Snapshot (6 page)

‘That’s a good thing though, surely?’ Narey asked. ‘If the girls aren’t on the streets.’

Joanne’s mouth became very small as she lowered her head and shook it.

‘Nope. I can see why you’d think so but no. When they all worked the old red-light district down here then we knew where they were and they knew where we were. Now they are all over the shop and we might only see a handful of girls in a night. These women are vulnerable. We want them out of sex work altogether, not just off the street.

‘The ones who are still working round here are usually the ones who don’t have whatever it takes to organize themselves with a phone or a bloody website. The addicts. Their lives are in complete disarray and arming themselves with a sim card or hitching up their skirts to Google is beyond them.’

‘That what Melanie was then? An addict?’ Narey asked the question, already sure of the answer.

Joanne gave a brisk nod.

‘From what I’m told, yes. Big time. I’d have been sure of it anyway but the few girls that knew her said she had a very heavy crack habit. It’s par for the course, whatever any woman’s reason for getting into prostitution – whether it’s to feed a habit or feed their child – drug use spirals once they are involved. That’s simply a fact.’

Narey looked towards Corrieri, encouraging her to get involved in the conversation. Willing as ever, Corrieri nervously took up the invitation.

‘Yes,’ she butted in. ‘I read a survey saying that there were a thousand women on the game in Glasgow and that 950 of them were drug users.’

Corrieri immediately saw Joanne’s eyebrows shoot up and a look of disapproval cross her face.

‘But,’ Corrieri continued hastily, ‘even if they are on the game, they are still women. We must remember that.’

‘Jeezus Christ, where do you get them, Rachel? Listen, young lady,’ she shouted at Corrieri. ‘That is a phrase that’s always got on my tits. The Game. It’s not a fucking game. Tiddlywinks is a game, croquet is a game, hide-and-seek is a game. These women face violent attacks, rapes and robberies at the hands of punters every day of their working lives. That’s why our efforts are all put into getting them the fuck out of this “game”.’

Julia turned a despairing glance towards Narey who gave her a supportive look to suggest that it was okay and that she would sort it.

‘We know that they face these dangers, Joanne. That’s why we’re here. The women that knew Melanie, can you give me their names?’ she asked.

‘What? Sorry, no. You know how it is, Rachel. They talk to me in confidence and they’re not going to keep doing that if I run off to the cops with whatever they tell me.’

The anger was clear in Samuels’s voice, years of hard work taking their toll on her good humour.

‘All I know is that the women who knew her were in here in tears,’ she continued testily. ‘From what I could make out they weren’t particularly friendly with Melanie but when there’s an attack then it scares the shit out of the lot of them. All I can tell you is that they say she was a proper looker before the crack got to her and that she had a room in a flat in Maryhill, although my guess is she is the kind who would be moving around on a regular basis. Oh, and there was talk of a heavy-handed boyfriend. That’s it.’

‘Joanne, I’m not trying to lay a guilt trip on you here but one girl has already been murdered and this guy could strike again. Surely that makes a difference. Let me talk to them?’

The woman massaged her temples in an attempt to keep her temper under control and emerged with a forced smile.

‘No guilt trip, really? My responsibility is to all the women working out there and I can’t put my relationship with them at risk over one incident. Their safety is everything to everyone that works in here so don’t lay emotional blackmail on me. They are in danger every bloody minute they spend on the street. I will speak to them and
if
they want to talk then I will get back to you. Best I can do.’

Narey nodded thoughtfully.

‘Okay, fair enough. I appreciate it, Joanne. It’s in all our interests that the bastard that did this is caught as soon as possible.’

Samuels smiled again, her natural demeanour returning.

‘I know. They are all dirty jobs and we all have to do them. As soon as I hear anything, I’ll call you.’

Moments later, Narey and Corrieri were back on the streets, shivering as the cold hit them after the warmth of the drop-in centre. The DC looked apologetically at the senior officer.

‘Sergeant, I’m sorry for messing up in there. Getting her back up like that.’

‘Don’t worry about it,’ Narey reassured her. ‘Joanne likes to let off a bit of steam sometimes. It’s good for her.’

Corrieri smiled but still seemed doubtful.

