Authors: Mari Hannah
Who was she kidding?
Jo knew perfectly well what Kate’s reaction would be: disappointment, frustration, regret – all three.
Take your pick.
As if on cue, her mobile rang.
It wasn’t Kate.
‘Have you told her yet?’ Emily McCann said. ‘Assuming you’ve made up your mind.’
‘No, I haven’t,’ Jo said.
‘Told her or made up your mind?’
‘Don’t push it, Em.’ The doors to Jo’s Land Rover clunked open. Climbing in, she placed her book on the passenger seat, steeling herself for an earache from her friend.
‘I’ve been really busy and never got the chance.’
Emily McCann was too astute to buy such a pathetic excuse. ‘You
must.
You know how she feels about you. If she finds out from someone else, she’ll be completely
devastated!’
Jo started the engine. ‘She’s tough. She’ll cope.’
‘You owe her—’
‘I owe her nothing!’
‘OK, OK.’ Emily sighed. ‘But you’re in the wrong and you know it. Why can’t you two kiss and make up and put the past behind you? Life’s too bloody short.
I’d give my right arm to have Robert back—’
‘That’s different!’
‘How?’ Emily asked.
‘You were married, for years. He was—’
‘The most amazing person in the world, my soul mate? I seem to remember you describing Kate in exactly those terms not so very long ago. You only get to meet
the one
once, Jo.
Believe me, I’m speaking from experience. Isn’t it time you started acting like grown-ups?’
‘Isn’t it time
you
stopped pretending it’ll work?’
Jo didn’t mean that. She knew it
could
work. One word from her and Kate Daniels would succumb to whatever demands she made, including coming out to the whole wide world if she
really pushed it, despite what she’d said yesterday. But Jo wasn’t about to ask her to sacrifice her police career, a job she was good at, a job that meant everything to her. It’d
always been – and still was – Jo’s contention that Kate would rise through the ranks no matter what her sexual orientation. But she’d got it into her head that the opposite
was true. And every time a high-up closet gay was outed by the press and felt compelled to resign from his or her job, it only served to reinforce her perception that ambition and homosexuality
were a disastrous combination.
Jo suddenly had that aching feeling, the one she got every time she thought about Kate, the one that began in her chest and worked its way into the pit of her stomach where it ached some more.
She didn’t need reminding how good they were together, by Emily McCann or anyone else.
‘Are you angry with me?’ Emily asked.
‘No, Emily. I’m angry with
her
! I’ve been angry with her for months, so angry I could punch her lights out.
She
did this to us, not me!’
‘So bite the bullet and put an end to it.’
Jo sighed. Until Kate came along she’d not had much luck in the love department. She’d been married and divorced from a bully who’d since been murdered – caught up in a
sinister psychopath’s game of revenge against his mother. Jo had actually been accused of his murder by the force that employed her as a profiler, spending several weeks in custody on remand,
only to have the charges withdrawn by the CPS before the case reached court. She had Kate to thank for that.
Another thing to thank her for.
‘Jesus, Em. Why is life always so fucking complicated?’
‘I don’t know, it just is . . .’ Emily’s voice trailed off. ‘Have you actually made a decision about the research project? I need to know one way or the
other.’
‘Yes, no . . . not entirely.’
‘You’d be mad not to take it.’
‘I know I would.’ To Jo’s left, the library door opened. A woman wheeling a shopping trolley with the words
These wheels emit no CO2
written large across the front
emerged into the sunshine glaring at Jo’s four-by-four. Turning off the ignition, Jo looked away. ‘I need time to think it through, Em.’
‘You did apply?’
‘Yes, I did.’
‘Good . . . then the job’s all yours.’
Torn both ways, Jo leaned her head in her hands, her elbows on the steering wheel. She loved working with the Murder Investigation Team. Hell, she loved working with Kate Daniels. But maybe the
time had come to make a clean break of it. Yesterday morning she’d lied to Kate for the very first time, stalling, pretending to have too much on when she’d asked her to help with her
current murder incidents.
Nasty cases they were, too.
Out the front windscreen, an elderly couple with cotton-wool hair and wrinkled skin strolled by hand in hand, a young couple following close behind, their arms wrapped around each other. The
whole world appeared to be in love. The question Jo was asking herself was:
did she want to join them?
