Someone Else's Skin (28 page)

‘I think Pandora’s hope was intended to give us something to cling to.’ Ed stood with his shoulder at hers. ‘The medical evidence . . .’ he began.

‘The doctor said she presented like a sex worker. In other words, it could’ve been consensual. I was the one who decided it wasn’t. Just as I decided Leo’s nervousness at the hospital meant he was guilty.’ She bit at the inside of her cheek, tasting iron. ‘The cupboard under the stairs was big enough for a man. His broken hand and ribs . . . We added it all up –
I
added it up – and made eight from four, because it fitted what I thought I knew about men and women. What I
expected
.

‘At the refuge, Hope made sure Shelley saw her bruises. She told the women about Leo, let them see how afraid she was, how desperate. She abused their trust, made them witness a stabbing, knowing how vulnerable they were. Maybe she enjoyed it. The power trip. Making them provide an abuser with an alibi . . . Can you imagine how Simone’s going to feel when she finds out she’s been protecting an abuser?’

‘You’re assuming Hope will let her go,’ Ed said shortly.

‘I’m not assuming anything. I’m
hoping
.’

He walked away from her, watching the water. Marnie moved to join him. The bridge breathed under their feet.

‘Simone will have told Hope what happened to her, with Lowell.’ Ed held his neck in his hand. ‘If she told
me
. . . she’ll have told Hope. She’ll have made a gift of her worst nightmare, to a woman who thrives on manipulation, torture . . .’

‘If Hope’s got any sense, she won’t hurt Simone. She could still make a case for self-defence with Leo. The evidence . . .’

‘Why try to kill him?’ Ed asked. ‘Just for the power rush?’

‘He was working up his courage to come to us. She knew she’d pushed him as far as she could, and she needed an alibi if he went to the police. There was too much evidence of abuse, if he chose to expose it. She couldn’t cover it all up.’

They looked upstream, at the sprawl and soar of the city. ‘She meant to kill him. I’m sure of that. When she realised he wasn’t dead, she was terrified. That was probably the only honest emotion she’s shown us.’

Perhaps there was another motive, too. The need to kill the one person who knew everything about her. The only witness to the real Hope. Had Stephen killed Marnie’s parents for the same reason? To expunge that truth?

‘Back at the refuge,’ Ed said, ‘when you were talking about the invisible gorilla . . . You said Ayana didn’t think it was self-defence. She thought Hope meant to kill Leo, even if she didn’t suspect her of the abuse.’

‘None of us suspected Hope of that. She resented my questions at the hospital, but I put it down to the fact that I’d taken what was left of her dignity. She was weeping, for God’s sake. That’s supposed to be the hardest emotion to fake. Tears blur your vision, bad for survival, isn’t that what they say?’

She’d made more mistakes than she could count. She turned to face Ed. ‘You saw her, at the hospital. Did you pick up any threatening vibes?’

He shook his head. ‘Nothing.’

‘She likes to play the little girl lost. I bet men fall for that all the time.’ She studied his face. ‘Control turns her on, but she despises men. Sees them as lower primates. I bet she saw you as a challenge, someone higher up the food chain . . . She wanted witnesses.
Needed
them. Not just as an alibi. As . . . vindication. Witnesses mean justice. In some way, even if it’s twisted. Witnesses make it real.’

‘You really think she won’t hurt Simone?’

‘I can’t be certain,’ Marnie admitted. She was thinking about the flowers. The roses that Hope insisted Leo bring to the refuge, even though she hated flowers.

They make a mess and then they die.

The roses were a trigger, had to be. Hope’s way of binding at least one of the women to her, so tightly she could be sure of an ally if things went wrong, or if she needed a passionate advocate.

‘It’s possible that Hope stage-managed more than the stabbing. She told Leo to bring a big bunch of yellow roses to the refuge, but Leo swears Hope hated flowers.’

‘I thought they were to hide the knife,’ Ed said.

‘Maybe, but why yellow roses especially? That’s what Hope insisted he bring. So I’m thinking, what if the roses weren’t for Hope?’

Ed repeated, ‘The roses weren’t for Hope?’

‘You told me Lowell Paton took Simone flowers, every week.’

‘Yes . . .’

‘Lowell said the same thing. He said he took her yellow roses. What if Hope knew the roses would be a trigger, knew
what
they’d trigger? That way she’d be certain of at least one person’s reaction to Leo’s arrival at the refuge. Complete shock. Fear. Simone wouldn’t have had any trouble seeing Leo as a rapist, a potential killer. She’d see the roses and she’d remember Lowell.’

