“Anyway,” Annie went on, “Chambers may very well be the least of our problems. Things are complicated, and it’s going to be difficult to keep everything in its proper compartment. First off, and high priority as far as I’m concerned, is that we found a gun on our patch, as you probably know already. Rather, the parents found it and shopped their daughter.”
“I do know about that. Wouldn’t you?”
“If I had a kid and I found a gun in her room?”
“Yes.”
“Probably,” said Annie. “I don’t know. Somehow it goes against the grain. Tough one, though.”
“Not for me,” said Winsome. “I’d do it in a shot. No pun intended.”
“Your dad’s a cop, mine’s an artist.”
“What difference does that make?”
“I don’t know,” said Annie.
“But we’re both cops.”
“I just meant that I might try and deal with the situation on my own. You know, talk to her, try to understand. The way things are between mother and daughter now, any chance of anyone understanding anything has gone right out the window.”
“Sometimes it’s not the most important thing.”
“What is, then?”
“That no one gets shot.”
Annie gave a little shudder. “Fair enough. Maybe I’m overplaying the liberal mum. Maybe I’d just shop the little bastard and have done with it. That’s probably why I’m lucky I don’t have any children.”
“Yeah, I could just see you turning in your own kid. Softie.”
“Anyway,” Annie went on. “The house is still in lockdown and we’re waiting on ballistics. Should know more by this afternoon. The girl’s on bail—bed-and-breakfast arrest—and the mother’s stopping with a friend. And you know what happened to Patrick Doyle.”
“Yeah,” said Winsome. “It’s terrible.”
“Plus I had a visit last night from one of the AFOs involved. Wanted to know if I was on their side.”
“Are you?”
“I’d like to say I was on the side of truth and justice, but somehow with Chambers around, words like that turn to ashes in my mouth.”
“But you’re not going to lie for anyone, are you? You don’t even know them.”
Annie put her hand on Winsome’s forearm. “No, Winsome, I’m not going to lie for anybody. Christ knows, I wasn’t in the house, I don’t know much to start with, but when Chambers gets around to me, I’ll answer all his questions honestly to the best of my ability, and if I don’t know the answers, I’ll say so.”
“Can’t say fairer than that.”
“Who said fair had anything to do with it?”
“Cynic.”
“Yes, well…Don’t forget, I worked with Chambers once.”
Winsome gobbled up her burger and started picking at her chips. “Where do I start?” she asked, glancing up at Annie from her plate.
“You know DCI Banks’s daughter?”
“Tracy? Is that her name?”
“That’s right. Though she seems to have taken to calling herself Francesca these days.”
“That’s nothing. Kids often go through periods of dissatisfaction with the names their parents gave them,” said Winsome. “I know I did. I called myself Joan for years in school.”
“Tracy’s twenty-four. She’s not a kid.” Annie shot Winsome a glance. “You did, though? Really? Joan?”
“Yeah. I wanted an ordinary name. I hated Winsome. Didn’t you ever change your name?”
“No. Somehow or other, I’ve always been just Annie. So you know Tracy, then?”
“I’ve spoken with her at the station once or twice. Nice girl, or so she seemed. I can’t say I know her. Is there a problem?”
“Maybe. Not only has she changed her name,” Annie said, “but she’s changed her appearance, too.”
“So? People do. Look at you. You got your hair cut and highlighted. You used to dress like a hippie and—”
“All right. I get your point.” Annie touched her head self-consciously. “True enough. I’m not trying to make anything out of it in itself. You’re right. Sometimes people just like a change. It’s just that she also seems to have disappeared.”
“Seems to have?”
“Yes, well, this is where we enter the realm of total conjecture, or fantasy, as Madame Gervaise would say. Which is why I’m talking to you here and not to her at the station.”
“Because I’m more gullible?”
