The Secret Dead (London Bones Book 1) (13 page)

25

King’s Cross isn’t as seedy as it used to be, but it still hasn’t quite been swallowed up by gentrification despite the millions of pounds poured into the regeneration of the station and the attached buildings and offices.

I only saw two obvious prostitutes on the walk back to the station and didn’t get propositioned by a single street weasel. Maybe it was still a little early. Another decade, and the whole area would be nothing but chain coffee shops and anonymous offices. I couldn’t pretend to be sorry about the lack of addicts sleeping in doorways or desperate women selling themselves, but the relentless march of corporatisation made me think of my mother.

King’s Cross used to be a village called Battle Bridge, and when the Romans sacked it, she was there and already thousands of years old. She’s the one who told me that the belief that the station is built on the site of Boudicca’s last battle isn’t true.

My mother hated London. Or rather she hated the city as it is now. She’d lived most of her long life here, but she’d been dead too long. The city she returned to was unfamiliar and overcrowded. Occasionally something she recognised—a church, a monument—rose out of the strangeness like an iceberg, and then she’d get into one of her black moods. Sometimes I think the only thing that surprised me about her was that she didn’t choose to go back to death a lot sooner. I was so absorbed in my thoughts that I didn’t see the suited ghost until he was right in front of me.

‘Hey, Miss Boney.’ He waggled his eyebrows at me. ‘Just wanted to check you arranged my movie for Saturday.’

‘It’s all done.’

‘Good.’ He grinned. ‘Oh, by the way. There’s something following you.’

I spun around. The road was busy. A group of tourists, loaded with oversized suitcases, waited at a bus stop. A bearded man in jeans and a hoodie walked towards me, seemingly paying attention to nothing but the McDonald’s burger he was eating. Further away, three teenaged girls giggled as they walked. Each had the same dark, glossy hair, straightened within an inch of its life.

‘Who is it?’

‘Nothing human, love.’

I stared down the road again, looking for non-humans. Two of the tourists had the cerulean skin of the water people, and one of the teenaged girls had an aura that suggested something other, maybe a potential witch. None looked the slightest bit interested in me. I turned back to the ghost, but he had gone.

I looked up thinking that perhaps Ben had come to me, but there was nothing but lighted windows and dull sky. Finally, skin prickling, I walked on.

I’d been up since three, hadn’t eaten in hours, and was starting to feel a little faint. I stopped at the first coffee shop I came to with free Wi-Fi, taking the reasonable stance that I wouldn’t find Benjamin Brannick if I fainted and fell in front of the Number 91 bus. It wasn’t the only reason. I wanted time to think and get Malcolm out of my head.

The cheapest food was a wrapped shortbread biscuit. I went for that along with a coffee with plenty of sugar. Even a couple of quid saved on an overpriced sandwich was another couple of quid into the escape fund. Other than someone twittering at one of the PCs against the far wall, and a pair of teenagers with their bums half hanging out, the rest of the place was empty. I took a table next to the wall by the radiator and slipped out of my shoes. I flexed my socked feet; the heat began soaking into them immediately.

Before I did anything else, I called home and spoke to the carer, who assured me Sigrid was fine. His shift ended at three-thirty. I looked at my watch. It was just past twelve. I was meeting Adam at one to check out youth clubs, so I had just over three hours before I had to be back.

I booted up my laptop while I sipped at the blisteringly hot coffee. It burned my tongue, but the first sip went straight to my brain. One sip’s worth of caffeine couldn’t possibly wake you up so instantly, so I knew it was a psychological thing. Didn’t make a damn bit of difference: it was still good.

Outside, the world was moving on after the lockdown. A group of tourists leaned against the window and argued about something on their map. A lone street weasel hung about near their rear, waiting for an opportunity to pick their pockets.

Malcolm had said, ‘He killed me.’ It wasn’t ambiguous, but it might have meant nothing. Maybe it was the product of his brain turning to mush. But he had wanted to see me, had refused to talk to the police.

Malcolm and I weren’t friends. I thought he was a first class wally, and he knew it. Out of all the people he could have insisted on seeing, I should have been at the bottom of the list.

He killed me
. If Ben had murdered his father, I could understand Malcolm not wanting to tell the police. It could have been some kind of accident and he didn’t want to get the boy in further trouble. But why me? Why not Obe? Okay, maybe not Obe. Surely he had someone closer to talk to.

He killed me
. Not
Ben killed me. He killed me.
Perhaps he meant someone else. Neil? I’d thought Malcolm had said something about a brother. Maybe it was
not Ben, my brother.

That didn’t make sense either. Malcolm didn’t have a scratch on him. He could have been poisoned, but I thought that should have left some sort of mark too. A purple tongue or swollen face or something. My knowledge came a little short. I’d never had cause to research poisoning methods. And Neil hadn’t been there. Which might make it something slow acting, that had been targeted at Malcolm so that no one else was affected. And that Malcolm knew who did it.

Oh, stop it,
I thought.
This isn’t Agatha bloody Christie. Malcolm’s brain was addled. He didn’t know what was going on.

I finished the coffee, then returned to the counter for another one.

I still hadn’t spoken to Jillie’s brother, Samson. I’d left him a message, but he hadn’t rung back. I dialled his number again, but it just rang and rang then went to voicemail. I left another message.

I needed to go about finding Ben logically and methodically. Adam was searching the hotels and going door to door. Obe was holding the Lipscombe Fort, and I’d put out feelers to every contact I had.

Ben had participated in the Teen Outreach Programme. The queries I had sent out had come up with nothing, but Jillie said Malcolm had taken him somewhere else. It seemed like a long shot, but I didn’t have any other ideas.

