Philip Brennan 02 - The Creeper (10 page)

‘No, you don’t,’ said Phil. ‘We haven’t confirmed that the body is Julie Miller so the last thing the family needs is you two pestering them. There’s no story here.’

‘Yeah?’ said Terry, a snide grin appearing on his face, ‘then what are you two doin’ here?’

‘Stopping people like you harassing innocent citizens,’ said Rose. ‘Now back off.’

‘Sorry, darlin’.’ Macintyre slipped Rose’s grasp and was round her.

‘Hey . . .’ She turned, gave chase up the drive, grabbed him easily. She turned him to face her.

‘Get your hands off me or I’ll do you for assault . . .’ He slid the camera bag from his arm, struggled to free himself. His face twisted with anger.

‘Want to get arrested? Yeah?’ Rose’s voice was rising.

‘Get your fuckin’ hands off me!’ Camera down, his fists were raised to reply.

‘Rose . . .’ Phil turned, made to go to her, but didn’t get that far.

From out of her pocket she produced a small canister and sprayed it in Macintyre’s face. His hands went immediately to his eyes and he fell to his knees, screaming.

Phil stared. She looked at him, anger still dancing in her eyes. ‘You saw what happened,’ she shouted. ‘He assaulted me. I was within my limits and defending myself. Right?’

Terry was standing open-mouthed. A smile crept over his features, his eyes still glassy. Phil could see the journalist’s mind working. Terry knew as well as Phil that DS Rose Martin had been not only out of order but also out of control. And that meant money.

Phil had to take action. He couldn’t give Rose a bollocking in front of the two journalists but he couldn’t let them get away to tell what had happened. He turned to Terry. ‘There’s no story here, right?’

Terry looked at him as if he was breaking a spell.

‘Right?’

He gave an ugly laugh. ‘Really? You don’t think so?’

Phil’s eyes hardened, his body language became tense, threatening. ‘At the moment your little mate is looking at assaulting a police officer and trespassing. What about you? Want to join him?’

‘There was only one person doing any assaulting here.’ Terry’s eyes were lit by a nasty light. He had found an even better story. ‘That’s how it’s going to read.’

Phil sighed. ‘I’m warning you . . .’

Terry laughed. ‘What you gonna do, Officer? Hit me as well?’

Phil sighed. ‘Here we go . . .’ He grabbed hold of Terry, turning him round and thrusting his arm up his back, reading him his rights as he did so.

Terry cried out in pain. ‘What . . . what you doin’?’

‘Arresting you.’ He turned to Rose. ‘Get the other one.’

She didn’t need to be told. Macintyre had slipped to his knees, hands rubbing his eyes and whimpering, kicking out his legs in pain. She roughly pulled his hands behind him, cuffed him.

They had the two journalists in armlocks and were preparing to take them to Phil’s Audi when the front door opened. Brenda Miller stood there, Cheryl Bland behind her.

‘What . . . what’s happening?’ she said, her voice distant and small as if trying to wake from a stubborn dream.

‘Journalists,’ said Rose Martin. ‘Trying to make your life hell. We stopped them.’ She couldn’t keep the triumph from her voice.

‘My life is already hell . . .’ the words screamed, her voice cresting before breaking down into sobs. Cheryl Bland put her arm around her, led her away from the door.

But not before she had fixed Phil with a look that spoke of pain and disappointment. At everything and everyone. At him.

He didn’t blame her. Pushing Terry inside the back of the Audi he felt the same way himself.

He got behind the steering wheel, started the car. Rose got into the passenger seat, eyes blazing with righteous anger. She was smiling. There was no sense of victory inside Phil. Only a hollowness.

Not trusting himself to speak, Phil drove to the station in silence. He put a CD into the player, wanting something to fill the empty space.

Doves:
Lost Souls
.

It felt appropriate.

20

T
here was a knock at the door.

The tension was broken. Anthony Howe straightened up, looked at the door, frowning as if emerging from sleep. His features changed, his eyes no longer darkly lit.

‘Come in,’ he called.

The door opened. A young man, dark-haired, tall, dressed in regulation student-issue jeans and sloganed T-shirt, stood there. He was about to speak but saw Anni sitting there, stopped.

‘Yes, Jake,’ Anthony Howe said.

The student looked between the two of them, uneasily. ‘Um . . . we had a meeting?’