“No. Because I can’t think of anyone more level-headed. Hear me out, Winsome. You can tell me if you think I’m talking rubbish.” Annie pushed her empty plate away and drank some more beer. Her glass was close to empty, and she fancied another. Given what chaos the afternoon might bring, though, she decided to abstain and ordered a coffee and some sticky toffee pudding and custard instead. “Juliet Doyle, the mother of the girl who had the gun in her room, told me that her daughter Erin shares a house in Headingley with two other girls,” she began. “Rose Preston and Tracy Banks. The Leeds police searched the place on the afternoon of Erin’s arrest. Rose was present. Apparently, when Tracy got home from work that evening and Rose told her what happened, she went ballistic. She seemed most concerned about some bloke called Jaff, Erin’s boyfriend. Erin’s not talking, so we can’t get anything about him from her. Tracy took off almost immediately Rose gave her the news, and she hasn’t been seen or heard from since.”
“How do you know all this?”
“I paid a visit to the house yesterday evening and talked to Rose. I also called at this Jaff’s flat—nice place, down by the canal—but it was all locked up and there was nobody home. One of the neighbors told me the police had already been around asking questions. He seemed in a bit of a huff, kept his door on the chain, said he didn’t have to answer any more questions. He was right. There wasn’t a lot I could do, so I went home.”
“Some people are like that,” said Winsome.
“I rang DI Ken Blackstone in Leeds this morning, and guess what? He checked and told me they hadn’t sent anybody to Granary Wharf yesterday.”
Winsome frowned. “So what do you think’s going on?”
“I don’t know. This is where it becomes pure conjecture on my part. Rose got the impression that there was something between Jaff and Tracy, or so she told me. Tracy certainly seemed unduly concerned about this Jaff, at any rate. Whether she knew about the gun or not, I have no idea. I know this is all mere speculation, but given that both Tracy and Jaff seem to have disappeared from view, it’s my bet that they’ve gone off somewhere together, probably headed south. If the gun does belong to Jaff, then he’s obviously scared that Erin’s going to tell on him, or that the police are going to track him down through it, so it’s easy to see why he might want to make himself scarce.”
“So he’s on the run. Makes sense. You really think he’s used this gun?”
“Not recently, according to the preliminary ballistics report. The point right now is that he was probably the one who owned it, whatever the reason.”
“And Tracy’s part in all of this?”
Annie ate some more pudding, then washed it down with coffee. “Don’t know,” she said. “Either she is involved, and she’s gone with him, or she’s not involved but she’s gone with him.”
“Or she’s gone somewhere else. On her own.”
“Maybe,” said Annie. “But unlikely, don’t you think? The timing is just too coincidental.”
“Circumstantial is what it all is,” said Winsome. “But you’ve got a point. The thing is, I can’t believe Tracy’s mixed up in anything bad. Not the DCI’s daughter.”
“I agree she always seemed like a decent kid, but people change, Winsome, fall in with the wrong company, develop a chip on their shoulder, start to resent their lives or the way they perceive they’re being treated. Rebellion. It comes in many shapes and sizes, and not only when you’re a teenager. Twenty-four isn’t all that old. If she really fancies this Jaff bloke…Christ…”
> “What?”
“Nothing. Just remembering my own bad boy phase.”
“Bad boy?”
“Yes. Don’t you know what bad boys are, Winsome?”
“I don’t think I’ve ever really had much experience of them.”
“A bad boy is unreliable, and sometimes he doesn’t show up at all, or if he does, he’s late and moody; he acts mean to you, and he leaves early. He always seems to have another iron in the fire, somewhere else to be. But always while you’re waiting for him you can’t really concentrate on anything else, and you have at least one eye on the door in case he’s the next one to walk in the room, even though you think he might be seeing someone else, and when you’re with him your heart starts to beat a little faster and your breath catches in your chest. You might be angry, but it won’t last, and you’re happy for a while when he gives all his attention to you, and then it starts all over again.”
“Sounds awful,” said Winsome.
“But it’s exquisite agony,” Annie said. “Sometimes he doesn’t turn up for days on end, and your heart aches for him. He goes to bed with your best friend, and still you forgive him, still you want him.”
“You had a bad-boy phase?”