The Wi-Fi connection was erratic, but I managed to locate at least four youth centres within a mile radius of Malcolm’s house. None had websites, and one had lost its campaign to stay open. I only found one phone number—a mobile number that was no longer in use. I jotted the addresses down in proximity order. I sent Adam a text giving him the address of the first one.

Next, I searched for Malcolm’s postcode and pulled up a map of the area together with the little pins that designate places of interest. A quick plug-in at the counter and a payment of 50p, and I had a print out.

Almost no matter where you are in London, everything is built up closely, the houses packed on top of each other. Few spaces are like the old car dealership and unused for years – space is too valuable in a crowded city. If Ben had done three or four flying hops, it was still a lot of buildings and houses for Adam to search, but I was looking for arcades and malls, in case the youth centre didn’t pan out. I marked them on my map with red pen. I packed up my laptop and made my way to the station. There was no sign of the suited ghost or anyone else, but my back prickled all the way down the escalators.

The first youth centre on my list was situated just off the high street in a shop front between a kebab place and a closed estate agent. The inside was hidden from public view by a set of dusty curtains. A pile of post and takeaway flyers was stacked against the glass door. I squinted and made out a postmark dated November. I scribbled a note on the back of a business card just in case and pushed it through the post flap.

‘Nothing here, huh?’

I jumped. Adam was walking towards me. He wore black jeans, a black coat, and a black beanie over the remains of his hair. He looked like a big pasty ninja.

I shrugged. ‘These places only last as long as the funding.’

We checked my map, then started walking east.

‘So, I met your father,’ I said.

He looked at me. ‘And how did that go?’

‘Not well. He threw me out.’

Adam laughed, but there was no humour to it. ‘Don’t take it personally. He’s like that with everyone. He can be a bit of an asshole at times, but it’s been worse recently. And Malcolm being dead isn’t going to help.’

‘Why recently?’

‘He’s got a disciplinary hearing at work coming up, although he should be used to it. He’s always getting into fights. He’s been round the HR carousel a good few times.’

‘That bad?’

He laughed. It sounded bitter. ‘Yeah, they’d have sacked him long ago, but he’s too good at what he does. He was the one who dealt with that water sprite in Brixton last year. If it wasn’t for him, half of London would still be swimming. He specialises in both water and earth.’

‘Rare combination.’

‘Doesn’t stop him getting the occasional black eye.’

We fell silent. I had the impression Adam had told me more than he’d meant to, but I understood. When it came to family, sometimes you just needed to vent.

‘He said something about Ben killing your dog.’

Adam grimaced. ‘Yes, that was nasty, but it’s not as bad as it sounds. Ben did do it, but he didn’t know any better. You need to understand what it’s like up there. They live off fish, sea birds, and rabbits. Ben’s not like modern kids who don’t know where the packages in the supermarket come from. His stepdad had just started taking him out to hunt rabbits. It was an unfortunate misunderstanding.’

I slowed to a stop in front of the second centre on the list. It was church affiliated and run in the hall of St Joseph’s, a Catholic church situated just off the main drag of the high street. It was a new brick building—spacious and airy—not like the one I went to growing up, which was ancient and smelled a bit like damp and old lady.

My mother wasn’t a big fan of modern religion. She missed the old religions and was known to wax nostalgic about the days when blood sacrifice was the done thing. Although I suspect she may have done it just to annoy Stanley.

The side door to the hall was open, so we let ourselves in. I gave out a friendly ‘Helloo.’

Two middle-aged women were setting out chairs in the centre of the hall. Another shook out a large mat to go in the middle. The closest, a well-padded black woman in a print dress, gave me a friendly smile.

‘I’m afraid the Mummy and Me class doesn’t start until one-thirty, but you’re welcome to hang about and have a coffee while you wait.’

I held up my arms like she was pointing a gun at me. ‘We actually wanted to ask some questions about your youth group.’

She peered a bit closer, then looked at Adam. ‘Oh, you don’t have a baby, do you? This is what happens when I don’t put my glasses on. I’m so sorry,’ she said, as if accusing strangers of parenthood was a terrible faux pas. ‘I’m happy to answer any questions as long as you don’t mind watching me get the tea ready.’

We followed her into a tiny kitchen area separated from the main hall by an open window. She turned on an urn big enough to cater for Hogwarts and began pulling mismatched mugs from a cupboard above the sink.

She introduced herself as Linda. I told her my name in return and showed her a copy of the most recent Polaroid of Ben I had, the especially sulky one.

‘Bless,’ she said. ‘Doesn’t he look like he’s in a funk? Yes, I know him, I thought he was a hunchback until I saw him on the news. Boy never took his coat off. What’s your interest in this?’

Adam leaned back against the kitchen counter. ‘I’m his cousin. We’re worried about him.’

She didn’t turn around. ‘Uh-huh.’

‘We just want to find him to make sure he’s safe,’ I said.

‘Isn’t that for the police to do?’ Linda started setting the mugs out on trays on a table just outside the kitchen.

‘No. Ben’s...’ I hesitated, not sure of the right word to use without being obvious. ‘I’m from the Lipscombe Trust. He mightn’t want to contact the police.’ I showed her my ID. She peered at it.

‘May I?’ she asked and held out her hand.

I gave it to her, and she disappeared through a door to the right, presumably to make a phone call and verify my identity.

Adam raised his eyebrows at me. I shrugged. Family doesn’t come with an ID badge.

She was back within five minutes and handed my badge back. ‘Sorry, can’t be too sure. You never know what people want with the kids we have here.’

‘Of course,’ I said. ‘Have you seen him recently? Or can you give me contact details for anyone he was friendly with? I’m hoping he’s gone to one of them.’

Linda appeared to be thinking about it. I pulled my backpack off my shoulder and handed her a small pack of my cards. ‘If you could maybe just pass my contact details on to his friends... I don’t know if he had any particular friends.’