Death Line (14 page)

The man bit his lip. Why didn’t the police just come clean? Why prolong the agony by not admitting immediately that it was Scott’s body? It had been left to reporters to reveal the
truth. No matter how much activity was going on behind the scenes, it would be twenty-four hours before detectives officially launched a murder inquiry. Twenty-four hours...

He glanced down at his hand, wondered briefly why the palm was bleeding.

Bev parked the MG alongside the waste ground in Balsall Heath. Apart from the guy in a turban who was having a fag in the newsagent’s doorway, the Quarry Bank estate was
pretty quiet. Early yet, though; curry smells from close by Balti houses lingered in the air. Reminded her of last night’s pig-out, reckoned some of it was still floating round the alimentary
canal.

She grabbed her Raybans and stepped out of the car. With the mercury relentlessly rising, she’d finally succumbed to lowering the soft top. Could be a bad move round here; best keep her
eyes peeled, not that she was going far. Shouldering her bag, she headed for the spot where Josh’s body had been dumped. A handful of other folk must’ve had similar ideas going by the
mini-shrine that had sprung up. Bev thought of the visit as touching base, a sort of secular pilgrimage. Though the Haines murder was theoretically her baby, her main motivation was still a little
boy with big glasses and a cheeky grin.

Dropping by now hadn’t only been prompted by visions on the way to work. Not that she was hallucinating or anything. Josh’s image had stared out from posters plastered all over
Moseley and Highgate, presumably further afield as well. Originally intended to tell the public about a missing boy, they now asked for help in finding his killer. Lancelot had ordered the word
change. Waste not want not, she supposed. Was a sodding waste though, wasn’t it? She aimed a vicious kick at a stone, winced when her big toe took the brunt. Big deal, Beverley. Josh’s
life had been snuffed out almost before it began. And what was there to show for it? A few cheap bunches of flowers, a garish green teddy, a couple of candles and a Villa scarf. The earth was
parched, cracking under the heat. Squatting she took a closer look, wiped a finger under her eye. Must have a speck of dust in it.

She scrabbled in her bag until her fingers closed round the figure. OK, it was stupid, it’d probably get nicked soon as she turned her back. But so far she’d failed to do anything
else for the poor little sod. There y’go, Josh, she whispered, then slipped the toy into the folds of the scarf, a Power Ranger with two arms. Tiger, like the one Josh had been clutching when
he died, the one still with forensics. She sniffed. Odds of the killer leaving DNA on it were zilch. He’d left naff all anywhere else. More by judgement than luck: she had a feeling the guy
they were after left nothing to chance.

Glancing at the flowers, she reckoned the local florist must’ve had a job lot of chrysanthemums and daisies, gaudy bouquets of the things lay sweating under cellophane shrouds. Reaching
out, she read the handwritten messages.

Bev raised a bemused eyebrow. Benefit. Doubt. Maybe he would. According to Powell, Stacey now had the twins back living with her at Jubilee Row. The DI had called at the house yesterday
ostensibly to tell her Haines was dead, and at the same time establish where she’d been when the guy was getting himself killed. Her account checked out. Powell and Knight were satisfied she
wasn’t implicated. Likely neither would seriously have entertained the thought but for Stacey’s unscheduled appearance at Highgate screaming for five minutes on her own with Haines.

Rising, Bev spotted a couple of sunflowers peeping out from under the daisies. Talk about hiding their light. And they were her favourite. Glancing round, she gently nudged the others aside with
her toe. Lucky that, or she’d never have spotted the card.

The letter was on Powell’s keyboard when he arrived for work that morning. He’d quickly established that a cleaner had found it near the door in reception and
dropped it off on the DI’s desk. Great. Mrs Mop’s dabs would be all over it. As forensics would find out. The single sheet of A5 plus envelope was in the lab now; DCI Knight was reading
a copy. The two men sat across from each other in the senior detective’s office. Powell studied the chief’s face closely. It gave nothing away, unlike whoever had typed the tip-off.

“Well-wisher?” The DCI sneered, laid the paper on the desk. “Mighta wished us well a damn sight sooner.” He smoothed a hand over his bald head.

