Blood Secrets_A gripping crime thriller with killer twists

by Dreda Say Mitchell

  Babs reached up on tiptoes, tugged his head closer, threading her fingers into his hair and almost sucked the life from him.

  Alright, so he’s got a tongue and lips on him to die for, but you know you shouldn’t be here. Babs willed her mind to shut it, but the warnings wouldn’t let up. He might be retired, but once a copper always a copper.

  Babs snatched her mouth away and stumbled back, gasping for air. ‘Patrick,’ for once she used his real name, ‘there’s no point to this luv—‘

  ‘So you admit I’m your love?’ His voice was gentle, his face frank and open.

  Babs clucked her tongue and rolled her eyes. ‘You know what I mean. They say ‘love’ all the time where I come…’ She harshly sucked the rest of the words back. The time for pussy footing around was over.

  She took a bracing breath. ‘Yeah, I fancy you something rotten. Some might say that’s called love. I dunno. What I do know is that you can’t have all the sweets in the sweetie shop.’

  ‘I beg to differ.’

  He swept her into his arms. Babs squealed louder this time. The fool was going to break his friggin’ back. Then tears pricked her eyes. This was the type of romance she read about in Mills & Boon, the sort not meant for women living on The Devil’s Estate.

  She smiled away as he made a beeline for the bed. ‘Patrick, you’ll give yourself a bloody hernia, you stupid man.’

  ‘As light as a feather.’

  He laid her down and that’s when her guard shot up again. Babs crossed her arms protectively over her boobs. Her cheeks glowed hot with embarrassment.

  ‘My body ain’t the same as it was all those years ago. Things have gone a bit south, know what I mean?’

  He stared back at her as if she was a feast before a hungry man. ‘I don’t care if you’ve gone south,’ he kissed her left ear, ‘north’, kissed her right ear, ‘west’, placed his lips on her forehead. ‘Babs, wherever you’re going I aim to be there too.’

  Her face lit up into a cheeky grin. ‘Well, I hope your truncheon is still heading north.’

  Gently he helped her with her dress. Then her bra. Babs went scarlet again as she slapped her hand over her boobs. ‘I really don’t look the same. Things ain’t what they used to be.’

  He didn’t answer, simply took her hands away from her chest. And there they were – her boobs for all the world to see. Babs wasn’t even sure she was breathing as she watched his face. Please don’t let him be disgusted! I’d die of shame on the spot!

  Tricky Dickie couldn’t take his eyes off them. ‘Babs, they’re fucking beautiful.’ His hands softly palmed them. ‘So smooth. So soft. So edible.’

  His mouth was on her right nipple. He sucked. He licked. Babs thought she was going to burst a gasket. Ohhhh! What a feeling.

  He pulled his head back. His eyes were on fire. ‘If we don’t get down to it I’m going to embarrass myself.’

  Giggling they got his kit off in record time and spent the next hour getting reacquainted with each other very well indeed. Making love and cuddling each other tight like a couple of teens surprised they had private parts that actually worked.

  Then he went and spoiled everything, at least in Babs’ eyes.

  ‘I want us to get married.’

  She was out of his arms and off the bed quicker than a bride could say, ‘I do.’

  Babs started flinging her clobber on as she spoke. ‘That ain’t gonna happen. My girls would have a fit, probably turn their backs on me.’

  And the gold. Fuck me! How could she have forgotten about the gold and him being the law?

  For the first time he looked like the serious copper she had met years back. ‘My son and daughter have known about you for years, ever since I parted company with their mum in ’98. And they’re happy for me and actually want to meet you.’

  Babs looked at him wildly as she did up the zipper of her dress. ‘You know why we can’t be officially together.’

  He got angry. ‘Oh, I get it, I’m good enough to taste but not swallow.’

  ‘I’m still the girl from The Devil and you’re still the fella in blue.’

  ‘Former blue. You can’t keep living life through your children.’

  She swiped up her bag in a huff. ‘My kids are all I’ve got.’

  ‘You’ve got me.’ His voice was hard but there was hurt there too.

