Dead Like You (45 page)

120

Friday 23 January

Denise Starling drove home recklessly in her black Mercedes convertible coupé. She stared at the wet road ahead through her mist of tears. The wipers clop-clopped on the windscreen. A chirrupy woman was wittering away on BBC Sussex Radio about disastrous holidays people had experienced, inviting listeners to call in.

Yeah, every sodding holiday with Garry Starling had been a disaster. Life with Garry Starling had been a disaster. And now it was getting even worse.

Shit, you bastard.

Three years into their marriage she’d fallen pregnant. He’d made her abort. He didn’t want to bring children into the world. He’d quoted some poem at her, some poet whose name she could not remember, about your parents screwing you up.

What had happened in Garry’s childhood had twisted him, that was for sure. Damaged him in ways that she could never understand.

She drove, way over the limit, along the London Road, past Preston Park, and shouted, ‘Fuck you!’ when the speed camera there she had totally forgotten about flashed her. Then she turned into Edward Street, drove along past the law courts, and Brighton College and the Royal Sussex County Hospital.

A few minutes later she made a right turn, opposite the East Brighton Golf Club, where Garry was a member – not for much longer, she thought, with some strange, grim satisfaction – let him be a sodding pariah too! Then she crested the hill, swung into Roedean Crescent and finally turned right, into the driveway of their large mock-Tudor house, passing the double garage doors, and pulled up in front of Garry’s grey Volvo.

Then, her eyes still misted with tears, she unlocked the front door of her house. She had trouble, for some moments, unsetting the alarm.
Typical! The one time we have trouble with the alarm, Garry’s not around to get it sorted!

She slammed shut the front door, then slid the safety chain across.
Sod you, world. You want to ignore me? Fine by me! I’m going to ignore you too. I’m going to open a bottle of Garry’s most expensive claret and get rip-roaring sodding pissed!

Then a quiet voice right behind her said, ‘Shalimar! I like Shalimar! I smelt it the first time I met you!’

An arm clamped around her neck. Something damp and sickly-sweet-smelling was pressed across her nose. She struggled, for a few seconds, as her brain began to go muzzy.

As she lapsed into unconsciousness, the last words she heard were, ‘You’re like my mother. You do bad things to men. Bad things that make men do bad things. You’re disgusting. You are evil, like my mother. You were rude to me in my taxi. You destroyed your husband, you know that? Someone has to stop you before you destroy anyone else.’

Her eyes were closed, so he whispered into her ear, ‘I’m going to do something to you that I once did to my mother. I left it a little late with her, so I had to do it a different way. But it felt good afterwards. I know I’m going to feel good after this too. Maybe even better. Uh-huh.’

Yac pulled her limp body up the stairs, listening to the bump-bump, bump-bump of her black Christian Louboutins on each tread as he struggled with her weight.

He stopped, perspiring, when he reached the landing. Then he bent down and picked up the blue tow rope he’d found in the garage, in his gloved hands, and knotted one end firmly around one of the mock-Tudor ceiling beams that was in easy reach of the stairs. He’d already prepared the other end into a hangman’s noose. And measured the distance.

He placed the noose around the limp woman’s neck and heaved her, with some difficulty, over the banister rail.

He watched her fall, then jerk, then spinning around and around.

It was some minutes before she was completely still.

He stared at her shoes. He remembered her shoes the first time she had entered his taxi. Feeling a need to take them from her.

Hanging limply, looking pretty dead so far as he could tell, she reminded him of his mother again now.

No longer able to hurt anyone.

Just like his mother hadn’t been.

‘I used a pillow on her,’ he called out to Denise. But she did not reply. He wasn’t really expecting her to.

He decided to leave the shoes, although they were so tempting. After all, taking them was the Shoe Man’s style. Not his.

121

Sunday 25 January

It was a good Sunday morning. The tide was in and the baby on the boat next door was not crying. Maybe it had died, Yac thought. He’d heard about cot death syndrome. Perhaps the baby had died from that. Perhaps not. But he hoped so.

