Читать книгу Perfect Silence - Helen Fields - Страница 10

‘Brought you a coffee, ma’am. I gather you’ve just got back from the mortuary. Thought you might need a pick-me-up.’ DS Lively walked into Ava’s office and deposited a steaming mug on her desk, closely followed by an unopened packet of rich tea biscuits. Ava inspected the gifts then studied Lively’s face.

‘For fuck’s sake, Lively, tell me you haven’t killed someone in police custody,’ she said.

Lively managed to look offended for a few seconds before smiling. ‘The job’s making you cynical. Can’t a lowly sergeant bring his chief inspector a hot drink without you assuming the worst?’

‘We’ve worked together how long now?’ Ava asked.

‘I believe it’s in the region of a decade, ma’am,’ Lively said, sitting down.

‘And in that time, how many hot drinks have you made me?’ Ava continued.

‘You’re overthinking it, boss. What’s the news on the girl you found out on Torduff?’ he asked.

‘Grim,’ Ava said, ripping open the biscuits. ‘Are you expecting me to share these, only you appear to have made yourself comfortable for no apparent reason.’

‘No, they’re all yours. I’ve been hiding them at the back of a drawer to stop the other thieving gits from nicking them.’

‘That’s enough. Tell me what you’ve done and how much shit you’ve got MIT in,’ Ava demanded.

Lively reached over and plucked a biscuit from the packet. ‘It’s Detective Constable Salter. I’m worried about her,’ he said, before stuffing the biscuit into his mouth whole.

‘Has something happened, only I wasn’t notified that there was an issue,’ Ava said.

‘Without wanting to sound like a paternalistic asshole, it’s too soon. Christie shouldn’t be back on duty yet.’ He looked longingly at the coffee. Ava moved it beyond his reach before he began dunking.

‘You got injured quite badly too, on a recent case. I seem to recall you being advised to get surgery on your left shoulder, not that you took any notice. When I questioned your decision to come back to work, you said you knew your own body better than anyone else.’

‘This is different and you know it. You can’t compare losing a baby to getting your arm into a fight with a crowbar,’ Lively muttered.

‘The doctor declared Salter fit for duty,’ Ava said. ‘I’ve spoken to her. She believes she’s ready and I trust her judgment. What is it you know that no one else does?’

Lively brushed crumbs from his lap onto the floor, frowning.

‘Come on, Sergeant, you came in here to say something to me. Get it over with.’

‘Christie Salter nearly died in my arms, ma’am, on a kitchen floor after some sick fuck had taken her hostage and a dotty old woman misjudged her target and stabbed her. If the paramedics hadn’t been on the scene, we’d have lost her. She was in surgery for hours. Her baby girl died in her womb. You can’t tell me she’s fit to be back out on the streets, not with the sort of crap we deal with every day.’

‘Sergeant,’ Ava said gently, ‘you don’t think that perhaps it would be a good idea for me to refer you for some counselling, given what you went through that day? DC Salter wasn’t the only one who suffered a trauma. It must have been an appalling thing for you to have witnessed.’

‘Would you fuck off! Oh shite – sorry, ma’am, I forgot who I was talking to,’ he said.

‘Forgiven. This isn’t easy. I understand that the prospect of talking to someone about your emotions isn’t natural for the more mature members of the force, but times have changed. There’s nothing to be embarrassed about and no one need know except us,’ Ava said.

‘I don’t need a bloody shrink. I need to make sure DC Salter’s safe and right now, as her ranking officer, I’m not convinced she is,’ he replied.

Ava held out the biscuits as a peace offering. Lively took a handful.

‘All right. Your choice. But you can’t make her feel as if she shouldn’t be here, however well-intentioned you are. This is what she needs to help distract herself from her loss. You and I would both do the same in her position.’

‘If you’re keeping her in MIT, I want your word you’ll keep Salter off the Torduff Road investigation. It’s too much. I heard what a mess that poor girl’s body was in.’

