Bodies By Design: The 2nd Jasmine Frame Novel (Jasmine Frame Detective)

by P R Ellis

  ‘Sometimes she dropped it off here. Sometimes my wife went to collect it.’

  ‘Oh, so you did go round to Bredon Road, Mrs Taylor, and met Honey?’ Jasmine said. This was interesting - surely Mrs Taylor must have noticed something different about Honey Potts’ statuesque, well-endowed figure.

  ‘A few times, that’s all.’ Mrs Taylor waved the question away.

  ‘And you didn’t find her appearance unusual?’

  ‘What do you mean? I suppose she was a big woman.’

  ‘You didn’t think that she might be transsexual too?’

  ‘Do you see transsexuals everywhere, Miss Frame?’ Mrs Taylor spat out Jasmine’s name. ‘No, I never gave it a thought.’

  Kelvin Taylor looked at his watch and heaved himself off the sofa. ‘Are there any further questions, Officer? I have another appointment.’

  Tom glanced at his notepad. ‘We may have more questions, Mr Taylor, but I think that’s all for now.’

  ‘Good. My wife will see you out.’

  Tom and Jasmine stood up and were ushered towards the front door. As they were leaving, Jasmine turned to Mrs Taylor.

  ‘Xristal and Honey were she-males. Were you aware of that, Mrs Taylor?’

  ‘What a strange term. What does it mean?’

  ‘They had the appearance of women, but the working genitals of a man.’

  ‘What a disgusting thought. Of course I had no idea. Goodbye.’ She closed the door on them.

  ‘Why did you ask that?’ Tom got into his car.

  ‘I wanted to see how she would react?’

  ‘And?’

  ‘Well, she’s a stuck up cow, but she’s either a consummate liar or a complete innocent if she wasn’t intrigued by Honey Potts’ augmentations.’ Jasmine plugged in the seat belt.

  ‘Perhaps they do know more about the prostitution angle. We’ll have to check their other properties.’

  ‘And definitely put them on your suspect list.’

  ‘What motive would they have? Xristal was apparently paying her rent regularly so why should they want to lose that? There’s no evidence linking either of them to the scene. There’s not even proof that Xristal and Honey were prostitutes. We need to track down some of their clients.’ Tom turned the car back towards Kintbridge. ‘Do you think they shared any of Tilly’s punters?’

  ‘Tilly caters for a totally different clientele,’ Jasmine said. ‘Her punters like young-looking girls, not big women with pricks!’

  Tom dropped Jasmine off in St Benedict’s Street and she sauntered back to Bredon Road. She passed her car and walked the full length of the street. Parfitt’s SUV was back in its regular position, but there was no sign of him. Another chance of snapping him missed. Feeling fed up with the chore of surveillance, Jasmine returned to her Fiesta. Sighing frequently, she tried to focus on watching Parfitt’s house, but her attention kept wandering. Thoughts of her impending operation and who could pick her up from the hospital, jostled with images of Xristal’s remains on the hospital slab and wondering about Xristal’s life as a she-male bondage specialist whore. Her mind flicked from one problem to another with no solutions to her questions.

  To break the pattern and stop herself nodding off she got out of the car and went for the familiar short walk up and down the street. It was late afternoon by now and there was no movement in Parfitt’s house. Her phone rang from inside her bag. She scrabbled for it, hoping it was Tom with some news and perhaps another, more interesting task. Once she had it in her hand she swiped the screen not noticing who the caller was.

  ‘Hi. Tom?’

  ‘No, it’s Angela, Jas.’

  ‘Oh. Hi. Sorry I wasn’t expecting you...’

  ‘No, well it has been a while hasn’t it?’ A while! It had been over a month since Jasmine had heard from Angela, and they’d only seen each other once in the nearly three months since the divorce had come through.

  ‘I suppose you’ve been busy, Ange.’

  ‘Yes. You too?’

  ‘Yeah. I’ve got quite a bit on.’

  ‘That’s good.’ Angela’s sympathetic tone rankled a bit because it always seemed she doubted that Jasmine could make a go of living and working alone. But, she reflected, they’d had good times together and Angela understood her better than anyone else.