‘But if she wasn’t annoyed then she might have given you the name of the girls that knew Melanie.’

‘No,’ replied Narey. ‘She was never going to do that. But I thought if she was pissed off enough then she might not notice that her talking to the girls for me was the best that I was hoping for in the first place.’

Corrieri looked thoughtful.

‘So it wasn’t entirely a bad thing that I blundered in by mentioning “the game” the way that you mentioned it to me earlier.’

Narey smiled quietly.

‘Not entirely, Julia, no. Let’s go get some lunch.’

Tuesday 13 September

Winter parked his car in the Cambridge Street car park and made his way along Renfrew Street past the back of the Savoy Centre, dodging rain showers and dangerous lunchtime umbrellas. The earlier throb from the beers that he’d shared with Addison the night before had gone and he still had a few hours before his shift started and he’d have the pleasure of finishing off filing Rory McCabe. He was heading for the shops on Buchanan Street, intending to get a birthday present for his young cousin Chloe.

He’d just crossed West Nile and was a hundred yards from the Royal Concert Hall steps at the end of Sauchiehall Street when he was assaulted by a long-haired smiley face doing a half-arsed tap-dance routine.

‘Hi there. How are you today? Got a minute, just a minute? I don’t want any money.’ No, of course you don’t, you lying git, thought Winter. Walking down Buchanan Street was a lot harder than it used to be. Apart from a couple of streets cutting across it, it was pedestrianized all the way from the Donald Dewar statue at the top of the hill down to St Enochs, which should make it a dawdle of a stroll but instead you have to fight every inch of the way past crowds, kids, chuggers and street entertainers.

The chuggers hunted in packs under Dewar’s short-sighted gaze and also down on the flat where the top-end designer shops were. If you could dodge past one then sure enough there would be more of them asking for a minute of your time and your bank account details.

The eejit in front of Winter was still smiling away, moving his weight relentlessly from foot to foot.

‘Sorry, I don’t have time,’ Winter said as patiently as he could muster.

‘Ah go on, it will only take a minute. You know you want to.’

‘I said I didn’t have time.’

‘Ah but you didn’t really mean it,’grinned the chugger.

‘Look, just fuck off.’

‘Hey, no need for that. It’s for charity!’

Suddenly Mr Charity began muttering swear words under his breath. Winter allowed himself a grimace of satisfaction, his work was done and another prat had been converted to his miserable version of Glagow.

He kicked on down Buchanan Street, the smirry rain slowly eating into his clothes. Winter was annoyed at letting the chugger get to him but he had been a persistent sod. Worse than that it had got him irritated enough that he knew the crowd he could see gathered down the street would mean his anger level going up another notch. It meant a street entertainer.

He hated them. The escape artists, fire-eaters and magicians were bad enough but even worse were the living statues. He’d always wondered what kind of way that was for a grown man or woman to make a living. Getting yourself tarted up with paint and standing still for a while was not a talent. He walked on, past Diesel, Tiso’s and the White Company, past a statue decked out in black and with make-up, perched on a bicycle with a basket in front of him. Winter had the sudden but not unfamiliar urge to kick him off to see if he managed to stay still when he hit the ground. However he guessed the rest of the people in the street, some of whom actually seemed to be impressed by this crap, might not have understood so he let it go. Another barely living statue had got off his perch and was having a fag while making a call on his mobile. That was more like it.

Winter knew he could be bad-tempered and intolerant but he spent most of his time on the dark edges of the city where most of these people never ventured and it meant he could get annoyed at them simply for living normal lives. His temperament wasn’t quite up to photographing a suicide or a fatal pile-up or the victim of a drug overdose then watching halfwits gawping in wonder at a man who could stand still for five minutes. He’d stare through a lens at a fifteen-year-old kid stabbed through the heart then see people staring in shop windows at shoes costing three hundred quid and dresses going for a grand a time. So far he’d always resisted the urge to smack their heads against the window.

He’d passed the huge Vodafone store, with Princes Square, Hugo Boss and Frasers up ahead. He managed a laugh at a Hare Krishna with a crazy smile and a ponytail, asking some bewildered granny if she was a rocker. He guessed the answer was no. He had to be more tolerant of these muppets, it really wasn’t doing him any good to . . .

