Damaged Goods (19 page)

Max had again broken into the money given to him by Barrows, and justified it on the grounds that he would need to look smart to make it in the States. In a country where image was everything such a jacket wouldn’t be an asset but a necessity. When the money started to roll in he might even be able to write it off against tax.

He saw her walking towards him through the town centre, checking her reflection in the window of British Home Stores. Her face was drawn into a scowl. She looked small and vulnerable, despite the tough-girl glower.

‘Charlene, baby,’ said Max.

She nodded hello. Apparently she had not taken kindly to being drugged during their last encounter, but Max had been doing this for long enough to turn the situation around.

‘Listen, baby, I know you’re probably embarrassed about what went down at mine, but it happens. You got a little crazy but that’s cool.’

He saw her mouth soften to a pout, unsure now as to who was mad at whom.

‘The shoot wasn’t the best,’ he persisted, ‘but I ain’t vexed.’

‘No?’

‘Of course not. Anyway, I’m a pro and I still got a couple of good shots.’

Charlene’s face flushed with pleasure, as he knew it would. ‘Let me see them.’

‘I’ve put them in your portfolio, you can take a look the next time you’re round at mine.’

He eased her into the restaurant, his hand in the small of her back. ‘In fact, an associate of mine has suggested a film might be just the right vehicle for you.’

Her eyes opened saucer-wide. She seemed nearer to ten than thirteen. ‘A film.’

They ate their doughy meal (three slices of margarita and unlimited visits to the salad bar for £3.99 before 5 p.m.) and Max chatted about production companies and distribution rights.

He mentioned his views on agents. Charlene should seriously consider getting one, and indeed he did know at least two with a good reputation, although she might think fifteen per cent a bit steep.

He spoke of trips abroad. Personally, he hated flying, but what could you do, it came with the territory.

All the while Charlene listened and nodded, her mouth crammed with oily cheese, her head filled with previously unimagined plans.

Max was good at this bit: the flannel, the flirting, the fairytale. One night last year when he’d been too strung out to sleep he’d watched a documentary about how some priest had talked a bunch of altar boys into sucking his cock and what have you. Grooming, they’d called it. Max thought that was a stupid word. Like something you’d do to a dog for a show. Whatever it was he had it in spades. After all, he’d learned from a master.

When his mother had finally given up even the pretence of caring for her son and handed him in to the social so she could pursue her favoured pastimes of drinking, smoking and being beaten by whatever lowlife she had most recently taken up with, Max found himself in care at The Bushberry Home for Disturbed Children. One of the men who worked there was not like the others and listened closely to his charges, smiling his wide, warm smile, telling them not to worry. He turned a blind eye to the odd cigarette and gave out little treats of chocolate and fizzy drinks. He wiped away tears and kissed sad cheeks, and if you were one of his special ones you could sit on his knee. Grace had been very special indeed. She’d driven him wild, but it was her fault for being so beautiful. He loved her with all his heart and they’d be together as soon as she was sixteen, but she mustn’t tell anyone. They wouldn’t understand.

Grace was so happy she thought she might burst, and had to, just had to, tell her best friend. She scrubbed the stains out of her knickers and confided in Max that she was going to get married as soon as she turned sixteen.

And Grace was no chump. She’d lived with her dad long enough to spot a scam when she heard one, but she still took it all in.

God how he had hated that man for breaking Grace’s heart; still hated him for what he did.

And yet, Max had to hand it to him, the man could sell sand to Arabs. Yes, the man was a genius.

Lilly arrived home frazzled and starving. A carbohydrate frenzy beckoned. She fancied chips, the way her mother had made them. The potatoes dried in a tea towel on the draining board and submerged in a pan of dangerously hot oil. Delicious, but a cursory glance in the kitchen confirmed the absence of potatoes, clean tea towel or sunflower oil.

Lilly put pasta in a pan and ran a bath for Sam. She wondered what the director of social services would say as she undressed herself and dived into the water with her six-year-old son.

They scrubbed away their days at work and school then dried each other off. For fun, Sam painted Lilly’s toes, each one a different colour.

When Sam, pink and squeaky, lay on his bed with a
Scooby Doo
comic, Lilly padded downstairs in an extra-large T-shirt that had come free with a six-pack of Boddingtons, and a pair of orange slipper-socks that Miriam had given to her as a joke.

She opened the fridge and pulled out bacon, cream and cheese. She cracked a free-range egg and separated it in her hand, allowing the white to slip through her fingers into the sink. When she had three oily yolks she added a thick dollop of cream.

