Like This, for Ever (3 page)

‘That’s just the butterfly,’ said Hatty. ‘Shit, it could be anywhere.’

‘Jump up and down,’ instructed Jorge. ‘It’s probably caught on something.’

As Hatty jiggled, making the steel beneath them twang and groan, Barney stood up and rolled down the ramp. Keeping his eyes down, he made his way up and down it several times. No sign of the lost earring.

‘I have to go,’ said Sam. ‘I still haven’t done that friggin’ field-trip write-up.’

Hatty announced that she was leaving too.

‘Me and Harvey will walk you,’ said Jorge, as the brothers rolled down the ramp to join Barney. ‘There’s a perv around, remember?’

‘A perv that kills boys,’ replied Hatty, whose face was still twisted with disappointment at the loss of the earring. ‘What you trying to say?’

‘And just what part of “Bring your brother straight home” did you not understand?’

The gang practically jumped in unison. They’d been so fixated on the detective watching them from beyond the gates that they’d completely failed to notice the other woman, who’d appeared
in the yard without any of them, even Barney, seeing her.

‘How did you get in?’ said Harvey, turning to check the gates.

‘Jorge weighs more than I do,’ the small, silver-haired woman replied, ‘and is an inch taller. If he can squeeze through a gap in the railings, so can I.’ She looked round the yard, at the high walls, the dark building, the gates. ‘Why do I get the feeling you lot aren’t supposed to be in here?’

‘You said you were working,’ said Jorge.

Jorge and Harvey’s mother was a freelance photographer. Sometimes she stayed out all night, on call at the offices of a news agency, and Harvey and Jorge were left in the care of their elderly grandmother. Their dad, who’d been a war correspondent for the BBC, had died before Harvey was born.

‘The job’s over,’ replied his mother. ‘And so is this little party. Goodnight, everyone. Straight home now.’

The brothers and Hatty said their goodbyes before making their way across the yard behind Jorge and Harvey’s mum.

‘You coming?’ Lloyd asked Barney.

Barney nodded. ‘My dad’ll be on my case if I’m much later,’ he said. ‘I’m just going to have a quick look for Hatty’s earring. See you.’

Alone, Barney made one last circle of the yard, steering clear of the Indian village. The rain of earlier had made for a narrow drain that ran around the edge. Barney moved slowly, following the flow of the rainwater, until the pipe disappeared underground and an iron grille held back debris. Then he stopped blinking and let his eyes lose their focus. The patterns always took longer at night, but after a moment or two they came. And there it was. Clinging to the underside of a Mars wrapper. He bent, picked the wrapper from the drain and rescued Hatty’s earring.

Beaming, Barney looked round, having for a moment completely forgotten that the others had gone. He’d never been alone in the community centre before. He hadn’t realized quite how high the walls were, or how dark the shadows beneath them became when there was no one around to distract him. He was looking directly at the painted face of a long-haired girl on the opposite wall. She sat on a rock, in the middle of the ocean. She was smiling
at him, not in a pleasant way, and her strange green eyes seemed to say that she knew a secret, and she was only biding her time before she told.

A sudden rustle behind him made him jump. The wind, which normally couldn’t make it past the walls, was blowing a crisp packet around. Time to go. He left the yard and skated round to the main street. Maybe he’d get a chance to give the earring back to Hatty when they were alone. He’d reach out and gently push it into the hole in her left ear.

‘Barney!’

He jumped again as though he’d been shot. He hadn’t noticed the policewoman approaching, had forgotten about her completely.

‘Hi,’ she said, when she’d reached him. ‘You on your way home?’

He nodded.

‘We should go together,’ she said. ‘It’s pretty dark.’

‘OK,’ he agreed. He could move at a walking pace if he wanted to, although in fairness, she didn’t hang around. She was taller than he, and thin, with long hair scraped back into a ponytail. She never seemed to care what she looked like. On the other hand, she always seemed to look OK.

‘Are you on duty?’ he asked after they’d walked halfway down the street.

‘No,’ she said. ‘I’m not working at the moment. I’m on sick leave.’

