Broken (3 page)

Kate shook her head. ‘No, actually, I don’t. On top of everything else she gives them prescription drugs to take - is that what you’re telling me?’

The man nodded. ‘But, you see, Miss Burrows, you’re looking at all this from a normal person’s point of view whereas Regina is not normal. She is an habitual drug user. Her life is chaos. Complete and utter chaos. She stumbles from one major disaster to the next. But - and this is the big but - she loves those kids. Her eldest, Michaela, actually looks after her mother. Keeps the other two in hand and tries in her own sweet little way to be a help. To make her mother’s life that bit easier. They love her. Whatever we think about the situation, we have to think first of those kids.’

Kate smiled. ‘My own thoughts entirely, and the sooner they’re away from her the better.’

The social worker closed his eyes and sighed heavily. ‘Away from her means in care. Split them up and they’ll be unhappy. Don’t judge everyone by your own standards, Miss Burrows. It never works, you know.’

He looked deep into her eyes, his gaze penetrating. She glanced away.

‘I’m sorry, Mr Bateman. I appreciate you’re trying to help your client but frankly I think that away from her is about as good as it’s going to get for those children.’

He pushed his hair away from his face in a surprisingly female gesture.

‘Regina’s mother was a university lecturer in Ethics.’

He nodded at her surprise.

‘She also systematically abused her two children by burning them, humiliating them and starving them. When Regina was nine she was found in a large detached house with a quarter-of-an-acre garden. She was suffering from malnutrition and her younger brother had been dead for five days. Their mother had left them to go on a trip to Finland of all places. There was no food in the house, nothing. But the children were too frightened to use the phone and get help. They were found by accident. A neighbour had come by to drop off some gardening catalogues of all things.

‘That memory is what Regina lives with every day of her life. Now I’m telling you, Miss Burrows, she would not harm her kids intentionally. She can’t cope with the day-to-day running of her life - being a normal person is beyond her - but I tell you again, she would never hurt a hair of those kids’ heads. Believe me, I
know
.’

Pushing his chair back gently, he walked from the canteen.

Kate watched him go. He looked burdened down. It was in his walk, his eyes, his whole demeanour. But, unexpectedly, she found herself liking Regina Carlton’s social worker.

 

Patrick Kelly sat in the back of his Rolls-Royce and listened to Willy Gabney, his driver and confidant, expounding on the advantages of having a girlfriend. As usual. Willy had been seeing a woman for a few weeks now and was happier than Patrick had ever known him. He looked almost handsome nowadays which for a man as ugly as Willy had to be a miracle.

Patrick let him prattle on; it saved having to answer any questions. He lay back against the leather upholstery and sighed. He wanted to get home and inside Kate as soon as possible. He smiled at the thought.

Just then, his mobile rang. ‘Kelly here.’

He listened for a few seconds then, turning off the phone, yelled at Willy to turn round and drive back towards the West End. His face was like thunder.

Willy saw immediately that he had had bad news. ‘Everything all right, Pat?’ Silly question.

Kelly shook his head. ‘No, Willy. Everything ain’t all right.’

 

Estelle Peterson was not young though she looked it. Long black hair, dyed and conditioned to within an inch of its life, actually made her look quite innocent instead of hardening her features. It was a look the other women were jealous of though none of them envied her her large nose, squinty eyes set too close together and child’s rosebud mouth.

She was also very short-sighted so that she habitually peered at people, making her seem interested in what they were saying - which she never was, unless it was a pimp or a customer.

Today, though, she looked frightened. She sat in the empty lap-dancing club, hands shaking as she sipped at a very large brandy. Her mascara had run into her eyes, giving her a clown-like appearance.

Tommy Broughton was staring at her as if he had never seen her before. She shuddered again, looking frail and haunted.

‘I want to go, Tommy. I ain’t getting involved with Old Bill.’

He topped up her glass and nodded. ‘Kelly will be here soon. We’ll take our lead from him, OK?’ He tried to sound reassuring, but it was obvious to both of them that he was more frightened than she was.

