If I Should Die (Joseph Stark) (9 page)

‘All of them again.’ Harper chuckled to himself.

It proved an unproductive day. Stark was glad he got to spend it sitting at his desk instead of traipsing around the estate. His hip had been looking forward to a day off, but his mind was restless to know what had happened.

‘Stark?’ Groombridge was peering at him from his office door.

‘Guv?’

‘Seen many post-mortems?’

‘None, Guv,’ replied Stark, with a sinking feeling about the rest of his so-called weekend.

‘Then tomorrow’s your unlucky day.’

Groombridge picked Stark up early and drove to the mortuary. His intention was to get a feel for Stark on the way but something in the young man’s silence made it curiously hard to strike up conversation, and when he did, the responses he received were appropriate, friendly, and so concise they often brought the topic to a close. Groombridge smiled, imagining the effect this might be having on Fran. But that hadn’t been the reason for her mood yesterday, or that of the whole team.

‘It really isn’t our fault,’ said Groombridge. ‘People make their own decisions. All we can do is ask the questions we’re duty bound to ask.’

‘Guv.’

A monosyllabic ambiguity. Groombridge gave up for now. It hadn’t been their fault; it was
his
. As DCI it had been his call to press Stacey, to drive a wedge into her weakness and expose that weakness to her tribe. He’d not expected this result, but that was his fault too.

Stacey lay on the mortuary slab, naked, blue-black and broken, the huge Y-shaped incision in her torso closed with oversized stitches. It seemed wrong to find her alone like that. An irrational sentiment. Groombridge watched Stark for any discomfort but saw no more than he had the previous day. The first time he himself had been in this situation he’d thrown up.

Groombridge remembered his first corpse all too clearly. An accidental drowning: the body had been in the water for several days. How many had he seen since? He might list them if he sat down to it
but he doubted he’d remember them all. But not to remember your first? It was easier to believe Stark was just repaying a thoughtless question. Easier, not necessarily true.

‘I had a feeling you’d be hovering,’ said Marcus Turner, wandering in, drying his hands on disposable blue paper. ‘Our concerns appear justified, I’m afraid.’

‘Murder, then.’ Groombridge raised his eyebrows, unsure what he’d been hoping to hear.

‘A fall from height masks much, Chief Inspector, but in this case not enough. Look, the cut on the temple I showed you. It was fresh. It had only minutes to bruise
ante mortem
. I found the victim’s blood on what’s left of her mobile phone and the shape is consistent.’

‘She was hit with her own phone?’ asked Groombridge.

‘Indeed. But the real smoking gun is round the back, here.’ He pointed to several skull X-rays on the illuminated viewer. ‘Here, bordering the shattered side, this edge, do you see? This semi-oval shape missing, and these surrounding pieces …’ Marcus looked at them expectantly but when neither copper was willing to speculate, he continued, ‘The skull shattered across this point, in part, because there was already a hole here.’

‘Created by?’

‘Blunt instrument. Heavy, rounded tip. Egg-shaped, perhaps.’

‘So she was hit from the front with her phone, then from behind with something else. Multiple assailants?’

Marcus shrugged. ‘Nothing from the scene to say one way or the other. There’s too much post-mortem contusion pooling from the impact to find any defensive bruising on her arms, but there are bloody scrapes to the fingertips and split nails, which I fear will match samples SOCO found on the balcony of the derelict top-floor flat.’

‘Suggesting that even with her skull stove in she resisted going over,’ concluded Groombridge. The reports of the prolonged scream also suggested she was conscious all the way down. What a way to go. He shook his head to dispel the image, but it was instantly replaced with one of Stacey crumpling into tears before his questioning.

‘Was there anyone else’s skin or blood under her nails?’ asked Stark.

‘Sadly not. We’ll swab the phone and clothing, too, of course, but
any foreign DNA found will likely be everyday transference from family and friends.’

‘Or so-called friends,’ said Groombridge, coldly.

