A hammering on her front door pulled her from her seat. Through the glass panel she saw the outline of Kerry and she opened the door with trepidation.
‘Can I help you, love?’ She forced a friendly smile on to her face. Kerry was not above punching people who upset her.
‘Have you seen my Mercedes?’
Sally shook her head. ‘I saw you with her a while ago, love. I thought you was taking her to your mum’s.’
Kerry’s face screwed up with annoyance. ‘What the fucking hell are you on about, you silly old bitch? I been shopping all afternoon.’
You’ve been shoplifting all afternoon, you mean, thought Sally.
‘You trying to cause trouble, as usual? I left them both in the flat and I just got home. Mercedes is nowhere to be seen, so do you know where she is? I know you give them biscuits and that, and I also know you spend your life looking out the fucking window. So who did you see with Mercedes and when?’
Sally was frightened. ‘I thought she was with you. I am sure it was you . . . dragging the poor little mite down the road—’
The punch, when it arrived, was painful.
When the police got there, Sally was battered and blue, and Kerry was looking for another fight. It was what she did whenever she was upset, and Kerry was upset. Very upset. Plus she loved fighting with Old Bill.
Chapter Six
Kate stared at the girl before her. She knew Kerry, everyone knew Kerry - she was a legend in her own lunchtime.
A big girl, overweight and with bad skin, Kerry was not what you would call pretty. She had learned at an early age that to get attention from boys, you allowed them liberties, and to get attention from everyone else you became a figure of fear. She swore all the time, issued veiled threats as an intrinsic part of her vocabulary and she was proud of herself. That was what made Kate really pity her.
Kerry thought she was clever - a somebody, someone to respect. She honestly didn’t see anything wrong with her life at all. Now, as she stared back at Kate Burrows with a mixture of fear and anger, she looked almost feral.
‘Calm down, Kerry. We only want to sort out what’s happened here. Now, do you know where your youngest daughter is?’
Kerry’s face was hard under the bright lights of the interview room.
‘No, I fucking don’t. I was looking for her when that cunt McIntyre started winding me up . . .’
Kate slammed a fist down on the table, making the other people in the room jump.
‘I do not want any more of your language, OK? You have a child on the missing list - even
you
must see the sense in working with us on this one. I’m not having any us and them situations here - right? I want answers, girl, and I want them tonight. If Mercedes is wandering around on her own then I suggest you help us find her before she comes to harm.’
Kate glanced at the social worker in attendance and her eyes spoke volumes.
Bernie Kent took Kerry’s hand. He said gently, ‘Come on, love, we need to sort this out now. No more time-wasting. ’
Kerry nodded almost imperceptibly.
‘Let’s start from the beginning,’ Kate said quietly.
‘Where were you today and when was the last time you saw Mercedes?’
Kerry wiped a grubby hand across her face. ‘I was at Lakeside all day shopping.’
She saw the sceptical expression on the DI’s face and frowned. ‘I came home about eight this evening. I got a cab back, and the baby was gone. My other girl, Alisha, said that she fell asleep and when she woke up, Mercedes wasn’t there.’
‘Who was supposed to be looking after the children?’
Kerry licked her cracked lips and said almost inaudibly,
‘No one. No one was looking after them, really. When I left, little Mary Parkes was there, but she had to get home by five. I meant to be back before then but I was caught up with something. She locked them in the flat and put the key under the mat as usual. That’s how I got in.’
Kate sighed. ‘So you left the kids all day with a young girl. How old was she?’
‘Eleven. But she’s a grown-up eleven, if you know what I mean.’
Kate knew she meant an early developer and probably sexually experienced, which did not mean she was grown up. Though the girl probably thought it did.
‘We’ll be bringing her in soon and getting a statement. Isn’t her father Lenny Parkes, the armed robber?’ Kate felt awful using fear like this but she had dealt with the Kerrys of this world long enough to know it was all that made them amenable. ‘Did he know his daughter was at your flat when she should have been at school?’
