Problems with Girls (DI Sloane Book 2)

by Kelly Creighton

  Chapter 44

  I watched Lizzie being interrogated in next room and saw her face on the monitor, the luster of her scowl, the innocent bright-eyed façade she put on, the sense of injury she tried not to let slip.

  Chief Dunne came by and asked if I was alright. I said I was.

  ‘The spent bullets and their casings from the Comber Road shooting have been examined by the ballistics expert,’ he said.

  ‘And, what were their findings?’ I asked.

  ‘They were issued to the PSNI.’

  ‘Pat Kinahan,’ I began to tell him.

  ‘Hewitt told me all about that,’ Dunne said. ‘You look peaky, maybe you should go home.’

  ‘In a minute,’ I said.

  Sarge Simon was in the interview room, grilling Lizzie with Fleur Hewitt.

  ‘If I wanted Justin dead I’d have killed him,’ said Lizzie on the screen. Star of her own show.

  ‘What was your intention?’ asked Hewitt.

  ‘So he’d know,’ Lizzie said. ‘But I didn’t want him dead, after all, I’m having his baby.’

  ‘What was your intention? Make him suffer? To punish him?’

  ‘Damn straight.’

  ‘The gun you used was a stolen police issue. Explain how it came into your possession,’ said Simon.

  ‘I just walked into my childhood home and took it.’

  ‘It belongs to your father, Officer Pat Kinahan, is that right?’ Simon asked.

  ‘Right,’ said Lizzie.

  ‘He had also reported his car windows smashed during the early hours of Thursday 26 April. Mrs. Kinahan, your mother, reported seeing a light-coloured car driving away from the scene, but it was late and she couldn’t tell what colour.’

  ‘That was Justin Nicholson’s car. A silver Mercedes,’ Hewitt added.

  ‘What were you doing in Bangor then, Lizzie?’ Simon asked.

  ‘You tell me,’ she replied.

  I paged Hewitt at that stage and asked her to come out and talk to me. She looked up at the camera and then paused the interview.

  ‘What in the hell are you doing here?’ she asked me in person.

  ‘I have big news,’ I told her.

  ‘You should be resting, you nutter.’

  ‘Listen,’ I said. ‘That bite on Erica McClelland …’

  ‘What about it?’

  ‘It matched Lizzie’s DNA, Kate Stile just phoned and told me.’

  Fleur looked confused. ‘How did you get her DNA?’

  ‘From that water bottle you gave her in the hospital.’

  Fleur began to laugh at my gall. ‘You must really want this.’ She eyed Lizzie on the monitor, then told me to come in with her as she relieved Sarge Simon. He looked at me in surprise too.

  A smirk settled on Lizzie’s face. She smacked her lips and gave me a smile. ‘How are you?’ she asked insincerely.

  I tried not to recoil. I sat down. ‘Great, Elizabeth,’ I said. ‘All the better for seeing you.’

  Hewitt resumed the interview and said, ‘We have your DNA on the corpse of Erica McClelland.’

  Lizzie was taken aback and it felt good to surprise her, now it was my turn to smirk.

  ‘I have no idea who that even is,’ she said.

  ‘Don’t you, because your DNA is all over her?’

  ‘I never gave anybody my DNA.’ Lizzie narrowed her eyes.

  ‘But you bit Erica on the arm.’

  ‘Did I? Whatever you’ve done here, it’s unethical. I know you can’t have my DNA without my consent.’

  ‘No, you definitely gave consent,’ I said.

  ‘Ooh! Are you sore?’ she asked me.

  ‘Lizzie,’ said Hewitt, ‘this part is where you tell us what happened, and how Erica McClelland’s dead body was found on Ballyholme Beach with your DNA on her.’

  ‘Oh, the one on the beach?’ Lizzie cooed. ‘The one who thought she was something special? That one?’

  ‘Explain further, if you would?’ said Hewitt.

  ‘The one who was flirting with Justin at that gig. That one?’

  ‘So you were at the Vacant Aluminium gig at The Night Kitchen?’

  Lizzie had played cat and mouse enough, I could see that even she was tired, she had dark rings around her eyes, and whatever she was going to say about it, to make it seem like Erica’s fault, would be a lie and we all knew it. Each girl had been picked up opportunistically.

  ‘We were giving her a lift and she was revealing a lot of skin,’ said Lizzie. ‘You’ll have seen the photos. A right little whore.’