“Maybe he’s been away?” And could’ve caught the DI’s witness appeal on local telly last night. It was the only reason Powell could see why the letter was addressed
to him.

“You’re assuming it’s a he. You’re assuming it’s genuine and not some time-wasting tosser.” He took a sip of espresso. “I’ll tell you this for
sure: this time round we take nothing for granted.”

Powell shrugged. He cut a covetous glance at the boss’s personal coffee maker gleaming and steaming on top of the filing cabinet. The DI hadn’t even had chance to nip to the canteen
for a cup of Nescaff. Getting the original letter off to the lab had taken a while, establishing who lived at the given address had taken another, tasking someone to view the nick’s security
tapes on the off-chance whoever had delivered the letter had been caught on camera had eaten up more time and by then Knight had been in the building demanding chapter and verse.

Powell watched now as the chief stroked a finger along his top lip. “What do we actually know?”

The intelligence had been gleaned that morning by a solitary DC from a couple of neighbours. Powell had ordered the softly softly approach. If the tip was pukka, the last thing they needed was
to let the suspect know they were on to him. The DI glanced at his notes. “Occupants are Eric and Bridie Long. Married, no kids. Lived in the house about seven years.” Looking at
Knight, he paused for two, three seconds. “Runs a red Vauxhall.”

“Red?” Knight’s voice was calm. Powell sensed he was itching to go in heavy-handed. Was also aware that after what had happened with Haines, the DCI wouldn’t risk another
half-cock debacle. “This guy, Long? Has he got form?”

Powell jabbed a thumb over his shoulder. “Tyler’s checking now.” Mac had been kicking his heels in the incident room waiting for Bev to show. “He’ll call soon as
he’s got anything.” A few clicks on the police national computer, it wouldn’t take long.

Knight nodded, presumably in approval. “Help yourself to coffee, Mike.”

Thank you, God. “Ta, gaffer.” Not that he got to drink it.

Drake Street, Stirchley was the sort of place you’d go out of your way to avoid. A long way. Powell parked the unmarked police motor just up the road from number
twenty-four, peered through the windscreen and told Carol Pemberton he hoped her jabs were up to date. Lips in exaggerated pucker, he sneered: “You’ll need a tetanus booster after
this.”

“Just a little prick...” The DC leant forward to grab her bag. “Isn’t it, sir?”

Powell’s hand paused on the seat belt release. “You being sarky?”

A curtain of glossy black hair hid her face. “Me?”

He narrowed his eyes, suspected she was getting as lippie as Morriss in her old age. Pembers was a year younger than him. Could easily walk the sergeant’s and possibly inspector’s
exams if she didn’t put her kids first. “I do the talking. Got that?”

“Be my guest, sir.”

Locking the car, he ran his gaze up and down the narrow street. Even bathed in sunlight the two-up-two-down terraces peppered with satellite dishes were the pits. Rotting window frames and once
red brickwork were now shades of dog shit. Long’s was probably the worst. Straggly dust-laden weeds sprouted here and there from crumbling mortar and sagging guttering. The Hanging Gardens of
Babylon this was not.

He sniffed. “Knew I shouldn’t have worn the new suit.”

“Glad you’ve got your priorities right, sir.”

“Eric Long you mean? He’s not going anywhere.” Not with officers positioned at the back of the property as well as two further unmarked police vehicles in the street. Over the
top? Maybe. Better safe... Unlike nine-month old Hannah Cox, the daughter of Long’s former partner who’d died in squalid circumstances from neglect and abuse back in 1999.

Mac Tyler had passed on information he’d picked up from various websites as well as the PNC’s less lurid data. Top lines were: Eric Long aged forty-three had served three years for
causing or allowing the death of a child or vulnerable person. Many commentators believed it was murder and Long should have been sent down for life. The victim’s grandfather wanted the
‘baby-killing bastard put down.’

Powell banged the door with the side of his fist. “Let’s see what he’s got to say for himself, eh?”

“I reckon she was lying, chief.” Mobile nestling under her chin, Bev perched on the MG’s bonnet, scrabbling in her bag for a light. The other hand held the
card she’d found at Josh’s makeshift shrine. Bev thought it likelier now that it had been deliberately concealed, given it looked to have been written by his father, a man Stacey Banks
claimed not to have seen hide or hair of since Josh was in nappies.

