Cold Kill (27 page)

You can run through Notting Hill Gate without bringing too much attention to yourself, but not if you're a man carrying a woman's handbag. The first mugger had taken out the purse and wallet, so he let the bag drop. Jamie was fast, but not in those boots. He came out of the far end of the alley in time to see the men rounding the corner. In a couple of minutes they would be down into the tube
and gone. He gazed after them, breathing hard, then gave a little sob of distress, childlike, before going back to pick up the bag.

The woman was wearing a white leather jacket and a pale blue scarf. She came towards Sadie, walking crookedly, as if she were naked. Her nose was out of true and blood was running from her mouth. Her eyes were unfocused. Sadie stood back to let her pass. The woman's scarf and jacket carried splashes and trickle-lines of red. She neither looked at Sadie nor spoke to her, but walked slowly out into the street as if unsure of which direction to take.

Jamie came back carrying the woman's bag. He was muttering under his breath and grinding his teeth, flicking glances over his shoulder as if the muggers might come back; as if he hoped they would. He punched the wall and Sadie leaped back. She hadn't seen this before.

She said, ‘All right?' And then, ‘Take it easy.' Jamie slid down to the floor and tucked his knees up to his chin.

Sadie picked through the bag's contents, but there was nothing she wanted, nothing she could sell. Some makeup, tissues, a set of door keys on a casino-chip key ring, a letter, a receipt for a Patek Philippe wristwatch. Maybe the door keys would come in useful, even though there was no address to go with them. She put them in her pocket then, as an afterthought, dipped into the bag's interior pockets and a smile lit her face. Paydirt was a credit card in a zipper compartment, shiny and new and brimming with potential.

On the front of the card, a name: Ms Lauren Buchanan. On the reverse, a signature: rounded, careful letters devoid of flourish or style.

Her clothes were from the skip and thrift-shop collection, she smelled very slightly of piss and her hair was rank, but
she asked for a bottle of Scotch and a bottle of brandy in a firm, clear voice and put down the card with confidence.

The guy in the liquor store put the booze into a bag and ran the card. Sadie said, ‘You do a cash-back service?'

He said he didn't.

She said that was okay and signed Lauren Buchanan in a neat, characterless hand.

There were a dozen stores still open for business in the arcade and she visited them all, buying things she didn't want but might be able to sell, each time asking for cash-back. When Delaney appeared on the scene, Sadie was carrying a store bag in each hand and looking for the next place to try. Cash-back wasn't a service anyone had been eager to provide and, of the dozen stores, four had called the police. She looked at Delaney and the look said money. He handed her a twenty and they walked together for a while.

‘Don't ask me any more questions,' she said.

‘I'm just checking on you,' he told her. ‘Checking to see how you are.'

‘How do I look?'

‘Prosperous.'

She laughed. ‘I had a good day. It's getting closer to Christmas.'

As they reached the diner, a patrol car drew up and two cops got out, one tall, the other short. They laughed when they saw Sadie laden with her bags, but the good humour didn't last. They'd met street-sweepings before, freaks like this with pink and green streaks in their hair and metal in their faces. Sadie turned to run and one of them got round to block her; he shouldered her into the wall. A bag fell from her hand and the bottles of booze smashed.

Delaney said, ‘Hey.'

The cops took him for a bystander. They ignored him. The tall one held Sadie by her hair while the other cuffed her, then they shoved her into the car. Her head knocked the side of the roof.

Delaney said, ‘Take it easy.'

The tall cop shut the car door, looked at Delaney a moment, then sauntered back. He said, ‘Some sort of problem?'

‘You don't have to treat her like that.'

The tall cop smiled. He continued to look at Delaney for a while, as if waiting to make sure that he'd said everything he was going to say. Then he leaned forward and said, ‘Fuck you, okay?'

Delaney said, ‘Where are you taking her?'

‘That was “fuck you”, in case you didn't hear.'

‘What's your name?'

The cop wasn't expecting it. He had already started towards the car; when he turned back, his look was a slow burn.

‘Because,' Delaney explained, ‘you might well be seeing it in print.'

