Dead To Me (9 page)

‘And their relationship?’ Rachel said.

‘He was an enabler. Without Sean, Lisa might have kicked the drugs into touch. An outside chance. With Sean, forget it. Like trying to stop smoking when someone’s waving a full pack of King Size in front of your face, lighter at the ready.’

Rachel instantly craved a cigarette. ‘We’ve had reports of domestic violence,’ she said.

He gave a nod. ‘According to her records, Lisa had a reputation for violence when she was in Ryelands. Now and then she’d explode. A lot of anger.’

‘Can’t think why,’ Rachel said.

He smiled. ‘Sean, I don’t know so much about, but he doesn’t have any compunction about hitting a woman.’

‘But it wasn’t necessarily Lisa who was the punchbag?’

‘No, though he’d be stronger than her.’

Rachel agreed. He wasn’t a big lad, but he wasn’t a weed either, and Lisa had been slightly built. ‘Did Lisa ever use a knife?’ She thought of the crime-scene album, the blood. Had Lisa gone for Sean and he’d wrested the weapon from her, used it?

‘Not that I’ve come across. Anything to hand, I’d imagine. You think he might have done it?’ Raleigh asked.

‘Too early to say,’ Rachel said. ‘Would it surprise you?’

‘No, not at all,’ he said frankly.

‘OK. Lisa was signing on?’

‘That’s right, we were looking at access courses and improving her literacy and numeracy skills. Getting Lisa into a job and getting shot of Sean would have been the way to turn it all around, but it’s hopeless out there. That age especially. Dozens of kids after every minimum-wage vacancy.’

Rachel tried to imagine the girl on the mortuary trolley in a job interview. Failed.

‘Things weren’t great between Lisa and her mother. It was all or nothing. Denise veered from being a wreck unable to cope with anything to wanting to be best buddies. That inconsistency, it’s very difficult for a child. Denise would get drunk and emotional and ring Lisa, and either Lisa would hang up or they’d end up in a shouting match. Our aim is to keep families together as much as is possible, but sometimes the family isn’t a healthy unit. The relationships get stuck in a self-perpetuating cycle that doesn’t help anybody.’

‘Sounds hopeless,’ Rachel said.

‘Sometimes I think it is, but I’m not a complete pessimist.’ He smiled. ‘With the right sort of intervention, sustained and well resourced—’

‘Throw money at it,’ she said.

‘Couldn’t the same be said in crime prevention? Early intervention, working with the family as a whole? Tough love?’ He was smiling, teasing her.

‘How often did you see Lisa?’

‘Every fortnight at first, then once a month. She could phone in between if there were problems.’

‘Did she?’

‘Couple of times. Cock-ups with the housing benefit, that sort of thing.’

‘Was she involved in any other sexual relationships?’ Rachel asked.

‘No.’ He looked curious.

‘Prostitution?’

‘No. Though she wouldn’t necessarily tell me.’

‘She didn’t confide in you?’

‘Not much. Conflicting view of social workers. She knew I was there to help, to give her support, but that can be read as bossing her about.’ His phone rang again and he glanced at his watch. ‘Timewise …’

‘Nearly done,’ Rachel said. She skimmed back over her notes. ‘And when did you last see her?’

‘The twenty-fifth of November.’

‘And how was she then?’

‘I had no particular concerns – nothing new, anyway,’ he amended. ‘I’ve tried talking to her about rehab, but it’s got to come from them.’

‘Was anyone threatening her? Did she have any enemies?’

‘No.’

‘Thanks. If anything else occurs, just give us a ring.’ Rachel passed him a card, the MIT number. It didn’t have her name on yet, something she’d have to ask Gill about – or Andy. As sergeant, he might be more approachable.

Raleigh got up to show her out. His phone was bleating and she signalled that she could make her own way and left him to his work.

Rachel was still out when the mobile phone company came back to say they had just emailed the data the team were waiting on, so Janet printed off all the details, waded through it and relayed the crucial bits to Gill. Incoming text at half past twelve, from a number not yet known to the inquiry. Outgoing text to that number immediately after. No way of knowing the content of the texts. Outgoing call at twelve fifty-five p.m. to a local landline number. Two incoming calls, the first at thirteen ten from Sean Broughton.

