Let The Bones Be Charred

by Andy Maslen

  She climbed into the sweltering interior of a 73 bus, touched her phone to the contactless pad and took a seat upstairs at the front, her favourite spot ever since she was a little girl going into London with her mum.

  She alighted into the warm, humid air of Islington at the bus stop by Angel tube station. Unfamiliar with the neighbourhood, she headed north on Upper Street into the heart of the bourgeois North London district famous for its Labour Prime Ministers, looking for a pitch where the local girls wouldn’t tear her a new one for crowding their patch.

  A skinny white guy in a grey hoodie hissed at her from a shop doorway.

  ‘Oi! You looking for gear?’ he asked.

  How come they always recognise us? she asked herself.

  DS Tamsin Aldridge flicked on the indicator, ready to turn right off Upper Street into Liverpool Road and finish her extended shift. The station was a few minutes’ drive away and she was looking forward to clocking off and meeting a few mates in The Craft Beer Co. Bar on White Lion Street.

  Hands crossing on the wheel, she spotted a familiar face walking down from the Angel then stopping to talk to one of the street-level dealers on her list. The face belonged to Charlotte Evans, AKA Arianna. Tamsin made a split-second decision. She cancelled the turn and pulled over into the bus lane.

  The pusher tugged his hood further forward and sauntered off. The tom turned, saw her, pasted a smile onto her skinny white face and leaned down into the passenger window, which Tamsin had just buzzed down.

  ‘Hello, darlin’. Looking for business?’ she asked, her bright lips curved upwards into a smile. Which slid off her face to be replaced with a scowl. ‘Oh, shit!’

  ‘Hello, Arianna. Jump in.’

  Wearily, Arianna pulled open the passenger door and climbed in, slamming it behind her and folding her arms across her chest.

  ‘Just my luck. I ’adn’t even started yet!’

  Tamsin smiled as she found a quiet spot to pull over.

  ‘Well, then, there’s nothing I can book you for, is there? So tell me. What’s a nice girl from Stokie doing looking for trade in Islington?’

  She watched as the downy hairs on Arianna’s forearms erected in the air-conditioned atmosphere inside the car.

  ‘Couldn’t sleep, could I? I went for a walk.’

  ‘Couldn’t sleep?’ Tamsin laughed. ‘What’s your bedtime, then, half-past nine?’

  Arianna’s voice took on a whiny tone.

  ‘Look, DS Aldridge. Please don’t take me in. Not tonight. I don’t need it, awright?’

  Tamsin smiled.

  ‘I’m about to go off duty. The last thing I want to do is dive into a mountain of paperwork. So how about this? We’re looking at a new crew shipping heroin into North London. You hear about new suppliers or you see new guys on the street, selling, you let me know, OK?’

  Arianna shook her head.

  ‘I can’t! You know what they’re like. They look down on us worse than your lot do. If I grass up a dealer you’ll be pulling me out of a skip in tiny little pieces. I can’t!’

  Tamsin sighed.

  ‘Oh well. I guess it’s paperwork for me and a nice night in the cells for you, then, isn’t it?’

  ‘No, wait! I know something.’

  Tamsin felt a little prickle of excitement in her stomach. Probably nothing, but let’s hear the girl out.

  ‘What kind of something?’

  ‘You got to promise to let me out. And I want, like, immunity.’

  Tamsin laughed again.

  ‘Immunity from what? You’re not exactly in the big leagues, Arianna.’

  Arianna shook her head.

  ‘OK, not immunity, then. I used the wrong word. I mean, I tell you what I know and you, like, put the word out to your mates to leave me alone for a while. And Belle,’ she added quickly.

  ‘I can’t make that kind of promise, you know that. But let’s hear it and if it’s good, I tell you what. I’ll put you down on the system as one of my informants. Then if you do get picked up, the arresting officer will refer it to me and I’ll sort you out. Just as long as you stick to Stokie and soliciting and don’t get involved in anything naughty. Deal?’

  Arianna didn’t even pause.

  ‘Deal,’ she said.

  ‘Well come on, then. There’s a nice bottle of prosecco with my name on it in a bar near here and I’m tired.’

  Arianna took a deep breath and swivelled in her seat until she was facing Tamsin.

  ‘You know that Craig Morgan? The assistant mayor or whatever he calls ’imself?’

