Absent Light (11 page)

“Are those the contact sheets for Jacks?” she said, eyeing the file.

He nodded. He had very expressive eyes, she thought.

“Thanks,” she beamed. “Anything of interest?”

“Depends on your point of view,” he said with an enigmatic smile. “Four hundred and twenty pages including some fairly quality information. Stuff on the Park Lane Boys mainly.”

She gave an involuntary shiver. The Park Lane Boys had a formidable reputation. Based in Aston, they were principally a white gang who sometimes used black criminals to do their dirty work. Powerful, impressively armed, the Park Lane Boys not only ran large-scale protection rackets, but, through sheer terror, had made impressive inroads into the crack-cocaine business. Total loyalty to the gang was demanded. Any new member was forced to go through a form of initiation involving carjacking at gunpoint, any indiscipline punished by severe beating, any defector executed, usually by a shot in the face. When the police once tried to talk off the record to one of the few surviving victims of an attack, the former gang member asked for it to be recorded
on
the record that he knew absolutely nothing.

“Nothing that sends your alarm bells jangling?” she said.

“No,” Stratton said firmly.

“Take a peek?”

He silently passed her the file. She opened it, scanning the list of meetings and phone conversations. As Stratton said, it was mainly a catalogue of information passed to Adam, with notes about the type of action taken. There were also numerous references to other criminals, mainly professional thieves, a couple of whom Jacks was asked to cosy up to. “Who's Damian Crawley?” Helen said, looking up.

Stratton smiled. “A light-fingered individual. Crawley's managed to successfully evade the law for a couple of decades. He steals to order and has been linked with any number of robberies, but we've never had enough evidence to charge him and bang him up.”

“So that's why Adam was keen to exploit Jack's friendship with Crawley?”

“Yup, it was hoped that Jacks could find out when the next big job was in the offing.”

“But nothing came of it.”

Stratton shook his head.

“Probably wasn't enough time.”

“Either that, or Jacks wasn't as well connected as he made out.”

Helen read on. No dodgy dealing. No references to money unaccounted for. In fact, there was nothing to suggest that Roscoe was anything but above board. A bit of her felt vindicated. She handed the file back to Stratton. “Dead end,” she remarked.

“A line of enquiry closed,” Stratton corrected her.

She smiled at him. “I guess that's something.”

“The problem is,” Stratton said crisply, “what if something else happens to you?”

“I'll cross that bridge when and if.”

His eyes levelled with hers. “You'd have to make it official, Helen.”

She opened her mouth to protest but Stratton headed her off. “I've been giving it some thought. As long as we find the right people to talk to, I reckon you're in with a chance.”

“What sort of a chance?” she said suspiciously.

“Fifty-fifty”

“Not good odds.”

“Neither is doing nothing.”

She couldn't think up a cogent argument so she said the first thing that flashed into her brain. “Are they really going to be that bothered?”

Stratton burst out laughing. “That's the kind of response I get from prostitutes and paedophiles. Everyone's entitled to be protected. What makes you so bloody special?”

She gave him a transparent look.

“For God's sake, Helen, you're old news. Sure, lots of people would have preferred it if you'd kept your mouth shut, or at least gone about exposing Jacks and his minders in a more subtle way…”

“I tried,” she murmured. But not soon enough, she thought, miserable at the memory. When, eventually, she went to Barnaby Finch, who in turn went to Detective Chief Inspector Dukes, it was already too late. Somewhere after that the information looked as if it was going to get buried, and she lost patience.

“But there were plenty of us,” Stratton continued, “who thought you did the right thing.”

She gave a shaky laugh. “Could have fooled me.”

“Corruption's a dirty word, Helen. You said so yourself. Everyone feels tainted by it. Makes people edgy.”

Usually because truly corrupt officers rarely worked alone, she thought. “Which is precisely why no one's going to be interested in little old me. Anyway, Adam wasn't corrupt. That file exonerates him.”

Stratton rolled his eyes. “Hardly. He just knows how to play the system. He was the classic
Lone Ranger
.”

