Authors: Kevin Brooks
‘OK … and you haven’t found anything at all that links Bishop with the Nissan or Anna Gerrish?’
‘No.’
He looked at me, his mind seeming to wander for a moment. Then his eyes regained their focus and he said, ‘Do you need any help with the drink-driving charge?’
I smiled. ‘My solicitor got it thrown out last week. Procedural errors.’
‘Good.’
‘You’re tired, Leon,’ I said, getting to my feet again. ‘You need to rest.’
He nodded. ‘I know, I know … but before you go, John …’
‘What?’
‘Leave Bishop to me for now, OK? I’ve still got a lot of close contacts in the job. I’ll make some enquiries, see what I can find out, and I’ll get back to you as soon as possible. But in the meantime … well, just don’t go fucking around with him, that’s all.’
‘OK.’
He smiled at me, a sad and weary smile that seemed to take an awful lot out of him. ‘And listen,’ he muttered. ‘Listen …’
His eyes were closing even as he spoke to me.
I turned quietly and started to leave. But just as I got to the door, I heard him speak to me again.
‘You see this picture, John?’ he said.
I turned round and saw him looking up at a framed photograph on the wall. It was a picture of Leon and my father, taken shortly before Dad died. They were together at a barbecue somewhere – red-faced in the sun, drinks in their hands, both of them smiling broadly at the camera.
‘If ever you have any questions, John,’ Leon said, ‘and I’m not here to answer them … just remember that picture.’
I looked at him. ‘What do you mean?’
He smiled again. ‘You’re a detective … you’ll work it out when the time comes.’
I shook my head. ‘I don’t understand –’
‘You know, John,’ he said vaguely. ‘There’s something I’ve been meaning to ask you for a long time … something I’ve been thinking about …’
‘Leon,’ I said. ‘I really think you should get some rest now –’
‘You see, what I can’t understand, what I’ve never been able to figure out …’ He looked at me, his entire body quite still. ‘When your father killed himself in his room … why did he lock the door?’
‘What?’
‘It doesn’t make sense, does it? If you’re going to kill yourself, why make a point of locking the door first? What purpose does it serve?’
‘I don’t know …’ I said, confused. ‘I’ve never really thought about it …’
He smiled distantly. ‘Perhaps you should.’
‘Are you trying to say –?’
‘I’m sorry, John,’ he muttered, his eyes beginning to close again. ‘Would you mind asking Claudia to come up here? I think … I think I’m …’ He sighed hard. ‘God, I’m so fucking tired.’
‘How long has he got?’ I asked Imogen.
‘I wish I knew,’ she sighed. ‘But you know what Dad’s like, he refuses to talk about it.’ We were in her car – a ridiculously expensive black Mercedes – and she was driving me home. ‘He has his good days and bad days,’ she went on. ‘Sometimes he’s OK, other times … well, you saw what he was like tonight.’
I nodded. ‘Is he at home all the time now?’
‘Just about. He struggles into the office every now and then, and he still insists that I keep him up to date with everything that’s going on with the business, but he spends most of his time in his study now.’
‘What does he do up there?’
‘I’m not sure … he’s got a few things he’s been working on for years – old cases, I think. He’s forever emailing people, speaking to old colleagues …’ She sighed again. ‘He just can’t seem to give it up.’
‘Yeah, well,’ I said. ‘Maybe that’s not such a bad thing … at least it’s better than just lying around feeling sorry for yourself.’
‘I suppose so …’
I glanced at her, realising how much she’d changed over the years. She didn’t
look
all that different to the seventeen-year-old
girl I’d once thought I loved – the same shiny black hair, the same graceful features, the same overall air of almost aristocratic elegance. But she’d grown up now. She was a married woman. She ran a business. She was confident, capable … she could deal with the world.
‘What?’ she said, smiling as she noticed me looking at her. ‘What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing … I was just …’
‘What? Just looking at me?’
‘Sorry …’
She laughed. ‘I’m not complaining.’
I gazed out of the window for a while, not saying anything. We were driving through the town centre now, and the night was alive with drinkers and clubbers – groups of girls, groups of men … short skirts, drunk eyes, T-shirts, no coats …
‘So,’ I said to Imogen. ‘How’s Martin?’
Martin was her husband, Martin Rand. A financier of some sort, he worked in the City, commuting to London every day. Apart from the fact that he was sickeningly energetic, and grotesquely good-looking, and unbelievably rich, I didn’t really know very much about him.
‘Haven’t you heard?’ Imogen said.
‘Heard what?’
‘We split up.’
‘Really?’
She nodded. ‘A couple of months ago … I thought you knew.’
