Backlash (4 page)

And that was where all the planning broke down, Marie thought– because even if something had gone seriously wrong, what were the bobbies likely to do about it in the middle of the night?

‘She's probably just struck lucky,' she heard herself say aloud. ‘Found a punter with a lot of money, an' a lot of stayin' power.'

‘Yes, that will be it,' Lucy agreed, far too readily. ‘She'll just have struck lucky.'

Marie lit up a fresh cigarette from the butt of her old one.

We've got to keep reassurin' each other that everything's all right, she thought. And maybe, if we say it often enough, it really will be.

FOUR

F
or Monika Paniatowski, the corner table in the public bar of the Drum and Monkey – at which she was now sitting with Crane and Beresford – was nothing less than a time machine. It was at this table that she had first decided that she hated DI Bob Rutter, and then realized that she had fallen in love with him. It was on this very chair that she sat – heartbroken – when Rutter's sense of duty forced him to end the affair, and it was where she had come to grieve when she learned he had taken his own life.

But the table held happy memories, too. It reminded her of working with DCI Charlie Woodend, the man who had made her the policewoman – and perhaps even the person – she was now. It recalled for her the joy – even amid the despair – when she finally accepted that Bob's last wish had been that she should raise his daughter, Louisa, as her own.

There were times, it had to be admitted, when she'd considered breaking with the past and using another pub – or, at least, another table – but she knew, deep inside herself, that was never going to happen.

Paniatowski took a sip of her vodka and banished the time machine to the back of her mind.

‘All we've got so far is a forced window – and a woman who went missing sometime in the last ten hours,' she said to her team. ‘Now maybe, even as we speak, DS Meadows is on her way here with a vital piece of information which will help crack this case – a car number plate, or a description of a strange man, for example – but I don't think that's at all likely.'

‘Any particular reason for believing that, boss?' Crane asked.

‘Yes. The intruder was very careful. He didn't choose just
any
window to break in through – he chose one that was hidden from the neighbours and in the emptiest part of the house, which suggests to me that he's been planning this for some time. And given that he's been so careful about that, he's not likely to have been sloppy over other things. So we won't find his prints in the house, the car he used was probably stolen, and if he thought there was any chance of him being spotted, he was probably wearing a disguise.'

‘How would he have got her out of the house?' Crane asked.

‘I don't know,' Paniatowski admitted.

‘She's not a big woman,' Beresford said. ‘In fact, she's quite tiny. He could have fitted her into a sack or a largish box.'

Paniatowski's eyes narrowed. ‘Oh, you know her, do you, Colin?' she asked sharply,

‘I've . . . err . . . met her,' Beresford said.

‘And what's she like?'

‘As I said, she's petite.'

‘I mean, as a person.'

‘I only met her the once,' Beresford said, evasively.

‘But you must surely have formed some impression of her.'

‘Lively,' Beresford said. ‘Charming. Very outgoing.'

‘Did she also strike you as the kind of woman who might consider doing a bunk?'

‘I thought you'd already dismissed that as a possibility, boss,' Beresford protested.

‘
Did
she strike you that way?'

‘The window was forced, boss.'

‘If she's done a bunk, she could have forced it herself in order to throw everybody off the scent – and you still haven't answered the question,' Paniatowski said.

‘No, she didn't look like that kind of woman,' Beresford said. ‘In fact, she seemed quite devoted to Mr Kershaw.'

‘Well, isn't that nice,' Paniatowski said sourly. ‘All right, we'll go back to the assumption she's been abducted, even if we don't know how he got her out of the house. Now who'd have been likely to snatch her?'

‘Could be a kidnapper – for ransom,' Crane suggested.

‘We'd already dismissed that possibility before you arrived – and there are two good reasons for that,' Paniatowski told him. ‘The first – as Kershaw pointed out himself – is that he's not a rich man.' She paused and turned to her inspector. ‘He
isn't
a rich man, is he, Colin?'

‘How would I know?' Beresford wondered out loud.

‘And the second thing is that if she's been kidnapped for ransom, then the kidnapper must be a hardened professional criminal,' Paniatowski continued, ignoring the question. ‘And no professional criminal is going to snatch such a high-risk target as a Chief Superintendent's wife.'

‘Do
you
have a theory, boss?' Beresford asked.

‘I think it was personal,' Paniatowski said, ‘
so
personal that the kidnapper was prepared to take on the whole of the Mid Lancs police force if he had to.'

‘What sort of motive are we talking about here?' Crane asked.

‘I don't know,' Paniatowski confessed. ‘He may have wanted to get back at her, or he may have wanted to get back at Kershaw. But whichever is the case, he will have known her, and that's why, first thing in the morning, we'll be talking to all – and I do mean
all
– of the Kershaws' friends and relatives.'

‘That's a bit of a tall order, especially with the friends,' Beresford said. ‘They're a very popular couple.'

‘Yes, well, you'd know more about that than I would, wouldn't you, Inspector?' Paniatowski said.

The clock struck the hour, and once again Marie heard the click-clack of Lucy's impossibly high heels approaching.

‘I've got some good news for you,' Lucy said, the moment she drew level with the doorway. ‘Grace hasn't disappeared at all. Ruby saw her going off with a punter.'

Marie gasped with relief, but then, almost immediately, fresh worries and doubts began to set in.

‘And we know him, do we?' she asked hopefully. ‘Is he a regular?'

‘Ruby didn't
interview
him, to see if he was suitable, you know,' Lucy said with a smile. ‘She only saw them from a distance. But he was definitely driving a big car, and it was definitely Grace getting into it.'

‘And when was this?' Marie asked.

‘Ruby said it was just after it went dark. So what would that make it? Five hours ago?'

