couldn't even pick up the phone to tell them? She muttered a distracted, ‘Right, thanks, John,' but addressed the door. Hunt had left her to it, probably to extract the flea from his ear.

Sarah sat back, crossed her legs, flung her pen on the desk. It wouldn't just be a head cold. Baker had never taken time off sick as long as she'd known him. Certainly explained why she'd not heard back from him though. Given Mrs B had buggered off months ago, presumably he'd be on his own in the house? Sarah pursed her lips. Wondered if the old boy liked grapes? As she reached for the phone, it rang. ‘Shona? Hi.'

After a minute or so, she hung up, pensive. She hoped Luke Holden liked hospital food.

The only food Luke Holden would be sampling for a while would be via a tube in his nostril. He looked whiter than the sheet he lay on. Even through the glass of the IC unit, Sarah could see he wasn't up to visitors, let alone a formal interview. She could also see why Caitlin had got mixed up with the guy. Despite his critical medical condition, he was well fit, strong features, fine bones. Quite the sleeping beauty. So why try to kill himself?

Shona and Beth had found Holden lying face down in a pool of vodka-stinking vomit. He'd supplemented the booze with enough sedatives to fell a bull elephant. If he was seeking a bit of shut-eye, the syringe sticking out of his right arm seemed superfluous. The oblivion could easily have become permanent according to the medics. When Shona had entered the bed-sit his breathing had been so shallow, she thought they'd already lost him. The CPR she'd administered at the scene almost certainly saved his life. The coma he was in now had been chemically induced.

‘I couldn't find a pulse at first, ma'am.' Standing alongside Sarah, Shona kept a steady gaze on the patient, steadier than her voice. ‘If we'd not got there when we did …' Her hand trembled when she held a bottle of water to cool her forehead. What little colour the redhead's complexion normally held had faded, and the freckles looked darker, more pronounced.

‘Good work, detective. You did well.' Sarah briefly considered patting her arm, but Shona was no-nonsense Glaswegian; she'd shrug off any sign of moral support or physical contact. Besides, Sarah didn't do the touchy-feely stuff.

‘I was glad to see the paramedics, ma'am. They got a drip in, gave him oxygen. Called in the details to A&E. Those people are brilliant.' Typical Brucie, modest, self-effacing. ‘A neighbour let us in. That saved a wee bit of time too.'

While the drama unfolded, Beth had scouted round the place; apparently neither room had cat-swinging potential. Nor any other kind from what Sarah had heard. As well as being small, it was sparse, surprisingly neat. No pictures, books, CDs – nothing personal, nothing linking him with Caitlin Reynolds. Beth had found a donor card and next-of-kin details in Holden's wallet. His mother lived in Devon and had sounded less than grief-stricken, according to the officer who spoke to her. Mrs Holden would, quote, ‘try and get up there early next week'. If Sarah was in the same boat, she'd get a move on. Looking at Holden, she reckoned the donor card could come in useful any time.

She voiced her next thought. ‘But no note, Shona.' No indication why? It wasn't a given; only about a third of suicides left some sort of explanation.

‘Not that we saw, ma'am. I guess it might have been a cry for help?'

Booze, pills and a shot of heroin?

Thank God somebody heard it then, because to Sarah it sounded like overkill.

N
icola let herself into the house, leaned her head against the door, squeezed her eyes tightly shut. Deep breaths helped slow her heart beat, but nothing would soothe her mind, rid it of the poignant image: the little girl in the sundress, smiling, clutching the teddy bear. The little girl her parents called their princess. The little girl Nicola's mother had murdered.

She sank to her haunches, buried her face in her hands. Other pictures surfaced in her mind's eye: Pauline proudly holding her mum's hand, Pauline splashing in a paddling pool, Pauline in the school nativity play with wonky wings and half-mast halo, Pauline's father carrying a tiny white coffin into a village church.

‘Dear God, no,' Nicola murmured again and again.

The air in the library had been lifeless. She'd spent an hour there surfing the net, scouring news archives. If she'd not seen the stories herself, she wouldn't have believed them. With growing horror, she'd skimmed report after report, printed out the most shocking, furtively slipped them into her bag.

All those column inches, and in all these years not one word from her bloody mother.

Nicola shucked off her coat, slung it over the banister, headed for the kitchen intending to make a drink. Sod that. Tea wouldn't do it this time. She diverted to the sitting room, poured a large Scotch, swirled most of it round her mouth. She drained the glass, picked up the bottle then placed it back. No more; she needed a clear head.

She'd felt uneasy in the library, as if people knew what she was, as if ‘murderer's daughter' was tattooed on her forehead, as if they could read secrets with their prying eyes. She needed to look at the articles properly, try to get her head round the impossible. By God she'd seen her mother in a new light, all right. She kicked off her shoes, settled on the leather sofa, reached into her bag.