  Babs couldn’t deal with it. She shot out of the room, couldn’t remember the journey down the stairs and only stopped rushing when she hit Finsbury Park tube. The pain was so intense she had to hold on to the wall as commuters hurried by. Why had she opened her heart – again - to a man she couldn’t have in her life?

  21

  ‘Now, don’t forget what I told ya about what time to put him to bed,’ a flustered Dee instructed Natty’s new nanny on Saturday evening.

  Dee cradled him way too tightly to her breast. She stood in her state of the art kitchen in her larger than life house in Essex as she faced Miriam. It was the nanny’s first day with Natty and suddenly Dee couldn’t – wouldn’t – let him go.

  She was dressed to impress, heading off for her club’s launch party. If she didn’t shift it she was going to be late. But she couldn’t let go of her darling baby. Stop being a right div part of her brain reasoned while the other half warned, ‘what do you really know about this woman?’

  ‘Mizz Dee?’

  Miriam’s voice brought her crashing back to the present. Dee had to admit she liked the sound of the nanny’s voice – quiet, sweet and soft. Natty would like that.

  The nanny continued as she reassuringly smiled at her. ‘I know exactly how you’re feeling. You would not be a normal mother if you didn’t feel some level of anxiety about leaving him for the first time with what is, essentially, a stranger.’

  Hearing it spoken aloud Dee felt even more of a Wally. She needed to cut the apron strings and stop behaving like the world was coming to an end. She looked adoringly down at the son that she and John never expected they would have. He was kitted out in an all-in-one sky-blue baby suit with cute bears on the front and matching socks. Gucci o’ course.

  His eyes sparkled, giving her that million-watt smile that made her heart melt. Dee had a soft spot for kids. Hearing about abuse cases made her want to tear someone’s head off. How could anyone look at a tiny baby and want to do them harm? It was a sick world, no doubt about it.

  ‘Mizz Dee, if you don’t leave now you’ll be late for your big night.’

  Dee looked up to find Miriam holding her arms out ready to take Natty. ‘He’ll be in the safest pair of hands you could possibly think of.’

  Dee gave her little man a kiss as light as a feather on his baby-soft forehead to last him until she came home.

  She whispered, ‘Now you be a good boy for Miriam while mummy’s off earning an honest crust.’

  Dee straightened and took a shaky breath. Right, here goes! Finally she passed her much-loved son into another woman’s arms. Miriam cooed to Natty as they followed Dee out into the spacious hallway, passing the large photo of Dee’s long dead, much-cherished cat Banshee, who wore a pink bow in her fur. Dee reached for her coat and black leather Versace studded tote handbag. Once she had her coat on she gazed back fretfully at the nanny holding her son.

  Miriam held Natty in the crook of her arm so that his mum could see him. ‘Wave good-bye to mummy.’ She held his hand up and moved it in a wave.

  ‘Don’t you worry Mizz Dee, me and Natty are going to become the best of friends. The very best.’

  ‘Finally,’ Miriam whispered in a sweet tone to Natty as his mother’s convertible drove away. ‘Didn’t think the fucking bitch was ever gonna shut that filthy gob of hers and sod off.’

  She rocked him as they took the stairs to the next floor. God, it was pure bliss to have a baby back in her arms. There was no feeling like it in the world.

  ‘Now, what shall we do today? Play with some toys? Watch Teletubbies on the DVD? Oooo, I do like that Tinky Winky.’

&n
bsp; Bagging this job hadn’t been easy but the effort she’d put in had paid off. Miriam had doshed up the teen junkie to chuck the brick through the club’s window and while Dee was called away she’d gone on the hunt for the list of applicants for the job. Thought she’d have a right job on her hands hunting it down. Who would’ve thought it would be all ready to go on the bitch’s desk. There were four names, including hers with accompanying contact details. Two names were crossed out in thick red - she assumed that meant they were non-starters - which left only one other person in the race. Pamela Caruthers.

  Once she left the club she’d given this Pamela a little tinkle.

  ‘This is Mrs Black’s assistant—‘

  ‘I didn’t get the job, did I?’ came the deflated interruption.

