The Burning (39 page)

He laughed. ‘Do you really want to know?’

I had time to experience a spasm of pure jealousy in the split-second before he relented.

‘It’s not what you’re thinking. I used to be on the Met hotel crimes squad. I arrested someone here. The assistant manager was part of a gang from Kosovo who had a nice little thing going, thieving from the guests. He got four years, I seem to recall. And I got a discount card from the very grateful manager which I hadn’t had a chance to use before today.’

‘Oh. So not a regular romantic hang-out, then.’

‘No. I haven’t brought anyone else here. Just you.’ He turned and prodded the bed. ‘Decent mattress, I hope. Do you want to lie down?’

I did. But I did not want to lie there on my own. Before I could think of a way to convey my feelings without sounding too cheap, he had knelt down in front of me and started undoing the laces on my trainers, whistling under his breath in a particularly unromantic way.

‘I feel like a horse at the blacksmith’s,’ I said as he lifted my foot to slide my trainer off.

‘Whoa there, Bessy.’ He pulled the other one off and stood up, very close to me, and again I experienced that wave of excitement and nerves that had so unsettled me earlier. I stared at his mouth, thinking about leaning forward and letting my lips brush his … I edged forward a little, close enough to feel the warmth from his skin.

He cleared his throat. ‘Maeve.’

I snapped out of my reverie and looked up at him, aware from the blood beating in my cheeks that my face had gone the colour of the walls.

‘I thought you might just want to rest. Don’t think I haven’t realised that you may be suffering from brain damage because of your head injury.’

‘I’m fine. I feel much better. Really, apart from being tired, I’m back to my old self,’ I gabbled and he laid a finger on my lips to stop me talking.

‘Don’t think I won’t take full advantage of your weakened condition, then. If you want me to.’ I took his hand and moved it away from my mouth. ‘How might you do that?’

‘I thought I might start like this.’ He bent his head to kiss me, and it was wonderful and strange and completely right all at the same time.

‘The only part of me that is weak,’ I observed presently, ‘is my knees.’

‘Really?’ Rob sounded interested. ‘Let’s have a look.’

The easiest way to do that, it seemed, was to take off my jeans. And before long, we had moved beyond the initial awkwardness, the laughter, the playing around. It was serious, what we were doing. But more than that, it was right.

And it was better than I could have imagined.

‘Again?’ he asked some time later as we lay side by side, facing each other, no more than three inches apart. He was trailing his finger down the length of my spine and back up in an unhurried rhythm.

‘Yes. No. Not yet.’ I struggled to open my eyes, lulled into a daze by the overwhelming feeling of well-being. ‘Rob.’

‘Maeve.’ He matched my tone, sounding and looking absurdly solemn. I poked him in the chest.

‘Take me seriously. We need to talk.’

‘Now?’ He rolled onto his back and threw his forearm over his eyes, shutting me out. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’ I sat up, pulling the sheet up around me. ‘We shouldn’t be doing this. It’s just going to complicate a good working relationship. And if you tell anyone on the squad, I’m not going to be able to show my face in the incident room.’

He moved his arm so he could glare at me with one eye. ‘Why do you think I would talk about this?’

‘“Maeve’s got great legs and a nice little arse too. She’s gagging for it. I’d shag her until she couldn’t walk in a straight line,” ’ I mimicked. ‘That was it, wasn’t it? I haven’t forgotten anything? I only heard bits of it, but I think I got the gist.’

‘That was completely different. That was just talk.’ He reached up and drew me down to him. ‘Let me see if I can do it, though.’

‘For God’s sake,’ I protested, half-laughing, half-cross. ‘We have to work together. We can’t possibly do whatever it is we’re doing here without jeopardising everything. At the very least, one of us will probably have to leave the team, whether this goes anywhere or not. I mean, I’m jumping too far ahead here. It’s not like I’m trying to see into the future. But we should be responsible about it.’

Rob frowned, looking down so I couldn’t see his eyes. ‘Why don’t you stop thinking about what’s going to happen and concentrate on the here and now?’

‘Don’t you even care about what I’m saying?’ Did that mean he saw what we were doing as a one-off?

He thought for a second as his hands moved, sliding under the sheet I still held around me. ‘No. Now I appreciate your efforts to wrap yourself up as my Christmas present, but I’ve been a very good boy and I’d like to open it a few days early.’

It was easier, somehow, to push the doubts to the back of my mind. Easier to allow myself to be folded into his arms again. Easier to run my hands over his skin, learning every inch of it, shutting out the real world as it rattled on, far below our windows.

