No Lovelier Death (17 page)

It was Suttle’s turn to hand round half a dozen photocopies. The sight of Rachel on her knees in the upstairs bathroom brought conversation to a halt.

‘Fuck.’ It was Glen Thatcher, the D/S in charge of Outside Enquiries. Another slap on the wrist from Parsons. Language this time. And a bit of respect.

Thatcher mumbled an apology. But where did an image like this come from?

Suttle explained about the discovery of Hughes’s mobile. A series of images had been sent to his number at 23.08. This happened to be the most explicit. The sender, after negative billing checks, had turned out to be someone with a pay-as-you-go phone, but Scenes of Crime had a positive ID on the background tiles in the mobe shots. The only person with whom Rachel Ault had shared a bathroom appeared to be Matt Berriman. Berriman, of course, was also an ex-boyfriend.

‘We definitely know that?’ Still Thatcher.

‘About Berriman?’

‘About him being the only person she had in the bathroom?’

‘No, not for sure, of course we don’t. But unless she’s gobbing every one she can lay her hands on, it’s a reasonable assumption. Berriman had just done her a big favour, remember, in her dad’s office. Maybe she was saying thank you.’

‘So Berriman videos her and then sends the pictures to Hughes?’

‘Of course.’

‘To wind him up?’

‘To tell him the way it is. Think dog. Think lamp post.’

Faraday shuddered. Suttle’s metaphor was brutally accurate. ‘Revenge then?’

‘Ownership. The way I see it, he’s telling Hughes his time is up. Rachel’s back where she belongs. And if you’re after proof, then take a look at this.’

‘So we need to be thinking about Hughes’s reaction. Is that what you’re saying?’

‘Exactly.’

Heads nodded around the table. Then Jerry Proctor extracted a note from his file. One of his investigators had phoned him with more information about Rachel’s bedroom. Now might be the moment to table it.

‘OK, boss?’ He paused for long enough for Parsons to give him the go-ahead. ‘We’ve got traces of blood on Rachel’s duvet. Not a lot, and there’s no indication of how long it’s been there, but enough to make us ask a question or two. Especially now. With this.’ His massive hand settled briefly on Suttle’s photo.

Parsons understood at once the implications.

‘You’re suggesting Hughes was in the bedroom with Rachel? After he got a look at what she’d been up to?’

‘I’m suggesting it’s possible.’ He glanced down the table towards Suttle. ‘Unless we’re thinking she was somewhere else in that last half-hour before she left?’

Suttle shook his head. ‘No one seems to have seen her. It’s certainly not in the witness statements.’

‘Then it would make sense, wouldn’t it, boss? She does the business on Berriman then goes up to her bedroom. Hughes is the new boyfriend. He might be downstairs somewhere. He might be up there waiting for her. He might be anywhere. Then his mobile goes off. He cops a look at the bathroom shots then goes ape. They’re both pissed. There’s a row. He slaps her around. She does a bunk, runs off into the night, hops over the wall, ends up next door. She’s had enough. She wants a bit of peace and quiet. She wants to think about things. In due course Hughes follows.’ Proctor paused, looking from face to face. ‘Is it just me or does this story tell itself?’

Heads turned towards Parsons. For a moment Faraday thought she was going to ask for a round of applause. Instead, another voice. Jimmy Suttle.

‘That’s terrific, Jerry. Except they both ended up dead. So where does that fucking leave us?’

 

The Mackenzies had been back in residence for barely an hour by the time Winter turned into Sandown Road. He parked the Lexus outside and sat behind the wheel for a moment. A carpet of flowers covered the pavement outside Bazza’s house, and there were more bouquets outside the Aults. He got out and bent to read some of the cards.
Rachel, we loved you
, went one.
Gone but never forgotten
, someone else had written.
Our Candle in the Wind
, a third.

Winter stepped over a beautifully wrapped bunch of roses and pushed through the open gates. Finding the front door locked, he made his way round the back of the property, skirting the pool. Apart from a footprint or two in the flower beds, there was no sign that Scenes of Crime had ever paid a visit.

The kitchen opened on to the rear patio. Winter found Mackenzie inside, monstering some flunkey or other on his mobile. Next door, in the lounge, he could see Marie fussing around, giving an armchair a nudge, plumping cushions, picking up scraps of paper, putting her own scent back on the place. In the kitchen, even with the windows open, you could smell the chemicals the Scenes of Crime guys had used. Latent prints, he thought. Blood. Whatever.

