The Death Collector (9 page)

He turned to go back up the stairs when his torch flashed upon something else in the room. It was in the corner, hidden underneath some tarpaulin. He walked over and shone his torch on it. Why would something need to be covered up in a cellar?

He pulled back the tarpaulin and then dropped his torch in shock, casting him into darkness, but he had seen enough. He sat down, his hand over his mouth, worried he was going to vomit.

On the cellar floor was a woman. Naked and dead.

Joe sat in his car and looked up at his mother’s house, a small semi on an ordinary street, with a low brick garden wall and short concrete drive. The day at work had been long and he didn’t have the energy for a family gathering, but it’s what they did, the Parkers, some effort to hold together what was overshadowed by the darkness of Ellie’s murder.

They had become more regular as the year had gone on, Joe and his older brother Sam worried that their mother couldn’t cope with Ruby, a headstrong teenager born in the wake of Ellie’s death, in the hope that the joy of a new life could somehow make up for the loss. Everyone knew that Ruby was a replacement and it seemed like she always struggled to live up to the billing. Joe’s mother found it hard to cope, spending most days in a fog of vodka-fuelled unhappiness, so Sam had taken it upon himself to be there more for Ruby.

Their mother’s life had been made even worse by the loss of their father a few years after Ellie, a heart attack bringing an end to his grief. Joe knew that visiting was a good idea, but he found himself pulling away from his family more and more. He had promised that he would make more of an effort, desperate to make up for the part he felt he had played in Ellie’s death. It was his shadow, the dark cloak that surrounded him and stopped others getting close.

Sam was already at the house, his grey saloon parked on the drive, and Joe knew there was no way of avoiding it. Sam was made head of the family by their father’s death and he bore that title like a duty. Even his choice of career had been motivated by their sister’s murder, driven by the need somehow to make it right. But how could you make up for something like that?

Joe got out of his car and walked up the short drive. He knocked on the door, to announce his arrival before going inside. There were shouts from the living room and then two little blonde girls ran towards him, one jumping and grinning, the other running more chaotically, her arms raised in the air as if she was about to crash into the walls.

Erin and Amy, Sam’s daughters. He bent down to kiss them on their heads as they clung onto his legs, laughing.

‘Can you find your daddy for me?’ Joe whispered to them, and they ran off, shouting.

When he looked up, Sam’s wife Alice was there, wearily pretty, the humdrum of motherhood showing in her tired eyes.

She smiled and then looked beyond his shoulder.

‘What’s wrong?’ Joe said, turning round.

‘I just wondered whether you were bringing someone with you,’ she said, and Joe noticed a glint in her eye. ‘A new girlfriend or someone. We keep hoping.’

Joe smiled. ‘You know me better than that. If I ever meet someone, you’ll find out when you get the wedding invitation.’

She leaned in and kissed him on the cheek. ‘You should find someone, Joe. You’re too good-looking to be single.’

‘Thank you,’ he said, laughing. ‘But I’m thirty-four. All the good ones are taken now.’

Alice set off down the hallway, Joe following. ‘So apart from being the most eligible bachelor in Manchester, how are you?’ she said.

‘Oh, just the same. You?’

‘Married to your brother,’ she said. ‘So just blissful.’

It was meant as a joke, but there was an edge to her voice. ‘Everything all right, Alice?’ Joe said.

Before she could answer, Sam appeared at the end of the hallway, pulled along by his daughters, who were screaming, ‘Uncle Joe, Uncle Joe.’

‘I thought you weren’t coming,’ Sam said, a hint of complaint in his tone.

‘I’d never miss it. How’s Mum?’

‘Just the same. On her way to drunk.’

‘And Ruby?’

‘She’s not here.’

Joe sighed. Every week he wondered when he would get the call to say that Ruby had been arrested for something, dragged into stupidity by those kids who hang around in black hoodies, all dressed the same so that no one would be able to identify them properly. Joe appreciated the irony; he would stay out all night to help those in the hoods if he got the call.

