The Bad Things (18 page)

‘Bloody hell.’ She banged her fist on the table. ‘He was here, just before the press conference. Asking about the case. Bloody hell.’ Kate sighed. ‘And no one questioned it? No one on the inquiry?’

‘Well, you didn’t, did you? Not at the time. You reckoned there was a good reason. And as I said, it was only a rumour. No one was sure that it happened. Perhaps there was no such line of inquiry. I don’t know, Kate. It was just something that reached my ears after Jessop hanged himself.’

‘Oh, I’m not blaming you, Steve.’ She thought for a moment. ‘Edward Grainger was in charge, wasn’t he?’ She remembered him well; a bluff copper who liked to do everything by the book, but with a reputation for basic honesty and a desire to see right done. ‘I remember him. And I remember he left Suffolk as soon as Jessop and Wood were convicted.’

‘Yes,’ said Rogers. ‘He was shipped off to Guernsey after that. I think he’s retired now.’

‘Still in Guernsey?’

‘No. Came back somewhere round here I believe.’

‘Hmm. And why would Jez Clements not want every avenue looked into? Want any line of inquiry investigated thoroughly when it was his children involved?’

‘I don’t know, Kate.’

There was certainly plenty to look into; now, there were other things to do.

‘All right, Steve. I’ll have to sleep on it, or something.’ She gave him a tired smile. ‘Now it’s time to go and caravan-knock.’

She saw Rogers open his mouth to speak, and lifted a hand to stop him. ‘I know it’s late, but we’ve got a murderer to catch.’ She took her coat off the back of her chair.

‘So you’re still coming with us, are you, Ma’am?’ He shifted on his chair.

‘Yes. Is that all right with you?’

She walked out of the door before he had a chance to reply.

18

‘Here you go.’

Malone’s voice pulled Alex out of a deep sleep that had been disturbed by dreams of Martin Jessop’s bulging eyes as he hung from his top bunk, a knotted shirt around his neck. Jackie Wood had been in the dream too, smiling at her, blood dripping from her lips, hands beseeching. Alex was running away from them, down a corridor with a large, old-fashioned key in her hand. The corridor was endless, and Alex could feel panic rising in her throat. She was glad to wake up. ‘Thanks,’ she said, as he put a cup of tea on her bedside table, the feeling of terror gradually dissipating, her heart slowing down. ‘You off out?’ An unnecessary question as he had on his thick coat.

‘Yep. Got a couple of bits and pieces to do.’

She struggled up and leaned back on the headboard, wishing her head didn’t feel so foggy. The trouble was, when she got home she’d downed several glasses of white wine to dull the edges of the day. After meeting Killingback, she’d hesitated outside the police station, wondering whether to use her NUJ card to get into the presser, but had decided it was too dangerous. It was being held in a small room and she was bound to be noticed. Then, when she had got home, Malone was waiting for her. One drink led to another, one kiss led to another, and before she knew it, Malone was staying the night. She put a hand to her forehead. Had she given him a front door key, too? Oh God. She was never going to drink again.

Alex damped down a wave of nausea and concentrated on stopping the room pitching and rolling around her. ‘What sort of bits and pieces?’

She knew it sounded as though she was quizzing him, and she probably was. Malone wanted to move in with her, said they belonged together; fitted together. Alex wasn’t sure he was right – how could she be – she’d only known the man for three months. But only a couple of days ago she’d been thinking he might be the one for her, so why was she hesitating now? There again, an in-depth interview for a magazine was hardly an application form for the role of boyfriend and surrogate father to Gus, was it? Because that’s what she wanted as well. Not just someone to share things with, talk over things with, laugh with, but someone who could keep Gus on the straight and narrow. Or just any path, as long as it didn’t involve the police.

And that was another problem. She knew, from the way Malone always evaded any poking into his past, that he wasn’t exactly squeaky clean. Not such a good role model, then. On the one hand, she was so desperately lonely. On the other, she had always sworn she wouldn’t introduce a man to Gus unless it was somebody she was serious about.

She could remember very little of Gus’s father, had only a fuzzy recollection of his face, which she thought had been tanned and handsome. For that, read bland. She’d been in Ibiza with a dozen other hacks on her first press trip and spent the first twelve hours in a club high on vodka cocktails and freedom. She’d just dropped a tab of Ecstasy when he came up to her and began to chat. He might have been the DJ at the club, he might not have been. But she’d had a sort of recklessness about her at the time that made her go back to his flat and do things girls like her shouldn’t. The next morning she tiptoed out of that flat without saying goodbye. Feeling a failure.

