Blood Secrets_A gripping crime thriller with killer twists

by Dreda Say Mitchell

  The sound of a major league row going on in the squat made Tiffany half open one sleepy eye. By rights she should’ve jumped out of bed scared out of her wits. But Tiff - being Tiff - was still feeling the affects of a booze and ecstasy bender from a night on the razz and so she couldn’t be arsed. She’d only dossed down on the mattress on the floor a couple of hours back and the only thing that was going to shift her any time soon was someone chucking money in the air.

  ‘Keep the bloody racket down will ya,’ she yelled, properly miffed.

  Was it too much to ask for a girl to get some beauty sleep around here? Tiff checked the time on her Nokia: eleven in the morning for Pete’s sake. What was the world coming to when a girl couldn’t get some shut-eye?

  She yanked the sleeping bag over her head and tried to forget about the banging and shouting. Sounded like it was coming from the hallway. Why, oh why, was there always some bat-shit drama going in this squat? Tiff didn’t mind the bare floorboards, the peeling wallpaper and the damp. She could put up with there being no gas or lecky too. It was the petty slanging matches that went on for what felt like 24/7 that did her head in. It was always the same. Someone had pinched someone else’s drugs, milk, pillow or girlfriend. A right royal den of shysters. But then again there was no rent or rates to worry about.

  That was certainly a big factor in Tiff taking up residence here. After she’d made a dog’s dinner at her first shot of independence, she’d had no alternative but to slink back to her mum’s on The Devil’s Estate, tail firmly between her legs,. Tiff had hated that. Though, truth be told, as much as she’d despised being back on The Devil at least it had been a safe place to put her head down. Unlike her life in that flash duplex on the Island where the good times had been derailed by her borrowing blunt like it was going out of fashion. Her mum had put a spanner in the works of her coming back home of course. Told her in no uncertain terms she had a week to find her own gaff. If it hadn’t been for the girl she was snogging at the time giving her a steer on this squat, she’d have been well on her uppers, just another homeless with a can of lager and a dog on a string.

  Tiff put her past troubles aside and got on with the business of sleeping. She’d nearly nodded off again when the door was flung open and crashed against the wall. Some maniac rushed across the creaking boards to the window and flung open the curtains. Or, more like, lifted the towel that was nailed there.

  Tiff squeezed her eyes tight. If someone thought she was budging from her snug bug nest they had another thing coming. ‘Will you sod off whoever you are?’

  ‘They’re here. And they’ve come mob-handed.’

  It was the voice of one of the girls who bedded down in the living room. Tiff couldn’t recall her name but she’d obviously ignored the government’s warning to, ‘Just say no’.

  Tiff snuggled deeper. ‘Who’s here?’

  ‘The bailiffs. And the filth are sitting in their motors as back up.’

  The Bill didn’t scare Tiff, nor did the bailiffs. She’d been dragged up on The Devil; take more than that lot to put the frighteners on her. ‘What do they want?’

  ‘Well, they’re not here to service the boiler, are they?’ came the sarky reply. ‘We’re being slung out, you dopey cow. Some of the boys are barricading the front door with the furniture.’

  Tiff sniggered as she finally popped her head out of the sleeping bag. Her hair was shaved around the sides with a dyed-silver Mohican in the middle and she wore a nose ring. ‘That’ll be a good trick; we ain’t got no furniture. It all went on the fire along with half the floorboards.’

  The girl was in a right two and eight, moving in an agitated state from one foot to the other as she kept a nervous watch at the window.

  She let the towel fall back and tried to pep Tiff up. ‘Come on, move yourself, we’re making a fight of it. We might get another couple of days outta it.’

  ‘Can’t see the point.’ Tiff threw her head back in a large yawn.

  No-name-junkie fisted her hands on her hips like an angry mother. ‘You really are crap, aren’t you Tiff? There’s no zip in you at all.’

  ‘Got that right in one. I’ve been evicted before and I expect I’ll be evicted again before I finally get my rose covered cottage out in the sticks.’

  The other woman scratched the needle tracks on her arm as she made her way to the door. ‘Suit yourself. If you’ve got any gear, best flush it down the John before they kick their way in.’

