Something You Are (3 page)

When I woke up I could feel sunlight on my face and my eyelids were encrusted with sleep. My shoulders were aching, propped up with cushions, and when I managed to prise my eyes open I realized I had fallen asleep on the sofa.

I sat up and Emma's diary slid off my stomach on to the floor.

‘Ah, fuck.'

I looked at my watch.

‘
Wo
.'

It was almost midday and the shock propelled me to my feet. I wavered, blinking, until the room came into enough focus for me to locate my mobile on the coffee table. There were no messages from Russia. My flatmate, Mark Chester, had been away for over a month now and I only had five texts to show for it.

I turned in the direction of the kitchen for coffee, decided that I didn't have time, and went into the bathroom instead. It wasn't good. I had a meeting with Edie Franco about a new job in forty-five minutes, and turning up looking like the casualty of a cheap stag weekend wasn't how I wanted to project my professional image.

‘Jesus…'

I dashed some water on my face, took off my shirt and noticed I'd written something on the back of my hand.

‘Who is K?'

A recent section of Emma's diary came back to me.

‘Went for another p/u with K. Imagining Dad's face, LOL.'

I looked at the reminder again before washing it off, and sprayed some deodorant over the lingering smell of sweat and perfume.

Edie Franco owned one of Mark's favourite nightclubs: the Underground. Direct, impossibly blonde and built like a Valkyrie, she came across as the sort of woman with whom you would be lucky to survive a sexual encounter. She was winking at forty, but you couldn't tell.

I was half an hour late but, as I should have expected, she was later. I managed to drink two cups of coffee at the bar before she arrived with a gust of sleet and freezing wind. She was wearing a red coat that covered everything down to her knees and her handshake was more of a firm stroke.

‘I missed those swimming-pool-blue eyes!'

‘Edie.' I pulled away briskly after she kissed me on the cheek. ‘You want anything to drink?'

There was no apology for the time. ‘Coffee, black.'

I nodded at the barman. ‘I'll have the same.'

‘Move to the sofas?' She indicated her head and started walking.

I followed her to a spot away from the doors and sat down opposite her. It felt better to have a table between us.

‘Haven't heard from you in a while?' I said.

‘Life's been sweet, what can I say? You get married, you have a kid, you open a club, you think about another kid…' She crossed her legs, slipped off her coat. ‘Get divorced, call up a beautiful man… don't worry, that's not where you come in…'

The barman came over and put down two coffees.

I looked at mine, smiling, but didn't touch it. ‘I'm, er… sorry to hear that.'

‘Sorry about the divorce or the beautiful man?' She raised her eyebrows and her expression became coy, wide eyes blackened with theatrical make-up. ‘Well, sometimes people just grow away from each other, or too close to other people, or several, whatever.'

I smiled.

‘You ever wanted to have kids, Dominic? Pass on that hot side-profile?' She turned her head so I could admire hers, the same nose and full lips.

‘Looks better on you,' I said, picking up my coffee.

Another festive song was playing. I looked up at the fake holly pinned to the spirit shelf. There was still a month to go but Christmas was everywhere.

‘Sad, isn't it? Working over Christmas.' There was a pause as she followed my eyeline up to the lights. ‘Sometimes the evenings look so beautiful from my office I can barely stand to walk home alone… I rarely do, that's probably why we're here, huh?'

‘Sidney.' It had dawned on me what the job was.
Who
it was. ‘It's Sidney, isn't it? Something to do with the divorce?'

Silence.

I shook my head. ‘Damn, Edie, you know I don't like to—'

‘You don't like to know why. Isn't that how you work?'

I put the coffee down, too high on caffeine already and unable to look at her directly. ‘Domestic disputes, come on, I thought you were above this sort of thing?'

‘He wants my son. What am I above? Love?'

I pointed a finger. ‘Now
that's
what I don't like to work with!'

‘I can't go to court.'

‘You mean you w—'

‘I can't go to court!'

‘You—'

‘I
won't win
!' Her fist slammed on to the table and coffee dashed across the polished surface. ‘I… won't win.'

The background chatter waned for a moment and I looked over my shoulder, worried about how much attention we were drawing to ourselves.

Edie sat back, touched her hair and looked at the spilt coffee. When she spoke again every word was controlled.

‘I won't win in court.'

‘You're the mother, you always win.'

‘I won't.'

There was an intensity in her face that I found difficult to match. It was why she was such a good businesswoman; every expression was inherently threatening.

‘Why?' I asked, even though I didn't want to, even though I could have done it without knowing.

‘He had someone follow me, for quite a while, recording… things. If it gets out, which he has threatened it will, I'll never see Scott again.'

‘So what do you want me to do? Just destroy the recordings?'

‘I'll pay for whatever you need to do to stop them getting out.
Anything
. Understand?'

