Be My Girl

by Tony Hutchinson

  She pulled her phone out of her bag and made a call.

  ‘All okay with the Press?’ Ed asked, his mobile pressed to his ear.

  ‘No, it bloody wasn’t. How well do you know this Brian Banks idiot? He’s been shouting his mouth off in the pub about how his daughter was raped by a masked man who got into her home.’

  ‘Fuck! The stupid bastard.’

  ‘I want you to go and see him, and tell him that he is in danger of single-handedly fucking up this investigation.’

  She filled Ed in on her conversation with Darius. ‘If Darius heard him, others in the pub could have done. After you give him a bollocking – and make it a good one – ask for the names of as many people as he can remember who were there that night. It could even be the killer was in the pub, overheard Banks, and wants us to believe it was our rapist.’

  ‘I’m on it, Sam. Mind you, that would tend to rule Jason out. He knew that we had Crowther locked up.’

  ‘But he doesn’t think Crowther is our man, does he? He said it when we were talking about that solicitor. When did that become his opinion? Perhaps he knows Crowther’s not our man. Maybe he knows better than any of us.’

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Reporters were milling around chatting when Sam returned to the media briefing room. She survived, did a number of interviews unscathed and 40 minutes later was back in the HOLMES room.

  Dave Johnson jumped to his feet and asked if he could speak to her in her office.

  She glanced at her watch. 4pm.

  ‘Everything okay?’ she asked as she sat down behind her desk. ‘We were worried about you this morning.’

  He dropped into a seat and Sam spotted the sweat patches under his arms. She had never seen stains on Dave’s shirts.

  ‘Fine. I just needed some time out. It was a shock about Louise. Just trying to get my head round it. But listen, the lab’s been in touch. We’ve got the DNA result off the condom wrapper. It’s not Crowther’s and it’s not Amber’s.’

  ‘So if the rapist’s not Crowther, the rapist could still be the killer.’

  ‘Potentially, yes. It’s also possible the DNA just belongs to someone who helped make the thing but that’s highly unlikely. Everything is all automated these days. Crowther’s admitted stealing the knickers, both pairs. His solicitor’s given us a heads-up he’s prepared to admit stealing more, but that’s as far as it goes. He’s having nothing to do with the rapes. Brief says he hasn’t got it in him.’

  Cupping her right hand around her chin, Sam considered Dave’s words carefully before responding.

  ‘It may be he knows we’ve got him anyway for the knickers from Danielle and the swimming baths and he’s ready to chuck in a few other admissions to ingratiate himself , to con us into thinking he’s coughing everything.’

  Dave nodded, locked his hands behind his head, sweat stains on full show.

  ‘Or it may be he’s nothing more than a sleazy loser who steals women’s knickers.’

  Sam considered Crowther, picturing him in her head.

  ‘We know he lives alone. Parents are dead. He doesn’t seem to have had any girlfriends. He appears to all intense and purposes to be a loner.’

  Dave nodded. ‘I agree boss, but of course we know he was out running the night Amber was attacked.’

  Sam shook her head, details darting through her mind.

  She said: ‘But the uniforms are adamant that he wasn’t wearing an Adidas tracksuit, and we know from the CCTV that someone was out that night wearing a three-striped top. And remember, the girls have described the rapist’s clothes as Adidas.’

  Tilting her head, Sam looked at the ceiling hoping for a flash of inspiration from the dirty white paintwork, but there was nothing.

  Keep working the evidence, Sam told herself.

  Dave continued: ‘The house-to-house teams were approached by a neighbour of Emily’s who had just got back from a week in Lanzarote. She didn’t know what was going on until yesterday. Seems she heard the sound of breaking glass at Emily’s, went outside and the only person she saw was the postman doing his deliveries. She asked him about the noise and he told her he’d seen two boys run past him. One was carrying a cricket bat.’

  ‘Interesting,’ Sam said. ‘Do we know who he is? At the very least we’ll be able to confirm when the time the window was broken.’

  ‘We’ve already tracked him down. Bev Summers will see him later.’

  ‘Excellent. When did that come in?’