‘I can confirm at this time that the deceased’s name was Stacey Appleton, fifteen years old. We would ask you to respect her mother’s wish for privacy at this difficult time,’ said Groombridge, sternly.

Fat chance, thought Stark, watching his boss on TV.

‘In light of early evidence we are treating this fatality as suspicious.’

‘Inspector! Inspector!’ A woman’s voice made itself heard above the clamour.
Chief
Inspector, thought Stark, crossly. If Groombridge resented the shoddy informality he did not show it, merely beckoned for the question. ‘Is it true that you think this death is linked with that of Alfred Ladd and the assaults on other homeless persons?’

Where the hell had they got that? thought Stark. On screen Groombridge blinked, twice. ‘I can confirm that both cases are being dealt with under the purview of my team. That is all I can say at this time.’

Groombridge brought the briefing to a swift conclusion and the news moved on to the next item. Stark turned it off and poured himself a double. Half a day off had not made up for sleep squeezed between tumbling thoughts of guilt and death. The flashback had rattled him. It was the first he’d experienced in many months and the first time he’d thought about the marketplace bombing in years. An earlier wound. Iraq. They’d heaved off the debris to reveal a girl, perhaps ten years old, with crush injuries and a thready pulse. Stark had tried to stop them moving her until the paramedics returned, but shouting locals shoved him aside, snatched her up and rushed her away in the back of a tatty Hyundai. He’d made enquiries later but could not discover her fate among all those wounded. A day spent bagging bodies and body-parts of men, women and children while screaming bereaved threw shoes and stones at you, like it was your doing. A day best forgotten.

And if the sight of Stacey sprawled dead on cold ground had triggered unwelcome memories, the sight of her laid out on the slab had tested his composure to its limit. Groombridge had hardly blinked. Would he, too, be drinking tonight to forget?

Monday did not like Stark. The whisky had helped him begin the night but had done little for the morning. A hot shower had barely driven the dreams from his thick head. Pills were his only hope today, for hip and head, if not heart.

Kyle Gibbs was up first, shuffling into the interview room, looking about as resentful as it might be possible for a teenager to look. He said nothing during the preliminaries, barely nodding at his name and date of birth.

‘Where were you on Friday night?’ began Groombridge.

‘Home,’ grunted Kyle. ‘My mum already told you.’

Groombridge returned Kyle’s stare for several seconds. ‘I would remind you that you are being interviewed under caution. That if you’re lying, and I pretty much take that as read when speaking with you, it will harm your defence.’

The legal leant towards the microphone. ‘Have you anything in the way of evidence, Chief Inspector? My client wishes to help and has confirmed his whereabouts.’

‘I have considerable evidence. And I’m sure Forensics will tell an interesting tale. I sometimes wonder at how easy it was for criminals to get away with things before DNA comparison. Thank goodness for technological progress.’

‘Is this relevant?’ asked the legal.

‘Oh, I do hope so.’ Groombridge smiled.

In all likelihood, probably not, thought Stark. As Marcus had said, unless it was from blood, DNA was only really helpful in establishing a link between criminal and victim: everyday transference was all but inevitable between family and friends. Or so-called friends. Stark did not like Kyle Gibbs. This was his first time in close proximity to the young man and for once he would happily have stayed behind the glass. But for whatever reason Groombridge had had other ideas.

The call-location traces had drawn a blank too. They only worked if a phone was switched on and a call or text was made or received. The Ferrier Rats knew to turn them off when they were up to something, and to replace SIM cards on a regular basis.

Kyle did not look worried. Not on the surface, anyway. Perhaps there was something in his eyes, but he was not about to confess and at this stage that was just about all they could hope for. As if reading
his thoughts, Kyle glanced at Stark and huffed, a small sneer appearing. Groombridge probed him a while longer but everyone in the room knew they were here to tick a box. The sneer returned as he left.