  ‘Look,’ Angela went on, ‘I haven’t got long, but I thought it was about time we met up again, don’t you think?’

  ‘Yes. That would be nice.’ They always had plenty to talk about whenever they met and, now the divorce was out of the way, there was no more of that irritating legal business to sort out. Perhaps Angela would be free to pick her up from the hospital on Monday?

  ‘How about tomorrow evening, Jas? We could meet in a pub. It’s short notice, I know, but…’

  ‘That will be fine.’

  Angela would now guess that she still didn’t have much of a social life and could come out whenever she called. Well, that was true enough. She was free unless something came up with the investigation, in which case she’d just have to put Angela off.

  ‘Where do you suggest?’

  ‘How about the Earl of Pembroke in Whitclere? Do you know it?’

  ‘Yes, of course.’ Jasmine couldn’t remember ever visiting the pub, but she knew the area.

  ‘It does good food and it’s the type of place where you can have a decent chat.’

  ‘That’s good.’

  ‘Shall we say eight o’clock?’

  ‘Fine.’

  ‘Oh, by the way, I’ll have a friend with me. His name’s Luke. He’s looking forward to meeting you.’

  A friend? A boyfriend? Jasmine was surprised at how the news affected her. She knew that now she and Angela were divorced there was nothing stopping Angela finding another man. There hadn’t been anything in her way before, to be fair. They were no longer partners and hadn’t been lovers for considerably longer but, nevertheless, the thought of Angela being with another man depressed her. Angela would no longer be her soul mate.

  ‘Jasmine? Is that OK? I’ve got to go.’

  ‘Uh. Yes. I’ll see you both tomorrow.’

  ‘Good. Take care.’

  Angela hung up. Jasmine found herself standing on the pavement staring at the phone. Why was Angela so keen to meet? Was it to show off her new boyfriend, to prove that she had moved on, that they were no longer an item? The divorce had been a legal necessity rather than a sign that they had stopped loving one another - although in reality their relationship was over. She still loved Angela, although the need to be a woman was a stronger emotion and had put an end to their married life together. She returned to the car, wondering what this Luke would be like and feeling that another thread connecting her with her past life had snapped. Sitting watching nothing happen seemed a pointless exercise and she felt restless. Enough of waiting for Parfitt to appear, she needed to do something. Her mind turned to Xristal and Honey and how they earned the money to support their lifestyle. Were they working on their own or were their clients provided for them by a pimp? She didn’t know the answer, but she thought she knew how to find out - and it didn’t mean travelling far.

  She started the engine and drove slowly along Bredon Road. It was a long road running west from the centre of Kintbridge. At the town end, the houses were elegant Edwardian terraces now somewhat dishevelled and mostly divided into flats. Further along, there was a mishmash of twentieth century architecture, from thirties suburbia through sixties concrete modernism to nineties brick and tile uniformity. Jasmine pulled up outside a detached 1930s house with a drive and a scruffy lawn. Curtains obscured the bay windows on both sides of the front door on the ground floor and above, giving no hint as to whether the house was occupied or what went on inside. But Jasmine knew. She had been here once before.

  It had been a drugs raid early one morning, not long after she had transitioned. Unusually, Sloane had her included her in the team on the ground, probably because he needed every body he could get. They hadn’t foun
d the drugs they expected, so in most respects it had been a failure. Sloane’s mood had been evidence of that. What they had discovered was a brothel occupied by half a dozen working girls, most of whom could barely speak a word of English. The girls were carted off and dispersed, but with no sign of the pimp not a lot happened. The business had been allowed to re-commence, with the police keeping a watchful eye. It was better to know where things were going on rather than them taking place out of sight.

  Jasmine recalled the stampede into the house after the door was battered down; the search through the rooms for stashes of drugs; beds overturned, drawers and wardrobes opened and their contents ransacked; the frightened girls, naked or wearing skimpy nightclothes. She remembered the adrenalin rush, the excitement of doing a job she loved. She also remembered the depression and disillusionment when she found herself left out of similar operations, sidelined to look after the desk back at base, the feeling that she wasn’t wanted as part of the team anymore.

