Left for Dead: A Maeve Kerrigan Novella (Maeve Kerrigan Novels) (5 page)

Grudgingly, Number Thirty-Seven started up the stairs, heaving himself up by clinging to the banister. I let him get a good head start before I put my foot on the bottom step. The more space there was between us, the better. When he was almost out of sight at the top I ran up to join him, two at a time.

‘I used to be able to do ‘em like that,’ he said sadly. ‘Youth is wasted on the young.’

I was brisk. ‘I’m sure you made the most of it at the time. In here?’

‘Yeah.’ He went first, without switching on the light. ‘Mind the things on the floor. Just for your own sake, really. It’s not valuable, any of it, but you might come to harm.’

There was no bed in the room but that was because there was no space for it. Boxes were piled high on all sides, and indefinable clutter filled the floor. Two steps in I had become entangled with a clothes-drying rack that was splayed across my path. I freed myself with some difficulty, avoided a loop of electrical cable and joined the man in his bay window.

‘Wow. That is a grandstand view.’ I was looking straight down the side of the main building on the site, straight at the bins. I tried to imagine how the scene had looked when the car had been parked where we found it originally. ‘What did you see? Where did you see him?’

‘He was walking around there.’ Number Thirty-Seven pointed, his expression vague, then scratched his belly. ‘By the garage.’

‘And how tall would you say he was?’

‘No idea.’

‘As tall as the man with grey hair standing by the garage door?’ Also known as Charles Godley, God for short.

‘Not that tall.’ He squinted. ‘More his size.’

He was pointing at Andy Styles. I groaned inwardly at the thought of asking Andy how tall he was. He would take it the wrong way, somehow. He would turn it into an opportunity to pick on me about my height.

‘Where did he go after he’d walked past the garage?’

‘Near the bins. He tried to lift the lid up but they’re locked. Then he walked away.’

‘Which direction?’

‘I didn’t stay to look. I only watched him for a bit. It was weird that he was wearing his hood up, that’s all I thought. I didn’t know it would be important.’

‘You’ve done really well.’

‘Do you think so?’

‘Definitely.’

‘What about a kiss to say thank you?’ He was leaning in as he said it, his wet lips pursed as he aimed for my mouth. I turned my head away and stumbled backwards, hitting the windowsill with a thud.

‘Stay back,’ I snapped.

‘Don’t be shy.’

I could have arrested him, if I’d wanted to spend the rest of the shift at the police station processing him into custody. Not appealing. The main thing on my mind was making sure no one found out he’d tried it on with me. I could imagine the comments I’d get.

‘I will kick you in the testicles if you so much as breathe on me again,’ I said icily, one hand braced against his chest so he couldn’t get any closer even if he wanted to. I wasn’t even looking at him as I said it. I was looking at the office building, noting that it had a single-storey extension around the back. From this angle, I could see that something was
lying on the roof of the extension, but the streetlights weren’t bright enough for me to be able to guess what it was. I started towards the door.

‘Hey! Where are you going?’

‘Thanks for your help.’

‘Come back,’ he called after me, but I was already halfway down the stairs. I banged the front door behind me, wishing I could lock it from the outside to keep him in there indefinitely. I could still feel his eyes on me as I strode across the road to the yards.

‘Where are you off to in such a hurry?’ Gary Lovell fell into step beside me. ‘You look a bit flustered. Feeling all right?’

‘Never better.’ I skirted the area that the crime-scene officers had sectioned off. ‘Come with me.’

He did as I asked, all the way to the extension at the back of the main building. He didn’t even ask any questions when I took another pair of gloves out of my pocket and put them on. I looked up at the roof, trying to gauge the height.

‘Give me a leg up.’

‘Why?’

‘I’m not sure yet.’ I put my foot in his palm and he heaved me up so I could hold on to the side of the building and see what lay on top. ‘I knew it.’

‘What is it?’ He was still supporting a lot of my weight and I could hear the strain in his voice. I leaned forward and made a grab for the handbag I’d seen from Number Thirty-Seven’s window.

‘Got it.’

He lowered me to the ground and I started going through the contents of the bag as Gary leaned in to see, his face close to mine. There wasn’t much left in the bag so it didn’t take long. One hairbrush. A photograph taken in New York of two girls, laughing, standing in
front of the Statue of Liberty. One of them could have been the victim. Her injuries had been so severe I really couldn’t tell. No keys or money. There was a wallet, though, with a card in it in the name of Sally-Ann James, forty pounds in cash, and a driver’s licence with an address for the same woman. In the picture she had long dark hair and a heart-shaped face.