The cop stood very close. His breath was smoke-and-burger with a little dental decay built in. He said, ‘Are you obstructing me in the course of my duty, I wonder? I'm not sure, so I'm going to give you the benefit of the doubt.' He backed it up with a little, blunt-fingered poke to Delaney's shoulder, then walked to the car, got into the passenger seat and slammed the door hard. His eyes were still on Delaney as the driver tripped the roof-bar lights and cut out into the westbound traffic.

Delaney found Jamie standing at his elbow. Jamie said, ‘Where's Sadie?'

‘She'll be okay,' Delaney said.

Jamie was looking up and down the street, though he must have seen them take her, must have seen them muscle her into the car. He was shivering but not with the cold.

‘Where's Sadie, where's Sadie, where's Sadie, where's Sadie...?'

The Notting Hill police computer made a little incident-tree. It started with a rough-sleeper called Sadie Brooks who had used a credit card stolen from a Ms Lauren Buchanan and from there went to a mugging reported later that evening by a Mr Duncan Palmer. The little electric connections then went Duncan Palmer – Valerie Blake – AMIP-5 –DS Mooney. Stella picked up the tree as an attachment to an email sent to her by DS Gerry Harris, the same cop who had done her a favour by spotting the fact that the Clean Machine had burgled Valerie Blake's flat.

Harris had added a message:
This probably means nothing, but your name appeared on my screen. We're doing lots of this sort of business just now. This week – Muggers, 96: Christmas Spirit, nil
.

Stella called to get more details and learned that Lauren Buchanan had been too traumatized to report the incident herself. The officers who called at Duncan Palmer's flat were able to get only the sketchiest description of her attackers. A female beggar had been picked up for using Buchanan's credit card, but after it became clear that she'd had nothing to do with the attack she'd been released with a warning – it wasn't worth the paper overload. Ms Buchanan's bag had been found and returned to her once the contents had been listed.

Stella was interested to see on the list a receipt for a Patek Philippe wristwatch.

Maxine Hewitt was reading over Stella's shoulder. She said, ‘Nothing in it for us.'

‘He's engaged to Valerie Blake, she's attacked and killed. Now his girlfriend's attacked.'

‘But not killed. It was just another mugging, wasn't it?'

Stella shrugged. ‘Seems that way.'

‘So it's a coincidence.'

‘It warrants a visit,' Stella said. ‘Here's another thing: Palmer doesn't know we know about Lauren Buchanan. I want to see the look on that bastard's face.'

It was not one look but three: puzzlement followed by surprise followed by anger. No hint of embarrassment.

Palmer said, ‘She's in bed. She can't get up.'

DS Harris had faxed over the trauma report from Paddington A & E. Stella said, ‘Facial bruising, broken nose, possible hairline fracture of the cheekbone. Nothing about broken legs.'

‘It's where she feels safe.'

‘Perhaps we could meet her later.'

‘She's given a statement.'

‘And so did you,' Stella reminded him, ‘but it made no mention of Ms Buchanan.'

‘It's nobody's business but mine.'

‘You didn't tell us that Valerie Blake had been burgled, did you? You didn't tell us because you didn't know. You were in America, ducking her calls. Not just because you were lying to Valerie, but because you were lying to Lauren too. Difficult to field a call from your fiancée with your mistress at your elbow.'

Maxine could hear the edge of anger in Stella's voice and wondered briefly about its source. Like everyone on the AMIP-5 team, she knew something of Stella's relationship with John Delaney, and something of George Paterson. She said, ‘We traced some of Valerie's stolen property.'

Palmer said, ‘It should go to her parents.'

‘It will,' Maxine agreed. ‘There were some things in her pockets. A letter to you. You might like to have it; it's not required as evidence.'

The letter was in Stella's pocket, but she didn't produce it. Instead, she showed Palmer the petrol receipt from Heathrow that had been with it. ‘She drove you to the airport, didn't she?'

Palmer shrugged. ‘And so –?'

‘And so she waited while you checked in and – what? – had a coffee with you, kissed you goodbye, waved you off. And you met Lauren Buchanan air-side.'

