Tastes Like Fear (D.I. Marnie Rome 3) (32 page)

I held out my hand to May and she took it, pulling it to the front of her nightdress.

Cool cotton under my hand, hot skin under that.

I was touching her.

She was saying my name, asking me to tell her what I was hiding, who was inside.

I shouldn’t have done it, I know.

I shouldn’t have done any of it.

But I did.

48

The derelict clinic in Mitcham was brown inside, sticky floors, walls stained by smoke. On the second floor the roof let in the rain, broken tiles and plaster littering the floor.

Camping stove, sleeping bag, bottled water. Just as Adam Fletcher had said.

Pigeon droppings rotted the floor, an acid taste on Noah’s tongue. He stood at the side of Ledger’s makeshift bed, trying to measure this half-life. Not even half a life; less than that.

Ledger had been in Afghanistan, returning shell-shocked, struggling to adjust to civilian life. Perhaps this was preferable to living in a house, faking a degree of normality. Preferable to the mould at Paradise House. He’d been alone here. The neatness of the stove, the sleeping bag – he’d been on his own. Off radar. The aluminium windows sucked up the sound of traffic and people and planes, as if six radios were playing simultaneously at a distance. Life’s soundtrack happening outside, elsewhere. How often had Ledger woken on this floor, shouting from nightmares? Maybe it was better to have them here, away from people.

Noah turned a slow circle under the sagging ceiling.

Light through the brickwork picked out the dimpled plastic of the water bottles, the metal zip of the sleeping bag. Otherwise, it was dark despite the sunshine outside. Cold, too. Beneath the rotting plaster and pigeons he could smell tobacco. He crouched on his heels, moving a gloved hand under the edge of the sleeping bag, keeping the beam of his torch on the same spot.

Tucked underneath the nylon bag – a battered yellow and green tin.

Noah opened it, shining the torch inside.

Shredded tobacco and cigarette papers.

In the pinched red shred of the tobacco, he could see the precise shape of Ledger’s thumb and forefinger.

‘Nothing in Mitcham,’ Noah told Marnie when he was back in the fresh air. ‘He was here, on his own, but not in a while. There’s a good layer of dust on the stove, and the sleeping bag’s growing mould. It’s a dump, beats Paradise House even. I wouldn’t want my worst enemy living like this.’

He looked up at the building, its boarded windows scrawled by graffiti. ‘How’s Grace?’

‘The doctor’s with her. Fluids helped to calm her down, but I’m not sure we’ll get much sense out of her in the next few hours.’

Noah heard the frustration in her voice. ‘No sightings of Loz and Christie?’

‘None. Colin’s looked at every route away from the subway on foot or by car. If she was in a car, I think we’d have something by now. The CCTV on the roads is good. Much patchier if they were on foot. I’m thinking Christie knew which route to take to avoid the cameras.’

‘Makes sense. She’s been taking kids for months now.’

Noah started walking in the direction of the tramlink. ‘I’m headed back to the station, unless you want me somewhere else.’

‘I’ll see you there.’

‘It’s me,’ Marnie said.

‘Hey.’ Ed was at work, office white noise in the background. ‘You okay?’

‘Loz Beswick’s missing. We think she’s with the killer.’

‘
Shit
. How …?’

Marnie touched her hand to the ignition key, but didn’t start the car. She was waiting for news from the doctor who was with Grace. The car was quiet, and it was private. ‘Loz knew where May went when she wasn’t at home. It was all in her sketchpad, hidden in Loz’s room. A pedestrian subway in Stockwell. Loz was there this morning; now she’s gone. A young woman took her. Three kids saw Loz leave with her. They didn’t think it was anything to be worried about.’

Joel and Corin and Daisy, sucking on her gingerbread latte, knowing a killer was at large but unable to link that fact to their lives, or to Loz’s life. Believing themselves immune.

‘We found the girl from the Traffic accident,’ she continued. ‘Grace Bradley. She’s in hospital but she’ll be okay, at least I hope so. She knows where this woman takes the girls but she can’t help us, not yet. A trauma specialist is with her, but it’s taking too long. We need to find Loz quickly. He’s killed two girls already.’

‘He?’

‘I don’t think the woman taking them is the killer. But I may be wrong.’ Marnie shut her eyes for a second against the craze of light coming from the hospital’s windows. ‘I went to Sommerville this morning.’ Dancing to Stephen’s tune, and she’d broken her promise to take Ed with her the next time she went there. ‘It was connected to the case; one of the girls said she recognised Grace from the news last night.’ She reached her free hand to the steering wheel, picking at a patch of fraying plastic. ‘I saw Stephen. Not to speak to, but he was there. He’s … changed.’

