'Please stop.'
Caffery leaned his shoulder against the car and knelt on the guy's back. A voice in the back of his head was reminding him, This is how suspects die. This is how they die in detention. Suffocated. The coroner will find cracked ribs, bruises consistent with the victim being knelt on. They die from not having the strength to lift their ribs and let air into their lungs. And then the voice said: It's what you should have done to Penderecki.
'This can kill you,' he hissed into the man's ear. 'What I'm doing will kill you – fat though you are. If I stay here long enough you'll die. OK?'
'Please, please don't. Please . . .' He was crying now. He couldn't sob because Caffery was too heavy, but tears were rolling out of his eyes and mingling with the sweat. 'Please.'
'Tell me, you fucker, or we'll be here until you die.'
The man screwed up his eyes. He put his hands on to the ground and tried to lift his weight off the pavement to suck in a breath. 'OK,' he sputtered. 'Get off me and I'll tell you.'
Caffery slapped one hand against the car and got to his feet. The driver struggled on to his back, breathing hard, his face pressed against the grimy postbox.
'There are a few . . . people,' he panted, 'a few people who come here.'
'All on the game or do you like to be the one who converts them?'
'No.' He swallowed. 'No. They're all professionals.'
'And black? You like them black? Is that what your record will show? Young and black?'
He nodded miserably, a line of spittle hanging from his mouth.
'What?' Caffery put both hands on the car so he was stretched over the driver. He could sense one or two people watching him from outside the supermarket, but he didn't look up. 'What did you say?'
'I said yes.'
Caffery felt in his pocket for his mobile, pulled up the picture the multimedia unit had sent him and thrust it into the guy's face. 'This one. Fucked him too, have you?'
He glanced at the picture and away. 'Yeah,' he muttered. 'He's one of them.'
'Name?'
'Changes. Jim, Paul, John, whatever he feels. There's something wrong with him. He's not really twelve, he just looks it . . . Really he's eighteen – I swear. He's got a condition that makes him smaller . . .'
Caffery remembered a boy in London, a twelve-year- old, who used to advertise saying, 'I am an eighteen-year-old who had an accident that has left me looking just eleven years old.' Designed for all the old nonces who wanted to get away with their dirty child-rape habits. 'I've heard that story before, you piece of shit.'
'It's true.' The man stared at him. 'It's true. Ask anyone. Any of the ones who hang out here, they all know him. He dressed for me like a schoolkid, but he isn't, really. I swear he isn't. I don't do that any more – you know, with the kids.'
'Sure you don't.'
'Don't tell him I was the one who told you. I think he's got – friends. Family.' He wiped his nose, gulping down tears. 'Please don't tell him I told you.'
Caffery raised his head. Outside the supermarket three kids in board clothes were staring at him. When he met their eyes they turned away, pulling up their hoodies. 'So,' he said, 'when's he coming? Today?'
'Maybe.' He sniffled. 'Sometimes he comes at lunchtime, but if not him there'll be others.' He wiped the tears out of his eyes. 'Please don't say I told you. I don't want to upset anyone.'
'If you don't want to upset anyone, then stop fucking little boys,' Caffery said. He put his hands in the small of his back and flexed his shoulders, letting them click so his tense muscles would release.
'All right,' he said, helping the man to his feet. He opened the car door and shoved him towards it. 'Wait there. Don't move. Any of your other boyfriends come along you send them on their way, even if you and your sad little hard-on have to sit there all day. When he comes, act like nothing's happened. Get him in the car – I'll do the rest.'
'What about my keys? What am I going to do without my car keys?'
'Jesus Christ. I'm telling you to help me because you're a piece of shit and you owe something to society. Not because I've turned into the archangel fucking Gabriel. Now. Get. In. The. Sodding. Car.'
Caffery was sweating when he came back. 'It's a waiting game now,' he said, grabbing the tobacco pouch and beginning to roll up. 'The clue we're looking for will walk right up to that car in about ten minutes.' He licked the paper and lit the cigarette.
