Cold Sacrifice (12 page)

‘How old is she?’

‘Guess.’

He shrugged. He didn’t have a clue.

‘Anything from twenty-five to thirty-five.’

‘Twenty.’

Ian was surprised and a little shocked.

‘She looks more like forty,’ he said, remembering Della’s raddled face.

Ian didn’t bother to call first. He wasn’t expecting Henry to be at home early on Wednesday afternoon, but thought he would drive out to Herne Bay anyway and take another look at the park where Martha had been stabbed, while he was waiting for her husband to come home. He tried the house first and was surprised when Henry opened the door. He explained he had been given two weeks’ compassionate leave from work.

‘They don’t usually,’ he added. ‘They’re a bunch of bastards as a rule. But the case has been in the papers and they’re worried I might upset some of the customers if I turn up to fit their kitchens just now. The bosses are fussy about their image.’

Briefly, Ian outlined the reason for his visit. To begin with, Henry didn’t seem to grasp what he was talking about.

‘An appeal’ he repeated, ‘what’s that?’

Ian explained and finally the widower nodded to indicate he had understood.

‘OK,’ he said, ‘go ahead. I don’t mind. Why would I? Do what you have to do.’

Ian explained that he hadn’t come to request permission.

‘What do you want then?’

‘It helps in these instances to have a family member of the victim present.’

‘You want me to be there?’

‘Yes.’

‘What? On the telly?’

‘Yes.’

Henry shook his head.

‘I don’t think so.’

Ian wasn’t surprised. It was a common reaction. It wasn’t hard to persuade Henry to change his mind, once Ian insisted that it was likely to be a real help in gathering information that would lead to an arrest.

‘Well, if you’re sure it will help.’

‘There are no guarantees, Mr Martin, but the chances are high that it will help encourage a witness to come forward.’

He didn’t get on so well when he suggested Mark join them. At first Henry was evasive, claiming he didn’t know where his son was. Then he said he thought Mark might be busy, and when Ian asked for his mobile number, his father claimed not to know it. Finally, when Ian said he would trace the number himself, Henry told him bluntly not to bother.

‘You won’t get him on the telly to talk about his mother.’

‘Not even to help find out who killed her?’

‘He’s too upset. They were very close. You can try if you like, but I don’t suppose he’ll even want to talk to you. You’d do better to leave the lad alone. He’s been through enough, with all this. Now if that’s all –’

‘There is one other question, Mr Martin. You withdrew a thousand pounds from your bank account on Monday.’

‘So? It’s not a crime to spend money, is it?’

‘What was it for?’

Henry didn’t hesitate.

‘I blew it.’

‘Blew it? Do you have any receipts?’

Henry gave a bark of laughter.

‘Look, I went into town on Monday night and got completely plastered and as far as I can remember I bought drinks for a load of strangers. I ended up in a cab. Someone put me in it and I got home somehow. But don’t ask me where I went or how I got there, because I couldn’t tell you, I was so out of it. Wouldn’t you be, if your wife had just been murdered?’

R
OB WAS BUSY SETTING
up the television appeal. Ian was relieved he didn’t have to be involved in it but, at the same time, he couldn’t help feeling slightly disappointed at being excluded from the bustle. He knew he was being unreasonable. It wasn’t as though Rob would learn anything new from talking for a few minutes on camera. On the contrary, Ian was more likely to pick up new information if the broadcast prompted people to phone in, which was the intention. Having written up his decision log he took a quick break and was pleased to come across Polly in the canteen. Over a mug of tea, she told him she had spoken to Eve Thompson’s father who had confirmed her identity. It was a disappointment, even though Mark had never really been a suspect. He had no motive for killing his mother and by all accounts had been very close to her. Meanwhile the net was closing in on Henry, whose witness seemed anything but reliable.