  She dragged the wig off her head. No disguises necessary for this task. Tossing her bag over her shoulder, she got out of the car and walked up the drive to the front door. The one smashed in by the police had been replaced by a more secure-looking, solid wood door. She rang the doorbell and waited. It was difficult to hear anything through the thick door, but at last it opened a few centimetres. Jasmine shoved, hard. The door swung open and she stepped through into the hall. A woman stood backed against the wall, her hand still on the door handle. She was short and could have been anywhere between forty and sixty - her long greying black hair made it difficult to judge. She was wearing a black wraparound dress, but there was little of her to wrap around. Her thin bare arms and legs and hollow cheeks made her look almost emaciated. There was a look of surprise and fear on her face, which slowly turned into disdain as she looked at Jasmine.

  ‘Who are you?’ the woman asked, in a husky, eastern European accent.

  ‘I’m a detective.’

  The look of fear returned. ‘Police?

  Jasmine took her private detective’s I.D. from her bag and waved it briefly at the woman, not giving her an opportunity to read it.

  ‘Don’t worry. I’m not going to arrest you. I just want information.’

  The woman pulled herself upright, sniffed and pushed the door closed.

  ‘What information?’

  ‘Are there more of you here?’

  The woman opened a door and entered one of the front rooms. Jasmine followed. Despite it still being daylight outside, the thick drawn curtains made the room appear as if it was night-time. A couple of standard lamps provided illumination. Jasmine saw three girls sitting on the sofa and armchairs that lined the walls of the room and were the only furniture, but for a small writing desk in an alcove and a large coffee table in the centre of the room. They were wearing flimsy negligées and stockings and suspenders. One was dark but the other two were pale and, though one was blonde and the other brunette, they looked like twins. They stared at Jasmine with indifference.

  ‘Hi girls,’ Jasmine said with a smile – no response. ‘Look, I need your help. I wonder if you have seen either of these girls before.’ She took her phone out of her bag and quickly thumbed the screen to bring up the image of Xristal and Honey. She walked around the room showing it to each of the three girls. They looked, but showed no flicker of recognition. Finally, she showed it to the older woman who screwed up her nose and shook her head.

  There was the thud of the front door opening and steps in the hall. Jasmine dropped her phone into her bag and spun around in time to see a man enter the room. He was shorter than Jasmine by a couple of inches, wore a white T-shirt under a shiny grey suit and had short black hair and a moustache.

  ‘Hey, who are you?’ His voice was rough with an estuary twang.

  ‘I’m a detective.’

  He scanned Jasmine up and down from her blonde bob to her bare tanned legs.

  ‘I know you,’ he said. It was as if a light went on in his head. He smiled. ‘Yes, that’s it. Your mug was in the papers. You’re that trannie who used to be a cop.’

  Damn, thought Jasmine. Well, she had taken the decision to remove the wig.

  ‘What are you doing here? Snooping?’

  ‘I just want…’

  ‘We don’t have snoopers here. Especially freaks and cock sucking arsefuckers like you.’

  He lunged at Jasmine with a hand stretched out, fingers spread to encircle her throat. She didn’t think, just stepped aside, grabbed his arm, kicked his legs out from under him and pushed him to the floor, pressing his face against the thin carpet with her knee in the small of his back. The girls and the woman looked on impassively.

  ‘I don’t like being insulted by morons like you,’ Jasmine said, ‘especially when I was simply being polite and asking for information. I don’t care what sordid little business you have going on here.’

  The man struggled ineffectively, then lay still.

  ‘What information?’

  ‘Are you going to be sensible?’ Jasmine asked with another prod of her knee in his back and a twist of his arm.

  ‘Ow. You’re killing me.’

  ‘You won’t attack me again?’

  ‘No. Let me up. I can’t breathe.’

  Jasmine released the arm and stood up. She stepped away from the man towards the exit and retrieved her bag which she had dropped. The man rolled over and sat up rubbing his arm.

  ‘What do you want then if it’s got nothing to do with this place?’

  ‘I want to know if you know anything about the competition.’

  ‘Competition?’ His face was blank. He pushed himself to his feet.