At length Mackenzie brought his conversation to an end. The bruising on his face, yellows and a livid purple, had the makings of a decent sunset.

‘Nice flowers, Baz.’ Winter nodded towards the road. ‘You should fetch some in here.’

Mackenzie was more interested in the Scenes of Crime team. ‘Those bastards have been through my office,’ he said. ‘They’ve done the filing cabinets, the drawers in the desk, the lot. I know they have.’

‘So what? It’s a waste of time, isn’t it? Now you’re Mr Respectable? ’

‘Too fucking right. And Mr Angry too. You know what we’re up to tonight? Me and Marie? We’re having the neighbours round, the whole fucking street. There comes a time when you want a bit of action for all the fucking council tax you pay and that time is now. So guess who else is coming?’

‘Tell me, Baz.’

He named the local MP, a long-serving Lib Dem with a reputation as a table thumper. In Mackenzie’s view, he too would shortly be earning his keep.

‘I want questions in Parliament.’ He seized a copy of the
Daily Telegraph.
‘Have you seen this?’

Winter settled into a seat at the kitchen table. The surface still felt sticky. Chemicals again, he thought.

Mackenzie had opened the paper at one of the feature pages. The article was titled ‘The Morning After The Night Before’
.
Winter skipped from paragraph to paragraph, aware of Mackenzie hovering above him. He’d yet to put the kettle on. Shame.

‘Well?’

‘He’s got a point, Baz.’

‘She, mate. She’s got a point. In fact she
is
the fucking point. She’s a mother; she’s got kids of her own; she lives in a nice fancy part of Surrey; her old man toodles off to the city every morning, scores tons of moolah. Everything’s sweet, everything’s cushty. The kids are in private school. They’ve just bought half a chateau in France. They’ve got it well fucking sorted. Then what? She turns on the telly on Sunday morning and - bang - she’s looking at a pad just like hers, same wood panelling, same high ceilings, same fucking taste in wallpaper for all I know. Except it looks like something out of the Blitz. It looks like some fucker’s dropped a bomb on it. Why? Because we’ve lost it with the kids. Totally fucking surrendered. White flag. Doors wide open. Help-yourself time. This isn’t some shithole in Salford or Birmingham. This is
Craneswater.
This is the bit of England where you pay getting on for a million quid and expect something in return. Like peace of fucking mind, for starters. Or am I wrong?’

Winter looked up to find Marie standing by the Aga, miming applause. In the last twenty-four hours, he thought, she must have heard this a thousand times. At full throttle Bazza could fill an entire newspaper single-handed, the more right wing the better. Any day now he’d consider running for Parliament himself.

‘Write them a letter, Baz.’ Winter tapped the article. ‘Get it off your chest.’

‘No, but look mush, here …’ He frowned, trying to find a particular quote. ‘Here it is. “Violence is like a rash. Unreasoning violence. Inane violence. A violence bred of boredom, of envy, of simple greed. It spreads and spreads. Unchecked it will infect us all. The time for decent people to take a stand is now. Otherwise we may be facing the slow death of a thousand Craneswaters. And by that time, believe me, it will be too late.”’ He looked up, beaming. ‘There, mush. Spot on. Couldn’t have put it better myself.’

‘She’s a politician, Baz.’ Winter had spotted the woman’s byline at the foot of the article. ‘She’s a Tory. She’s got an agenda. She’s beating the drum.’

‘Of course she is, mush. But does that make her
wrong
? No fucking way. This country’s going down the khazi, mate, and someone needs to get a handle on it.’ He half turned in the chair, looking for his wife. ‘Ain’t that right, love?’

‘Definitely.’ She glanced at her watch. ‘Were you serious about young Danny or shall we have coffee?’

 

Minutes later, with Mackenzie at the wheel, Winter was setting off to find a young drug dealer called Danny Cooper. A couple of Bazza’s older lieutenants, still on modest retainers, had called in to say that the local Drugs Squad were calling house-to-house at certain addresses, eager to have a chat with the lad.

