Friendless Lane Read online

‘You’re gonna let her come back, ain’t you?’

  ‘Probably.’ Reggie scratched at a fleck on the glass with his thumbnail. ‘Yeah. She’s a good worker. Punters like her.’ He gestured to the stairs with his head. ‘Now get yourself ready.’

  Kelsey trotted across the bar and up to the dressing room at the top of the stairs. There was only one other girl up there, already sitting on the stool in front of a big mirror surrounded by light bulbs. Only two bulbs were working.

  ‘All right, Tish,’ said Kelsey and threw her puffa into a locker on the other side of the room.

  Tish was a whiney arse. All she ever did was moan. It was always too hot. Or too cold. Her shoes rubbed her feet. The tips were too mean.

  ‘I’ve got a proper headache,’ said Tish.

  Kelsey wanted to tell her to shut the fuck up, but she didn’t. She’d been kicked out of untold strip clubs, massage parlours and knocking shops for getting into it with the other girls. Not this time. Orlando’s was half decent. Reggie ran a tight ship and paid what was owed every night without bitching. And there were always loads of punters. She’d worked in places where the girls had argued over who was getting the most work. Imagine that. Girls scratching one another and pulling hair from the roots over whose turn it was to suck the next rancid cock. Orlando’s wasn’t like that. It was full every night, packed at the weekends. They came from all over. Working blokes on their way home from the factories. Young lads on stag dos. The crews from Marsh Farm, the Clayhill and Bury Park with fists full of crack money.

  No way was she losing this job.

  ‘Do you want some Nurofen?’ she asked Tish.

  ‘Got anything stronger?’

  Like Kelsey and all the other girls, Tish had a habit.

  ‘Don’t even think about it,’ said Kelsey.

  Reggie had three house rules. No fighting. No stealing. And no taking drugs. Break any of those and you were out on your ear. Only last week a black girl called Suzy had been caught smoking half a joint through the open window in the dressing room on her break. Reggie had kicked her out. Literally. She’d hit the pavement outside the club wearing her hot pants and bra. Her stuff was thrown out to her through the offending window.

  Tish groaned and rummaged in her bag, pulling out a half-litre of vodka. She unscrewed the cap and took a swig, returned it without offering it to Kelsey. Kelsey didn’t care, wouldn’t have taken it anyway. You didn’t share stuff with working girls. Not if you’d got half a brain.

  A bell rang. Punters.

  Tish pulled herself to her feet as if she was seventy. ‘My back is killing me.’

  ‘Tell Reggie I’ll be down in five,’ said Kelsey.

  Tish nodded and ambled to the stairs, fiddling with the straps of her vest top. ‘Is it me or is it freezing in here?’

  Kelsey didn’t answer and pulled out a can of hairspray. She pressed the nozzle and sprayed around her head in a huge cloud until her hair felt like cardboard. Then she took out some concealer and dabbed it over the scars round her mouth. Her mobile rang but she didn’t recognize the number. She never answered the phone unless she knew who it was. She wondered if it might be Gem. Maybe her old phone had got lost or nicked and she’d had to get a new one.

  The bell sounded. Two quick rings in succession. Reggie was getting pissed off.

  She pushed the phone into her pocket, locked up her stuff and skittered down the stairs into the pounding music.

  [#]

  The natural light in the canteen was a blessed relief after the violent dazzle of the morgue. The last of the day’s weak February sunshine leaked through the windows.

  Jack carried a tray to the table and placed cups of tea in front of Lilly, Gregor Stone, then himself. On a chipped plate he had a Crunchie, a Twirl and a packet of Minstrels.

  ‘Help yourself,’ he told them.

  ‘Thanks, but I won’t,’ said Stone.

  The guy had an American accent and Jack wondered what on earth he was doing working in Luton.

  Lilly took the Twirl, opened the packet with her teeth, removed a finger of chocolate and bit it in half.

  ‘Okay?’ Jack asked.

  She nodded and crammed the second half in her mouth. She looked shaken, but was holding it together. You had to hand it to the woman, she was bloody tough. People met her for the first time and saw the crazy red curls, the ample cleavage. They made assumptions that were usually wrong.

  ‘So.’ Lilly took out the second finger. ‘How did she die?’

