by Sarah Hilary
‘Do we trust them?’ Using his gruffest tone. If they’d missed a trick …
‘We looked at them when May first went missing. And DS Jake’s been taking another close look in the last twenty-four hours, after the sketchpad showed up.’ Marnie paused. ‘If you’d seen them just now … They’re out of their minds with worry. Neither car’s been out of Taybridge Road since yesterday. Neighbours saw Loz in her school uniform walking with her usual bag at the usual time. We could waste time quizzing the Beswicks further, but I’d rather spend it looking at the subway. There’s CCTV all around there. We’re checking the routes from Taybridge Road and the school, in case she doubled back.’ If they’d only kept the police tape up longer; if she hadn’t asked Forensics to work so fast; if she’d been able to win Loz’s trust …
Welland knuckled the base of his neck. ‘We’re tracing her phone?’
‘She’s not used it since last night. We’re hoping she has it with her. It’s our best lead right now. And we’re checking her computer. May didn’t use one, but Sean says Loz lives on the internet. So far all we’ve found is photos of road signs and role-play accounts.’
‘What’s a role-play account?’
‘Pretending to be someone she isn’t. Nothing sinister, just playing at being characters from her favourite books and TV shows. Escapism. Nothing that looks as if it will turn into a lead.’
Welland frowned at Marnie’s report. ‘Tell me about this woman, Christie Faulk.’
‘In her early twenties. According to Jodie Izard, a year ago she had dark hair and brown eyes. That was over in Lewisham, where she took Grace. Our three from the subway say the woman Loz went with was blonde, brown-eyed. We’re assuming it’s the same woman.’
‘Early twenties, but we think she’s our killer? Or just his recruitment agent?’
‘We don’t know.’ Either way, Loz had gone with her, willingly. How much pain must she’ve been in, to take a risk of that magnitude? ‘We need to find Christie, obviously.’
‘Any connection between Faulk and Ledger?’ Welland asked next.
Marnie shook her head. ‘But we don’t have a formal ID for Christie yet. No ID and no photo. We’re hoping Grace can help. I’m going over to the hospital to speak with her.’
‘She’s in the same place as Kathy Bates?’ He meant Emma Tarvin.
‘On separate floors, but yes.’
Welland tugged at his lip. ‘I had Traffic back on the phone, bitching about that.’
‘I hope you bitched back. Kenickie is a nasty piece of work.’
‘He’s off my Christmas card list. What else from the subway? I gather Forensics got quite the haul. Condoms, shitty toilet paper, the works.’
‘Fran’s looking for DNA to match to Missing Persons. Joel and the others mentioned a boy called Eric, and Sasha. We showed them a picture of Sasha Ronson, but it’s not the same girl.’
‘Even so,’ Welland said, ‘lots of missing girls in the vicinity of this madman’s hunting ground. If he’s got more, do we have any good reason to hope he’s keeping them alive?’
‘Whoever killed May and Ashleigh made their deaths public. There’s no reason to think they wouldn’t have done the same with any other girls they killed.’
‘Unless the others were killed first. Botched jobs, say. It might’ve taken a while to work up to the public displays. Isn’t that the usual pattern with these lunatics?’
Marnie didn’t want to think of any other girl as this killer’s botched job.
‘Displaying them in public places could be a comment on the way we’re ignoring their pain,’ Welland said. ‘Isn’t that how Ledger’s wife said he felt about civilian life – that we needed waking up to what was going on around us?’ He kneaded the skin under his eyes with the ends of his fingers, looking more cynical and weary than usual. ‘Demonstrating he has the freedom of the city, comes and goes as he pleases, doing what he likes. No boundaries, just plenty of risk-taking.’
Marnie didn’t comment. He could be right, that was the miserable fact of the matter. Welland could have put his finger on exactly what was happening.
He leaned towards her. ‘Are we giving Laura Beswick’s photo to the press?’
‘Not yet. It could spook our killer. That might be why Ashleigh was dumped so soon after May.’
‘But he’s still taking girls. What’s he up to? Playing Manson families, some sort of cult? He’s not raping them, or not yet. Which makes sense if the killer’s a woman. This Christie Faulk.’
