Good Girl Gone Bad Page 5

  “I’m afraid we can’t,” Kane said. “It’s been taken in as evidence by one of the officers already out here tonight.” He inclined his head towards the street.

  Thank God he’d stepped in, thinking quickly. If it had been left to her, she’d have ballsed it up, mumbling some sort of nonsense, the whole plan ruined.

  “So as I said, we need to get going.” Kane barged past Jez, clearly unfazed by him, and waited for her on the path.

  Jez had staggered to the side, onto the flagstones—he hadn’t wanted grass out the front—so Charlotte took her chance and joined Kane, not looking at Jez as she scooted past and followed her saviour, walking between the lines made in the gravel path from the suitcase wheels, out onto the street.

  “You’d better be back,” Jez called after her.

  She didn’t answer. Didn’t turn around.

  She was done with him, done with everything to do with him.

  And she was never coming back.

  She couldn’t get in the car fast enough. She stumbled, her foot catching on something she couldn’t see, and she blushed, even though Kane couldn’t see her. He was putting her case in the boot, and it whacked shut, him venting his anger, she reckoned. Seat belt on, she waited, then, when he didn’t get in after a couple of minutes, she craned her neck to see where he was, and he appeared at the driver’s-side window, his tie flapping in the wind. Then he was in, beside her, and he clicked the locks, and she immediately felt safer. They pulled away, and she peeked out of the corner of her eye. Jez stood on the step outside the door, between the two lions, three ferocious beasts in a row. A cigarette dangled from his mouth, the orange glow on the end a speck from this distance.

  She didn’t have to see him again if she didn’t want to.

  And she didn’t.

  Hopefully this was it, and she was free.

  Kane pulled away from the kerb, and they travelled for a while in silence.

  With the evidence of humanity all around her, showing signs of people living their lives—folks walking, heads bent, dogs trotting at their heels; lights going on in bedroom windows, the inhabitants getting ready to turn in; the occasional car slewing past through inch-deep puddles left from earlier—she wondered whether she’d have any semblance of a normal life now. She could turn the clock back, pretend none of this had ever happened, that she’d never met Jez, and if anyone asked, she’d always been single, living alone, no gossip to give them.

  Wouldn’t that be nice?

  Kane swerved into a driveway in front of a house on the only other decent estate in town. His headlights lit up a white garage door with vertical lines a few centimetres apart. Some dirt had stuck in the grooves—that blood in the lion’s mane—and the silver handle in the centre was at a tilt, as though whoever had been here last hadn’t twisted it properly to engage the lock. Perhaps they’d had to be moved and had been in a hurry to get away, the person they’d been running from finding them.

  She shuddered, and Kane turned to her. She didn’t want to meet his gaze, wasn’t ready for that yet, so she said, “This is nice. Fancy kind of safe house, isn’t it?”

  “No. It’s mine.”

  What the hell? “Um, no. I agreed to be taken to a safe place, not—”

  “This is a safe place.”

  “But it’s your house. We were only shagging a few hours ago, and now I’m in your private space where it could happen again. No, I can’t—”

  “It won’t be happening again any time soon. You’re not in a good place emotionally. Mentally, either, I’d bet. You’re going to look after yourself here until I can haul Jez’s arse in, then you’re going to move on to a better life.” He paused. “Right?”

  She sighed, asking herself why every damn thing had to be so difficult, why obstacles were always in her way for one reason or another. She could never just be these days, always wound up, waiting for the gavel that was Jez to come down on her and commit her to a life behind invisible bars.

  Sod it. She’d give this a go, telling Kane everything she knew and suspected about Jez, then, once Jez was banged up, she was off. She had funds in a private account Jez didn’t know about—that was why her credit card was constantly near its limit—and her statements and letters from her mum had been redirected to Henry’s. She picked the mail up whenever she had coffee at his place. She’d been drawing cash out on credit and telling Jez she’d bought this or that, showing him old clothes still with tags on, ones he’d forgotten about. She had enough for a deposit on a new place, for a bit of furniture, some spends to keep her going for a while. Sixteen years salting cash away was a long time. She’d manage. There was employment to be had, at a supermarket or corner shop, the same as she’d had before he’d stopped her working.