Headlines leapt at her:

The same photograph appeared alongside every report. Nicola tried but failed to see her mother's features in the ten-year-old Susan: the dark pudding-bowl haircut, fat moon face, mean little eyes behind National Health specs. Glowering and surly, she looked every inch the spiteful bully prosecution witnesses had described. Nicola guessed it was a police mug shot. Surely if her mother's family owned a better picture they'd have given – if not sold – it to the press? Maybe papers didn't pay back then, though? From Nicola's reading, the reporting certainly wasn't as sensational, the tone and language restrained by today's standards. The story didn't need sexing-up anyway. A ten-year-old girl bludgeons her best friend to death then tries to blame it on an innocent man?

Nicola snorted. Un-fucking-believable.

She lit a cigarette, sucked smoke deep into her lungs. She scanned another print-out, desperate to locate any mitigating circumstances. Anything that could help her understand why? A defence lawyer hinted at an abusive background. Several bruises had been found on Susan's body during a medical examination. Her father was known to be handy with his fists, especially after a drink. She'd also come in for a lot of stick from the village kids, bullying, name calling. Big deal, Nicola thought. At least her mother had lived to tell the tale.
Tell the tale?
Yeah right. What a joke.

She glanced round for an ashtray, headed for the kitchen. The way she saw it Susan bloody Bailey had got off lightly. Her Majesty's Pleasure had turned out to be a meagre ten years. Two tabloids had carried the story:
Babe in the wood killer released on probation
. That was 1971 and the last references Nicola had been able to find. There'd been none of the subsequent press hounding that had dogged Mary Bell, the only other female child killer Nicola had heard of. Shame really. The media had run Bell to ground and she'd been forced to tell her daughter the truth about who she was, what she'd done. Nicola had spent her entire life in ignorance. Blissful? Not now it sodding wasn't. She saw it as utter betrayal.

She leaned against the sink, ashtray in hand. All these years of living a lie, hiding behind a false façade. Had the police given her mother the new identity? Maybe she'd ask – when she could bring herself to speak to the old bag again. Even today, she'd clammed up about it, literally turned her head against the wall. Claimed she couldn't remember. Christ, did she think Nicola was thick or something? Patently, her mother hadn't imagined the tongue, the mystery man, a whisper in the ear. ‘Speak no evil' hadn't been a warning to keep her trap shut in the future. It referred to the web of lies she'd spun in the past. She
must
have known the significance when she'd begged Nicola to visit. Selective amnesia? Memories dead and buried? In deep denial, more like. Her mother had protected her own miserable existence for years. And the way Nicola felt now, she'd never forgive her.

And neither, she realized, would the man holding Caitlin.

The pieces were falling into shape; Nicola was beginning to see the picture. Pauline's murder was the motive for Caitlin's abduction. Sins of the fathers? Sins of the grandmother.

Crime and punishment.

Nicola and Caitlin were paying the price. That was why they'd been targeted. But who was exacting revenge? And what would be the cost?

Stubbing out the baccy, she pricked her ears. Didn't recognize the ring-tone at first, then almost dropped the ashtray. She ran next door, fumbled for the phone in her bag. ‘Hello? Who is this? Hello? Hello?'
Damn, damn, damn.

‘Took your time, didn't you, Nicola?' She heard the smirk in his voice. Funny guy. Dead funny.

‘What do you want?' she snapped.

‘What do you think?' Curt contempt.

She took a calming breath, softened her voice. ‘Look, please, I just want my daughter home.'

‘Pauline's mum and dad wanted her home too.' Silence, deliberate pause. ‘Just not in a coffin.'

Nicola tasted blood in her mouth. ‘I'm truly sorry about the little girl. But please, you have to believe me, until a few hours ago I knew nothing about the murder.' Her eyes smarted with tears. ‘You can't blame Caitlin or me for anything, surely you can see that?'

‘I'll tell you what I see, shall I, Nicola?' His tone implied it would be the last thing she'd want to hear. ‘I see an eye for an eye.'

‘Oh my God, the tongue …?' She pressed a hand to her mouth to prevent more words and thoughts escaping.

‘Neighbour's nosy dog. It needed silencing.' Dismissive tone. Minor detail. Back to the point. ‘An eye for an eye, a tongue for a tongue.'

A child for a child?
The ultimate retaliation. Nicola swallowed. ‘You want—'

‘Justice.'

‘But Cait—'

‘Not Caitlin. Your mother. I want to spit on her grave.'

‘She's an old woman for God's sake.'

‘Too old. She's a waste of skin. Just do it, eh?'

Nicola showered until the scalding water ran cold, scrubbed until her skin was raw. The symbolism wasn't lost on her: a psychiatrist would wax lyrical about ‘washing away sins' – out, out, damn spot and all that. Maybe there was an element of that but in reality, she'd felt unclean, contaminated, even now she felt her skin creep. Hugging both arms tightly round her waist, she paced the bedroom. When she'd helped the old bitch on her way, he'd let Caitlin go. That's what he'd promised. Could she trust him? A man who revelled in taunting her, who'd snatched her daughter, hacked out a dog's tongue? She swallowed bile. Thank God, she'd not reported that touching little tableau. All bets were off if she contacted the cops, he'd warned.
Bets?
Crass bastard.