The phone rang. Lilly swore under her breath, picked up the receiver with her clean hand and held it with her chin.

‘It’s me,’ said David.

‘Aha.’

‘I’ve been thinking about your car.’

‘That must have been thrilling.’

‘I want to pay for the repairs.’

‘I thought you were broke.’

‘I am, we are, but Cara should have told you about the insurance.’

‘Yes, she should.’

‘So you should send the bill to me. But you’ll have to take over the premiums.’

‘Okay.’

‘Okay?’

‘Okay.’

‘Right, well, I’ll be off. Things to do. What about you?’

‘Cooking.’

Lilly could almost hear his ears pricking.

‘Anything nice?’

‘Carbonara,’ she deadpanned. It was David’s favourite.

‘Heavy on the parmesan?’

Lilly reached for the grater. ‘I’m shaving that baby now.’

She smiled to herself. Cara wouldn’t eat cheese. She was lactose-intolerant. She knew what he was implying but Lilly wasn’t going to make it easy for him. ‘Where’s the salad-muncher?’

‘She’s out,’ he said.

‘Having a seaweed body wrap, no doubt.’

He didn’t rise to the bait, such was the power of Lilly’s food. ‘Something like that.’

Lilly relented. ‘Want to eat?’

‘Give me twenty minutes.’

The doorbell went in ten.

Lilly pulled at the door. ‘Did you take the Harrier jump jet?’

It wasn’t her ex-husband. ‘Jack!’

He looked embarrassed. ‘You’re expecting someone else.’

‘No. Yes. Sort of. Come in.’

Lilly became instantly aware of her appearance. A downmarket Bridget Jones.

‘Let me get you a drink. Beer or wine?’

‘Whatever’s cold. It’s bloody roasting out there.’

‘I know. It’s ridiculous for September. An Indian summer, I suppose.’ Lilly could hear herself gabbling about the weather. ‘My nan used to predict one every year, and when it rained on the first or the second of September she’d say it was good for the roses and would then predict the coldest winter on record.’

Jack laughed politely.

Lilly went for the drinks and pulled off the day-glo socks, although Sam’s pedicure was hardly an improvement. She bolted down half a glass of Sauvignon blanc in the kitchen and filled another for Jack.

Back in the sitting room, Sam was perched at the end of the sofa appraising Jack with studied cool.

‘What are you doing up?’ asked Lilly.

Sam kept steely eyes on the intruder. ‘I heard a man’s voice. I thought it was Dad.’

‘Afraid not, wee man. I’m Jack and I work with your mum.’

‘He’s a policeman,’ added Lilly, who knew how Sam would react.

‘Wow,’ Sam shouted, ‘have you got a gun?’

‘Not with me,’ said Jack.

‘Did you ever kill anyone?’ asked Sam.

Lilly saw a strange look creep into Jack’s features, a flicker of something dark. Not more than a shadow, but definitely something.

‘Of course not, love, he looks after children,’ she said.

Sam made no effort to hide his disappointment.

‘I once caught a bank robber,’ countered Jack.

The child’s enthusiasm returned. ‘How?’

‘Let’s go back up those stairs and I’ll tell you all about it.’

Lilly watched in amazement as Jack led Sam back to bed and wondered what Jack would think if she changed into something less shapeless. Jeans and a vest top might set the right note, casually sexy but not obvious. Hmm. Maybe obvious would be better.

She was weighing up the option of a short satin robe she had optimistically bought on sale at Agent Provocateur but had never worn, when David walked in.

‘Tell me it’s massive,’ he said.

‘What?’ asked Lilly.

‘The bowl of pasta.’

‘Pasta?’

David shook his head and laughed. ‘You can’t have forgotten already.’

Jack entered the room.

David looked him up and down in much the same way as Sam had done. ‘But I see you have other things on your mind.’

‘I’m just leaving,’ said Jack.

‘You don’t have to,’ said Lilly.

They looked at each other for an excruciating moment.

‘I’m just leaving,’ Jack repeated and drained his glass.

As he left, Lilly shut the door behind him.

‘What was that about?’ asked David.

‘I have absolutely no idea.’

Jack continued to cringe until he had put a good mile between himself and Lilly. What was he thinking turning up on her doorstep? It had served him right when the husband arrived. They were obviously still involved or he wouldn’t still have a key, and she wouldn’t have been dressed like that, in only a T-shirt, her legs long and bare and smooth.

