A Deadly Thaw (28 page)

‘I’m going to sell this place.’

Mark looked up briefly from the bag he was helping Kat pack. A policeman had accompanied them upstairs and stood sentry on the door of the bedroom. He’d warned them that he would be itemising everything Kat removed. ‘You don’t need to do anything rash. Now’s not the time to make that sort of decision.’

Kat emptied the rest of the drawer. That was all the T-shirts. She’d leave the thick winter jumpers until another time and make do with a couple of cardigans now the weather was warming up.

‘What next?’ Mark was looking around her bedroom. ‘Take enough to see you through for a couple of weeks. I don’t want you to have to come back again until things have settled down.’

Kat thought of Mark’s spare bedroom. ‘Is there room in the car for one of Lena’s pictures?’

‘Of course. I’m going to show the copper what we’ve taken from here.’

She crossed over to the landing, went down the stairs and into Lena’s studio. The room smelt stale, the odour of paint that had been there on her last visit now nothing more than a lingering echo. She took in the scene. In the shabby room, the canvases suddenly looked like things of beauty. The hues of blue, which had once appeared lacking in passion to Kat’s eyes, now had an icy rigour to them. Stifled emotions, perhaps, but even repression was an emotion of a sort. She wondered which one to take.

She crossed over to the window and looked out into the garden. She could see, over by the ancient fence, a bunch of tulips bowing gently in the breeze. She looked through the canvases, and, sure enough, she found a picture of the blooms. She picked up the painting and put it under her arm as she went downstairs.

A shadow outside the front door caused her heart to miss a beat. The knocker slammed against the door. A man in uniform came quickly out of the kitchen. ‘I’ll get it.’

Connie stood on the doorstep. ‘Can I come in? I need to ask Kat about Stephanie Alton.’

‘Steph? I thought we’d discussed all this. I knew her as a teenager.’

Connie stepped into the hall. Kat didn’t want her to go into the living room where Lena had been found. It was the room she’d been avoiding, and she didn’t want to face it now. The detective looked briefly towards it but remained still. Mark, alerted by the bang on the door, came downstairs.

‘It’s about her daughter.’

Kat frowned. ‘Mary?’

‘Do you know what she looks like?’

‘I’ve never met her. It’s Lena who’d met up with Steph and Mary. I told you all this.’

‘We think there’s a possibility, a strong possibility, that the boy who left you those gifts from Lena was Mary.’

Kat opened her mouth and shut it again. The boy was a girl? She thought of the musky masculine sweat emanating from his clothes. ‘I’m not so sure about that.’

The detective shrugged. ‘Well, we’re not positive, either, but I need to check it out. Where did Lena say she’d been staying while she was in Bampton?’

Kat shook her head. ‘I told you. She said she’d been staying with Mary. I don’t have any more information. A flat somewhere in Bampton, I assumed.’

Connie’s mobile rang, and Kat watched her answer it. A voice barked down the phone. The detective’s features brightened as she cut the call. ‘I’m going to go there now. You sure Lena didn’t say anything else about Mary?’

Kat heard Mark move behind her and felt him lay a hand on her shoulder. ‘Lena told me only what she wanted to tell. That was always the case with her.’

They drove in silence back to Mark’s house, the car stuffed full of her things. He pulled up outside the house but didn’t get out.

‘What’s the matter?’

‘I could almost hear that girl’s address. You were closer to that policewoman. Did you hear what they said?’

Kat nodded. ‘12b River Terrace.’

He looked behind him.

‘I want to come with you.’

He shook his head. ‘I’ll take the car. We can unpack it later. I know where River Terrace is.’

‘But—’

‘I’m worried that if Mary is the boy who’s been leaving you the things, then she’s still a danger to you, or to someone else. He was carrying a knife when you last saw him.’

‘But Connie’s going to see Mary. Why can’t we just leave it to the police?’

‘I’m going to help someone I understand. Someone whose position is not a million miles away from my own. You know who’s to blame for that.’

‘Lena?’

‘Your sister screwed up someone’s life. No, don’t protest. Whatever happened in 1987, it doesn’t justify her manipulating someone just out of childhood. That young girl will be grieving for her mother.’