‘I agree with you on that score. You picked up a face slashing, I understand. Probably a dead-end case, but it needs investigating. I’m leaving it with you and Salter. I need every other body on Zoey Cole’s murder, so don’t expect help from anyone else. Wrap it up as quickly as possible, then I’ll review DC Salter’s suitability for another case. This stays between us, all right?’

Lively stood up, nodding, as Ava’s office door opened.

‘Sit your carbohydrate-endowed arse straight back down in that chair, Sergeant,’ Detective Superintendent Overbeck said.

Lively crossed his arms and remained standing, but stayed where he was.

‘Is there a problem, ma’am?’ Ava asked her superior, who was looking stunning in a tight-fitting midnight blue suit and six-inch stilettos, with bright red nails. It was a wonder she could hold a pen or type, Ava thought, wondering if she was aware that all the police under her command called her the Evil Overlord out of her earshot, not entirely unjustly.

‘When isn’t there a frigging problem in your team, DCI Turner?’ Overbeck said. ‘I’ve just had the pleasure of being interviewed by some of those do-gooders who occasionally get to come in and visit the prisoners in their cells, just to check we’re providing five-fucking-star care for Edinburgh’s charming criminals.’

‘I think the ones in our cells are usually called suspects, ma’am,’ Lively smirked. ‘Something about innocent until proven—’

‘Sergeant, if you speak again before I ask you to, I will pour that steaming coffee on the desk all over your balls, get me?’

Lively winced and Ava did her best not to smirk. Lively was regularly insubordinate to her, and even more so to Luc Callanach. This was the first she’d seen him silenced by a superior officer and it was pleasing to watch.

‘Am I to assume there was a slip in our usual standards?’ Ava enquired.

‘To be fair, only if you call having an incomprehensible man with half his frigging face hanging off, stuck in our cells instead of being in a hospital – or preferably still on the streets given how badly he was fouling up the custody area – a slip!’ Overbeck hissed. ‘Now,’ she stood directly in front of Lively, ‘as you were the arresting officer, you’d better have the shiniest, most watertight explanation for why this has happened to me on a day when I finally got my husband on a plane for a month-long golfing vacation and was looking forward to a serious amount of alone time without anyone pissing me off.’

‘Gone somewhere nice, has he?’ Lively grinned.

‘Pass me your coffee, Turner,’ Overbeck said, holding out her hand.

‘Don’t you dare, ma’am,’ Lively said. ‘That’s the first cup of coffee I’ve ever made anyone in this police station. I don’t want it wasted!’

‘Sergeant, would you please answer DS Overbeck’s question?’ Ava said.

‘Only if she says please.’

‘Lively, you’re going to get yourself fired.’ Ava shot him an unmistakable look.

‘Stay out of this, Detective Chief Inspector,’ Overbeck said. ‘I don’t have any problem at all with your sergeant giving me a reason to fire him.’

‘Lively,’ Ava said, getting to her feet and glaring.

Lively tutted and gave in. ‘He’s a victim of crime, refused an ambulance but we need a statement from him. He’s also homeless and a drug addict. We need to question him, and the only way to stop him from disappearing was to book him as drunk and incapable, and wait it out.’

‘So you just made up the drunk charge?’ Overbeck asked. ‘Even though he actually wasn’t?’

‘That’s right.’ Lively smiled.

‘So you’ve not only broken every procedure we have in terms of custodial care of the seriously injured, you’ve also reported a false charge against him.’

‘Aye, that pretty much sums it up,’ Lively said. ‘Was there something else you wanted, or am I free to go and try to extract a statement from our guest?’

Overbeck stepped closer, her eyes level with Lively’s, their bodies forming strange polar opposite silhouettes against the window, one stick thin and the other seriously paunchy. Ava held her breath while she waited for one or other of them to concede defeat.

‘Get him out of my cells, out of this police station and preferably out of this city,’ Overbeck said. ‘Ensure not a single particle of shit is going to hit any proverbial fan, then either retire or make sure I never have cause to speak with you about this again. Do you understand, Detective Sergeant?’

