Fever of the Bone (33 page)

She emerged from the stairwell in a burst of cold air, leaning across to brush her lips against his cheek. Her skin was cold, but flushed with the sudden heat of the restaurant. ‘Good to see you,’ she said, tossing her coat over the chair and sitting down. ‘How was Worcester?’

‘I nearly got arrested,’ he said.

Carol laughed. ‘Only you!’ she said. ‘How did you manage that?’

‘Long story, later. The job was—’ he held a hand out flat and waggled it. ‘Sort of OK. Not straightforward in terms of profiling. They’re going to struggle with this one. And he’ll kill again if they don’t close in.’

‘That’s disappointing. I know you like to feel you’ve made a difference.’

He shrugged. ‘Sometimes it’s not up to me. But what about you? I heard you on the radio this morning. Sounds like you’ve got plenty on your plate.’

‘No kidding.’ Carol picked up the menu. ‘I don’t know why I look. I know I’m going to have spring rolls and Pad Thai Gai.’

‘Me too.’ He waved a hand at the waitress and they both ordered, Carol adding a large glass of wine to her food. ‘How’s it looking?’ he said.

‘Like your guys in Worcester, we’re going to struggle with this one. Damn all to go on. We’re just praying forensics come up with something.’

‘I know Blake says I’m off-limits. But we can talk unofficially, surely? I’ll give you all the help I can,’ Tony said.

She looked down at the table and fiddled with her chopsticks. ‘I appreciate that.’ A pause, then she met his eyes, her expression unreadable. ‘But I can’t accept.’

‘Why not?’

‘Because it’s wrong. If we’re not paying you, we’ve no right to your expertise. I’m not prepared to exploit our friendship.’

‘That’s precisely why it’s not exploitation. Because we’re friends. Friends help each other. Friends are there for each other.’

‘I know that. And I hope you’ll be there for me personally. I want your support, I want to be able to come and sit with you and have a glass of wine at the end of the day and say the things I would be able to say to someone who cares about me. But I can’t tell you the stuff you want to know as a profiler.’ Her wine arrived and she took a long drink.

He couldn’t deny he liked that she thought of him as the shoulder to lean on. But he struggled with the logic of her professional position. ‘That’s daft. If I thought it would help me with my profile for West Mercia, I’d run it all past you. Because you’re the best detective I’ve ever worked with. I don’t care where I take help from. I’ve already picked Fiona Cameron’s brains on this one, and she’s not being paid,’ he protested.

‘That’s up to you and Fiona. Tony, if Blake thinks that taking you off the payroll means he gets the product of your brilliance because of our relationship, then he’s got to be shown he’s wrong. Until he understands that, I’m not talking to you about the details of these cases. You’ll have to be like everyone else and read about them in the papers.’ She placed her hand over his and her voice softened. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘I mean, I get your point about not wanting to take advantage of our relationship. Not wanting Blake to get something for nothing. But this is people’s lives we’re talking about, Carol. This is a killer who is going serial unless you can stop him. Surely we have to do what we can to stop that? Isn’t that more important than making a point?’

For a moment, he thought his appeal to her finer instincts had won her over. She bit her lip and fiddled some more with her chopsticks. Then she shook her head. ‘This isn’t about cheap point-scoring. It’s about a bigger picture. It’s about making sure my team is properly resourced. It’s not just a question of what happens in this case. If we don’t settle this nonsense now, a lot more people are going to die and not have any kind of justice. I can’t work with one hand tied behind my back for ever, and Blake has to be made to see that. You’re right, there are lives at stake. And that’s why I have to take a stand here.’

He remembered that he wasn’t supposed to know about Tim Parker. He thought for a moment about how he’d have reacted if he’d genuinely been ignorant. ‘So you’re doing this without any outside help? A potential serial and you’re going back to the old ways of thinking only coppers know how villains think?’ He aimed for disbelief and annoyance, not sure how hammy he seemed.

Carol looked away. ‘No, we’ve got someone from the faculty doing a profile.’

Tony groaned. ‘I’ve done myself out of a job, haven’t I? So who is it? Tell me it’s one of the better ones.’

‘Tim Parker.’

He put his head in his hands. His voice came out muffled. ‘And what did you make of Tim?’