Kerry’s brief, a small balding man called Harry Dart, held up a hand. ‘This has no bearing on the case at all.’
Kate smiled at him. ‘I beg to differ. Mr Parkes is an extremely well-known face in these parts and he will not take lightly to the fact that we are knocking on his door about his beloved daughter. We need to know the score, for safety’s sake.’ Kate was using the man and she knew it, but what else could she do?
‘I don’t know whether he knew. I expect he didn’t. But all the kids come round to me, everyone knows that.’
Kerry was justifying herself and Kate felt even more pity for her than before. She had Kerry on the hop and was going to keep her there.
‘Is there anyone who might have taken Mercedes? A friend, relative - her father?’
Kerry laughed nastily. ‘I don’t know who her father is to be honest.’ This was said with the customary bravado. ‘I just want her back.’ It was rather more heartfelt.
‘But we have three witnesses who say they saw you walking down the road with her an hour before you reported her gone.’
‘Then they were wrong. I was over Lakeside as I said.’
‘Can anyone put you there? Did you see or talk to anyone you knew?’
Kerry shook her head. ‘No. But I got a cab home . . .’
‘Lakeside is a ten-minute drive home from your flat. You had ample time to get there and back in thirty minutes. Can you see where I’m coming from? Three people saw you with the child, Kerry. Now what is going on? They all know you, know who you are. Let’s face it, round your flats you are the star, aren’t you? You make sure of that. They recognised you all right, love. You had hours in which to get home, do what you had to do and get back over to Lakeside. Now, have you anything sensible to say?’
Kerry wiped her nose with the back of her hand. Then, jumping up like a maniac, she started laying into everyone she could get hold of. Including her social worker and her brief.
It was pandemonium.
And Kate was no nearer finding out where the child could be, and more importantly, who she was with.
Ten minutes later she went back into the room. This time Kerry was quieter and much more civilised.
‘I swear on my kids’ heads, I have no idea who took her or why everyone thinks it was me. I was drunk out of me brains, I admit that, but I was skanking over Lakeside. Thieving, for fuck’s sake! You can do me for that, but not for harming me kids. I love them. Whatever anyone thinks of me and my life, I
love
them fucking kids! I would never hurt them. Never. And if anyone tries to say different, I’ll batter their brains out and all!’
‘Whose brains have you already battered out then?’ Kate’s voice was quiet.
Kerry’s eyes filled with tears.
‘You have twice been arrested for violence towards your children . . .’
Kerry interrupted, screaming, ‘I smacked them, that’s all. Everyone smacks their kids.’
‘Once you
smacked
your eldest daughter around the head with a shoe. Am I right? She had to have five stitches.’
Kate saw the social worker close his eyes in distress.
‘You were given Alisha back only five weeks ago. She had been staying with your mother, am I right again? You are under a supervision order yet you left two small defenceless children with an eleven-year-old girl while you went out thieving. Now you say your daughter was taken by a stranger and you know nothing about it! Am I getting all this correctly?’
Kerry was crying now, the real Kerry, an overweight girl whose hard front had disappeared in less than five minutes.
Getting up, Kate said gently, ‘Talk to your brief and I’ll be back in fifteen minutes, OK? See if we can make some sense of all this.’
Both the brief and the social worker looked at her unhappily. She was putting the ball in their court and they knew it.
Kate walked back to her office and lit a cigarette. Pulling on it deeply, she saw a note on her desk saying that she was to expect a call from Detective Inspector Jenny Bartlett. It was signed by Leila and Kate thanked her lucky stars for her friend’s help.
It was procedure that if a case was difficult then officers could bring in someone regarded as an expert in that area. It was in no way regarded as a slur on the officer in charge. In fact, it was often recommended by the Home Office, especially if a case was going nowhere. But experts were most often called in for crimes of paedophilia or child death, when specialist help and advice would be needed.
