Dead Alone (18 page)

Irene stood on the breezeblock and banged on the door.

‘Clare! Open up! I know you’re in there!’

A window opened further down the passageway. ‘Oi, do you mind! Some people are trying to sleep.’

‘Sorry. I’m worried about Clare. Have you seen her?’

‘You the filth?’

‘Do I look like the frigging police?’

‘Some copper came round. We haven’t seen her since. We was thinking she’d been arrested.’

‘Clare? Don’t be thick.’

‘Well then, why hasn’t she been in to see the old lady next door but one? Relies on Clare, that woman does.’

‘You could do it.’

‘Not my business, darling.’ The man pulled his fat head back inside the window. Irene knelt at the
letter box. ‘Clare, sweetheart, it’s me, Irene. Open the door.’ She rummaged in her large, soft leather handbag. ‘Right, I’m calling the police. Nine, nine, n—’

Clare appeared in the doorframe at the end of the short hallway. Irene had known that if she was still breathing she wouldn’t want anyone wasting the emergency services on her. Clare felt very strongly about that. She wasn’t to know that Irene didn’t even have a mobile phone.

‘That’s right, love, open the door.’

Clare opened the door.

‘Jesus, love, what’s happened?’

‘Frank’s dead.’

‘What?’ Irene pushed the stationary Clare back inside and closed the door, put an arm round her and led her to the sitting room. A video of an early Ray St Giles’ show was playing silently on the telly. Irene ignored it. There was a solitary dent on the seat cushion. Clare returned to exactly the same spot, sinking lower than she had before. Irene noticed a layer of dust on the faux-mahogany side table. More on the windowsill. Dust eddied in the shaft of light, it was the only thing that moved – that and St Giles, silent on the screen. Time had stopped for Clare Mills. ‘I’ll make us some tea and you can tell me what’s happened.’

Irene poured a hefty amount of whiskey in the tea, added several spoonsful of sugar and brought a duvet back with her. She prised Clare’s elbows off
her knees and put the duvet over them instead. Clare held the mug with two hands. Unsteady. Childish.

‘I’m going to turn this off, sweetheart. It’s not helping.’

‘He killed my family, Irene. That man killed my family, and there he is, laughing at me.’ She looked up at Irene. ‘He should have killed me too.’

‘Don’t talk like that.’

‘Why not? He left me here, clinging on to the hope that I would find Frank, and now I know he is dead. What was it all for? Those years of being strong. Pretending I could cope.’

‘Tell me about Frank. What happened?’

‘That policeman came. He was ever so upset, worried he’d given me too much hope. We went to Sunderland, see, met a man. He was ever so nice. We both did DNA tests. Course he isn’t my brother. Frank is dead. I have been fooling myself for too long.’

‘So, wait, the policeman didn’t tell you he was dead? You don’t know for definite?’

‘I know –’ she pointed to her chest – ‘in here. He’s dead. ’Cause if he wasn’t, we’d have found each other.’

‘Sweetheart, he probably doesn’t know he had a sister. He may be a completely different person to you.’

‘No, Irene. I am a good person. Mum and Dad, they were good people. Frank would have been good too. No one can find him.’ She stood up and walked to the kitchen. The five names, written in
black marker pen on white card, were still up on the wall.

She ripped the first one off the wall. ‘Stewart – returned to mother, aged six.’

She grabbed the second. ‘Prison. He was born in Ireland.’

The third. ‘Clive. Living in Sunderland, parents unknown, no DNA match.’

The fourth. ‘This poor blighter killed himself. Illegitimate son of a priest and a prostitute.’

The last, fifth and final. ‘Gareth Blake. Died aged four. Caught some disease a year after being taken into care. Could have been Frank, I suppose. Never traced his parents. But Frank was a healthy boy when they took him. Care was an evil place, but they didn’t like us to die on them, looked bad. Meant people came checking. We were always taken to a doctor at any sign of a cough. They wanted us nice and healthy for their dirty ways.’

Irene put her arm round Clare’s thin shoulders. ‘I’m so sorry. I should have taken you in myself.’

Clare turned to her. ‘Both of us?’

‘Of course. That’s what I meant. I should have taken you both in.’

‘Thanks, Irene, you’ve been a good friend. Mum was lucky to have you.’

Her team may have thought she was mad, but the magistrate was easier to convince: he had given
her the search warrant straight away. Ray St Giles opened the door for Jessie. The team she had handpicked for the job – Burrows, Fry, and another PC – stood behind her. Ray St Giles smiled.