Jade Higgins had been working as a pole dancer for a few years. Her stint at the club in Margate was the longest she had stayed in any one place. Before she took up dancing, her history had been erratic. Her mother had given her up for adoption at birth. The couple who had taken her in had never completed the formal adoption process but had relinquished her into care when she was only eighteen months old. From there she had passed through a succession of foster homes and institutions, until she had dropped out of the system when she reached sixteen. She had turned up in Margate a year later by which time she had reinvented herself as Della. There she had embarked on a brief affair with an older man who had thrown money at her for a while, paying for an abortion, and cosmetic surgery on her breasts and nose. When he tired of her, she had found a job as a pole dancer.

‘And she’s still only twenty,’ Polly concluded. ‘It’s not much of a life so far, is it?’

Ian nodded without answering.

‘I remember being twenty,’ Polly screwed up her face. ‘With my dad being on the force, I suppose it was always there at the back of my mind, that was what I was going to do, but at twenty I hadn’t grown up yet. And she’s already had abortions and plastic surgery, and been a prostitute, and God knows what else besides.’

Ian tidied up his desk and set off early to meet a former colleague for a drink on his way home. He glanced at his watch and put his foot down. His previous detective inspector was waiting for him when he reached the pub. They had worked together before she left the Murder Squad in Kent for London. As a single woman Geraldine could please herself, but Ian was keen to avoid any risk of gossip and had suggested meeting in a small pub off the beaten track where they were unlikely to be spotted. It was absurd and at the same time quite exciting. He felt like a kid bunking off school.

‘So what’s it like, living in London?’

He shifted in his seat, trying to fit his long legs comfortably under the table without knocking into her.

‘Honest truth or sanitised version?’

‘What do you think?’

She gave a rueful smile.

They had worked so closely together, he could sense that she wanted to talk about her experience. An absolute trust had developed between them, a kind of intimacy that often arose between colleagues working side by side in the emergency services and armed forces knowing there might be times when their very survival depended on mutual understanding. He was beginning to doubt he would ever share such a close relationship with his wife. The thought made him almost unbearably sad. He was dismayed to hear that Geraldine was finding London a lonely place to live.

‘I’ve got a great sergeant, though she’s not like you, of course.’

He couldn’t help grinning.

‘We made a good team, didn’t we?’

‘Your turn.’

‘What?’

‘Tell me about married life.’

He hesitated, tempted to unburden himself. Loyalty to Bev restrained him.

‘It’s fine.’

She knew he was lying and smiled in unspoken sympathy.

Stopping on the way home to fill up with petrol, he bought a bunch of flowers and a bottle of wine at the garage. There was no reason not to think kindly of his wife. He told himself the flowers had nothing to do with his friendship with Geraldine. He ran up the path, hoping Bev hadn’t arrived before him. The house was empty. He took some salmon pieces out of the freezer and put them in the microwave to defrost while he laid the table. Half an hour later he had made a bowl of salad, boiled potatoes and put them in the oven to brown, and had the fish defrosted and ready to grill. He poured himself a beer and sat down to wait for Bev. She was usually home by half past six. He dozed off in front of the television. When he woke up it was half past eight and she still wasn’t home. Worried, he tried her mobile.

‘Hi, thank you for calling. Leave a message and I’ll call you back.’

Ian thought about the cases he had worked on involving missing persons; young women, teenagers, children. He tried Bev’s phone once more, and again the phone went straight to voicemail. He flung himself down on the sofa, flicked through different channels on the television and opened another beer, telling himself she would be home soon. Half an hour later, he heard the front door slam and leaped to his feet.

‘Where the hell have you been?’

‘What?’

She took off her shoes and placed them carefully on the rack in the hall without looking up. Ian watched her, admiring the curve of her calves and her elegant hands. She straightened up and took off her coat. He noticed she was smartly dressed, in a knee-length pencil skirt that showed off her slim hips. He guessed she had gone out straight from work.

‘It’s gone nine.’

‘So?’

She turned her back on him to hang her coat in the cupboard.

‘I was worried.’

‘Worried? Why? It’s not late.’

Too late, he realised he had walked straight into a minefield. Hands on hips, Bev spun round and launched her attack, demanding to know how often he had been late home.

‘Well? Has one week gone by when you haven’t been home late?’