He hadn’t made up his mind, Marnie realised. Not about Jamie Ledger, or Christie Faulk.
She got to her feet. ‘I’ll let you know what Grace has to say. Otherwise, all hands are on the search for Loz. If you can get us more hands …’
Welland nodded. ‘Leave it with me.’
Jodie Izard had described Grace Bradley as a born survivor, hard as a cat’s head.
The girl in the hospital bed was wretchedly thin and bruised, her hands knuckled at her sides, the bump of bone showing in her wrists. They hadn’t tried to remove the writing from her skin, its black scrawl smudged in places by the abrasions from Emma Tarvin’s walking stick.
Marnie could read a handful of the words.
Liar. Animal. Dead.
Fran had used baby oil to clean the writing from May. Marnie wanted to do the same for Grace. She sat at the side of the bed. ‘Grace, I’m Detective Inspector Rome. I need your help.’
No response, not even a flicker in the grey eyes, too big for her face. Like Loz’s eyes.
‘I need your help finding the place where you and May were staying. Can you remember?’
Grace shut her eyes. She turned her fists until her arms were lying in plain view along either side of her body. Liar. Animal. Dead. Words, but not the ones Marnie needed from her.
‘I need to find Christie Faulk. I think you know her. She’s taken May’s sister. You knew May. You were with her, and Ashleigh. That’s right, isn’t it? Only now Christie’s taken May’s sister Loz. Loz is thirteen years old. We’re very worried about her. I think you know where Christie’s taken her. It’s the place you were running from when Emma took you in.’ Marnie didn’t mention the car crash, or the cupboard, or the beatings. ‘Help me to find Loz, please. She’s angry and scared. She wants to find whoever killed her sister. We think she went with Christie believing Christie would take her to May’s killer—’
The sound coming out of Grace was raw and low-pitched. She rolled her head against the pillows weakly.
‘You didn’t know May was dead,’ Marnie realised. ‘I’m sorry, I thought you knew. I thought that’s why you ran from that house, because you saw how dangerous it was.’
She waited, to see if Grace’s distress would get worse. But there wasn’t any time. There wasn’t any time to wait.
‘Grace, tell me where Christie has taken Loz. Somewhere safe, she said. I know there’s food, and shelter. I know she looks after you, to start with.’
‘Y-you don’t.’ A whisper, broken. ‘You d-don’t know.’
‘Tell me.’
Grace rolled her head again. Refusing to answer Marnie’s question, or unable to? Not crying, or not with her eyes. No tears came from under her shut lids, but her chest rose and fell beneath the blanket.
‘It’s all right.’ Marnie reached for her hand and held it. ‘It will be all right. You’re safe now. You can help me. I need your help. You can help to save Loz and whoever else is still inside the place Christie lied about. Because it’s not safe. It’s very, very dangerous. We need to get Loz and the others away from there, just like you got away. Tell me where she took you. Help me.’
Grace stopped shaking her head. Her chest hiccuped before it went still. Too still.
Marnie was about to check her pulse when the girl pulled her hand away, lifting her arm and putting it across her eyes, her wrist bent at an odd angle, unnatural.
Light lay along her forearm, highlighting the words written there.
Liar. Animal.
Dead.
Marnie saw Grace and May sitting together cross-legged on a stranger’s floor, writing on their skin with black marker pens, picking their words like weapons.
But there was something else on Grace’s skin.
A word Marnie had missed, until now.
Just above her left wrist.
In spiky letters, smaller than the rest:
Killer.
45
Christie
‘This is home,’ Christie told Big Eyes. ‘What d’you think?’ She shed her coat, transferring the keys to her jeans pocket.
Big Eyes took a hard look around the kitchen. Cupboards, table, knife rack. ‘Nice.’
‘Want to see the bedrooms?’
‘I’ll have to share, right?’
‘Not necessarily. Depends on who’s staying the night. We come and go, pretty much.’
‘Do I get a key?’ Big Eyes said. ‘If I can come and go, I’ll need a key.’
‘Sure.’ Christie nodded. She opened a drawer next to the stove ‘Help yourself.’
The drawer was full of door keys on plastic key rings. Big Eyes picked a green one.
