The Burning (17 page)

I smiled. ‘Lucky for me that you’re so organised.’

‘That was another thing Rebecca taught me. Because you think you’ll remember stuff, but you don’t. So always write things down. Save everything. And always keep a record so you know what you did and when. It makes everything easier in the long run, Rebecca says.’ Jess stopped short and put her hand over her mouth, before correcting herself. ‘Said. Rebecca said. She always carried a diary and wrote notes in the back. I used to tease her about it, actually, because I mean who has a paper diary these days? But she said it was better than having an iPhone or whatever because she couldn’t wipe the whole thing by pressing one button, or knacker the memory by spilling a drink on it. Been there, done that, she said. Pen and paper all the way. And she was right, you know. So I started to do the same.’

I bit the end of my pen, trying to remember if I’d seen a diary in Rebecca’s flat. ‘Did she always have it with her?’

‘Pretty much. She called it her second brain. It’s a Smythson. The cover was pink leather. Bright pink. Like a Barbie diary.’

I had to assume I would have noticed that if it had been there. I scrawled a query in my own notebook to check it out. When I looked up, Jess’s eyes had filled again.

‘Sorry. It’s just – it brings it all back, you know? I can’t believe I’m never going to see her again.’

I had done sympathy and the clock was ticking. I cleared my throat. ‘Any chance of getting that list together now? I can wait.’

‘Sure. I’ve got records of her voicemail messages since she left too, if you’d like them. Mr Ventnor wanted me to keep checking it to make sure we didn’t miss out on any of her clients. People still call for her, you know.’

‘That would be brilliant.’

She got up, sniffing, and made for the door. With one hand on it, she hesitated. ‘Please – I don’t want you to think less of Rebecca because of what I’ve told you. She was an amazing person. She didn’t deserve what happened to her.’

‘That’s sort of the point of my job,’ I said gently. ‘No matter who they are or what they’ve done, they never deserve it.’

‘Never?’

I shook my head.

‘OK. I’ll be five minutes.’ She disappeared, then popped her head back in. ‘Make that ten. There were a lot of guys.’

I took a good lungful of frigid, petrol-scented air when I made my escape from Ventnor Chase. Rank though it was, it tasted like freedom. I was waiting for a lift, but as far as I was concerned it was a million times better to wait outside than in the soulless reception where a flat-screen TV tuned to Sky News hung behind the receptionist’s desk, providing me with an unsolicited update every fifteen minutes on the lack of progress in the hunt for London’s current serial killer. I had become extremely tired of the offices while I’d been waiting for Jess to come back. The quiet tastefulness of beige carpet and mushroom-coloured chairs grated on me. It was too perfect, too manicured. Too good to be true, just like Rebecca. The more I found out about her – about the secrets she’d been keeping, and the life she’d been busily dismantling – the more I felt that Rebecca had been a disaster waiting to happen.

While I leaned against some railings, I went through my notes and found Louise North’s business card. I dialled the number for her direct line and got voicemail, then tried the mobile number on the back. It was neatly written in black ink, definite and precise like the woman herself. She answered on the second ring. She sounded completely unsurprised; it was as if she had been expecting me to call.

‘What have you found out?’

In spite of myself, I bristled; I had not rung to report on what I had achieved (or failed to achieve, I had to admit) in the days since I’d last spoken to her. I did not, I assured myself, have to justify myself to Louise North. So it was doubly annoying to hear the apology in my voice when I spoke.

‘We’re still following up some leads, Louise. Making some progress. But nothing substantive yet.’

‘That’s disappointing. How can I help?’

‘Did you know that your friend had a drugs habit?’

Silence at the other end of the line. I waited, counting off the seconds in my head. Three … four … five … There are comparatively few people who can stand to allow a silence to develop for longer than a couple of seconds on the phone, but it was a full seven seconds before she spoke again.

‘I had some idea, yes. Is that relevant to how she died?’

‘We’ll see,’ I said, not really knowing myself. ‘Er – how did you form that idea, may I ask?’

‘Various things.’

More silence. I pulled a face; she was the wrong kind of person to talk to on the phone. I should have gone to see her. She had less room to manoeuvre when she was sitting in front of me. ‘Do you mind telling me what those things were?’