  Tamsin nodded. ‘Yes.’ The feeling was back, stronger than before.

  ‘He’s a client of mine. Likes me to do ’im up the arse with a dildo. A really massive one. God knows how he can bear it. Other stuff, too. Really kinky. S&M.’

  The image was too much. Tamsin laughed so hard her stomach started cramping. When she’d managed to calm herself down and wiped her eyes with a tissue she turned to Arianna.

  ‘That was epic, Arianna. Thanks. Look, I don’t know if it’ll be useful, although he is the Deputy Mayor for Policing and Crime, so who knows? But a deal’s a deal. You’re free and clear for two months, OK?’

  Arianna nodded and smiled.

  ‘Thanks, DS Aldridge. You take care.’

  ‘Yeah, whatever. You, too, Arianna. Stay out of trouble.’

  Arianna hadn’t told Tamsin that the story about Morgan was a secret. There wouldn’t have been much point, given the situation she found herself in. It was information, and information was there to be traded.

  Tamsin traded it the moment she had the sweating pint glass in front of her. Knowing about the Deputy Mayor’s sexual proclivities wouldn’t help her clear a single case, but it would earn her major points in the gossip stakes.

  From the table in The Craft Beer Co. Bar on White Lion Street, the information travelled into a number of homes, and the general CID office at Islington Police Station on Tolpuddle Street. One of the officers into whose ears the information was whispered was a female DI.

  Greer Wallace had attended the same Edinburgh school as Callie McDonald. They were a few years apart but had reconnected in London through their membership of the school’s alumni group on Facebook. And they were due to meet for a theatre trip the following Friday. She grinned. I’ll save it for the interval drinks, she thought.

  61

  SATURDAY 25TH AUGUST 11.07 A.M.

  PADDINGTON GREEN

  Stella stared at the whiteboard. Three murdered women looked back at her.

  In their ‘before’ photos, each woman was smiling. Her hair was immaculate, her makeup in place, her posture confident yet relaxed. All were professionally shot pictures, from the media page on LoveLife’s website, the About Us page on that of The Church Times and a publicity pack put together by the BBC press office to advertise Habits of a Lifetime.

  In the ‘after’ photos, all traces of the women’s dignity and poise had been cruelly stripped away. Stella clamped her lips together and vowed that she would see their killer behind bars whatever it took. Whatever, Stel? Yes. That’s what I said.

  She turned to face the team.

  ‘Thanks for coming in today, guys. I know you’ve all got families and social lives. So, where are we? Arran, any joy from our three nutters who were threatening Niamh?’

  He stood and cleared his throat. Stella was pleased to see he had a bit more colour in his cheeks and he’d shaved properly. No blood-spotted scraps of tissue anywhere to be seen.

  ‘Basically, they were all washouts as suspects. Although I have to say I wouldn’t want to meet any of them down a dark alley. Especially Kulik. The guy’s married with three lovely kids, all sweetness and light at his house, but when we had him in here it was like interviewing a completely different man. The stuff he came out with, it was really horrible wasn’t it, Def?’

  Def nodded.

  ‘I hope to God his fantasy life stays that way but, if he ever decides to act out, we’re going to loo
k back on this case as the hazy, crazy days of summer. But his alibi was watertight. When Niamh was being butchered he was at work. He’s a storeman at the Tesco superstore in Clapham. About thirty people can vouch for him and at least five we spoke to did.’

  ‘Same with Alfie Brown,’ Arran said, picking up the baton from Def. ‘At the pictures with his dear old mum all of Monday afternoon at the Milton Keynes megaplex or whatever it’s called. She keeps all her ticket stubs and pastes them into a scrapbook with a star rating. She showed me. The Meg got four, if you’re interested. We checked the CCTV and you can clearly see young Alfie and his mum entering at 12.45 p.m. and leaving at 5.55 p.m. No way could he have got from Milton Keynes to Wimbledon, chopped Niamh’s tits off, strangled her then driven back to Milton Keynes in that time.’

  ‘Yukiko Watanabe’s alibi was even better,’ Def said. ‘She was sectioned on March 15th. Paranoid schizophrenia. She’s been in a secure psychiatric unit ever since.’