‘Can’t you cover him up at least?’

Tommy sighed. ‘As I said, it’s best not to touch anything until Kelly gets here.’

Estelle started to cry again and he walked towards the phone.

‘I’ll ring him. See how long he’ll be. OK?’

Estelle nodded, her eyes firmly fixed on the glass in her hand.

 

Regina looked terrible and Kate guessed that she would usually have had a little something to lift her by now, had she not been under arrest in the police station.

‘Are you a registered addict, Regina? If so, I can get a medic to give you something to bring you up a bit.’

Regina stared at her blankly a moment before speaking.

‘Listen to me, Burrows. I don’t care if my own mother put me by that building site this morning - I wasn’t there.’

‘Then how did your son get out of the house and over to the other side of town? How did he climb up inside a building that was falling apart and which had no real staircases? He had to have been lifted bodily from floor to floor. So, if you didn’t take him, Regina, who did? Now you say that even at two he’s streetwise - but not
that
streetwise, surely?’

Regina began pulling at her hair, physically tearing at it in terror and distress. ‘I don’t fucking know! Someone must have taken him . . . I don’t fucking know!’

She was crying now, a painful animal sound, repeating over and over, ‘I don’t know! I don’t know!’

Kate Burrows stared down at the girl and unexpectedly her heart went out to her.

‘Were you higher than usual last night? Could you have done this and not realised what you were doing? Was there anyone else at your place other than the man you’d picked up at the pub? Does anyone else have a key? Can you give me one reason not to believe you knowingly took that child and left him in a dangerous situation which could easily have led to his death but for the keen sight of a young girl?’

Regina looked up at her tormentor and shook her head. ‘I don’t know what happened. I swear to God, I really don’t know how he got there.’

Kate looked into the haunted face. The eyes were pleading for understanding. The girl’s whole body language screamed out, trying to make Kate believe what she was saying. Her hands, nails bitten to the quick, were trembling visibly as she attempted to light a cigarette.

And for a few seconds, Kate Burrows was inclined to give her the benefit of the doubt. But only for a few seconds. She had encountered liars of Olympic standards over the years. Had heard what she considered every story in the book.

This girl’s story didn’t add up at all, which was why Kate couldn’t understand why she had not even tried to change it over the last four hours. Most people changed their story over and over. Others came well prepared and changed their story as and when a hole appeared in it. Regina just kept repeating hers over and over, different words but never deviating from the main point.

As far as she was concerned her kids had been in bed asleep. She had no idea how her son had managed to get to the building site. She was so out of it, she could not have walked across town, let alone carried her two-year-old son. She was also strung out, weirded out and tired.

Kate was wondering how she herself was going to get on with interviewing the boyfriend. She needed caffeine and nicotine soon. Her head was thumping, her eyes were aching and all she wanted was to wrap this case up and get home.

But it wasn’t going to be that easy. She had a feeling that Regina was going to stick with her story, as implausible as it was, and that this was going to be one hell of a long day.

 

Patrick Kelly walked into his night club, Girlie Girls, at just after one in the afternoon, his face set into a mask of anger. Manager Tommy Broughton was sitting at the bar nursing a large brandy. At this hour the whole place looked rundown. No club ever stood up to the harsh light of day.

Tommy nodded at Patrick, his face ashen, teeth tightly clamped. Patrick walked through to the small back bar and stared down incredulously at the battered body of his old mate Micky Duggan. One hand over his mouth, he shook his head sadly.

Micky had been savagely beaten to death. His mutilated body would not have looked out of place at the scene of a train wreck or some other terrible accident. But lying in a pool of his own blood, face stuck to the plush carpet, he looked wrong. All wrong. His neck had been snapped, one savage twist of bone and muscle by a strong man the only explanation.

But why?

Everyone liked Duggan. He was a crack, a laugh. Hard enough when he had to be but basically a nice person. His main fault had lain in his natural talent for aggravation. With a drink in him he got lairy.

‘Fuck me, Pat, he looks rough!’ Willy Gabney’s voice was high with shock. ‘Do you reckon he’s dead?’

