Another Girl

Book 15: A DC Smith/Kings Lake Investigation

by Peter Grainger

Genres: Police Procedurals; Crime Fiction

Synopsis

A big car pulls up. No one gets out. Then the doors of a bar nearby open and people appear. Two men and a young woman, and one of the men has a hold on the woman’s arm. It looks as if they’re having words. Then this all happens quickly—they push the woman towards the car, one of the back doors opens and they manhandle her inside. There's a muffled shout from the woman and the car pulls away. It’s all over in a few seconds.
     It's just a few seconds—but seconds are all it takes to set in motion a sequence of events involving every member of the Kings Lake Central murder squad in the days to follow. And this time the threat is to one of their own. 

Publisher: Union Square & Co.

Print pages: 304

Sample

Fat Sarah was using a seat these days. It was a folding stool, the sort people use for camping. She didn’t think it would take her weight but Pimple, who gave it to her, said he thought it was German made and so it would, definitely. Pimple had graduated to a proper folding chair with arms, which he’d found in a skip. The chair had a tear across the back but he’d got some of that Gorilla tape and fixed it. He said he didn’t need two seats. Too much to carry around every time the coppers moved him on, and if you got a night or two in a hostel they wouldn’t let you take all your stuff in, so you had to store it which meant taking your eyes off it and then someone nicked it, every time. The hostels are full of thieves, like hospitals are full of sick people.

Fat Sarah. The name didn’t bother her, she’d had it for years, it was who she was. Like Pimple didn’t bother about being called that, because his skin was pretty bad and that was a part of who he was – when you’re on the streets you get a different sense of what’s important, and nicknames aren’t. Not that she was on the streets, not these days. The council found her a room almost two years ago, and she’d been careful to look after it – sometimes they did an inspection, and the woman always said hers was a pleasure to visit, always one of the best. So, if you’ve got a room, you’re not on the streets, but she had been for eighteen months before that, and the people she’d known there were still a part of her network – that’s what a social worker had called it, saying everyone should have a support network. These streets can be mean, so you stick together, help each other out. Even in the backstreets, alleyways and underpasses there are some people you can trust. Sarah could name a few, on the fingers of one hand.

This was a regular spot, close to the cash machine on Barclay Road. Early evenings are a good time, with people arriving after work to get some money, or coming there before they go out on the town, especially on a Friday night. Or at least it always used to be a good spot but there aren’t so many people using these machines now – everyone pays by card or phone. If you make a part of your living by begging, there are tougher times ahead, for sure. They’re saying one day there might be no cash at all, for anything. That’s one thing you can be certain of in this life – it never gets any easier for the people on the streets.

She never asks, never says anything aloud to them. One reason for this is that it’s a step lower than she’s prepared to go; she has some standards and has survived this long without doing so. Another reason is that you’re more likely to be accused of harassment if you speak to them. People find it tricky explaining to a copper that you looked at them in too appealing a way or that you were holding a bit of cardboard which said “Two small dependents to feed”. You don’t need to say a word to make a few of them feel guilty for taking handfuls of notes out of a hole in the wall when you’ve got an old ice-cream tub in front of you with 15p in it.

Weird things happen in this life, same as anyone else’s. Last Christmas a posh-looking bloke in a suit came to the machine the night before Christmas Eve. It was cold and rainy, and Sarah had been making her mind up to get back to her room and Bella and Mikey. This man pressed the buttons and waited for his cash to appear. First he took his card, and then he was giving her a funny look. He wasn’t smiling at all and she prepared herself for some of the usual aggravation – not scared, eighteen months in doorways hardens you up.

The cash machine made its whirring sound, dealing out his notes. He had them in his hand, not looking at her now but shaking his head. She knew something strange was going on. Once or twice she’d been given a tenner but nearly always it’s just some loose change, that’s enough to shut up most people’s conscience, but you definitely see an increase in takings around Christmas time. It’s the season of goodwill.

He was muttering, talking to himself – she never caught what he was saying but it went on for a few seconds. Sarah got up off the pavement, picking up the blanket – this was before the seat – ready to move away from him, when he turned and held out the money towards her. All of it. She was just staring and he said, ‘Go on. Take it.’ So she did. The bloke said, ‘Merry Christmas,’ but he sounded bitter with it, and she’d thought, Christ, his life must be worse than mine. He walked away, and she never saw him again. When she counted the money, there was a hundred quid, five new twenties.