Stop it, man
.

But she had been pleased to see him. She’d invited him in for a drink, introduced him to her son. Maybe there was something there.

He played bat and ball with the idea all the way home and decided to find some spurious reason to call her first thing in the morning and ask her outright if she liked him. Back home he ate a piece of unbuttered toast and drank three cans of warm lager knowing full well he would do no such thing.

CHAPTER TWELVE

Friday, 18 September

Lilly had a busy day ahead of her. First a showdown with Kelsey at the prison, then a meeting with Jez.

‘We need to talk turkey,’ he’d said. Whatever that meant.

Sheba was waiting for Lilly in the same place. Defying the heat, she was dressed in a black wrap dress, its jersey skimming her curves. Her only concession to the warm weather was a pair of open-toe shoes with vertiginous heels under which she ground out the remains of a scarlet-tipped cigarette.

‘You do the talking, I need to observe her closely,’ Sheba said.

‘Will you be able to tell if she’s lying?’ asked Lilly.

Sheba shrugged. ‘Maybe. Everyone has a tell. A little gesture they make when under pressure.’

‘What’s mine?’ said Lilly, laughing.

‘You push your hair off your face,’ Sheba answered seriously. ‘I don’t know what Kelsey’s is yet.’

‘But you’ll suss it?’

‘I hope so, but some people are so good they control them.’

They made it through security without incident until a bored group of officers asked to check in their mouths. Lilly watched the other visitors, their cheeks bulging like hamsters with drugs, saunter past while she and Sheba waited for someone to find the appropriate implement with which to undertake the search. At last one of the guards brandished what looked suspiciously like the handle of a white plastic spoon.

Sheba gave the dirtiest of giggles and opened wide. The guard pushed in his stick and looked as if he’d love to follow.

Lilly took her turn and the guard wrinkled his nose. She regretted the packet of cheese and onion crisps she had eaten on the way. Her humiliation was complete when he offered her a mint.

Kelsey slunk into her seat and took up her usual position.

Lilly was unimpressed. She needed to know if it was all just an act.

‘The prison doctor says you can talk.’

Kelsey’s head snapped up. It was the fastest movement Lilly had ever seen her make.

‘He says your mouth has healed.’

Kelsey’s hand hovered around her lips as if to check whether it could be true.

Lilly couldn’t tell if the surprise was genuine. She hoped Sheba could judge more accurately.

‘Is he right, can you talk?’ asked Lilly.

Kelsey picked up a pencil and wrote.

I don’t think so
.

‘What the hell does that mean? Either you can or you can’t!’

Her own harsh tone shocked Lilly but she was desperate for answers. She was doing everything she could to help this kid and the prospect that Kelsey was playing some evil little game was too much. Christ, Lilly had tortured herself over the letter and spent her evenings touring Tye Cross to get to the bottom of this mess rather than at home with her son. She’d put her life in danger chasing a pornographer to prove Kelsey’s innocence. These kids always told lies. It was second nature and Lilly generally shrugged it off, but she needed to know the truth about Kelsey, too much was at stake to let it go.

Kelsey opened her mouth as if she might speak but nothing came out. Her eyes filled with tears and she wrote,

I’m sorry
.

It was so pitiful that Lilly was immediately filled with remorse. This was a damaged child, not a sociopath. She deserved better than the life she had led and she deserved better than prison. She certainly deserved better than Lilly’s suspicions.

Lilly glanced at Sheba for acknowledgement that she felt the same but the psychiatrist’s reaction was sanguine.

Lilly spoke gently this time. ‘I’m sorry too. Now let’s concentrate on getting you out of here.’

But Kelsey wouldn’t or couldn’t look up, she just wept into her chest, hot tears splashing onto the table. Lilly watched them fall until a guard called a halt to the meeting and took Kelsey back to her cell.

Lilly and Sheba passed through the prison back to the outside world. The endless metal doors that opened and then closed behind them only served to remind Lilly of the distance she had put between herself and Kelsey. She should be Kelsey’s closest ally yet the wall between them was impenetrable. If the child did anything stupid Lilly had no one to blame but herself.

The acidic smell of vomit filled the air, and up ahead a group of prisoners mopped the corridor. One of them looked up from her work and waved at Lilly.

‘Hello, Angie,’ said Lilly.

‘Who pissed on your chips?’

Lilly laughed in spite of herself. ‘Things are, how shall I say, difficult.’