‘Back so soon, Detective Inspector?’

‘I have a warrant to search these premises,’ Jessie stated. Ray St Giles did not take the papers she proffered him.

‘Look, luv, I know bent coppers, and you aren’t one of them. I don’t need to go over your paperwork, do I? Wouldn’t mind going –’

‘That’s enough, Giles,’ said Burrows, stepping forward.

‘St Giles to you.’

‘I don’t think so.’

Jessie began to direct her team through the series of interconnecting Portakabins that made up the St Giles empire. It wasn’t much. Thin blue nylon carpet. A punctured soundproof ceiling on a grid of weak metal rods. Cheap office furniture. The whole thing vibrated with the footfalls of searching policemen. She knew exactly where to look, of course, but played out the ‘search’, opening every drawer and cupboard until she reached the filing cabinet that Tarek had told her about. It was locked. As she knew it would be.

‘Keys, please,’ said Jessie.

Ray St Giles threw them at her. She caught them left-handed. He smirked. It made her feel stupid. She knew what she was going to find in that cabinet from the look on his face. She opened it. Nothing.

‘Rather big piece of furniture to keep in these, well, let’s be honest, fairly cramped offices.’

‘You’re right. I’ve been on to the company to move it. We’ve no need for it in here. Having said that, I’m not planning on being in these offices long.’

‘Who works here?’

Ray St Giles shook his head. ‘Okay, Detective Inspector, if you want to go through that charade. I have a production assistant called Tarek Khan, a good boy, a hard worker. You’d like him, Driver. I have a research assistant, a lad called Alistair Gunner. He’s new. Prepared to work for shit just to be in TV, but, hey, that’s not my problem. There are others – the receptionist, the secretaries, the make-up girls – but they don’t come down here much.’

Jessie remembered the girl on her knees. ‘Can’t imagine why.’

There wasn’t much point, but she carried on searching the premises until she had looked from wall to pre-fab wall. Still nothing. Ray St Giles had known she was coming. It made her worried for Tarek. She wondered where he was.

The window glass was protected by a wire mesh. Outside, a slender man stood in the courtyard. He turned away when he saw Jessie looking.

‘Make you feel at home, does it, Mr St Giles?’ She nodded towards the window-guard.

‘I have served my time, Detective Inspector. Are
you so short of evidence that you have to start harassing old-timers?’

‘Just routine enquiries.’

‘Routine, my arse. Go away, DI Driver. Go back to your desk and your theories and start again. Bad girl, you go to the bottom of the class. I expected more from you.’

Jessie bristled. ‘The cable company can’t afford to pay you much, can they?’

Ray picked up a cigarette and lit it.

‘You’ve got a nice house, though. North London, too. It must be worth, what, a million now?’ said Jessie, one eye on the lad skulking in the courtyard.

Ray St Giles walked over to where Jessie stood and put a hand firmly in the middle of her back. He pushed her away from the window, a steady, firm push, that directed her to the door. Burrows moved in.

‘Down, boy,’ said Ray St Giles. ‘No need to get heavy, but I think we have concluded our business here, haven’t we?’

Jessie nodded for the men to move out of the room.

‘You haven’t asked me why I’m here,’ said Jessie, feeling Ray’s hand conduct uncomfortable heat through her leather jacket.

He put his mouth next to her ear. ‘I don’t have to,’ whispered St Giles.

Jessie turned to face him, but Ray put his index finger up to her mouth. ‘I care about my career,
DI Driver. I care about it very much. People protect the things they care about. I suggest you do the same.’

‘Are you threatening me?’

Ray laughed. ‘You’ve been reading too many of those gangster books. Threatening you, that’s very old hat. No, just offering you some career advice. What are you, thirty-two, thirty-three? You must be ambitious. Wouldn’t want a harassment charge against your name, would you? Death to a copper, that is, in these oh-so-sensitive times.’ He showed her the door and began to close it. She watched him through the narrowing gap. ‘Then again, Detective …’ he said, as the door closed and the flimsy aluminium frame shuddered.

Burrows put his hand on her shoulder. She jumped.

‘News from Niaz. He’s found your boat.’

Jessie took her bike. It was quicker, and this she wanted to see. At last the much-criticised search of the river had revealed the first solid clue for two, possibly three murders. She had been wrong about the tunnels. They were a red herring. One that had successfully sent her down into dank, disused burrows while the answer lay, like Verity, on the mud all along. But not on the same shore. The opposite shore. That was clever. Jessie never thought the murderer would cross the river. It seemed too dangerous. She’d only been searching the south side. But now, thinking about it, with
nothing suspicious on board, how risky was it to cross to the other side, if you weren’t afraid of the river itself?