‘How?’ Ed asked.

‘He’s working out. Getting strong. Maybe he’s scared about the move to adult prison.’

‘Did he look scared?’

Smiling at her through the fireproofed glass, buzz cut showing the bones of his head. ‘No.’

‘But you’re okay,’ Ed said.

‘I should have spent more time with Loz. Asked better questions, helped her to trust me. She knew where May was going but she didn’t tell us. Any of us. She’s cut off from her parents and I knew that, but I thought she’d talk to me or Noah if she had any sort of evidence. She didn’t trust us to find May’s killer. She went looking for him, on her own. Ed, she’s thirteen.’

‘It wasn’t because she didn’t trust you. At that age? It’s just really hard to talk.’

Marnie knew he was right, but she also knew that Loz would have talked to Ed. Everyone talked to Ed. It was his superpower.

‘This sketchpad we found in Loz’s room. Life studies, X-rated. I think Loz knew it was there, maybe she even hid it herself.’ Remembering the wire under her fingers, furred by paper torn from the pad. Had Loz torn pages out before she’d let her parents see it? If so, why? And which pages? ‘She was protecting May, and she was scared. Ashamed, too. The whole house is ashamed …’ She dropped her hand from the steering wheel. ‘I’m not making much sense, sorry. I’m tired.’

‘Where are you?’ Ed asked.

‘St Thomas’s, waiting to speak with Grace’s doctor. I’m all right. Better for being able to talk to you. Just wishing I’d done a decent job of talking to Loz when I had the chance. That shouldn’t have been impossible. I saw how it was for her in that house. I saw how lonely she was. And she asked me about the Forgiveness Project, about Stephen. I should’ve been able to make a connection – get her to talk, or to trust me.’

‘Don’t beat yourself up,’ Ed warned. ‘You need to stay on top of this.’

‘I know.’ She straightened and checked the mirror, wiping the self-loathing from her face. ‘The doctor should be finished with Grace soon. Then I have to try and find a way to get her to talk to me.’

‘Can I help?’ Ed offered.

Victim Support.

It was his job. His superpower. And Grace was afraid of Marnie, didn’t want to talk to the police.

‘I can be there in half an hour,’ Ed said. ‘If you need me.’

She closed her eyes in relief. ‘Please.’

49

Christie sorted the dirty clothes into piles. Counted the water barrels in the kitchen. Checked the food levels and corrected the chart to show what was running low. They needed more fish, more grains, more powdered milk. She sorted the rubbish into black bags to put with the bins on the next street, where the houses were full of people. Counted batteries, and gas canisters for the stove. Her period was due, so she made a note to buy pads. Aimee was a late developer; she’d only had two periods in ten months but she wasn’t well, didn’t eat properly. Christie hadn’t told Harm about the bright red blood she’d seen in Aimee’s pads, too bright to be normal. Maybe Aimee really was sick and not just pretending, to keep Harm happy.

A sound from the stairs, the mezzanine floor.

Christie stood and listened, tensing until her neck cramped.

Laura, exploring. Nosy. Dangerous. What would Harm make of her? Christie sucked a finger into her mouth, trying to put a name to the shaking under her skin. Not fear, or not just that. She’d done what he’d asked, brought him his new girl. Old girl. Ancient.

What’d she done?

She put down the shopping list and walked to the barrel, holding a glass under its tap until the glass was full and the barrel belched. She carried the glass from the kitchen, moving slowly so she could listen for Laura. She knew every creak in this place and every groan, heard the emptiness of Laura’s room as she stood with the glass in her fist. Upstairs …

Laura had gone upstairs.

Christie stood listening with her chest and the ends of her fingers, wet on the glass. A bubble burst in the water, its pressure pricking her thumb. If she looked down, she’d see her face lying in the glass, mouth squirming into a smile.

Laura was walking across the floor of Aimee’s room, towards the bed.

Another two steps and she’d be there, right at the side of the bed where Aimee was sleeping, or pretending to sleep. Christie knew all her tricks. She
knew
.

Another step, one more.

Why had she stopped? Because she was scared?

Christie lifted the glass to her lips.

The water tasted blue and dead.

She stood and listened to the silence spreading and spreading overhead.