  ‘That’s no reason,’ I said, but Hewitt put her hand out to stop me saying anything else. Let her hang herself, Hewitt was thinking.

  ‘She was paralytic,’ said Lizzie, ‘and when she woke in the back seat …’

  ‘What happened then?’

  ‘Justin and I were making love.’

  ‘Where?’

  ‘In the car.’

  ‘Were you having sexual intercourse beside Erica?’

  ‘She was out of it by that stage. Suddenly, she woke all disorientated, and ran. She didn’t have to. She could have joined in.’ Lizzie laughed. ‘Actually, scrub that, joining in was not an option. She wasn’t his type. He likes blondes,’ Lizzie said this like Fleur and I, two brunettes, should be crying into our pillows. ‘Though she could have just asked us to drive her home, but Erica jumped out and ran, down in the direction of the water. I chased her down there and she tripped, we wound up having a tussle and that’s when Chloe …’

  ‘Chloe Taylor?’ I said.

  ‘Erica. I mean, Erica! That’s when I took a chunk out of her arm. She was trying to headlock me, so it was self-defence.’

  ‘Where was Justin during this?’ asked Hewitt.

  ‘He was watching, a little way off. He was encouraging me, supporting me.’

  ‘And then?’

  ‘He went back to the car and got the knife.’

  ‘Who stabbed Erica?’

  ‘Justin gave the knife to me. Erica was in the water. And we were all wet, Justin found it erotic. We went back to the car.’

  ‘After you had stabbed her?’ I asked.

  ‘Keep up, Harriet! After that, Justin and I made love on the bonnet of the car.’

  ‘You didn’t assault Erica?’

  ‘Sexually? No. But I did assault her, I killed her.’ Lizzie laughed.

  Hewitt sighed in disgust. ‘And tell us what you know about the death of Chloe Taylor.’

  ‘So what happened was …’ Lizzie settled down as if she was going to tell us a frilly piece of gossip. Her eyes became sparkly. ‘One night Chloe and I got drunk, and were telling each other things, private things, like how she was falling for Martin Walsh, so, sorry, but that was not a lie, you just didn’t want to believe it.’

  ‘There was never a relationship between Dr. Walsh and Chloe,’ said Hewitt.

  Lizzie shrugged. ‘Do you want me to tell you what I know or not?’

  ‘What did you tell Chloe?’ I asked. ‘Did you tell Chloe that you and Justin had been abducting girls and taking their underwear?’

  Lizzie laughed. ‘Smart,’ she said. ‘I’m not giving you everything. You’ll have to earn that.’

  Big deal, I thought, we have you on enough. It’s only a matter of time till we get you for everything. Lizzie could have blamed Justin for stabbing Erica, he wouldn’t say any different now.

  ‘Two weeks after Erica, we’d sat up talking shit. I woke up with this real dread that I’d told Chloe about that little whore, but I wasn’t sure. I’d already been testing her with bits and pieces.’

  ‘Breadcrumbs. Why? To see if you could trust her? To shock Chloe?’

  ‘To see if she would take the bait.’

  I could see Lizzie had always been attention seeking, even being around us all the time, she yearned the recognition. How Lucinda Press would have hated her! How I hated her. Lizzie wanted Chloe to know she had killed someone.

  She’d been proud and turned on by it, e
mpowered. She was the polar opposite of everything Chloe was and believed in.

  ‘I didn’t hear from Chloe for almost a week after,’ said Lizzie, ‘she was ghosting me. She came round for a drink that Tuesday night but hardly said a word. Spoke more to Drew. She left dead early, saying she had to open up PACT the next morning. So I went to see her at the PACT office. ‘‘Let’s go for a drink tonight,’’ I said, but she refused. Then I asked, ‘‘Why not? What did I tell you?’’ and she said, ‘‘Nothing.’’ So I said, ‘‘Why have you been off?’’ ‘‘You know why,’’ she said. That morning, I said I’d nip out and I came back with coffee, put a little something in hers, enough to knock out an epileptic horse. But Chloe refused to drink it, said she was on decaf. For her anxiety.’ Lizzie snored. ‘Then she had her back to me, and I, whack, whack, whack, located the CCTV tapes, put on her coat, and was gone. Now she’s proper ghosting me.’ Lizzie laughed again.

  ‘And you wrote to the papers, taunting them and us?’ said Hewitt. ‘And it was you who was trolling Chloe when she was on the TV. You didn’t like the attention she was getting with her activist work.’

