Nightmare City (8 page)

But, bearing in mind the nature of the incident - a hit that
went awry, or so it seemed - even if he did turn up at a hospital
there would be little hope of him talking. Henry favoured the
latter possibility anyway: he’d more than likely turn up in a ditch
somewhere having bled to death. That way there would definitely be
no chance of him speaking to the cops.

Henry’s stomach panged with hunger.

It was 2.30 p.m. and apart from some toast that morning, he’d
eaten nothing all day. He walked to the zoo cafeteria, ordered a
sandwich and a coffee and sat down to eat before returning to the
mortuary to catch the tail-end of the post mortem.

As he sipped the brew he had difficulty in focusing his mind
on anything other than the look which had passed between himself
and the gorilla before it charged him. He knew he was probably
overplaying the significance, but hell, it had been just like
looking into the eyes of another human being. There had been
intelligence and knowledge. Henry shook his head and felt very
sorry for such a creature having to live in captivity. He hoped
Boris would pull through.

The last thing he wanted was to be investigating the murder of
a gorilla.

‘
You look serious.’

Standing next to Rider at the bar was Isa. He hadn’t heard her
arrive. She was staying in a guest-house opposite the club. He had
been deep into the club’s books, trying to make some elusive
figures balance. A struggle. He pushed the calculator to one
side.

‘
Life is serious,’ he said, forcing a false smile which then
metamorphosised into a real one. Isa always had the capacity to
cheer him up.

‘
I could make it more fun for you, John,’ she said and kissed
him lightly on the cheek.

‘
No doubt you could, hon,’ he conceded, ‘but afterwards it’d
still all be there.’

‘
Must be bad.’ She laid a hand on the back of his head. He
could smell her lady-scent through her clothes. It made him
slightly woozy for a moment. He pulled her towards him and hugged
her gently, then released her. She stepped away.

Rider missed the look of longing in her eyes. They had always
been good friends, other than for one night when a little
flirtation went too far and they ended up making love. But it had
proved to be a one-off, much to Isa’s frustration, because she had
been hopelessly in love with Rider for longer than she cared to
mention. He seemed to continually miss the signs and she didn’t
have the guts to tell him. Because above everything else - at least
from his perspective - they had been and were once again, business
partners. ‘I think I saw Ron Conroy being driven in his Merc. Am I
right?’

Rider nodded.

‘
He’s the reason you look like you’ve seen your arse, isn’t
he?’

‘
Yeah, but let me worry about him. My problem. No need for you
to get involved.’ He slid off the bar stool before she could say
anything and stood up. ‘So, what do you think about this place now
you’ve had a good look around, got the feel of it?’

‘
When you look beyond the shit and the sticky carpet and try
to imagine it how you describe, not bad, not bad at all.’ She
nodded appraisingly. Her mouth turned down at the corners as she
considered. ‘Loads of potential, but it needs so much money
spending on it, John. Even if you were going to run it as a
straight disco it would need gutting. Those ceilings look like
they’re about to come down. And I don’t have too much money to
invest, not at the moment.’

‘
I do. Don’t worry about that aspect of it. I’m not asking you
for anything other than your expertise and I’ll pay you well for
that. But what d’you think about the plan - the north’s first
lap-dance joint? Right here in Blackpool, the tackiest place in the
world?’

‘
Seems a good idea and in the right town.’

‘
Good. Your job will be to provide the dancers and manage
them.’

‘
Not a problem,’ she said. Isa Hart ran a respectable escort
agency in Manchester, specialising in escorts for the’ Busy,
discerning professional’, whatever the sex. A profitable business
in itself, it also provided a sound front for many other less
respectable activities including the provision of exotic dancers
for the Middle East, strippers for high-class men’s clubs and
one-off functions, gay dancers and, of course, where Isa had
started all those years ago - running call girls.

She had known Rider for many years. They had jointly run
several ventures in the strip-joint and call-girl territory, but
these businesses had crumbled when Rider hit the bottle and the
coke.

They both gazed down the bar, across the vast dance floor and
beyond to the raised seating area which was the restaurant. Rider’s
plan was to get rid of the dance floor, and build a huge circular
bar on which the girls would dance to pounding rock music and
relieve the customers of their money.

He could see it all. Brash. Glitzy. Rude - very rude. Yet well
run, tightly policed by his staff, fun and completely in keeping
with Blackpool’s image. The clientele would not be able to touch
the girls and there would be no hint of prostitution. They would
simply dance provocatively, virtually naked, in front of and almost
in the laps of customers. Money would be handed to them and they
could be ‘bought’ for individual dancing.

To Rider it was a beautiful image, which was one of the
reasons he didn’t want to sell the place to Conroy.

He had a goal now, an aim in life, and he wanted to achieve
it.

And he had plans for the rest of the building too. There were
another two storeys above which used to be offices for the casino
and although the floors were generally rotten and dangerous, he
planned to bring them up to scratch and open a restaurant and pub
on the first floor and convert the second into new
offices.

‘
The planning application goes in next week. We’ll see what
reaction it gets. Should be favourable.’

‘
You mean you’ve greased some palms?’

Rider merely smiled at her and raised his eyebrows.

The doorbell rang.

Jacko, who’d been restocking the bar, sauntered away to answer
it while Rider pointed out a few more things to Isa.

A few moments later, Jacko was back, flustered.

‘
Cops,’ he said.

Rider closed his eyes despairingly as he remembered something.
The bell rang again.

He dashed behind the bar, reached under the counter, rummaged
for a second and pulled out the gun he’d commandeered from Curly.
He shoved it into Jacko’s hands who held it like he’d been given a
dog turd.

