Ruthless a Gripping and Gritty Crime Thriller

by Charlie Gallagher

  Rhiannon stared back. She swallowed hard and looked from one police officer to the other.

  ‘Dead?’

  ‘Yes. I’m so sorry.’

  ‘Oh,’ she said. Her voice was weaker, her eyes suddenly looked different — like they were missing something. Jamie had delivered the death message a few times now — too many — and it was always the eyes that carried the first reaction. It was like you could see a spark going out, never to be replaced.

  ‘Is there anyone else here?’ Jamie pressed.

  ‘No,’ she said. Her head dropped, her chest suddenly rising and falling as she sucked in more air, a sure sign of someone fighting back panic.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Rhiannon. This is the part of the job I really hate.’

  Rhiannon picked at her foot. She still stared out like she was waiting for an emotion.

  ‘How old are you, Rhiannon?’

  ‘Sixteen. Seventeen soon, though.’ She spoke quietly. She took a couple of deeper, slower breaths.

  ‘And is your aunt your primary carer?’

  ‘Yeah, for about a year now. Oh God! What happens now? It was such a stress last time, when my mum—’

  Jamie and Angie exchanged a glance. ‘What happened with your mum, Rhiannon?’

  ‘She gave up.’ Her breathing was rushed again. She lifted her eyes and they flashed with anger.

  ‘Gave you up?’

  ‘Gave everything up. Except the drink. The social people, they said she had to quit the drink or they would take me away. She tried. Just not hard enough.’

  ‘So your aunty stepped in?’

  ‘She saved my life. They were planning to put me in foster care. It was sorted and I was all ready to go. I begged Aunty Mel, but I didn’t need to. She didn’t even know anything about it. If she had known, she would have offered from the start. And she works shifts, so it’s difficult — my aunty does, I mean. She’s a nurse . . . I guess my mum, she didn’t talk to her about it. Too embarrassed or whatever.’

  ‘Your mum will have to be told — about her sister, I mean. We’ll need someone to formally identify your Aunty Mel too. Do you want me talk to your mum? Maybe something can be arranged with Social Services. Maybe she can sort herself out in the circumstances and you can go back there? Not straight away — I’ll have to sort something out in the short term, but thinking longer term?’

  ‘Formally identify? So it might not be Mel, it might—’

  ‘It’s her, Rhiannon. I’m so sorry. These are formalities.’

  Rhiannon suddenly leant forward, her head in her hands. She took a minute. ‘I can’t go back to my mum. Not while he’s there. Why are all men such arseholes? My Aunty Mel . . .’ Finally, the tears came. Rhiannon sobbed into her hands. Angie moved to sit next to her and wrapped an arm tight around her shoulders.

  ‘I’ll start making some calls,’ Jamie said to Angie, who nodded.

  ‘And put the kettle on for some tea!’ Angie called out. Jamie made his way into the kitchen.

  Chapter 4

  The pain in William’s leg was too much, and he fell the short distance from his squatting position onto the kitchen floor. There was nothing left. He knew he wouldn’t find anything, but desperation had him turning out the contents of his kitchen cupboards for a forgotten bottle of alcohol.

  The parade of shops was just a few streets over. A couple of minutes for an able-bodied man, but today the pain in his legs was particularly bad. It was always worse in the mornings. He was out of painkillers and he hadn’t put in his repeat prescription at the doctor’s for more. The doctor’s surgery was just a few doors down from the shop. He would try today.

  * * *

  The walk to the convenience shop took him ten minutes in total. He’d stopped to rest on a couple of low walls when the pain had gotten too bad. It felt like his whole right thigh was on fire, the pain pulsing in time with his heartbeat. An elderly Asian woman looked up from the counter as he entered the store. Her long dress and scarf looked out of place in the muggy interior. William himself had the cold sweats and his hand had a visible shake as he reached for a litre bottle of cider. It was on the bottom shelf of the chiller and he struggled to straighten with it in his grasp. He limped to the counter.

  ‘Four pound.’ The woman thrust out her hand for the payment. He felt in his back pocket for his last five-pound note. His pound coin change was discarded on the counter top, his cider pushed into a thin blue carrier bag and the woman sat back on her chair where she was largely concealed behind the counter display. He left as quickly as he could manage.