Word on the street suggested that he’d turned up at Saturday’s ruck with a decent stash of high-quality cocaine. He’d been flogging it for silly money, throwing yet more petrol on the firestorm that had engulfed 11 Sandown Road. There were stories of thirteen-year-olds from Portsea coked out of their heads, of one girl who’d put so much up her nose she’d ended up in a cubicle at the A & E. Some of these stories had featured in the local
News
, part of their ongoing coverage of a story that had ballooned to national proportions.

‘Peter’s gonna be reading all this shit.’ Mackenzie frowned, gunning the engine. ‘And that man’s no fool.’

Winter nodded. As a Crown Court judge, Peter Ault would doubtless know exactly how Baz had made his money, but like so many other establishment figures he obviously got some weird buzz from finding himself sharing a fence with an ex-drug baron. Unless, of course, his precious daughter ended up dead beside next door’s pool.

‘Lots at stake then, Baz.’

‘Too fucking right.’

‘And this Danny Cooper? I thought he was supposed to be some kind of protégé of yours? The young apprentice? The new kid on the block?’

‘That’s bollocks.’

‘No, it’s not, Baz. You told me yourself.’

‘Did I?’ He shot Winter a look. The Range Rover was misfiring badly.

‘Yeah. You said he was a good lad - sound, solid. You said he read the market well, didn’t take silly risks.’

‘I was talking about the property game.’

‘No, you weren’t; you were talking charlie.’

‘Wrong, mush. Since when do I talk about charlie these days? No need, is there?’

Winter knew it was a question that required no reply. In tight corners like these Bazza had a habit of talking to himself. When the facts weren’t to his liking, he invented a set of new ones. That way he’d still be ahead of the game.

The Range Rover was slowing to a halt, trailing a thin plume of blue smoke. Winter looked up at a block of newly converted flats on the seafront.

‘This is where Westie lives.’ Winter started to laugh. ‘It must be fucking serious.’

 

Westie was the most inventive of Bazza’s heavies. After a decade of relying on home-grown muscle from one or other of Pompey’s travelling families, seasoned men of violence, Mackenzie had finally settled on an ex-pro footballer from the West Midlands to keep the scrotes in order.

Westie was tall and black. He had a flat Birmingham accent and a reputation for being something of a psycho. He’d developed an impressive line in persuasion and appeared to take a genuine pleasure from hurting people. He rarely left a victim without taking a photo or two and was rumoured to keep a scrapbook of the choicer snaps, though Winter had never seen it. Nowadays, thankfully, Bazza only wheeled him out on special occasions.

He appeared at the kerbside moments after Bazza’s blast on the horn. Can’t wait, Winter thought.

Mackenzie, gazing at the steam curling from the Range Rover’s bonnet, told him they needed to swap motors. There was something buggered in the radiator and he’d get the AA down later to take a look. Westie’s treasured Alfa Romeo was parked across the road. It was black, polished daily. They drove north, sticking to the maze of terraced streets, bypassing the traffic. After the badlands of Somerstown, Westie pointed the Alfa east, towards Fratton and Copnor. Danny Cooper, it turned out, was camping with his Auntie Maddie in a house near the top of the city, trying to keep his head down. The Filth, said Bazza, were knocking at all the wrong doors.

Westie was plugged into his iPod. These days he favoured a long white raincoat with epaulettes. Underneath he wore black jeans and a black collarless shirt. He’d grown a neatly trimmed goatee beard and flashed a heavy gold Rolex at anyone who might be impressed. Westie had never had much time for irony, Winter thought, but now it was beginning to show.

Number 98 Tennyson Road was a terraced house with a brimming wheelie bin wedged in the tiny rectangle of garden. A poster for the Spiritualist Church hung in the front window. Westie eased the Alfa to a halt.

Auntie Maddie had evidently been expecting the visit. She answered the door within seconds, gave Mackenzie a smile and said she hadn’t seen young Danny since before lunch. She thought he might have gone shopping. Probably back later.

Bazza returned the smile and pushed past. A nod sent Westie into the lounge on the ground floor. After the lounge he checked the kitchen. Then he was back. He shook his head. No Cooper.

Bazza and Winter followed Westie upstairs. Cooper was in the tiny bedroom at the rear of the property, sprawled under a purple duvet, feigning sleep. When Westie gave him a shake, he slowly rolled over, rubbing his eyes. Winter was looking hard at the duvet.

‘Mr M,’ Cooper mumbled. ‘Nice to see you.’

Bazza nodded. ‘Sick, are you? Only it’s the middle of the afternoon. ’