  Stella watched the way the faces in the room reacted to each story, the uniform expression of depression, or maybe disgust, as each alibi was recounted. It couldn’t be helped. But she needed something to gee them up.

  ‘OK. So they’re a bust, but we never really held out much hope, did we? Trolls are just that. Trolls. They stay in their caves and pour out their bile over the internet. The man we’re looking for? He probably doesn’t even have a Facebook account.’

  She held up the CCTV photo Cam had found at Sherborne Ropes.

  ‘I had Lucian go to work on this with his crew of geeks. Using an algorithm,’ she made the word sound like ‘magic wand’, ‘he calculated that the guy in the picture is five-eight. So a bit below average height. Which, I know, before anybody says anything, is about as much help as a chocolate truncheon, but there we are.’

  62

  SATURDAY 25TH AUGUST 8.35 P.M.

  SOHO

  Stella thanked her Uber driver and stepped out into the warm, humid Soho air. She inhaled the smells and tried to separate them as an exercise. Roast duck, coconut cakes, spilled beer on the pavement outside an Irish pub and, above it all, car exhaust fumes. She checked her watch for the tenth time and, realising she was early, headed away from Gerrard Street intending to walk for ten minutes and try to calm her jitters.

  Reaching the junction of Wardour Street and Brewer Street, she looked right at the fenced-in churchyard of St Anne’s. A few winos had created an encampment in one corner and they, together with a handful of assorted mutts, were basking in the late-evening sun.

  To her right, a door marked BongoMedia.com burst open. A scrawny, bearded thirty-something man wearing a grey tweed cap staggered backwards into the street, crashing into her. He yelled into the slowly closing door.

  ‘Ah’m the boss and if I want a topless model on the front cover then that’s what we’re doin’, and nae wummun with Pee-Em-fuckin-Ess is gonnae tell me different!’ he shouted in a broad Glaswegian accent. ‘In fact, I’m comin’ back in there and ah’ll do it ma’sel.’

  Then he pulled the door open and headed back into the dark stairwell beyond.

  ‘Whoa there!’ Stella shouted, stepping forward and gripping him by the upper arm, keen to avoid his assaulting whoever he’d been swearing at. ‘You need to calm down.’

  As the door closed behind Stella, he tore himself free, turned, stumbled and fell against her, throwing out a hand that ended up clutching her left breast.

  ‘Get your hands off me!’ she said, pushing him away.

  ‘Ah, God, another fuckin’ feminist. Whassa matter, darlin’? You on the rag an’ all, are ye?’

  She spun him around and slammed his face back into the wall so that his right cheek was jammed up against the grubby paintwork. Then she hissed into his left ear.

  ‘I am a feminist, as it happens. I’m also a police officer. So unless you want me to arrest you and charge you with sexual assault, I suggest you just take yourself off somewhere quiet and get yourself straight, OK?’

  She let him go and spun him round to face her. He was pale, and his red-rimmed eyes were having difficulty meeting hers.

  ‘Copy that,’ he said meekly, before sliding past her and pushing through the doors.

  She let a minute or so pass, using the time to steady her breathing, then emerged into the sunlight and headed back towards Gerrard Street. Next time you’re early, sit at the bar, she told herself.

  She walked through the door of Dumpling Palace at nine on the dot. Mr Yun, bald head shining in the red lamplight, beamed when he saw her. His gold teeth competed with his hairless pate in an effort to dazzle Stella.

  ‘Mrs Stella! You here at last! Your party upstairs already.’

  He shouted in Cantonese at a passing waitress dressed in a scarlet silk dress. She stopped and came over to Stella.

  ‘Come with me, please?’

  Mr Yun had given Stella a corner table with a commanding view of the rest of the diners. Apparently deep in conversation were Lucian, Gareth and Jamie. Facing out, Jamie saw Stella first. He smiled and stood.

  ‘Stella! We thought you’d got called in.’

  She smiled, ignoring the flittering butterflies in her stomach, and went over to greet him. He kissed her on both cheeks, then let Lucian and Gareth do the same.

  Once they were all seated again, and Stella had a glass of white wine in her hand, she looked over the table at Gareth. His unruly mop of black hair hung over his eyes, which were a deep, almost black-brown and crinkled with good humour. She’d met him a handful of times and didn’t think she’d ever seen him without a smile on his face.