Nikki Cockcroft came next. A different piece of work: coiled like a spring, not wound tight with fear or guilt but with malice and a mouthful of venom. She did not keep silent through the preliminaries, but sniffed and swore at every opportunity. The questioning did not go much better.

‘Are you at least sorry?’ asked Groombridge, wearily.

‘For what?’

‘For the death of your friend, Stacey? She was the only other girl in your little gang. Was she not your friend?’

Nikki shrugged.

‘That’s it? You’ve known each other since childhood and she gets a shrug, nothing more?’

‘I didn’t kill her,’ snarled Nikki. ‘Why don’t you finish your questions and fuck off?’

Groombridge did just that. In all honesty Stark could hardly wait to get out of the room. If Kyle had made him want to lean across the table to slap him, Nikki had made his skin crawl.

‘I could use a shower,’ said Groombridge. ‘Who’s next?’

‘Colin Messenger, Guv,’ replied Fran, who had been watching through the glass.

‘The brains of the bunch,’ observed Groombridge. ‘Remind me why we do this.’

‘Because no one else would for the pay,’ replied Fran.

‘What do you think, Stark?’ asked Groombridge. ‘Should we chuck it all in?’

‘No one else would have me, Guv.’

Now Groombridge laughed. ‘Great. We’re the only drinkers in the last-chance saloon. How long till we can go to the pub and wash the bitter taste of despair from our mouths?’

‘At least six hours, Guv,’ Fran replied despondently.

‘How about you, Stark? I’d say you’re earning a pint today.’

Stark made a pained face. ‘Busy tonight, Guv, sorry.’

‘Hot date?’ scoffed Fran.

Stark laughed. ‘Only with pain.’

‘Ah,’ she nodded knowingly, ‘the laying-on of hands. Or is it the one when they plonk red-hot stones on your back? You’ve the look of the masochist about you. Or one of those massages when they walk on your spine? I hope your masseuse is a thirty-stone hirsute Samoan called Trevor.’

Behind their amusement Stark knew they were watching for clues. Maybe half of the truth would keep them happy, for now. ‘Hydrotherapy.’

‘
Hydrotherapy!
’ Fran threw her head back, laughing. ‘Oh,
bless
! Aquarobics without the music! Tell me it’s a class of chubby old ladies in swimming caps!’

To Stark’s amazement, she resisted the chance to share this nugget gleefully with the office, but when he put a call through to her later she couldn’t resist saying, ‘Cheers, Bob.’

As she listened to the caller, all amusement fell from her face and her head dropped. ‘OK, thanks.’ When she looked up, Stark was struck by her uncharacteristic sadness. She got up wordlessly and knocked on Groombridge’s open door. ‘Guv, Stacey Appleton’s mum was just found dead.’

Karen Appleton lay on her back on her stained sofa, vomit on her cyanotic lips. One empty bottle of budget vodka lay on the floor nearby. Another looked to have rolled from her dangling hand, spilling some of its contents into the filthy carpet. The room stank of booze, urine and despair.

‘Family Liaison called round yesterday to see how she was doing and got no answer,’ said Fran. ‘Today they had a peep through the net curtains. Looks like she choked on her own vomit.’

‘A logical conclusion.’ Marcus nodded. ‘Doors and windows locked, no indications of a struggle, no pills in the vomitus. Dead at least twenty-four hours, probably longer. We’ll check for physical evidence, of course, and I’ll confirm cause of death, but at this stage I’d hazard accidental death at best, suicide at worst.’

Groombridge said nothing. Stark could imagine what he was thinking. Another death to chalk up, pointless and, above all, preventable. Tragedy squared. It hardly mattered whether Karen had drowned in bilious despair or died merely because her carer, her long-suffering daughter, wasn’t there to roll her into the recovery position before going to bed; accident or suicide, this was little short of double murder. Whoever killed Stacey had as good as killed her mother too.