  ‘Last night.’

  Sam wanted another look at the CCTV stills. Her brain was pounding, demanding a breakthrough, any scrap that would advance the investigation.

  The February temperatures had done little to freeze the surface mud and water. ‘Marvellous,’ Ed muttered as he tiptoed like an overweight ballerina, the glossy shine on his black leather shoes vanishing with each step. Why were the offices always at the back of the yard in these places?

  Scrap metal seemed to be piled everywhere and the noise from the crusher pounded his ears like a Canary Island dance club. A raised-arm signal from the owner brought down the decibels, but not much, and Ed’s ears were still ringing.

  ‘Sergeant Whelan. How can I help you?’ Brian Banks shouted.

  Wearing a red sleeveless padded jacket, a checked woollen shirt, blue jeans and brown rigger boots, Banks was playing to the crowd of three next to him.

  Past caring about his shoes, Ed marched up to Banks, and like a hitch-hiker thumbing a lift, indicated 'the office'. He spoke with just a hint of aggression.

  ‘I need a word. A private word.’

  ‘And good day to you too, Sergeant.’

  ‘Now,’ Ed said, marching towards the office, the sniggers of Banks’s audience only adding to his anger.

  Banks stepped into the office. ‘Tea?’

  Ed slammed the door shut and his voice erupted.

  ‘You’ve been shouting your mouth off in The Golden Eagle about the attack on your Danielle.’

  Banks stepped toward Ed, the gap between them so small their toes were almost touching, Banks’s eyes were bulging and when he shouted, Ed could see saliva clinging to his lips.

  ‘Don’t you dare come in here and accuse me of shouting my fuckin’ mouth off. What the fuck are you doing about catching the bastard who attacked Danielle? Fuck all by the look of it.’

  Ed matched Banks’s volume and aggression. ‘For your information, we’re working our bollocks off to catch this bastard, but you letting your gob go won’t do anything but fuck it up. Now the Press know the bastard who attacked Danielle was wearing a mask Want to know how? Because someone heard you being the big man on Wednesday night in the fuckin’ pub.’

  Ed wondered whether Banks’s eyes were going to burst.

  ‘I was fuckin’ angry, for fuck sake! My daughter’s raped in her home by a cunt wearing a mask.’

  ‘But we’d deliberately kept that from the Press,’ Ed said. ‘We’d not released it and I know the girls sure as hell didn’t. So it’s down you shouting your fuckin’ mouth off.’

  Banks walked backwards and sat on the corner of the desk, his arms outstretched, palms facing upwards, and the redness draining fast from his face.

  ‘Look Ed, I was wound up. I’m sorry. I wasn’t thinking. I wanted to kill the bastard and I still do. I put out five grand to find him.’

  Taking his cue from Banks, Ed lowered his voice.

  ‘I know you have. Look, I understand where you’re coming from but you’re not helping. The guy that attacked Danielle will be a loner. He’s not going to be running around telling the world and his wife what he’s done. Your five grand won’t sort anything out.’

  Ed put his hands in his trouser pockets before continuing. ‘There’s a guy in custody who stole a pair of Danielle’s knickers a few weeks ago.’

  Banks shot up off the desk. ‘You’re fuckin’ joking?’

  ‘Before you go jumping to any conclusions, we don’t think he attacked Danielle. I don’t want to
find him beaten up somewhere.’

  ‘I don’t even know who the fucker is.’

  ‘I’m sure it wouldn’t take too long.’

  ‘Sounds to me like the wanker deserves it. What are you fuckers doing protecting nonces like him?’

  Ed held Banks’s hate-filled eyes.

  ‘Just leave it, Brian. And while I’m on, having Duncan Todd beaten up wasn’t a particularly bright idea either.’

  ‘Duncan Todd? I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

  ‘Well, we’ll leave it at that, then. You know, and now you know I know.’

  A temporary silence then Ed made his move to get the man onside.

  ‘Now I want you to do something for me. Something that might actually help catch your Danielle’s attacker, not balls it up.’

  Banks’s eyes narrowed. He spoke slowly. ‘Go on.’

