Hanging Hill (21 page)

4

Zoë went back to her office, clenching her teeth so hard they hurt. She couldn’t get Ralph’s face out of her head, how he’d been so scared of his parents. She couldn’t get Nial out of her head either –
He wasn’t out hurting Lorne Wood
. Nial
knew
what she only had a hunch about: that Ralph wasn’t a killer.

The door to the incident room stood open, the whiteboard covered with scribbles, Ralph’s photo pinned up. She passed it, went into her office and stared at the reams of paperwork among which there
might
be a person who
might
know something that
might
prove them all wrong. Something that would let Ralph off the hook. She sank into her chair, a sense of defeat creeping over her. A lot of ‘mights’ and no ‘concretes’. Ralph didn’t stand a chance. Didn’t stand a sodding chance.

Somewhere outside the office a door slammed. She didn’t get up but used her toe to pull her door open a fraction. Ben was coming along the corridor. He was holding a folder under his arm, his glasses in the other hand, a strained look on his face, as if this case was really doing his head in. Behind him came Nial, slouching along uneasily, trying to act nonchalant and doing such a bad job of it that he only managed to look furtive. The two weren’t exchanging a word.

Zoë was about to retreat when Ben’s office door opened and Debbie came out. She was wearing a creamy lace dress – feminine and innocent – high green sandals on her tanned feet. There was a bit of a sway in her step, as if she was enjoying life. Her face changed when she saw Nial. She stopped in front of the door, crossed her arms and frowned at him as he passed. Like a head-mistress who’d just come face to face with the biggest troublemaker in the whole school. He raised his eyes sullenly to her and, very, very slowly, Debbie shook her head. If the gesture had had words they’d have been:
you silly, silly little boy
. Then, as if there was nothing more disappointing to her in the whole world, she turned on a heel and walked away in the opposite direction.

Before anyone could see her, Zoë kicked the door closed and turned her chair back to the computer. Her face was hot. She rolled up her right sleeve and studied the skin. Covered with marks and scabs. She found a piece of flesh that wasn’t marked. It would be easy to dig her nails into it – so easy. She closed her eyes. You don’t have to, Zoë. Don’t.

The computer beeped to let her know an email had arrived. She opened her eyes, blinked at the screen. It was from a DS in the targeting team. There was a paperclip next to the subject line. She rolled down her sleeve and clicked on the attachment. It was a PDF file with three main spreads: on Marc Rainer, Richard Rose and David Goldrab.

She clicked on Marc Rainer first. He was pictured leaving a café on a nondescript street with two black guys who wore tight trousers and Afro hair, as if they wanted to be in a blaxploitation movie. Rainer was thick-set and wearing a mustard turtle-neck under a brown leather jacket. He wasn’t London Tarn. The second was a custody photograph. Richard Rose. An English name, but his heritage was from somewhere in the Levant: Turkey maybe, or Cyprus. She clicked on the third. And sat, hardly breathing, looking into his eyes.

London Tarn. Unmistakably, London Tarn. Years and years had passed but she’d have known him anywhere.

His name was David Goldrab.

5

‘Have you ever heard of David Goldrab?’ The uniformed inspector looked up from the overtime sheets he was signing off. Zoë stood in the doorway, her arms folded. ‘David Goldrab. Apparently he’s got connections on our patch.’

The inspector put down his pen and looked at her levelly. ‘Ye-es,’ he said cautiously. ‘Why?’

‘Oh, nothing. Just his name came up. I’m having a little look at him.’ She broke off. The inspector’s face was twisting unhappily. ‘What is it?’ she asked. ‘What’ve I said?’

‘Nothing. It’s just that …’ He glanced at the telephone. ‘David Goldrab?’

‘That’s the one.’

‘I put down the phone to his brother about an hour ago. Nice piece of work – calling from London. Called me a “fucking woolly” and a few other things. Made a few allegations about my feelings towards sheep.’