  William licked his lips as he stepped back out into the sun. His attention was dragged to the left where the door to his doctor’s surgery opened. A woman poured out backwards, she spun to face him, pushing a buggy with a wailing child inside. He’d go later for his pills.

  He turned into his road and found a low wall under the shade of a large tree. He needed a rest, maybe a little something to take the edge off the pain, too. The cider hissed from the neck and the sickly-sweet scent immediately filled his nostrils. He took a deep swig, the blue bag stuck to the condensation covering the bottle.

  ‘Will, man!’ The voice was jovial but William didn’t recognise it immediately. He squinted against the sun at the man standing over him.

  ‘Damon,’ Will said. Damon Allcott. He was the sort William knew of, rather than anything else. He was part of the drug supply scene in the area, himself an addict, too, William reckoned. He always seemed to attract a lot of bad people or police attention, two things William sought actively to avoid. Damon stood straight on, his right hand tucked into the front of his tracksuit bottoms. He was looking worse than William remembered: gaunt and pale, his mousey-coloured hair flat down one side where he’d slept on it. William reckoned he’d lost weight, too.

  ‘Man, I heard. Sorry, man. Shit!’ Of course he’d heard. A heroin addict overdoses and word travels fast. It was a sick world. The underground knew that Janey was a twenty-year addict; they knew that it would have taken a strong hit to kill her. They would want to know where she’d managed to score something that good. Perverse.

  ‘Yeah, thanks. I don’t know where she got it from. I never got involved in her shit, Damon. That’s not my scene anymore. I can’t help you.’ William struggled to his feet. His thigh burned. He tried to shake it out; sometimes that helped. He was aware of where Damon was standing — all but blocking his way — and he didn’t move.

  ‘Your leg giving you shit, Will? You could do with some help, mate.’

  ‘I’m fine thanks, Damon. I’m nearly home.’ He could sense Damon alongside him, hanging just off his shoulder.

  ‘I don’t mean getting home, I mean like daily shit. Without Janey it’s gonna be tough, right? For a while I mean. She ain’t gonna be grafting with you no more is she?’

  Grafting. William had always hated the word. Criminal-speak for earning money on the wrong side of the law, but call it grafting and it almost sounded like an honest day’s work. His and Janey’s graft was shoplifting for the most part — meat and perfume mainly. They had a good outlet for both. It was quick money.

  ‘I’ll manage.’

  ‘Maybe you don’t have to. I got a guy who needs a place for a few days. He’ll pay rent, like. Keep you in a bottle or two a day of the old moonshine. Not that shit though. The good stuff. Whatever you like.’

  ‘Thanks, Damon, but I want to be on my own for a bit.’

  ‘It would be just until you get on your feet. A hundred quid up front pays until the end of the week. That sorts you out for a bit, right?’

  William stopped his walk. A hundred quid. He could use the money. Of course he could. But all he had ever heard about Damon Allcott was to stay away from him. He was bad news.

  ‘Thanks for the offer. I need to sort the house. There isn’t the room for two anyway. I’m good for now.’

  ‘I’ll bring him round to meet you. He’s a good guy. He can help you get the place straight.’

  ‘No
thanks, Damon. I’m staying on my own for now.’

  Damon grinned widely and patted William on the shoulder. ‘I’ll bring him round, just for a drink,’ he said, and then walked away.

  Chapter 5

  Rhiannon woke up confused. The room was bright and white everywhere — the walls, the ceiling, the crisp sheets that she lay under. She felt a sudden panic. Nothing was familiar. She didn’t know where she was. Her eyes flicked round the room and fell on her bag bundled clumsily under the window, her battered old Converse pumps spewing out of the top. And she remembered. She remembered the phone call, she remembered the late night police visit, she remembered crying with the kind lady police officer. She remembered her aunty.

  She could hear scuffling outside her door, the movements of other people. She could hear voices but not words. She turned on her side and stared at the white wall. There was a light tap on her door. She ignored it but the door pushed open anyway, a hesitant push, just enough for a voice to be projected through.

  ‘Hey — you okay in there?’

  Rhiannon sat up. She stared at the door, the source of the voice still hadn’t revealed herself. She guessed the girl was around her age.

  ‘I’m okay,’ she said. The door pushed open further and the girl stepped into the room. Her blonde hair was pulled back tightly, revealing a face with a lot of makeup and intricately shaped eyebrows.

  ‘You the new girl, then? Came in last night?’