Patrick took a deep breath and said through gritted teeth, ‘Unless he’s thinking of walking around with his face looking at his arse, I’d say he is dead, Willy, yes.’

His driver was offended and it showed. ‘I was only asking, Pat.’

Patrick sighed heavily. Willy was loyal to a fault but about as intelligent as a gnat, and at times like this - especially at times like this - it could be wearing.

‘Do you reckon he was murdered?’

Patrick did not even bother answering that one. Instead he sighed heavily again and walked back to Broughton and Estelle.

Regina’s boyfriend was a scruffy, ignorant young man called Milo Bangor. As Kate looked at him she marvelled at the way people somehow always lived up to their names.

He looked suitably weird but then, as she knew very well, he was frightened. Terrified, in fact. It showed in the way his hands shook and his voice trembled whenever he answered her questions.

As she watched him making another match-thin roll-up she knew he had been in prison and that he was under the firm impression he might be going back there.

‘So, Milo, I guess you know what I want to ask you about?’

He looked at her directly for the first time and smiled nervously, displaying brown crooked teeth.

‘Do I need a brief, lady?’

Kate grinned. ‘You tell me, Milo, you’re obviously the expert.’

He sat silently for a few seconds. He was actually thinking. Kate was impressed. She would have laid money that actual real-life thinking was beyond him.

‘I never touched no fucking kid,’ he said finally. ‘And if that cunt has, and thinks she can lay it at my door, you can tell her from me I’ll break her fucking back.’

Kate raised one perfectly plucked eyebrow. ‘In those exact words, or shall I soften the blow a bit?’

Now he was talking he couldn’t seem to stop.

‘She treats them kids like slaves, man. I mean, she shouldn’t even be allowed to have a dog, let alone those poor little bastards.’

‘You sound like an expert on childcare. Now, can you tell me all your movements from yesterday lunchtime, please?’

Milo started laughing then. A low, scornful sound. ‘I can’t even remember getting up half the time. I mean, please!’

His arrogant yet frightened voice irritated her and she said loudly, ‘Well, you’d better remember, boy. In fact, you can have a good bloody think while I get you a brief, OK? Suddenly I think there’s a very good chance you’ll need one.’

Kate stood up and was pleased to see a sober expression on Milo’s face.

‘I never touched no fucking kid, lady. You better believe that.’

She smiled again. ‘I think you’d better convince me of it, don’t you? After all, you were there, you were out of it, you are a prime suspect. I mean, for all I know, you and Regina worked a flanker. Did it together. I don’t know, do I? But someone does. Someone was there, someone saw what happened, someone did the deed . . . and, Milo, I intend to find out just who the hell it was. Got that?’

Her hard voice penetrated his fogged brain and he looked very young suddenly and vulnerable and Kate felt a surge of reluctant pity for him. For Regina. For all the wasted lives she saw on a daily basis.

She ended the tape and quietly left the room.

 

Patrick Kelly sipped at his brandy. He knew he was in shock which didn’t help dispel the trickle of fear that was slowly creeping over him. A man he had known all his life was lying dead in the club they’d owned together - a club where he had a feeling a serious amount of ducking and diving had occurred over the last few months without his knowledge. Otherwise why else would someone waste Micky?

He stared at Broughton. ‘All right then, what’s the scam? What has been going on?’

Tommy Broughton shrugged. ‘I don’t know, Pat. I take oath on that.’

Patrick finished his brandy in one gulp. ‘Don’t fuck me about. Not today. I really ain’t in the mood.’

Broughton shrugged. ‘You know what he was like, Pat. One minute he was all over you like a rash, the next he wanted to fight ya.’ He held out his arms in supplication. ‘Micky had more rows in here the last few weeks than fucking Adolf Hitler on a bad trip. Christ, his nickname was Wanker - that says it all, don’t it?’

Patrick stared at Broughton. What he’d said was true enough. Micky had argued with everyone. Rumour had it he’d argued bitterly with his mother, brothers, wife, girlfriends - even with the lap dancers and he had trumped most of them.