‘Yes, ma’am. Happy to oblige,’ Lively said.

Callanach and Tripp parked around the corner from the domestic abuse shelter, then phoned ahead to have the back door opened up, the front door being used as little as possible to disguise the nature of the property from any save for those who needed to know. Most of the women inside were running or hiding. The police weren’t always welcome visitors, either. Too many victims had been ignored, told there was insufficient evidence to prosecute, or just plain disbelieved. Modern policing was attempting to bridge the trust gap, but that was a long-term project. There were generations of failings to make up for, Callanach thought, as he rang a silent doorbell and looked into the security camera, holding up his identification for closer viewing. Tripp did the same. Eventually the door buzzed open and they stepped through into a vestibule. A woman appeared behind the glass of an internal door.

‘Would you check that the outer door behind you is firmly locked, please?’ she asked. Tripp did so. She unlocked the inner door and let them into a wide hallway. ‘I’m Sandra Tilly, the deputy shelter manager. Would you mind coming into the kitchen to talk, only I don’t want to disturb the women in the lounge.’

‘Of course. I’m DI Luc Callanach,’ he said. ‘We don’t want to disturb anyone unnecessarily but it would help if we could see Zoey’s room. I know other officers have already been in there, but it’s useful to get a better idea of who she was.’

They walked down the corridor and entered a functional room with cupboards marked only with numbers. ‘They correspond with the bedroom numbers upstairs,’ Sandra explained. ‘The women who stay here often don’t use their real names, although Zoey actually did. She said it was therapeutic for her to feel as if she’d stopped running. Other women use pseudonyms until they feel really safe with each other. If anyone ever does manage to break in, they won’t find it easy to figure out which room they want. Zoey was in number four.’

‘Do you mind if we have a look in her kitchen cupboard?’ DC Tripp asked.

‘Sure,’ Sandra said, opening it. ‘Have you arrested anyone yet?’

‘Not yet,’ Callanach said. ‘Were you aware of anyone harassing Zoey, or trying to contact her? Any letters, emails, texts?’

‘Nothing that I was aware of,’ Sandra said. ‘A lot of the women here choose to spend a period of time in the digital dark. They get rid of their old mobile numbers, change email addresses, shut down every form of social media. This shelter isn’t for mild cases of abuse. We have limited places and it’s expensive to run. As horrible as it sounds, we only house women or girls who have suffered long-term, major-impact abuse and who are judged to still be at risk and vulnerable.’

Tripp took out a few packets and tins, a couple of mugs and a cookbook. ‘Healthy Eating for One,’ he read. ‘Looks like Zoey was trying to take care of herself. No junk food in here. The tins are all vegetables rather than desserts. She was thinking about her long-term future.’

‘How much did Zoey tell you about what she’d been through?’ Callanach asked Sandra.

‘She shared quite a lot in our group sessions. The girls have a daily meeting to share their experiences, when they feel ready. Zoey kept herself to herself when she first arrived, but gradually she started to talk to the others. She’d suffered violence and psychological abuse. Nothing sexual, at least not that she ever told us about.’

‘Her stepfather?’ Callanach checked.

‘Yes,’ Sandra said. ‘Christopher Myers. He once broke her nose because she called him Christopher rather than Dad. Seems he couldn’t bear to be reminded that anyone had ruled the family before him. Zoey had a brother, too, although she didn’t talk about him much. Would you like to see her room now? I’m off duty in ten minutes and I can’t leave you in the property.’

They followed Sandra upstairs, where she opened a door with two different keys to reveal an orderly bedroom with a chair, a chest of drawers and a matching wardrobe. A small en suite with a shower was behind a second door.

‘The bed’s made, all the clothes are away,’ Callanach said to Tripp. ‘Zoey didn’t go anywhere in a panic and there’s a suitcase under the bed. She wasn’t running from any threat she was aware of and it looks as if she had every intention of returning.’

