Too Close For Comfort (4 page)

Wendy supposed
she must have been five years old, at best. She smiled as she
recalled her father picking her off the lawn and holding her in his
arms. Even now, she missed him terribly.

She recalled
that day at eleven years old when she returned home from school to
be told that her father had died. Mildenheath’s finest police
officer and finest father – shot in a bungled bank robbery. The
terror and desperation flooded through her now as she experienced
the emotions again – as though brand new.

As the first
tear rolled down her cheek, Wendy, startled, opened her eyes. Thank
goodness – the lights were red once again and the traffic was still
stationary. She looked to her left to see if the man with the
piercing blue eyes was still there. As she turned her head to him,
he reciprocated. Alarmed, Wendy shot her head back to dead centre
and concentrated hard on the red light ahead.

Why is he
looking at me? What does he know? He knows, doesn’t he? He can see
the guilt. He knows what I’ve done to Michael. Oh shit, oh shit.
Come on, fucking lights. Turn green, you bastard!

As though
Wendy’s power of concentration had worked, the lights turned green.
But the traffic stayed still.

CHAPTER
EIGHT

As Wendy
meandered round the hospital car park looking for a space, her head
was filled with thoughts of what she might find inside.

Would Michael
be conscious? Would he have tubes and lines sticking out of every
orifice, just like last time? Surely not – he couldn’t be as bad as
he was last time. He wouldn’t do that again. Three weeks in
intensive care; his stomach pumped, his kidneys flushed; his face
as grey as stone. Despite this, Michael showed no remorse and had
made no attempt to turn his life around. This is what irritated
Wendy the most; this was why she had seen her brother only a
handful of times over the past few years. Wendy knew deep down that
each time could well be the last.

As she traipsed
up the unnecessarily long and winding disabled access ramp, last
night’s words rang in Wendy’s ears.

I’m through
with you, Michael. I don’t want anything to do with you.

It was the only
way I knew how to cope.

I’m through
with you, Michael.

I’m trying! I
swear to God I’m trying!

I’m through
with you, Michael. I don’t want anything to do with you.

I don’t want
anything to do with you.

The stench hit
Wendy as soon as the automatic doors opened. It smelt of death and
antiseptic. Wendy hated hospitals. The woman at the reception desk
reminded her of a schoolteacher from a budget porn film – her
dark-rimmed glasses perched on the edge of her nose; her suit
blouse exposing far too much breast tissue for medically unstable
patients to cope with. Tart. That might even be a health and safety
issue.

The tart looked
down her oh-so-perfect spectacle stand and informed Wendy that
Michael was in bed number seven on the Egret ward. The tart’s blunt
manner led Wendy to believe that she knew exactly why Michael was
in the ward.
Look at her, coming in here to visit her worthless
drug addict brother.

As Wendy
entered the Egret ward, she scanned the walls for a laminated
placard displaying the number seven. Two elderly gentlemen in beds
one and two were comparing their abdominal scars whilst a Jamaican
lady snored loudly from bed five. Two beds closer to Wendy, in bed
number seven, lay Michael.

Michael was
awake and looking at Wendy like a small child who knew he had done
something terribly wrong. The helpless look on his face shook her
to the core. She cantered over to bed seven and hugged Michael.

“Careful, sis.
I’ve had all sorts of bloody lines and pumps hanging out of me. I’m
a bit sore.”

“Oh, Michael.
Why did you do this? Why?”

“Because I’m a
fucking idiot, Wend. Because I couldn’t cope with you leaving me
again and I hated myself. I fucking hated myself.”

“How could you
be so selfish, Michael?”

“Selfish? You
want to talk to me about selfish? How many times have you come to
visit me over the past few years, Wend? You’re just as bad as dad
was – devoting your entire life to the sodding police force and
making everyone else take a back seat.”

Wendy bit her
tongue. “Michael, I have to work to live. My job is very important
to me and it involves a lot of hard work. You've not exactly made
much effort with me, either,”

“Is that the
best you can do? You’ve seen me twice in eighteen months because
your job involves a lot of work? Even dad used to be home to see us
one or two nights a week.”