  Did she have any stuff? It had been one hell of a rave the night before so she thought not. There was a lull for about ten minutes and it was nearly long enough for Tiffany to drift back to snoozeville. In a half dream, she saw her mum standing over her, stabbing a finger at her going into her usual Judge Judy routine:

  ‘What’s the matter with ya girl? When you gonna grow up and do something with your life? How much longer are you gonna ponce, skive and thieve? Eh? And don’t give me any lip or think you’re too old to feel the back of my hand across your bonce.’

  Tiff woke with a start. There was a crash but it wasn’t Babs’ hand across her head. It was the front door being booted in.

  ‘Nazis! Sieg heil!’ one of the guy’s mocked from the hallway.

  Another voice yelled, ‘You feel no shame chucking homeless people on the street?’

  The druggie, who’d been in her room, joined the chorus, her tone beyond hysterical. ‘How would you like it if someone did this to your old gran?’ To which a stern male voice replied, ‘my old gran would have more self-respect than to squat on someone else’s property.’

  The sound of a brief, half-hearted struggle took place before the voices moved onto the street. Smash, crash, wallop! Tiff didn’t need to see to know what that was; the sound of the squatters’ belongings being unceremoniously dumped in the gutter.

  Tiff pulled a face in the sleeping bag. So much for the fight they were going to put up.

  Her room door was flung open again.

  ‘There’s another one in here.’

  To Tiff’s surprise it was a woman’s voice. She didn’t know girls did this kind of work. Whatever! Tiff wasn’t moving.

  ‘Oi! Sleepyhead! Rise and shine. Get your shit together, time to go.’

  Tiff toughed it out inside the sleeping bag. ‘Gimme a break luv - I’m knackered. Why don’t you board up the doors and windows and I’ll let myself out across the lean-to later?’

  Tiff howled in pain as a hard kick sunk into her belly. She didn’t even have enough time to get her breath back before a second blow knocked her, along with her sleeping bag, clean off the mattress, sending her rolling, like Cleopatra, across the dodgy floorboards. Tiff had been around long enough to figure out that the blows were professionally placed to cause maximum pain. This woman obviously knew how to dish it out and had learnt her trade somewhere nasty.

  Gasping, chest rising high, Tiff shoved back her sleeping bag and begged, ‘Alright, alright, steady on, there’s no need for that, I’m going, I’m going.’

  The woman was smirking at her. She was a proper bruiser. Thick set with cropped hair, tats popping out like greeting cards and a dead ringer for a tough off ‘Bad Girls’. More importantly she was wielding a wicked looking baseball bat.

  Suddenly Cell Block H’s finest peered at her more closely. ‘Hold up a minute! I know you!’

  She proceeded to stroll over to Tiff, who was in no mood for another kicking so she did her best to manoeuvre, quick as a flash, out of reach, but the sleeping bag hampered her progress. The woman caught up and lorded it over her.

  Holding her aching belly with both hands, Tiff babbled, ‘No, you don’t.’

  ‘Yeah I do – you’re Babs Miller’s girl. Jen, ain’t it?’

  One of the basic rules Tiff had learned in life was never to admit to anything. ‘No, it ain’t.’

  The woman rocked back on her heels. ‘Yeah, it is, but I think you’re the lippy one, Tiffany. I did bird with your ol’ girl. I remember you and your sisters coming up on visitin
g days. Jen was the looker, Dee the gorgeous black daughter and you’re the one with the gob.’ She grinned but that only upped her menace quota. ‘The name’s Knox. I expect your mum told you all about me. Sorry about the rough stuff babe but everyone’s gotta earn a living, haven’t they?’

  Tiff was in no mood to swap prison tales with this hatchet-faced horror story.

  Knox got back on with her job, slapping her baseball bat menacingly in the palm of her hand. ‘Give Babs my love. Now fuck off.’

  Tiff didn’t need telling twice. She pulled on her trackie bottoms and a torn T-shirt, rolled up her sleeping bag and threw her shit into twin, blue plastic bags. It didn’t take long; there wasn’t much. While she did so, Knox wrote something in a notebook and then ripped it out.

  ‘Ere – this is my number. Give it to your mum. I’d like to catch up with her and yarn about our days on the block. I lost touch with her when I got my jam roll. She’s a good ol’ sort is Babs.’

