Cath Staincliffe: Dead To Me

‘Right,’ the DCI said, a sharp jerk of her head and she stepped through to the crime scene.

Rachel put her glove back on, her fingertips stung with cold. She wanted a fag now; a fag, a pee and a bacon-and-egg sandwich. And a hole in the ground to hide in while Gilly-knickers dreamt up her punishment.

They told us there were no superior officers, Rachel thought; senior, but not superior. Reflecting a more democratic force. You weren’t supposed to say force any more either – too many connotations of police brutality and deaths in custody, riot gear. A service not a force, partnership with the people. Seemed they’d forgotten to tell Gill Murray she was no longer superior, treating Rachel like a kid who’d wet herself in assembly. I don’t care, Rachel told herself, screw her. Godzilla. But she did care really. She really, really cared, because Gill Murray – well, she’d been the one Rachel wanted to be. The one Rachel followed in the news, the one everybody agreed was a superb detective, an inspired strategist, a charismatic leader. Clever and forward-thinking. The one who had broken through the glass ceiling without a scratch to show for it. And hadn’t hauled the ladder up after her. Rachel had dreamed of meeting her, working with her someday. But now? She shook her head, annoyed, stamped her feet. The clouds were darkening, heavy and slate-coloured, blotting out the horizon. Sleet on the way. A kid on a bike circled at the edge of the outer cordon, stared over at her for a moment, then spat on the floor and swooped off.

Tosser, Rachel thought. Infanticide… killing by any wilful act or omission of a child under twelve months old…

The call came three weeks later. Rachel was processing papers for an indecency hearing. She’d got a head cold and it felt as though all the cavities in her skull were filled with heavy-duty glue and her throat with sand. She was still in work. Never took a sickie: she might miss something.

Her phone rang and she picked it up. ‘DC Bailey.’ Checked the time, pen poised over her daybook.

‘Rachel – Gill Murray.’ Clipped, bossy.

Rachel waited for the blow to land. Drew a noose in her notebook.

‘I want you in my syndicate, week on Monday, Chadderton. Shift starts at eight.’

‘RACHEL BAILEY.’

She said it like a threat, thought Janet, studying the woman who slammed her bag down on the desk facing hers and looked about as if disgruntled at what she found.

‘DC,’ Rachel Bailey added, and message delivered, gave a nod. Sat down.

‘Janet Scott,’ Janet said.

‘Yeah, she said she wanted to put me with you.’

Oh, joy. Janet kept her expression open, pleasant, as she wondered what on earth Gill was playing at. They were already carrying Kevin, a knob who did knobby things, as a favour to Gill’s mate on one of the other syndicates. And now she pitches up with a kid who has far too much attitude, a half-sneer on her face, and should have gone into modelling or lap-dancing, got the looks for it, and dumps her on Janet.

Janet went back to her screen, checking through her emails, clearing her actions completed, getting up to speed on work in progress.

‘So – you been here long?’ Rachel Bailey asked.

Janet was reminded of playground interrogations – what’s your name, where d’you live ? All front and nerves shredding underneath.

‘Thirteen years, twenty-five on the job.’

Rachel froze, looked at her. ‘Straight up?’

Why would I lie? ‘Yeah.’

‘Never gone for promotion?’ Rachel said.

‘Yeah.’ Shaking her head slightly, tragic or what ? Janet wasn’t bothered. She knew she was good at her job. She’d done a shedload of courses and got all the accreditations to prove it. She’d not the slightest interest in climbing the greasy pole. For what? Ulcers and politics and even more pressure? Promotion was a route away from the coalface, from the hands-on, face-to-face, stink-in-your-nose reality of catching killers. Gill Murray never got to so much as interview a suspect or a witness any more. She went to the scene and the post-mortem and she coordinated each investigation, managing her team, thinking about loopholes and implications, complications. Assessing evidence as they delivered it to her: was it robust enough for the CPS? Would it stand up in Crown Court? At appeal, in Europe? None of that pushed any buttons for Janet. She wanted to be eyeball-to-eyeball with the people who had done it, the people who had seen what was done. Making them sing.

‘Not long till retirement,’ Rachel observed, pegging Janet for Mrs Average, time-server. The girl clicked her mouse, began to peer at her monitor. ‘Kids?’ Rachel asked.

‘Two,’ Janet said, a little echo of sadness inside. Happy for the newcomer to pigeonhole her: working mum, not fully committed either way, never gone for promotion, not had the drive, the vision, the brains. Mediocre. Just hanging on for her pension. Shoot me now.

The girl gave her a pitying look, then, losing interest, swivelled in her chair, scoping the room again. No one else in yet. Quarter to eight. The kid sighed, pulled her hair – glossy brown and waved (an effect that would take Janet’s eldest, Elise, all morning to achieve) – up into a ponytail, let it drop.

‘What about you?’ Janet kept it civil.

‘God no. Not the maternal type.’

She sounded almost like a teenager, that practised disdain, but she must be in her late twenties, Janet guessed. ‘Where were you before?’ Teeth not quite gritted.

‘Sex Crimes, with Sutton,’ Rachel said.

‘John Sutton?’

Rachel nodded, glanced at her watch. ‘I need a fag. Is there…’ She whirled a finger in the air, asking for directions.

Janet toyed with the idea of sending her the wrong way, but only because the girl had got her back up. She’d never be that petty. ‘Along the corridor, down the stairs, side door on the ground floor.’

Rachel snatched her bag and swung herself to her feet.

Janet watched her go. Took a breath, lowered her shoulders and returned to her inbox.

The office was open-plan, not a large space, desks crammed together in pairs, each with its computer terminal and phone. There was a bigger meeting room off it, which they used for briefings. Gill had a room to herself, roughly two and a half paces from Janet’s desk. She was generally visible through the glass partition, unless she closed her blinds. It was a bad sign when the blinds went down. The team would wait, people trying to work more quietly, waiting to see who was in for a bollocking.

Gill was in before the others and Rachel was still off having her nicotine fix so Janet went straight into Gill’s office.

The DCI had barely got her coat off when Janet jumped in: ‘Why me?’

Gill froze, tilted her head to one side. ‘It’s an interesting philosophical question, kid, but you’re going to have to give me a bit more…’

‘Rachel Bailey.’

‘She’s here?’ Gill beamed.

‘I don’t want her,’ Janet said.

‘Reason?’

‘I’ve already got one teenager at home, and her sister’s in a permanent state of revolution, I can do without it at work. Why put her with me? Put her with Mitch.’

‘What’s she done to you?’ Gill was shifting through paperwork on her desk now, easing into her chair. ‘She’s only been here five minutes.’

‘Five minutes too long. Who sent her?’

‘I picked her.’

‘You picked her,’ Janet said, appalled. ‘Can’t you unpick her?’

‘She’s a bit rough around the edges,’ Gill allowed.

‘Dog rough,’ said Janet. A pit bull bitch, she thought but that seemed too harsh. Rude. ‘Give her to Pete or Lee, or any of them.’