‘No …’
‘That’s why I’m living at home at the moment.’
‘Oh, right … I thought you were just visiting.’
She looked at me. ‘Are you
sure
I didn’t tell you? I could have sworn …’
‘I would have remembered if you’d told me,’ I said. ‘So what happened …? Or don’t you want to talk about it?’
‘No,’ she said lightly. ‘It’s no big deal. It was just … well, lots of things really. We just grew apart, I suppose.’ She hesitated for a moment. ‘And, you know … Martin had always wanted us to have kids …’
‘And you didn’t?’
She glanced at me. ‘I wanted a family, yeah … but I wanted to carry on working too.’ She shook her head. ‘I didn’t want to stay at home all day, changing nappies and cleaning up sick, while Martin carried on living his life, swanning around all over the world.’
I nodded, not sure what to say.
Imogen smiled at me. ‘You never liked Martin, did you?’
‘I never really knew him that well.’
‘Yeah, but you still didn’t
like
him.’
I looked at her. She was smiling at me.
I said, ‘Are you doing all right?’
‘Yeah,’ she said, nodding. ‘Yeah, I really am.’
‘Good.’
‘How about you? I mean, apart from all this stuff that’s going on at the moment. How are you doing?’
‘Well, you know …’
‘The business OK?’
‘Yeah, fine.’
‘What about the rest of it?’
‘The rest of what?’
‘Your life …’
‘I don’t know,’ I muttered, inexplicably embarrassed for a moment. ‘I get up in the morning, you know … go to work, come home, do stuff …’
‘What kind of stuff?’
I shrugged. ‘Just stuff … the same kind of stuff that everyone else does. Read, watch television, eat, sleep …’
‘Are you seeing anyone?’
‘No.’
‘Do you want to?’
I sighed.
Imogen looked at me. ‘Sorry … I didn’t mean to –’
‘It’s all right.’
‘I’m just … I worry about you, John, that’s all.’
‘You don’t need to.’
‘I know,’ she said, grinning. ‘But I enjoy it.’
I smiled at her, and for a moment I was reminded of how close we used to be, and how different things used to be. Back then … it was a ghostless time – the spring before the summer, when the leaves that were falling now had yet to even form.
I looked out of the car window and saw that we were nearing the turn-off to my street. ‘You’d better drop me off here,’ I said to Imogen.
‘Why?’ she said, still smiling. ‘Don’t you want to be seen with me?’
‘There were reporters waiting outside my house when I left,’ I explained. ‘And a TV crew too. If they see you with me … well, you know how it works.’
She glanced at her watch. ‘But it’s 10.30, John –’
‘Oh, yeah, I forgot … they all go to bed at ten o’clock, don’t they?’
She nodded, pulling in at the turning to my street and parking expertly at the side of the road. The engine of the Mercedes purred quietly, and for a second or two we just sat there in the warmth of the car, sharing an intimate silence. ‘I’ve got a hat and scarf in the back of the car,’ Imogen said after a while. ‘It’s not the most subtle disguise in the world, but if you
wanted
to invite me in for a drink, I could leave the car here …’
I looked at her, not sure what to think or say … and my uncertainty clearly showed in my face, because after a few moments Imogen smiled sadly and said, ‘Some other time, maybe?’
‘Yeah, I’m sorry … it’s just –’
‘I understand, John. Really, it’s OK.’ Her smile brightened, and she leaned across and kissed me. ‘And you never know,’ she added, brushing my cheek with her hand. ‘A mysterious woman in a hat and scarf might just turn up one night, looking for some company …’
‘I’ll look out for her.’
‘You do that.’
I couldn’t see any reporters or TV people as I walked down the street towards my house, and I wondered briefly if perhaps they
had
all gone home and gone to bed early, but then – just as I was approaching my house – the door of a parked car opened and a sharp-eyed young woman clutching a digital voice recorder jumped out.
‘Mr Craine?’ she called out to me. ‘Could I have a quick word about –’
‘No,’ I said firmly.
She took no notice, scuttling up to me, then scrambling along beside me, sticking the recorder into my face. ‘How did you feel when you heard the news about Anton Viner, Mr Craine?’
‘Wonderful,’ I said. ‘It really made my day.’
She was taken aback for a second, long enough for me to get to the house and get my key in the door.
‘How did you find Anna’s body, John?’ she said. ‘How did you know where it was?’
I didn’t say anything, just opened the door.
‘Did you
know
Anna, John?’
I went inside and shut the door, but before I’d got halfway along the corridor, the doorbell rang. I turned round and walked back along the hallway, reached up to the bell, and yanked out the wires. Then I just stood there for a while, in the silent darkness, waiting to see if she knocked on the door … and I was really hoping that she didn’t, because I didn’t
want
to do anything stupid, but I had a feeling that I might.