‘Hope told Leo to bring yellow roses?’

‘Yes. She insisted on yellow roses, and a knife. I fixed on the knife, we all did, but the roses were a weapon too. A way to make Simone remember – and react. A way to prime her as a witness and as a backup plan in case the stabbing went wrong.’

Ed half turned away, linking his hands behind his head. ‘Jesus . . .’

Marnie moved so the breeze was at her back, thinking of the suitcase Hope took from the house. Leo had been reluctant to tell her what was inside the case, but in the end he’d confessed, the way he’d confessed the rest of it. No – not the
rest
of it, not everything. She doubted that she’d seen more than the tip of the iceberg. All couples hid their private lives to one extent or another, and the Proctors had more to hide than most.

‘How can I help?’ Ed asked.

‘By keeping things calm at the refuge. We’ll have to re-interview everyone, about Hope. How’s Britt getting on? Is she keeping Shelley in line?’

‘I hope so.’ Ed grimaced. ‘Not sure
hope
is the right word, under the circumstances. Makes you wonder what was going through her parents’ minds, when they named her.’

Marnie sketched a quick picture of Hope’s childhood. He listened in silence, then sighed. ‘What does it say about me, that I’m not surprised? I’ve heard much worse . . .’

‘Parents don’t breed psychopaths. They don’t always help, that’s for sure, but look at Ayana, and Simone. They didn’t let their early experiences turn them into monsters.’

‘Where’re Hope’s parents now?’

‘Her mum died six months ago. Cancer. I’m wondering if that was the tipping point, for what happened in Finchley. The timing fits. Her dad’s in sheltered housing, in Dulwich. Leo didn’t go into details. He didn’t think her mum’s death was significant, but from the way he described what happened? I think it must have been a catalyst. After her mum’s death, Hope started getting a lot worse.’

‘You don’t think there’s a chance she’ll go after her dad?’

‘Kenneth Reece. I’m tracing him, but from what Leo said, Hope never had a problem with her dad. She blamed her mum, for being a victim.’

‘That doesn’t sound good for Simone.’

‘Simone’s a survivor,’ Marnie said.

Ed nodded, but he didn’t look happy. ‘Let’s hope she gets the chance to prove it.’

7

Abby Pike was working late. ‘Here’s that list of sheltered housing in Dulwich. Do you want me to start ringing round?’

‘Thanks.’ Marnie scanned the list and handed it back. ‘We’re looking for Kenneth Reece, late fifties, widower. His wife was Gayle Reece. She died in October. I don’t have the exact date.’

Abby wrote it down. Her desk was chaotic, but it was an organised chaos. Marnie bet she could lay her hands on everything she needed, when she needed it. ‘Tell me about the CCTV.’

‘Nothing from the hospital yesterday. I got the Finchley footage, but it doesn’t show the roof and that’s where they took her, isn’t it? Ayana.’

‘How about footage from the Proctors’ house?’

‘The nearest camera’s two streets away, by the tube station.’ Abby nodded at the monitor on her desk. ‘Here.’

Marnie crouched to see the screen better. It was the usual poor quality. Muddy imagery, stilted delivery. Nothing like the crystalline data secured in television dramas, where every courtroom in the land presented jurors with infallible evidence captured by cameras in the well-lit locations chosen by criminals for the purposes of recording their misdemeanours. The CCTV outside Woodside Park tube station relied on yellow sodium street lighting, the worst kind. Of course it did. What was it Marnie had said to Noah, right at the start of this?
No one loves us that much.

She peered at Abby’s monitor. Hope Proctor and Simone Bissell had gone into the underground station at 8.11 a.m. Nearly twelve hours ago. Simone was carrying a suitcase. Hope had her head down.

‘Woodside Park,’ Abby said. ‘The Northern Line runs all the way to Elephant and Castle. After that, if you want Dulwich, it’s buses. I’ve asked for CCTV from the British Transport Police. So far, I can’t find them coming out of the tube at Elephant and Castle, so maybe they weren’t headed for Dulwich, but I thought it made sense to start there, if that’s where her dad’s based.’

Marnie straightened up. ‘Good thinking. Keep looking.’

‘Are we going public with the missing persons? The new status, I mean.’

‘Not yet. I need to be sure Hope won’t panic and do something stupid . . . Can I have the footage on disk? I want Ed Belloc to take a look at it.’

‘Of course.’ Abby took the CD from the computer drive and slipped it into a plastic case. ‘Here you go.’