‘We’ll be eating soon. There’s plenty of food here. Do you cook?’
‘A bit. Not really. But I can help out. I guess that’s what everyone does, right?’ Big Eyes tucked the key into her pocket, still looking around the kitchen. Every second sweep her eyes went to the door. She’d not bothered looking at the windows. Too high up. Only one way in and out.
Christie moved past her to shut the drawer. She’d found the keys in a junk shop, a job lot. Not one of them opened the doors here. But they looked good, all jumbled in the drawer.
Help yourself, come and go …
Harm’s idea, to make the girls feel safe. None of them had tried the keys on their first day, not even in their first week. Later, when it was too late, they cried when they found the keys didn’t work. Or like Grace, they fought.
Standing in the kitchen, Big Eyes looked old. She wasn’t. She was younger than any of the others, but she looked ancient. Fear snaked into Christie’s throat. What had she done?
She picked up a glass. ‘Water’s here.’ She walked to where the barrels were stacked, showing the girl how to work the tap that Harm had fitted.
‘What’s wrong with the sink?’ Big Eyes said.
‘They haven’t connected the water. This’s a new-build. No water, no gas. No electricity except what Harm’s fixed up for us.’
‘Who’s Harm?’
‘A mate.’ Christie shot her a look. ‘Don’t freak. It’s not like that.’
Her face flickered, on the blink. ‘Like what?’
‘Whatever you’re imagining.’ Christie sucked a breath, drinking from the glass until the snake stopped moving in her mouth. ‘I was the same when I first came here. It looks weird, because we’re not used to anyone else giving a shit about us.’ She shrugged. ‘Some people do, that’s all.’
‘Like Harm.’ Big Eyes put her hands in her pockets, shoulders up, trying to look tough.
‘Yes.’ Christie watched her across the smooth lip of the glass. ‘Just like Harm.’ She paused, then added, ‘You’ll have to give us a name.’
‘Laura.’ It might’ve been her real name, or a lie.
All the girls lied, sooner or later. Even May, who’d been the only one Christie had trusted with a real key, certain she’d come back that night after helping Grace to get away. But it was Christie who’d scared Grace into going to Emma Tarvin’s, knowing the old woman would keep her quiet, and teach her a lesson she wouldn’t forget. May had come back alone, or so Christie had thought. She hadn’t known about the lie in May’s belly, and the way it would ruin everything.
‘Come on.’ She walked Laura to the room May had shared with Ashleigh. ‘This’s yours. I’ll fix you up with some bedding.’
‘Thanks.’ Her eyes were on the mezzanine floor. ‘What’s up there?’
‘Another bedroom.’
‘Is that where you sleep?’
‘No. My room’s at the back.’
‘Who sleeps upstairs?’
‘Aimee, for now.’ Christie shrugged. ‘I’ll introduce you later. She’ll be sleeping now.’
‘Why? Is she a baby?’ Laura looked as if the idea of a baby frightened her.
‘No. She’s had the flu so she needs a lot of rest. I’ll take her some food in a bit.’
‘Okay. I’ll help if you like. I’m good at looking after people. My mum drinks, it’s why my dad left. I looked after my little brother until they took us into care.’
Christie was used to listening to the girls’ stories, setting her face to sympathy. It helped that she was afraid of Laura. She didn’t know why, only that the girl looked ancient, a spell-breaker, like she’d been alive for ever. Harm had wanted a girl and Christie had brought him one. Let him deal with it. ‘What happened to your brother?’
Laura walked to the window with its tinted glass and its view of the chimneys at Battersea. She said in a stiff voice, ‘He died. It’s why I ran away, so I didn’t end up the same.’
Christie nodded. ‘I get it.’
‘Do you?’
‘I told you about Neve.’
Laura turned so the light was behind her, blanking her eyes. ‘How did you find this place?’
‘Harm found it. He was working here when the new flats were going up. They never finished building, permissions expired, they ran out of money.’ Christie recited the story with a shrug. ‘He says sooner or later someone will come and kick us out, but it hasn’t happened yet.’
‘So we’re squatters?’
‘More or less. It’s safe, that’s the main thing.’ Could this girl hear the hard hammering of the lie in Christie’s throat? ‘So … are you staying?’