  ‘I want you to make a list of everybody you can remember being in the pub that night and what they were wearing as best as you can remember.’

  ‘Yeah, okay, but how will that help?’

  ‘I want to know who overheard you so we can visit them and tell them not to say anything. Call it damage limitation,’ Ed lied.

  Ed Whelan had only one interest about who was in the pub. If the rapist and the killer weren’t one and the same, the killer had to have heard about the ski mask and before Louise’s murder, those who overheard Banks in the pub were potentially the only ones apart from police officers to have known about it.

  Ed left the yard having told Banks he would telephone him later for the list. Clearly Banks wouldn’t remember everyone but visiting those he was able to recall would lead to other names and the domino effect would begin.

  In between tears, and protracted silences, June Harker seemed to make endless cups of tea, shuffling from the living room to the kitchen, her red tartan sheepskin-lined zip-up boot slippers never fully lifting off the floor. Her blue, thick cotton dress and white Arran cardigan were immaculately clean but emphasised her frailty in the small, well-kept house, so hot the Family Liaison Officer wondered if the radiators had been pumping out heat since September.

  Sitting down, his jacket laid across the arm of the plain green wing-back armchair, waiting for yet another weak, milky tea in a china cup, Paul Adams looked around at the framed photographs of a young Louise playing in the street, noting the cars captured in the background were smaller, more boxy than those today. It was clear the street outside this house had been her playground, a house that had been her childhood home.

  A head-and-shoulders photograph of Louise in her police uniform, displayed in a large silver frame, took pride of place on the pine fire surround.

  He took the drink and sipped it out of politeness. June seemed to be sitting to attention like old people of a certain background tend to do when they are in the company of so-called authority. Paul listened to her shaking voice, synchronised with the shaking of her cup on her saucer, telling him Louise’s first love had been her job.

  ‘Alan Smith loved himself, though. He never liked Louise being in the police. All those men,’ June said. ‘He kept saying she would have an affair. He was always accusing her if she was late home. Then it was him that had one. Not that it surprised me. And they had only been married three years. So much for his vows! No, I never liked him, but I kept my own counsel. Louise was besotted with him.’

  As a vacant look overcame her, Paul gently pushed for more, knowing a devil could be hiding in the detail.

  ‘Do you know where he’s living now, June?’

  June raised the cup to her lips, fighting back tears. ‘Living over the brush with a woman somewhere in Newcastle.’

  Paul had an address for Alan Smith, and knew that he had already been told Louise was dead.

  ‘Sorry to ask these questions, June, but I need to establish certain things. Was Alan ever violent towards Louise?’

  June stared ahead, thinking hard.

  ‘I don’t think so… No. They argued, but I don’t think he ever hit her. Most of her friends were police officers. She should have married one of them. He was a brewery rep, so he was always in pubs, talking to women, no doubt. I told Louise to go and meet someone else after he left, but she never did. Now she never will.’

  The silent sadness that followed June’s sharp intake of breath made the rattling of her cup on the saucer seem deafening. Paul stood and gently took the cup from her, fearing it would fall off the saucer. He put it on the dark occasional table next to her.

  ‘Will someone be going to see Alan?’ she asked, looking up at Paul.

  ‘I’ll see him later, June. Did Louise ever mention anyone threatening her?’

  ‘No. Everybody loved her. Why would anyone want to hurt her?’

  ‘That’s what we’ll find out. Detective Chief Inspector Sam Parker will visit you later. She’s very good. She knows what she’s doing. She’s in charge.’

  June nodded.

  ‘I’m sorry. I know that this is really hard. Can you tell me if any knives were missing from the block in Louise’s kitchen?’

  June’s face was full of concentration again.

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘What about her keys? Were any of those missing?’

  ‘No. There are only the two sets as far as I know. She has one and I have the other. I got Alan’s when he left. Louise’s key is in the hall, on the table. I used mine to open the door this morning.’

  Her voice fell away. Paul could imagine what was replaying in her mind.

  ‘Does anyone else have a key?’