Flea watched him smoke. She could feel the last two days tugging her down and she had an overwhelming urge to cry or sleep, she couldn't tell which. Next to her Caffery smoked the whole of the cigarette, watching the blue Nissan in silence. Then he crushed the butt in the ashtray, rolled up the pouch, put it on the dashboard and said, in a level voice, 'When I was eight my brother disappeared.'
'I'm sorry?' she said numbly.
'My brother went missing,' he said calmly, as if he was telling her what he'd had for breakfast. 'I was with him when it happened. We had . . . There was a fight, and he left, walked out the bottom of our garden into a railway cutting. It wasn't dangerous because we'd been there a million times. Except this time . . .' For a moment it was as if he'd forgotten he was speaking. 'Except this time he didn't come back. There was a convicted paedophile lived on the other side of the railway. We didn't call them that then – called them child-molesters, kiddy-diddlers. Everyone knew it was him, but no one could prove it. That was thirty years ago and I still don't know where my brother is.'
She stared at him, her heart thudding. He'd heard. He knew what had happened to Mum and Dad – someone in the force must have told him how her life had been changed by the accident, that she'd never get her life back. She took a breath. 'Why are you telling me this?' she said, her voice small. 'Why?'
'Because you want to know why I half killed that guy just then. See, I walk around with this fucking great weight of guilt on me about what happened to my brother because when something like that happens – to the wrong son, that's how my parents saw it – when it happens you never get past the guilt. And it comes out in ways I'm (a) not proud of and (b) could get me shafted big-time.' He jerked his head at the blue Nissan – the driver had pulled down the rear-view mirror and was inspecting the damage to his face. 'He's a nonce.' He gave a pained smile. 'My nonce radar, if you want to call it that, is tighter engineered than most people's.'
She couldn't answer. She went on looking at him for a few more moments, and then, when she couldn't bear it any longer, turned away and stared out of the passenger window, her mouth open a little because she was breathing fast.
'It's OK,' he said behind her. 'I'm not asking you to forgive me. You can go ahead and report me. I don't much care any more.'
Behind her Flea heard the creak of leather as he moved in his seat, the rattle of his keys, and then she felt his hand on her shoulder.
'I'm sorry,' he said quietly. 'I didn't mean to put you in that position. I really didn't mean to.'
She couldn't move. All she could think about was his hand on her back. Then, just when it seemed they'd be there for ever, in that car on the dusty urban street, listening to one another's breathing, something inside her unlocked. Her mouth opened and words came out.
'If you cut your own arm off it wouldn't be enough. That's what it's like, isn't it? The only way you could make amends would be to die yourself – to die more horribly and in more pain and fear. It's the only way.' She turned to him, her face hot. 'You wish over and over again that it could have been you – you would die their death a million times over rather than feel one more second of that guilt.'
Caffery pulled his hand away, his skin suddenly grey, as if all the late nights and worry had caught up with him in one hit.
'My parents,' she said. 'A few people in the force know, but they'd never talk about it. Two years ago, and I still haven't got their bodies back. Not like with you – I know where they are, exactly where. Everyone knows. It's just that no one can get them back.'
She stopped speaking as sudde
nly as she'd started, shocked by the amount she'd said. His eyes were focused on her, his pupils narrowed to pinpoints. For a long time he didn't say anything. Then he half lifted his hand and, for a split second, she almost thought he was going to hit her. But he didn't. He lowered his hand, dropped it on to the steering-wheel and turned wearily to look out of the window. There was a long silence while she tried to find the right thing to say. Then, as she was about to speak, something happened that made it all too late. A small figure dressed in a strangely oversized brown jacket and rolled-up jeans walked straight in front of the car, going in the direction of the supermarket.
And that, of course, was when it kicked off.
53
Caffery swivelled in his seat to stare at the guy. 'Fuck,' he murmured. 'I think that's him.'
'What?'
'The one on my phone.'