  ‘We don’t have the PM report yet,’ said Jack. ‘But it’s looking like she was strangled.’

  ‘The marks on her face.’ Lilly pointed at her own cheek with the finger of chocolate. ‘Were they pre-existing?’

  Jack shook his head. ‘We think she put up a fight.’

  They sat in silence for a moment. Lilly ate the chocolate, Jack blew over the rim of his tea cup. Stone didn’t move.

  ‘Any leads?’ Lilly asked at last.

  ‘None,’ said Jack. ‘I was hoping Mr Stone might have some ideas.’

  Gregor Stone gave a small cough. ‘I’m afraid we haven’t any information on where Gemma has been in recent weeks.’

  ‘I thought she was in care,’ said Jack.

  Stone coughed again. ‘The last placement broke down.’

  Jack’s eyes widened. Basically the poor kid had gone back home and nobody had bothered to check up on her. Honestly, what were social services for if not to keep an eye on children like this one?

  ‘She’d been in contact with Kelsey,’ said Lilly.

  ‘Kelsey Brand?’ Jack was shocked.

  ‘They’d been working together,’ said Lilly. ‘That’s why Kelsey was in my office. She was asking if I’d heard from Gem. She was worried about her.’

  ‘Who is this person?’ Stone asked.

  Jack’s eyes bored into Stone. ‘A prostitute,’ he said. ‘A drug addict.’ Yes, he wanted to add, this is who Gem had been running around with, this girl who was supposed to be in your care.

  ‘So she might be involved?’ asked Stone.

  ‘No.’ Lilly spoke too quickly. ‘She hadn’t seen Gem. She’d been trying to find her.’

  ‘Do you have an address?’ Jack asked.

  ‘A phone number,’ said Lilly.

  ‘I’ll talk to her tomorrow.’

  ‘Can I be there, Jack?’ Lilly asked. ‘I think she’s going to be really cut up. In a weird way, she was looking out for Gem.’

  Jack shot Stone another glare.

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘We’ll go together.’

  [#]

  The bed was cold and wide and empty. Outside, the wind howled in long, low, mournful whistles.

  Lilly checked the time. Three thirty a.m. She couldn’t sleep. All the nights when Alice had kept her awake with endless crying, and now she was fast asleep in her cot, making small snuffling noises like a furry animal.

  And Lilly couldn’t bloody sleep.

  She slid her legs out of bed, pulled on a pair of day-glo pink-and-white-striped slipper socks and padded out of the bedroom and down the stairs.

  In the kitchen, she flicked on the kettle and poked about in a pan of leftover sausages in gravy. She pulled one out with her fingers and ate it cold.

  As she waited for the water to boil, she tried not to picture Gem lying on the gurney.

  Instead, she thought about another dead body. Her mum. Laid in a coffin in the chapel of rest, a frilly high-necked gown covering everything except her face. Lilly had half expected her eyes to shoot open, for her to ask, ‘What the hell am I wearing?’ and demand the emerald-green dress she’d bought in the sales when Auntie Beryl got married for the third time.

  Lilly had been devastated when her mum died, but it had also been a relief. Elsa had suffered so long, her body reduced to the thinnest of skin stretched over the weakest of bones. And the cough. Always the cough. Bending her in two with the force of a tidal wave, making her vomit into a bowl at the side of her bed.

  It wa
s different with Gem. There had been nothing wrong with her. Life might not have been a bed of roses, but it had only just begun. Things might have got better. She was, after all, around the same age as Sam.

  And here in the kitchen, in the dead of night, that was the saddest thought of all.

  [#]

  ‘Spring’ from Vivaldi’s Four Seasons flew out from the radio, the strings soaring across the bathroom.

  Jack turned on the shower and jumped in with the brisk efficiency of a man with too much to do. He needed to get the post-mortem report on Gem and go over it with someone from the lab. Then there was the couple who’d found the body; he needed to see them, take them through their statement to check that nothing had been omitted. And of course he had to speak to Kelsey Brand.

  He squeezed shampoo into the palm of his hand and massaged it into his scalp. For a man of his age, he had a good head of hair. It ran in the family. His dad still had a fine mop. Not a tooth in his head, mind.

  He rinsed off the suds, going over his mental to-do list. There was a lot to get through, but first things first. He needed to do something. Something important.