‘Did we? Thought I was . . .’ Howe looked at his watch. ‘Right. Sorry. Just a few more minutes. Not be long.’

Jake pointed towards the corridor. ‘Shall I . . .’

‘Please.’

He left, closing the door behind him. The silence in the room was like the inside of a human heart; Anni could hear, feel, the blood rushing round her body.

‘Right,’ said Howe, finding a pen on his desk suddenly fascinating enough to lift up and toy with in his fingers, ‘you mentioned Suzanne Perry?’ His voice had changed. Softer, reasoned. Back in control.

‘Yes, I did.’

‘Why? That subject, as far as I’m concerned, is closed.’

‘Perhaps.’ Anni crossed her legs, looked down at her notepad, pen poised over the page. ‘Can I just ask you where you were last night?’

‘I was—’ He pulled his eyes off the pen, back to her. ‘Can I ask why you need to know that?’

‘If you could just answer the question, please.’

He sighed. Anni watched his eyes. He seemed to be deciding how best to answer the question, what tone to take, what information to give. ‘I . . . was at home.’

‘Alone?’

‘Yes.’

‘You live alone?’

‘I . . . we’re separated. My wife and I.’

‘And there was no one with you?’

‘Please tell me what this is concerning.’

His voice was rising. Anni kept hers steady, her gaze level.

‘In a moment. If you could just answer the question, please.’

‘As I said, I was at home.’

‘And what did you do there?’

‘I . . . made dinner. Then I read for a while. Watched some TV.’

‘What did you watch?’

He looked startled by the question. ‘Why do you need to know that? Are you making, making some kind of value judgements about me?’

‘No. I just wanted to know what you watched.’

‘A soap opera.
Coronation Street
. Then . . .’ He put his head back, thinking. Or, thought Anni, pretending to think. ‘I don’t know. Something on BBC4. A documentary.’

‘About what?’

‘Byzantine art.’

‘That something you’re interested in?’

‘Not particularly. It was on and I, I . . . can you tell me what this is about, please?’

‘And what did you do after that?’

‘Had a whisky. Went to bed. What I normally do.’

‘And that was it for the night?’

He nodded. Anni didn’t reply.

‘Am I supposed to have done something? Does this involve Suzanne?’

The dark fire returned to his eyes when he mentioned her name. Dark. Nasty, Anni would have said.

‘It does,’ she said. ‘Suzanne Perry was attacked last night.’

He recoiled, as if the news had hit him in a physical way.

‘Attacked . . . where?’

‘In her flat.’

‘How?’

‘Someone came in while she was sleeping, into her bedroom. ’

‘My God . . .’ He looked again at the pen, thought of picking it up once more, then decided against it. ‘Did he . . . what happened?’ And then, before she could answer, almost as if he didn’t want to hear the answer to his question, he said, ‘Was she hurt?’

‘We don’t think so.’

Anthony Howe shook his head. ‘Oh dear . . .’ Then a realisation seemed to dawn on his face. He looked directly at Anni. ‘You think I did it?’

She said nothing.

His anger rose. ‘You think I did it? I . . . somehow . . . made my way into her flat and, and . . . you think that was me, that I could do that?’

Anni kept her voice professionally calm and even. ‘We don’t know, Mr Howe. There was no sign of forced entry. Whoever it was must have been known to Suzanne. Probably had a key.’

Howe sat there, staring at the wall, saying nothing.

‘And since you and Suzanne have, shall we say, a history, I thought I should pay you a visit.’

Still nothing.

‘What did happen between you and Suzanne, Mr Howe?’

‘Professor.’

‘Professor.’ So much for informality, she thought. ‘What happened?’

He sighed. ‘She destroyed my marriage.’ His voice was small, fragile. ‘I . . . We had an affair. That was that.’ He looked at Anni. No trace of any anger in his eyes now. No trace of anything but sadness. ‘That was that.’

‘And the stalking? The phone calls?’

‘It ended badly. Animosity. Accusations.’

‘But was there any—’

‘It ended badly. That’s all I’m saying.’

Anni didn’t press him. ‘So,’ she said instead, ‘last night—’

‘I was at home. All night.’

‘No one to vouch for that?’

Bitterness entered his voice. ‘I didn’t know I would need anyone to.’