  ‘I did, yeah.’

  ‘I’m Sam. Like Samantha, obviously, but I’m Sam.’

  ‘Rhiannon.’

  ‘Okay, cool.’

  ‘You live here?’ Rhiannon asked. She rubbed at her eyes.

  ‘For like a couple of months. Not long. They just moved a couple out to their own places. That’s what I want, but you know, I gotta be eighteen. Or seventeen with a deposit and a job — but who’s got that, right? But that’s like a month from now.’ She paced across the room to Rhiannon’s bag and picked up the trainer that had made it to the floor. She cast her eyes over it; she didn’t seem to approve. ‘What’s your story then?’

  ‘My story?’ Rhiannon said.

  ‘Everyone here’s got one.’

  ‘I dunno. I got told it was just for now. The police brought me here last night. I had nowhere else to go.’

  ‘We all get told that. Just a few days. That’s what I got told. But once you’re here you don’t go nowhere until they find you a place to live on your own and the council won’t even put you on a list until you’re eighteen. This ain’t no short stop.’

  ‘We’ll see. It was all a bit sudden last night. I don’t really know what’s going to happen to me at the moment.’

  Sam’s attention was back on Rhiannon’s bag. She picked it up, her hand pushed into it and she pulled a few items of clothing out. ‘This all you brought?’

  Rhiannon stood out of bed and grabbed hold of her bag. She pulled it away. ‘It’s all I’ve got.’

  Sam was smiling. ‘I’ve got loads of clothes and I reckon we’re about the same size. You can borrow what you want. It’s rough coming here with nothing. I did that. I got myself a good man, though. He buys me everything. You should come out with us. There’s a group of boys. Maybe we can get you a man, too. Unless you already got one?’

  Rhiannon shook her head and then dropped her bag back onto the floor. ’Sorry, I’m just a bit tired I think. Thanks for the offer. Maybe I’ll take you up on it later.’

  ‘Don’t worry. There’s breakfast downstairs. Rose always does a cooked breakfast when we get someone new. But you need to hurry or all the good stuff will be gone!’

  ‘I’m not hungry, thanks anyway.’

  Sam took one last disapproving look at the clothes she had tipped out onto the floor and left.

  Rhiannon stepped out of bed and pulled on some shorts. She pulled open the curtains and looked out over the busy Hythe Road in the town of Ashford. It was the next stop up the motorway from her aunty’s place in Langthorne. The house was on a busy road, a major link between the motorway and the town centre. It was morning rush hour and the road was choked. She looked down at the square drive that was as wide as the house. The house itself was a big square, too, detached and divided up into more bedrooms than were ever intended. She stepped out of her room. There were three more bedrooms off the corridor and a large room on the opposite side that acted as a communal living room for the girls upstairs. It had two sofas with brightly coloured throws opposite an old tube television and a fridge that hummed loud enough for Rhiannon to hear it from her room. As part of the tour the previous night, she had been told that it was only girls in the house. Rose was an emergency foster carer, the first port of call for the police in the area. The officers were on first name terms with her and they had all stood around for a while, swapping stories involving previous occupants of the house. Rose had shown Rhiannon to her room. It was basic: a bedside cabinet and a tall wardrobe with a creaky hinge.

  The stairs were creaky, too. Rhiannon made it to the bottom and then stopped and went back to the large kitchen. A circular table that looked like it’d seen a lot of wear stood in the middle. Sam was already sitting there. Rhiannon smiled weakly. Rose was filling rough-cut bread with fried bacon — it smelled delicious.

  ‘I was just going to bring this up to you, my love!’ Rose smiled too; it looked very natural. She was a large woman. She wore light blue jeans that sat high on her waist and looked like a cheap fit below a black top. Her hair was down; it was thick and brown with a clump of grey gathered around the roots.

  ‘Thanks,’ Rhiannon said.

  Rose gestured at the table. ‘Sit down. Do you like sauce? I have red or brown.’

  ‘No, thanks.’ Rhiannon sat.

  Sam was hurrying her food; she stood still chewing. ‘I gotta get to college. We’ll talk later, though, yeah? About meeting the boys. You’ll like them.’

  Rhiannon watched her leave.

  ‘You’ve met our Sam then, love?’ Rose scooped up Sam’s dirty plate and cup.

  ‘She came in to see me earlier. She seems nice.’