  Tiff snatched the note and stuffed it in her pocket. Without a word, she made for the door, headed down the stairs and out through the broken front door where chippies were already measuring up. The other squatters were long gone. Down the road a carload of coppers was sitting patiently although with Knox on the case Tiffany wasn’t sure they were really needed. That bird was a one-woman heavy mob.

  Tiff’s pace slowed to a crawl as she turned a corner with her bags already weighing her down. She was out of other places to go. Jen and Dee had long since stopped putting her up. Her other mates were fed up with her and squats were hard to come by.

  It was going to have to be her mum’s again. Inwardly she groaned. She couldn’t face it. As soon as she crossed the threshold of her mum’s, Babs started up with her earache routine. Finger wagging, lectures on earning a living, warnings about drugs and bad company; it was like being a long-suffering teen all over again. Even being kicked around by mad girl Knox was better than that. Plus, who in their right mind wanted to live on The Devil’s Estate? Been there, done that, never going back. Except it was looking like she had no alternative. Why was life such a B.I.T.C.H?

  Tiff’s mobile pinged in her pocket. A text from big sis Dee.

  ‘You’d better be on your way or else.’

  Bollocks! She was meant to be meeting her sisters at Dee’s new club in Stratford, which was opening its doors for the first time on Saturday. There’d been talk of Tiff running the bar but that had tailed off lately and she knew why. Probably Jen bitching and moaning for all she was worth:

  ‘Give Tiff a job? Are you off your rocker? She’ll help herself to your first night’s takings along with a selection of the optics and then be away on her toes.’

  Tiff had a think as she pulled out a fag and lit up. She didn’t really want to go to Dee’s new club, no doubt to be bossed only the way older sisters knew how. But then she had nowhere else to go. And there was always the possibility that she might be able to find a room there where she could crash for a while. Her mood brightened. It was worth a punt before she ended up back on The Devil with her mum.

  5

  ‘Ruddy Nora, they’re here already,’ Fred the Red warned tightly as the van full of deflated OAPs moved into the care home driveway.

  Fred, a bloke who usually had way too much to say for himself, hadn’t exercised his gob much since they’d left Liverpool Street. Neither had Pearl, who sat next to him. There was a hopeless, defeated atmosphere. The old folks in the back looked like they’d aged ten years. Much of their hard earned savings were gone and they knew it. If Pearl ever got her hands on that scheming, scamming, cheating Saint Aubin she’d choke him slowly until his lying eyes popped clean out of his deceitful head. But what ate her up the most was it was all her fault.

  Feeling wretched she didn’t look up. ‘Who’s here?’

  She didn’t give a monkey’s who’d put in an appearance. No doubt another so-called entertainment outfit the care home’s top brass insisted on putting on for them, like they were brainless, dribbling ninnies. If she had to sit through another long-haired Hippy-Mary and guitar strumming sidekick singing Kum-friggin’-baya she’d be doing some serious damage with the same said guitar.

  Mind you she loved this care home. The one she’d previously lived in in Ilford had been a right morgue.

  ‘Old Bill,’ Fred answered briskly.

  Pearl’s head shot up in an instant. A cop car sat on the grass near her room. Her heart accelerated as one thing swerved into her mind – the gold. What if the cops had found out? But how could they have? Only she and Babs knew where it was. Fred’s next words calmed her down.

  ‘That kid up Liverpool Street must’ve changed his mind and given the plod the full SP and told them where to find us.’

  Vi, seated next to her identical twin, Di, cried out in horror, ‘we’re not going to end up in the slammer are we Fred?’

  The sisters shared a room and were devoted to each other. Where you saw one you usually saw the other. They might be knocking on but they never left their room without rose-red lippy, bold-blue eye shadow and retro, silver screen Diana Dors hair.

  Fred puffed out his chest in a manly fashion as he caught Vi’s alarmed expression in the rear-view mirror. ‘Not on my watch. I’ll protect you with my life luv.’

  Everyone, except Vi it appeared, knew he was sweet on her. He became cocky as he added, ‘Leave it to me. I’ll talk to ‘em. I know how to get round the law. Cross their palms with a pony and they’ll soon decide it’s not in the public interest to press charges.’

  Pearl slapped him, with feeling, on the thigh and scoffed, ‘I don’t think so; you’ll just kick off as usual. You could start a fight on a desert island. Leave the chat to me. I’ll go on the attack and demand to know why they aren’t chasing that crook Saint Aubin.’