‘And if she was aware of a threat, I’d guess she’d have reported it to someone here as a precaution. Not least to keep the other women safe,’ said Tripp. ‘So was this a random kidnapping and murder? Just an unfortunate coincidence that she crossed the path of an opportunistic killer?’

‘Possibly, but the wounds inflicted have a personal meaning to whoever caused them. Come on. There’s nothing else here, no laptop or mobile.’ Callanach shut the drawers he’d opened. ‘No letters or diary. I guess it’s time to visit the stepfather.’

They walked back down the stairs to find Sandra waiting for them with her coat on and keys in hand. She let them out and followed behind.

‘Thanks for your help,’ Callanach said.

‘No problem. I’ll just stay and lock up. Call if you need anything else,’ Sandra replied.

Callanach and Tripp walked around the corner towards their unmarked car. ‘Do we have Zoey’s medical records yet?’ Tripp asked.

‘Still waiting. Hopefully we’ll get them within the next couple of days.’ Callanach stopped and sighed. ‘I meant to ask Sandra for a copy of the CCTV footage from when Zoey last left the shelter. I’ll go back. You start the car and put the stepfather’s address into the SatNav.’

He turned around and made his way towards the shelter’s back door. He was about to call out to Sandra when he saw a man approach her, kissing her at length before letting go. Sandra laughed, said something Callanach couldn’t hear from that distance and kissed the man again.

The male shouldn’t have been that close to the back door of the shelter, was Callanach’s first thought. Even if he wasn’t a threat, the women living there should be able to come and go without anyone seeing them. Judging by the intensity of the greeting, it looked like a new relationship. People rarely kissed for more than a couple of seconds after the first few months – not in public anyway. Keeping his footsteps light, Callanach walked in the shadow of the property’s rear wall until he was close enough to Sandra to say her name quietly.

‘Oh God, you made me jump,’ she said. ‘Did you forget something?’

‘One last query. Hello.’ He held out a hand to shake Sandra’s boyfriend’s. ‘I’m Detective Inspector Callanach.’

‘This is my boyfriend, Tyrone,’ Sandra answered for him.

‘Tyrone?’ Callanach let the missing surname hang in the air between them.

‘Tyrone Leigh,’ the man muttered. ‘Is there a problem?’

‘DI Callanach’s here about the incident,’ Sandra explained to her boyfriend, before turning her attention back to Callanach. ‘Tyrone knows because I asked him to drop me at the mortuary to identify Zoey’s body.’

‘Sandra shouldn’t have had to do that,’ Tyrone said. ‘This job’s tough enough already.’

‘I agree,’ Callanach said. ‘It’s a terrible thing to ask anyone to undertake, but unfortunately it was necessary. Did you ever meet Zoey?’

Sandra and Tyrone’s eyes met briefly before he answered.

‘We bumped into her once, in the supermarket up the road,’ Sandra said. ‘I was picking up dinner on the way home and Zoey happened to be in there.’

‘Who else other than residents knows the address of the shelter?’ Callanach asked. ‘Have you told any of your friends or family, Mr Leigh?’

‘Did I do something wrong?’ Tyrone asked.

‘Not at all. I’m just covering all bases. We need to know how Zoey was located by her attacker.’

‘Seems pretty bloody obvious to me you should be arresting her stepfather,’ Tyrone said.

Sandra glared at him. If looks were kicks, Tyrone would have been holding his shin, Callanach thought. He raised his eyebrows.

‘I only told him because Zoey was a bit off with him in the supermarket, didn’t want to shake his hand when he offered. I was just explaining that she’d had a rough time of it at home,’ Sandra muttered, red-faced.

‘I understand,’ Callanach said. ‘Probably best in future not to share any of your residents’ details though, no matter what the circumstances. Could you let me have a copy of the security CCTV showing the last time Zoey left the shelter? I’ll send an officer to fetch it tomorrow. Thank you, Miss Tilly.’

Callanach took out his phone as he walked away and made a note of Tyrone Leigh’s name, knowing that a row would be starting behind him.