‘She had become erratic. She was always a bit unreliable, but she was getting to be completely impossible. She made arrangements to see me and then didn’t turn up. She was hard to get hold of. I mean, that’s why I went around on Friday. To see her. Because it had become so difficult.’

‘When you were tidying,’ I said, knowing what the answer would be, ‘did you find anything that might have proved it? Drugs? Or drugs paraphernalia?’

‘Yes.’

‘Which?’

‘Both,’ Louise said tightly. ‘In the bathroom, by the sink. White powder, which I assumed was cocaine. I flushed it down the loo. And there was a mirror with a razor blade on it. I got rid of that too. I had it in my handbag when I left the flat.’

‘And you didn’t think to mention anything about this when I asked.’

‘It wasn’t relevant.’

‘Isn’t that for us to decide?’ I could feel a headache starting, a throb behind my left eye, and I pressed the heel of my hand against it.

‘I suppose so.’ There was another pause. Then, ‘I’m sorry. I made a mistake. I was trying to protect Rebecca, and her parents. I had been hoping to talk to her about it – get her to get help. But I never got the chance.’

‘Once you knew she was dead, you might have thought better of hiding it. I gave you every opportunity to come clean when we were looking around the flat the other day.’

‘I was in shock.’

‘Clearly. It just makes me wonder what else you found that you didn’t think of sharing with the police.’

‘There wasn’t anything else.’

‘I’d like to be able to believe that,’ I said, sounding as cross as I felt. ‘But I can’t exactly take what you say at face value any more.’

‘I’ve apologised, DC Kerrigan. What more do you want?’

‘I want to know what happened to Rebecca’s diary. Did you think that was worth spiriting away too?’

‘What diary?’ She sounded wary.

‘The one that she always carried, according to her assistant. A pink one. We didn’t find it in the flat.’

‘Neither did I.’

‘Are you sure about that?’

‘Positive.’

‘The diary would tell us what she was doing right up to her death, wouldn’t it? She wrote down everything in it, I believe. Maybe things that you think we shouldn’t know.’

‘I didn’t see it.’

I wouldn’t have described Louise North as flustered, but there was definitely tension in her voice. I wondered if she ground her teeth in her sleep. All of that stress had to come out somehow.

‘Right. Well, I would appreciate it if you would share information with me instead of trying to hide Rebecca’s secrets out of misguided loyalty.’

‘Point taken.’ The veneer of calm had cracked; she sounded properly pissed off and I suppressed a grin. A beat, and then she spoke again, this time with a more measured tone. ‘If I think of anything, you’ll be the first to hear about it.’

I thanked her cordially enough and rang off, then swore. I’d meant to ask her if she’d been the one who helped clear out Rebecca’s office, just so I knew. It didn’t matter enough to call her back, but I made a note to ask her about it the next time I spoke to her.

A silver Ford Focus had pulled in next to me, and the driver was revving the engine in a very irritating manner. I bent down to look in through the passenger window, which was open.

‘Looking for business, love?’ said the man in the driver’s seat.

‘Sorry, I don’t do Mancunians.’

Rob snorted. ‘That’s about all you don’t do, if half of what I’ve heard is true.’

‘Probably only a quarter of it is worth believing,’ I said primly as I folded myself into the car. ‘And even then some of that is wishful thinking.’

‘Oh, but it’s fun to think about, isn’t it?’

‘It’s more fun to do it, to be honest, but you’ll have to settle for thinking, my friend.’ After five years in the job, I had enough material for twenty sexual harassment cases if I had wanted to take them, but the constant innuendo never really bothered me. For one thing, I had never actually slept with anyone in the Met, so any speculation was just that. For another, it made me laugh. And when laughs were otherwise thin on the ground – like now – any excuse would do.

But there was one thing I wasn’t laughing about. I turned to glare at Rob. ‘Gobshite? Was that the best you could do?’

He looked wounded. ‘What do you mean?’

‘The mugs, Rob. Don’t play the innocent with me. You wrote “gobshite” in mugs in my kitchen.’

‘It’s Ian’s kitchen really, isn’t it? I hope he didn’t think I meant that
he
’s a gobshite.’

‘What else was he supposed to think?’

Rob shrugged. ‘That I wanted to write the longest swearword I could think of that didn’t use any letters twice. It was either that or knobhead.’

