Hope Road (13 page)

“Doesn’t sound like nothing to me.”

“Forget Baron. Is Freddy’s story standing up, about the money in the boot?”

“Says he’s got no idea. But he’s not
talking
to me, John. He’s holding back. I can only do so much for him if he won’t tell me what really happened.”

“How long can they keep him without a charge?”

“Wednesday, with magistrate’s signature.”

“So we’ve got three days.”

“This won’t go til Wednesday. They’ll be charging someone sooner than that. Feeling I’m getting, anyway. And Freddy’s looking favourite.”

“Freddy didn’t do it. He can’t have done.”

“Soon as you know who did, I’m all ears,” says Moran, running a hand down his silk tie and stifling a yawn. “I better be getting back. They’ll be having another go at him before bedtime.”

Five minutes later John pulls up on a narrow cobbled lane down by the river. He remembers this area as a rat-infested wasteland at the bottom of the city, Tetley’s brewery on one side, on the other a long stretch of warehouses leaning over the black water as if they were about to sink into it.

“You sure this is all right?” he asks Connie as she gets into the car. “No pizza tonight?”

“It’s fine. You can drop me off later.”

The warehouses are now apartments, and the rats gorge on ciabatta crusts from the brasseries and tapas bars that line the cobbled streets. Connie rents a studio apartment overlooking the river that must cost close to what she earns at the showroom.

“I’m starving, how about you?”

“I’m okay,” she says, “I’ll watch.”

He drives off, glancing at her with mild dread. He’ll have to explain what this is all about before long. First, though, he wants to show her something.

They head north on the York Road, past the
Eurolodge Hotel
. It’s Saturday night but the streets up here are almost empty.

“You know this part of Leeds?” he asks as they turn onto Harehills Lane.

She shakes her head, looking out at a shabby parade of old shops all boarded up for the night, a house clearance company, a bookies, and a run-down snack bar with rusted iron grills on its windows. Then come the red brick houses, back-to-back terraces, row after row of them.

“I wanted to show you something about Joe, your… ehm, do we actually know how much DNA we have in common?”

“Yes,” she says. “None.”

“
Really
? We’re not family? So why did you turn up at my place asking for a job, if it’s not a rude question?”

“You dad’s uncle is Alfonso, right?”

“Right.”

“Alfonso and your granddad also had a sister, Beatriz, who married Javier, from Toledo. So Javier was your great-half-uncle.”

“That follows… I
think
.”

“Javier’s son, also called Alfonso, is my
step
-dad. My real dad died when I was two. Mum got married again. I always thought of Alfonso as my dad.”

“So we’re half step cousins by marriage?”

“Which is the same as fuck-all.”

“Glad to see you’re picking up the lingo.”

He turns down one of the side streets and peers out through the windscreen.

“Joe thought these houses were a goldmine,” he says.

“And?”

“He was right. Rent ’em out, four to a house, students mainly. Decent business. He bought a couple. It’s a cheap part of town, but property’s not that cheap. But the houses were making him good money. Then one day he was drinking down at Lanny Bride’s place in town. You heard of Lanny?”

“No.”

“Doesn’t matter. They got talking. Turns out a lot of Lanny’s staff were illegal immigrants and he had four lads from Iraq with nowhere to stay. Joe tells him he’s only got one room left. Fine, says Lanny, stick four mattresses on the floor.

“They paid two hundred a month for a mattress and a share of the bathroom.
Each
. Eight hundred quid a month for one room in a four room house. You know what happens next?”

“Poor students, is my guess,” Connie says. “That’s thirty-two thousand a year. And,” she shakes her head in disbelief, “they’re illegal, so no problem with repairs and complaints, stuff like that, right?”

John laughs. “You’re not supposed to be impressed.”

She shrugs. “A lot of my friends shared the same room with brothers and sisters right til they left home. It’s nicer. Or you prefer sleeping alone?”

I’ve got no choice at the moment.

He takes a deep breath. “Anyway, in the end Joe had seven houses up here, full of Chechnyans, Kurds, Brazilians, Venezuelans, Russians… It was like the bloody United Nations. These guys didn’t mind if the neighbourhood was run down. They were tough, and most of ’em were working for Lanny Bride, one way or another. A few drug dealers on the street corner wasn’t gonna freak ’em out.”