  An hour later, Jack parked outside Rowntree Secure Hospital. Set in well-maintained gardens, it reminded him of Manor Park, Sam’s posh private school. If it wasn’t for the blue NHS sign, you might mistake it for a home for well-heeled old folk; you might never know that it housed some of the most notorious criminals in the country.

  He put his hand on the door handle but suddenly his decisiveness snapped and he was sucked dry. He felt as though he’d spent the night on pints of cheap larger with bourbon chasers. He slumped back into his seat.

  He had to do this. There was no option.

  Groaning, he threw open the car door, let the cold morning air hit him and slid out. He had to do this.

  At reception he was greeted by a small woman with a shock of brown curls held off her face by a bright orange scarf. He showed her his badge.

  ‘Good morning, Officer,’ she said with a smile. ‘How can I help you today?’

  Christ, anyone would think he’d waltzed into a bank, not a hospital for the unhinged.

  ‘I’m here to see Katherine Knight,’ he said. ‘I called yesterday.’

  The woman nodded, her curls bobbing cheerily along, and checked a sheet of paper. ‘Yes, you’re expected, but Dr Alerdice would like to speak to you first.’

  ‘Why?’

  The woman giggled. ‘Monkeys and organ grinders, Officer.’ She picked up a telephone. ‘Take a seat and I’ll call up.’

  Jack didn’t want to sit. He wanted to get this thing over with. And what did the doc want to talk to him about? Had Kate mentioned something? His collar was chafing the skin on his neck and he wished he’d worn a T-shirt. Why hadn’t he?

  There were four crimson chairs around a low table scattered with leaflets. Jack chose the nearest and sat on the very edge. It tipped forward slightly, the back legs leaving the floor. He reached for a leaflet. Living With Schizophrenia. There was a photograph of a young man striding across a field. The caption underneath read, ‘Self-care: avoid alcohol, eat well and take regular exercise.’

  He thought of the schizophrenics he’d nicked in his time. One lad called Benny regularly had to be fished out of rivers and lakes, bare arse naked and freezing. That probably wasn’t the regular exercise the leaflet had in mind.

  A door opened and a blonde with very pale skin peeped around. ‘Officer McNally?’

  Jack jumped to his feet.

  ‘Geraldine Alerdice,’ she said, shaking his hand. ‘Come through.’

  He followed her through the door, up some stairs, which she took two at a time, and into her office. The place was neat. Books on the shelves where they should be, desk clear of everything except her computer. On the wall was a huge black and white photograph of the Giant’s Causeway.

  ‘Beautiful place,’ he said.

  ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I’m from County Antrim.’

  A Northern Irish girl then? No trace of an accent, though.

  ‘So you’re here to see Kate?’ She sat down and gestured to the chair opposite, indicating that Jack should do the same. ‘Can I ask what it’s regarding?’

  ‘Just a wee chat.’ Jack tried to give the impression that he was here on official business without actually lying. ‘She’s not going to be arrested or anything like that.’

  Dr Alerdice nodded. ‘I’d just like you to know a little of where we are with Kate before you see her.’

  Jack raised both palms to show he was listening.

  ‘We haven’t finished our diagnosis yet, but I’m pretty sure Kate has antisocial personality disorder,’ said Dr Alerdice. ‘She has a lot of the traits. Impulsiveness, lack of guilt, never blames herself.’ She counted them off on her fingers. ‘Disregard for social norms. Manipulation of others.’

  ‘You’re making her sound a lot like a psychopath,’ Jack laughed.

  ‘That’s the old-fashioned term for it.’

  Jack’s face fell. ‘You’re kidding me? You’re telling me Kate’s a psychopath?’

  ‘Her history displays a long-term pattern of antagonistic behaviours. She’s been detained under the Mental Health Act at least six times that we know of.’

  Jack’s mouth fell open. ‘How the hell did she manage to join the force?’

  ‘She was a minor.’ Dr Alerdice shrugged. ‘She changed her name. And, frankly, she’s very, very clever.’

  Jack sat back in his chair, speechless. He knew Kate had lost the plot, had suffered some sort of a breakdown, but a psychopath? How had he missed that? He thought of the time they’d spent together, the joking around, the energetic sex. He thought of her holding Alice on her knee, smiling into her face, whispering into her ear.