“Stop comparing
me to dad, Michael!”

“Why the hell
not? You’re both the bloody same. All that matters is the police
force and the rest of the world can go to hell.”

“Michael, you
really need to understand that we’re on the same side here. You’re
not to blame for being here in this hospital bed. The people to
blame are the scum who push drugs onto vulnerable people and get
them hooked; the people who use their filthy drug money to feed
organised crime; the people who think nothing of being a rapist or
a murderer. They are the people I have a responsibility to bring
down, Michael. We’re fighting the same battle.”

“I dunno, Wend.
At the end of the day you’re able to go home to your warm cosy
little flat while I’m still out fighting on the streets. It’s
twenty-four seven for me, you know.”

“So join me.
Come and stay with me in my ‘warm, cosy little flat’ and I’ll look
after you. No more drugs, no more dealers knocking on the door, no
more temptation.”

“What? Are you
sure?”

Wendy almost
regretted the offer as soon as she had made it. Was this really the
right decision to be making? Getting involved in something like
this could impact badly on her career. There it goes again – that
word. Career. What does a career matter when your brother is dying
slowly and painfully through a drug addiction? Wendy knew what she
had to do.

“I’m sure,
Michael. At the end of the day, you’re still my brother.”

***

As she left the
Egret ward with the Jamaican woman still blissfully snoring away,
Wendy was on an emotional high. She knew she was the right person
to look after Michael and to aid his recovery. What’s more, she
felt increasingly confident about the serial killer case. She
hadn’t felt this good in ages.

Fumbling
through her pockets for her car keys, Wendy pulled out a crumpled
business card.

Robert
Ludford ~ Chartered Accountant
.

She took her
mobile phone from her jacket pocket and dialled the number.

“Hello,
Robert?”

“Yes. Is that
you, Wendy?”

“Yeah. Listen,
I wanted to apologise for what I said on the phone earlier. I was
out of order. I’ve been under a lot of stress recently and...”

“It’s fine,
honestly. Apology accepted.”

“Thank you,
Robert. Does the offer still stand?”

“Dinner? Of
course it does.”

“Excellent.
Shall we say tomorrow night?”

“I’ll pick you
up at eight.”

CHAPTER
NINE

Tom Connors sat
in silence as Culverhouse began to conduct the interview.

“For the
benefit of the tape, Tom, my name is DCI Jack Culverhouse and this
is my colleague, DS Wendy Knight. Tom, I’ll cut straight to the
chase. We’d like to speak with you about a young lady called Ella
Barrington. We believe you may have known her. For the benefit of
the tape, I am now showing the suspect a photograph of Ella
Barrington.”

“Suspect? You
didn’t say nothing about me being no suspect!”

Wendy
interjected, “It’s just police terminology, Tom. For the benefit of
the tape, you know. Don’t worry – you’re not under arrest.”

Culverhouse
shot a thankful smile at Wendy.

“Terminology,
exactly. Tom, do you recognise this woman?”

Tom shuffled
uncomfortably.

“No, I’ve never
seen her before.”

“Are you
sure?”

“I told you.
I’ve never seen her before.”

Culverhouse sat
in silence for a moment, wistfully planning his next move.

“Tom, do you
recognise this woman? For the benefit of the tape, I am now showing
the sus—Mr Connors a photograph of Maria Preston.” He handed the
photograph to Tom Connors. It looked as though it had been taken at
a recent party. Fellow drunken revellers partied on behind her
whilst she posed daintily for the camera, a single lock of blonde
hair draped across her forehead; a symbol of the care-free attitude
she must have had that night. It had been one of her last.

“No. I don’t
recognise her either.”

Culverhouse let
out a slight involuntary grunt and glanced almost apologetically at
Wendy.

“Tom, we’ve got
two
independent witnesses who’ve seen you with this woman on
a number of occasions.”

Wendy
interjected, “Guv… I don’t think that's…”

“They’re lying!
You’re lying! I’ve never seen her in my life – I swear!”