‘Whose bag is that?’ Gary asked.

‘The victim’s, unless I’m very much mistaken,’ I said. ‘And I’ve just found out her name.’

At the end of the shift, cross-eyed from lack of sleep, I admitted defeat and went home. I got back to the flat as my flatmate Aisling emerged from her room. She was yawning, wrapped up in a dressing gown, sleepy-eyed and tousled and somehow innocent in a way that I would never be again.

‘Good night?’

‘Mmm.’ I had changed at the police station into jeans and a T-shirt, my usual routine since we weren’t supposed to be identifiable as police officers on our way to or from a shift. I hadn’t washed yet. I could feel the dirt from the yards in my hair, under my nails, and in all the creases of my body, even if it looked as if there was nothing there. The only thing I wanted was a shower, and a long one, but Aisling had to get ready for work. I got a glass out of a cupboard and ran some water into it.

‘Busy?’

‘It was, yeah.’

‘You must be shattered.’ She yawned as she carried the kettle to the sink. ‘Want a tea?’

‘Better not.’ I was jumping from too much caffeine anyway.

‘It’s so weird that you have to go to bed now.’

‘That’s shift work.’

Aisling shook her head. I had the feeling that she didn’t altogether approve of my job, and would have preferred a flatmate who would be available for beers in the evening and cooking a roast on Sundays. I couldn’t actually think of a single person who thought my job was a good idea, with the exception of the careers teacher at university who had been very
impressed with the Met’s pension scheme. Aisling and I had been friends in school and when she’d suggested renting a flat together in Sydenham I’d jumped at the chance to move out of home. So far it wasn’t working out quite as either of us had expected. There were the usual flatmate issues with dirty dishes and the bathroom-cleaning rota. Aisling was chronically untidy and disorganised but she minded actual dirt, which was fair enough. She had turned out to be a fan of the passive-aggressive note – just to ‘remind’ me that it was my turn to tidy up when we didn’t see each other for days on end because I was out working when she was at home. I didn’t blame her for being annoyed about it, but cooking and cleaning and housework didn’t come naturally to me, and I couldn’t bring myself to care about that. I dipped in and out of Aisling’s life and if I couldn’t remember was what currently going on with her on-off boyfriend, at least she never seemed to mind telling me. Nevertheless, we got on fine, most of the time, and while we were both earning a pittance it made sense to share the flat, even if it was pretty dingy.

‘We’re nearly out of cereal.’ She shook the box.

‘You can have it.’

‘You have to eat something.’

‘Later. I had dinner about an hour ago,’ I lied. I felt as if I would never be able to eat again.

‘What did you get up to last night?’

‘Just the usual. Answering 999 calls.’

She laughed. ‘It’s so weird to think of it. I mean, calling the police and you turning up.’

I looked down at myself, lanky in jeans and Converse. ‘You know, I’m more impressive in uniform.’ With my 30,000 mates to back me up. Being in the biggest gang around helped.

‘It would still be weird. I mean, the police are grown-ups.’

I grinned. ‘So are we.’

‘Not really. Not properly.’ She looked genuinely unsettled at the thought for a few seconds. Then she brightened. ‘Hey, did I tell you about what Sharon said to me at work yesterday? You are not going to believe this.’

I listened to the story about her bitchy colleague, murmuring the expected responses when she paused for my contributions. As soon as I could without seeming rude, I left her to the inane chatter of Radio 1’s breakfast show and her cereal, and shut myself in my room. I was tired to my very bones but I couldn’t relax. I wandered around the small space, listening to the noises that told me Aisling was finally getting ready. She was running late. There was a lot of swearing and door banging involved in the process. At last I heard the front door slam. I counted to twenty. It opened again.

‘Forgot my phone!’

‘Bye,’ I called as the door slammed again. Aisling would never change.

I trudged to the bathroom, peeling off clothes as I went. I stood under the shower, the water as hot as I could stand, until steam filled the whole room. I scrubbed my skin until it was tender to the touch, ridding every inch of my body of the night’s grime and the smell of the yards. Every time I closed my eyes I saw Sally-Ann’s huddled form, or the dirty old man lunging at me, or Superintendent Godley’s unreadable expression when he looked at me. I had no idea what he’d made of me, if anything, but seeing him in person had been a thrill for a police geek like me. I assured myself that I’d have preferred Sally-Ann to be unharmed even if she was the only reason I’d got to meet him; I wasn’t completely cynical.