  ‘She means well, I’m sure. She doesn’t hang about with the best people, though, Rhiannon. You seem like a clever kid. Don’t get caught up with that lot.’

  ‘I’m not really planning on getting caught up with anything to be honest. Am I seeing Social today? Are they being told about what’s gone on?’

  ‘They know. The police referred you last night. It was Social that got hold of me. You got lucky, love. I’ve been full for most of the year. I just got a girl out into her own place. Would you want that?’

  Rhiannon shrugged. She really hadn’t thought about it. She hadn’t really thought about anything other than living with her aunt. They were good together. Aunty Mel was cool, really laid back. Rhiannon had her own life. She’d finally found a place to settle and now it had all been stripped away from her overnight.

  ‘Listen to me. You don’t need to be worrying about all that right now, love. You just take your time. The Social will do what they do, but all the time you need to be here you’re welcome, okay?’

  ‘That’s great. Thanks, Rose.’

  ‘Not a problem. Now, you want some tea?’

  ‘Sure.’

  * * *

  There was a knock at the door. William was laid out on the sofa. The television was on but it was just background noise. He’d been lying awake in the fog of strong cider. He’d been staring at Janey’s empty sofa.

  The knock came again, an urgent pattern. William wasn’t expecting anyone. He hadn’t had a visitor in months. He felt the pulse in his head as he rose to a sitting position. He was suddenly very hot and he pulled his shirt away from his collar.

  Damon Allcott smiled a greeting. A black lad stood next to him, he was wearing an all-grey tracksuit, the top unzipped but the hood pulled over his head. He was tall and strongly built, and he wasn’t smiling.

  ‘Will, how you doing, man?’ said Damon.

  ‘Doing fine.
’

  ‘This is my guy, Aaron. I was telling you about him earlier, yeah?’

  ‘I told you, Damon, I don’t have room for anyone. I just want to be left alone.’ William’s head hurt. He closed his eyes to the bright sunshine for just a second. It was long enough for Damon to get his foot in the door.

  ‘Can we do this inside? I don’t wanna be talking about this out on the street, you know what I mean? It’s a respect thing.’ Damon’s smile had gone. William hesitated. The two men stood firm and he stepped back. He suddenly felt like he had no choice. Damon stepped straight through the lounge and into the kitchen. He peered into the bedroom, checking they were alone. He had a carrier bag in his hand and he pulled a bottle from it.

  ‘Rum. I hear it’s your thing, right? Aaron here can turn out and get you some coke mixer if you want — whatever you need.’

  Aaron moved into the lounge. His nose wrinkled. He was carrying a holdall that William hadn’t been able to see behind his back. He put it on the floor next to the sofa, reached into his pocket and pulled out a clump of folded notes. He counted some out quickly and dropped them on the cluttered table.

  ‘There’s one hundred there for a few days.’ Damon spoke for him.

  William eyed the money and the bottle of rum that was now stood beside it on the table. He still didn’t like the idea, but it was clear to him that they weren’t here to give him a choice.

  ‘A few days,’ he repeated back.

  ‘Just a few days. And he’ll help you sort this place out a bit. I know you’ve not had the chance to get it sorted. Then he’ll be gone and you’re a hundred quid up! Happy days!’ Damon said.

  ‘Just until the weekend.’ He felt it best to lay down exactly what he saw as being a few days.

  The two men exchanged glances.

  ‘Until the weekend,’ Aaron spoke, finally.

  Damon slapped William playfully on the arm. He strode into the kitchen and returned a few seconds later with a dirty glass. He broke the seal on the rum and poured a good measure. ‘Here you go then, mate. Get this down your neck. I reckon Aaron here is good for another bottle or two before the weekend comes, don’t you worry about that.’ He held the glass out and William took it. Damon looked encouragingly at him and he necked it. The liquid was smooth on the back of his throat, much less harsh than the cheap cider he’d had in the morning. It was good. William hadn’t had something this good for a long time. Damon was already pouring him another and William held the glass for him. He felt a pat on his arm and Damon made to leave. He said something but William focused on the drink, on the hit of the liquid, the warmth in his throat, and that familiar feeling as it mingled with his bloodstream. Aaron was on his sofa. William shrugged. He scooped up the rum and walked a few paces to Janey’s sofa. He sat down clumsily and patted the cushion affectionately down one end. He hadn’t moved it since two nights before.