  Resigned to being caged in for a bit longer—it was a means to an end and well worth it—she got out of the car and waited for Kane to join her by the wooden front door. The modest house was nothing like she was used to these days, but it was a cross between that and the one she’d grown up in, so she’d possibly be more at ease here.

  Kane collected her suitcase then opened the front door. He held his arm out as if silently saying ladies first, and she smiled at his gentlemanly behaviour. She could do with a man like him, but now wasn’t the time to be thinking of another relationship. Rebounds were never good, so people said. She wouldn’t know. She’d only ever been Jez’s girlfriend.

  She stood in the hallway, awkwardness squeezing her stomach, a little girl lost in a new world she wasn’t sure she could fit into. She’d dreamed about it so many times, but to actually be here now, away from Jez, it didn’t seem real.

  “It’ll take some getting used to,” Kane said, shutting the door. He pushed her case, and it rolled off towards a door at the end. “But you can do this, you know. You’re strong enough; otherwise, how did you go out tonight and do what you did?”

  “What we did,” she said. “I don’t know, if I’m honest. It was a spur-of-the-moment thing. I’d had enough, and it was my way of taking some sort of control. And just think, if I hadn’t gone, I’d still be there now, and so would Mrs Smithson.”

  “That isn’t your fault. Mrs Smithson, I mean.”

  He took her hand and guided her to the far door, opening it and nudging her suitcase so it stood against the wall out of the way. She slipped her hand from his, and he raised his eyebrows for a fraction of a second then walked into the room. A kitchen, it was, similar to hers at home—it isn’t home anymore—all gleaming white appliances, high-gloss cupboards in black, and a white table and chairs. She sat, not knowing what else to do, and waited for his interrogation about Jez and what he got up to.

  “I don’t know about you,” he said, flicking the kettle on, “but I’m going to make us a cup of tea, then I’m off to bed.”

  Oh. Well. “Okay. I could do with some sleep myself.”

  But she’d be awake all night, she just knew it, tossing and turning in a strange bed, unable to get Jez out of her head, that blood on his temple, those scratches. Had he got them from Mrs Smithson when he’d killed her?

  “Did you see the blood on him, those scratches?” she blurted.

  “I did. You didn’t see me talking to a uniformed officer after I put your case in the boot then?”

  He did? “No.”

  “Jez will be taken in. That blood will be tested. We have the perfect excuse—Mrs Smithson. Those scratches will be swabbed. All right, he’ll probably be let out after questioning—which I’ll do in the morning, he deserves a night in the cells even if he didn’t kill her—but if those results come back with DNA identified as belonging to Mrs Smithson, you won’t be seeing him again.”

  “I don’t plan on it anyway.”

  He made the tea then, and they sat in silence at the table, Kane opposite, one of his knees pressed against hers. It was nice, that feeling of someone good being there with her, so she didn’t move her leg to break contact.

  She finished her tea, and he popped the cups in th
e dishwasher, turned out the kitchen light, and hefted her case up the stairs. She went up after him, remembering how he’d felt earlier in the hotel room, his skin, his everything, then shook the thoughts away.

  He showed her to one of his spare rooms, a double bed in the centre covered in a tasteful dove-grey duvet. Built-in wardrobes with sliding mirrored doors stood to the left, black cabinets either side of the bed to match the black leather headboard, all in all a room obviously decorated by a man.

  He left her case by the door and retreated out onto the landing. “Try and get some sleep, all right?”

  She nodded.

  “I have to be at work by eight,” he said. “So help yourself to food when you get up—or I might make you breakfast, depends how I’m strapped for time. Make yourself at home. Just don’t go out for now, okay?”

  She nodded again, and after he’d left and closed her door, the splash of a shower filtered through, and she moved to a second door in her room. She looked inside—an en suite—and decided to shower herself. She could do with scrubbing that house off her, the home she’d been unhappy in for so long, even though she’d showered already tonight.

