Cold in Hand (2 page)

Time was on their side.

When the man failed to pick up the phone, Lynn used the bullhorn instead. Firm but fair. If he could hear her, this is what he had to do.

She repeated it again, unflustered and clear.

Nothing happened.

And then it did. The door opened gradually and a handgun was thrown out onto the grass.

"All right," Lynn said, "now step outside slowly with your hands in the air."

Halfway across the patchy square of lawn, he stopped. "Couldn't even do that," he said to no one in particular. "Couldn't even do fucking that."

"Pathetic," Ben Fowles remarked.

There was a scorch mark on one side of his face; at the last moment, he had pulled his head away.

One of the children tried to run towards him, but the grandmother held him back.

Not for the first time, Lynn caught herself wishing that she still smoked.

Chambers came over and shook her hand.

Fowles nudged her on the shoulder with his fist. "Good job," he said.

Lynn did her best not to smile. Dusty Springfield, she said to herself on the way back to the car, that's who it was. Dusty, the one and only.

She tried Charlie's office number but there was no reply; his mobile seemed to be switched off. No matter, she'd be home now soon enough. A table for two at Petit Paris on King's Walk. Paris, Nottingham, that is. Moules, steak frites. A decent bottle of wine. Try to leave room for dessert.

Lucky?

Her hands were still shaking a little when they touched the wheel.

Like a tooth you couldn't stop probing with the tip of your tongue, the song was still nagging away at her as she turned onto the Woodborough Road and eased into the outside lane. She heard the call over the Force radio nonetheless: disturbance on Cranmer Street, near the junction with St. Ann's Hill Road. Only moments away.

"Tango Golf 13 to Control."

"Control to Tango Golf 13, go ahead."

"Tango Golf 13 to Control. I'm on Woodborough Road, just turning into Cranmer Street now."

Lynn swung sharp left across the traffic, cutting off a mud-spattered four-by-four and causing it to brake sharply. Cranmer Street was only narrow, barely a two-car width, vehicles parked down the left-hand side making it narrower still. A builder's van with fading Forest stickers in its rear windows started to pull out in front of her and then thought better of it.

"Control to Tango Golf 13. Response units are attending. Advise await their arrival."

There were several small blocks of newly built flats high on
the right and beyond those an old municipal building that was now student accommodation. Behind fencing along the near side, the ground was being cleared, deep holes being dug; council housing demolished and replaced. Just opposite the intersection with St. Ann's Hill Road, a crowd of youths, many of them wearing hoodies—what else?—had gathered in a rough circle that spread out across the street.

As Lynn cut the engine, she heard the sound of shouting, raucous and angry; chanting, like a soccer crowd baying for blood.

"Control, this is Tango Golf 13. I'm on Cranmer Street at the scene. A gang of fifteen or twenty youths fighting."

Lowering her window, she heard a scream, urgent and shrill, followed almost immediately by another.

"Control, this is Tango Golf 13. I'm on top of the incident and shall have to intervene. Immediate backup required."

"Control to Tango Golf 13, advise—"

But she was already out of the car and running towards the crowd.

"Police! Police, let me through."

As she pushed her way into the circle, an elbow struck Lynn in the ribs and an outflung hand caught her high on her cheek, a signet ring breaking the skin.

A few of those standing at the front turned to see what was happening, and she was able to force her way to the centre. Faces, all shades, stared at her, showing everything from indifference to pure hate. Young males, mostly, wide-leg jeans slung so low it seemed as if their crotch hung somewhere down between their knees. More than a few wearing black and white, Radford colours. A gang thing, is that what this was?

"Fuck off, bitch!"

A head arched sharply back then jerked forward and the next second she was wiping a gobbet of spittle from her hair.

Jeers. Laughter.

More shouts, more threats.

The two young women—girls—who'd been at the heart of the fighting had broken apart when Lynn pushed her way through.

Fifteen, she guessed, sixteen at best.

The one closest to her—thin white face, head close-shaven like a boy's, leather jacket, black-and-white scarf, skintight black jeans—was bleeding from a cut high on her left cheek, a slow trickle of blood running down. There was another cut on her arm. Her adversary, facing Lynn, was most likely mixed race, dark hair tied back, denim jacket and jeans, a short-bladed knife in her hand.