He had copies of all this week’s
Argus
newspapers laid out on the table in the saloon. Bosun, the cat, had walked over them. That was OK. They’d reached an understanding. Bosun did not walk over his lavatory chains any more. But if he wanted to walk over his newspapers, that was fine.

He was happy with what he read.

The Shoe Man’s wife had committed suicide. That was understandable. Her husband’s arrest was a big trauma for her. Garry Starling had been a major player in this city. A big socialite. The disgrace of his arrest would have been hard for any wife to bear. She’d been telling people she felt suicidal and then she had hanged herself.

Perfectly reasonable.

Uh-huh.

He liked it best when the tide was in and the
Tom Newbound
was floating.

Then he could pull his fishing lines up.

He had two fishing lines out, each with weights on them so that they sank well into the mud at low tide. Of course he had been worried each time that the police had searched the boat. But he needn’t have been. They pulled every plank up from the floor of the bilges. Searched in every cavity there was. But none of them had ever thought to raise one of the fishing lines, like he was doing now.

Just as well.

The second line was tied, at the end, to a weighted waterproof bag. Inside were the shoes of Mandy Thorpe. Fake Jimmy Choos. He didn’t like those fake shoes. They deserved to be buried in mud.

And she deserved the punishment he had given her for wearing them.

But, he had to concede, it had been good punishing her. She’d reminded him so much of his mother. Fat like his mother. The smell of his mother. He’d waited a long time to do that to his mother, to see what it felt like. But he’d left it too late and she was too sick by the time he’d gathered the courage. But it had been good with Mandy Thorpe. It had felt like he was punishing his mother. Very good indeed.

But not as good as punishing Denise Starling.

He liked the way she had spun around and around, like a top.

But he hadn’t liked being in custody. Hadn’t liked the way the police had removed so many of his things from the boat. Going through everything and messing up his collections. That was bad.

At least he had everything back now. It felt like he had his life back.

Best news of all, he’d had a call from the people who owned this boat, to say that they would be staying on at least two more years in Goa now. That made him very pleased.

Life suddenly felt very good. Very peaceful.

And it was a rising tide. Nothing like it.

Uh-huh.

122

Friday 20 February

Darren Spicer was feeling in a good mood. He stopped off at the pub, which had become his regular staging post on his way back home from work, for his now customary two pints with whisky chasers. He was becoming a creature of habit! You didn’t have to be in prison to have a routine; you could have one outside too.

He was enjoying his new routine. Commuting to the Grand from the night shelter – always by foot, to save the pennies and to keep fit. There was a young lady who worked as a chambermaid at the hotel called Tia whom he was getting sweet on – and he reckoned she was getting sweet on him too. She was Filipina, pretty, in her early thirties, with a boyfriend she’d left because he beat her up. They were getting to know each other pretty well, although they hadn’t actually yet
done it
, so to speak. But that was just a matter of time now.

They had a date tomorrow. It was difficult in the evenings, because of having to be back for lock-in, but tomorrow they would be spending all day together. She shared a room in a little flat up off the Lewes Road and, giggling, had told him her room-mate was going to be away for the weekend. Tomorrow, with luck, he reckoned, they’d be shagging all day.

He had another whisky to celebrate, a quality one this time, a single malt, Glenlivet. Mustn’t drink too much, he knew, because arriving back at St Patrick’s drunk was a sure way to get thrown out. And now he was getting close to his coveted MiPod. So just the one Glenlivet. Not that money was no object – but the old cash situation was improving all the time.

He’d managed to get himself on to room maintenance at the hotel, because they were short of staff. He had a plastic pass key to get him into every guest room in the building. And he had today’s takings from the room safes he’d opened up tucked in his pocket. He’d been cautious. He was going to keep his promise to himself to stay out of prison this time for good. All he took was a tiny fraction of any cash he found in the safes. Of course he had been tempted by some of the fancy watches and jewellery, but he’d stuck to his guns, and was proud of his self-discipline.

In these past four and a half weeks, he’d stashed away nearly four grand in his chained suitcase in the locker at St Patrick’s. Property prices had come down, thanks to the recession. With what Tia earned, and with what he could put down as a cash deposit in, say, a year’s time, he should be able to buy a little flat somewhere in the Brighton area. Or even move right away to somewhere a lot cheaper. Perhaps warmer.