‘I’m not taking the job,’ she said.
T
he Bacchus was on High Bridge in Grainger Town; a narrow cobbled street that ran between Grey Street and Pilgrim Street. It was very close to the police station, which is why
Daniels had chosen it. She rarely drank in the pub herself but it was Gormley’s second home. They could be back in the incident room in minutes if need be.
Adele’s voice floated in the air as he held the door open for her.
Inside, four men were propping up the bar. Another stood waiting to be served. The young man pulling his pint looked shagged out, a growth of designer stubble on his chin, hair thick with gel.
Like any good barman, he clocked the detectives the minute they appeared in the doorway.
‘Bit early for you, isn’t it?’ he said to Gormley as they approached.
‘Funeral,’ was all Gormley managed in return.
The barman raised an eyebrow. ‘Anyone I know?’
Gormley shook his head. ‘Daughter of a polis killed in the A1 crash last week.’
‘Grim. Want the usual or a short?’
‘A half, and pour yourself one, Justin. Second thoughts, make mine a pint.’ Gormley turned to Daniels. ‘My shout, boss. What can I get you?’
Daniels scanned the optics. ‘Famous Grouse. Straight, no ice.’
Froth from the John Smith’s spilled over the glass and pooled on the bar as the lad set it down. Gormley paid up and then followed Daniels across the worn wooden floor to a quiet table in
the corner of the room. As she sat down, she glanced back towards the bar.
‘Justin a new friend of yours?’ she asked.
‘Wife’s nephew.’ Gormley took a long pull on his pint and wiped a wet hand on his jacket. ‘He’s harmless. Bit of a barrack-room psychologist, mind you. You know the
type. Thinks he can solve everyone’s problems across the bar. Jumps to conclusions too. You’ll be the scarlet harlot by the time I get home.’
Daniels smiled at his attempt to lift her mood. It was a difficult task with multiple enquiries weighing her down. The Ralph Street enquiry had stalled. Naylor wasn’t happy because
headquarters were breathing down his neck for a result. Letting out a big sigh, she asked Gormley for his take on it, knowing full well what his answer would be.
He didn’t disappoint.
‘It’s a dog’s breakfast, if you ask me.’ He pointed out the obvious, that they had begun the investigation with four possibilities: random kids’ prank gone wrong .
. . right house, wrong person . . . right house, right person . . . wrong house entirely. ‘As far as I can see, that remains where we’re at.’
He had a point. The investigation was going nowhere, and scratching around for leads was frustrating the hell out of both of them. Mark Reid’s mystery girlfriend still hadn’t
materialized and Daniels was asking herself why. The identity of the woman was vital. They needed to rule her in or out. But all efforts to trace her had failed. According to her service provider,
her phone had gone silent since Gormley tried to contact her.
‘We’re missing something, Hank. Why has Reid’s girlfriend not come forward? She’s bound to have seen reports of the fire by now.’
‘Not necessarily. Maybe she didn’t recognize the address, didn’t connect the two.’
‘That’s always a possibility.’
‘He was supposed to be babysitting Jamie at his own house, don’t forget. She might’ve rung late that night because she was going away for the weekend. If she’s out of
town, she could be completely unaware. It does happen.’
Daniels wasn’t convinced and told Gormley why. She’d been going over and over Judy’s phone call the whole way through the funeral. There was no mention of a trip when she
called him, no ‘miss you’ message. If she was on the level, why were there no clues to her identity in his flat? They had found nothing written down, no photos, no personal mementos or
keepsakes. They had no evidence tying her to him, just a wardrobe full of clothes, if indeed they
were
hers . . .
‘You don’t think that’s odd? Because I do,’ she said.
Draining his pint, Gormley set the empty glass down on the table. He had something on his mind. Something he was reluctant to part with.
‘What?’ Daniels queried.
Gormley shrugged it off. ‘Doesn’t matter,’ he said.
‘Yes, it does. You got something to say, I want to hear it.’
‘I think it’s too early to judge her, that’s all. She could be completely innocent. She and Reid might have legitimate reasons for keeping their relationship secret. I’m
not having a dig, but you of all people would know about that.’ He met her gaze across the table. ‘I’m making a pig’s ear of this. What I’m trying to say is,
it’s not only the guilty who have things to hide.’