He sneaked a sideways glance. She didn’t look sick. For one thing, she went out running every morning, he heard her leave as he got ready to go to the newsagent’s and often they’d both get back to the house at the same time. Sometimes he’d see her riding off on her bike, a gym bag slung over one shoulder. And in the evenings, she often left the house on foot, coming back hours later.

They’d reached the corner and Barney had a second’s gratitude that he wasn’t on his own. This was the only bit of the journey home that bothered him, having to pass the old house. Even with the security fencing, even with all the ground-floor doors and windows boarded up, he couldn’t help the feeling that someone could be in there, waiting to jump out.

‘This house gives me the creeps,’ he said.

‘You should see it on the inside,’ she replied. ‘Kids and homeless
people used to break in before all the windows were properly boarded up. We used to get called out to it quite a lot.’

They turned the corner and left the old house behind.

‘Barney, it’s not really any of my business, I know,’ she said. ‘But I’m not sure it’s very safe for you and your mates to be out after dark at the moment.’

‘We stay together,’ replied Barney. ‘We look out for each other. And Jorge and Lloyd are nearly fifteen.’

He waited for Lacey to point out that he’d been alone when she’d met him and got ready to respond that he was fast. That no one could catch him on foot once he got some speed up.

‘Five boys of your age have gone missing recently,’ she went on. ‘None of them lived very far from here.’

‘What happens to them?’ he asked her. ‘The TV never says how they died. Do you think the Barlow twins are dead as well?’

‘I hope not,’ she said, in a voice that told him she was pretty certain they were.

ALONE ON THE
rapidly dwindling beach, Dana walked to the water’s edge. Just over a year ago, when she’d moved to London from her native Scotland, she’d fallen in love with the river at night. She loved the way it curled its way between the buildings like a sleek black snake, mirroring only what was beautiful about the city – its lights, its architecture, its colour. Now, the spot around Tower Bridge would always remind her of two small, pale bodies, two boys who should have run squealing along this beach, not been carried from it in body bags. She took her phone from her pocket.

‘Hey,’ said a deep male voice with a South London accent.

‘Hi. Where are you?’

A pause. ‘Just in my car. Parked, not driving. What’s up?’

‘It was them. The Barlow twins. As we knew it would be, I suppose.’

A whispered curse. ‘You OK?’

‘I’m on my way to tell the parents. Mark, their mother …’

Another pause. ‘Want me to come?’

Dana smiled to herself, shook her head. ‘No,’ she said. ‘I’ll be fine. What are you up to anyway?’

A sigh came down the line. ‘Dana, there are some things it’s better you don’t know.’

‘Enough said, I suppose.’

Silence.

‘What’s up?’

‘I shouldn’t say this,’ said Dana. ‘I wouldn’t to anyone else. I haven’t the faintest shred of—’

‘Dana, just say it.’

‘I think it’s a woman.’

Silence for a heartbeat, then, ‘Oh?’

‘No sexual abuse, Mark. No physical abuse of any kind, except the wound that kills them. Their bodies are perfect and we find them curled up like they’re asleep. Just looking at them – oh, I can’t explain it, but they inspire such love. I know it sounds stupid but I think the killer loves them, in her own way. I don’t think she wants to hurt them, I think she can’t help herself. I think maybe she lost her own son at that age, and something is making her re-enact it with proxies.’

‘Anything to back this up, other than what your gut is telling you?’

‘Nothing.’

‘Then the chances are you’re having the normal reaction of any woman your age confronted with dead kids, and you’re projecting what you feel on to the killer.’

‘Yes, but …’

‘Not done yet. On the other hand, as theories go, it’s not completely off the wall. You can soon run a check on boys of that age who’ve died in London in recent years. If any died of extensive blood loss, if any of the mothers have had unusual difficulties coping. It’s a lead.’

‘Yeah, I can get that started tonight. Look, I’ve got to go. Thanks, Mark.’

Dana disconnected the line and heard a lapping sound at her feet. In the minute or so that she’d been talking, the water had crept closer. She took a step back and stumbled, then turned round and found herself walking faster than was sensible. The lights had been taken away, most of the people had gone from the beach and from the bridge, and she really needed to watch her step. Miss your footing on one of these beaches at night, hit your head as the tide crept its way in, and it could be the end of you.