She often thinks about that, especially on days like this one when she’s got nothing in two hours. There’s money at home, enough to feed the two cats, which is the main thing. She’s had Bella two years, found her as a kitten while she was still down at the underpass – Mikey arrived at the flat of his own accord six months later. Not supposed to have pets in the social housing but they turn a blind eye – it keeps people quiet and better behaved if they think they’ve got something to lose.

It’s got dark. October, the nights drawing in. Sarah remembers her dad saying stuff like that. He was all right, her dad – her mum, not so much… Across the road there’s a bar, and the word is it’s a dodgy place. No one she knows ever goes there. As usual there’s a heavy outside, and sometimes you see people get turned away for no obvious reason, and that makes you wonder how they make their money, doesn’t it? Other times, someone will turn up and get the door opened for them. Maybe it’s a private bar but she’s never heard of such a thing.

She’s just watching, thinking about it again, when a big flash car pulls up outside. No one gets out. Then the doors of the bar open and people appear. Two men and a youngish woman, and one of the men has a hold on the woman’s arm. It looks as if they’re having words. Then this all happens quickly – they push the woman towards the car, one of the back doors opens and they manhandle her inside. Sarah hears a muffled shout from the woman and the car pulls away. It’s all over in a few seconds. The three men, the heavy and the two from inside, stand and look up and down the street, looking for witnesses, but they don’t take any notice of Fat Sarah because she’s just a part of the furniture, like the road signs and the rubbish bins. Then the two men go back inside.

Yeah – these are tough old streets nowadays but you don’t see things like that every day. She doesn’t like to see women being pushed about. Ought to report that sort of thing…

A voice says, ‘Fat Sarah? Here again?’

While she’s been watching, a couple of PCSOs have come along the street. PCSOs are always in pairs. This is because they’re only half a copper really, so you need two to make up a real one. Sarah recognises one of them, the one who’s spoken to her – a short, stocky blonde woman, about forty.

Sarah says, ‘No law against sitting in the street, is there?’

Because she’d been ready to go home, she’d already picked up the plastic box – got lucky there – but the bit of cardboard was still on show.

The other one, a bloke of no more than thirty, said, ‘There are laws against begging. It’s called the Vagrancy Act. We have reason to believe-’

He must be some sort of trainee, allowed out for the first time. The officer Sarah had recognised shut him up and said, ‘Have you been asking for money from people coming to the cash machine, Sarah?’

‘No. I ain’t said nothing to no one.’

The woman PCSO knew this, knew that people who’d been at it a while understood the rules, understood the law better than the prat standing next to her. The woman said, ‘Good. Just so there’s no more misunderstandings, I’m asking you to move along now.’

You don’t argue. Fat Sarah got up from the seat, one hand against the wall behind her to stop herself toppling over. She folded the stool and then said, ‘I seen something just now.’

The woman had a bit of a sarky smile but she said, ‘Really? What did you see?’

Sarah told them about the little incident over the road. The PCSO said they’d go and have a word, and sure enough, they crossed over. The heavy was still outside – the other two men had disappeared. Sarah saw the plastic plods start talking to him, and then he was replying, nodding and pointing to the doors of the bar. It went on for another minute or so, and then eventually the bloke was laughing, like they’d all shared a joke. The PCSOs started walking away, and he put up a hand to them, the way you do to say thanks.

But when they were maybe thirty yards down Barclay Road, he turned to look across at Fat Sarah. He was broad, not tall but the sort you know not to mess with – he had a bald head and a short beard. He stared at her for a long time it seemed, and then he did that thing where someone points with two fingers on one hand, first at their own eyes and then back at you. It means, I seen you, I’m watching you.

It was almost dark now. There were lights in the shop windows but the pavements were empty. She felt sort of scared, and the cats would be hungry. He’d dropped his hand but he was still staring at her when she began to walk back into the centre of Norwich. She’d give this place a rest for a week or two.

Karen Williams had worked late, trying to clear her desk because there was to be an unscheduled stocktake at the warehouse the following Monday, and she didn’t want to come in over the weekend. It was already dark by the time she left the outskirts of Kings Lake and took the Hunston road. Using her Skoda’s Apple play, she sent a text to her husband, telling him she would be home within twenty minutes – for a Friday evening, the road was unusually quiet.

Seven minutes later she signalled right to leave the A road and entered the box junction that would take her to Old Newton. There was something large on the road, too big to be one of the deer that sometimes got knocked over here, and she swerved to avoid it, her car bumping into and then over the kerb, leaving her at an odd angle, with the front wheels on the verge and the rear wheels still on the road. She was a little shaken, but not so much by the near miss as what she thought she’d seen lying on the road. The engine was still running, so she pulled forward and to the left, parking her car on the verge and out of the way of any other vehicle that took the road to Newton. Then she switched off the ignition and got out.