‘As he told us, backed up by his phone log,’ said Gill.

‘And the second, thirteen fourteen from Denise. Which also fits,’ Janet said. The FLO, true to his word, had got Denise’s mobile charged and then checked the calls she’d made.

‘Who’s the landline?’

Janet shrugged. Gill picked up the office phone and dialled.

‘Taxi?’ came the answer. Janet could hear from where she was standing.

‘Bingo,’ Gill mouthed. She handed the receiver to Janet so she could get details from the dispatcher and locate the driver who had picked up Lisa.

When she came off the phone, Gill nodded: ‘Put Kevin out of his misery.’

Janet looked,
Do I have to
? Kevin still working his way through the directory – T for taxi.

‘Be nice,’ Gill warned. ‘What about cell site location?’

‘Later today, maybe first thing tomorrow,’ Janet said. ‘Right, I’m off to see a man about a cab.’

‘Rachel still out?’ Gill looked at her watch.

‘Still with the personal advisor,’ Janet guessed.

‘If she’s done, take her with you,’ Gill said.

Oh, bloody marvellous. Gill was determined to force them together at every opportunity. Janet phoned Rachel: ‘Where are you?’ Hoping she’d be busy.

‘On my way back,’ Rachel said, an edge to her voice, as though she thought Janet didn’t trust her.

‘Meet me at Speedy Cabs.’

‘We got the taxi!’ Rachel suddenly alive and excited.

11

SPEEDY CABS OPERATED
out of a railway arch close to the canal in Ardwick. Either side were a welding outfit and a pallets store. Janet wondered if the curved roof caused a headache for the pallets firm, space they paid for and couldn’t use, not ideally suited to the square shape of the stock.

Rachel was there already having a fag by the railings. ‘Kevin came through?’ She sounded surprised.

Janet shook her head. ‘’Fraid not. Cell-phone provider.’

Rachel dropped her cig and ground it out. They crossed the cobbled street to the front of the archway, went in through a steel door that led in turn to the dispatcher’s office and a small rest area where a couple of drivers were having lunch. The telly in the corner was showing a rerun of the latest Manchester derby.

‘Ladies,’ said the dispatcher.

Janet and Rachel showed their warrant cards.

‘Kasim will be back any minute,’ he said. Then ‘Yes!’
to
the screen as a shot bounced off the crossbar. ‘Up the Blues,’ he said, sniffing out their affiliation. A city of two teams. Sporting rivalry passed down from one generation to the next.

Rachel shrugged. ‘Whatever.’

Disappointed, he looked at Janet. ‘Me neither,’ she said. Ade used to follow Oldham Athletic, a suicide mission if ever there was one; went to a few matches when he was younger. Janet never fancied it.

They heard a car trundle over the cobbles and a cab pulled up in front of the office.

‘Kasim,’ the man confirmed.

‘Thanks, we’ll talk outside,’ Janet said. More privacy there.

Kasim was curious, bright-eyed and bushy-tailed. He had done that thing with his eyebrows, Janet noticed, lines cut through. Looked as though his hand slipped shaving. She didn’t get it. I’m getting old, she thought. The taxi drivers look younger every day.

‘She the girl that was murdered?’ Kasim asked them when they told him what they were there for.

‘That’s right,’ Janet said. ‘You picked her up, when?’

‘Just after one.’

‘Where from?’

‘Shudehill, near the Printworks,’ he said.

‘Where did you drop her?’

‘Fairland Avenue.’

‘She was on her own?’ Janet said.

‘Yeah.’

‘Dispatch says she’s a regular fare?’

He shrugged. ‘We’re reliable. People stick with you if they know you’re gonna turn up.’

‘Did she say anything?’

‘No, just, maybe the weather?’ Like he was guessing. Janet didn’t want guesses.

‘Can you remember what she was wearing?’ Rachel said.

He exhaled noisily, indicating that was a really hard task. ‘To be honest’ – he shook his head – ‘don’t even notice what the girlfriend’s wearing half the time.’