  ‘Yes. A couple of working girls in a house down the road.’

  The man shrugged. Jasmine got her phone out again and held it up for him to look at.

  ‘These two. Seen them around?’

  The man bent close to examine the photo. He let out a bark of a laugh.

  ‘They’re geezers. Faggots with tits. Like you.’

  Jasmine pursed her lips.

  ‘No, not like me, but they are she-males.’

  ‘I don’t deal in perversions. My girls,’ he waved his hand at the three sullen young women, ‘offer a good honest service to straight blokes who want a bit of relaxation.’

  Jasmine shook the phone to get his attention. ‘But do you know them or anything about them?’

  He screwed up his face in an expression of distaste. ‘Nope. I’ve never seen either of them and I hope I never do, fucking perverts.’

  ‘What about your clients?’

  ‘I told you, my girls’ clients are straight guys. They wouldn’t touch those freaks with a bargepole. But I hope your old friends in the Bill run them out of town. I don’t want this area getting a reputation for the kind of filth they get up to.’

  ‘You want this area for yourself do you?’

  ‘Why not? Can’t a bloke make a few quid providing personal massage for hardworking guys?’

  Jasmine accepted she wasn’t going to get any more useful information. At least she’d found out that Xristal and Honey were probably working on their own without this or any other pimp keeping an eye on them.

  ‘I hope it is just massage your girls offer. My old friends, as you call them, will be taking an interest otherwise.’

  The man laughed again. He had regained most of his early swagger.

  ‘I don’t think old man Sloane will be in a hurry to come here again after the egg on his face he got last time. Get out of here you cock-teaser. Margot – show the man out.’

  Jasmine bit her lip and dropped her phone back in her bag. Backing into the hall, she kept the grinning pimp in her sight. The older woman, Margot, squeezed past her and opened the front door. As she left, Jasmine whispered, ‘Don’t let him bully you or the girls, Margot. Get in touch with the police or me.’ She held out one of her cards but Margot shook her head and made no move to take it. Jasmine shrugged and stepped outside. The door closed with
a heavy clunk.

  She returned to her car feeling dejected and dirty. Seeing women being abused as the three girls obviously were demoralised her. She’d let Tom know what she’d seen and he could decide whether another raid, this time for evidence of prostitution, was in order. But the point was she had found out little about Xristal. She sighed, started the engine and headed home.

  Jasmine fidgeted and paced around her small, dreary flat. She hoped a hot bath would help her relax. Concentrating on shaving her legs and arms until they were smooth and hair-free occupied her for a while. Having dried herself, she dressed simply in a short cotton skirt and T-shirt, picked up cheaply from Primark, re-did her always necessary make-up and decided to look for something to eat. The fridge was, as usual, almost bare but she found leftovers of a spaghetti bolognaise in the freezer. She heated it up and ate it with a slice of bread. She told herself she must do some shopping. When? Tomorrow? It was Friday. She tried to sit down and watch TV, but she couldn’t settle. Everything she had learned about Xristal that day kept going through her head.

  How did she find her clients? Were they all off the internet or did she use traditional methods? Jasmine was impatient to find out. Sitting around doing nothing irritated her. Finally, she’d had enough. Slipping on her pumps, she grabbed her bag and left the flat. She got into her car and started to drive. Where was she going? No ideas occurred to her as she turned onto the main road heading into the town centre. It was while entering the one–way system she remembered. Some of the street girls used to assemble and tout for business near where Xristal had lived. She’d go and talk to them, see if they knew Xristal.

  Back on St Benedicts Street again, she passed the turning to Bredon Road and drove on over the railway line. She pulled into a road on the right and found somewhere to park. She wandered casually back to the main street, crossed and turned into Railway Terrace. The road dropped down to the station, the lights of which were visible a couple of hundred metres further on. The original row of terraced houses was long gone, replaced by the long, windowless concrete wall of a disused retail warehouse, daubed with flaking graffiti. The pavement opposite ran along a fence bordering the railway cutting. The sun had already sunk behind the buildings to the west and the evening gloom was settling. Three women were loitering under a solitary streetlight. Jasmine crossed the road to join them.