by Tania Carver
The bell she rang was only comparatively modern, 1970s as opposed to the rest of the house that looked like it belonged more in the 1870s. It was slightly less well maintained than the rest of the row, the paint round the windows chipped and peeling, the door needing a fresh coat of varnish, the front garden less manicured. She checked her list. It belonged to a writer.
Suzanne Perry and Zoe Herriot’s list of clients from the hospital. In need of speech therapy. Luckily, they hadn’t been there for a long time so the list wasn’t huge. But it was extensive and far-ranging. Socio-economically and geographically. Anni had ruled out the children. She didn’t regard them as a priority and would only start looking at them if the adult list didn’t pan out. There might be a vengeful parent or family member involved somewhere but she doubted it, really. So the adults were where she was starting.
She had cross-referenced the ones that she had flagged up with Julie Miller’s list. There were three that stood out and she was calling on the first one now. He had been referred to a speech therapist following a stroke. Anni had the bare essentials of his medical notes. Writer. Early fifties. Heavy drinker, heavy smoker. Mild to medium stroke. Responded well to treatment, discharged after three months of regular sessions, expected back for a check up in three months time.
She waited for the door to be answered.
The scene in the cell earlier that morning had stunned her. Horrible. Awful. She had heard of things like that before but never witnessed it for herself. Especially to someone she herself had questioned and fingered as a suspect.
Anthony Howe. When Fiona Welch read out the profile his name had jumped out at her. A perfect match. There had been such a sense of jubilation when she had brought him in, the exhilaration of a job well done. Or a good job about to be done. And then this. A total unravelling. Had he done it because he was guilty or because he was innocent? She didn’t know. She hoped he came round so they could ask him.
But the real shocker had been the follow-up she had witnessed. Her boss striking a superior officer. Their superior officer. She had seen arguments before, differences of opinion, sure. On an almost daily basis. Strong personalities clashed all the time when under pressure, no big thing, part of the job. But to actually go so far as to take a swing at a superior officer and to see Phil Brennan be the one to do it, that was unprecedented. Admittedly, there had been times she had felt like doing that to Fenwick herself, but still . . .
She hadn’t said a word. Knew she shouldn’t, it wasn’t in her best interests to. Knew Phil wouldn’t want her to either. And no matter what had gone on between them recently, she was still loyal to her boss.
And then there was Mickey. With his spiky hair, cocky smile and sharp suit she had dismissed him as just another ambitious young officer, thinking he was a master of the universe and a shag magnet because he had put away a couple of villains, won a few fist fights and made it to DS. That was how she had taken the previous night’s phone call at first, but the way he had behaved on the stairs earlier was different. He seemed serious, intense, even. Worried. In fact, she was beginning to think she had misjudged him.
And the way he had blushed when she had touched his arm. Sweet. She smiled at the memory.
But not too much. She didn’t date guys she worked with. Not after last time.
But maybe he did have something important to say to her. Maybe he would ring her.
The front door opened, putting all further thoughts of Mickey Philips out of her mind. In front of her was a man. Small, grey-haired, portly. He looked old enough to be the father of the man she was calling on. He looked at her, warily.
‘Keith Ridley?’ she said, folding out her warrant card.
‘Yes?’ His voice held a tremor that matched the one in his hand holding the door open.
‘Detective Constable Anni Hepburn. Can I have a few words?’
He slowly stood aside to let her in, closing the door behind her.
She entered and all thoughts of her fighting bosses, Mickey’s tongue-tied attempts to talk to her and the condition of Anthony Howe were forgotten and pushed from her head as she concentrated on the job she had to do.
Forty minutes later she was back out in the sunshine, striking him off the list.
He was a writer of crime fiction, she had discovered, although she hadn’t read any of his books. However, it would have been more accurate to say his real calling was self-destruction as he had sat in front of her chain-smoking cigarette after cigarette with a can of lager on the arm rest of his chair while she questioned him, his shaking hand alternating what he put to his lips.