They take a right turn. More houses, same red bricks, lintels painted black, wheelie bins outside.

“Then Joe needed some quick money. He wasn’t the kind of bloke could just go to the bank. So he had to sell a couple of the houses. Told the blokes living there to get out.”

“He threw them out?”

“Not at first. But they had no contracts, that was his thinking. When they kicked up a fuss he got some back-up and threw ’em out. He was Tony Ray’s son you see. Big shot, brought up that way. Never had to struggle, not like Dad.” He stops, measures his words. “Joe was hard. He’d go toe-to-toe with anybody. But in a way that was his problem. He had to go in strong every time.”

His voice fades.

“You want?” he says, pulling out his cigarettes.

They drive in silence for a while, smoking.

“We never found out who killed him,” he says as they join Roundhay Road and head back into town. “Den was the first one there the night he was shot. She helped clean me up.”

He inhales so much smoke that his lungs spasm, sending him into a coughing fit. He manages to stop the car, then explodes into a series of enormous sneezes that rock his body.

A minute later he’s wheezing, staring at the windscreen, both hands on the steering wheel.

“Den was the only person I could talk to. Don’t know why, really. I was a mess, couldn’t deal with victim counselling, all that bullshit. She was the only one I trusted. She listened. Saved me from, well, I don’t what. That’s how I got to know her.”

“And now?”

“And now,” he says, slipping the Saab into gear, “I’ve fucked it all up. Come on, I need you to pretend you’re a prostitute.”

She tells him to go down by the side of the old market building then loop around and come back up past the Parish Church.

“Are you sure?” he says.

It feels strange taking directions from someone who’s only been in the city a few months, but Connie seems to know what she’s talking about.

“I’ve seen a few girls working here,” she says. “I don’t know what we’ll find out talking to them, though.”

He slows the car.

“She might have started her career on the streets,” he says, looking into darkened doorways as he drives. Cowering among abandoned shops are a tattoo parlour and a grubby cafe, their windows boarded up for the night. The brickwork of the buildings is uneven, riddled with cracks. “I just want to know a bit about her. See if there’s anything obvious, anything that connects her to anyone.”

Connie huffs.

“I don’t think these girls have
careers
,” she says, trying to imagine how desperate and vulnerable a girl must be to find herself out here. “Donna never worked in a
doorway
,” she resolves, shaking her head. “She can’t have done. It’s just not like her.”

The car slows to a stop.

“You
knew
her?”

“Met her once.”

“Why the hell didn’t you say!”

“I only heard her name on the news half an hour ago. I didn’t know it was her until then.”

“Jesus Christ.”

“I met her once. She was with Freddy.”

“Oh, no. Tell me you’re fucking joking…”

The Saab jerks forwards, flies fifty yards up the street in first. He rams it into the curb and yanks the handbrake so hard it’s almost vertical.

“Come on,” he says, weighing up a Mexican restaurant outside. “This’ll do. I need something to eat.”

“He was trying to impress her. Wanted to meet for dinner with me and Dave.”

“That’ll be your on-tap sex slave?” he asks, shovelling a collapsing fajita into his mouth.

“Yes. And
he
’s off limits, so don’t you go telling the police that Dave met her. Please.”

John holds up a hand in submission.

“Seems like we’re all working on a need-to-know basis here.”

“We had a curry,” she says, poking her fork into what looks like a mini pizza. “Donna wanted it.
So
.”

“So? So what?”

“
So
, that’s what she’s like. I ask myself why do I have to eat that horrible
curry?
Why? Because Donna wants. So we have curry.”

“And the others?
Dave
?”

“Big men from Yorkshire, they’ve got to like curry, so spicy that sweat runs down their faces. It just tastes of chilli. Is all it tastes of.
Chilli
.”

“It’s a macho thing.”

“It’s a horrible thing. It stings my mouth when I kiss him. And later, when he, how do you say,
goes down
, it stings some more.”

“Now that really is an argument against spicy food.”

“You can laugh, you don’t have a vagina.”