Stark turned away and went to look in Stacey’s room. If anything, it was worse. Peeling, mould-stained wallpaper in some hideous seventies pattern, a faded child’s princess duvet cover and pillow on the bed. There were no boy-band posters, no teen magazines, no make-up or hair products. Just a child-sized wardrobe with a limited array of clothes, begged, borrowed or stolen, a solitary My Little Pony toy and a heavy-duty slide-bolt screwed to the inside of the door to keep her mother out or, worse, her mother’s gentlemen friends.

‘Not much to show for a life,’ commented Groombridge at his shoulder.

Stark had seen too much poverty to be shocked but that didn’t make it any less depressing.

Karen’s death photo joined her daughter’s on the board next to Alfred Ladd’s. There was no office banter that afternoon. Three deaths in as many days were no laughing matter. The team retreated into their own thoughts, unwilling or unable to look each other in the eye. Stark could have used that pint. His anticipation about seeing Kelly again now seemed flip. Just as he was pulling on his jacket to leave, his phone rang. He had to overcome temptation not to leave it. ‘Stark.’

‘Constable, this is Sergeant Ptolemy. I’ve got someone in the car I thought you should talk to, just out front. Can you come?’

Intrigued, Stark wandered down. A girl in her late teens or early twenties, with dyed purple hair, multiple facial piercings and a glorious black eye, puffy and fresh, was sitting in the back of the car. She was holding a half-finished burger and a milkshake and appeared torn between these riches and her present company.

‘This is Rachael. She got into a row with a shopkeeper in the covered market. He didn’t like her begging outside and she’s got a bit of a gob on her. Probably what got her the shiner. But it wasn’t the shopkeeper that gave it to her. She doesn’t want to make a statement about who did but we “negotiated terms” by which she will now repeat to you what she told us.’

‘Go ahead, Rachael. He doesn’t bite. That I know of.’ Peters winked at Stark.

Rachael looked at Stark, clearly reluctant. But she’d taken the food. ‘It was that lot that’ve been beating us up,’ she began defensively. ‘You lot won’t stop them.’ Ptolemy coughed meaningfully and she altered her tone. ‘Those arseholes from the Ferrier. That wanker and his slag and the rest.’

‘Kyle Gibbs and Nikki Cockcroft?’ Stark couldn’t quite believe his ears. Surely they weren’t so stupid as to carry on their antics while the police were looking at them so hard.

Rachael shrugged. ‘Don’t know names.’

‘The description she gave us sounded all too familiar,’ said Ptolemy.

‘When was this?’ asked Stark.

‘Saturday night,’ said Rachael. ‘Shit night for begging. I was just
having a quiet one out of the way, but they wouldn’t leave off. Why won’t they leave us alone? You lot should stop them,’ she spat, ‘but you don’t give a
shit
!’

Stark clenched his jaw against a harsh rebuke. On deployment he’d been confronted with angry, often grief-stricken nationals on more than one occasion, people overcome with bitterness and fury, people with genuine cause or pain, who had to be placated or faced down. This clueless chit, with her belly full of fast-food and her thoughtless accusation, should never have got to him, but after today … He crouched to her eye level, speaking with all the quiet calm he could muster. ‘I
do
give a shit. If I had concrete evidence, those vicious little fuckers would be locked in our cells right now and half the building would be dancing and pouring drinks. But I don’t have the evidence. Yet. Perhaps you could help me with that instead of venting blind assumptions while you devour the payment you extorted for doing your civic duty.’

Despite his effort to conceal his anger she shrank back as he spoke, hardly able to meet his cold gaze. Both officers were looking at him askance. ‘Tell him what they wanted,’ prompted Ptolemy.

Rachael glanced nervously between them. ‘They were looking for someone. A girl, with pink hair.’

‘A homeless girl?’ asked Stark. Rachael nodded. ‘Do you know who? Or why?’

She shook her head. ‘Can I go now? Please.’