She hadn’t even known she was pregnant for three months, and when it had finally dawned on her, made an appointment with a clinic in London to ‘deal’ with the problem. Then she was commissioned to write a piece about attacks on abortion clinics in the States and she’d had to look into the whole issue. What she found out made her cancel her date with the clinic, pack up the job, and go home to Suffolk.

Gus was the most important and precious thing in her life.

After he was born she vowed she would avoid relationships like the plague, but not long after, Martin Jessop had come along. She’d never really figured out what had made him different, why it had seemed right at the time, she just lived with the regrets.

Then when Millie and Harry were killed, Alex’s emotions were all spent on her sister. But now the loneliness had kicked in, as well as the realization that she wasn’t getting any younger.

And Malone made her laugh. But she still knew very little about him.

‘Malone? What bits and pieces?’

He smiled and stroked her hair. ‘Come on, sweetie, just stuff.’

‘Are you ever going to tell me what stuff?’ She realized her voice was shrill, but she had no idea what he did, where he got his money from; how he made a living now he wasn’t being an undercover copper any more. ‘I’ll start to think you’ve got a wife stashed away somewhere.’

He leaned over her and planted a kiss on her forehead. ‘I must go.’ He turned towards the door.

‘What about the police?’

He paused, his hand on the door knob and she could have sworn she saw his back stiffen. ‘What about the police? I thought it was all okay.’

‘It is. I just thought…I just thought you needed to go and do your statement, give your fingerprints and all that.’ Alex’s heart started hammering almost as badly as it had done during her dream and the nausea came back with a vengeance.

‘I’ve done it.’ He turned. ‘So no need to worry, okay?’ He patted his pocket. ‘Don’t worry, I can let myself in now if you’re not home.’

‘Okay,’ she said. Damn, damn, damn.

She fell back onto her pillows. One day she would follow him, see where he went, what he got up to. She smiled. Now she really was going barking mad. The thought of even being able to follow him without him knowing was ridiculous. The thought of following him was ridiculous. Stupid.

But where did he go?

And had he deliberately ignored her jibe about a wife?

She shook her head, and waited for the room to stop spinning again. Waited for her skin to stop feeling clammy. Enough. She reached for her cup of tea and her hand brushed something metallic and cold. The key to the locker in Norwich.

Why would Jackie Wood have hired a left luggage locker unless she had something to hide? It wasn’t as if she’d left stuff there during a day trip to the city, otherwise she would have got it out at the end of the day. No; there must be something in there she didn’t want other people to know about. What other people? Alex wasn’t sure, but one thing she was sure of: she had the key and she could find out what Wood was hiding. Perhaps. How she hoped it was the diary. What was it the reporter had said? Dead men tell no tales. Maybe not. But diaries certainly can.

An hour later she was up, showered and dressed, and eating dry toast in the kitchen with Gus, the hangover having retreated more than she deserved.

‘What are your plans for today, love?’

He shrugged, smearing jam onto his piece of toast. ‘Seeing the lads. Maybe a bit of footie in the park. Hang around, you know.’

She nodded. ‘Great. But—’

He silenced her with a look. ‘I’ll be okay Mum, really.’

He reached across and rubbed her arm, obviously having sensed her doubt. ‘I will, Mum, I promise. I won’t spend the day at the amusement arcade or anything. I’ll probably do something healthy like go fishing as well as have a bit of a kick about.’

She laughed. ‘Fishing? I rather doubt that.’

He feigned a hurt look. ‘Why?’

‘First,’ she ticked it off on her fingers, ‘you don’t have a fishing rod, and second, there is nowhere to fish around here – except the sea, I suppose – and third, you don’t even like fishing.’

‘Rumbled,’ he said, getting up and putting his plate in the dishwasher. ‘Mum, don’t worry. A bit of footie really is on the cards and then we’ll just hang about. Maybe do a bit of studying.’

She hardly thought studying fitted the agenda. ‘And who is we?’ she asked, not expecting much of an answer.

To her surprise he blushed. ‘Oh, you know. Jack and the rest of the gang, and Carly and a couple of her friends.’

‘Carly?’ That was interesting.

