Tastes Like Fear (D.I. Marnie Rome 3) (20 page)

‘Can I see?’

‘Without a warrant?’ Crooking his mouth at her, but it wasn’t a smile. He wanted her gone.

He’d lost his daughter, a coach crash when Tia was fourteen. Everything led from that – his restless curiosity and sense of injustice – as if his past was a corpse inadequately weighted below the water of his present life, always on the rise.

‘You’re getting domesticated,’ Marnie said. ‘That’s new.’

‘Everything’s new,’ Adam said. ‘Except you.’

Walking back to the station, it occurred to Marnie that Adam could find out who was sending care packages to Stephen Keele. It was possible he already knew. Six months ago, he’d told her he was trying to solve the puzzle of why Stephen had killed her parents. Without her permission, without asking whether she wanted his help. She’d made it clear how little she liked his interference, but perhaps she should make use of his talents. Adam was good at what he did. He might be able to find the answers that were eluding her. He was smart and resourceful. She’d discovered that when she was sixteen. Adam was one of the reasons she’d run away from home. He’d told her once she wasn’t a bad daughter, but she hadn’t believed him.

Her phone thwapped. ‘Noah. What have you got?’

‘A lead on the subway, I hope. Dan says he knows the tagger Rents. He’s based in Stockwell. I’m going to send him the sketch, see if he can give us a location for the subway. And Dan’s put me in touch with one of his urban explorer friends who might know other ways into Battersea.’

‘Good. I’m going to check in with Ron to see how the house-to-house is going. Then I’m meeting Ashleigh’s parents at the mortuary.’ She paused. ‘Anything on the alibis?’

‘Sean was home alone both afternoons. The day May went missing, and the day she died. Loz got back from school around four o’clock. Unless she’s covering for him, he was in the house. Her mum got home later, around the time Jamie Ledger found May’s body. I’m checking both cars, Sean’s and Katrina’s, in case they were near the power station that afternoon. If anything turns up, you’ll be the first to know … Did the press behave themselves?’

‘More or less. Once we tell them about Ashleigh, that might change.’Adam wouldn’t be the only one to see a link between the killings of two teenage girls within the same square mile. ‘If the killer
is
panicking, we need to contain the story. Find Traffic’s girl and identify the subway in May’s sketch – see whether anyone else went missing from the same place in the last four months.’

‘You think he’s holding more girls,’ Noah said bleakly. She knew he was seeing the faces from the whiteboard. Sika Khair and Kim Nguyen, sixteen. Sasha Ronson, fourteen.

‘Keep in touch,’ Marnie told him. She ended the call, ringing Ron’s number. ‘Anything?’

‘Apart from earache? Not yet.’ He sounded strung out. ‘It’s getting edgy here, boss. Some shit-stirrers are suggesting a racial motive, stressing that our victim was a white girl, which isn’t making it any easier.’

‘Tell DC Tanner to get in touch with the Community Safety Unit and ask them to be on site with you. I’ll do the same. Keep me posted.’

30

‘Abandoned places are best,’ Dan’s friend told Noah. ‘The ones everyone ignores. Sometimes it’s about spectacle, sure, like those students putting Santa hats on the spires at King’s College, or getting a car on to the roof of the Senate House. Sticking two fingers up because why not? But a lot of us just like the quiet places, seeing a different side of the city, you know?’

Noah handed him a cup of coffee from the stall across the street. ‘Dan told me about King’s College. I hadn’t heard about the car on the Senate House.’

‘They had to cut it into pieces to take it down. So, yeah. Spectacle. But most of us are happier staying out of the papers. It’s about passing under the radar, not lighting the system.’ Riff was in his thirties. Booted and suited, with a middle-management haircut, gold wedding ring, square-toed shoes. A surveyor by day. By night, an urban explorer. ‘I’m telling you this in the past tense, yeah?’ He worked the plastic lid from the coffee. ‘I gave it all up months ago.’

‘Why did you?’ Noah asked.

‘Aged out.’ Riff shrugged. ‘Like Dan.’ The skin around his eyes was tanned and lined. Old scars on his hands, knots in his wrists from climbing. ‘What you’ve got to understand is that most of us had decent jobs, nice homes, money coming in. Finest edgework I ever saw – bravest – came from a call-centre worker. Said his job drove him insane because it was so safe and inconspicuous.’

‘Edgework. Because it’s about finding the edge of the city? What about the security? How did you get inside so many places?’