  ‘I’m happy to say that Mrs Black would love to offer you the job.‘

  There was a gasp at the other end, followed by a quick and grateful, ‘you don’t know how thankful I am. This was my twentieth interview since being made redundant from working as a teaching assistant. Been working at that school for going on twenty years…’

  Miriam rolled her eyes. If there was one thing she hated it was a bleeding heart sob story. ‘Before we can dot the i’s and cross the t’s, Mrs Black needs you to know that the job offer is subject to one condition.’

  ‘Anything.’

  Miriam’s smile was genuine this time; she was going to enjoy this.

  ‘Every second Saturday you’ll need to be available to join in her S&M parties—‘

  ‘I beg your pardon?’ came the horrified response.

  ‘The blokes do like a lot of begging, but nothing too kinky. A couple of the guys have been on the lookout for an older woman, you know fleshy boobs and wobbly belly.’

  ‘Well I never!’ Miriam could almost feel the woman rising to her feet in righteous indignation. ‘I’ve never heard such filth in my life. And my tummy doesn’t wobble, thank you very much.’ Steel entered her voice. ‘You tell Mrs Black she can stuff her job.’

  The dial tone rang in her ear as the call was cut.

  So easy. She looked down at the baby. Now she had the little prince all to herself.

  They reached the landing. ‘I know,’ she said in a mock-surprised voice, ‘we’ll have us a great adventure and go find that cow’s room and see what’s inside.’

  Dee had given her the grand tour of the tacky house from the lounge, which the stupid moo called the Hollywood, to the gym and swimming pool in the back. The only room that had remained off limits was Madam Dee’s bedroom.

  ‘No one, apart from me and the housekeeper, who pops in Wednesdays and Fridays, goes into my boudoir,’ was Dee’s firm instruction.

  We’ll see about that! As if a slag like Dee Black even knew what a boudoir was!

  The room was huge, with a generously proportioned skylight above the king size bed, which was covered in a leopard print duvet and frilly cushions. She thought the pillowcases would be leopard print but they had a design she couldn’t make out from where she stood, so she moved herself and Natty closer. They were imprinted with a photo of a laughing Dee with her arms around the shoulder of a much older man, who Miriam took to be the late, departed John Black.

  Her lips rippled in disdain. ‘Trashy, totally trashy, that’s what it is my poppet. The deluded woman has got zero taste.’ She rocked him closer to her chest.

  Miriam pursed her lips in distaste as she took note of the partially opened door that led to a dressing room. ‘We’ll leave mummy’s clobber for another day coz it’s time for us to get to know each other a bit better.’

  She kissed him on his cheek, which made him gurgle with pleasure. Miriam laid him on the bed. He kicked his cubby legs and arms in the air as she walked with attitude towards the leopard print – yes leopard print - dressing table.

  She half turned to the baby and with scorn uttered, ‘Can you believe this lady? No fucking class, that’s what.’

  She rifled through Dee’s make-up until she found a bright-red Mac lipstick. Miriam took it and sat next to Natty on the bed. Poor thing looked wiped out.

  She gazed down at him with a glazed expression in her eyes almost as if she wasn’t really there. ‘Now I’ve got you back Andy I’m never gonna let you go.’

  She tickled his tummy, but Natty didn’t smile this time letting out a piercing wail as if he was trying to tell her his name wasn’t Andy.

  She ignored his desperate cry. ‘I want you to say after me – mummy.’

  He continued to wail, which made her nerves wear thin. ‘Come on, say mummy.’ More wails. Her face set into a stiff, stern mask. ‘Not to worry my gorgeous boy, I’ve got a great way for you to remember who mummy is.’

  Miriam undid his body suit and pushed it back exposing his soft baby belly. Abruptly his wailing stopped as he looked at her with the helpless innocence of a child.

  ‘This will also help you to learn to read and write of course.’

  She took the lipstick and scrawled one word in large, red capital letters across his tummy.

  MUMMY.

  22

  ‘Mum, you look like a million large ones,’ Little Bea gasped in star-struck wonder as she stared at Jen.

  Courtney gave the thumbs up too. ‘No one will be able to touch you tonight.’