‘She was traumatised.’

‘I know all about trauma and about feeling helpless, but the question, Kat, is how many people are you prepared to make pay for someone else’s crime? And where does it stop?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘I didn’t make anyone pay. Neither did Stephanie Alton. But Lena did. And it’s time to stop things. I do understand. I really do, but not everything can be condoned, and not all is forgivable. You know that as well as me.’

After he had gone. Kat stood in the road for a moment then pulled out her mobile from her bag. She flicked through her contacts until she found the number. Theresa, who had endured years of counselling in an attempt to come to terms with her own experiences at the hands of her attackers. Probably either of those two men. She needed to know that there were others out there. The call went to voicemail. Kat thought about leaving a brief message but instead clicked off. Almost immediately, the phone rang.

‘Did you just call? I’m sorry I didn’t get to the phone in time.’

‘It’s Kat Gray.’

‘Is everything all right?’

Kat took a deep breath. ‘Theresa, I really do think you should go to the police.’

Sioned Rhys sat in front of Llewellyn, holding her cup on her knee. She’d turned down Margaret’s offer of coffee from the shop across the road, preferring instead a cup of mint tea from a packet she kept in her handbag. She spotted Llewellyn looking at the pale-green liquid.

‘I drink two glasses of red every evening. In case you think I’m one of those goody two-shoes. I’ve just got sick of drinking crap coffee in the stations I visit.’

Llewellyn grunted. ‘I’m spending a fortune at that new place. Three quid for a cup of coffee. It’s daylight robbery.’

Rhys looked down at her cup. ‘Sign of the times. You’ve got to move with them. Talking of which . . .’

Llewellyn picked up the bound document in front of him. ‘So this is your report.’

‘You’ve read it? What do you think?’

‘I think it makes depressing reading.’ Llewellyn flicked to a page. ‘Complaint number one,’ he read out, ‘Failure to show understanding or knowledge of the CPS policy with regard to prosecuting rape cases. The Rape Investigating Officer openly admitted in interview that he had no knowledge of the CPS Policy for Prosecuting Rape Cases at the time of this investigation.’ He looked up at Rhys, who was watching him calmly. ‘Finding, therefore,’ he continued, ‘that I consider there to be sufficient evidence to substantiate this complaint.’

Rhys put the cup on his desk. ‘I’m sure you’ve got the gist. In the vast majority of the cases that were examined, the behaviour of the detective sergeants and constables involved fell well below the standard expected of them.’

‘And your recommendation is . . . ?’

‘That the officers involved are subject to disciplinary proceedings.’

‘You mention individual
and
organisational failings though.’

‘As part of the recommendations, I’m going to ask that the policy and procedures of the treatment of women who make allegations of sexual assault are reviewed. But from what I can gather, the current system works much better. Significantly better.’ She looked across to Llewellyn. ‘Do you know the officers involved?’

‘Of course I know them. I’m so old, I think I know everyone here.’

‘It wasn’t just lack of training, you know.’ She made a face. ‘I seriously wonder how some of the individuals involved got through the recruitment process.’

Llewellyn put the report down on the desk with a bang. ‘The thing I’m worried about, what’s keeping me awake at night, is did we damage the investigation into the murder of Andrew Fisher by keeping quiet about this one?’

‘I don’t think so. Andrew Fisher and Philip Staley were allowed to continue their attacks because of our failure to treat the reports seriously. But nothing we did has impacted on the investigation into their murders.’

Llewellyn grimaced. ‘But it’s connected, isn’t it? What happened now. Mistakes from our past are coming back to haunt us.’

Rhys smoothed her skirt. ‘Mistakes usually do.’

The station was boiling as usual. Sadler had rolled his shirtsleeves up to above his elbows and made a mental note to ask the facilities manager to turn down the heating. Palmer also appeared to be sweating slightly. His usually neat appearance was tempered by a five o’clock shadow that shouldn’t have been there at eleven in the morning. Sadler thought about asking if everything was all right but baulked at the potential consequences. Connie had also been looking down recently, and if the reason for this was what Sadler suspected, then he really didn’t want to get involved, even though he knew, eventually, that’s what he would be doing.