‘You
twat
…’

‘Four letters and too many Ts. Try again.’

‘I’d rather not.’ I bit my lip, trying to keep a straight face and failing. ‘For God’s sake, Rob, he was pissed off already.’

‘I’m sure you made him feel better.’ Abruptly, he changed the subject. ‘How did you get on at Rebecca’s office?’

I filled him in on what I’d learned at Ventnor Chase and he looked thoughtful. ‘Not the most stable person, was she? Drugs, an eating disorder, unemployed at the time of her death … It was all going a bit wrong.’

‘You can say that again. Perfect on the outside, rotten on the inside. Troubled was not the word.’

‘So, DC Clever Clogs, do you want to hear the results of the house to house?’

‘More than anything.’ I felt excitement squeeze my stomach.

‘No one saw anything.’

‘Seriously?’

‘Very much so. Lots of them recognised her, lots of them remembered seeing different men there with her from time to time, but none of them remembered what happened on Thursday night, if anything did. Do you know what bothered me the most?’

‘Obviously not,’ I said patiently. ‘But I suspect you’re going to tell me.’

‘None of them cared. When we told them she was dead, none of them actually cared. One of them asked what the square footage of her flat was. Fucking animals. I hate London.’

‘So why live here?’

He shrugged. ‘If you want exciting crimes, go where the exciting criminals are, and that means London. But that doesn’t mean it’s a good place to live.’

‘Or die,’ I said soberly.

‘So have you worked out who killed Rebecca yet, if not the Burning Man?’

‘I’ve got an idea.’

‘Already?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘Not her boyfriend.’

I looked at him, deflated. ‘How did you know?’

‘It’s always the boyfriend. Too obvious.’

‘Murderers
are
obvious,’ I insisted. ‘It all fits. Can you think of a better way of getting rid of someone than to make it look as if a serial killer has targeted them? Get the police looking the wrong way, sit back and act as if you’re in mourning. Wait for the dust to settle and go on with your life. It’s perfect. Rebecca’s assistant said that Gil was the love of her life. She thought it was a real turning point for Rebecca when they broke up, and not the good kind of turning point. I think she was obsessed with him. I think she’d have done anything for him, including going to the dodgiest bit of Kennington in the dead of night to meet him. I think she trusted him and the feeling I get is that maybe she shouldn’t have.’

Rob looked at me with a frankly sceptical expression. ‘You’ve met him, haven’t you? What did he say to make you so suspicious of him?’

‘Honestly, I don’t know.’ A chill raced over my skin and I shuddered. ‘He gives me the creeps.’

‘OK. I’m sure that will be enough for the CPS.’

‘Obviously it isn’t,’ I snapped. ‘But I’m working on it.’

‘Course you are. Let’s go and talk to this friend of hers, then. What’s her name?’

‘Tilly Shaw. Short for Matilda, presumably.’

Rob pulled out into the traffic at speed. He always drove as if he was just behind the lead car on the last lap of the Grand Prix and I braced a hand on the dashboard to steady myself. A horn blared and I flinched, looking over my shoulder to see a black cab filling the back windscreen, altogether too close for comfort.

‘Jesus. I’d like to get there in one piece if that’s OK with you.’

‘Fine by me.’ He accelerated to get through the lights before they changed to red and didn’t quite manage it. ‘Just sit back, relax and enjoy the ride.’

‘Two of those things are completely impossible with you behind the wheel, and I’m already sitting as far back as I can,’ I pointed out.

‘Anyone who drives like you can’t really complain.’

‘I drive perfectly well,’ I said with dignity. ‘It’s just parking I can’t do.’

‘Oh, nothing important then.’

‘No one ever died because they couldn’t parallel park.’

‘Well, we’re not dead yet.’

‘Yet is right. Just stop talking to me, OK? Just … concentrate.’

‘I can drive and talk.’

I shook my head, pressing my lips together, and refused to speak again until we arrived at Tilly Shaw’s address. She lived in Belsize Park, in a small one-bedroom flat carved out of a larger Victorian house, and standing in the communal hallway with a bitter draught whistling around my feet I feared the worst, but her door opened with a blast of heat. Tilly was small and ravishingly pretty, with dyed red hair cut in a deep fringe. She was wrapped in layer upon layer of knitted material, not all of which was immediately identifiable as a specific garment.