The waitress shimmered up in her tight satin kimono with a platter of spring rolls and placed it between them. Carol picked one up and bit into it. ‘Ah,’ she gasped. ‘Hot!’ She chewed open-mouthed, swallowed and drank more wine. ‘We used to have an expression when I was a teenager: NBB.’

‘NBB?’ Tony nibbled more gingerly.

‘Nice Bloke, But . . .’

‘And that meant what, exactly?’

‘Pleasant enough. But something missing. Charisma, looks, smarts, personality, sense of humour. One or more of the above. Fatally flawed as a potential boyfriend, basically.’ Seeing him about to respond with more mystification, she clarified her meaning. ‘Not that I was thinking of Tim as potential boyfriend material. What I meant was that he’s perfectly personable, clearly not stupid and knows how to take an order gracefully. But it’s obvious he’s not got what it takes.’

‘And I have?’

Carol laughed. ‘Apparently.’

Tony shook his head, laughing with her. ‘That’s more than a little worrying.’

‘So do you know young Tim? Am I wrong? Does he have what it takes?’

Tony debated what to say. Should he tell her the truth, that Tim had about as much empathy as a tabloid journalist? He didn’t care about Tim, but he did care about not undermining Carol and her team. So he settled for unfamiliar diplomacy. ‘He’s got some ability,’ he said. That was stretching it as far as he was prepared to go.

They ate in silence. Then Carol said, ‘If he’s no good, I’ll know,’ she said.

‘I know you’ll know. The question is what you’ll do about it.’

She gave a wry smile. ‘I’ll tell him. And then I’ll raise merry hell with Blake. And hopefully he’ll let me bring you in from the cold.’

He’d always loved her optimism. It had taken a battering over the years, but still she clung to the belief that things would work out for the best. He knew he should be grateful for that. Why else would she have clung on to him all this time? ‘I’ll make sure I’ve got my thermals on,’ he said. ‘It might take a while.’

‘We’ll see.’ Carol finished the last of the spring rolls and sat back, wiping her lips with the napkin. ‘So tell me about nearly getting arrested.’

Tony obliged, playing up the slapstick to lift her spirits. ‘The amazing thing is that they still paid attention to my profile,’ he finished.

‘I wish I’d seen the look on the estate agent’s face,’ Carol said.

‘She screamed like a train whistle,’ he said. ‘It was not a good experience.’

‘What about visiting the house? Was that a good experience? ‘

Tony tilted his head back as if seeking inspiration on the ceiling. ‘Yes,’ he said, considering. ‘Yes, it was.’

‘What was it like?’

‘A home,’ he said. ‘A place where someone lived comfortably. Nothing for show, everything because it was what he wanted, what he needed.’ He sighed. ‘I think I might have liked him.’

Carol’s eyes were soft with sympathy. ‘I’m sorry.’

‘It can’t be helped.’ He loaded his fork with noodles and filled his mouth. It was as good a way of avoiding conversation as any.

Carol was looking troubled. She’d stopped eating and was signalling to the waitress for more wine. ‘I found out some stuff when you were gone,’ she said. He raised his eyebrows in a question. ‘Stuff about Arthur. Why he left.’

Tony stopped chewing. His food seemed to have expanded into an impossibly large lump. He forced himself to swallow. ‘How did you find that out?’
And why did you do it
? Because she couldn’t help herself. Because she was the best detective he knew.

‘I started with old phone books. I found his factory. He was brilliant, Tony. He developed a new method of electroplating surgical instruments. He patented it, then sold the business to some big outfit in Sheffield. He was pretty amazing.’

He studied his plate. ‘He did well down in Worcester too. He had a factory there. He carried on inventing new stuff. And selling out.’ He was well aware of the ambiguity of his final sentence. It matched his ambivalence towards Blythe.

‘I also found out why he left,’ she said, digging into her bag and coming out with a print-out of the story from the Triple H. She handed it over in silence and waited till he’d read it.

‘I don’t understand,’ Tony said. ‘Why did he leave town? He was the victim here. Are you saying there was something more to this? Was he being threatened or something?’

‘No, nothing like that. According to Vanessa—’

‘You talked to Vanessa about this? Carol, you know how I feel about involving Vanessa in my life.’ His raised voice was drawing attention from the handful of other diners in the upper room.