Palmer was flicking through the notes that they had spread around the table. ‘I can’t believe it went this far and no one picked it up. We’ve got a mixture of unreported attacks that Connie discovered through finding old patrons of that bar, and ten or so clear reports of rape that absolutely nothing was done about.’ His voice was shaking with anger.

Sadler picked up a file. Case number nine had been particularly badly treated, in his opinion. The victim had drunk four blue Bols and lemonade. She had said in her statement that she was drunk but had not particularly responded to the man’s advances and had been leaving the bar when he pounced. The officer who took the statement had reported it in the standard way, but the dismissal of her claims, mainly due to the amount of alcohol she had drunk, made Sadler hot with an anger to match Palmer’s.

He wondered what the victim was doing. Was she a Stephanie Alton or a Rebecca Hardy? Because it was the Rebecca Hardys of this world that you had to hold on to. She’d gone on to make a decent life for herself. A happy marriage and three children. Just that one lingering resentment, a prickle of unhappiness in the life she had made. That an unprovoked attack made years earlier had not been investigated with the vigour it had warranted. Sadler thought about Connie’s righteous indignation regarding everything that happened. Surely things had changed. And Stephanie Alton. What made someone a survivor and another not? The eternal question.

Palmer was looking at Stephanie’s picture. ‘Do you think everything that happened is down to us? The life she had in the end? If we’d given her more support, do you think things might have turned out differently?’

‘I don’t know. I always shy away from simple explanations, but one thing’s for sure: we did things wrong. When I started this case, I thought the outcome would be greater scrutiny for the way we identify recent deaths, but I would personally welcome anything that improves the way we treat these women. The victims.’

‘And yet, our focus is on the perpetrators. We’re spending all our time and resources on finding who killed them.’

Sadler felt suddenly tired. ‘We’re bringers of justice. Whatever form it takes. Whatever we feel about the people in question.’

‘You think Lena Gray was culpable too?’

‘In her own way. For killing Philip Staley. There are a lot of women being denied justice because she administered her own particular brand of it.’

‘You still think it was unpremeditated.’

‘Probably. I don’t always understand people’s motives. I’m not endowed with extra gifts of insight, even after years in the job. I don’t know why Lena decided to help her husband when she knew him to be an associate of the man who raped her.’

Palmer was back at his computer scrolling through his emails. One caught his attention. He squinted at the screen. ‘What the—’

Sadler looked up. ‘What is it?’

Palmer picked up a sheet of paper from the printer. ‘This can’t be right.’

‘What? What is it?’

Palmer laid the paper down on the table and ran his finger down numbers.

Sadler joined him. ‘What’s the matter?’

‘I’ve got Daniel Frears’ mobile-phone records here. Andrew Fisher was shot at Hale’s End on the ninth of May.’

‘Right.’

‘Well, according to these records, Daniel was using his mobile at regular intervals around the Whitby area.’

Sadler picked up the paper and looked at the dates. ‘He could have lent his mobile phone to someone.’

‘It’s possible, I suppose. But why would you travel from Whitby to Bampton without your mobile phone? When you go on a journey you would usually take your mobile with you, wouldn’t you?’

‘Perhaps he was trying to confuse us. In case of an arrest, his mobile would be being used by someone else.’

‘I don’t think he was thinking like that. If he’s angry about his sister, would he be thinking that clearly?’

They glanced at each other. ‘So if he was in Whitby, he can’t have been in Bampton murdering Andrew Fisher.’

‘But he definitely killed Lena.’

‘He was in the house around the time of her murder. Kat confirms this and he’s now missing. That certainly makes him our prime suspect.’

‘And if he wanted to kill Andrew Fisher, then Lena would also have been in his sights. It was she who sent Andrew to Whitby in the first place.’

‘Unless someone beat him to it.’

‘Where’s Connie?’

Palmer shrugged.

Sadler lost his temper. ‘What the hell’s that shrug for? Where’s Connie?’

‘She went out. Talking about tying up loose ends. We think the boy who left the gifts for Kat Gray was Stephanie Alton’s daughter.’

Sadler slammed the paper down on the table. ‘Get her on the phone.’