Jenny was all right, and this was just her kind of case. She specialised in child abuse and abduction. Kate made a mental note to kiss Leila, the first chance she got.
She now had three local women, all of whom had apparently decided to kill their children overnight. All claimed they were innocent and all were known either to police, Social Services or both. Such things happened, Kate knew that. It was a part of everyday life. But to have three practically overnight on her patch was stretching things too far.
The witness statements were the strangest part of it all. Each woman had been observed with her child, though they were all adamant that they had been nowhere near them at the time. All admitted neglect, leaving the children alone, but not actual murder.
If they were telling the truth, where did that leave the police? And what about the body of the child on the rubbish tip?
Who was he and why wasn’t anyone looking for him?
Someone
must know who he was. Surely
someone
must care?
Kate closed her eyes in consternation and tiredness. She was missing something, she knew she was. Eventually it would come to her, she knew, and then everything about this disturbing case would become clear.
At least she hoped so.
She deserved a break.
Boris Stravinski watched the screen with clinical detachment. He was scanning CCTV videos, trying to piece together some information.
The girl beside him stirred and he moved away from her slim body. She opened her eyes and smiled at him. She was very pretty and she knew it.
He stared down at her. ‘Get dressed and fuck off. Sergei will give you your money.’
His harsh words made his accent lose its appeal and the girl got up without a word and started dressing. He ignored her as he scanned the screen.
At the door she turned to face him and said sheepishly, ‘Will you want to see me again?’
He shook his head, his long thick hair making her jealous of its glossy beauty.
‘You weren’t worth the money, my dear.’
She left the room crushed and Boris felt a flicker of compassion which he fought down. When paying for sex, you got a fuck and that was it. He paid up, he fucked them. Why did he always hate them so much afterwards?
Or maybe it was himself he hated. He was an extremely good-looking man, he knew that much without being vain. Women adored him, and yet he still preferred to mix with whores. He pushed the troubling thoughts from his mind.
Whores were just there and when you were finished they went on their way. That was the big attraction for him.
Since losing his girlfriend Anna two years before, he had not bothered with regular women at all. Anna, the mother of his son, had been shot in Moscow while she shopped. He had lost three good men with her that day and it rankled still. But he missed her. He missed her and her humour and her tidy mind so very much. His son missed her too.
He recognised one of the faces on the video and paused the tape, smiling.
Then, getting up, he walked through to his shower room and stood looking at himself in the mirror. He was a big man, in every way. Long thick black hair hung to his shoulders in glossy waves. He looked like a darker version of Richard Gere. Women, especially Englishwomen, were always pointing that out. He marvelled at the combination of beauty and power. Irresistible.
Yet beauty in a woman did not really affect him
per se
. He valued character, a sense of humour in a woman, a
brain
. He liked to talk with them, have fun with them, and then make love with them. At least, that was how he used to be. Before Anna died.
He stepped into the shower and turned on the water. As he washed he wondered where Kelly was and when he would learn what had happened to his money.
That was Boris’s chief concern at the moment.
Everything else could wait.
Patrick had moved from home into a small flat in Ilford. It would not have been his first choice, but no one knew him there and that suited him. As soon as he had realised what was going down he had started covertly moving stuff to his car, taking just a few things that were important to him, ever conscious of being watched.
His brief was not a happy man, saying Patrick would soon be declared wanted in connection with murder. But Patrick knew something he didn’t. And neither did the police.
Patrick knew who had killed Duggan and why. It had to be the Russian after his money. If Kate came up trumps and lied for him, he was home and dry.
Willy was sitting watching football. Patrick poured them both a stiff drink.
‘Fucking Manchester United give me the hump, Pat, they really do. Like a load of fucking shirt-lifters they are. Unbelievable.’
Pat didn’t listen. Willy was a dyed-in-the-wool Millwall supporter and always would be. Greater teams, and they were legion, gave him the hump.