The boat was a punt. Like the rower Nick Elliot had said it would be. It had a flat stern and a shallow draw. Perfect for slipping up and down the mud flats. Jessie reached the river just as the crane was lifting the boat out. Silt-laden water ran through a gaping hole that had been punched in its base. The evidence had been scuttled. Laid to rest in the deeper channel between the north bank and the Richmond Eyot. Hundreds of people walked along this stretch of the river at low tide. The murderer’s footprints would have merged with the rest until the next high tide brushed the bank smooth again. Richmond. A nice touch. It wasn’t a riddle. It was a reminder.

P. J. Dean wouldn’t have gone through all this just to get rid of an errant wife. These murders had the hallmarks of a more sinister motive. If P.J. had wanted Verity dead, all he had to do was give her an overdose. Even if Eve was a thorn in his side, she would be hard pushed to tarnish his good name. Yes, he had strange domestic arrangements, but what famous musician didn’t? It wasn’t enough to make him a murderer. Not of this calibre. This had been planned. For months, maybe years. So who? Who resented Verity Shore’s, Eve Wirrel’s and Cary Conrad’s celebrity status enough to kill? What could their deaths achieve?

The crane swung the boat round and began to
lower it over the waiting tow-truck. It spat brown water at the on-lookers. There was paint on the side of it. A name. Jessie got closer. The remnants of a name, in green letters. T/T: Tender To … The rest had been scratched out. Jessie was determined to find out which larger vessel this boat had belonged to. Who had bought it? Who had sold it? Who had made it, and when? She gave her list of requests to the forensic team and returned to her bike. At last she had something to tell Jones. She’d have to give him the bad news too: Ray St Giles was on to them.

Jessie was spread over the sofa like margarine. It had been a lousy week. Ray St Giles was on her case and the boat was proving hard to trace. They had found evidence in the house in Barnes, even extracted DNA and traced it to known drug dealers. Two were behind bars at the time of the murder and one was abroad. They had several other, unidentified strands of DNA, but nothing that matched evidence picked up at the wood, the church, or Cary Conrad’s house.

Maggie came in with a plate of Marmite on toast and two cups of tea. ‘It wasn’t as bad as I thought it was going to be,’ she said, feeding Jessie. ‘Henrietta is a dominating old cow, but Joshua isn’t bad, once you get to know him.’

‘Hm …’

‘If only his mother didn’t suffocate him. She suffocates everyone – it’s all about her, her, her. Everyone conveniently forgot it was supposed to be my show. I tell you, she’s a bitch. I soon found a way to piss her off, though.’

‘What did you do?’ asked Jessie, spilling crumbs down her front.

‘Flirted with her son, of course. It was quite hilarious to watch. Any time I went anywhere near him, she would appear in a puff of Opium. She has everyone eating out of her hand as if she were royalty, but the truth is she’s just some wizened old woman with an Oedipus complex.’ Maggie shuddered. ‘Joshua has quite a reputation with the women, so I don’t think the feeling is mutual.’

‘Is there a Mr Cadell?’

‘Oh yes, Christopher, he used to be a documentary-maker until he was eclipsed by his wife. Henrietta says he is very busy, no one knows in what though. They are still together, but rumour is he also likes the ladies. Poor old Henrietta, looks like she keeps getting left out. No wonder she writes such gruesome books about sex and murder. All historically accurate, of course,’ she mimicked. ‘She told me that Ray St Giles murdered more people than he went down for.’

Jessie sat up. She’d heard those words before.

‘That got your attention. Henrietta said that he murdered two women, prostitutes, who worked in his club. She’s been doing research on it. She wants
to know how a man like that gets his own show. She absolutely hates him.’

‘She’s not alone.’ Jessie rubbed her eyes. ‘If she hates him so much, why go on his show?’

‘Oh, she didn’t decide she hated him until afterwards. It was a chance to promote the book, so she took it. You would have thought a woman that famous didn’t have to worry about sales, but no, she and her entourage go around the country to bookshops, radio stations – she does the works. I’ve always told you, success is no accident.’

Jessie lay back down on the sofa. Ray St Giles and two prostitutes. Well, that changed things. Maybe he’d had them killed, maybe he was still having people killed, maybe there was a history between Gunner and St Giles …

Maggie hit Jessie’s leg. ‘Wake up, we’re going out.’