The noise hit him as he came to the corner of Gordon Street. He realized that until then it must have been drowned out by the towering high walls of shops and flats but it smacked him as soon as he reached the gap. Sirens. Both cops and ambulances. Shouting. Something big was going down. Winter bolted in the direction of the noise, driven by the itch to see what was happening. Judging by the number of 999s on scene it was major and he didn’t want to miss it. Fuck! He didn’t have his gear with him. He had a decent camera on his mobile but that was it. Everything else was in the boot of his car in Cambridge Street.

There was nothing he could do about that though, nothing else but run. The corner of Buchanan stayed pedestrianized till it reached the point where the road hit West Nile Street and Winter charged along it, dodging between two cars and onto Gordon Street. Ahead was Central Station and he knew that was where the clamour and the blaring were coming from.

The crowds grew thicker as he got nearer and he had to barge his way through, hearing swearing at his back and taking a couple of swipes for his trouble. The throng was even thicker at the sandblasted corner of the Central where Gordon Street ran out and Union Street started. Winter could see that four cop cars had cut off access points and were only allowing emergency vehicles through. What the hell had happened? There was already police tape up creating a cordon but he got the impression no one had been there too long.

Winter shouted ‘Police’ as he shoved his way through the undergrowth of the human jungle, cutting a swathe through the swearing till he was just a couple of ranks back from a front-row seat. There were uniforms forcing the crowd back as best they could and beyond them a no-man’s-land before there was another ring of cops shielding detectives and white-togged forensics. Two of them, Paul Burke and Caro Sanchez were his best guess under the bunny suits, were firing off cameras. There were anxious faces everywhere. Winter was pushing his way past two guys in leather jackets and getting a hard kick on his ankle when the high-vis screen suddenly parted and he saw a body lying in a pool of crimson blood, the head angled violently to one side. Just as suddenly the view disappeared again and his frustration began to boil over.

‘Gaz!’ he roared at a cop he recognized and was rewarded with a glance. ‘What the fuck’s happened?’ Winter asked him.

Gaz McKean looked round to make sure none of his bosses were watching and stepped a few feet away from his position just long enough to talk to Winter without the entire crowd hearing.

‘It’s Cairns Caldwell. Shot through the head. Looks like it was a sniper. No one saw a thing. Could have come from anywhere. The impact turned him round so they’re struggling to work out an angle. Look, I’ve got to get back.’

‘Christ’s sake. Can you have a word with your sergeant and get me past the line?’

‘Are you serious? We’re a wee bit busy, Tony, in case you hadn’t noticed.’

Cairns Caldwell. Major gangster. Responsible for bringing in most of the heroin that came into Glasgow. Ex-public schoolboy now worth multi-millions. Well he was until some fucker put a bullet through his napper. The shit had officially hit the fan.

Winter had to get in and photograph this. Damn, why was his gear back in the boot of his car?

Then suddenly he saw Two Soups. Baxter had stood up, shaking his head and firing off an order. Winter managed to catch his eye and gestured that he wanted to get across the cordon. Baxter laughed, swiftly followed by a curt shake of the head. Damn him, thought Winter, he’s loving this. He tried to shout but his voice was taken away by the noise of the sirens and the crowd. There was no way that Two Soups was for listening anyway.

Winter pushed his way along the crowd till he was between two cops he knew, Rob Harkins and Sandy Murray. He put on his most confident face and strode between them.

‘Cheers, guys. Fucking crowds are mental. You’d think they’d never seen anyone shot in the head before.’

Murray didn’t even blink while Harkins only counted to five before he nodded Winter past him. Winter knew he was never getting past the inner ring, it was protecting the good stuff not just holding back the natives, but this was a start. He found the best gap he could in the cordon and slid onto his arse, then pulled his mobile out of his pocket to see what six megapixels could do from ten yards away.

Winter was aware that some of the cops were looking down at him in bemusement but was hopeful that enough of them would know him by sight that they wouldn’t ask why he was armed with a mobile phone rather than couple of grand’s worth of kit. He didn’t care anyway. He only had eyes for Caldwell.