He meant no offence and none was taken. He knew all about her ‘baggage’ and was cool with it. She was pleased. It made it easier to talk to him. Besides, she knew exactly what he was
getting at. But she wasn’t buying it. Even if she was dealing with a clandestine relationship, she’d have expected to find stuff belonging to Judy in Reid’s flat. So far
she’d found zilch. There was still no clue to Judy’s identity –
except a uniform –
assuming she was the same woman Reid’s mates had seen him with – and
they had no proof of that either.
‘Maybe they didn’t want to go public until his divorce went through,’ Gormley suggested. ‘I know a guy whose ex screwed him rotten because of a new squeeze, insisted on
having her salary taken into account when the civil courts were working out alimony payments. You said yourself the clothes in his wardrobe were top notch. For all we know, she may have been a high
earner too.’
‘That’s plausible . . .’
‘So what’s bothering you?’
‘There wasn’t even a toothbrush of hers there.’
‘No DNA, you mean?’
‘That too. But people in love send each other daft things, don’t they? My relationship with Jo may not have been common knowledge, but I’ve got loads of that sort of thing at
home. Books, letters, cards she sent me when we were together, all of them signed. Suffice to say, there’s plenty there to lead a clued-up detective to her if they looked hard enough. See
what I’m saying?’
Gormley shrugged, his eyes darting to his nephew then settling on Daniels.
‘Maybe she wasn’t that important to him,’ he said. ‘Maybe he still had the hots for his wife and was waiting to see how the land lay before getting too involved with
anyone else.’
Gormley could identify with that. His own marital problems had begun many years ago when he was conducting enquiries away from home. He’d been unfaithful to his wife and got caught, quite
literally with his pants down, when she turned up unexpectedly to tell him she was pregnant. The hooker he was with hadn’t batted an eyelid, just picked up her clobber and left the room. His
wife had never really got past it.
That didn’t mean he loved her any less.
Daniels wanted to reach out and hug him, support him like he’d supported her. If he could turn back the clock, she knew he would. But was the same true of Mark Reid, she wondered? It would
certainly explain the photograph of Maggie they’d found in his flat. Had he strayed while his wife was pregnant only to regret his indiscretion afterwards? Had Judy got wind of it and taken
drastic action to get rid of the competition?
The voice message again.
Hi, babe. Tried your mobile. Assume it’s on charge. Hope I haven’t woken Jamie. If you get this message, call me.
Suddenly, a thought occurred that really wound Daniels up. Not quite a Eureka moment, but enough to get her excited.
‘Y
ou know, you might be right, Hank.’ She stared at him, her eyes wide with hope. ‘For days something’s been niggling away in the back of my brain. I
couldn’t quite nail it. Judy hasn’t phoned Reid since the night of the fire or left any further messages, right?
Why
hasn’t she?’
‘Well, he didn’t return her calls, did he? Maybe she’s lost interest, hooked up with someone new.’
‘No.’ Daniels shook her head. ‘The tone of her call didn’t suggest that to me. I think she
knows
he’s dead and therefore knows there’s no point
calling him again. The questions we have to ask ourselves are these: did she phone him to give herself an alibi initially and isn’t bright enough to have kept up the pretence? Or did she
really not know he was dead until she read it in the press? You just said it yourself: she thought he was at home with Jamie. If she’s the one who set the fire, the target being Maggie, she
may not have realized her fatal mistake until afterwards. I want you to be more proactive. Get out there and concentrate on
her
. Talk to Reid’s mates again, his neighbours. Someone
must know who the hell she is.’
‘What you going to do?’
It was a good question, one she didn’t answer straight away. Her head was spinning with countless jobs, a long list of actions for her team. She needed to call Matt West for a start, see
how the Forensic Science Lab were getting on, find out how close they were to a result on the cigarette butt. Then she planned to ask Carmichael to exert pressure on the Technical Support Unit for
those video enhancements in both murder cases. And set aside some time to analyse the report on the high-viz jackets she’d asked the accident investigators to supply. And re-interview PC
Dixon and a whole lot more besides.