“Oh, for God's sake,” she said, in spite of knowing that Stratton had strongly argued this to her superiors in an effort to distance her, and anybody else connected with the case, from Adam.

“He was bloody good at his job,” Stratton admitted, “Popular and charming, I grant you.”

“And trusted,” she chipped in doggedly.

“But he'd been passed over for promotion and his marriage was struggling. Coupled with that, he got a buzz out of working alone, and, underneath that flash exterior…”

“Charismatic,” she cut in, feeling the colour blossom in her cheeks.

“He was extremely manipulative,” Stratton continued, unabashed.

“You've been reading too many reports,” she said, barely keeping a lid on her composure. “He was a man, not a profile.”

“And how do you explain his talent for covering his tracks?” Stratton countered, eager, it seemed, to have the last word.

She looked at him, took a breath, softened her voice. “There weren't any to cover.” Oh, how she wished she could have said it with more conviction. The truth was she didn't know any more. The more she tried to remember, the more confused she felt. Deep down, she suspected, Stratton was right.

“How would you describe him, then?” he said, levelling with her.

She chewed her lip. “Misguided.”

They stared at each other in stalemate. Stratton was the first to break the silence.

“As far as Harmon and Wylie are concerned, you're just another case. What you did or what you used to do has no relevance to them. You've got to dump the past where it belongs.”

“What if it won't dump me?” She was painfully aware of sounding defensive. He sipped his wine, cradled the glass. He's embarrassed, she thought. Coppers don't like emotional women. That's what Adam told her, usually when she was banging on about his wife. “Do you know what day it is tomorrow?” she said quietly.

He looked blank for a second, then his eyes lightened with recognition. “The day Rose Buchanan was killed,” he said, sombre.

“I can't forget,” she murmured. “I don't think I ever will.”

“Helen…”

“That call-out was bad,” she said, cutting across him, needing to talk, “but it was no worse than some of the others. I'd seen dozens of dead bodies: mutilated, raped, burnt, rotting. Any scenes of crime officer will tell you that it's always the kids who get to you most. Rose might have been old enough to have sex, but she was little more than a child really. Too young to be so brutally extinguished,” she said, taking a morose pull at her drink.

“And then when Adam confirmed that it was Jacks, that he'd been running him for months, like it was a confession.” She looked straight into Stratton's eyes. “You know, men say the strangest things when you're in bed with them. It's as if they think the bedroom confers some kind of confidentiality clause.”

“Not just men,” Stratton said with a smile, attempting to defuse her.

He was right. She'd done exactly the same with Martin. She looked away, shook her head at her own folly. “Sounds daft now, but I used to think of myself as a conduit for the victim. I felt as if I were responsible for telling their story, recording what happened, how it took place, the way they died. In my head, I was this great spokesperson for the dead. It sounded grand and noble, lifted a shitty day.” She glanced at Stratton with defeated eyes. “Now it just seems poncey.”

Stratton didn't say a word. Simply let her talk. Like the old days.

“It wasn't just because Rose Buchanan was pretty and vulnerable, but…”

“Because it could have been avoided,” he cut in softly.

“If
only
one of the players had talked,” she said, anguished. If only
I
had talked, she thought.

Stratton reached over, touched her chin with the crook of his finger. “You're not responsible for the failures of others. Like I said, Helen, you have to move on.”

She nodded, pulled away, took a deep drink to relieve her aching throat and hide the guilt in her eyes. “I take it you didn't turn anything up,” she said, coldly pulling herself together.

Stratton's face relaxed a little. This was easier territory for him. “As I thought, Jacks is doing his time, best behaviour and all that.”

She clicked her tongue in disgust. “I suppose he'll be up before the parole board soon.”

“You have to be joking,” Stratton assured her. “As far as anyone else involved is concerned, there's no credible link to either of the attacks on you.”

“You're certain?”

“As much as I can be.”

“I should feel pleased.”

Stratton scrutinised her with shrewd eyes. “But you're not?”