The figure was heading towards the blue Nissan. He stopped at the bin, dipping his head briefly, then carrying on his way, stopping at the Nissan and using a thin hand to knock on the window. A thought came to Flea: I know him. Where do I know him from? But then Caffery was out of his seat, rolling up his sleeves, and everything started happening so fast she forgot it.
From the Nissan came a bellow, primeval-sounding: 'Police!' It was the driver yelling, waving his hand out of the window. 'Get out of here! The police!' Then two things happened at once: the small figure in the oversized jacket ran clumsily back in the direction he'd come while Caffery hit the roof of the car – like a declaration of intent – and sprinted after him.
Flea was trained for all of this, but everything drained out of her head instantly. Caffery was rounding the corner out of sight and she didn't know these streets. She fumbled for her phone, dropped it, picked it up and realized the back had cracked – the SIM card and the battery were hanging out. She threw herself on to the driver's seat, groping under the steering-wheel, saw the keys weren't there and wrenched herself back the opposite way, clutching the phone and battery in one hand, fumbling her keys with the other.
She rolled out of the car, raced back to the Focus and jumped in. The car leaped forward, almost into the path of a delivery truck. She braked, clutching the wheel and swearing while the truck drove leisurely past, then raced the car across the road to the opposite side, taking the left-hand turning.
The street stretched ahead of her, one of those Victorian terraces that made her think of the north, red-brick and featureless. She let the car idle, not knowing which way to go. Caffery and the little guy might have been anywhere. And then she saw them, about a hundred yards down, bursting out from the line of parked cars, first the figure in the ridiculous jacket, then Caffery, his white shirt like a flag. She pushed the car forward, drawing level with them as they skidded sideways into an alley.
She reached over and pulled out her A–Z of Bristol, fumbled furiously to the index, then ran her finger down to Hopewell. Behind her a car was hooting, wanting to get by, but she ignored it. Jamming the book between her knees, flicking through to the page, she spread it on her lap. She saw where they were, and that the alleyway ended on the Hopewell estate. The driver behind her wound down his window and was screaming something about why was it always women who fucked with the rules of the road, and what was she doing? Putting in a Tampax? She gave him the finger and flung the car into gear.
The back-streets were narrow, only room for one car in one direction at any time, but she wove and spun the Ford through the warren in less than a minute, and came out braking hard on a wide street with grass verges at either side and wire-enclosed saplings planted at intervals. She was at the entrance to the Hopewell estate, and from her calculations the road to her right led down to the alley. She opened the window and sat forward, heart racing.
At first she thought she'd missed them. But then she heard footsteps racing towards her. The little man in the jacket burst out of the street, straight past her – she glimpsed thin limbs and a drawn face – then he was out on to the scrappy square of grass, racing across it, the shadows of the tower blocks flick-flacking across the crown of his head. She unsnapped her seat-belt and started to get out of the car, because there was no Caffery behind him and she'd been sure he'd be on the guy's heels. But then, just as she was about to take off, he appeared, walking now, his finger to his mouth when he saw her, waving her back into the car. She sank into her seat, keeping her feet on the pavement but pulling the door half closed against her calves as he walked past.
She watched him, mind twitching, eyes darting around, taking it all in. She didn't know the roads to the east, where the supermarket was, but she knew this estate. It was arranged around six behemoth tower blocks interconnected with figure-of-eight cast-concrete walkways, surrounded by triangles of grass. She could picture it from above, like a town-planner's model. And from the way the little guy was running, she guessed he was heading to the North West Tower, the notorious drug-trading tower. She waited a moment, her heart thudding against her ribcage. Then, the moment Caffery disappeared in the lee of the South West Tower, she swung back into the car and fired it up, steering round the little car parks and rubbish depots.
She was taking a risk – they could have gone in any direction – and when she shot out almost at the foot of the North West Tower she thought her gamble had backfired. The place was deserted, just the empty entrance to the estate covered with flypostings and graffiti, a row of recycling bins with filthy carrier-bags bulging from their mouths. Not a soul.