‘
Take that upstairs and hide it - hide it somewhere they won’t
find it, just in case they want to search the place. Well, go on,
go on!’ He shooed Jacko away. ‘Make yourself scarce,
Isa.’

‘
What do they want?’ she asked wide-eyed, the sight of the gun
having thrown her.

Rider did not reply. He turned and walked to the front door,
grating his teeth angrily, swearing at the thought of Conroy. Today
was becoming like one of the good old days, and the sad thing was,
annoyed though he was by the whole debacle, he was quite enjoying
it, in a sick, perverted sort of way.

After Henry had finished at the zoo, he made his way back to
the mortuary. Dr Baines, the pathologist, didn’t tell him anything
he hadn’t already guessed. The girl had died from multiple
stab-wounds. Anyone from a total of forty could have been the fatal
blow.

Baines promised a written report as soon as possible. That
meant anything up to a week because of workload.

Henry thanked him, waved goodbye to Jan and gloomily returned
to the office, where he immediately sought out FR His boss was in
the murder room set up for the newsagents job, in deep conversation
with Tony Morton. Henry had to wait to step in.

FB looked blandly unconvinced when Henry said he wanted a full
team on the beach corpse.

‘
Sorry Henry, this takes priority in terms of manpower and
resources.’ He flicked his hands at the incident room. ‘The sordid
little murder of a junkie who was probably on the game and deserved
what she got doesn’t even rank.’

Anger bubbled up inside him at these crass remarks, but he
managed not to punch the living daylights out of FB.

‘
She actually deserves as much as anyone,’ he replied
calmly.

FB gave one of his famous sneers and said, ‘That’s as maybe,
but the reality is you’re gonna have to manage this one as best you
can with the resources available - i.e. whoever’s left in the
office.’

‘
They’re all on this sodding job. Can I have Derek Luton
back?’

‘
Nope - you’ll have to make do.’

‘
Jesus,’ Henry uttered under his breath.

FB relented slightly. ‘Tell you what. I’ll give you one HOLMES
terminal and an operator to go with it.’

‘
Big fuckin’ deal,’ Henry snapped.

‘
Don’t push it, Henry,’ FB warned him.

‘
Overtime budget?’

FB laughed.

And that was that.

In the CID office, the Support Unit Sergeant who had been
leading the team searching the beach for evidence was waiting. He
handed a small black leather-clutch bag with a gold clasp and
shoulder strap triumphantly to Henry.

The find cheered Henry.

Eagerly he cleared his desk top, spread out a sheet of
polythene and opened the water-sodden bag, emptying out the
contents. He had been hoping that there would be something in here
to give him a quick lead, even though there was nothing to suggest
the bag even belonged to the dead girl.

And the contents of the bag were, at first glance, going to be
of no use whatsoever in solving the murder.

A crumpled packet of Benson & Hedges cigarettes, three
left in, a plastic throwaway lighter and a syringe with a rusty
needle. Everything soaked in sea-water, the cigarettes being not
much more than tobacco mush.

‘
Fuck,’ said Henry, disappointed, but not completely
surprised.

It would have been nice to have tipped out a driving licence
and passport with her name on and a diary detailing her most recent
acrimonious split with her latest lover who had threatened to kill
her ... but it was not to be.

He tipped the cigarettes out of the packet then carefully
ripped out the gold paper innards. Nothing.

He looked closely at the lighter, flicked the mechanism and
found it worked. It gave him nothing else.

Neither did the syringe. Inside it, though, looked to be the
crystallised remains of some controlled substance.

He turned the bag inside out, finding the black nylon lining
to be ripped, he probed with his fingers into the space between the
lining and the bag. Nichts.

‘
Don’t suppose you found anything else?’ he asked the Support
Unit Sergeant hopefully.

Negative.

Shit.

Despondently Henry picked up the bag again and twirled it
around between his hands. He looked through it once more ... and
saw something. Tucked into the bottom corner of the mirror pocket,
folded several times, was a small piece of paper.

Very easy to miss, he reassured himself.

He pulled it out, holding it tentatively between finger and
thumb, laid it out on the desk. It was sodden, almost to the point
of disintegration.

Using the tip of a ball-point pen he unfolded it, trying not
to tear it. He ended up with a triangular piece of paper which
could have been the corner of a page, possibly a telephone
directory. Some words - thankfully in pencil- were written on the
paper and quite legible. An address - a house number and a street
name, but no town specified.

Henry made the assumption it was Blackpool.

Ten minutes later, together with another detective, he was
pushing his way through the main door of a block of flats in South
Shore, about to do one of the things he most enjoyed doing:
knocking on doors.

It looked a likely place, and although he tried not to
stereotype people, he could well imagine the dead girl to have
lived in such surroundings.

He rapped his knuckles sharply on the first door he came to
and looked around whilst waiting for a reply.

The hallway, which reeked of cat piss, was littered with
uncollected post, milk bottles - empty, unwashed - and a baby
buggy. Oddly enough, no cats were to be seen. Henry glanced over
his shoulder at the tubby Detective Constable who was accompanying
him. ‘See, told you. They all smell the same, these
places.’

The detective, Dave Seymour, nodded. ‘I know, boss.’ He was an
experienced officer with more years on the CID than Henry and only
a couple to go before retirement.

Henry raised his hand to knock again just as the door opened
reluctantly - but only as far as the flimsy security chain allowed.
Henry could easily have put his shoulder to the door and burst
through.

Behind the door stood a thin, pale-faced female holding a
screaming baby to her flat chest. Her eyes were red raw, sunken.
One of them bore the remnants of a nasty-looking green bruise. From
inside the flat came the sound of a TV turned up to a high
volume.