I nodded.

‘You want anything upfront?'

‘No, it's all right.' I picked up my bag and got out ten pounds for the coffees.

‘Who are you walking home with?' she asked.

I shook her hand and smiled when she held on to it for much longer than was necessary. ‘I'm not going home, and I could do without any dodgy internet tapes.'

‘Worked for Paris Hilton.'

‘I'll give it some thought.' I kissed her hand. ‘Merry Christmas.'

Red Café, Kentish Town.

I stirred four sugars into my tea with a stiff shoulder when my mobile rang.

HARRIET MOBILE
.

I ignored it. I always did my best to ignore my sister and it wasn't difficult. She spent most of her time on the floors of council flats injecting smack into her thighs.

My older brother, Tony, was also unreachable but for different reasons. He was flying helicopters in Afghanistan and rarely found the time to call. The last time he had tried I had been on a job and had my phone switched off, and since then I'd heard nothing.

It was for the best really, that we had grown so far apart as adults. We all had our shame to hide. Namely the fact that despite our relatively privileged upbringings, fully functional parents and decent educations, our method of rebellion seemed to be single-handedly fucking our lives up.

Brinks arrived with rain and grease in his hair.

‘Why here?' he asked, shaking water off his coat.

‘They do great sausage sandwiches.' I pushed one of the plates across the table at him. ‘Cumberland, they use.'

Brinks put a folder down next to the plate, fidgeting in the chair. ‘I got some of what you wanted. Most of the photos and some of the initial statements.'

Already Brinks was earning his money. The man was a natural double agent and I wouldn't be surprised if there was an extensive list of people paying him for information. If he was classier, less desperate and more educated, he could be doing a lot more with his talent.

I flicked through the folder but decided against taking out the photos yet.

‘DNA?'

‘I'll let you know.'

My hand hovered over the folder again. ‘Toxicology?'

‘Shit, it's early days, Nic, calm down.'

I warmed my hands around my tea. ‘Can you talk me through the statement? Taxi driver, you said?'

‘I can't give you his name yet, not until we've charged him or released him, but he's a strong suspect even beyond what we'd assume anyway. And there's no point looking at me like that. I'm not going to tell you because I'd actually like a chance to question him before you' – he gestured in mid-air – ‘do your thing.'

‘Do my
thing
?' I raised my eyebrows even higher. ‘What? Strut my funky stuff?'

‘Stop being a dick.'

It was like winding up a precocious child. I got out my tobacco and started rolling a cigarette. ‘Have you talked to the parents yet?'

‘I actually just came from there.'

‘And?'

‘To be expected. Mother's a state, the father's aggressive; all in all not the nicest way to spend the morning.' He looked out of the window at the rain. ‘How well do you know Pat Dyer?'

‘I wouldn't really say I
know
him.' I started dissecting my sandwich with the cigarette behind my ear, willing him to shut up and leave me alone to look at the folder. ‘Seen him around a few times but nothing intimate, if that's what you mean.'

‘Oh yeah?'

I couldn't help smirking. ‘Stop trying to talk like a DCI, Geoff, it really doesn't suit you.'

Brinks looked back at the window with hurt pride in his eyes. Looking at him was like watching for the onset of rigor mortis in a living human.

I asked, ‘You want some tea?'

‘Fuck you.'

He got up and walked out.

The man behind the counter brought over another mug.

I smiled at him and got out the photos, face down. When I was sure no one could see them but me I turned them over one by one and ran my eyes over them in detail.

One of her hands had fallen open around a can of Pepsi. None of her nails were broken but her chest was concave, collapsed, as if someone had stamped on it over and over. Her face was the same and her neck, crushed. There was something about the lack of blood, and the way her body had fallen, that made me uneasy. I would have expected more from a head shot.

Everything about it looked rushed, amateurish and chaotic. Why hadn't the killer disposed of her clothes properly for a start? Why leave her in a place that was so easy to access? All that had shielded her from the end of the alleyway was a scattering of bin liners and a skip. She'd been dropped there with the carelessness of someone throwing away dead batteries.

My mobile started ringing and I put the photos back in the folder.

‘Hello?'

‘Is this a good time?' Pat sounded more docile than he had a day ago.

‘Fine, fine.'

‘Can you make it round to mine?'

‘Are you sure you don't need more time to…?'

‘More time to what?'

Silence.

I faltered. ‘What time is best for you?'

‘Anytime. I'll be here.'

For a second, the dislike gave way to pity.

‘OK, I'll be over in a couple of hours.'

I hadn't expected a call this soon. Denial didn't usually set in this early, but Pat struck me as the sort of person who powered through life that way, dealing with adversity by filling his schedule and frantically ticking days off the calendar.

I put the folder into my bag to look at later, wishing that I had switched off my phone and let Edie walk me home.