  Sometimes it was the best thing to do, washing it all away.

  NINE

  Kane stared at Pickins across the table. The man really was a prick, like Kane had told Charlotte, and it seemed like days ago he’d been with her in that hotel room. So much had happened since that hour he’d spent with her in the pub and the next hour in bed. Pickins didn’t deserve her. The fucker had a diamond and didn’t even know it. Didn’t care.

  Richard Lemon sat beside Kane, whisky fumes coming off him, cigarette smoke lingering on his clothes. His shirt, stained at the armpits, looked hard and crusty there. Yellow from old sweat. If he had a wife, she’d be sick of the stench of him, but he’d never been married, and it didn’t seem like he’d be waiting at the end of the aisle for some clueless bride in the future either. From what Richard had said, he spent most of his time outside of work up the boozer or acting out the role of potato on his couch, Johnnie in front of him whatever the scenario.

  “What were you doing yesterday evening?” Kane asked Pickins.

  “No comment.” Pickins folded his arms across his chest and smirked, the grin almost lost inside his trendy beard and moustache.

  “People who have something to hide tend to say that. So, I’ll ask again. What were you doing yesterday evening?”

  Pickins smiled wide, showing pristine teeth the same shape and size as Charlotte’s. The pair had spent a fortune on dentistry, that much was obvious. “Well, it’s like this, see. I was with my missus the whole time. Ask her, she’ll vouch for me.”

  She bloody won’t. “I’d like you to tell me what you did with your girlfriend.”

  Pickins chuckled. “What, you want me to tell you I fucked her up the arse, do you? Because that’s what I did.”

  Kane held back a sigh—didn’t clench his teeth. The muscles would flex in his jaw if he did, and Pickins would know he’d pissed him off. Got to him.

  Blood boiling and threatening to force him to say something he shouldn’t, Kane asked, “What else did you do?”

  Pickins shook his head. “Blimey, you’re a right kinky bastard, aren’t you, wanting to know all the ins and outs. Did you like what I did there? Ins and outs…” He pressed a fingertip to his chin and rolled his eyes towards the pockmarked ceiling. Lowering them again to level his gaze on Kane, he said, “Now let’s see. I fondled her tits for a bit, then I rubbed her—”

  “You’re clearly not interested in saving yourself,” Kane said, reaching across to poise his finger over the stop button of the recording machine. “Interview suspended at—”

  “Aww, wait. Just wait, will you? I’m messing around, aren’t I. No need to get your Calvin’s in a twist.” Pickins unfolded his arms and propped his elbows on the table. Rubbed his palms over his face. Breathed out through the gap where his pinkies almost met. “Look,” he said, voice muffled behind his hands. He dropped them to his lap. “I was out, all right? Out at the time that old dear died.”

  “Where?”

  He cast his eyes down then back up to stare at Kane. “If I told you, I’d have to kill you.”

  He roared with laughter, head thrown back, the front chair legs rising, him balancing there, and all Kane needed to do was push him a bit and Pickins would slam onto the floor, whacking his head on the radiator behind. But there were cameras, and he didn’t need the hassle he’d have over one momentary lapse into red-mist anger.

  “This is serious, Pickins,” Kane said.

  “I know, copper. I was being serious.”

  A threat then, one Kane was glad had been recorded.

  Richard farted.

  For fuck’s sake!

  Kane flared his nostrils. “So, you’re not going to tell us what you were doing, is that right?”

  “I just did. I was fucking my—”

  “Your missus doesn’t have the same story as you.”

  “Then she’s lying.” Pickins lowered the chair and rested his forearms on the table.

  They sat in silence for a full minute, Kane waiting for the second hand to tick round just a bit more than that to ramp up the tension. And the room was full of it, oozing out of Pickins as though tangible, something Kane could reach out and grab and shove down the bastard’s throat, choking him. Richard wasn’t successful in hiding another gaseous expulsion, a burp this time, and Kane’s patience was pushed to the limit. If he didn’t get out of there and away from the pisshead beside him and the arsehole in front of him, he might not be able to control himself.