‘Thanks,’ Marnie said. ‘And you’d better call in Noah, and DS Carling. It’s going to be a late night.’

Ed was waiting in her office. He’d made coffee. ‘I’ve got the footage,’ she said.

‘Great.’ Ed pulled up a chair next to hers.

Marnie was tired of studying the CCTV’s tide of people going in and out, London’s streets rendered in lurid video-game Technicolor that made everyone look like a suspect. She was going blind, searching through the pictures. Except for the images of Hope and Simone at the tube station. She couldn’t stop looking at those. She and Ed watched the footage three times.

‘It looks like Simone’s in charge,’ Marnie said. ‘Doesn’t it?’

‘Yes, it does.’

Marnie touched her thumb to the picture. ‘Simone doesn’t know. Yet. She thinks she’s helping Hope. She thinks she’s in control of the situation.’ Her neck prickled at the thought of Hope shattering that illusion, once the women reached whichever hiding place Hope had chosen for them. She picked up her coffee, holding the hot mug against her face, hoping the flare of pain in her cheek didn’t signal the onset of a migraine.

‘Woodside Park . . .’ Ed was still studying the image. ‘You said Hope’s dad’s in sheltered housing, in Dulwich, was it? Woodside Park’s in the right direction.’ He’d drawn the same conclusion as Abby Pike.

‘Yes. I should have an address for her dad very soon. Kenneth Reece.’ She checked her watch. ‘Can I ask a favour?’

Ed said, ‘Sure. If I can ask one.’

She knew what he wanted. ‘We’re looking for Ayana. I promise you that.’

‘The Mirzas’ house is on the way to Dulwich,’ he pointed out.

‘Okay. Let’s do things in that order.’

Ayana’s parents lived in a terraced house that opened directly on to the pavement. The street was a mess of roadworks, abandoned for the night. A deep trench ran up one side, exposing pipework so corroded it looked like the trunk of a tree growing horizontally under the tarmac.

The Mirzas’ house had thick net curtains at the windows and a pane of frosted glass in the front door, impossible to see through. Marnie rang the bell and stood back so that Ed would be the first person the Mirzas saw when they came to the door.

No one answered until the third ring, and only then with the chain on. A young man in a newly ironed shirt peered through the gap. He looked like an office intern, very smart and groomed. ‘Yes?’

‘Hatim?’ Ed smiled. ‘Can we come in?’

‘Sir,’ he wrinkled his brow, ‘I don’t know you.’

‘I’m Ed Belloc, from the Victim Support Unit. This is Detective Inspector Rome.’

Hatim’s eyes scared to Marnie. He couldn’t have been more than seventeen. Ayana’s little brother. What part did he play in the bleach attack that blinded his sister? Marnie could smell garam masala; saw in her mind’s eye the cloth purse Noah said Ayana wore at her waist, memory and warning in one.

‘Sir,’ Hatim deferred to Ed, keeping the door chained, ‘what is this, please?’

‘I spoke with Turhan earlier. Didn’t he mention it?’

‘Sir, no, he didn’t.’

‘Are your mum and dad in?’

‘No, sir.’

‘Nasif, maybe? Turhan? He was here earlier.’

Hatim shook his head at each name. It was Marnie’s guess that his brothers had briefed him for this task, leaving him home in case of a visit by the police.

‘Can we come in, please, Hatim?’ she asked.

He paused, then nodded, sliding the chain free and opening the door, standing like a sentry as they stepped into the square sitting room. Everywhere was tidy, a whiff of room spray under the cold scent of cooking. School textbooks on the table, patterned throws pulled neat on the sofa. Photos on the walls, all boys. None of Ayana. Marnie knew straight away that they wouldn’t find Ayana here.

‘We’re wondering where we can find your sister.’

Hatim stayed by the door, his shoulders pulled back. ‘I haven’t seen my sister in a long time,’ he said.

It was what they’d told him to say, she guessed, but it sounded like the truth. Hatim was slight, with an adolescent’s awkward, outsized hands and feet. She had the sudden, horrible suspicion that he’d poured the bleach into his sister’s eyes. He didn’t have the weight to hold anyone down. The older brothers would have done that, delegating what they saw as the easy task to Hatim.

She picked up one of the textbooks from the table. ‘We’re worried about Ayana. We think she might be in danger.’

Hatim looked possessively at the book in her hands. ‘She should have stayed here. We would have kept her safe.’

‘I don’t think she knew that.’ Marnie opened the book, riffling the pages. ‘I think she was scared to be here.’