  ‘I didn’t even know her then, you stupid pig.’ Lizzie snorted.

  I believe that was right. I still wonder if it was Lucinda Press or just another cyber bully. There are a lot of them.

  I stared at Lizzie for a moment, almost amused. ‘I’ve looked up your notes,’ I said with great pleasure, ‘you wanted to get into the police, tried out for years. But you didn’t get in because … why do you think that was?’

  ‘Intelligence.’ She pursed her lips.

  ‘Intelligence?’

  ‘I wouldn’t have been any good. I’m too intelligent to be a peeler. I mean, what sort of detective leaves alone a bag with tens of thousands of quid in it?’

  ‘We’ll cease recording here,’ I said.

  ‘What kind of mother is bought out of her kids’ lives for less than a grand and a half?’ I asked Lizzie as we brought her back to her cell.

  ‘Can I get some tea and toast? Now I’m eating for two,’ she asked, ignoring my question.

  ‘You’ll be charged with his murder, too,’ I said, ‘now the father of your unborn child is dead.’

  I wanted to surprise her.

  ‘Really?’ She laughed. ‘Is he really dead? But see what I did, Harry, I made him suffer, dragged it out. That was intentional – off the record. Like with you. If I wanted you dead, I’ve had killed you. But then it would have been game over.’

  ‘It is game over,’ I said, and louder, ‘Any sugar in your tea?’ I smiled through gritted teeth.

  ‘No, I’m sweet enough,’ she said, ‘but plenty of milk, Harry, ta.’

  She would have to whistle for it.

  *

  Drew phoned me. ‘I saw on the news that you have Lizzie in custody,’ he said.

  ‘We can’t give a name right now.’

  ‘But I heard about the shooting at hers. Was it your colleague, the Scottish girl, who was shot?’

  ‘No, Drew, why?’

  ‘Was it you?’

  ‘Yes,’ I said. ‘I received a gunshot wound.’

  ‘I underestimated you.’

  ‘What is it you want, Drew?’ I tried to raise my arm and pain shot right up to my jaw. ‘We will update Jackie when we have more to tell him.’

  ‘I have one for you, do you want it?’ said Drew.

  I shook my head but he couldn’t see that. ‘If you want to give some information,’ I said.

  ‘Okay, but only because I’ve new respect for you.’

  I smiled through the pain. Tough lad Drew Taylor was about to tout on someone.

  ‘Our anniversary breakfast was at The Bell, if you remember …’

  ‘No, I don’t,’ I said.

  ‘Me and Roxy’s anniversary, the morning Chloe was killed.’

  ‘Yes,’ I said, somehow hearing what he’d said as our anniversary, mine and his. Maybe I shouldn’t have been out of bed. My shoulder was ablaze and I was exhausted.

  ‘Well, they were there at the same time as us.’

  ‘Who was?’

  ‘Justin and his sidepiece.’

  ‘Justin and Mary Heaney?’

  ‘They had a yellow folder on the table and they were looking in it every now and then.’

  ‘Yeah?’

  ‘It’s a maternity folder, they’d just been for a scan at the Ulster. The day of Chloe’s funeral, I was dropping your woman home, Slabber, when she started to go on about my Roxy.’

  ‘Lizzie? What did she say?’

  ‘She’d seen the Facebook messages her man had sent but Lizzie tried to tell it a different way, as if it was Roxy starting things up. She didn’t know I’d already seen them.’

  ‘I see …’

  ‘I tried to wipe that smile off her face and I told her, ‘‘Think you’re clever, don’t you, girl? But your man is having a child with another girl’’.’

  ‘What did Lizzie do then?’

  ‘She asked me to drop her to Bangor, but I waited outside for five minutes and she let herself into this wee bungalow. She had a key. And when she came back outside she had boxes of bullets. Oh, and I should have said, I’m not testifying to any of this. I’m just telling you, to help you get the bigger picture.’

  Chapter 45

  I went to type up notes. Hewitt was about to phone the CPS, but she hung up. ‘What was that about money?’ she asked me.

  ‘Nothing,’ I said.

  ‘It didn’t seem like nothing. That’s what was in the bag that went missing, all that money, forty g’s?’

  ‘No,’ I said.

  ‘You don’t have to lie to me,’ said Hewitt, ‘just tell me to butt out.’

  ‘It’s not a lie.’