‘Valerie's dead,' Palmer said. ‘I don't see how any of this matters.'

‘Not much at all,' Stella said. ‘I just wanted to establish how much of a bastard you are. We need a word with Lauren before we go.'

She was just as Harriman had described her when he'd followed her to the jeweller's: tall, blonde, slim, sexy, but her body language and the look on her face added other attributes: scared, intimidated, hurt. She had brought her duvet with her and sat wrapped in it while Stella asked her about the attack.

Lauren said that, yes, there were two men. That she didn't know them. That she didn't think she'd recognize them again. That she felt violated. That she felt as if she would never be able to go out again. That London was a violent place full of disgusting people and that the police didn't seem to give a damn. She was sitting next to Palmer on the sofa and hanging on to his arm with both hands. He seemed to lean away from her a little and he wore a stretched smile.

‘You can see how she is,' he said. ‘If there's nothing else you need –'

‘There are victim-support schemes,' Maxine observed.

‘We'll be okay,' Palmer said. ‘We'll be fine.'

‘That's good,' Stella said. She reached into her pocket. ‘Here's the letter. Valerie's letter. It might have been evidence, so I'm afraid we read it. She asks what's wrong and whether you're having second thoughts. She tells you she loves you. There's more.' She dropped it into Lauren's lap. ‘You could read it together.'

Maxine drove but she didn't speak. Stella let it ride for a while, then said, ‘You think I did the wrong thing?'

‘Tough to say. He's a bastard; she's traumatized. Maybe it evens out.'

‘She must have known about Valerie Blake. The wedding was planned. She waited for him air-side, then they went off on a jaunt.'

‘Pretty crappy thing to do,' Maxine agreed. ‘But maybe he made promises. Maybe he said it was just a matter of finding the right time to tell her, that he felt trapped, that once the whole marriage thing had started he didn't know how to stop it.'

Stella remembered Jan saying:
I'd always known. The marriage was denial
.

They drove out into Holland Park Avenue. Maxine said, ‘Maybe she really loves him and doesn't care what it takes. We've all been there, haven't we?'

Now Stella was the silent one.

She had called a local decorating firm and they had said yes, sure, no problem, and hadn't shown up. She didn't mind. She was beginning to like the graffiti-tagged walls and furniture.

Delaney was leaving messages but not at the squad room, not too many and none pleading or sad. Just: ‘Take care' and ‘Call when you're ready' and ‘Are you okay?' She thought it was a clever ploy and wondered what he was really feeling. Then it occurred to her that perhaps the messages meant what they said.

You think so?

Well, why not?

Okay, so what about you? How do you feel?

I love him, I miss him, but now that I'm not there
...

You wonder what's keeping you away.

That's right.

You still have the keys to his flat. You could walk in any time.

Or I could send them back.

What would Anne Beaumont say: your one-time shrink?

Easy. She'd say fear of commitment, fear of making the wrong choice, nostalgia for George and a relationship based on fondness and trust, the dubious wisdom of going straight from one relationship to another
...

And what do you say?

I say exactly the same. I also say I love him and I miss him.

And the problem is
...

That the situation I'm in
…
that we're in
…
what has to happen next
…
It requires forgiveness
.

And you're not good at that.

Not particularly. Forgiveness is a virtue. I didn't grow up with it.

She was breaking eggs into a bowl when he called. She saw his name on the screen and picked up.

He said, ‘You have to eat, don't you?'

They met at the Indian restaurant and sat at the window table. There were fairy lights round the colour photo of the Taj Mahal and snowflake patterns on the windows. In the street, a few flakes of the real stuff wafted down and disappeared.

Delaney said, ‘We're going to need some rules, you were right about that.'

‘Your rules or my rules?'

‘Our rules.'

They had some things to catch up on. She told him about the Shit Spreaders and the pissed-on bed and Panhandler Pete. He put out a hand and turned her face to the brighter light from the street. The bruise was a fading yellow-black roundel. He said, ‘The front line gets nearer all the time. Inside five years you'll all be carrying guns.'