Pat answered the door with a glass in his hand and stubble on his chin.

I suspected that the clear liquid wasn't water. ‘You wanted to talk?'

‘Yeah… yeah, come in.'

The air inside the house was thick and hot. Pat went into the huge kitchen and refilled his glass. He hadn't changed out of his suit; it was more creased and carried a heavy stench of smoke.

I dropped my bag by the door and followed.

‘Want any?' he asked.

‘Bit early for me, thanks.'

‘Bet you've seen the reports and all… in your line of work?' Grey eyes glared over the rim of the glass. ‘You've seen the photos?'

‘I've seen a few. Most of it I haven't been able to see yet.'

‘But you've seen the photos?'

I knew what he was thinking. No father would ever want another man to see his daughter like that.

‘I'm sorry,' I said.

‘Oh, that's nice,' he sneered. ‘I've always wondered about your types. Do you enjoy looking at stuff like that?'

I stayed silent but my chest tightened.

He was rubbing his eyes, trying to rub the image of his daughter out of them.

‘How's your wife?' I asked, the question like a lead weight on my tongue.

‘Upstairs.' He didn't answer the question but refilled his glass, downing it and refilling it again. ‘Did you see what he did to her?'

‘I know, it's sick.'

‘Fucking
cunt
puts his hands on her… on my baby…' Downing the glass and refilling it with shaking hands. ‘I want you to find him. I'll pay you anything, I just want you to find him.'

Any words of sympathy or comfort were strangled. It wouldn't help.

‘Do you want some coffee?' I asked in an attempt to defuse the atmosphere.

He nodded, fingering a notch on the edge of the dining table.

I put the kettle on and opened the window to let some fresh air in. The anger and the fear were clamped around my limbs like a straitjacket.

‘Do you know if Emma had a boyfriend?' I opened cupboards, searching for sugar.

‘She broke up with Danny.'

‘So she wasn't seeing anyone new?'

‘No…' He shook his head, picking at a splinter. ‘She would have mentioned it.'

‘What was her friend's name?'

‘It was Jenny who she was meeting, Jenny Hillier.'

‘Do you mind if I speak to her, just to ask her a couple of questions?'

He shrugged, his finger bleeding. ‘Sure, I can give you her number.'

I nodded and strained the coffee.

‘Black,' Pat said. ‘Just black.'

‘Shall I take one upstairs?'

‘Whatever. She won't speak to you.' He didn't seem to care.

I hovered with two coffees in my hands.

‘I'll find him,' I said. ‘I don't want more than twenty grand, I'll find him.'

‘Don't kill him.' Pat looked up from his coffee with blank eyes. ‘You won't kill him until I see him. I want to make him hurt, I want to make him fucking
bleed
.'

‘I know.' I glanced upwards again and indicated with the coffee. ‘I'm just going to…'

He waved a hand, apparently losing interest in my actions.

I left the kitchen and went upstairs; pictures glared at me from every wall. All the doors were shut apart from one, which was ajar. There was no light inside. I nudged it open with my shoulder and she looked up sharply from where she was sitting on the floor beside the bed, knees brought close to her chest.

‘Sorry… It's er, me. I was just bringing some coffee.'

She didn't acknowledge me but looked away again. Her clothes were unchanged but she looked thinner under them. Still the grey cocktail dress and cardigan, still dressed for the missed social occasion.

‘Can I get you anything else?' I came inside and put the coffee down on the dressing table. ‘Something to eat?'

The side of her face was shiny with tears and the blue eyes were shot with red.

I couldn't put my arms around her this time, not like before, so I sat down beside her instead, mirroring her pose. A few minutes went by before I realized how cold it was. I reached up past her and held the cup of coffee in front of her face.

‘You should warm up,' I said.

Eventually, when I refused to move, she took it without looking at me and rested it on her knees. When she brushed her hair behind her ear I noticed a new bruise on her wrist next to the old scars.

I stood up, went back downstairs and saw that my bag had disappeared from where I had left it by the door. I stared at the doormat as if it might appear, rerunning through the memory of letting it drop from my hand.

I whirled around, thinking of the photos, and saw Pat sitting at the kitchen table. As I came closer I saw them, spread out in a collage of blood and open wounds. Pat was leaning over, looking far too closely, eyes right up against the glossy prints, against the bin liners and blood and naked skin that he had once called his daughter.

My bag was by the foot of his chair.

I saw his fist tighten around the glass as he heard my footsteps.

‘Hey!' My hand went for the photos.

He grabbed the front of my shirt and the glass hit the floor.

‘Fucking
what
!' he snarled.

I slammed his arm into the granite worktop and twisted it up behind him. The alcohol gave me the advantage over his superior height.

‘Don't touch me again.'

‘Fuck off,' he spat through gritted teeth.