‘The more sophisticated the security, the more places you can breach it. We didn’t even have to be clever a lot of the time. We wore hi-vis and hard hats; that got us into a ton of places in broad daylight. Sometimes we ninjaed the scaffolding. Otherwise, it’s about finding the cracks in surveillance, vanishing points. Access points.’

‘Vanishing points,’ Noah repeated. Was that what the killer had done? Found the vanishing points at Battersea Power Station and on the Garrett? Harder, surely, with a dead body in tow.

Riff drank more coffee, watching him. ‘So how’s Danny boy?’

‘He’s good.’ Noah smiled. ‘We’re good.’

‘Still climbing?’

‘On holidays, sometimes. Mostly he’s working in galleries, and on installations. Like the one at the power station a while back.’

‘Not the rotten apples?’ Riff grinned when Noah looked blank. ‘They filled a cage with like a hundred thousand apples and let them rot. Whole place stank of cider for
months
.’

‘Before Dan’s time, I think.’ A trio of kids mooched towards the bus stop on the other side of the street. In uniform, like Abi Gull and her friends, but no more in school than Abi had been earlier in the day. They glanced towards Noah and Riff, then blanked them, busy with their phones. ‘If I was looking for a hiding place, where would I start? Construction sites?’

‘Maybe. But too much of London’s been rinsed now.’

‘By rinsed, you mean hacked. Explored.’

‘Yeah. Sometimes you think you’ve found a place, that you’re the first ones there. Then you see the markers – someone else beat you to it.’

‘Markers like tags? Graffiti?’

Riff nodded. ‘But honestly? You’re asking the wrong person. I’m aged out. When you can’t find the edge any more, or not without taking massive risks, it’s time to call it a day.’

‘I thought it was all about the danger.’ Noah smiled. ‘Dan still says he despises safety.’

‘It’s about connecting. Belonging. To the real city, and to your team, your tribe.’

‘What was your best time? Dan said you had a soft spot for Battersea. I know he does.’

‘For sure.’ Riff shut his eyes, tipping the coffee cup to drain its last mouthful. ‘Can’t stand what they’ve done to her. Those wankers’ mansions.’

‘I saw the show flat. On top of the old boiler house.’

‘Fucking waste. She was a princess. You should’ve been there when the Millennium fireworks were kicking off, should’ve felt her chimneys shake. Best buzz of my life.’

‘How’d you get in? Dan said the security was always pretty tight.’

Riff shot him a glance, then grinned. ‘I’ve got a photo of Danny with one of the chimneys. He fucking loved the princess.’

‘He told me.’ Noah smiled. He waited, not pushing.

‘They got paranoid about security. Searchlights, dogs. It got a
lot
harder once they decided they could make money out of her. Soon as we heard about the penthouses, we knew we wouldn’t get to see her the same again, maybe ever. That got a few of us wanting a last trip. Goodbyes, you know?’

‘Did you get to say goodbye?’

Riff shook his head, still smiling. ‘That’d be illegal.’

‘Okay, sure. But say someone wanted to make one last trip. With security the way it is right now. It’s illegal, but would it be impossible?’

‘Nothing’s impossible … The show flat’s on top of the old boiler house. That’s where you found her, the girl that was murdered? He took her up there to kill her?’ Riff looked ill. ‘Freak.’

‘He didn’t kill her there. I can’t give you details, but he wanted her found in the power station.’

‘That’s sick. If you’re thinking he was an explorer … None of us would’ve done a thing like that. It’s the opposite of what we’re about.’

‘We don’t think he’s an explorer. But we can’t figure out how he got her into the power station. Past the security. The guards and the dogs.’

‘There’s more than one way in.’

‘He didn’t come by river.’

Riff was quiet for a moment, then he said, ‘The guards with dogs. You’ve checked those out, right? I’ve paid a few bribes in my time.’

‘We’re checking everyone with access to the site in the last four months.’ Noah made a mental note to revisit the security lists. ‘You mentioned taggers. We’re looking for a street artist called Rents.’

Riff shook his head. ‘Don’t know him.’

It was a long shot, but Noah took out his phone, scrolling to May’s subway sketch. ‘And you don’t recognise this place?’

‘Sorry.’ Shaking his head again.

‘If you think of anything, can you give me a call? Via Dan, if you prefer.’

Riff nodded. ‘Good luck.’