Stark couldn’t shake off the sheer lunacy of Kyle and Nikki. Were they so sure of themselves, so sure of police impotence, so shameless? It beggared belief. The cab journey to the Carter Orthopaedic Hospital slipped past unnoticed and, arriving with time to spare, he settled into a comfortable reception armchair and shrugged off unwanted thoughts the best way he knew, with a book: one of a series of twenty naval tales set in the Napoleonic wars that a navy lad had once recommended to him. The first had started so innocuously that it was only halfway through you realized you were hooked. The story was at a particularly gripping juncture, deep in the heart of an engagement, and Stark was soon engrossed, tea cooling on the small table beside him, a biscuit poised halfway to his mouth. It was only the sense of someone standing next to him that startled him into the present.

‘That biscuit hasn’t moved in minutes.’ Kelly slid into the opposite seat. ‘We called your name, you know.’

A glance at the chuckling receptionist said it all. ‘Sorry, miles away,’ he said, flushing a little.

‘Somewhere sunny, I hope?’

He showed her the cover. ‘Bay of Biscay, winter of 1802, at night.’

‘I’m sure it had its delights. How are you? Any new acts of recklessness to report?’

‘Fictional only.’

She looked at the blurb. ‘Boys and their toy soldiers. I thought you’d have had your fill.’

‘Actually it’s about a friendship.’

‘In war.’ She shook her head. ‘Are you looking for validation or thrills?’

‘Perhaps just distraction.’ The part of his nature that too often revelled in the funny side of confrontation was keeping quiet. He was knackered, and the last person in the world he wanted to argue with was her. That thought was new and disconcerting.

She studied him for a moment. ‘You OK?’

Stark frowned. ‘OK?’

‘You’ve the weight of the world on your shoulders.’

Uncomfortable, he half nodded, half shrugged, and wholly avoided.

Kelly smiled. ‘I’d like Lucy to sit in on this session. I’d value her opinion. But I’ll understand if you’d prefer her not to.’

Prefer not to parade your disfigurement in front of yet another stranger, she meant. ‘I’ve been nursed by enough motherly types to abandon dignity long ago.’

‘Poor you.’

It was a surprising riposte, said with warm sarcasm and a twinkle in those pale-blue eyes. It threw him slightly and made him regret his touchiness. The care he’d received had indeed left few refuges for dignity, but often enough it was the indifference with which it was administered that eroded dignity rather than the physical imposition. He retained an unflattering opinion of nursing that might or might not have been fair.

The military wards at Selly Oak hadn’t been too bad. The patients were young soldiers, fit, aside from injury, and most still had that
early-stage determination. But once you’d made it to the general wards with the elderly and infirm, poor sods who needed more, far more, it exposed a lack of empathy in some nursing staff that at times bordered on shocking. The doctors were OK generally but it was easier for them: competent or otherwise, they could breeze in on rounds, be cheerful and reassuring, then breeze off to the next bag of bones. But the nurses … There were gems, of course, a handful who remained amused and engaging as they went about their work. Perhaps their warm light cast shadow on the rest. Nights were the worst.

It was the one topic you could never broach with a medical professional and perhaps it was an understandable reaction to their daily grind of suffering and tedium, how they had to be just to cope. They had a hard bloody job, that much was obvious. Who would want their hours, their duties? Who but a service-person. Nurses too often displayed a ‘poor me’ attitude, which infuriated the soldier in Stark. God help an army of whining soldiers. That was the whole purpose of rule one: no fucking sympathy. It wasn’t that you didn’t feel sorry for yourself, you just didn’t seek affirmation from your fellow sufferers. What would be the point? They knew just how shit it was; they already empathized to their core. It was a given.

‘Quite right,’ he agreed. Besides, it wasn’t the motherly types who unsettled you, it was the beautiful, clever girls who saw straight through you. And a girl prepared not to hide it was positively terrifying. He tried to summon something clever, something flirtatious, but was relieved when nothing came.

‘Come on.’ She led him to Hydro, walking just far enough in front to afford him an absorbing view. To his – mild – shame he used his limp to advantage.