‘You’ve left it late,’ Sam said.

‘Yes, I know. Something came up at work.’

‘Why do they always come first?’

‘What, the crooks, the thieves and worse?’ Joe said. ‘Don’t. I’m sick of the same argument. I’m too tired, and it wasn’t like that.’

‘So what was it? ’

Joe thought about what he could say when Sam spotted the earnest look in his eyes and said, ‘Something more than the usual?’

Joe shrugged.

‘Anything you want to share?’

‘Am I making it that obvious?’

‘Come on, talk to me,’ Sam said, and nodded towards the back of the house.

Joe followed Sam through the living room, towards a small conservatory at the back, where Joe knew his mother sat on her own when Ruby was at school.

Sam closed the door behind him, the warmth still there from a day of the sun streaming through the window and roof. He sat down with a sigh on the sofa, the cane supports creaking.

Joe had noticed that Sam had become quieter since joining the Murder Squad. It was harder to raise a laugh from him these days, and he wondered whether his brother was going through the same as him, if he too felt surrounded by death.

‘I can tell you want to say something,’ Sam said.

Joe sat down opposite. ‘Times are hard at the office, that’s all. I know you think we’re all rich in law, but what you see from the police station runners is just show. The pinstripes, the flash cars. They feel the need to look the part, but the firm has had enough. I’ve got to work out who to sack, or else sack myself.’

‘That’s not good.’

‘Yeah, but you know what, I might go for option two. I’ve had enough.’

‘Come on, it can’t be that bad?’

Joe rubbed his eyes. ‘Yeah, maybe just a long day. I was at the station last night. Well, more like this morning.’

‘Anything decent?’

‘Not really,’ Joe said. ‘A strange one though. The client wouldn’t tell me anything about it, and then I got a visit from his mother today, who told me that he had gone missing. It seems like I was the last person to see him.’

Sam raised his eyebrows. ‘How come?’

‘I don’t know. I dropped him off near his house but he never made it home. He’s only a kid. Fifteen. They might blame me. I should have watched him all the way.’

Sam pulled at his lip and looked back towards the house, to where Erin and Amy were playing on the floor with Alice.

‘You look as though you’ve got a secret to share now,’ Joe said.

‘Was it Carl Jex?’

Joe was surprised. ‘How did you know?’

‘His mother reported him missing,’ Sam said. ‘Some of us knew his father.’

‘David Jex?’ Joe said, and when Sam nodded, Joe knew that the coincidences were drawing together. But then something struck him. ‘You said
knew
.’

‘Well, know, I suppose, but he went missing around six months ago. Just vanished. People were talking about him today, after his wife called in about Carl. He was under a lot of stress so we’re expecting him to turn up dead somewhere. I didn’t know him but it’s still pretty sad. The job can make people like that sometimes.’

Joe was surprised about that, his brow creased into a frown. Neither Carl nor his mother had said anything about David Jex going missing. ‘So what are you doing about Carl?’ he said.

‘At the moment, not much. I heard that when someone offered to go round, his mother refused.’ Sam leaned forward. ‘Tell me about him. I might be able to get someone to do something.’

‘A bit intense and awkward but he seemed pretty well-balanced for a teenager. No police record but he was pulled in for being a peeping Tom. He asked for Honeywells but wouldn’t tell me anything about his defence. Nothing. He just wanted to know whether the cells were bugged. So he stayed quiet, because I couldn’t advise him if I didn’t know what he was going to say. He was interviewed, released, and I drove him home. Except that I didn’t drive him all the way home. He walked the last part, once he was happy there was no one following. His mother said that he never made it, but I had watched him walk towards his house, so how can that be right? It’s strange that his mother shared his paranoia about the police, as if it was some kind of family disease. It doesn’t fit with being married to a detective.’