Angie looked at the film of regurgitated food floating on top of her bucket. ‘Things are, how shall I say, fantastic in here.’

Lilly laughed again. ‘I’m sorry, Angie.’

‘Don’t be, it’s better than bang-up. At least I get a blather with some of the girls.’

Angie pulled out a roll-up from her pocket and lit it without removing her rubber gloves. ‘Anyway, I’m glad I caught you, it’ll save me using my phone card. I spoke to the girl who got cut and she says she’ll talk to you but only cos I told her you were sound, so don’t go fucking it up.’

‘I won’t,’ said Lilly.

The guards gestured to Angie to get back to work and moved Lilly along.

‘What was that about?’ asked Sheba.

‘Good news, I hope.’

Generally barristers liked to do business in their chambers. Old-fashioned, book-lined apartments set in airy squares around Temple, the area in the city between the Embankment and Fleet Street.

Lilly resented going there. She hated being met at reception by the teenaged clerks straight out of central casting for
EastEnders
and their endless yet fruitless offers of coffee. She loathed being made to wait while the barristers finished their oh-so-important case in the High Court. Always, it seemed, far more complex than her own.

She wanted to run amok down the dark corridors shouting, ‘I’m the bloody client here.’

But no, she would sit and fidget and check her watch until someone would sweep her into their room with more offers of nonexistent coffee.

Happily, Lilly undertook most of her own advocacy in court and so had precious little need of barristers. She had never understood solicitors who did all the hard work – the paperwork, the interviews, the endless conversations with clients – only to hand over the case to a barrister at the fun part: the trial. Lilly would go to any length to avoid such a scenario. Occasionally, when two trials fell on the same day she had no option but to pass one on. Even Lilly couldn’t be in two places at once.

But Kelsey’s case was different. Lilly couldn’t do it alone. She might have years of experience but even she wouldn’t attempt a murder case at the Old Bailey.

Jez, however, was not one to stand on ceremony and had proved amenable to Lilly’s suggestion that their meeting take place in her office. He arrived early and was shown to Lilly’s room by a sullen-faced Sheila.

He looked at the mountainous paperwork dumped on every surface in the small room. ‘Let’s do this in the pub.’

They ordered their drinks and took a table in a smart and almost empty bar called Lancasters. It seemed to change hands every six months and its current reincarnation was a New York loft conversion with grey walls and blond wood. The wine list was extensive and the staff predominantly Australian. Quite a change from its former life as a tapas bar with live flamenco dancing on Thursdays and Saturdays. Lilly noted that the only thing that never changed was the lack of customers.

Jez put his file on the table but didn’t open it. ‘This is a difficult one, Lilly.’ He tapped the folder. ‘There’s not much evidence against Kelsey and I’m tempted to treat it with the contempt it deserves and ask the judge to kick it out before arraignment.’

‘Absolutely,’ said Lilly.

‘I doubt that this one will go for it, of course.’

‘But the case is so weak,’ said Lilly.

Jez waved a dismissive arm. ‘Politics.’

Lilly opened her mouth to argue but was loath to appear the silly ingénue. Instead she voiced her other concerns.

‘But you know what trials are like. There’s always the risk that the jury go off-piste.’

Jez nodded. ‘Too unpredictable. The problem is the general public like to feel these things are resolved. Someone’s dead and someone must be to blame.’

‘Then we give them someone else,’ said Lilly.

‘Like who? It needs to be credible.’

Lilly thought about Max. ‘I thought I knew who did it. A dealer, pimp, all-round scumbag. He knew Grace, and when I tried to ask questions he attacked me.’

‘Sounds perfect.’

‘Just one problem,’ she said. ‘He didn’t do it.’

Jez shrugged. ‘Doesn’t really matter. He’s not on trial so we’ll just give him to the jury as a possible alternative. Rake enough muck to cast doubt on Kelsey’s guilt.’

The waitress came over with their bottle of wine. Both Lilly and Jez fell silent until she left.

‘Normally I’d agree, but the police know for sure it’s not him,’ Lilly said. ‘They’re his alibi.’

‘Then we’re back to square one.’

A group of young men at the next table, flushed by the heat and lunchtime beer, began to whistle and shout. Lilly realised that Sheba was the focus of their attention. She graced them with a wink before sitting next to her brother.

‘Such a tart,’ he chided.

Sheba drank from his glass. ‘Hello, little brother.’

He wrinkled his nose at the lipstick she left on the rim and gestured to the waitress to fetch another glass.