‘That’s not fair,’ he protested. ‘I don’t work regular hours, and you know it. You’re always home by six thirty. I was worried about you.’

Any hope that she would be pleased he had missed her vanished at her verbal onslaught.

‘So it’s all right for you to come back at all hours, whenever it suits you, but you still expect me to be here when you get home. Well, isn’t that just typical? So it’s one rule for you and another for me. You can go gadding about to all hours, coming and going whenever it suits you, and that’s fine, just as long as the little wife is waiting for you when you decide to come home.’

Ian sloped into the kitchen, overwhelmed by the passion of her invective. He never seemed to get it right where his wife was concerned.

D
ELLA FELT UNDER HER
mattress for the envelope, pulled it out and counted the notes again. Forty-six crisp twenty quid notes. It had seemed too good to be true when the old bloke had made the offer. Fifteen hundred quid just to tell his brother she’d been shagging him on Friday night. She had never even seen the bloke before. On Friday evening she had been in the flat washing her hair, watching TV and painting her nails because the manager had sent her home on account of a swollen eye.

‘You look like shit. We can’t have you putting the punters off, can we?’

‘But what about tips?’

‘What sort of tips are you expecting to pull, looking like that? Go home and sort your face out, for fuck’s sake, and don’t come back before you’re fixed.’

It was a blow, but she had made the best of it, like she always did. Apart from the loss of earnings, she hadn’t been unhappy about spending a few days at home.

A thousand quid, with another five hundred to come, just when she was strapped for cash, had more than compensated for the days off. Talk about a stroke of luck. She counted the money one more time and stuffed two notes into her bag before slipping the rest back under the mattress. It wouldn’t last long at the rate she was spending it, but was more than enough to tide her over. In the meantime her eye was no longer inflamed and the bruising was easy enough to conceal with make-up. She was back in the game, as though she had never been away. She took a swig from a bottle and smacked her lips. Mostly she could only afford the cheap stuff, but this was real Smirnoff from Russia, thanks to Henry messing about with his brother’s wife.

There was just one problem. Henry hadn’t mentioned the police might be interested, and she didn’t understand their angle. She lay back on her bed and thought about it now, considering her involvement with Henry from every point of view. What it all boiled down to was that his brother suspected Henry of screwing his wife. Either the brother had complained to the police, or else Henry himself had connections with the police. He might be a cop himself. Or his brother was, more like. She sat up, leaning on her elbow, and took another gulp. The liquid slipped down her throat, burning and cooling at the same time; comforting. She couldn’t help feeling sympathetic towards a man who had promised her fifteen hundred quid. So what if he was a cop? If she played her part well, he’d pay up. What the fuck did she care if she spoke to a policeman or to Henry’s brother? All she had to do was stick to the same story. It was all a bit confusing, but the money was real enough.

Lying down again, she went through her lines. She had been with Henry on Friday night. He had picked her up in his car – she couldn’t remember where – and they had driven out of town, along a dark road – she didn’t know where. The rest was like any other punter. They had been in his car driving around for a few hours. It was past ten when he had dropped her off in the town – she couldn’t remember where exactly – because she hadn’t reached home until half past ten. That was important. She was to say she had been drunk, so his brother would believe her being so hazy about the details. Henry had thought of everything. Nothing could possibly go wrong. As soon as she had spoken to his brother, he said he would give her another five hundred. And it wouldn’t end there. He didn’t know it yet, but after that she was going to screw another payment out of him, and another. She giggled. It wasn’t blackmail. She was doing him a favour. He ought to be pleased to pay up, because she was getting him out of trouble. She sat up and reached for the bottle. It was nearly empty, but she could get more. As much as she wanted.

The front door banged, disturbing her doze. Someone was clattering around in the kitchen. Della hauled herself up out of bed, shoved the empty vodka bottle in a drawer, and checked her money was carefully hidden before she went to join her flatmate in the kitchen.

‘You look rough,’ Candy said. ‘Are you OK?’

‘Never better.’

‘Tea?’

‘I’ll make it if you like.’