  Fred parked the van round the back. He got out to open the back doors and, wearing a huge grin, gallantly offered his hand to Vi to help her down.

  ‘Thanks Fred.’ She patted his hand gently.

  Fred leaned in, his face going slightly red. ‘Anytime Vi, anytime.’

  If he got any closer to his secret crush he’d be slobbering all over her, Pearl observed, resisting the urge to roll her eyes.

  ‘Fred, find your feet and step to it,’ she ordered.

  As they drew closer, Pearl saw two uniformed cops and some of the Home’s staff peering through an open window and inspecting the walls. When she drew closer still, she almost keeled right over.

  Merciful God in heaven! They were looking in her room. Her hand instinctively clamped over her mouth in shock. The iron bars on her windows were hanging off. There were black marks around the frame and up the exposed brickwork where the paint had been burned off.

  Fred seemed even more shocked than she was. ‘What the fuck?’

  One of the two officers turned towards them. ‘Good afternoon sir – madam. Is this your room?’

  A cloud of doom descended over Pearl. She felt sick to her very soul. Almost turned tail and ran. Instead she went into her feeble, old lady routine, shifting slowly, shoulders hunched, muttering mumbo jumbo as she headed towards the blown out window. She peered inside.

  No! No! No! Her settee had been slashed to ribbons. Not the gold! Please not the gold! Her troubles with Jerome Saint Aubin and a savings scam were child’s play compared to this. In a daze she saw the tyre marks on the grass and flower beds. They were deep and wide and obviously made by a van or truck. Her sharp gaze zeroed in on an object lying a few yards away that no one else seemed to have clocked. And that’s the way she wanted to keep it.

  When she didn’t speak, one of the cops said, very slowly and loudly, as if talking to a three-year-old, ‘Is. This. Your. Room. Madam? Only there seems to have been some kind of incident here. An explosion it looks like. Have you got any information that could help?’

  Pearl drew a deep breath but no words came out when she tried to speak.

  She knew she was in shock so she tried again. ‘Yes…No…’ her voice sque
aked. ‘No, I’ve been out all day.’ Then she remembered she was meant to be a doddering old dear. ‘Well, I think it was today. Might’ve been yesterday or last week.’ Her eyes darted around as she played the confused old bat to the hilt.

  The cop pursed his lips. ‘It was today. We’ve heard all about that. A posse of you old dears went down to Liverpool Street to sort out that scam merchant Jerome Saint Aubin?’ He sighed. ‘I hope you had better luck catching him than we did.’

  Distract him. Steer him away from the subject of your room, Pearl mentally chanted anxiously to herself.

  ‘Are we in trouble officer over the business at Liverpool Street?’

  ‘Nah, they don’t want any grief over that. Having a crook who’d operated out of their premises is a bit of a red face for them.’ His gaze narrowed. ‘Now then, why would anyone want to blow the window off your room? Did you keep any valuables in there? Only your room seems to be the only one with bars on.’

  Both cops stared hard at her now, putting her on the spot. Pearl had lived much of her adult life wheedling her way out of trouble. She knew every trick in the book, but at that precise moment all she could think about was some light-fingered prick had nicked hers and Babs’ gold. But who? Who? Who, when only Babs and her knew about it or where it was hidden?

  It was Fred who came to her rescue when he blurted out, ‘Gas.’

  ‘Gas?’ The cop frowned down his nose at him.

  ‘Yeah, that’s right.’ Fred’s voice gathered confidence. He levelled his knowing gaze at Pearl. ‘You cook on the ol’ gas heater in your room, don’t ya Pearl?’ He gave the cops a sidelong, ‘she ain’t all there, know what I mean?’ look.

  ‘You was probably brewing up a cup of char and was so wound up about scumbag Saint Aubin, you forgot to turn it off afore we went out and then – boom! Up it goes while we’re out.’

  ‘Oh yes,’ Pearl admitted weakly, for once in her life grateful for that motor mouth of Fred’s. ‘Gas. Boom! Up it goes!’

  The officers escorted Pearl inside to see if any of her belongings had disappeared in the gas explosion. Instead of doing a proper check, she stood in front of the sofa, waving her kaftan like a pair of gigantic, multi-coloured bird wings in an attempt to hide the damage from the two cops.