She heard papers rustling, suspected Knight wasn’t listening properly. “Read it again, will you, sergeant?”

Rolling her eyes, she obliged:
Sorry, son. Should of been there for you. The bastard’s gonna rot in hell.
The handwriting was scrappy as the grammar. But the message to the killer
seemed clear enough. And it wasn’t have a nice day.

“Lots of people call kids ‘son’,” Knight commented. “Doesn’t have to be the father.”

“
Should’ve been there for you
, chief?” She held the lighter at arm’s length, tried to spark up; empty, sod it. No response from Knight either. Obviously needed a
prompt. “It’s not the sort of thing some casual acquaintance comes out with, is it?” Sounded to Bev like guilt kicking in, several years too late. Mind, for all the cops knew,
‘should of been there’ could refer to the Wednesday Josh went missing. Maybe on occasions Bobby Wells collected his son from school. They only had Stacey’s word he was a feckless
father. Maybe he was there for Josh that day, and there’d been a row. What if Wells had a temper and taught Josh a lesson? The wording on the card could be part of an elaborate plot aimed at
casting suspicion elsewhere. Bev blew her cheeks out; maybe she watched too much telly.

“You could be reading too much into it, sergeant.” Patronising git.

“Sure. ’Cause we’re pursuing a shed-load of other leads, aren’t we, chief?”

Silence on the line suggested she’d gone too far. Mind, it made up for the sodding church bells ringing in her other ear. He’d not hung up, she could hear breathing. She peeled
herself off the bonnet, headed for the newsagents to get a lighter.

“Sorry about that, sergeant, DC Tyler just popped his head round the door. We’re bringing someone in for questioning in connection with Josh’s death.” He told her about
the letter left at the nick.

“Fair enough. Can’t just drop this though. We need to talk to Stacey...”

“I’ll get someone round...”

“Come on, chief, I’m on the doorstep.”

“You’re on the Haines case, sergeant.”

“Overlap, you said it yourself.”

If Bobby Wells had nothing to do with Josh’s death, he sure had more motive than most to get shot of Roland Haines.

“You can’t pin nothing on me.”

Even if Eric Long wore more than a string vest and trackie bottoms, the DI would baulk at approaching the guy with a barge pole let alone drawing pin. Tall and lanky with prematurely grey hair
that fell just below hunched shoulders, Long currently slouched in a grubby wingchair, empty cans and full ashtrays lay on the carpet at his knobbly feet. Unwashed, unshaven and unkempt, he was
also apparently unable to recall his movements last night let alone last Wednesday afternoon. “Keep me nose clean these days, I do.”

Powell was intrigued by Long’s response. The DI had kept his cards close to his chest so far giving the guy the impression they regarded him as a potential witness. So was his outburst the
knee-jerk reaction of many an old ex-lag? Or a pre-emptive strike from someone up to his neck in shit.

Time to get down and dirty. “See, here’s the thing...” Perched on the edge of a lumpy moth-eaten settee Powell shuffled a tad further forward, elbows on knees. “Why would
someone tell us they’d seen you in Marston Road if you’ve never been near the place?”

“How should I know?” The open-mouthed yawn released a wave of rancid breath in Powell’s face. The armpit hair was almost as revolting. “Nothing to do with me.”

The DI was torn: sit back and risk the Hugo Boss or suffer more halitosis hell. He cut a glance at Pembers who’d bagged the only hard chair in the room and had the added advantage of
sitting near the slightly open sash window. Miss Smug was taking notes, not that there’d been many to take. Long hadn’t even wanted to let them in. He’d argued the toss on the
doorstep until Powell jangled his keys and pointed at the car.

The DI opted to move back a fraction. “You saying our informant’s mistaken then?”

“Looks like it, don’t it.” The grin was gross, grains of rice caught in gaps between crooked teeth slick with saliva. It struck Powell that Long was archetypal Paedo Man. They
could be in an episode of
Cracker
here. But Long’s act didn’t ring true somehow. It was almost as though he was putting it on, enjoying himself.

Powell wasn’t playing games. “Let’s try again, eh? Last Wednesday afternoon, where were you?”