  That nearly brought Jen to tears as she stared back at her reflection and her girls who lounged back on her bed. Last year her eldest would’ve been spitting bile at her no doubt screaming her head off that she was doing a great impression of a scrubber. That had been a terrible time, one she took pains not to dwell on too often. With the help of the rest of the Miller clan they’d been able to claw what love and affection they had back. They were a family again.

  Jen self-consciously straightened the hem of her knee-length, sleeveless, silver brocade dress and then looked down at her silver box heels. She looked the part of a woman who was the manager of a club and heading off to its grand opening, but inside there was a corner of Jen that still felt ugly.

  ‘You’re a minging, pitiful mess. Let’s see if my hand can knock some beauty into ya.’ That’s what the girl’s father would yell at her, along with a host of other degrading shite, before he’d beat her from one end of the room to the next.

  Jen knew she wasn’t ugly, but if someone battered you with it enough times that’s how you started to view yourself. She tried to hide it beneath this harder looking Jen, but this feeling of not being worthy enough wouldn’t go away. She never talked to her mum, sisters or mates about it. They’d only insist she was living in the past and needed to put Nuts, her former husband, behind her. That was all good and well, but what they didn’t get was once you’d been a battered woman it took years to get your groove back.

  Jen shook off the past and asked, with a mischievous lift of her lips, ‘What earrings shall I wear?’

  Her daughters eagerly scrambled off the bed to help her decide. Five minutes later Jen looked the biz as she grabbed her knock off Stella McCartney jacket.

  As she put it on she stared at her daughters. ‘Courtney—‘

  ‘I know,’ her eldest cut in rolling her eyes with half-hearted annoyance, ‘look after Little Bea. If anyone comes to the door, scream the place down.’

  ‘Or get on the blower to me, got it?’

  Jen opened her arms and gathered the two people she cherished most in the world as close as possible. For a moment she closed her eyes and felt their twin hearts beating against her as one.

  ‘Mum, you’re gonna be late.’

  Courtney was right. Jen let them go and got into club manager mode. Her daughters waved her off, grinning for all they were worth. Then Jen headed to Mile End tube, head held high ultra confident that the club launch was going to be a night to remember.

  As soon as her mum shut the door, leaving a cloud of Opium perfume in her wake, Courtney swung into action. The last time she’d sneaked out was during last year. She’d done a runner back then causing all kind of ructions including ending up in the
same naughty kids’ secure home that Dodgy had bossed.

  Her sister, Little Bea’s searching gaze flicked just above the book she was reading, following Courtney’s every move as she quickly slung on a dark-blue Velour tracksuit and the same hooded jacket Dodgy had given her to wear during the smash up at the hairdressers.

  Little Bea’s gave her the once-over as she let out a resigned sigh. ‘Oh! It’s gonna be one of those nights.’

  Courtney flipped her hood over her head. ‘Ain’t gonna be long, an hour tops.’

  The old Courtney would’ve told her baby sister to shut her noise and mind her own, but she’d done a wagonload of growing up since then. She felt guilt-ridden leaving her sister all on her tod like this. Plus, her mum would have her guts for garters if she ever twigged. But that was a preferable fate to Dodgy coming looking for her, banging down her door shouting the odds about her no-show.

  ‘I mean it,’ she emphasised to her baby sister. ‘Be back in a jiffy. But if anything goes on, you get on your blab-slab as quick as to me, got it? Don’t try none of that shit you keep reading in those cop books if someone comes to the door.’

  Her sister loved reading. More to the point she couldn’t seem to get enough of true crime books. She was currently reading, ‘A-Z of Forensics’. Having become a true crime statistic herself, Courtney found her sister’s grisly obsession unsettling and downright weird. Their mum only allowed it because Little Bea was the top of her class in reading.

  Ten minutes, or so, later Courtney heard Beyoncé and Shakira’s ‘Beautiful Liar’ before she saw her new mates. When she caught sight of them, in their customary all-over black, Courtney nearly did a double take – they were dancing. And it wasn’t none of that prancing about some of the kids did but serious moves to the rhythm of the music. Fancy that, Dodgy being a beat freak, she would never have believed that. But then again there was loads of stuff she didn’t know about Dodgy.