‘Evening, dear,’ Lucy greeted him cheerily. ‘Don’t mind me. I’m just here as a second opinion.’

‘We’ll run through your homework routine first for Lucy,’ said Kelly. ‘Not those tracky bottoms again, though, if you don’t mind, and those big swimming shorts cover too much as well. We want to assess the musculature. Try these.’ She held out a pair of hospital-branded swimming shorts, much briefer than his own. He stared at them. ‘Just be thankful we replaced the old Speedos.’ She grinned. ‘No top either. Off you go.’

Stark suspected he was being played with, but what could he do? He could hear their muffled voices deep in some conspiratorial conversation. He emerged from the cubicle with his gown on, looking at Lucy.

‘Don’t be shy, dear. I’ve seen my share of car-crash rehab.’ He slipped off the robe and she didn’t flinch. ‘Give us a twirl,’ she said. Their eyes remained coolly professional. ‘OK, let’s see what you can’t do,’ said Lucy.

It had been a long week. He was impatient to get better and felt he must be improving, but tonight it seemed he was getting worse, although he tried fiercely to prevent it showing. It was all the more excruciating in the skimpy shorts. Aside from the scars, he wasn’t the specimen he’d once been. He’d always been lean, but pain and rehab-focused exercise had robbed him of some of the natural muscle he’d always enjoyed.

‘Hm,’ said Lucy. ‘OK, shower that sweat off and we’ll see how you are in the pool.’

Kelly ran him through the routine she’d begun teaching him the previous week. It hurt, and the sight of her in her swimsuit, which had allowed him to ignore this before, failed this time. If anything, it hurt more, and his earlier thought of flirtation seemed all the more foolish. As foolish as the expectation that swapping uniform patrol for CID would involve less time on his feet.

His torturers spent an age closely inspecting and manually articulating parts of him while discussing him in cold medical jargon, much of which he understood all too well. Back on the poolside they put on their gowns but had Stark stand on the spot doing about-faces on command in his wet shorts, humiliated and rather depressed.

‘I concur,’ said Lucy to Kelly. ‘He should move up to two sessions a week.’ Addressing him directly she added, ‘I have to agree with Kelly’s initial assessment. You really
are
a bit of a mess.’

Kelly covered her mouth to hide her amusement, while Stark prayed for the earth to open up beneath him.

‘Cheer up, though.’ Lucy grinned. ‘She was right about you having a great arse too!’

Kelly’s laughter gave way to a crimson blush.

Six in the morning and still Stark presents himself with disgustingly impeccable dress and grooming, thought Fran, only a faint redness around his eyes giving him any semblance of humanity. Were it not too precious she might’ve spilt coffee on him as she drove. Groombridge had drowned his sorrows with a pint and gone home to his wife. Fran had continued her self-saturation at home, alone. There were days when her tiny flat seemed cavernous. ‘Physio going OK?’ she asked, for something to say.

‘Fine, thanks.’

Another brush-off, though she caught an odd expression on his face when she glanced over. He said nothing more until they were in the office, with the team muttering over their caffeine of choice. They had a long day ahead, collating and cross-referencing statements, looking for slip-ups and incongruities. The usual summons from Scotland Yard meant Cox wanted all his ducks in a row before he faced the brass.

‘Anything else?’ asked Groombridge, after the summing-up.

Fran held up her phone. ‘Text from my contact in Pathology, Guv. Karen Appleton died of asphyxiation, almost certainly accidental.’

Stark raised his hand. ‘I had a strange conversation as I left work yesterday, Guv.’ His news that Kyle and Nikki’s escapades against the homeless were still ongoing caused visible consternation among the team. ‘I don’t really know what to make of it.’

Fran did. ‘Little shits! They’ve got some front! They know if we had any real evidence we’d have arrested them.’

‘Maybe they’ll get cocky and give us something we can really use,’ said Williams.

‘It’s odd, though, don’t you think?’ said Stark.