“Listen to me,
Connors. I’ve got a routine for dealing with shits like you. I ask
three polite questions and then it gets nasty. You’ve had two. What
do you know about Ella Barrington and Maria Preston?”

Tom paused for
a moment.

“They were
prostitutes, weren’t they? I mean, I saw it on the news. Look, I’d
been seeing a girl for a little while. Her name was Gabriella
Poulson. She was… one of them.”

“A prostitute?”
Wendy asked.

Tom Connors
looked uneasy at the mention of the word.

“Yeah. One of
them. I went to her a few months back and started to get involved.
Far too involved.

“You mean you
fell in love with her?”

“Sort of. I
guess. I couldn’t see enough of her. I started to see her every
night and I’d buy her presents – jewellery and stuff.”

“Did that not
get a bit expensive? I was under the impression you worked in a
video rental shop.”

“I do. I had
some money saved up and I worked extra hours. It’s strange, the
things you do for… y’know…”

Wendy nodded
sympathetically.

“I
understand.”

“Look, I wanna
get something off my chest. When I started to fall for Gabriella it
began to dawn on me just what she was.”

“What do you
mean, Tom?”

“The fact that
she was… one of them. It seemed to matter more and more all the
time. One night she came over to mine. She had clearly been to
another bloke’s house just before. Her lipstick was smudged and her
underwear was skew-whiff. It felt like she had no respect for me
and I just lost it.”

“You hit
her?”

“Yeah. I hit
her.”

Culverhouse
leaned forward onto the interview desk, poised like an eagle
stalking his prey.

“And what
happened?”

“Well I didn’t
kill her if that’s what you mean. She didn’t say a word. Just
calmly packed up and left. It didn’t strike me as being the first
time it’d happened, if you get where I'm coming from. But listen,
I’ve never seen any of those other two women before in my life. I
swear.”

“OK Tom. We’re
going to need to check a few things with this Gabriella Poulson. Do
you have any contact details for her?”

“Not on me. She
lives in digs on the Marshwood estate. Opposite the petrol station.
Number 4a.”

“Right. I think
we'd better go and corroborate your story. We'll keep you in a cell
until we've backed the story up.”

“No! You can't
keep me in here! Anyway, how can she back my story up if she's
dead? What happens then?”

“Then you've
got some explaining to do, Mr Connors.”

The Marshwood
estate was notorious in Mildenheath. Gang culture had gripped the
estate and cab drivers would no longer enter the estate for fear of
being attacked by feral youths. The estate used to be served by two
bus routes – the 34 and 62, but the local bus company had amended
the routes to circumvent the estate entirely. To most, it seemed as
though the Marshwood estate was cut off from the rest of
Mildenheath entirely, like a cancerous growth.

It was four
o’clock in the afternoon when Wendy and Culverhouse pulled into the
estate in their unmarked car. Entering the estate in a marked
vehicle was completely out of the question. Two back-up officers
sat on the edge of the estate in another unmarked car.

“A date?”

“Yeah, with a
guy I bumped into in the pub the other night. He’s an
accountant.”

“An accountant?
Right.”

“Is there a
problem?”

“No, no
problem. Just make sure you keep your attention focused solely on
the case, Knight. I don’t want any lovey-dovey bullshit out of you
until we’ve found our man. There's only one person I want getting
nailed at the moment, and it ain't you.”

They made their
way towards the block of flats opposite the petrol station. It was
fortunate that Tom Connors had referred to it in this way as the
building lacked any sort of identification. No name plaque, no road
signs, nothing. Just another grey, soulless building opposite a
petrol station. Stepping over discarded chip paper and lager cans,
Wendy and Culverhouse entered the building.

The entrance
hall was cold and dark, a staircase scaling the right-hand wall
before turning to climb the wall opposite the door. A teen-aged
couple, no older than fourteen, sat on the concrete apex with faces
interlocked and their hands where God only knew.

Hidden behind
the staircase, with the concrete apex and canoodling couple only
inches above them, was number 4a. Wendy inadvertently scanned the
door for the most germ-free spot before knocking firmly.

The door was
answered by a woman with a drawn complexion, her drug-riddled skin
hanging desperately from her bony cheeks.