Easier just to let go.

*

The room was dim when I opened my eyes, wondering what had woken me. A small lamp on the table by the window was the only source of light. I turned my head, disorientated for a moment, and looked into Rob’s eyes. He was standing by the bed, hovering over me. From where I was lying, he seemed to be showered, fully clothed and ready to go.

‘You’re up already,’ I said, starting to sit up, feeling groggy and somehow at a disadvantage for being still in bed.

‘Yeah. Sorry, pet, but you need to get moving too.’ He opened one hand to show me a mobile phone: my own. I reached across and snatched it from him, checking the screen. One voicemail.

‘It’s from Godley.’

I looked up, ready to snap at him for listening to my messages. He held up his hands.

‘I didn’t touch it. I heard it ringing and his number came up on the screen.’ He shrugged. ‘I thought you wouldn’t want me to answer it for you.’

‘You thought correctly.’ I shushed him then, listening to the superintendent’s mellow voice murmuring from my phone, pulling me back to the real world.

The message was a short one, and when it finished, I looked at Rob, reluctant to be the one to speak. He knew already though.

It was time to get back.

Chapter Fourteen

M
AEVE

I hadn’t imagined that Louise would fall apart in her interview. I hadn’t been naive enough to imagine that she would confess, no matter how expertly the questions were directed. But on the other hand, I hadn’t anticipated that she would take the option chosen by every obviously guilty career criminal I had come across, and answer ‘no comment’ to each and every question.

‘Did you murder Rebecca Haworth on the twenty-sixth of November this year?’ Chris Pettifer asked in his usual level tone, the opposite of confrontational.

‘No comment.’

‘Did you murder Adam Rowley on the thirtieth of April 2002?’

‘No comment.’ She answered the same way each time, in a conversational voice, as if it was all a game.

‘Did you try to stage the scene where Rebecca was found so that it looked as if she had been the victim of the Burning Man?’

Not a flicker of distress. ‘No comment.’

I sat beside the superintendent, watching the television screen that relayed live footage from the interview room. Godley was completely still, hardly blinking, totally focused on the interview. Behind us, other detectives came and went, standing for a few minutes or hours to watch Louise North defeating the efforts of our best interviewers, specially trained to deal with people accused of the most serious crimes. And as they took turns to try to break down the reserve of the woman in front of them, they couldn’t make her break a sweat.

‘She’s tough,’ Bill Pollock commented from behind me. ‘Not a hair out of place.’

‘She’s always like that,’ I said without looking around. ‘This is what she does.’

Godley took his eyes off the screen for a half-second to glance at me, having picked up on the bleak tone of my voice. ‘Don’t doubt yourself, Maeve. You may have been taken in by her initially, but you found her out in the end. The evidence is there. The facts don’t lie. And even if the rest is conjecture, it’s convincing.’

It was nice of him to sound so positive, but I knew the arrest had gone ahead with only lukewarm encouragement from the CPS. I didn’t know the lawyer who had been assigned to the Haworth case once Rebecca’s murder was positively, definitely and permanently removed from the list of Razmig Selvaggi’s alleged crimes. Her name was Venetia Galloway and her first name was the only flourish about her well-scrubbed, mid-forties person; otherwise she was strictly no-nonsense and as far as I knew, utterly lacking in a sense of humour. I had seen her in the distance, standing in Godley’s office with her arms tightly folded and her mouth puckered like the top of a drawstring bag as the case we were constructing began to fall apart for the lack of a confession.

And we weren’t going to get one. Louise’s manner was pleasant. Not even the most personal, borderline offensive questions seemed to ruffle her. Her solicitor sat beside her, massive in a pinstriped suit, a heavy gold signet ring on the little finger of his right hand, with the air of a man who hadn’t had to sit in a police station for quite a long time. He was the head of a large practice of criminal solicitors, generally regarded as the best in the business and certainly one of the greatest beneficiaries of legal aid cash in the country. The fact that Louise had got Thaddeus Sexton himself to sit by her side showed that she knew what she was doing. His reputation was as formidable as the man himself. Not, it had to be said, that he was doing much to earn his pay at the moment. Looking like a walrus who had spent some time and much money on Savile Row, he sat back with his eyes half-closed and let his client deal with the questions.

‘Were you jealous of Rebecca?’ Dornton was taking a more forceful approach than his colleague had tried. It had much the same effect on Louise.

‘No comment.’

There was a definite sneer in his voice as he asked, ‘Isn’t it true that you’ve been sleeping with her ex-boyfriend?’