‘His brother?’

‘Yup. Goldrab’s not been heard from for nearly four days. He lives up near Hanging Hill, and usually he speaks to his mother in London every day, morning and night. But he hasn’t answered his calls and now she’s having epis right, left and centre, the brother’s going ballistic and apparently we’re supposed to get every officer in Avon and Somerset Constabulary out hunting for this jerk. So he’s got form, has he? I didn’t know.’

‘He hasn’t,’ Zoë said distantly. She was thinking about Hanging Hill. North of the city. It faced north, looking out towards the Caterpillar. It was a weird place, damp and a little lonely. There was a bus stop there, on the same route that took in Beckford’s Tower – where Ralph claimed to have met Lorne on the night of her death – and continued to the bus stop at the canal. ‘Or, rather, he should have form but he flew under the radar. Clever man. Have you actioned anything yet?’

‘Someone in Intelligence is going to look at his phone later, and his bank account – but he’s not exactly vulnerable. One of the cars’ll swing by and do a welfare check.’

‘Have they left?’

He stood up and craned his neck to look out of the window at the car park. ‘Nope. They’re taking the GP car. It’s still there.’

‘OK. Call down. Tell them not to bother. I’ve got to drive through Hanging Hill in about twenty minutes. I’ll save them the hassle.’

‘You’re not getting all helpful on us, are you?’

‘Helpful? Christ, no.’ She patted her pockets, looking for her keys. ‘Like I said, I just happen to be going that way.’

6

The West Country got the first of the weather from the Atlantic. It got the first of the winds and the first of the Gulf Stream. Its job was to tame the systems for the rest of the country, to filter them out before they passed over to the powerful cities in the east. But the west had got used to waiting until last for the sun. Dawn took its time over Russia, over the Continent, creeping across France and over the ferries and small boats of the Channel, moving inland over London with its glass towers and steel buildings grazing the underside of the sky. By the time daylight found Bath it was weary of the land and anxious for the blue of the Atlantic. Evenings in Peppercorn Cottage were like fiestas, flame-coloured and long, but mornings seemed tired, half-hearted and flat, as if the light was only there because it had nowhere better to be.

That Monday morning it was misty. Millie had gone to school and Sally and Steve had breakfast at the kitchen table, beside the window. Afterwards they sat there, not talking, just staring out at the garden and fields. On the table between them was an empty cafetière and an untouched plate of croissants. Neither of them had much appetite – since Thursday they’d both felt tired, constantly tired. Sally had taken Friday off work and Steve had postponed his trip to Seattle. It seemed neither of them had the energy for anything.

A deer appeared outside, nosing the hedge at the bottom of the garden, its outline faint and blurred in the morning mist. Neither Sally nor Steve moved, but maybe it sensed them there – or maybe it could smell the traces of David Goldrab, reduced to ten knotted, bulging carrier bags – because, without warning, it startled, turned to look directly at the window, then bounded away.

Sally got to her feet and went to the Welsh dresser. She took a small key from her pocket, unlocked a drawer and took out a tin, which she opened and carried to the table. It contained an assortment of objects: some photos; David Goldrab’s signet ring with the four diamonds and the emerald – one diamond for every million he’d made in profit, the emerald for when he’d hit five million; the keys to his house, bristling with electronic fobs, two solid gold dice hanging from the ring; and five teeth. Steve had chosen the ones that were the most distinctive and had been the most visible in the photos: two incisors, which were filled with white composite, and another three, all molars, with gold fillings across the crowns. Their fine sharp roots were dull and brown with blood. ‘I can’t keep these things here any longer. You never know, with Millie in the house.’

‘I’ll find somewhere to hide them. Somewhere safe.’

‘Are we … going ahead? You know, with—’ She bit her tongue. She’d nearly said Mooney. ‘With the people in London.’

‘I’m seeing them tomorrow. Then it will all be sorted.’ He looked at the date on his watch. ‘I was supposed to be coming home from America today.’