He told her he didn’t know why he had suffered a stroke, must have been something hereditary. His wife was out at work teaching and he was home alone. Working on a new novel, he said, although he had turned off Homes Under the Hammer when they entered the living room.
He had nothing but praise for the work of Suzanne and Zoe, though. And, Anni thought, genuine shock and regret when he saw on the news what had happened to them. And, most importantly, a verifiable alibi. She had thanked him and left.
Walking to her car, feeling the kind of imagined, malevolent eyes on her that all outsiders were treated to in remote villages, especially black ones, her phone rang.
She answered it. Mickey.
‘Hey,’ he said. ‘How you doing?’
‘Fine,’ she said. ‘Working through the therapy list like I said I was going to.’
‘Any luck?’
‘Not so far. Got an ex-soldier next. Post-traumatic stress disorder. That’ll be a laugh. See what he comes up with.’
‘Right.’
‘You?’
He sighed. ‘Losing the will to live. Rapidly.’
She laughed. ‘Still hunting for Nemo?’
‘Yeah . . .’
‘Dory was my favourite. And the sharks.’
‘What?’
‘The film. Don’t say you haven’t seen it?’
‘No. You have kids, then?’
‘Nephews. Two of them.’
‘Right.’
Mickey fell silent. Anni waited. Eventually she decided to prompt him.
‘What was it you wanted to talk to me about, then?’
‘Yeah. When are you free?’
She told him she had an address for the soldier on a houseboat by the quayside at the Hythe.
‘Where we found the body,’ said Mickey.
‘Probably,’ she said. ‘D’you want to meet up there?’
He did. They made a time, rang off.
She drove away, glad to be heading back to the town. Feeling much safer there than in the country.
61
The Super sat behind the desk in Fenwick’s office. Stared at him, unsmiling.
‘Jesus Christ. What a fucking mess.’
Phil said nothing.
Fenwick was sitting next to him, a red welt over the side of his lip, his cheek puffed up, face turned away from the Super, eyes still on him. Phil kept the swollen knuckles of his right hand covered with his left.
The Super was never known by his full title, Chief Superintendent Brian Denton, at least not throughout Colchester Division. Just the Super. He wasn’t a physically imposing man but he had the confidence and presence that comes from knowing whatever he said was going to be listened to and acted on. With his swept-back grey hair, impeccable uniform and artfully concealed broken veins on his nose, Phil was always reminded of an ageing matinee idol who thought he was bound for Hollywood but somehow ended up in daytime soaps. Not everyone can run the Met.
But he was a first-class copper and he still retained a thief taker’s instinct, no matter how many years he had spent behind a desk.
Usually on a case like this Phil reported directly to the Super at Chelmsford, the DCI at the station, his direct superior, taking more of an office management role. The Super had mentioned Fenwick before. Phil got the impression he didn’t rate him much.
‘Heads should roll for this.’
Phi
l again said nothing.
Fenwick, however, leaned forward. ‘Well, sir, I . . . I’ve covered all bases adequately. Perhaps if the . . .’ - he risked a sly, angry glance at Phil - ‘. . . shall we say lower-ranking officers had done their jobs properly, we wouldn’t be in this mess.’
Phil’s vision turned red. His hands began to shake. Bastard.
He still said nothing.
The Super stared at Fenwick. ‘Surely as senior officer the blame should lie with you, DCI Fenwick?’
Fenwick went red. ‘Well, yes, perhaps . . . but I’m not out on the front line. I’m here, coordinating. I can’t be held responsible for everything that goes on.’
‘So you’re . . . what? Just a glorified office manager, is that what you’re saying?’
It was Fenwick’s turn to shake. Phil suppressed a grin.
‘I . . . I . . . no . . .’