‘No comment.’

‘Everyone loved her, didn’t they? Didn’t anyone love you?’

‘No comment.’

Training meant that Dornton and Pettifer didn’t show their frustration with Louise’s intransigence, but outside the interview room they were able to give vent to their feelings, and did. The frequency of breaks must have been one indication to Louise and Sexton that we were running out of ideas, especially since the clock was ticking. We had to charge her or free her within twenty-four hours of making the arrest, and either option had its risks.

‘We aren’t going to get anywhere,’ I observed once the screen had gone blank for yet another interview suspension. I looked at Godley, who had a thoughtful expression on his face.

Before he could respond, the door opened. Chris Pettifer was the mildest of men usually, but his face was red as he came in. He pushed the door so hard that it banged against the wall and a few tiny flakes of plaster slipped down to frost the carpet. ‘The fucking cow.’

‘All right, Chris,’ Godley said. ‘Sit down and have a break.’

‘She’s sat in there smiling at that tub of lard. Makes me sick.’

Dornton trailed in after him, too worn out even to swear. ‘I’ve had it, boss. We’ve done everything now, haven’t we? Tried the lot. She’s not going to say anything.’

‘That’s what Maeve thinks too.’ Godley stood up and stretched. ‘Right. Well, if we’re wasting our time, we should stop. What time is it?’

‘Twenty to four,’ I said after a glance at the big clock on the wall.

As if on cue, Judd poked his head into the room. ‘A little over two hours left, boss. What do you want to do?’

‘Not sure yet. Is Venetia around?’

‘Coming over in half an hour. She’s just been on the phone.’ Judd grimaced. ‘Not happy.’

‘Good,’ Godley said absently, and I suspected he’d stopped listening once he’d heard she was on her way. ‘Right. Here’s the plan. We’ll ask Venetia what she wants us to do. Whatever she says, we’re going to charge Louise North anyway.’

‘How are you going to get away with that? What if she says we have to let her go?’

‘Leave her to me, Tom. I’ll convince her.’

The look on Judd’s face spoke volumes – disbelief, awe and concern. ‘I don’t even want to think about how you might be planning to do that.’

‘You don’t have to think about it,’ the superintendent said. ‘You just have to wait until I’ve done it and make sure everything’s in order for us to charge Miss North.’

‘Are you sure?’ I was starting to panic again. ‘I mean, we really needed her to say she’d done it, didn’t we? That was something we’d all agreed. You said it yourself. We need a confession.’

‘And
you
said just now we weren’t going to get one. As it happens, I agree with you. But I also feel very strongly that the young woman in our interview room is guilty, and I dislike letting people like that go.’ He shrugged. ‘The trial is a long way off. Anything could happen. If we can charge her, we’ll get her into the system and see if being on remand makes an impression on her. Holloway is a bit different from the comforts of Fulham.’

I thought of the house I’d visited, the warm sunny kitchen, the cold living room. ‘We’ll see. But I wouldn’t be too sure that prison will make any difference to her. I think it’ll push her further into herself, even more out of reach. And I don’t know how we’ll get her back.’

‘With luck,’ Godley said, and grinned. ‘With a bit of luck.’

He whistled as he headed off towards his office, Judd two steps behind him as usual. I watched them go and my face must have shown how surprised I was. Pettifer, now restored to good humour, laughed.

‘You didn’t know that about Charlie, did you? Give him a risky proposition and he’ll always take it. And what’s more, it usually pays off.’

‘I hope so. I really do. But I wouldn’t bet against Louise either. And don’t forget, he’s still got to convince Venetia.’

How he got away with it, I will never know, but at twelve minutes past six on the eighteenth of December, Superintendent Godley formally charged Louise North with the murder of Rebecca Haworth. At his invitation, I was among the group of detectives watching from beside the custody sergeant’s desk as the superintendent went through the charge against her.

‘Louise North, I charge you with the following offences:

‘That between the twenty-fourth day of November and the twenty-sixth day of November 2009 you unlawfully and injuriously imprisoned Rebecca Haworth and detained her against her will.

‘That on the twenty-sixth of November 2009 you murdered Rebecca Haworth.’

As Godley read I was looking at Louise, trying to see any hint of fear or anger. She was totally composed but her face was colourless as she listened. Sexton patted her arm with a fat paw and she moved an inch away from him without acknowledging it.
Touch me not
. She was small beside him, almost fragile, and I recalled with surprise that she was my age. She looked much younger, and totally harmless. Well, appearances could be deceptive. I waited for her to look at me, but she kept her eyes fixed on Godley’s face while he spoke, and afterwards she looked down at the floor until she was taken to the cells, as if no one else was there.