‘I know.’

‘I’m still going to have to make that trip. And soon. I’ve postponed it once, but I can’t again. I’ve got to keep going on with my life. We both do. We have to behave as if it never happened.’

‘Yes.’ Sally nodded. ‘I know that too. It’s OK.’ She pushed her chair back, got to her feet and began pulling on the HomeMaids tabard. When David had hired her, he’d asked the agency to adjust the days she and the Polish girls went in. Today was the day the management had chosen. There had been nothing in the news about David Goldrab, so she knew she had to go along to Lightpil House as if nothing had happened. If she cancelled, or did anything out of the ordinary, the police would be bound to turn their attention to her. The slight bruise on her cheek left from David pushing her into the boot lid had already disappeared. Really, there was no excuse now. ‘You go to America. I’ll be OK.’

‘Sally?’

She looked up. ‘What?’

‘You know it’s all going to work itself out?’ In the morning light Steve’s face was older. His beard coming through made him look as if he’d lived a hard life for many years. ‘Don’t you?’

‘Is it?’

‘You made the best of a bad situation. And there isn’t going to be some sort of divine retribution for it. You won’t get punished. Do you believe me?’

She closed her eyes. Then opened them slowly. ‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘Maybe.’

7

The moment Zoë crested the horizon on the lane at Lightpil House she knew Jacqui had been right and that something along the line had changed seriously for the London boy who’d come out west in the 1990s. The house on the other side of the wall looked more like a Mediterranean palace than anything else, with its white walls and balustraded terrace basking in the sun. David Goldrab must have discovered someone in Bath’s Planning Department on his porn mailing list to have got Lightpil House through the application. It was horrific. Truly horrific.

She slowed about twenty yards from the front gates, pulled the Mondeo into a small layby and studied her reflection in the mirror on the sun visor. If he was at home he would never recognize her after all these years. But he might recall the name Zoë Benedict. In her pocket she had her own police warrant card, but there was a second one too, with the name Evie Nichols on it. She’d found it years ago, kicked under a table at a riotous police party. She should have done the right thing and given it back, but she hadn’t: she’d kept it all these years, sure one day it would come in handy. Anyway, she told herself, she was fairly sure she wasn’t going to need it. If phone calls were going unanswered Goldrab probably wasn’t there. Even so, she was shaking as she nosed the Mondeo forward to the gate, leaned out and pressed the buzzer.

No one answered. She waited two minutes, then rang again. When still no one answered, she parked the car on the side of the lane and wandered along the perimeter fence until she found a gap in the hedge. She squeezed through, emerging in the garden, and stood on the lawn, brushing off her clothes, looking up at the house with its enormous windows and glass atrium. Lorne, she thought, did you ever stand in this garden? Or on that patio? Or behind one of those windows? Wouldn’t it be something if your life turned out to have this in common with mine, as well as all the rest?

She went silently up the steps on to the huge sandstone terrace, and wandered along the back of the house, peering into the two-storey conservatory at the tall palms and the wicker furniture. The place was flooded with sunlight. She put a hand against the window to shade her eyes, and saw the filaments of the halogen lamps all lit, a newspaper discarded on one of the cushions. A little bud of curiosity opened in her. She went to the glass door and tried it. It was unlocked. She put her head inside, looking up at the glass ceiling, waiting for the familiar beep-beep-beep of an alarm system. But there was nothing.

‘Hello?’ she called. ‘Anyone home?’

