John Harvey: Cold in Hand

How possible was it that the gunman had been shooting indiscriminately into the crowd? How possible that both bullets had been intended for Kelly Brent rather than for her?

It had all happened so suddenly, so fast, Kelly and herself so close together. And then the impact of the bullet sending her staggering back, falling, arms flailing, leaving Kelly standing, exposed, in her place.

Used my daughter as a shield.

Consciously, unconsciously, could that have been what she had done?

Sacrificed my daughter's life for her own.

In the bathroom, bent low over the toilet bowl, Lynn retched until her throat was dry, each movement jarring her chest with pain.

Sombre suit, dark tie, Resnick sat uneasily on the thin cushions of the settee, Catherine Njoroge in a plain black trouser suit alongside him, the jacket with three-quarter sleeves and wide lapels; her hair tied back with purple ribbon, hands clasped in her lap.

Facing them, so close in the small room they could have reached out, almost, and touched, Kelly's mother, Tina, sat pinch-faced, stiff-backed, dark lipstick smudged across her pale face, alternately toying with the small silver crucifix that hung from her neck or picking at skin around her fingernails that was already plucked raw. The father, Howard, leaned back into a leather chair, legs crossed, sleeves of his grey sweatshirt pushed back above the elbow, a pair of ice blue Converse All Stars, unfastened, on his feet.

No one spoke.

A framed photograph of Kelly, head and shoulders, smiling, had pride of place on the tiled shelf above the fireplace, smaller family photographs to either side. There were others on the side wall and balanced on top of the wide-screen TV: Tina and the children, Kelly and her two older brothers, Michael and Marcus; Michael, the elder boy, the more prominent of the two.

Everything in the room was neat, dusted, in its place.

A home.

The last time Resnick had been in such a home, it had been to talk to a mother whose daughter had been killed in a drive-by shooting and one of whose sons was now in prison for avenging her murder.

Stories that repeated themselves too many times.

Tina Brent brought her finger to her mouth and bit away a piece of fraying skin.

It was quiet enough to hear the flat tick of a clock from one of the other rooms, the rattle of someone skateboarding past outside, the distant bass beat from a stereo along the street.

Contempt in his eyes, Howard Brent's gaze went from Catherine Njoroge to Resnick and back again.

"What she doin' here?" he said. "Make us feel good, yeah? One of us. Token nigger. Token black." He leaned sharply forward, feet to the floor. "Girl, how that make you feel?"

Unruffled, head turning slowly on her long neck, Catherine Njoroge looked back at him calmly through dark almond eyes. "I feel for you in your loss," she said. "Both of you."

"I bet you do," Brent said, leaning back.

Catherine's eyes flickered once.

One of Resnick's hands gripped the arm of the settee, the other, resting on his leg, had formed into a fist, which he willed to relax.

"Mr. Brent," he said, speaking deliberately, "so far, apart from one brief instance, you have refused to allow the Family Liaison Officer into the house. You declined to take part in the official press conference, choosing instead to make a statement of your own, in which you made a rash and wholly unfounded accusation against a member of this Force. In fact, you've shown much more interest in talking to the press than you have to the police. And now you insult one of my officers with what could only be described as racist remarks."

"Yeah, well-" Brent said.

"Well, what?" Resnick said sharply. "You want us to find your daughter's killer or not?"

"What sort of stupid question's that?"

"The one I'm asking."

"Fuck you!" Brent said, just beneath his breath, and, rising, quick to his feet, he turned and left the room, slamming the door in his wake.

Tina Brent winced and shrank even smaller into her chair. Brittle, she was close to tears, close to collapse.

Catherine Njoroge looked quickly towards Resnick, a quick nod telling her to go ahead.

"Mrs. Brent," Catherine said, "Kelly was wearing a gold chain with the name 'Brandon.'"

"So?"

"That would be Brandon Keith?"

"Yes."

"He was her boyfriend?"

"Yeah."

"And she was still seeing him? Brandon?"

"Far as I know, yeah."

"She hadn't said anything about them breaking up, some kind of a row, nothing like that?"

"Not to me, no."

"And she would have talked to you? If it had been anything serious?"

"She might."

"Only we think Kelly might have gone to Cranmer Street because of some kind of argument over Brandon, with another girl."

Tina Brent reached down into her bag for her cigarettes. "I don't know nothin' 'bout that."

"Joanne Dawson," Resnick said, "does that name mean anything to you?"

A quick shake of the head.

"Mrs. Brent?"

"No."

"You never heard Kelly mention her name?"

"I just said."

Using a disposable lighter, she lit her cigarette.

"The afternoon that Kelly was killed, she and Joanne Daw-son were fighting."

"I don't know nothin' 'bout that, I said."

"Kelly attacked her with a knife."

"Says who?"

"There are witnesses."

"Some people, they'll say anything." She drew the smoke down into her lungs, held it there, and then released it slowly from the corners of her mouth.

Catherine Njoroge picked up Resnick's glance. "Mrs. Brent, do you know if Kelly had a knife?"

"What knife?"

"You didn't see her, that day, with a knife in her possession?"

"'Course I didn't. What would she be doin' with a knife?"

"Perhaps she thought she needed it," Catherine said. "For protection."

"She didn't have no knife. How many more times?" The cigarette was trembling in her hand. "What the fuck's it matter, anyway, she had a knife or not? My daughter, shot with a fucking gun and you're sitting there asking me about some stupid, sodding knife."

Ash fell across her lap and she brushed it away, smearing grey across her skirt.

"What we're trying to do," Resnick said patiently, "is establish the reason for Kelly being there that day so that we can find out just why she was killed."

"Why she was killed?" Tina Brent's eyes were suddenly bright. "We know why she was killed. One of you lot, that's why. That's what got my Kelly killed."

Angrily, she stubbed out her cigarette. There were tears at the corners of her eyes, and she wiped them away with her sleeve.

"Your daughter," Resnick said evenly, "was killed because someone that afternoon was in illegal possession of a firearm, which they discharged into the centre of a crowd of people."

"So what? Some kind of soddin' accident, that what you're saying now?"

"What I'm saying, Mrs. Brent, is we don't yet know. We don't have all the facts that will tell us exactly what happened. We don't know if your daughter was deliberately targeted, or if her death was a terrible accident. But it's our business to find out-and we can do that better with your cooperation, yours and your husband's."

Tina Brent took a quick sideways glance towards the door. "You'll get no cooperation from him, I'll tell you that now."

"But you can help us," Resnick said.

She nodded and lit another cigarette. The bass sounds from down the street were louder now, more insistent.

"Brandon Keith," Catherine Njoroge said. "Have you seen him recently?"

Tina Brent shrugged. "Maybe."

"Can you remember when you saw him last?"

"Yeah, matter of fact I can. Last weekend. He come round for her. Sat'day, it'd be. That motor of his. Some fancy bloody thing."

"You saw him?"

"Like I said."