Five hours! Five whole bloody hours!

‘That's a long time for her to be away,' Marie said, as the fear bubbled up inside her.

‘Driving off in cars, with men, is what we do,' Lucy countered. ‘And it's not as if it's unheard of to take that long – a bit uncommon, I'll grant you, but not unheard of.'

Yet two words kept pounding away mercilessly at Marie's brain like a steam hammer.

Five hours . . . five hours . . . five hours . . .

‘What if it was
him
?' she asked tremulously.

‘What if it was
who
?' Lucy asked – though she knew well enough who Marie meant.

‘What if it was the
Ripper
!' Marie replied, almost choking on the name.

Lucy clamped her hands on her hips in a show of exasperation.

‘I should have put my foot down the moment the rest of you girls started calling him that,' she told her friend. ‘I should never have allowed it.'

And despite the situation – despite her own, still-present fear – Marie could not help herself from smiling at what Lucy had just said.

As if Lucy thought of herself as their leader!

And then it struck Marie that, in a lot of ways, Lucy
was
just that.

When one of the girls had a problem, it was Lucy she talked it out with. When a helping hand was required, it would more likely than not be Lucy who provided it. And it was Lucy who had come up with the idea of these safety patrols.

‘I should have insisted we called him the Dribbler or the Panter,' Lucy continued. ‘Calling him the Ripper was just stupid – it makes him sound much more frightening than he actually is.'

‘But he
is
frightening,' Marie insisted. ‘Just thinking about him is enough to scare the crap out of me.'

Lucy laughed again. ‘Then look on the bright side – you must be saving yourself a fortune in laxatives,' she said. ‘Seriously,' she continued, ‘I know he's not a nice man, but then
most
of the men we have to deal with aren't
nice
– in fact, you can count on the fingers of one hand the ones who are. And he's never done any real damage, now has he?'

‘Try telling that to Denise,' Marie countered. ‘She had to have ten stitches in her arm.'

‘Yes, she did,' Lucy agreed. ‘But that's almost as much down to her as it is down to him.'

‘What do you mean?'

‘She won't learn how to handle the punters. She always says the wrong thing, or does something to annoy them. And there's really no need for that, because this is a business like any other business – and the customer is always right.'

‘In most businesses, the customers don't carry a razor around,' Marie pointed out.

‘And neither do most of our customers,' Lucy said soothingly. ‘Listen, if it had been you or me in that situation, we probably wouldn't have got cut at all. And anyway, cutting her must have frightened him as much as it frightened her. He's nothing to worry about.'

‘If he's nothing to worry about, why do we take it in turns to patrol the streets?' Marie asked.

‘We're just being careful, that's all,' Lucy said unconvincingly. ‘Anyway, why would you think it was the Ripp— why would you think it was
that
man, who Grace went off with?'

‘Because she's been gone for five hours!' Marie screamed. ‘Five bloody hours.'

‘She's a smart girl,' Lucy said. ‘She wouldn't take any unnecessary risks.'

But
was she
so smart? Marie wondered.

Grace
said
she was nineteen, and that she'd been on the game for three years. But sometimes, when you caught her without any make-up on, she didn't look more than fifteen. And even
with
make-up, there was still a hint of the fresh-faced innocent about her which reminded Marie of herself, when she'd first started out walking the streets.

And how long did
you
keep that look, girl? she asked herself. Six months at the most!

‘I'd better be moving on,' Lucy said. ‘You want to learn to relax a bit, Marie. Carry on worrying the way you are, and you could end up a basket case.'

I could end up a lot of things, Marie thought. I could end up
dead
.

FIVE

D
S Kate Meadows appeared in the doorway of the Drum and Monkey's public bar, looked around, and spotted her new boss and the rest of the team at the table on the other side of the room.

Studying the deliberately purposeful way she strode across the room, Paniatowski felt a momentary glimmer of hope that perhaps – against the odds – Meadows was the bearer of some important piece of information which would help them to wrap up this bloody case in no time at all. Then, taking a closer look at Meadows' elfin face – and reading the very adult frustration that was residing there – she felt that hope flicker and die.

Paniatowski gestured towards the empty chair next to Crane, and said, ‘Anything to report, Kate?'

‘Kershaw's neighbours are either deaf or dumb – or both,' Meadows said, sliding gracefully into her seat. ‘None of them – not a single one – appears to have seen a bloody thing.'

Paniatowski felt her recent grumpiness start to evaporate, and did her best to hide a half-smile which had forced itself on to her lips.

She had been like Meadows once, she thought – young, enthusiastic, expecting every investigation to open up as neatly and easily as a tin of sardines.

‘You look like you could use a drink, Kate,' she said. ‘What's it to be? A pint of best? Or would you prefer a short?'

‘A tomato juice, thank you,' Meadows told her.

Around the table, three sets of very surprised eyebrows involuntarily rose, and then, when the wearers realized how rude that might appear, were quickly lowered again.

‘So you just don't fancy a drink tonight, then, Sarge?' Crane said, to cover his own embarrassment – and possibly that of the others. ‘Well, I can sympathize with that – I sometimes don't feel like one myself.'

‘Not that that happens
very
often, young Jack,' Colin Beresford said, with a chuckle.

‘It's not that I'm not drinking tonight – it's that I don't drink at all,' Meadows said, and though she appeared to be addressing the remark solely to Crane, it was plain that it was intended for the whole table. ‘And, in case the thought's crossing your mind that I might be a recovering alcoholic, Jack, let me assure you, here and now, that I'm not.'

Crane blushed. ‘I didn't mean to . . .' he began.

‘I know you didn't,' Meadows said, with a softening smile. ‘But it's better to get these things straight right from the start, don't you think?'