“Of course. Paul Burroughs. But I was only sixteen. I got over it early.” Annie didn’t want to talk about the later bad boy who turned out to be a psychopath. She certainly didn’t have a great track record when it came to choosing the men in her life. Winsome knew about the psycho anyway, and would be far too diplomatic to say anything. It was much easier to talk about Paul Burroughs.
“Was he unfaithful?”
“Of course he was. Bad boys are always unfaithful. That’s the first rule.”
“What else did he do that was so bad?”
Annie smiled fondly as she remembered. “Paul? Oh, nothing serious, really, not at first. Just minor stuff, fun stuff, run-of-the-mill. But he was a daredevil. He couldn’t care less.”
“Like what?”
“Well, one night, after midnight, for example, we broke into the local marina and borrowed a speedboat.” Annie couldn’t help but laugh at Winsome’s expression of horror. “If the harbor police hadn’t caught us, we’d have ended up in France, or more likely we’d have crashed on the rocks or something and drowned. He knew how to get it started—he could start anything with a motor—but he hadn’t a clue how to handle the wheel.”
“What did the police do?”
“Obviously not very much, or I wouldn’t be here with you today.” Annie shrugged. “A slap on the wrist, that was all, really. Or it would have been except…”
“What?”
“Well, Paul had a lot of problems with his family. His dad had gone off with another woman, and his mother was a bit of a zombie. She drank a lot and took tons of Valium. He was so mixed up and angry, you just wanted to hold him and make it all go away.”
“Did you?”
“No. Me? I’m not the type. Besides, you can’t cuddle bad boys. The problem was that he picked a fight with the biggest harbor cop when we got back on land, and he ended up in a cell for the night. That was only the beginning. After that, I didn’t see him anymore, but I heard later that he had a lot of problems with the law—stealing cars, joyriding, then muggings, assault, burglaries, stuff like that.”
“And now?”
“No idea. Prison, perhaps.”
“So he was a bad boy in the making?”
“Yeah. But bad boys aren’t always criminals. It’s more a state of mind. It never happened to you?”
“Sugar, the bad boys where I grew up were really baaad. Not just some sissy skinny-ass white boy stealing a motorboat. They carried machetes and AK47s.”
Annie laughed. “Anyway, who knows? Maybe it all goes along with this change in Tracy’s appearance, the piercings, the name. Like I said, rebellion can happen anytime, take many forms. All I know is that I’d like to find her and get things sorted, and I’d like to do it before she’s got the combined police forces of the whole bloody country on her trail. Either she’s thumbing her nose at us all, or she’s scared, but she maybe needs help, whether she knows it yet or not.”
“And Alan?”
Annie shook her head. “He won’t be back until next Monday, though I’ve got his mobile number for emergencies only. I could call him, wherever he is, as long it’s not some remote far-flung desert outpost. And that reminds me. I should drop by his cottage after work today. It’s been a while. Those poor plants of his will be fair gagging for a drink of water by now.”
“But you aren’t going to ring him?”
“I’m not sure it’s that kind of emergency yet. It’s my gut feeling that if I can get Tracy out of all this before he gets back and finds out about it, the better all around.”
“So what do you want me to do?”
“Walk softly and carry a big stick. Keep under the radar. Even though we’re only doing our jobs. You’re not tarnished by the firearms business, so you’re still in something of a privileged position.”
“So keep my head down and my eyes and ears open?”
“That’s about it. Once this business gets into top gear, they’ll probably be scrutinizing me as closely as a bug under a microscope. Soon I won’t be able to go to the toilet without filling in a form. First off, if you could find a way to uncover as much as you can about this Jaff, it would be a great help. You might start with Rose Preston in Headingley. She doesn’t know a lot, but I’m convinced she knows more than she was telling me.”
“I take it you’ve got their addresses?”
Annie gave her them. “As for Jaff, I’m afraid I don’t have anything except the address right now. And I don’t think there’s much point in going there again. His first name’s Jaffar, by the way. And the name next to his bell says ‘J. McCready.’ We’ll need to know a lot more than that.”