She finally prongs the circular object on her plate and takes a bite.

“Good?” he asks.

“It’s food.”

“Donna was a bit bossy, then?”

She stops chewing, concentrates.

“Selfish. But men liked her. You could tell right off. She made them feel like… like
men,
I suppose. Y’know?”

“Oh, I know.” He swigs from a bottle of
Corona
. “Pretty? How pretty did you think she was?”

“Very. Until she got drunk. Then not so pretty. But physically she
knew
how to be attractive. Great body, too.” She shakes her head. “A girl like that doesn’t have to work on the streets.”

John lifts his bottle and stares at it.

“Funny, the number of times I’ve had a beer with Freddy in the
Black Horse
after work, the last few weeks, and he never mentioned her.”

He sets the bottle to his lips and empties it in four long gulps.

“Is there anything about Freddy that I should know?” he asks, wiping his mouth with the back of his hand. “Some reason why he might have needed a car? Or something about that hotel? Ukrainians? Anything at all you can think of?”

“He was hanging around the hotel because he wanted Donna. And I think she wanted him, deep down.”

“Why you say that?”

“Dunno. With him she seemed happy. Big, strong man? Perhaps he made her feel safe. I’m only guessing.”

“Freddy’s certainly big.”

“Perhaps she needed a strong man. Whatever, they seemed happy together. They really did.”

She pauses, playing with her fork.

“There’s something else.”

She hunches over a little and reaches down into her cleavage and retrieving three crumpled twenty pound notes.

“I got ’em from Freddy.”

He snatches one, holding it up to his face. It’s still warm and smells wonderful.

“Orange and peach, coriander, sandalwood…”

“What?”

“Perfume. It was the family business once upon a time. I’ve got a nose for it.
Coco
, Chanel, right?”

“That’s amazing!”

“Actually, I knew you wore
Coco
from the day you arrived.”

As he speaks he examines the note. The watermark is printed, but it’s okay. The embossed security strips, the holograms… Half-decent fakes.
They’d pass muster
. And he’s seen these before, one of notes Baron showed him.

Oh, shit.

“You can tell in a second, can’t you?” she says, watching with amusement. “I mean
you
, like with the perfume. It comes natural to you, doesn’t it?”

He puts the fake note down, then looks around for a waiter and signals for another beer.

“He was really proud of himself,” she says, lowering her voice, “all the secrecy, like he was the Godfather or something.”

“Did you tell anyone about this?”

“Of course not.”

“And you’re sure he gave you these?”

“Sold.”

“Now you’ve gotta be kidding. How much did he charge, just out of interest?”

She raises an eyebrow.

“Twenty-five.”

“Twenty-five pounds?”

“Percent. I paid five pounds for each.”

Which is only partially true. Freddy sold her a thousand pounds’ worth of notes for two hundred and fifty, the majority of which she took to Manchester, using each note to buy a packet of chewing gum, a box of matches, or a can of Coke. Fifty different shops and market stalls over the course of five long and very tedious hours. With all the change she’d bought a ball of hashish the size of a small child’s fist. Not knowing how strict the British drugs laws were, she had transported it back to Leeds the safest way she knew how.

“Here,” he says, pulling out his wallet and handing her three twenty pound notes. “Take these instead.”

“Is the same to me.”

She takes the money as if it’s irrelevant.

His new
Corona
arrives.

“I used to pass off fake tenners as a kid,” he says, pocketing the three counterfeits then pouring half the beer down his throat. “I’d be about thirteen, fourteen. Joe used to sell me them. We never told Dad…”

Connie sips her spring water and listens, although it is not entirely clear whether he is talking to her.

“…I’d screw ’em into balls, spray ’em with vinegar water, y’know, get some age into the paper. Train to Sheffield or Bradford, up and down the streets, buying a packet of
Polos
in every newsagents, nine pounds-odd in change every time. Petrol stations, corner shops, amusement arcades, anywhere. I was inventive. By the end of the day I’d usually got rid of forty notes pretty carefully. Back home with a few hundred quid profit. I lived an elegant life at college with the money I saved.”

“Sounds like you enjoyed it.”