Dan called as Noah was making his way back to the station.

‘Hey,’ Noah said. ‘Any luck getting hold of Rents?’

‘He’s not called back yet … Have you seen Sol?’

‘Not since the migraine. Why?’

‘He was coming home when I was leaving for work, looking like someone beat him up. He wouldn’t talk about it, told me not to get you involved. I didn’t make any promises.’

Noah picked up his pace. ‘Badly beaten?’

‘Not that I could see. A bloody nose, bruises. He’d brought himself home, so he can’t have been that bad, but I thought you’d want to know.’

‘Yes. I’ll give him a call.’

‘He wasn’t answering the phone to me,’ Dan said. ‘I tried his number just now, and then the flat. If he’s there, he isn’t picking up.’

‘Okay. I’ll see if I can get hold of him. Thanks.’

Noah rang Sol’s number and listened to the voicemail message. Hung up and tried the landline, getting the answerphone. Whatever he was up to, Sol didn’t want to talk.
Shit
.

Noah felt a familiar pinch of panic. Worrying about Sol had been a part of growing up. He’d trained himself out of it more or less, but the voice he’d heard in the flat two days ago, Sol’s visitor making threats …

Life had been full of people like that back when Sol ran with the crowd on the council estate, getting into every kind of trouble. Knives, pills, even an amateur protection racket. Lately, there’d been signs he was straightening himself out, but that could be wishful thinking on Noah’s part. Or Sol could be finding it hard to shake off the trouble. If he’d been running with the wrong crowd, there’d be no easy exit. Same for the gangs on the Garrett: Abi and her schoolmates setting fires, terrorising old ladies. Once you started down that road, it was impossible to stop without losing face or losing friends. All those hard stares on the estate this morning …

Abi and her friends, who were little more than kids.

Even a dead girl hadn’t moved them, beyond curiosity and a certain morbid hostility.

Any one of them could be next. Did they know that?

Was that why they refused to look scared? Refused to stay indoors?

Standing out in the open, in their school uniforms, pretending to be grown-up.

Daring anyone – even a killer – to take them on.

31

‘She was always such a stranger. Even when she was tiny. I never really …
recognised
her. I blamed myself, thought I was going mad, post-natal depression maybe, because, “Who
is
this child? Where did she
come
from?” She wasn’t like me or my sisters or anyone we knew. Maybe she was like her dad. I didn’t really know him, not the way you’re supposed to know the person you have a child with. And he was off as soon as she was born. I was stuck at home with this stranger, and she … never liked me, cried whenever I went near her, hated being held or cuddled. She hated
me
… We were such strangers.’ Helen Collier stopped speaking at last, standing dry-eyed by her daughter’s body. Bewildered. As if Ashleigh had done another inexplicable thing by dying. ‘I tried to love her, but she made it impossible. She wouldn’t even let me
like
her, or look after her. Wouldn’t let me teach her how to lace her shoes when she was little, or how to put on make-up. Everything I did, everything I
tried
to do, she pushed me away.’

Ashleigh’s stepfather put his arm around his wife’s shoulders. A nice-looking man, fair-haired, his face lined by hope and worry. Helen was a big woman with a once-pretty face, wearing a dark dress sagged and faded at the waist; Marnie could see her holding a child in her lap. Not Ashleigh, but her son Jolyon, the sick little boy who’d been in and out of hospital since Ashleigh ran away.

‘Do you have any idea where she might have been living in the last two months?’

‘None.’ Robin Collier shook his head.

‘Could she have been with other girls, runaways?’

‘She didn’t like other people.’ Helen blinked at her daughter’s body. ‘Especially not other girls.’

‘Did she have a boyfriend?’

‘Not while she was living at home. She knew some boys, but she didn’t like them, that’s what she always said.’ Her face worked. ‘She wasn’t raped. He didn’t do that to her, at least.’

Marnie waited a moment. ‘The care home said she used her mobile phone a lot before she went missing. Sending texts or chatting to people.’

‘No one we knew. She never called us, never took our calls.’

‘She hadn’t been in touch since before Jolyon was born,’ Robin said.

‘How is he?’

‘Better, just for the moment. We’re counting our blessings, a day at a time.’ He hugged his wife closer. ‘I wish we could’ve helped Ashleigh, but Helen’s right. She wouldn’t let us. As far as we knew, she wouldn’t let anyone help her.’

‘Has her biological father been in touch?’