Lynn took a step forward, focussing on the girl's eyes.

"Okay, put the knife down."

Two steps more, then three. Slow, measured, as assured as she could be. Somewhere in the middle distance, the sound of a police siren coming closer. Overhead, the streetlights seemed to be getting brighter with each second.

"Put it down."

The girl's eyes were bright, taunting, only the merest flicker of fear. Of doubt.

The crowd almost silent, scarcely moving.

"Down."

Another half-step and the expression on the girl's face changed, her shoulders seeming to relax as she shifted her hold on the knife and lowered it to her side.

"On the ground," Lynn said quietly. "Put it on the ground."

The girl began to bend as if to obey, Lynn reading too late the widening of her eyes, too slow to counter the movement, lithe, as she sprang past, the blade slashing at the right side of the other girl's face and opening it like a ripe plum.

The girl screamed.

Lynn pivoted on her left foot, seizing the attacker by the sleeve and swinging her hard round, one knee coming up into
the small of her back, her fist chopping down on the girl's elbow and the knife tumbling to the kerb, the girl continuing to struggle all the same.

The police siren was closer still, the sound of an ambulance in its wake.

Lynn had forced the girl's right arm high behind her back when, from the corner of her vision, she saw the youth step forward from the retreating crowd, arm raised. Time enough, as she swung towards him, to note the black-and-white bandana wound tight around his head, the pistol held almost steady in his hand, the contempt in his eyes. The force of her movement took the girl round with her, propelling her forward, the first shot striking Lynn in the chest and seeming to lift her off her feet before sending her stumbling back, legs folding beneath her, falling away even as the girl, still standing, free hand outstretched as if to ward off what was to come, took the second bullet in her neck, immediately above the gold chain she wore with her lover's name engraved, a wash of blood arcing over the mottled ground and into Lynn's mouth and eyes.

Early evening. ER at the Queen's Medical Centre housed the usual miscellany: elderly ladies who had lost their footing on slippery, uneven pavements and taken a tumble, bruising a coccyx or fracturing, for the second time, an already-pinned hip; disorientated men of uncertain years with voices like rusted industrial saws, whose clothes stank of stale urine and hostel disinfectant; distraught mothers with babies who would simply not stop crying or fractious toddlers with badly grazed heads and gashed knees; a scaffolder who had stepped, helmetless, out into the air from the roof of a four-storey building; a trainee chef with the first two joints of his middle finger safe in a plastic bag of slowly melting ice; a young Muslim girl of twelve who had just started her first period; a cyclist who had been sent somersaulting high into the road by the outflung door of a Cherokee Jeep; a charmless fourteen-year-old boy, alarmed and obese, who had been taunted into swallowing the dregs of a bottle of toilet cleaner: each and every one waiting.

Later, when the clubs had spilled out onto the streets and the pubs had finally called last orders, there would be the usual motley collection of barely walking wounded, drunk many of
them, drugged, loud and angry and all too ready to strike out in frustration, bleeding from encounters with brick walls or nightclub bouncers, or injured in scuffles that had set off for no better reason than an ill-judged look, a nudged shoulder, a drink sent flying; and this being Valentine's Night, there would be a slow procession of discarded lovers, for whom the occasion had led to bitter accusations, confessions of infidelity, sudden realisations, overdoses, stabbings, attempted suicides, broken relationships that would be mended tearfully, some of them, there amongst the crowded chairs with dawn approaching.

The triage nurse barely looked up as Resnick approached, tall, bulky, his shirt crumpled, jacket unfastened.

"Lynn Kellogg," Resnick said. "She was brought in twenty minutes ago. Half hour at most."

The name rang no obvious bells.

"She's a police officer," Resnick persevered. "She was shot."

The nurse looked up then, little more than a glance, enough to read the anxiety in his eyes. "And you're what? The father?"

Resnick bridled, reining back his anger. "No, I'm—We live together."

"Right." She looked at him again. One of the buttons on his jacket, she noticed, was hanging by just a thread.