Laura had her hands in her pockets. Christie saw her curl a fist around the key she’d taken from the drawer. The key that didn’t fit any of the locks in here.
She nodded. ‘For a bit, thanks. If you’re sure it’s okay.’
‘It’s great,’ Christie said. ‘Good to have you with us.’
46
‘We have a problem with Grace Bradley.’
Marnie stood beside the girl’s photo on the whiteboard, addressing the team. ‘She’s clearly very distressed by whatever happened to her and whatever she witnessed before and after she found her way on to the Garrett. A trauma specialist is trying to piece together what she knows and how it might help us find Loz.’
‘So it’s not true that she confessed.’ Ron folded his arms.
‘There was no confession.’ Marnie looked at each member of her team in turn. ‘Some of you, I know, have seen the photographs of the writing on Grace. All of you, I’m sure, have heard the rumour going around that someone, maybe Grace herself, wrote the word “Killer” on her left arm.’ She paused, needing their attention focused on what mattered. ‘There are a lot of words on her arms, and on her legs, and elsewhere on her body. One of those words is “Killer”, another is “Dead”. I don’t believe her to be a killer, and thanks to DS Jake’s sharp ears, she’s not dead. To be clear, we have no reason at this time to believe Grace was responsible for the death of May Beswick, and certainly not of Ashleigh Jewell, since at that time she was locked in Emma Tarvin’s flat. We need to find out where she was before that happened, where she ran from on the night of the crash. She was coming from the west, according to both Joe and Ruth Eaton. She was on foot and she’d covered some ground.’ Grace’s feet were bruised and swollen, raw with walking. ‘We’re looking for anything we can find on Christine or Christie Faulk. She was seen with Loz eight hours ago. We’re putting together an e-fit so we’ll have a face to show to people soon. And we’re still looking for Jamie Ledger. DS Jake, you have an update on that?’
‘Ledger has worked on a series of new-build sites across London in the last thirteen months,’ Noah said. ‘We’re checking the ones to the west of Battersea Power Station and the Garrett. We know Grace was picked up by Christi
e over in Lewisham, so we’ve favoured sites in that direction. DC Pitcher’s drawn up a map. It’s on the board. Take a look.’
‘Loz hasn’t used her phone since texting last night,’ Debbie said. ‘Mum and Dad have tried texting and calling but the phone’s switched off and may’ve been dumped. We’re trying to trace it.’
‘We’re thinking somewhere large enough to hold more than one girl at a time and where they’d feel safe.’ Colin removed his glasses, polishing them. ‘At least to begin with. May and Ashleigh were clean and well fed. We’re not looking at a warehouse or a derelict site. This is somewhere with running water, meals. A home. We’re assuming that’s where Christie’s taken Loz.’
‘Our witnesses from the Stockwell subway didn’t get a scary vibe from Christie.’ Noah nodded at the missing faces pinned to the whiteboard. ‘She isn’t forcing these girls to go with her, but she’s clever. Manipulative. She wanted to take Loz and she knew how to make it happen. Joel and the others thought she’d be safe – didn’t see Christie as any kind of a threat. Loz isn’t naïve, but she is desperate. To find her sister’s killer.’ He paused. ‘I can believe she went with Christie hoping Christie would lead her to the killer. But I can’t believe she went thinking Christie was the killer.’
‘She could’ve got that wrong,’ Debbie said. ‘She’s thirteen, and not thinking straight.’
‘Bradley won’t give us anything?’ Ron demanded. ‘An address, a general location?’
‘She’s in shock,’ Marnie said. ‘Give her time.’
‘We don’t have time. Loz’s been gone five hours. With some nutter who’s either killing girls or handing them over to some other nutter who is. Her parents must be out of their minds.’
Marnie didn’t argue. Sean and Katrina Beswick were stunned, still trying to process the fact that Loz had gone in search of May’s killer. ‘Why?’ Katrina kept asking. ‘Why would she do that? Does she hate us?’As if Loz was a mystery to her, the way Ashleigh had been to her mother.
‘What about the other teenagers Joel told us about? Eric – any matches in Misper for him?’