  ‘No. Not even the cleaner. Louise leaves the key under the plant pot when she comes. I told her not to leave the key there, but she never listened.’

  ‘Do you know the name of the cleaner?’

  ‘It changes. Just depends. They come from an agency. ‘Mrs Muck Out’ or something liked that.’

  ‘How often?’

  ‘Once a week. Always on a Wednesday. Our Louise said they were very good.’

  Paul Adams talked generally about inquests, funerals, and the set-up of the investigation, before June politely asked if he could come back later. She looked exhausted.

  ‘Is there anyone I can call to come and sit with you?’ Paul asked.

  ‘No. There’s no one. I prefer to be by myself anyway.’

  ‘Tell you what, I’ll be back in a couple of hours. Is that okay?’

  ‘Yes. Thank you.’

  The single tear that trickled from her right eye slid slowly down her cheek.

  Alone in her house, she shuffled into what had been the dining room of her pre-war semi before Louise converted it into a bedroom (‘I’m not spending good money on a stair lift our Louise’) and rested her weight on the Zimmer frame she had kept out of sight of the detective. She gripped the metal as tightly as her bony arthritic knuckles would allow and stared at the crucifix on the wall, tears now rolling down her face.

  ‘How did you allow this to happen?’ she whispered.

  Nothing anyone had ever preached from the pulpit had prepared her for the discovery of her only child’s mutilated body.

  Her chest heaved, her voice wailed and the sobbing began.

  Chapter Forty

  The cold air was a welcome contrast to the stifling heat in the house. Paul Adams walked to the car, relieved the awkward first meeting, a step into the nightmare of another’s personal tragedy, was over. He had been there for hours and his only short break was when he walked down June’s path to hand a photograph of Louise to another member of the team. Copies would be needed for the press conference.

  There would be many more visits, more tears and recriminations, but the first one was over. No introductions would be necessary at the next.

  He now had information he could feed into the HOLMES room, information that would be important to build the picture of Louise and her life. He knew Sam Parker would value his contribution to the investigation. ‘The more we know about the victim, Paul, the more we know about the kille
r,’ Sam would say, like a mantra.

  He wanted to impress her. Sam Parker wielded influence. She could get him on to her team where he would work on high-profile investigations and get noticed, improve his chances of promotion. He would accept the piss-taking by the older detectives on the team. It was part of the game and promotion was everything.

  Bev Summers had joined the police at 18, and now 23 years later, had never married. A career detective, she preferred to live alone under her rules rather than living a married life of compromises.

  Staring into the glass panel of the door, the internal hall light bounced back her reflection as clear as if she’d been peering into crystal blue water on a sunny day. Her light grey suit and blue-and-white-striped blouse had seen better days; her short blonde hair with its split ends would require Lisa’s wizardry when she had time for a trip to the hairdressers. The tight wrinkles around her mouth, the result of a lifelong love affair with cigarettes, were beyond monetary, or human, intervention.

  Sam was standing next to her. She wanted to speak to Bev about the phone call and the flowers, confide in a woman, a woman she had known for years. The journey had provided the opportunity.

  Bev knocked on the brightly painted green front door, a complete contrast to the rotting window frames, of 19, Felton Drive, a detached house on the Gull Estate.

  ‘You do the talking,’ Sam said.

  A man in his mid-20s opened the door, his short dark brown hair drawing the eyes to his short, pointed nose.

  ‘Yes?’ he said in a quiet, almost timid, voice, showing Bev more of the left side of his face than his eyes.

  Bev held forward her warrant card.

  ‘Hi. Mr Spence? Michael Spence? I’m DC Summers. CID. I wonder if I can have a word? Nothing to worry about. It’s about a broken window, and you telling a lady that you saw a couple of young lads running away with a cricket bat.’

  ‘Oh. Yes, the boys with the bat. I remember.’

  ‘Can we come in?’

  Sam watched him change his stance; right hip pushed against the door frame, left arm touching the other side. Was he blocking their way in? He looked vaguely familiar. She hardly saw her postman – she was at work or still in bed when the post arrived, but a few weeks ago she did sign for a couple of books. Was it him?