Once I was dressed in the shorts and vest that were my summer pyjamas, I went into the living room and curled up on the sofa, switching on the television to see the news. There was a report on the local London news about Sally-Ann, although she wasn’t named and
there weren’t many details. I knew enough to fill in the blanks. The reporter was a young woman, beautifully dressed in a pale-pink shirt and pearl earrings, her hair immaculate and blonde, her make-up understated.

‘The victim is in a critical condition in a London hospital. Detectives are waiting to interview her once she’s well enough to speak to them. In the meantime, police are warning young women to take sensible precautions to ensure their safety when they are out at night in the capital. Their advice is to be wary of strangers, travel in groups where possible, and use licensed taxis at all times.’

There was nothing to say Sally-Ann hadn’t done all of those things, I thought, furious on her behalf. The reporter sounded complacent, as if no sensible woman would have found herself in Sally-Ann’s predicament. It wasn’t the victim’s fault that someone had chosen to maim her. It wasn’t her fault that she’d walked down lonely streets, or that no one had heard her screams until it was too late. It wasn’t my fault that we hadn’t got there in time to arrest the rapist and save her from the worst of his attentions either, but I couldn’t quite forgive myself for that. I switched off the television and was unsettled to find tears streaking my face. At least it had happened at home, I thought, rubbing at my cheeks to wipe the tears away. At least I hadn’t broken down at the scene.

I wandered into my room and drew the curtains, then lay down on my bed, feeling every muscle in my body complain as I eased back and tried to relax. I played last night’s shift back in my head, as I always did, analysing what I had done and what I had said. There were a few things that made me cringe, as usual. I couldn’t stop thinking about my little run-in with Andy Styles, and what Chris had told me about him. I also, in a very different way, couldn’t stop thinking about Gary Lovell.

But that was just stupid. And anyway, I’d been warned off, quite thoroughly, by Inspector Saunders. Chris, in his own way, had been equally discouraging.

Gary was going to have to work very hard indeed with that kind of opposition, I assured myself as I drifted off into a fitful, unsatisfying doze instead of the deep dreamless sleep I craved.

* * *

There was no one from my team in the writing room when I got in, though there were five or six officers using the computers or just hanging around. It wasn’t altogether surprising that I was the only one there, since I was more than an hour early. I sat down at a computer and logged on to the system, feeling self-conscious. I didn’t know anyone else who was in there, at least not well enough to say anything more than hello. I was aware of them watching me, though, and I wondered if they had heard that I was one who’d found Sally-Ann James. She was still alive, but barely. It was the first thing I had checked when I got into work. I’d been lucky to bump into one of the few detectives I knew, Emma Yarwood. She was working on the enquiry, she told me. Sally-Ann was still unconscious. Still unable to tell us in her own words what had happened to her, although the story was written all over her body in bruises and cuts and damage so horrendous that I couldn’t bring myself to imagine it.

I was early because I couldn’t stand being at home alone any longer and I’d done all the jobs I could think of, including clearing out the fridge. Aisling was going to be one surprised flatmate when she got home. Housework was the only thing that took my mind off the James case. If I managed to stay in touch with it as it developed, I’d have to get a cleaning job or something. There was a limit to how much hoovering one carpet could take.

What I specifically wanted to do – the reason I had come in extra-early – was read the CRIS reports on the Croydon rapes that Superintendent Godley had mentioned. It didn’t take long, in fact, to skim through them. The two attacks had been five weeks apart, the first taking place in May, the second in June. Again, the victims were women on their way home late at night, on foot. One had got off a bus, the other a tram. One was violated with a branch,
the other with a metal pipe, and no third-party DNA had been recovered from either victim. Both were beaten. Both lost items of jewellery that were not recovered – one earring and two bracelets in the first case, a ring for the second victim and her watch. Both had been left with money and valuables that a mugger might have taken – an iPod and a laptop computer. He took things of no value whatsoever. One victim lost a shoe and diligent searching had failed to find it. The only possibility was that he had taken it away with him. He’d also taken underwear and pens, a Tesco loyalty card and a tube of mascara. He was a real magpie, I thought. He just wanted things. Not even personal ones, in the case of the pen and the make-up. There was no way to know what Sally-Ann had been carrying in the bag he’d slung onto the roof in the yards, but it was a big cross-body brown leather one. Most women who carried a bag that big found plenty of things to put in it. It was frustrating, not knowing what he’d taken and what he’d left behind. And even if Sally-Ann woke up, there was no guarantee she’d remember anything useful. There was no guarantee she’d wake up at all, from what Emma had said.