“I can always use my natural charm.”
Annie smiled. “Yeah, there’s that.” Annie wagged her finger at Winsome. “But absolutely no drop-kicking.”
“It wasn’t a dropkick!”
“I DON’T understand,” said Tracy, holding up the gun by its long barrel. “I thought Erin had taken your gun.”
“Put that away.” Jaff took the gun from her and put it back in the hold-all. “She did,” he said, sitting down at the breakfast table and placing the sheet of paper facedown beside him. “This is a different one. Another one. I got it from Vic. Those eggs will be like rubber if you don’t get a move on. I like my eggs runny.”
As if she were in a trance, Tracy served up the bacon and eggs and poured two mugs of coffee. “But why do you need another gun?” she asked.
“Ta. Dunno. Protection. I just feel safer that way.”
Tracy regarded him through narrowed eyes. She had felt scared at first, seeing him standing there in the doorway, knowing how unpredictable he was becoming, but somehow now he seemed just like a little boy, naked from the waist up, tucking into his bacon and eggs—because clearly no matter what Tracy felt, it wasn’t going to stop him from eating his breakfast, or from doing exactly what he wanted. Tracy wasn’t hungry. Her stomach was too full of butterflies, so she just munched on a slice of dry toast and sipped black coffee. She had expected an explosion of rage when he caught her going through his hold-all, maybe even Jaff hitting her or something, but nothing had happened except this. Definitely an anticlimax.
“Have you ever used it?” she asked.
“Of course. Not this one, but one like it. You have to get the feel of it.”
“To shoot someone?”
“Don’t be silly. Just out in a field, like, tin cans. Target practice.”
“I don’t like guns.”
“You don’t have to. Nobody in their right mind does, but sometimes they’re useful.”
“For what?”
“I told you. Protection.”
“From whom?”
“It’s better you don’t know.”
“The person that stuff belongs
to?” Tracy gestured toward the hold-all. “The heroin or coke or whatever it is? Did you steal it?”
“It’s coke,” said Jaff. He paused with a forkful of bacon and egg halfway to his mouth, the yolk dripping, wiggled his eyebrows and looked her in the eye. “Wanna try some?”
Tracy couldn’t help but laugh. “Not right now, thank you very much. I’m serious, Jaff.” She had tried coke a few times, first at university to stay awake during her exams, then later at clubs and bars. She liked it well enough, and it usually made her randy, but it soon wore off and left her feeling shitty for hours. She certainly didn’t want to feel randy again right now, and she was feeling shitty enough already.
“Look, I told you before,” Jaff went on. “You’ve no idea what’s going on. You’ve—”
“Do you think I’m stupid, Jaff? Is that what you really think? The only reason I don’t know what’s going on is that you won’t tell me. I’ve asked you. But you won’t. If we’re going to keep on being in this together I need to know more. You’d be surprised. Perhaps I can help. Just how deep are you into all this?”
“All what?”
“You know what I’m talking about. The drugs. The money. The guns. What are you? Some kind of wannabe gangster? A gun-running coke dealer? Like you just walked out of a Guy Ritchie movie or something? A rock n’rolla? Is that it?”
“I don’t—”
“Because I’m not stupid, Jaff. Maybe all I know is that I’m on the run from the police in my dad’s house with a lad I hardly know, who just happens to have a few kilos of cocaine, several thousand quid and a loaded gun—I assume it is loaded?—in his hold-all. It certainly sounds like a movie to me.”
Jaff smiled at her. It was supposed to be his charming aren’t-I-a-naughty-little-boy-but-you-can’t-help-but-love-me-anyway-can-you? smile, but it didn’t work this time. “I suppose you think I owe you an explanation?”
“Well, yeah. That would do for a start.”
“Look, I didn’t ask you to come with me, did I? It wasn’t my—”
“Don’t give me that load of bollocks, Jaff. You know damn well that if it wasn’t for me you wouldn’t be sitting here at my dad’s breakfast table, eating bloody bacon and eggs.”
Bad Boy Page 15