  ‘Then we can get back to business,’ she said.

  ‘Good.’

  ‘Only, I saw how you were with Jocelyn, and now this, with Lizzie. Greg gave that money to you. Wanna know how I know that?’

  ‘You’re wrong,’ I said, ‘but go on.’

  ‘Because he gave his kids twenty grand each lately when he sold the Algarve villa, my mum told me.’

  ‘That is far-fetched.’ I forced a laugh.

  ‘Do you think I’m buttoned up the back?’ Hewitt said. ‘But that’s your private business. They’re your kids and I’m not judging. As long as it’s over, one way or another.’

  ‘Oh, it is most definitely over,’ I said.

  ‘Except maybe her. Maybe I judge her.’ Hewitt nodded at the screen. Lizzie was saying, ‘Yes, yes, I did do it,’ then singing it, standing up and spinning around her cell.

  ‘Here it comes,’ I said.

  Hewitt watched for another moment and elbowed me. ‘Ah ha, she is clearly mad. That’s quite fortunate timing. First a full confession, full cooperation and now the insanity defence starts. Boom!’

  ‘They won’t buy it.’ I shrugged, the shake of my shoulders reminded me of the bullet she put in me, and that it was out and I would heal but others would not. I popped some painkillers into my mouth.

  I saw some sort of crazy kid when I saw Lizzie, which wasn’t fair. If it was a man who did all the things she had he’d be called a monster. Lizzie, I could see splashed over the papers, pretty white lady, icy blonde femme fatale, a victim of the men who had damaged her, them being made the monsters.

  Well, they were both monsters, her and Justin. Her dad was a headbin too. But I doubted that all of her exes were as bad as Nicholson. I was as guilty as anyone I condemned for miscalculating her.

  ‘Drew Taylor just called me,’ I told Hewitt. ‘He reckons Molly was pregnant, it seems he told Lizzie the news after Chloe’s funeral, and that’s what made her go postal.’

  ‘Yes,’ Hewitt said, ‘did I forget to tell you, the autopsy showed a foetus. Sad, isn’t it? Lizzie found them with that app.’

  ‘Which app?’

  ‘Find My iPhone. Lead her straight to Justin.’

  Hewitt lifted the phone to ring the CPS and
give a cold recital of the facts. ‘Full confession to the stabbing and killing by drowning of Erica McClelland, full confession to the stabbing and killing of Chloe Taylor, full confession to the shootings and killings of Justin Nicholson, Mary Heaney, and her unborn child … and the shooting and killing of Ince Ross, shooting and maiming of …’ She looked at my sling. ‘Detective Inspector Harriet Sloane.’

  ‘So Lizzie’s pregnant too?’ I asked after she’d go the go ahead to keep Lizzie. It was a homerun. No bail.

  ‘I don’t think so,’ said Hewitt. ‘She won’t do a test for the doctor. Probably another fake, she’s fond of those.’

  ‘Why didn’t you add her and Justin’s abductions to the tally? Victoria and Kayley … and Maisie?’

  ‘We have enough for now,’ Hewitt said. ‘The test runs can be added later.’

  I had to scoff.

  In my bag my mobile was ringing. It was my twin sister, Charly, asking if I was with our father.

  ‘No,’ I said. ‘He never came to see me in hospital either.’

  This fact just came to me. No one had visited me apart from Paul. Not that I had wanted them to, or had stayed in for long enough to warrant visitors. They expected me to be fine. That, or they did not give a hoot.

  Where were the calls asking how I was? I’d been bloody well shot.

  ‘None of us can get a hold of him,’ Charly told me. ‘He visited Mummy this morning then he disappeared.’

  ‘I’ll call him,’ I said. ‘And thanks, I’m fine.’

  ‘Addam’s trying him,’ said Charly, ignoring me, ‘Coral’s at the house.’

  ‘What’s going on?’ I asked her.

  ‘Just come to mine as soon as you can.’

  ‘Is it Mummy?’

  ‘Just come here,’ she said with a glimmer of desperation; this was the lobby where she kept me until she threw open the door of the main room, ‘Mummy’s dead.’

  ‘Is she?’ I asked. ‘Is she really?’

  There was a long pause. ‘We can’t do this over the phone,’ Charly said.

  Funny thing was that I was not even surprised. Shocked yes, but I knew all along it would happen.

  ‘Don’t worry about Daddy,’ I said.