I was at Horseferry Road Magistrates’ Court early the following morning, nursing a polystyrene cup of watery tea and a headache as I waited for Louise’s first appearance. Thaddeus Sexton would be determined to keep her out of prison in the lead-up to the trial; we were equally determined not to allow her out on bail, and this was the first opportunity for battle to be joined. I wondered how she was coping with being in custody. The holding cells at the court made the police station where she had spent the night look like the Savoy. It was noisy down there, and chaotic, and altogether not what Louise was used to.

Up above, things weren’t much better. I dumped the tea and went into the correct courtroom to wait for Louise’s appearance. It was overheated and crowded, and the CPS prosecutor had a massive stack of files in front of him that suggested it was a busy morning. I crossed my fingers that Louise would feature early in the proceedings; I did not want to have to sit through a procession of drunk and disorderlies or possession of class A or common assaults, the usual fodder for the magistrates.

I spotted Sexton near the front, looking about as cheerful as if he had just stepped in shit. The magistrates’ court was so far beneath him I was surprised he had bothered to come himself. But then, Louise was going to be a high-profile client. It was worth his while to be there.

The district judge who was hearing the cases in that court was female, determinedly unmade-up and supremely efficient. She dispatched the first few cases on the list with barely a pause, and the list caller was kept busy, shuttling back and forth between the waiting area and the courtroom. At long last he came back into the room and said lugubriously, ‘Number seventeen on your list, Louise North, represented by Mr Sexton.’

It was a feature of the courts that you could hear the heavy security doors between the cells and the dock opening and closing with a shriek of metal and a jangle of heavy keys. It ratcheted up the tension nicely as the sound of locks turning and doors slamming came closer and closer. I fidgeted in my seat, looking around to see if anyone else I knew was there. At the back of the court I saw a familiar face: Gil Maddick. He looked strained, as if he hadn’t slept, and his eyes were glued to the door at the back of the dock. I looked in the same direction just in time to see it open and Louise step through it, flanked by two custody officers. She wore a white shirt and a black skirt, and the expression on her face was entirely neutral.

Her role in the proceedings was limited to stating her name, date of birth and address, which she did in a low-pitched but clear voice; pleas would not be entered until the case reached the Old Bailey. The clerk stumbled a little over the charges and the judge bent her head, listening. As soon as he’d finished, she nodded. The normal routine was to refer the case up to the Old Bailey for a plea and case management hearing, known as the PCMH, and that was exactly what she did.

‘We’ll have the PCMH in six weeks.’

Thaddeus Sexton surged to his feet in response. ‘We’d like to apply for bail, madam.’

The judge turned to the CPS lawyer who gave a brief, not to say sketchy outline of the Crown’s case, speaking rapidly and hoarsely so it was sometimes hard to hear him. ‘The Crown objects to bail being granted on the grounds that Miss North will fail to attend her trial because of the serious nature of the charges and the inevitable life sentence that would apply on conviction. She has no family, no community ties. She has considerable financial resources that are not restrained and would enable her to flee the jurisdiction, and as she has shown considerable ingenuity in attempting to avoid being brought to justice, there is every reason to believe that she would do the same to avoid the risk of conviction at trial.’

‘Madam, my client is of good character – she’s a respectable solicitor without a criminal record,’ Sexton countered. ‘There are other options than custody. She could be under a curfew and monitored with a leg tag. She is prepared to report to her local police station daily; she would surrender her passport and reside only at her home address.’ He spoke persuasively, rocking a little on the balls of his feet, putting in a fine performance in conveying arguments that the judge considered for all of three seconds before turning them down crisply.

‘Bail is refused because there are substantial grounds to believe that the defendant would fail to attend her trial if released. Take her down.’

The custody officers moved to take Louise back to the cells, but she stood where she was for a moment, staring across the court to where Gil was sitting. Her face was unreadable. I twisted in my seat to look back at him and saw that he looked distraught. He scrambled to his feet as she was taken away, and hurried out of the court before I could try to attract his attention.

I sat on in the court, thinking, as prisoner after prisoner shuffled into the dock and faced their fate. Gil should have been angry with Louise – he must have realised by now that she had planned to frame him for murder, having heard the outline of the prosecution case. But if anything it looked as if it was the other way round. There was no love on Louise’s side – that much was clear. But Gil had looked utterly and completely smitten. I sighed. People were strange. Love was stranger still.