"Look." Resnick fumbled in his wallet. "I'm a police officer, too. Detective Inspector."

The nurse handed him back his warrant card. "Go down that corridor, third cubicle on the left." And went back to her list.

Lynn was lying on a narrow bed, pillows at her head and back, wearing a flimsy hospital gown. Her own clothes were neatly folded on a plastic chair.

He had been standing there for some moments before she opened her eyes.

"Hello, Charlie."

Her voice was faint, like something passing on the wind.

"How you feeling?" he asked, reaching for her hand.

She made an effort to smile. "Like I've walked into a ten-ton truck."

"She's a little woozy." The doctor appeared at Resnick's shoulder. "Something we've given her for the pain."

He was young, late twenties Resnick reckoned, little more, and spoke with an Australian accent, not too strong. Australia or New Zealand, he could never be sure.

"How is she?" Resnick asked.

"I'm fine," Lynn whispered from the bed.

"A lot of bruising around the point of impact," the doctor said. "Tender, certainly. Could be a fractured rib or two. We're going to run her down to X-ray, get that checked."

"Nothing more?" Resnick asked. "Internal?"

"Not as far as we can tell. I've had a good listen to the lungs, and they seem to be functioning properly."

Resnick was still holding Lynn's hand, and he gave it a squeeze.

"Up and around in no time," the doctor said cheerfully. "Chasing down the bad guys."

Lynn said something neither of them could properly hear.

"Back in two shakes," the doctor said, leaving them alone.

Resnick lowered himself onto the edge of the bed, careful of her legs.

"I'm sorry," Lynn said.

"What for?"

"Dinner. We were meant to be having dinner."

"That doesn't matter."

"Your card."

"I saw the card. Thank you. It was lovely."

There were tears at the corners of her eyes.

"What?" Resnick said.

"I should have waited, shouldn't I?"

He didn't answer.

"Backup. I should have waited for backup instead of going blundering in."

"You didn't blunder."

"I made a mistake."

Resnick shook his head. "You did what you had to do."

"And nearly got myself killed."

Resnick breathed out slowly. "Yes," he said and folded both of her hands in his.

"The girl," Lynn said. "The one who was shot."

"I don't know. Touch and go, I think."

"You'll find out."

"Yes."

"You could go now."

He shook his head. "I'll wait. A few minutes won't make any difference, either way."

"What about the other one?" Lynn asked. "The other girl. Her face was badly cut."

"Here now, as far as I know. Getting stitched up."

The curtain was pulled to one side, and a nurse came through with a wheelchair. "Time to take you for a little ride," she said cheerily.

Resnick leaned over carefully and kissed Lynn on the cheek.

"Here." She held out one hand, loosely closed into a fist.

"What is it?"

When she opened her fingers, there was his loose button, snug in her palm. "Take care of it. I'll sew it back on when I get home."

"Promises," Resnick said, and grinned.

The officer outside Intensive Care hastily dropped his newspaper to the floor, the crossword less than a quarter done.

"Sorry, sir. I ... the girl, Kelly, they've taken her down. She's being operated on now. I thought it best to stay here."

"The family?"

"In the cafeteria, waiting. I said I'd contact them if there was any news."

"Kelly, you said the girl's called?"

"Yes, sir." He checked his notebook. "Kelly Brent."

Resnick nodded. The name meant nothing to him. Not until that moment.

"I'll be down in ER," he said. "You hear anything specific, any change, find me, let me know."

Lynn was sleeping, her face, devoid of any makeup, young and pale. A thin dribble of saliva ran down onto the pillow from one corner of her partly open mouth and Resnick wiped it away.

"She's lucky," the doctor said. "No fracture, as far as I can tell. Heavy bruising around the third and fourth ribs, close to the sternum. Breathing's going to be painful for a while, and she'll likely be tired, sleepy, but otherwise she'll be okay."

"How long before she's up on her feet?"

"On her feet? As long as she's sensible, nothing too strenuous, a matter of days. Fully operational, though, if that's what you're asking, I'd say a couple of weeks." He nodded back towards Lynn. "You two, you're an item?"

An item, Resnick thought. He supposed they were, that at least.