‘How did you find us?’ asked Lilly.

‘Your secretary told me your room was a pigsty so you’d hit the nearest pub.’

Lilly blushed. Neither Jez nor Sheba seemed like the messy types. She had never seen them dressed anything less than immaculately and both were loaded with cool.

‘So what have you decided?’ asked Sheba.

‘We’re going to run a soddi,’ said Jez.

‘Sod what?’ she said.

The clean glass arrived and he poured himself more wine. ‘A soddi. SODDI. Some other dude did it.’

Sheba opened her palms, none the wiser.

‘It’s a defence. We can’t just say Kelsey didn’t do it. If it comes to a trial we’ll have to give the jury another explanation of who did,’ said Jez.

‘Why?’ she asked.

‘I thought you were the shrink,’ he said.

‘And when you say something remotely sensible I’ll analyse it.’

They were quite a double act.

Lilly came to the rescue. ‘Nature abhors a vacuum. If we take Kelsey out of the frame we have to put someone else in.’

Sheba nodded that she understood. ‘So which poor sod is it going to be?’

‘We had the perfect candidate but it turns out he’s not guilty,’ said Jez.

Sheba patted his head in mock sympathy. ‘What a shame.’

‘Grace was on the game so it could just be a punter,’ said Lilly.

‘Would a jury buy that?’ asked Sheba.

‘I don’t see why not,’ said Jez. ‘It’s an alien lifestyle and most people are prepared to accept it has its inherent dangers. We can certainly wheel out the statistics about how many prostitutes met violent deaths in the last three years.’

Lilly looked at Sheba. ‘You don’t seem sure.’

‘The pathology’s wrong. Most prostitutes are killed in very violent circumstances.’

‘Grace didn’t exactly die in her sleep,’ said Jez.

Sheba furrowed her gorgeous brow, the nearest she came to wrinkles. ‘Let me finish. The statistics you want to offer up in evidence will tell you that most die as a consequence of unplanned attacks. They’re often beaten to death or stabbed by assailants who didn’t necessarily want to kill them but clearly didn’t care less at the time. Sometimes a client will lash out and then fail to curb the aggression.’

‘I think we can safely say Grace’s killer failed to curb his,’ said Jez.

Sheba shook her head. ‘I disagree. Grace received two clean blows to the back of the head. There were no signs of a struggle, nor defensive wounds. I’d say there was no fight at all, no attempt to overpower her, no aggression. He simply waited until she turned around and then
wham
.’

‘Grace never knew what hit her,’ said Lilly.

‘Literally,’ said Sheba.

‘But what about the mutilation?’ asked Jez.

‘It’s difficult to say what would motivate a person to do that,’ said Sheba.

‘Dr Cheney, who did the autopsy, thought there might be a bond between the killer and victim,’ said Lilly.

‘That’s probably true,’ said Sheba.

‘So our killer wasn’t a stranger,’ said Jez. ‘Which would explain why she let him in.’

Sheba’s lips glistened with wine. ‘But the bond needn’t be real. It doesn’t have to be familial, which is no doubt what the prosecution will say, it needn’t even be mutual. It just needs to exist in our killer’s mind.’

‘Could a punter feel that sort of bond with a girl he used regularly?’ asked Lilly.

‘Oh yes. Lots of men, with poor or nonexistent relationships with other women, form deep attachments with a prostitute. It’s one-way traffic, of course,’ Sheba looked sideways at her brother, ‘but self-delusion is a powerful thing.’

Jez lifted his glass in triumph. ‘A regular punter it is. I shall be famous for being the first barrister to use the
Pretty Woman
defence. It’ll become legendary.’

Sheba put her hand on his wrist and lowered the glass to the table. ‘As I said, the pathology’s wrong. There’s no sign of sexual activity whatsoever.’

‘Maybe he killed Grace before it got to that,’ Jez offered.

‘It’s possible, but why go on to cut her?’

‘Because he likes it,’ said Lilly.

Jez laughed.

‘It’s not as daft as it sounds,’ said Sheba. ‘There are three main reasons why assailants inflict post-mortem mutilation of this kind. The first is to disguise the identity of the victim, which doesn’t apply here because facially she was left intact. The second is where the assailant is so caught up in his actions he (a) doesn’t realise the victim is dead or (b) realises they’re dead but can’t stop the flood.’

‘Doctor Cheney said Grace would have died in the kitchen almost instantly so the killer must have dragged the body to the bedroom to start the cutting,’ said Lilly.