‘I know. But there’s nobody else to ask, Tony.’ She reached across the table and grabbed his hand. ‘I think you need answers. Sleeping in Arthur’s bed and working in his living room isn’t going to tell you what you really need to know. There’s no way you can make peace with yourself, with him, until you know why he ran away.’

Tony was so angry he didn’t dare open his mouth. How could she understand so little about him? Had he been fooling himself all these years, investing her with qualities she didn’t possess because he needed her to have them? He wanted to shout at her, to make her see how far she had trespassed. He knew he could devastate her and drive her from him with a handful of well-chosen sentences. And part of him wanted to do just that. Part of him wanted to banish her and her presumptions from his life. He’d travel further and faster and lighter without her. Then an appalling thought battled through his anger.
You sound just like Vanessa
.

‘What’s wrong?’ Carol said urgently, her face mirroring what he realised she was seeing on his. Fear and horror in equal proportion, he suspected.

He breathed deeply. ‘I’m not sure I can find the words for what I’m feeling,’ he said. ‘It scares me sometimes, how much of Vanessa there is in me.’

Carol looked as if she was going to burst into tears. ‘Are you crazy? You couldn’t be less like your mother. You’re like polar opposites. She cares about nobody but herself. You care about everybody except yourself.’

He shook his head. ‘I’m her son. Sometimes that terrifies me.’

‘You’re what you’re made yourself,’ Carol said. ‘What I’ve learned about profiling from you is that people are shaped by what happens to them and how they respond to it. You can’t offer that grace to the killers you profile and deny it to yourself. I will not sit here and listen to you put yourself in the same box as Vanessa.’ Her fierceness was hard to deny. To have provoked that in her, there must be something worth defending about himself. He couldn’t refuse to accept that.

He sighed. ‘So what’s Vanessa’s version of the story behind the story?’ He prodded the cutting with one finger.

Carol called on her most unusual gift, an eidetic memory for the spoken word. She had total recall of conversations, interviews and interrogations. It was an ability that had led her into some of the most dangerous places a police officer could be sent, and these days she regarded it as an extremely mixed blessing. Now, she closed her eyes and took Tony through the entire conversation. It was a depressing recitation, he thought, given all the more validity by the confirmation in Arthur’s letter that Vanessa hadn’t told him she was pregnant. If she was telling the truth about that, which hardly showed her in the best of lights, she was probably telling the truth about the rest of it. Carol was right. He hadn’t learned anything about the real Edmund Arthur Blythe by sitting in his chair and sleeping in his bed.

‘Thanks,’ he said when she reached the end. It occurred to him that Carol had answered one question whose existence she knew nothing of. No, he didn’t need to listen to whatever self-serving tale Arthur had concocted for the record. He knew now what had happened. It wasn’t pretty, but then most of life wasn’t. He’d kidded himself for a day and a night that he was descended from someone decent, kind and smart.
No, be honest. You kidded yourself about that for years. You always had fantasy dads that were all of those things and more
. He dredged a smile from somewhere. ‘You got time for coffee?’

Carol smiled. ‘Of course.’ Then she undercut everything he’d just told himself. ‘And Tony - remember, Vanessa’s always looking out for herself. She might have sounded like she was telling the truth, but don’t forget what a good liar she is. The truth might be a long way from her version.’

Niall slouched his way across the estate to the bus stop, shoulders spread, legs wide, making himself look as big and unattractive a target as he could. You never knew round here where the agg was going to come from. Too many fuckwits on too many drugs to be reliably bad. Some guy you’d been nodding mutual respect to for weeks could just turn on you like that and next thing you know, it’s all gone off.

There were already a couple of Asian lads lounging in the bus shelter. He’d seen one of them from time to time hanging around in the school yard at break. He cut his eyes at Niall, looking away before they could make proper contact. ‘Where you going, then?’ the boy asked.

Niall knew it would be suicide to say, ‘I’m meeting up with someone who’s going to give me a Russian lesson. How exciting is that?’ He shrugged and said, ‘Into town, innit? Hang with my crew.’

The Asian lad’s lip curled. ‘I never seen you with no crew. You don’t got no crew, you Billy No-Mates.’

‘What you know?’ Niall said, trying to sound like he couldn’t be bothered with this. Which he couldn’t, really. He had more going on.