Only when she’d reached the first step that wasn’t encrusted with river-weed did Dana feel her heartbeat begin to slow down. She turned back, one last time. By this time, it was impossible to tell where the beach ended and the water began. She could still hear it though, the soft, whispering sound it made as it crept towards her.

‘
WILL YOU BE
working on the murders when you go back?’ Barney asked Lacey, as they turned into the road where they both lived. Lacey looked down at the boy, only a few years away from becoming a man, and yet whose face was so fresh, whose skin so clear and whose thought processes so blindingly obvious. He was thinking that his stock with his gang of mates would soar if he had an inside track on a murder investigation. Especially one involving kids. People were invariably most interested in murders when they were potential victims themselves.

She was almost sorry to disappoint him. ‘No, I don’t work on murders,’ she said. ‘My job isn’t anything like that exciting.’

She could see him watching, waiting for her to tell him what her job was, hoping it would be something like Drugs, Vice or the Flying Squad. But how could she explain to a boy she barely knew that she didn’t think she would ever work as a police officer again?

‘You and your mates are good,’ she said. ‘I’ve watched you a couple of times now. If the light catches you the right way, especially against the mural with stars on it, you look like you’re flying.’

‘My mates are scared of you,’ he said.

The words seemed to take them both by surprise. Barney’s lips were clenched tight and he had an
oh shit
look in his eyes.

‘Are you?’ she asked him.

‘No,’ he said after a second. ‘But then, I knew you before.’

Before. This child, whom she’d spoken to less than a dozen times, could remember what she’d been like before. Jesus, even
she
couldn’t remember that any more.

Barney had stopped moving. ‘He’s here again.’ His voice had lowered, giving a hint of the man’s that was to come in a few years, and something about its tone put her on full alert. She stopped, too.

‘Who’s here?’ she asked. Two middle-aged women were walking away from them further up the street. There was no one at Barney’s front door.

‘The man that watches you.’

Lacey wondered at the complexity of the human heart that could feel fear, misery and joy, all at the same time. All with the same root cause. ‘What man?’ she asked, although she knew perfectly well.

‘The one who sits in his car outside your house,’ the boy replied. ‘Who knocks on your door a lot.’

‘Where is he?’ she asked him. ‘Don’t point or look, just tell me.’

The kid was bright, he did exactly that. ‘He’s in a green car on the left-hand side of the road about six – no, seven – cars away from us.’

So strong, the temptation to look for the car, to make sure he was right. ‘How on earth did you spot that?’

Barney shrugged, looked uncomfortable. ‘I just see things,’ he said.

‘What do you mean, you just see things? I wouldn’t even have known there was a green car that far down the street, but you not only see the car, you see a man sitting inside it, in the dark.’

He sighed. ‘The colours of the cars are reflected in the water on the road,’ he said. ‘There’s a silver one, a black one, red, two more silver, white van, then his green one.’

He couldn’t see the line of parked cars any more. She was blocking his view. If he was right, it was extraordinary. Incredible powers of observation and recall.

‘The streetlights are shining through the cars,’ he went on. ‘The light comes straight through most of them, but in the green one there’s something that gets in its way. A dark, solid shape, which can only be a largeish head and shoulders. A man, sitting inside a green car. It’s obvious.’

‘I think we need to get you working for the Met,’ said Lacey.

His face softened. ‘I’ve always been good at finding things,’ he said. ‘When I was a kid, I used to find four-leaf clovers in the grass. My mum collected them in a box for me. I’ve still got them. If you lose anything – you know, jewellery and stuff – just give me a ring. I’ll probably find it.’

‘I have very little jewellery,’ said Lacey. ‘But I could use a four-leaf clover, next time you find one.’

‘I don’t really see them any more,’ he said, taking her seriously. ‘I grew out of that. I see other things now. Lost things.’

They crossed the road and stopped at Barney’s front door. Neither of them had looked back at the green car but Barney’s eyes couldn’t settle. ‘Are you worried about him?’ he asked her.

She shook her head. ‘No, we sort of work together. Actually, he’s more of a friend.’

A look altogether too mature for an eleven-year-old appeared on his face. A friend? Who hung around outside her flat, banging on the door because she wouldn’t answer his telephone calls?