50

‘You didn’t witness May’s murder. You didn’t know she was dead until DI Rome told you. She was alive when you left, but you left in a hurry, in shock. What was happening in that place? What did you see to make you run?’

Grace’s eyes moved around the room, fretting at the distance from her bed to the door. She wanted to run again. Half dressed, half starved, covered in bruises. She didn’t feel safe here.

‘What’s happening in that place?’ Ed asked again. ‘Tell me one thing. Anything.’

He was sitting at the side of Grace’s bed, in a soft blue shirt and twill jeans, his fringe in his eyes, his elbows on his knees. All his attention on her. The easiest person in the world to confide in.

‘No … no water.’ Grace’s voice was thirsty, small. ‘In the taps.’

Ed filled the plastic tumbler from the jug on the bedside table, holding it for her to drink a little. ‘No water in the taps. That’s odd. What else is unusual about that place?’

‘No lights. No … heat.’

‘It’s an old house?’

‘Not … a house.’

‘A flat? Or something else?’

Grace lifted a hand above her head, wincing. ‘High.’

‘A high-rise? An old high-rise.’

‘New.’ She was whispering. ‘All new.’

‘A new-build.’

She nodded, shifting in the narrow bed, looking in surprise at the bruises on her arms. ‘What happened to me?’ Her eyes scared to Ed’s face. ‘I don’t remember.’

‘It’s okay. You were dehydrated, that’s making it hard to remember, but it’ll get better. You’re in hospital, being looked after.’ The doctor was pleased with Grace’s response to the fluids, predicting a complete physical recovery, but the trauma specialist had warned them to be careful with the questions they asked. ‘Tell me about the flat. It’s a new-build but it’s not finished. No water, no light or heat. What’re the rooms like?’

‘Nice.’ She shut her eyes. ‘They’re … nice.’ She squeezed her eyes tighter shut. ‘I want to go home. When can I go home?’

‘Where’s home?’

‘I told you. High. New.’ She wanted to go back to the place she’d run from.

Her hands were folded meekly. Where was Jodie’s survivor, hard as a cat’s head? Marnie needed that girl, that Grace.

‘Did you have a nice view?’ she asked. ‘From your window?’

‘Just … chimneys.’

‘These chimneys?’ Marnie held up her phone. ‘Grace? Are these the chimneys you could see from your window?’

The girl blinked at the screen: May’s sketch of Battersea Power Station. ‘Yes.’

‘Did you have to share your room? With May, or one of the others?’

‘Not … not always.’

‘So it’s a big place. How many rooms, can you remember?’

‘Four.’

‘Four bedrooms?’

‘And the one upstairs.’ Grace turned her head away. ‘The loft room. Five, with the loft.’

A big flat, lots of rooms and a loft. Marnie could picture the place, mezzanine bedroom ticking the trend for loft living. How many unfinished new-build flats with loft space were inside their radius around Battersea? Her thumbs pricked. She texted the new information to Colin and Noah, keeping it brief, concise.

‘Tell me about the loft room,’ Ed said. ‘Who sleeps up there?’

Grace’s gaze fixed on Ed. He didn’t make her nervous, the way Marnie did. ‘Aimee.’

Another girl. How many more?

‘How old is Aimee?’

‘Sixteen? I don’t know.’

‘Aimee sleeps in the loft room?’

‘He … keeps her up there.’ Biting her tongue, turning her head away.

He
.
Who?

Marnie held her breath, willing Ed to get a name from the girl.

Grace dropped her eyes, moving her thumbs across the words written on her wrists. ‘She’s special, doesn’t do anything with the rest of us.’ She pressed her nail into the writing. ‘Except May.’

Ed led her through the safe questions, earning her trust. ‘What did Aimee do with May?’

‘Talked.’ Grace shrugged her thin shoulders. ‘I don’t know. They were up there all the time. Ashleigh bullied them about it.’

‘How did she bully them?’

‘Always on at Aimee, hated her being the special one.’ She pushed her hair out of her eyes. ‘If I was Aimee, I’d have shut her up.’

Marnie got a flash of Ashleigh lying in the Garrett’s litter, her lips swollen shut.

‘Who’s in there right now?’ Ed kept very still at Grace’s side. ‘Can you tell me their names?’

‘May and Ashleigh and Aimee.’ Without drawing breath. ‘All of us.’

Marnie waited for her to remember that May was dead. Grace didn’t correct the list of names, but she added to it: ‘All of us, and Christie and Harm.’