Sergeant Eric Boyd took the call himself – it came through from the county’s emergency answering service. He was on duty, with just one other officer in the building – an officer who lacked the experience necessary if the call was not a hoax, and from what Boyd was told by the call-handler, it was unlikely to be one. Boyd already had the woman’s name and number, and he called her as he left the car park of the Hunston police station. She sounded calm enough and agreed to remain at the scene until he arrived, which should be, he reassured her, within ten minutes at the very most.

There were two vehicles parked on the verge when he arrived – the woman’s Fabia and a Ford estate. A painter and decorator on his way home had seen her hazard lights flashing and pulled over to see if she needed help – thank the Lord, thought Boyd, that the man seemed to be a genuine sort. Imagine the fuss if she’d stayed there at his request and then some pervert had turned up…

Boyd identified himself, thanked them both and then walked across to the box of the junction on the main road – there was no time for more preliminaries with traffic still moving north and south. He switched on his torch but it was almost superfluous. It was a body all right, male, sprawled on his front, the face visible, eyes closed, mouth open as if in surprise. From the odd angle of the legs, Boyd guessed they had been broken when he was knocked down. Though what he’d been doing out here on foot was a mystery – one for somebody else to solve.

He called Traffic at Lake immediately. The Old Newton junction would need to be closed and the main Hunston road ought to be reduced to a single lane – that would need officers and some sort of control. Then he got himself transferred to the duty desk at Lake Central and said they needed to get people up here quickly.

Boyd had cones and triangles and flashing lights in the boot of the Octavia. As the two civilians watched, he placed these on the road, effectively closing the Newton junction himself, preparing to explain to puzzled and probably annoyed motorists why they would be taking a detour tonight. Then he went to the two people.

The woman, Mrs Karen Williams, said, ‘I wasn’t sure what to do. I was sure he must be dead. I didn’t know whether to… You know?’

She made half a gesture, pushing with her two hands. Eric Boyd reassured her – he didn’t think there was anything she could have done. Then he thanked the man – Bill English, phone number and registration already recorded – and said there was no need for him to remain. Mr English looked a little disappointed but he got the message and headed for his motor. Mrs Williams called out a thank you to him.

Boyd’s radio crackled and a voice said vehicles were leaving Lake Central, eta twelve minutes. He asked the woman if she would mind remaining until then – there might be some questions if they’d sent a more senior officer already. She said she’d call her husband and let him know.

Boyd thought he’d better go and stand nearer the body but he didn’t want her to accompany him – neither did he want to leave her there alone. He suggested she should wait in her car. After a moment she said, ‘How awful.’

The sergeant thought it was an almost typical start to a weekend when he was on duty, but he said, ‘Yes, it is. Someone’s in for some terrible news.’

She said, ‘Will it be you who has to tell them?’

He hadn’t considered that, but it might be. He said, yes, maybe, if the man was local.

‘He’s foreign, isn’t he? Asian or something.’

Boyd had noted that but didn’t answer her. Cars were still coming south along the road to Kings Lake. He went then and stood between the body and the south-bound lane. It seemed the least he could do.

Phan Kim opened his second plastic bottle of water and drank some of it slowly. They had left two packs – he calculated the rate at which he could drink to make the water last until Sunday night. His maths was very good. He had done well in that subject when he was at school. The memory of school brought a little pain. Five years ago. It felt like a very long time.

The humidity gauge reading was too high. When he tapped it, the needle edged up, not down. Kim knew one of the extractor fans was sticking sometimes. He could probably have taken it apart and fixed it but he already had too much to do, and now he might be here alone for the whole weekend. They had said someone would come to take over on Sunday but he knew that might not happen.

Anh and he had been together since they arrived in the lorry almost a year ago – that’s where they met. But last week Anh had argued with the two men who brought them here – Anh spoke some English and he had made threats, and Kim had not seen him since. They lived in the same house but when Kim asked the others, no one had seen Anh after the men took him away on Monday. That was five days ago. He had even said to Anh several times, do not make threats to these people.

He got up and put on the goggles that would protect his eyes from the HID lamps. They produce the heaviest crops but they are energy intensive and make too much heat. Even now his vest was already soaked with his own sweat. Soon the plants will flower and then they will need more darkness, which will be better for those who tend them. This crop should be ready within one month.