  ‘I just want you to be aware of what you’re dealing with,’ said Dr Alerdice.

  [#]

  The visiting suite was at odds with how Jack felt, and the light streaming in through the floor-to-ceiling windows couldn’t lift his mood. Even the name seemed all wrong. The person described by Dr Alerdice had no business being in a visiting suite, enjoying the morning sunshine.

  By the time she walked in, Jack’s heart was pounding with a mixture of fear, anger and self-recrimination. When she lifted a hand to greet him, it was all he could do not to punch her.

  ‘Jack.’ Her voice was quiet and unsure.

  He had to force himself to speak. ‘Kate.’

  ‘Shall we sit?’ She pointed at the table next to the window. ‘Over there?’

  Jack shrugged, but followed her across the room and then sat opposite her. He put his hands on the table and stared at them.

  ‘It’s good to see you,’ she said at last.

  He looked up at her and found her smiling at him, but by God, such a sad smile. Then he noticed her hair, cut short like her boys’, the fringe ragged at her hairline. And so thin! Kate had always been trim, ran miles every day, but today she was positively fragile. She looked like a child. A lost child.

  ‘I didn’t know if you’d come,’ she said.

  Where was the old Kate? Always so sure of herself.

  ‘I almost didn’t,’ he said.

  ‘I wouldn’t have blamed you.’

  She put her hands on the table, inches from his own. The perfect nails, all round and pink and shiny, were gone. Instead they were cut to the quick, scabs around each cuticle. She caught him looking and put them out of sight in her lap.

  ‘The thing is, Kate,’ he said. ‘Your letter made it sound … I mean, the tone of your letter was a bit …’

  She cocked her head to one side, a gesture he’d seen a million times. He swallowed hard, trying to find the right words. But what were the right words for a crazy ex-girlfriend who had tried to kidnap your baby?

  ‘It seemed like you thought we were still together,’ he said.

  ‘Together?’

  ‘Yeah. Like we were still a couple,’ he said. ‘And, you know, we’re not. Not any more.’


  There. He’d done it. He’d told her it was over. He held his breath, waiting.

  Kate pressed her lips together and blew over them, making a soft whistling sound. ‘I don’t know if you’ve looked around you, Jack.’ She leaned forward. ‘But I’m in the loony bin.’

  They stared at one another for a long second, then her faced creased and she let out a laugh. Jack couldn’t help himself and laughed too.

  ‘Of course we’re not together,’ she said. ‘I’m not well, and if I want to get well – and I bloody well do – I’m going to have to stay here a while longer.’

  ‘Right.’ Relief flooded through him. ‘Right enough.’

  Kate looked out of the window into the garden beyond and smiled. Jack followed her eyeline to a bird feeder. Someone had hung a net bag of nuts from the perch and a tiny finch was swinging away, pecking with all his might.

  ‘There are lots of things that happened to me, Jack.’ Kate didn’t look at him, kept her eyes on the bird. ‘Things in the past, long before I met you. I should have told you about them.’

  ‘Why didn’t you?’

  Kate bit her lip. ‘Afraid, ashamed. Who knows?’

  ‘I’m sorry.’

  And he was. His anger had left him and in its place he was filled with … what? Sadness? Pity? Kate was barely an echo of who she’d been.

  ‘It’s not your fault.’ She turned to Jack. ‘It’s not my fault. But I’ve got to face up to those things and deal with them. They made me very ill and now I want to get well.’

  ‘You’ll get the right help here,’ he said.

  She gave another sad smile. ‘I’m going to turn everything around and rebuild my life, just you wait and see.’

  [#]

  By far the worst thing about places like Rowntree is the boredom.

  You’d think it would hardly matter compared to the drooling patients and the endless therapy sessions, but you’d be wrong.

  I used to let it drive me quite mad. Which was ironic, no?

  The first time I stayed somewhere like this, I went wild with the sheer frustration of it all. I begged Mum and Dad to let me go home. And I never beg. Ever.

  Of course they wouldn’t agree. They said it was for my own protection, that they were just trying to do the right thing. They told me that I needn’t be frightened, that I was perfectly safe. Well of course I was safe. It’s not as if the feeble-minded hordes could hurt me. That wasn’t the point at all.