The Super cut in. ‘This is a bloody mess. You’ve got more resources and bodies on this one than any other case in Essex. I want results. And I want this kept quiet, the press out of. If I see one word of this in the papers I’ll have both your jobs, clear?’
They both nodded.
‘Good. Right.’ He turned to Phil. ‘DI Brennan. Did you get a confession out of the suspect before he was taken to hospital?’
Phil shook his head. ‘No, sir.’
‘Pity.’ He looked at his watch. Sighed. Clearly on his way to another appointment. He looked between the two of them irritably. ‘Can I trust you both to carry on with this? Without one blaming the other for failings either real or imagined? Or the other feeling the need to express his feelings physically, no matter how deserving the recipient may be of them?’
The Super’s eyes twinkled. Phil caught it. He didn’t know if Fenwick had.
He knows. He knows what’s happened.
Phil nodded. ‘You can, sir.’
Fenwick was more hesitant.
‘Problem, DCI Fenwick?’
Fenwick risked a sly look at Phil, eyes lit by a vengeful light.
Here it comes, he thought.
‘Yes? I’m waiting.’
Fenwick shook his head, dropped his eyes to the floor.
‘Good. DI Brennan, you’re still in charge of this investigation. Move it forward, get results. The whole world and his bloody wife are looking over our shoulder on this one. DCI Fenwick, you’re in charge of damage control here. Like I said, not one word of this to the press. Or heads will roll.’
The Super stood up, bid them good day, let himself out.
Fenwick breathed a sigh or relief.
Silence in the room.
‘Not one word, Ben,’ said Phil eventually, ‘or heads will roll.’
Fenwick turned to him, quickly, angrily. ‘You won’t get away with what you did.’
There were plenty of retorts that came into Phil’s mind then but he kept his mouth shut. Instead he stood up, left the office and walked back to the bar.
The investigation was in full swing. Phones were being worked, keyboards pounded, voices raised, bodies all over the room. But there was something Phil was interested in more than the investigation at the moment. All to do with the plan he had thought up on the way to work.
He walked across to Milhouse, crouched at the side of his desk.
‘Milhouse,’ he said, ‘need you to run a check on someone for me.’
Milhouse looked up, pushed his glasses back up his nose. ‘Who?’
He handed him a folded slip of paper. Milhouse opened it, read it. Then looked up, his mouth a perfect ‘O’ of shock.
‘This is—’
‘Marina.’
‘Right.’ Milhouse frowned. ‘What kind of check?’
‘Financial, mainly.’ He gave him another sheet of folded paper. ‘Here’s her account details. Debit and credit cards. I want to know if you can find a trail, see where they’ve been used.’
‘But, this is . . . this is against the law.’
Phil tried to act casual. ‘Strictly speaking, without a warrant and all that, yes. But please. As a favour to your superior officer? A discreet favour?’
Milhouse looked between the computer and the paper. Eventually he nodded.
Phil managed a smile. ‘Thanks. This means a lot to me. And let me know as soon as you find something, yeah?’
Milhouse said he would.
He stood up, crossed to the door. Fenwick was just walking through it.
‘Where are you going?’
‘To do some policework.’
He swept through the doors before Fenwick could say anything else.
Rose Martin looked up from her desk. Ben was standing by the double doors, watching Phil Brennan walk away. She knew the look on his face by now - angry enough to do some serious damage.
She stood up, walked towards him.
‘Ben? You got a minute?’
She walked outside, knowing he would follow her into the corridor. Knowing he would follow her anywhere. Aware also that Fiona Welch had looked up, was watching them go.
‘That bastard . . .’ As soon as they were alone, the anger was vented. ‘The Super knows what happened, knows what that bastard did and condones it, bloody condones it . . . oh, he didn’t say it in so many words but I know what he meant. It was clear whose bloody side he was on . . .’
‘Ben.’ She placed her hands on his shoulders, looked directly into his eyes. They were flailing around, avoiding her gaze, but she kept at him, waiting for them to settle, like startled crows following a gunshot.