‘Anything about the trip, about the girl? How was she?’ said Janet.

‘Quiet,’ he ventured.

An unmemorable passenger had turned out to be front-page news, but Kasim had no juicy story to dine off. He could barely remember the fare.

‘What time did you drop her?’ Janet said.

He considered, rubbing his chin with one hand. ‘Maybe quarter past one, no later.’

‘She make or receive any calls?’ Rachel said.

‘A couple. I think her phone went.’

‘And what was she saying?’

‘Sorry. You zone out, you know? Eye on the road, the traffic. Nothing sticks.’ He gave a shrug.

If Kasim’s timing was accurate, and he wouldn’t be far out, given the relatively short distance of the journey, then the calls between Sean and Lisa and Denise and Lisa would have taken place while she was on the way home.

There wasn’t much more they could learn from Kasim, but he had given them a last sighting.

‘We know she was still alive at quarter past one and that she was dead by half three. That’s a pretty tight window,’ said Janet once they were back at the station, eating sandwiches from the deli. Janet was ravenous, had gone for a double-decker BLT and a flapjack.

Rachel didn’t answer. Janet turned to look at her. She was staring into space, miles away. Dolly daydream now, thought Janet. Wonder what she has to daydream about?

Suddenly Rachel said, ‘Why get a cab? Any number of buses go up that way, and she was opposite the bus station. She’s on the dole. Why get a cab?’

Janet swallowed her mouthful. ‘Lazy, feckless, spending her benefits on taxis. Only cost her four or five quid, anyway.’

‘Buy twenty fags for that,’ Rachel said, scowling, seemingly crushed that she couldn’t make sense of it.

She remained preoccupied over lunch, the cab business obviously bugging her. But Janet didn’t know that there was anything in it. Some folk had weird ways of budgeting. They saw it all the time: people with no carpets or curtains and a TV the size of a small car.

Gill had left instructions for Andy and Janet to co-ordinate reports for a case update and pull everyone in for early evening. Janet felt the familiar trip of her heart when she joined Andy in the meeting room.

‘Made a start,’ he said. ‘Further forensics’ – he pointed to a pile of printouts – ‘witness statements, Sean Broughton and’ – he indicated another pile – ‘Denise Finn.’

‘Fine.’ Janet nodded to the piles. ‘Rachel’s typing up the info from the personal advisor and I’ve adjusted the timeline. Cabbie set her down at quarter past one.’

‘You want to start collating and I’ll get Rachel?’ He gave her a quick smile. The way he looked at her sometimes, she wondered if he could tell the old attraction hadn’t gone away completely, could sense that she occasionally daydreamed about him. Like a lovesick teenager. Way back in training, that’s when Janet first met Andy, had a fling – until she came to her senses and married Ade. The men were physically very different, Ade stouter, shorter; Andy leaner, taller. Andy had quick, bright eyes. These days there was an energy about Andy quite unlike Ade. It was as if Ade’s batteries had worn down somewhere along the way and he couldn’t be bothered to recharge them. Not that Andy was hyper or anything, but he was engaged, sharp, keen. It was a bonus, having him there in the syndicate – one she kept to herself – enjoying the chance to work with him, have the occasional flirtatious thought. Harmless, she told herself.

Janet sat at the desk, pulling reports from each pile into sets for the team. The arguments between her and Ade seemed to erupt with increasing frequency. Any exchange about the house or the cars or the girls suddenly exploding into a blame game over who was supposed to be sorting what out. Her overtime was unpredictable, her hours out of the house often longer than his, and Ade flung this back at her every chance he got. In the middle of their most recent row, he’d accused her of preferring being at work to being at home. ‘I’m sick of living like a single parent,’ he said. ‘I do the lot and I get no thanks for it.’ Trying to make her feel guilty – and succeeding, though she would not let it show, would not give him the satisfaction. And even after the rows were over, the atmosphere lingered. Ade could man the barricades for days, his bitter silence like a chemical weapon. Janet always crumbled first, said sorry. Which allowed him to do likewise … till next time.