  “We’ll take a break.” Kane said the necessary for the benefit of the tape then rose.

  Richard stood, too, going out to ask a couple of officers to escort Pickins to his cell, hopefully. Pickins sat there inspecting his fingernails—no thick oil beneath them, what with it being scraped out earlier to go off for testing, just a faint line remaining now. Kane had made an important phone call once he’d had the samples in hand, and with any luck, by the end of the morning, he’d know whether Pickins had killed Mrs Smithson.

  “I want a fag before you lock me up,” Pickins said.

  Kane ignored him and waited by the door until the officers came, then he left, steaming down the corridor, up three flights of stairs, and into his office without checking on his team in the incident room. He wasn’t fit to speak to anyone at the moment.

  He sat behind his desk and went through everything in his head.

  Pickins had been out, Charlotte had said he’d left before she had, so his tale about being home all night was bollocks. She’d been gone for the two hours they’d spent together, plus the time it had taken for her to walk to the pub and for Kane to drive her home, so two hours forty minutes max.

  Pickins had been home when Charlotte had arrived, but with no one saying they’d seen him come back—Kane had checked all the neighbours’ statements earlier that morning—there was no telling how long he’d actually been out for. Long enough to kill Mrs Smithson? It didn’t take but a minute or so to whack someone on the back of the head and push them onto a bonfire, so he could have done that on his way home, gone in his own house, and no one would be any the wiser.

  Last night, Pickins had given a brief statement at his front door to a uniform, saying he hadn’t seen anything out of the ordinary, and the officer had taken it at face value—probably new to the force and unaware of just who Pickins was.

  So he’d been home at nine or thereabouts to have been questioned. Where had he been before that? And where had he gone afterwards? Kane had dropped Charlotte off at about nine-forty, and she’d said Pickins had pissed off out again around ten. The street had been pretty busy, everyone having a good old nose, and Kane had turned up at Charlotte’s shortly after. Her story about her life had taken an hour or so in the telling, then Pickins had come back, just after the pubs kicked out. He hadn’t smelt of alcohol at the front door, though.

 
Pickins could have done it, there wasn’t a question mark hanging in the air about that, but what if the blood wasn’t Mrs Smithson’s? What if the scratches had been made by someone else?

  If so, who?

  Kane kicked the bin by his desk, sending the screwed-up papers and empty vending machine cups flying. Dregs of coffee seeped out of two of them, forming penny-sized domes of liquid on the carpet. He didn’t bother clearing up the mess and instead flung himself out of his chair to look through the window.

  Victoria Road below, congested with traffic, one car snorting black fumes out of its exhaust pipe—he should get a ticket for that—gave Kane the urge to pack up and bugger off on holiday. Someplace where the air was clean, and everyone walked instead of driving. Where people didn’t spend their final seconds of life burning in a back garden they used to drink their first cuppa of a summer morning in, soaking up the sounds of birds in the trees, the bees coming out to collect pollen. Where kids didn’t go to Pickins, hoping to buy the magic elixir to shoot into their veins, or smoke, or pop a pill, anything, something to take away the craving of addiction.

  This world was fucked up, wasn’t it? Totally and utterly fucked up.

  He left his office, hating the feeling of not being able to do a damn thing about it all, and chatted with his team, added info to the whiteboard, and caught up on anything they’d come up with so far this morning. Nothing new. No one had seen anyone go to Mrs Smithson’s prior to her death, and the neighbour directly beside her had only gone inside her house to check she was okay because the front door had been gaping open as he’d walked past on his way home from work.

  The man, Fred Hill, a forty-something gym owner, had gone into her back garden, seen what he’d thought was someone on the bonfire, then rushed out to the front shouting for help. Returning inside, he’d grabbed a washing-up bowl, tipping the dirty contents of plates and cups into the sink, and filled it with water to toss it on the flames.