He went to the fridge, took out a pint of milk and poured some into a glass. ‘She was round here the other day.’

‘Ah yes. The pretty girl with the bee-sting lips.’

He drank the milk without meeting her eyes. She could see him blush. ‘I hadn’t noticed.’

‘Okay. Is she going skiing too?’ She hoped she kept her voice casual.

‘I think so.’ Gus kept his voice casual too.

‘Great.’ Oh, the import behind the one-word answers. ‘She seems nice.’

‘Yep.’

Okay, warned off.

He put down the glass, and she longed to lean over and wipe the milk moustache off his top lip. But he beat her to it, dragging the back of his hand across his face. ‘What about you, Mum? What are you doing today? Working?’

Alex thought about the Jackie Wood interview she should finish, and she thought about the key to the locker in the Forum nestling in her pocket. She knew which she ought to do, but she knew what she was going to do. ‘Actually, I think I might drive up to Norwich. I need a few things from Marks’s.’

‘Haven’t you heard of internet shopping?’ her son said, laughing. ‘Save you the petrol and the aggro.’

‘I know, I know. But I feel like a bit of a mooch around, treat myself to a bit of lunch or something.’ The key was burning a hole in her pocket.

‘Go for it, Ma.’ He pecked her on the cheek. ‘Gotta go. See you later.’

She might have been imagining it, but Gus seemed more relaxed, more in tune with himself. She rather hoped that Carly had something to do with it.

Alex arrived in Norwich as the sun struggled out from behind a slate-grey cloud and the pavements were just about dry.

Leaving her car in St Giles’s car park, she headed down towards the market. How she loved its vibrancy. The colourful awnings; the buzz of chatter; the tangy smells of hot dogs and fish and chips vying with the aromas of freshly-ground coffee and frying Chinese noodles; stalls selling artisan bread and organic vegetables jostling for trade with those selling boiler suits or every part imaginable for vacuum cleaners. She wandered slowly, up and down the aisles, weaving in and out of the crowds and the pigeons strutting among the people and pushchairs; steam rising from the freshly cooked food and hot drinks. Putting off the moment when she would go to the Forum, frightened about what she might find – or what she might not find.

Enough.

She paused only for a minute at the second-hand bookstall and then almost ran up the steps and out of the market. There was the Forum; a great modern edifice of glass and steel, opposite the beautiful fifteenth century St Peter Mancroft Church. She loved the juxtaposition of old and new.

The powder-blue lockers were located inside the foyer near the stairs to the car park in full view of the people who’d gone inside to take shelter from the cold. She held the key in her hand – she didn’t need to look at the fob to know the locker was number fifteen.

Standing in front of the locker, she tried to look as though she was meant to be there. Nonchalant, not shifting about looking guilty. Then she slid the key into the lock and turned it. The door swung open easily. Inside was a large brown envelope, which she pulled out and put in her handbag. Then she closed and locked the box, her heart beating hard.

Ten minutes later Alex was sitting in her favourite coffee shop, cappuccino in front of her, the tempting smell of Steve’s sausage rolls wafting around. She opened the envelope.

Drawings. No notebook, no exercise book, nothing that could constitute a diary, just a sheaf of paper covered with childish drawings. Primary colours – red, green, blue – splodges of paint depicting…what? A house, a stick family, a tree, maybe grass. Another – yellow, brown all mixed up. A tail was there, maybe? She turned the paper over:
The Tiger Who Came To Tea by Millie Clements
written in a no-nonsense hand
.
A third piece of paper, just a long tail of green.
The Hungry Caterpillar by Harry Clements.
She turned over more and more sheets, all paintings, all by Millie or Harry. All so precious. She touched some of the paintings with her fingertips, thinking of the twins, imagining them flinging the paint on the paper. Why had Jackie Wood got these irreplaceable pieces of childhood? She slumped back in her seat.

A memory: she was round at Sasha’s house, waiting. Her sister and the twins arrived back, laughing, cheeks flushed from the hot air outside. Millie and Harry were wearing matching Teletubbies’ T-shirts and sun hats and were holding tight to Sasha’s hands. It was one of Sasha’s good days, when she was enjoying looking after her children, being a wife, enjoying her life. Her eyes were bright, without the unfocused expression that overshadowed many of her days, and her skin looked fresh and luminous, not the grey that so often characterized her appearance.