‘Being married to a copper doesn’t stop the crazies,’ Sam said. ‘And you should see some of the letters we get from people who think we’re all part of some conspiracy, some state machine. The sort of people who think the Royal Family are lizards.’

‘I know, I’ve met a few myself; but this seemed different.’

‘How different?’

Joe thought about that, and whether he should mention the Aidan Molloy connection. Sam was his brother, but he was also a police officer.

‘If I tell you something, I want you to keep it to yourself,’ Joe said. ‘I’m talking brother to brother here.’

Sam shook his head. ‘You might switch off your morals when you go into work, but I have mine with me all the time. I’m not keeping a criminal’s secrets for you.’

‘Can’t you just switch off from being a copper for just five minutes?’

‘You’re not speaking to me because I’m your brother. It’s because I’m a police officer.’

Joe sighed. ‘Okay, I understand.’ He leaned forward and spoke quietly. ‘When we left, he told me that whatever he had been doing was connected to the Aidan Molloy case.’

‘What, the miscarriage case?’ Sam said.

‘That’s what Aidan’s mother calls it.’

‘Saying it often enough doesn’t make it any truer.’

‘I know that well enough,’ Joe said, ‘but David Jex was involved in the Aidan Molloy case, which makes me curious.’

‘So what do you think?’

Joe thought about that for a few moments before he said, ‘I don’t know, but there’s something going on. DCI Hunter was floating around the station last night, and he was David Jex’s boss on the Molloy case.’

Sam looked surprised. ‘Drew Hunter?’

‘Yes.’

‘Glory Hunter?’ Sam smiled. ‘Everyone’s favourite cop. Whenever
Crimewatch
turn up, he’s the one who likes to do the “to camera” pieces. It’s a bit of a joke, his vanity, but he’s lucky that he’s got a reputation to match it. A good copper.’

‘But you think it’s a coincidence.’

‘You’re seeing shadows that don’t exist. Aidan Molloy was a murder case, so they had a murder DCI on it. If David Jex was on his team, perhaps Hunter feels protective towards his son.’

Joe put his head back against the chair and the cane arms creaked. Of course it made sense.

‘Are you all right, Joe?’

He took too long to reply.

‘You need a break,’ Sam said.

‘I can’t afford to take a break.’

‘Everyone needs a holiday.’

Joe shook his head. ‘Do you know how stretched everything is in my world? I’m the only criminal lawyer in the firm, and we’ve got the other departments screaming at us to make more money. The recession is affecting how much commercial work there is and everyone wants lower fees. If I take any time off, the figures will suffer, and then my job will suffer. The way things are in criminal work, if I lose my job, I won’t find another one, so I’ll end up trying to stretch road traffic injuries into something worth paying out.’

Sam paused, and then said, his voice soft, ‘You were never the one to feel the pressure. That was me. I’m worried that you’ve got cracks showing. You look tired. I mean, really tired.’

‘I’m fine, Sam, don’t worry about me.’

‘And what about Carl Jex and Aidan Molloy?’

As Joe thought about what Sam said, he remembered Gina’s advice and realised that there was only one answer.

‘I’m going to forget about it.’

Carl leaned against the wall, his eyes closed, not wanting to open them again or to see what was in front of him. He felt dizzy. But he had to look, he knew that.

He steeled himself, the air filled with the fast drum of his heartbeat and the nervous rasp of his breath. He could do this. He scrabbled around on the floor for his torch, clicking it on when he found it and then opened his eyes.

His stomach rolled.

She was lying on her back, her head to one side, her dark hair fanned over the floor. She was much older than he was. In her thirties, he guessed, and pretty, but her face had lost all personality. He looked for injuries, like bumps and bruises, a cut, dried blood, some kind of hint as to how she had ended up in the cellar. All he could see were small brownish bruises around her neck, like spots. Her face was turned to one side, expressionless, her legs jutted out, stiff, so that she was like a mannequin thrown to the floor, the tarpaulin loose over her body.