Jessie groaned. Maggie stood up. ‘Come on, get your arse in gear. You’re not getting out of this one. We’ve got something to celebrate.’

Jessie raised a tired eyebrow.

‘That job I was up for. I got it!’

Jessie sat up in a spurt of energy. ‘Well done. I said you were fabulous.’

Maggie smiled. ‘Thank God we spent all those evenings in, practising on bananas. No, Jessie, don’t lie down again …’

‘Okay, okay, give me …’ a few moments, I’ll get myself sorted right now, I’m … Shit! It’s my brother’s birthday, must call him.

‘Give you what?’ Maggie stood over her.

‘What?’

‘You’re doing that thing again, drifting off in mid-sentence.’

‘Oh, sorry. I’m knackered. Everyone thinks I should arrest P. J. Dean, bring him in for questioning.’

‘You can’t do that. Women around the world will be up in arms.’

Jessie sat up. ‘Maggie, you won’t tell –’

‘My lips are sealed. As always. Peel yourself out of those obscenely tight leather trousers, get in the bath, then let’s go and party.’

‘Put so delicately, how could I resist?’ Jessie heaved herself off the sofa and went to the phone. ‘Get ready to sing,’ she said to Maggie. ‘It’s Colin’s birthday.’

‘Hello?’

Jessie prodded Maggie and they began to sing Happy Birthday. Badly.

‘What an aria,’ said Colin.

‘Have you had a nice day?’

‘Great. The girls brought me sugary lukewarm coffee and soggy toast at five thirty this morning.’

‘Oh, sweet.’

‘Yes. Adorable. How’s Bill?’

‘Amazing, as always. Working in dire conditions with more good nature than is actually human. We’re thinking of going down the Nile on his next break – what do you think?’

‘I think you’d better discuss it with my wife.
Why don’t you come up for the weekend? The kids would love to see you.’

‘I can’t. Sorry.’

‘They want a word, let them down gently.’

‘
JESSSEEEEE
,’ came the two shrieking voices down the line. ‘We’re making a tepee in the garden with Dad’s old shirts,’ said Charlotte.

‘That’s a wigwam, if you didn’t know,’ said Ellie.

Moving over to the window, she asked them both in turn what they had given their dad for his birthday. Ellie, the older, was in the middle of describing the Bob the Builder sweatshirt she had chosen for Colin when Jessie pulled the curtain back absentmindedly. Something on the street made her jump. Not something, somebody. Watching.

‘Talk to Maggie,’ she said, thrusting the phone into Maggie’s hand and running to her bedroom. Without turning the light on, she looked out of the window again. Nothing. She looked up and down the street. No one. Her eyes were playing tricks on her. It was Ray St Giles. He’d got her spooked. Exactly as he wanted her to be. Damn him and his liquid eyes.

Maggie was holding up a stunning black dress with spaghetti diamanté straps when Jessie returned to the sitting room.

‘Bloody hell,’ said Jessie. Maggie turned it round. It had no back and one big label. ‘Armani? Did you get a pay rise?’

‘Sort of. I like to think of it as a bonus.’ She grinned wickedly. ‘I went on a photo shoot for
Glamour
magazine – girls on the box, that sort of thing. Anyway, this amazing article of clothing happened to fall into my bag.’

‘Maggie …’

‘Honestly, I’ve no idea how it got there. I think you should wear it.’

‘Me?’

‘Come on, P. J. Dean might be there.’

‘I doubt it. His wife was recently dipped in acid, he probably isn’t in a party mood.’

‘From what I hear, that marriage was a sham. Like everything else these days. Now come on, don’t be a spoilsport.’

‘I can’t, that’s stolen property.’

‘Please get over yourself and put it on.’

Jessie couldn’t resist. ‘What about you?’

‘Funny thing that, some other stuff fell into my bag.’ Maggie held up a white leather trouser suit.

‘Ouch.’

‘It calls for vodka,’ said Maggie. ‘And if anyone asks, your sugar daddy dressed us.’

When they left the flat an hour later, Jessie scanned the street in both directions. There was no one in sight. Nevertheless, before climbing into their waiting taxi, she did a quick sprint to the tree where she thought she had seen someone. On the pavement was a barely smoked white-tipped cigarette, half of which was squashed flat against the York
stone. Using a plastic food bag from her handbag, she picked it up and wrapped it. Instinct and polythene bags. These were the tools of her trade and she never left home without them.