But she didn’t.
I waited a couple of minutes, then a few minutes more – and while I waited I was listening hard for any sign of life from upstairs … but there was nothing. No sounds, no faint vibrations, no sense of any presence at all. And as I moved quietly back down the hallway and unlocked the door to my flat, I wondered where Bridget had gone. Was she out with friends somewhere? Dancing, drinking …
enjoying the night? Or maybe she’d decided to give Dave another chance. Maybe she was with him right now … in a fancy restaurant, a pub, a club, at his place … in bed together …
I didn’t put the lights on when I went inside. I moved through the familiar darkness into the front room, sat down in the armchair, and lit a cigarette. The curtains were all still closed. The house was silent. I poured myself a tumbler of whisky, raised it to my lips, and drank deeply.
Around 8.30 the next morning I was smoking my second cigarette of the day with my third cup of coffee when I heard a commotion outside – hurried footsteps, raised voices, the sound of a dog barking. I got up and looked out through a gap in the curtains and saw Bridget and Walter struggling their way across the road, pursued by a gaggle of reporters and TV people. Bridget was saying nothing, keeping her head bowed down and her eyes fixed firmly to the ground, and Walter was just barking chaotically at everything. As they reached the front door, I went out into the hallway and met them coming in.
‘Shit,’ said Bridget, slamming the door on the reporters. ‘They don’t give up, do they?’
‘Are you OK?’ I asked her.
‘Yeah, I’m fine,’ she said, smiling at me. ‘How about you?’
‘Yeah,’ I nodded. ‘I’m all right. Look, I’m really sorry about all this –’
‘Don’t worry about it,’ she said, shaking her head and waving away my apology. ‘It’s not your fault, is it?’
‘Maybe not,’ I shrugged. ‘But I’m sorry anyway.’
‘Me too,’ she said, touching my arm. ‘About last night, I mean …’
I looked at her, not sure what she meant.
‘I meant to leave you a note,’ she explained. ‘To let you know where I’d gone … but I forgot. Sorry.’
‘That’s OK.’
‘I went to see Sarah,’ she said. ‘We had some pet-shop business to sort out, you know … tax and stuff. And then we had a few glasses of wine, and I didn’t want to drive home drunk … especially with all these reporters around –’
‘It’s OK,’ I said. ‘You don’t have to explain anything to me.’
She smiled. ‘I’m just telling you, that’s all.’
‘Well … thanks.’
‘You’re welcome.’
We looked at each other for a moment then – Bridget still smiling at me – and I realised that her coat was damp and her hair was glistening darkly with a light sheen of rain … and I remembered how Stacy’s blonde hair used to darken in the rain, taking on the colour of rain-goldened straw …
‘I’d better get a move on,’ Bridget said.
I looked at her. ‘Where are you going?’
‘Work,’ she said, glancing at her watch. ‘Saturday’s the busiest day of the week.’ She grinned at me. ‘Lots of fat kids wanting to buy mouses.’
I nodded, smiling. ‘Are you going right now?’
‘Yeah, I just need to get a couple of things from upstairs.’
‘I was just on my way into town, so if you want a lift …?’
‘Sure?’
‘Yeah.’
‘OK,’ she said, heading for the stairs. ‘I won’t be a minute.’
There were even more reporters waiting outside when we left the house, and as we headed across the street towards my car they swarmed all around us like maniacs – shoving microphones in our faces, shouting out questions, blocking our way, taking photographs. Walter started up with his chaotic barking again, while me and Bridget just kept our mouths shut and concentrated on walking in a straight line. I was doing my best to stay calm, to not let the pushing and jostling bother me … and I was doing a pretty good job of it until, just as we reached my car, a particularly annoying photographer rammed his camera so close to my face, trying to get a shot of me and Bridget together, that I just couldn’t help lashing out at him. As he shoved against me again, almost knocking me off my feet, I swung round and cracked my elbow into his camera, smashing it viciously into his face. He grunted in pain, stepping back and dropping the camera, and while he stood there clutching his bloodied nose, I leaned down, picked up his camera, and threw it over the factory wall. There was a momentary silence before I heard the satisfying sound of the camera splashing into the cooling pond beyond the wall, and then everything started up again – the scuffling, the jostling, the questioning, the digital whirr of cameras – and as we got into my car, I could just make out the bleating voice of the photographer I’d hit whining away in the background –
you brode my vucking node, you bartard … I’ll vucking do you for dis … I’ll vucking ab you …