Perhaps Spain.

Maybe Tia would like to be in a warm country.

Of course it was all a pipe dream. He hadn’t talked about any future with her yet. The thought of hopefully shagging her tomorrow was about as far as he had got. But he felt good about her. She gave off a warmth that made him feel happy every time he stood near her or talked to her. Sometimes you needed to go with your instincts.

And his instincts, ten minutes later, as he turned right off Western Road into Cambridge Road told him that something was not good.

It was the shiny silver Ford Focus estate double-parked almost outside the front door of the St Patrick’s night shelter, with someone sitting in the driving seat.

When you spent your life trying not to get nicked, you developed a kind of second sense, your antennae always up for spotting plain-clothes police and their vehicles. His eyes locked on the four short antennae on the roof of the Ford.

Shit.

Fear crashed through him. For an instant, he debated whether to turn and run, then empty his pockets. But he’d left it too late. The burly, bald, black detective who was standing in the doorway had already clocked him. Spicer decided he’d have to try to bluff it out.

Shit
, he thought again, his dream fading away. And tomorrow’s shag with sweet Tia. The grim, green walls of Lewes Prison closing around his mind.

‘Hello, Darren,’ Detective Sergeant Branson greeted him, with a big cheery grin. ‘How’s it going?’

Spicer looked at him warily. ‘All right,’ he said. ‘Yeah.’

‘Wonder if I could have a word with you.’ He pointed at the door. ‘They’re letting us use that interview room – OK with you?’

‘Yeah.’ Spicer shrugged. ‘What’s this about?’

‘Just a little chat. Got a bit of news I thought you might like to hear.’

Spicer sat down, shaking, very uneasy. He couldn’t think of any news that Detective Sergeant Branson could bring him that he would like to hear.

Branson closed the door, then seated himself across the table, facing him. ‘Dunno if you remember when we spoke – you were giving me the nod about the lock-up behind Mandalay Court? About the white van inside it?’

Spicer looked at him warily.

‘I mentioned to you there was a reward, right? Fifty thousand pounds? For information leading to the arrest and conviction of the man who attempted to attack Mrs Dee Burchmore? Put up by her husband.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Well, I’ve got good news for you. It looks like you’re in line for it.’

Spicer broke into a grin, relief flooding through him. Incredible relief.

‘You’re shitting me?’

Branson shook his head. ‘Nope. Actually, Detective Superintendent Grace, the SIO, has put your name forward himself. It’s down to you that we’ve potted our suspect. He’s been arrested and charged.’

‘When do I get the money?’ Spicer asked incredulously.

‘When he’s convicted. I think a trial date’s been set for this autumn – I can let you know when I have the details. But there’s not much doubt we’ve got the right man.’ Branson smiled. ‘So, sunshine, what are you going to do with all that loot? Shove it up your nose, right, as usual?’

‘Nah.’ Spicer said. ‘I’m going to buy a little flat, you know, as an investment for the future. I’ll use the money towards the deposit. Magic!’

Branson shook his head. ‘In your dreams. You’ll spend it on drugs.’

‘I won’t. Not this time! I’m not going back inside. I’m going to buy a place of my own and go straight. Yeah.’

‘Tell you what, invite us to your house-warming. Just to prove you’ve changed, all right?’

Spicer grinned. ‘Yeah, well, that could be difficult. If it’s a party, you know – like – there might be stuff here. You know, like – party stuff. Could be embarrassing for you to be there – you being a cop and all.’

‘I don’t embarrass easily.’

Spicer shrugged. ‘Fifty grand. Incredible! Fucking incredible!’

The DS fixed his eyes on the old lag. ‘You know what? I heard they didn’t bother changing the sheets in your cell. They know you’re going to be back.’

‘Not this time.’

‘I’ll look forward to the invitation. The Governor of Lewes Prison will know where to send it.’

Spicer grinned. ‘That’s very witty.’

‘Just the truth, sunshine.’

Glenn left the room and went outside, to where Roy Grace was waiting in the car. He was looking forward to an end-of-week drink with his mate.