  ‘How are you, Gareth?’ she asked.

  ‘I’m fine, Stella my girl,’ he said in his soft Welsh accent. ‘I just need to persuade Lucian to make an honest man out of me and I’ll be set for life.’

  Lucian grinned.

  ‘Marriage is old-fashioned.’

  ‘Not for us, boyo! It’s the latest thing! You want to get in on the action before it’s passé.’

  As they bantered, their waitress arrived with a steaming plateful of translucent pastry buns with cinched tops tied off with bright-green chives.

  ‘Chef make special pork bun for you. On the house. Mr Yun sends his compliments.’

  Jamie raised his eyebrows at Stella.

  ‘Come on then. What have you got on Mr Yun? Or are they protection buns?’

  She took one and bit it in half, savouring the beautifully balanced flavours: the fragrant roast pork itself plus garlic, chilli, ginger and Chinese five-spice.

  ‘It’s nothing like that. I got a Triad gang off his back a few years ago. He took it as a debt of honour to keep me in dim sum till my dying day.’

  An hour and several bottles of wine later, the quartet were laughing as Gareth told another of his ‘Tales From Year One’ as he called them.

  ‘So you see, because it’s so hot, I’ve gone in wearing Birkenstocks, haven’t I? No socks, obviously. And this little girl in my class, she keeps putting her hand up while I’m telling them about sports day. They all do it, you see, trying it on so they can go and arse about in the cloakrooms. “Mr Hughes, I really need the toilet,” she says. So in the end I give in and I say, “OK, then, Beulah, off you go, then.” Anyway, she goes to squeeze past me to get to the door and she just lets go, doesn’t she? All down her legs and all over my bloody Birkenstocks! Soaked, I was.’

  Stella wiped her eyes and looked to her right at Jamie, who was wheezing with laughter. He turned and caught her glance and the laughter turned into a smile. A drunken smile, but a very nice one. He leaned a little closer. He smelled good.

  ‘Your friends are lovely, DCI Cole,’ he said.

  ‘Yes, we are,’ Gareth said. ‘And we’re very protective of our dear little fag-hag. So, Jamie. I think it’s time you spilled the beans.’

  ‘What about?’

  ‘You and our lovely Stella here.’

  ‘Gareth!’ Stella said indignantly, eyes widening. ‘Leave him alone.’

  ‘No,
Stella. I need to know. Jamie, what, exactly, are your intentions towards my soul sister here?’

  Jamie grinned and straightened up.

  ‘Strictly honourable.’

  ‘Oh well, Stel,’ Gareth said. ‘Just another night in with your Rabbit, then.’

  Her mouth dropped open as Gareth roared with laughter.

  ‘I don’t believe you, you Welsh knob!’ she finally managed.

  Lucian intervened. He had drunk less than Gareth and was clearly relishing the chance to play the diplomat.

  ‘I think what Gareth meant to ask you, Jamie, was, what’s it like, working at Broadmoor?’

  Jamie’s smile, so wide a moment earlier, disappeared. He rubbed a hand over his head and took a swig of wine.

  ‘Well, that’s a very good question. I suppose the answer is, never dull. I like to think I’m helping people, but obviously the people I’m helping have committed the worst crimes imaginable. So it can be,’ he paused, and looked round at Stella, ‘challenging. One thing I can tell you is they can appear to be extraordinarily normal men. Some of them, I mean. We’ve got the ones who howl at the moon and would eat the other patients given half a chance, but there are also, you know, blokes in there who if you met them in the street, you’d just nod and walk on.’

  ‘You’ve got John Gaddowes in there, haven’t you?’ Lucian asked.

  Jamie nodded.

  ‘Murdered seven prostitutes, sex workers, I should say, in Liverpool in 2004. All killed with repeated hammer blows to the face. Worst serial killer in Liverpool’s history. They called him, with typical Liverpudlian wit, The Scallywhacker.’

  ‘What’s he like?’ Gareth said.

  ‘He’s one of the normal ones,’ Jamie said. ‘In fact, I was having lunch with him last week. He started crying. I asked him what the matter was and do you know what he said? “I just watched a documentary about how they work donkeys to death in Spain. It was awful.” And I’m thinking to myself, John, mate, you bludgeoned seven women to death with a ball-peen hammer and you’re crying over donkeys?’