‘D’you want to get back at him? D’you want to get even?’
‘You’re bloody right I do. I want to see the look on his face when—’
She jumped in quickly. ‘D’you want the glory for this one? Want Brennan to come in looking clueless?’
He looked at her. Said nothing.
‘I’ve got something that no one else has. And it’s gold.’
His anger stopped. She knew it was still there, though, like a stationary train at a platform or cancer in remission.
‘What?’ he said.
She smiled. ‘Calm down first, then I’ll show you.’
He smiled. It was a struggle. ‘You always know the right thing to say to me.’
‘I know,’ she said. ‘Come on.’
She led him back into the bar, aware that Fiona Welch’s eyes were still fixed on the pair of them.
Rose smiled to herself. Hands off, spod, she thought. There’s only one person going to get the glory on this case and shag the boss.
And that’s me.
62
Paula Harrison’s face registered a range of emotions that Phil hoped he would never have to experience.
She stood in the doorway to her house, clutching the door. She stared at him, round-eyed. If she blinked, Phil thought, the tears would start.
And might never stop.
‘Adele . . .’
‘Can I come in, Paula?’
She let him in. It was the same as his last visit only more so. The mess was messier, the cartoons on the TV louder and more vivid, the sense of lost hope more palpable.
She chased Nadine upstairs, waited until the door closed, perched on the edge of the sofa. Looked at Phil. Preparing herself.
‘We . . .’
She cut him off. ‘It’s her, isn’t it? The body. Adele . . .’
‘I think you’d better prepare yourself for the worst.’
And she broke. Not just tears but her whole body seemed to crumple as if her bones had dissolved, leaving her unable to move, to stand.
‘I’ll . . .’ Phil went into the kitchen to make tea. Let her sob in peace.
He returned to find her dabbing her eyes and blowing her nose with a paper tissue. She kept dabbing, kept blowing until the tissue was too sodden to function then, seemingly forgetting about it, just let it drop to the floor.
‘How . . . how did . . .’
‘We believe the body we found is Adele. We still need to do other tests to be sure but I j
ust wanted to warn you.’
She nodded absently.
‘You’ll be asked to make a formal identification of the body once we’ve confirmed it’s her. Is there anyone you’d like to come with you?’
She shook her head.
‘A family member? Friend?’
‘Adele was my family. All the family I had left . . .’
‘What about her father?’
A dark wave passed over Paula’s features. ‘He won’t be back . . .’ She glanced up at Phil, glanced away. ‘And, anyway, Adele hated him. She wouldn’t . . . wouldn’t . . .’ The tears started again.
Phil said nothing.
‘She was all, all I had . . .’
Phil looked at the pictures on the wall. Adele when she was younger with her brother. Both smiling, both looking like the summer would never end.
Both gone.
Phil didn’t know what else to say. He had no words that would make things better for her, no actions that could help. He phoned FLO, asked them to send Cheryl Bland round. She was on her way. Phil hung up, told Paula.
She nodded.
‘I think . . .’
But he never got to tell her what he thought. His phone went again. He answered.
‘Adrian here, boss. I’m with the CSIs in Suzanne Perry’s flat. Found something I think you should see.’
He looked across at Paula. Didn’t want to leave her alone. ‘Right now?’
‘’Fraid so.’
‘What kind of thing?’
He hesitated. ‘I think you should come and see for yourself, boss.’
‘OK.’ He checked his watch. ‘On my way.’
He turned to Paula. ‘I have to go.’
She looked up at him sharply, as if she had forgotten he was actually there.
‘Cheryl Bland’ll be here soon. She’ll help you.’ He handed her a card. ‘Call me if you need to.’
She took it. Let it slip through her fingers to join the used tissue.
Phil saw himself out.
63
‘Up here, boss,’ said Adrian Wren. ‘And, like they say in Star Trek, set faces to stun.’