My heart was pounding. ‘Don't you
dare
fucking touch me again.'

‘I won't! Get off!' Pat wrenched his arm away, swaying. He put a hand to his mouth and vomited a dark grey mixture of vodka and bile into the sink.

I gathered the photos and picked up my bag.

Pat leant against the counter, his lips resting against his fist and his eyes on the window. He was shaking.

‘I'm… sorry,' I said.

It took him a while to speak.

‘No one's fault but mine,' he replied.

I was parked on a kerb in the Audi, blowing cigarette smoke out of the window in the direction of Edie's house. It was a stylized, calculated assault of modernity, very much like the woman herself. It was all glass and right angles; so modern it was almost ironic.

At least it used to be her house. I doubted whether she still lived there. I didn't know what time Sidney usually got home, but I had no better way to spend the afternoon. He might have been out, taking his son somewhere, maybe visiting family…

Best to have nothing to lose.

That was how I had always done things. Apart from the firearms and the roof over my head and other transient objects there was nothing to become attached to. Friends and relatives and children were for people who could hold a conversation for more than ten minutes without wanting to beat the other person into the floor, who could handle small talk and network and do all of the things people were required to do in social situations.

When I had finished my third cigarette I switched my phone back on to keep myself amused. I sank down in my seat, put my feet up on the dashboard and scrolled through text messages.

The writing on my hand was still visible.

‘Who is K?'

Thinking back to the photos now, and the blood, I was almost certain Emma had been moved.

The phone started vibrating and I answered it because I was too bored to ignore it any more.

‘Hey, it's me.'

‘Yeah, I know.' I shut my eyes at the sound of my sister's harsh cockney twang. ‘What do you want, Harriet?'

‘Er, I need a favour…'

‘How did I guess?'

‘I'm not doing too good. I had this fight and I got fired and… I just need a little bit of cash. Just a little bit; I'll pay you back, I promise. It's just until I find another job.'

It was almost funny, the regularity and predictability of these requests.

‘Why were you fired?' I asked.

‘It wasn't my fault.'

‘It never is.' I rubbed my eyes. ‘So what happened to the last five hundred I gave you?'

She hesitated. What was most insulting was that she didn't even bother to sound convincing. Like other addicts I had come across she didn't speak for herself any more; everything she said was a stock phrase used on everybody in order to get what she wanted. When one didn't work she moved on to another.

‘Um… well, I had to pay off a few debts, and—'

‘Don't give me that shit, it went to your fucking dealer.'

There was a silence.

‘I only need a couple of hundred, just to pay off this debt and pay my rent and then I'm done, I promise. Oh come on, it's not as if you need it!'

She had managed to go from self-pity to excuses and then on to anger in less than a minute. I had the option, as I did every time, to tell her to piss off and make her own way, but even as I entertained the thought I knew it would never
happen. I hated her sometimes, most of the time these days, but not nearly as much as I hated myself for giving her the money.

‘Yeah, you're always a couple of hundred quid away from being
done
, aren't you?' I said. ‘It would be nice to hear a promise from you one day that I think you might actually keep.'

‘Oh please, I really need to pay this guy off and I don't have anywhere else to—'

‘OK, Harriet,
OK
.' I just wanted the call to be over. ‘How much do you want, two hundred?'

‘Er, could you make it three?'

I shook my head, fist tightening around the wheel. ‘Fine, three hundred. You can come and pick it up yourself, I'm not gonna waste any petrol money on you.'

‘Thanks, Nic, I promise—'

‘Whatever.'

I ended the call. Our parents gave her money too; it wasn't just me, but that didn't make me feel much better. Sometimes I caught myself wishing that our childhoods had been harder, more traumatic from an early age. I wished that Dad had been stricter or Mum had drunk too much, that either of them had done anything to unburden us of the responsibility for how our lives had turned out. It wasn't their fault, none of this was, but that was the problem.

Tony was the only one who refused to pay. I knew she had stopped asking him years ago, way before he went to Afghanistan. She had stopped seeing him because he was of no use to her, and around the same time I had also started avoiding him. I suspected the real reason was that he reminded us too much of our own failures, but I didn't like to dwell on it.

Sidney's car pulled into the driveway across the road.

It was half past four.

I memorized the number plate and watched Edie's son, Scott, walking up the drive holding a gym bag. He looked in his early teens and held himself like his mother. Sidney was tall, Scandinavian, square-jawed. From the one time I had met him in Edie's club a few years ago I remembered that he was quite softly spoken for someone with his build.

I checked my watch again, just to be sure. Time was almost an obsession to me; it had to be, in my line of work. Nothing was more crucial than timing.

Two more minutes had passed.

It didn't look like an easy house to break into, I thought. Someone would have to let me in, or I'd have to find another method of coercion…

I started the engine and pulled away.