Silence. She sniffed. The air was stale and the house was hot, as if the heating had been left on. There was condensation on the ceiling panes of the atrium. Missing, huh? Missing? She ferreted around in her pockets and found a pair of latex gloves. Pulled them on and stepped inside, looking around at the huge space. Amazing, she thought. All this because people liked to watch other people having sex. She went into the huge kitchen and looked at all the gilt and marble and downlighting. Two glasses sat on the kitchen table, one half full of champagne. There was a half-eaten sandwich on a plate next to the fridge, going hard and grey. In the microwave oven she found a plate of pasta, also dried up and congealed. She opened the fridge and saw a bottle of champagne with no cork in it. She sifted through the other things in there – bottles of vitamins, cartons of orange juice, packets of bacon and sausages. There was a marble cheeseboard with four wedges of cheese on it, covered with clingfilm. She picked up a bag of salad and checked the date: 15 May. Yesterday.

‘Hello?’ She stood in the hallway and called up the stairs. ‘Mr Goldrab?’

No answer. She went up the marble staircase, her footsteps echoing round the hall, and checked all along the first floor, both wings of the house, opening doors and peering into rooms that looked as if they’d never been set foot in since the day the house was finished. There was a gym, a home cinema, a clawed bath with a tap in the shape of a swan, and a four-poster bed in one room that could have slept ten people. No David Goldrab. Back on the landing she noticed a glass case standing open, a picture of a night safari in the back of it. Two aluminium arms were mounted in the picture. It was a display cabinet. Empty. Zoë experimentally opened and closed the glass door, looking at the lock, then at the stand. Whatever was missing from it was important.

She searched downstairs and still found no sign of him. Overlooking the back garden, an office was filled with banks of computers and DVD players – all black, red lights blinking from their shiny surfaces. A bespoke bookcase made of a reddish wood, maybe walnut, lined one wall, full of photos. There were two computers, each with a light on. When she touched the mouse of the first, the screen came to life. A spreadsheet with figures entered in three columns. The second PC also sprang to life with a quick nudge. This one showed an array of video icons. She peered at the titles:
Bukkake in Gateshead
;
Bukkake in Mayfair
. Bukkake – like Jacqui had said. Christ, she thought. Lorne, if I see your face in any of these, I promise I’ll find a way to keep it secret.

She closed the blinds, sat down in the swivel chair, and began opening files, watching them with her elbows planted on the desk, her mouth tight. Jacqui had been right about how nasty bukkake was. None of it actually broke any laws that she could think of, but it was pretty disgusting nonetheless, and Zoë had a high threshold for things like this. She truly, truly hoped she wasn’t going to see Lorne staring back at her from the floor of one of these bear-pits.

She was concentrating so hard on the faces of the girls that it wasn’t until the third video that she recognized the male star of the show. Jake the Peg. Jake the Peg! God, she thought, she could be as dumb as a bag of hammers sometimes. The whole station had been wondering how Jake had sharpened up his act lately – knowing he had to be up to something more than just dealing to the schoolkids. But a porn star? Old Peggie? No one had guessed that one. And no one would have guessed how he’d got his nickname. She gave a small, dry laugh. ‘So, Peggie,’ she murmured, looking at the screen, ‘
that’s
your secret.’ Christ, the world was a screwy place.

Zoë spent two hours going through the hard drives with a fine-tooth comb and by the end of it she was about 99.9 per cent sure Lorne wasn’t in the videos. The faces of one or two actresses who’d made brief appearances weren’t completely distinct. She made notes of the frames they appeared in. The girls weren’t blonde, like Lorne, but she could have been wearing a wig. When someone from HQ came over to pick up the computers Zoë’d ask for those faces to be enhanced. She pushed the keyboard away and gave the swivel chair a push with her foot, making it twirl. The bookcases sped by, then the window, with a view over the lawns, the swimming-pool and the trees outside. All the DVDs and the computers.

She brought the chair to a stop. Folded her arms and sat there, considering this situation. Half-eaten food? A computer like this left on standby with all the sensitive shit on it? Doors unlocked? Lights on and phone calls not answered? She didn’t know, just didn’t know, but if it wasn’t too good to be true, just too damned convenient for words, then the cop in Zoë would have guessed that Mr Goldrab, the only man who could link her back to that Bristol club, was no longer alive.