‘Do you still have a key to Suzanne’s flat?’

‘I never had one in the first place.’

‘But you’re still in touch with her.’

‘No.’ Said very quickly.

‘But you’re—’

‘I said no. She destroyed my marriage. Offered me her body if I gave her a first. Then, when it all went wrong, went to the police, to you lot, told them lie after lie about me. I’m lucky to still have a job here.’ He leaned towards her once more, anger informing his features. ‘So after all that, would I really stay in touch with her? Really?’

The mobile on his desk rang, stopping Anni from giving an answer.

‘Excuse me.’ He leaned forward, picked it up ready to answer. Checked the read-out. Stopped.

It kept ringing.

Anni put her pen down. ‘Don’t mind me.’

He kept staring at it, his eyes widening. His fingers began to shake.

Anni looked at the phone, back to Howe. ‘I said, don’t mind me.’

He kept staring, then, as if breaking from a trance, glanced at Anni, back to his phone. He hit the red button, silencing it.

‘They can leave a message if it’s important.’ He pocketed the phone, turned back to her. ‘And that’s all I have to say. So if you’ll excuse me, Detective, I have work to do.’ He picked up a sheet of paper from his desk, pretended to look at it. His hands were still shaking.

Anni stood up, saw herself out.

She passed the student, waiting patiently outside the door, made her way down the corridor.

She had seen the read-out on the screen. The name.

Suzanne.

The blood was pounding in her ears, her wrists.

Anni left the building.

21

‘D
on’t you ever do that again.’

Phil had parked the car at the station with the two reporters still in the back, gestured for Rose to join him at the other side of the car park.

She looked up at him, eyes still dancing with a defiant adrenalin rush. ‘Why? They were out of order. It’s a damned good job I stepped in.’

‘Is it? Really?’

‘I was within my rights on everything. You’ll back me on it.’

‘You were angry. At me, at the case, at not finding Julie Miller. You allowed that anger to cloud your professional judgement.’

‘You backed me up.’ Her voice was petulant but still defiant.

Phil leaned into her, face to face. ‘I had no choice, did I? But don’t you ever do that again. No mavericking, I told you. You pull something like that again and you’re off this case.’

‘You need me. I was in charge of the original investigation.’

‘I don’t need an officer who behaves like that.’

‘Make a complaint against me, then.’ There was an ugly smile twitching at the corners of her mouth.

Phil knew what that smile meant. Fenwick, his boss, was her protector.
Let’s see who he believes
, she was thinking.

Phil stepped back. ‘You can take them in, you can get them processed, you can handle the paperwork. Good luck.’ He turned to walk away, stopped, turned back to her. ‘This is your last chance with me. I mean it. And I don’t care who you think’s protecting your back.’

He watched the shock register on her face as she realised who he was talking about.

‘Yeah,’ he said, ‘I know.’

And this time walked away.

Suzanne heard his phone switch to voicemail. She started speaking but stopped herself. She didn’t know what to say. How to say it. Instead she ended the call.

She put the phone down on the table, sighed.

She would try again later.

The building was low-level with a brown sloping roof and nicotine-yellow brick walls. An anonymous piece of eighties architecture, this beige palace could have been anything from a prison to a hospital to a provincial budget motel. But it was none of those things. It was the main police station for the town.

Phil stood back and let Rose march their charges through the main door and up to the desk. She could deal with the Duty Sergeant and the processing. Good luck to her.

Phil crossed to the door at the side of the reception desk, punched in the code on the keypad. The lock clicked.

‘Excuse me . . .’

Phil opened the door, didn’t realise the voice was addressing him.

‘Excuse me . . .’

Phil turned. A woman had stood up from the sofa, was standing directly in front of him. She looked tired, her eyes red-rimmed, her face creased into worry-heavy frown lines. No make-up and her clothes weren’t good quality and they hadn’t been selected with care. She looked like she had slept in them. Her hair was uncombed and he couldn’t place her age. Possibly mid-forties but it could have been ten years either side of that.

Rose took the two journalists through the door without looking back. The pneumatic hinges pulled the door shut, leaving him behind. He had to talk to the woman now.

‘Yes?’

She looked him up and down. ‘You’re a police detective, aren’t you?’

The uniform on the desk had seen what was happening. ‘Just a minute, please,’ he said.