And then, like a burst of light on her retina – how come she hadn't seen him before? Caffery was standing about ten yards away, staring at her.
She threw open the door and jumped out. 'Jesus Christ! What is—'
He held up one hand to her, warning her to be silent. But the other arm was extended in the opposite direction, the fingers arranged in a neat point, telling her to look that way. And when she saw what he was pointing at, it was like having something dark and nasty go through her, because now she knew where she'd seen the guy in the jacket before. She'd seen him here. In exactly the place Caffery was standing now. It had been brief, only a moment's glimpse, but she remembered it clearly because it had been only a couple of days ago that he'd briefly walked past her. She looked again at the door Caffery was pointing to.
And suddenly nothing, nothing, was as it should be.
54
The door was blue, pale blue, the number eleven on it in mirrored stick-on letters and the guy in the jacket had disappeared through it. Caffery stood looking at it, his jacket pushed back, catching his breath from the run. An ordinary enough door – sad-looking net curtains in the window the dingy colour of used teabags from years of grease and neglect – and intuition told him this was the place where Mossy had been cut into pieces. God only knew what it was going to be like inside.
He went round the base of the tower to make sure there wasn't a back way out, but it was built as a square, with the lift shaft tacked on at the side. On the other side of the tower there were more front doors – no rear ones. He waited, looking at them, at the boarded-up windows, getting his breath back, and suddenly knew where he was – back on the Hopewell estate, just come at it from a different angle. Jonah's tower was the one in the far distance. He couldn't see them but there'd be about twenty coppers crawling up and down its stairwells right now. On this tower most of the bottom-floor windows were boarded. He watched those windows carefully, so silent in the midday heat. A little trickle of sweat broke from between his shoulder-blades and ran down his spine. He went back to the other side. And now, for the first time, he saw there was something wrong with Flea.
'Number eleven,' she murmured. 'It's number eleven.'
'Yeah,' he said. 'What about it?'
She tilted her head, then walked back a few yards, beckoning him. He followed, going nearer the cars until they couldn't be seen from the flat. He had to bend slightly to hear what she was saying.
'I know who lives here,' she whispered. 'I mean, he's a friend of mine.'
&
nbsp; 'Oh, great. Fucking great.'
'Yeah – and you. You – you know him too. Tommy Baines. Tig. The guy at the drug centre in Mangotsfield. The one with the eye.'
Caffery was trying to work this out in his head. 'The one with the—' He broke off. 'How the hell do you know him?'
She closed her eyes briefly, her face pale as if she couldn't believe this was happening. 'I've – oh, Christ, I've known him for ages, OK? But I've seen him recently too. He told me you'd questioned him.'
'Fucking magnificent. It really helps matters when people around you can't keep their mouths buttoned and when—'
'Wait a second,' she muttered, her face clouding. 'Just because someone's gone into his flat doesn't mean he's got anything to hide so don't get arsey with me. I mean, it could be nothing – it could just be that . . .' A thought stopped her in her tracks. She closed her mouth abruptly, and her eyes went up a bit, as if she was focusing on a place in the sky. 'Oh, shit,' she said. She rapped her knuckles on her forehead. 'Shit and double shit.'
'What?'
'That's me royally fucked.'
'What?'
She sighed, dropped her hand and walked across the sun-baked tarmac to her car. He watched her throw open the door and haul out her holdall, then rummage through it. She straightened up, then slid something that looked like a holstered knife, a dive knife, maybe, into the back of her trousers. Then she shut the door and was coming back, holding two Kevlar body-armour vests, one kitted out, the other with empty pockets. She stopped in front of him. 'The day we found the hand in the harbour?'
'Yes?'
'I got a text on my phone from him. From Tig.' She pushed the kitted-out vest towards Caffery. 'He wanted to see me. Hadn't spoken to him for ages, then suddenly he's in touch again. And when I came over he dug a bit, tried to get me to tell him what was happening with the case.' She made a face. 'There,' she said. 'I'm an idiot. Probably lose my job now, won't I?'