“It would have been simpler if there'd been a connection,” she said. “Then it would make sense. At the moment I feel as if I'm on a train wearing a blindfold.”

“Not sure of the destination?”

“Something like that,” she smiled sadly. She wondered whether to tell him about her visit to Robyn Roscoe's gallery. Better not, she thought. Nothing to tell anyway. Not yet.

Neither of them spoke for a moment. She could still feel the spot where he'd touched her chin. “Anyway, enough of me,” she said. “What about you?”

He looked startled. “I'm good,” he said, a bit too brightly, she thought.

“And Annie and the kids?”

His face clouded. “We're not together any more.”

She stared at him in astonishment. “I'm sorry, Joe. I'd no idea. When did you split?”

“About three years ago.”

She felt her heart flip. “I hope it's nothing…”

“Occupational hazard,” he cut in with a taut smile. Don't skewer me with kindness his look implied. “I see the kids. It's all quite amicable, as much as these things ever are,” he added ruefully. “We've both tried to keep the legal side of things to a bare minimum. I've never had much time for solicitors, as you know. They always seem to make a bad situation worse.” His eyes met hers. She tensed, not quite knowing what to say. The consequences of never being able to switch off during an active murder investigation, the long hours, heavy boozing, the tendency to respond to an important phone call first and let the family come second, often led to affairs, and frequently contributed to the disintegration of a marriage, but, in spite of Joe's insistence, the guilty part of her wondered whether she'd also been responsible for his predicament, whether his going out on a limb for her had precipitated its downfall. It was Joe who'd first warned her that Adam was married, that he was a manipulative individual, that there were ugly rumours about him, that any involvement with him could be dangerous to her. She thought it was borne out of envy. She hadn't listened. Not then.

“So where are you living?”

“I've got a place the size of a shoe-box in Stourbridge,” he said with a wry smile, “not that I spend a lot of time in it.”

She sensed his loneliness. They'd both lost their sparkle, she thought, or was it part of growing older, one of those horrible rites of passage when you suddenly realise that all your hopes are dreams, that you're never going to set the world alight, and that the things you chased weren't worth having in any case?

“More wine?” she said, picking up the bottle.

He glanced at his watch. “No, I'd better be going,” he said, getting to his feet. “Thanks for the drink.”

She felt a pang of disappointment but covered it with a smile. She followed him downstairs. He paused by the door and turned to her.

“Let me try to talk to someone, put it on the level.”

So like Joe, she thought, remembering. The words were almost identical, only the last time he'd appealed directly to Detective Chief Inspector Dukes. She shook her head.

“What about Harmon?” he coaxed. “She's a woman and a good police officer.”

“And Wylie?”

“He's a jumped up little prick.”

She burst out laughing. “What's it worth for me not to tell him you said that?”

“You trying to blackmail me?” he said, his mouth slipping into a smile.

“Wouldn't dream of it.”

He continued to look at her. She felt as if she had feathers in her stomach. “I mean it, Helen,” he said, serious now.

She checked the impulse to protest loudly. “Or?”

He let out a sigh. “What if something more serious happens? You've put me in a difficult position.”

Oh, I get it, she thought. If I don't say something, you will. Hadn't she said exactly the same to Adam four years before? “You giving me a choice?”

His reply was evasive. “I'll do everything possible to ensure your complaint's not buried.”

How, she wondered? “With the greatest of respect, you can't.”

Stratton's jaw tightened. He didn't argue. He knew she was right.

Guilt. It had to rate as the most corrosive of emotions, Helen thought, as she tried to sleep. Even misplaced, or survivor-guilt, as it was sometimes termed, attacks the soul in the most irrational fashion.

Sometimes she'd wake up and not remember. She'd spring out of bed with a lightness in her step, joy in her heart, then she'd look in the mirror, see the shortness of her hair, see her shame. It must be wonderful to be a psychopath, she thought crossly, plumping up her pillows for the third time. They never seemed troubled by wrongdoing of any kind. No conscience, no feeling, no pain.