The hydroponic tubes were getting blocked again, and he will spend hours over the weekend clearing them. If you do not do this, the floor becomes flooded, and the men see this and get angry. Kim knew more about this than the men. Once he was going to be an engineering student and he could make a better system but they do not listen to the workers. Often he wonders what might have happened if his father had not become ill. He would have finished his education, and maybe now he would be an engineer, telling other workers what to do.

There are four hundred and thirty-six plants. The men count them every time they are here. The plants are big now and each one will be worth a lot of money but he does not know exactly how much. The smell is strong – when the flowers come it will be suffocating and it can make you feel sick and strange.

He moved on to the next set of pipes, and worked mechanically. When they bring you it is in a van. You do not get to see much of the outside but it takes, he thinks, more than an hour to get here from the house in the city. He sometimes wonders what the world beyond this building is like, and how different to his home it must be. The name of Vietnam means many things. Home of the descendants of the dragon, the land of those who moved south from the old tyranny of China… It has a history as long as that of England. He is proud of this but feels the pain of remembering again.

More pipes were blocked. His hands were working but the sweat had run into his eyes and he seemed to be weeping. One day this will be over and he will go home.

Senior officer cover duties came around more often these days, about one weekend in three. Twenty thousand new police officers? It was a joke. Look at the murder squad at Lake Central – they were at a little over half the strength that had originally been promised when Freeman was setting it up, almost two years ago now. Central was a key station in the county’s police service, and it required someone of a detective inspector’s rank or the uniform equivalent to be on call. There were not enough to go around, even though Freeman herself would take her turn. This weekend it was DI Terek, and Tom Greene was determined to make the most of it.

He was taking down the frames that had supported this year’s crop of runner beans. It had been a successful year despite the long dry spell in August – the tricky job of running a proper standpipe down to the vegetable garden last year had paid off, and they had bags of beans stored in the chest freezer, and some salted ones in jars, much to the sarcastic delight of his teenaged offspring. The secret with a veg garden is feeding it, and all these beds had had proper farmyard manure within the past two years, except that one – he looked over at it – which will provide next year’s new potatoes. Potatoes don’t like a lot of manure, it causes them to scab and spoils the look of them.

Greene considered himself a half-decent gardener, the make-do-and-mend sort, telling himself he only bothered to save a bit on the weekly grocery bill, but the neighbours on either side, looking enviously over their fences, would have given a different account of the matter. It was a tidy, organised and productive plot, and if you’d shown pictures of it to some of the detectives from Lake Central and told them the garden belonged to one of their colleagues, not a few of them would have guessed first time that it belonged to their detective inspector.

They had bought this house ten years ago now – a former council house, built in the times after the war when homes fit for heroes meant something. It was semi-detached, had large rooms and an absurdly long garden – they’d walked down here on the day of the viewing and Greene had had a vision of the future. He saw lawns, swings for the children, dahlias and roses, fruit bushes and a vegetable plot, even though it was a wasteland. Jill had stared at it, then at him and said, ‘Oh. That’s that, then.’

Looking back towards the house, he could see her approaching now – it was too early for the usual mug of tea, and then he realised she was carrying his mobile phone. He frowned and as she neared him, she said, ‘Sorry. He was a bit insistent. Someone called Whittaker. From Norwich?’

Greene took the phone and gave his name – he knew who this was. The two of them had spoken about a month previously though they’d never met in person – Whittaker was a detective inspector based at Bethel Street in Norwich.

Whittaker sounded apologetic.

‘Sorry to bother you. I did call Lake Central and got put through to someone called Terek but he didn’t seem too interested. Said he’d pass something on but… Anyway, as you and I spoke before, you remember, when we were setting up the job, I thought… I hope you don’t mind too much.’

Greene could recall their previous conversation clearly enough, and if he needed more it was all recorded in a file on his desktop in Central. He said, ‘It’s not a problem. How can I help?’

Whittaker cleared his throat – he was hesitating about something. Tom Greene watched his wife pulling a few of the old bean pods from the canes and adding them to the basket where he was saving some for seed next year. The sky overhead had darkened since he came down here an hour ago, and he thought, it’s going to rain, even though it wasn’t forecast.

Whittaker said, ‘I don’t know whether we’ve got a situation developing or not. This young woman of yours. Is she sound? Reliable?’

The young woman in question was in her early thirties – Whittaker himself must be in his fifties, then.

Greene said, ‘I’ve never had cause to think otherwise. On occasion she can have a little too much to say at the wrong moment, but operationally… Why? What’s she done?’

Whittaker said, ‘It’s more what she hasn’t done. She didn’t check in with her contact last night, which is fair enough, they knew she’d. . .