Peter James: Dead Man's Grip

They used to embrace and kiss, even if they were only going to be apart for half an hour. Lou couldn’t remember when that had stopped – and in truth he didn’t care any more.

‘Seeing Dr Gottlieb today, hon?’ he asked.

‘He’s just so stupid, too. Yes, I’m seeing him. But I think I’m going to change. I need a different shrink. Paulina, in my yoga class, is seeing someone who’s a lot better. Gottlieb’s useless.’

‘Ask him for stronger medication.’

‘You want him to turn me into a zombie or something?’

Lou said nothing.

Carly sat in the back of the police car, trails of rain sliding down the window beside her, tears sliding down her cheeks. They were heading up a hill on the A27. She stared out at the familiar grassy landscape of the Brighton outskirts, which were blurred by the film of water on the glass. She felt detached, as if out of her body and watching herself.

Scared and confused, she kept seeing that cyclist underneath the lorry. Then the white van in her rear-view mirror that had disappeared, like a ghost.

Had she imagined the van? Had she struck the cyclist? The past hour was as fogged in her mind as the view through the glass. She clenched and unclenched her hands, listening to the intermittent crackle and bursts of words that came through the radio. The car smelled of damp anoraks.

‘Do you – do you think he’s going to be all right?’ she asked.

PC Pattenden replied to something on the radio, either not hearing or ignoring her. ‘Hotel Tango Three Zero Four en route to Hollingbury with suspect,’ he said, indicating left and taking the slip road.

Suspect.

She shivered, a knot tightening in her stomach. ‘Do you think the cyclist is going to be OK?’ she asked again, more loudly this time.

Pattenden glanced at her in the mirror. His white cap was on the front passenger seat beside him. ‘I don’t know,’ he said, shuffling the wheel through his hands as he negotiated a mini-roundabout.

‘He came out of nowhere, just straight at me. But I didn’t hit him, I’m sure.’

They were heading downhill now. His eyes were on her, briefly, again. There was kindness in them behind the hardness.

‘I should warn you that everything that’s said in this car is recorded automatically.’

‘Thank you,’ she said.

‘Let’s hope he’ll be OK,’ Pattenden said. ‘What about you? Are you OK?’

She was silent for a moment, then she shook her head.

He braked as they passed a vaguely art deco building that always reminded Carly of the superstructure of a tired old cruise ship. Several police cars were parked out the front. Ironically, she knew a lot about this building. There were photographs of it on the wall of the firm of quantity surveyors, BLB, for whom she had done legal work at the start of her career, when she’d been a trainee solicitor. The firm had managed the conversion of the premises from an American Express credit card manufacturing plant to its current use as the HQ CID for Sussex Police.

At the end of the building PC Pattenden slowed and turned sharp left up a driveway, then halted in front of a green reinforced-steel gate. There was a high spiked green fence to their right and behind it was a tall, drab brick structure. They had stopped beside a blue sign with white lettering announcing BRIGHTON CUSTODY CENTRE. The officer reached out of the window and swiped a plastic card. Moments later the gate began sliding open.

They drove up a steep ramp towards a row of what looked like factory loading bays at the rear of the brick building, then turned left into one of them, and into semi-darkness, out of the rain. Pattenden climbed out and opened the rear door, holding Carly’s arm firmly as she stepped from the car. It felt more like he wanted to stop her running away than to support her.

There was a green door ahead, with a small viewing window. He swiped his card on a panel, the door slid open and he ushered her forward into a bare, narrow room about fifteen feet long and eight wide. The door closed behind them. At the far end of the room was another identical door. The walls were painted a stark, institutional cream and the floor was made of some speckled brown substance. There was no furniture in here at all, just a hard, bare bench with a green surface.

‘Take a seat,’ he said.

She sat down, resting her chin against her knuckles, feeling badly in need of a cigarette. No chance. Then her phone rang.

She fumbled with the clasp of her handbag and pulled the phone out. But before she could answer the officer shook his head.

‘You’ll have to switch that off, I’m afraid.’ He pointed at a sign on the wall which read: NO MOBILE PHONES TO BE USED IN THE CUSTODY AREA.

She stared at him for a moment, trying to remember what the law was about making calls when you were arrested. But she’d only done a tiny bit of criminal law in her studies – it wasn’t her area – and she didn’t have the will at this moment to argue. If she complied, just did everything she was told, then maybe this nightmare would end quickly and she could go to the office. As for her particularly demanding client, she’d have to see him another day, but she absolutely had to be in the office for 2 p.m. for a conference with the barrister and another client, a woman who was due in court tomorrow morning for a hearing about financial matters in her divorce. Missing that meeting was not an option.

She switched off the phone and was about to put it back in her bag when he held out his hand, looking embarrassed.

‘I’m sorry, but I’m going to have to take that phone off you for forensic analysis.’

‘My phone?’ she asked, angry and bewildered.

‘I’m sorry,’ he repeated, taking it from her.

Then she stared at the bare wall in front of her. At another laminated plastic notice stuck to it: ALL DETAINED PERSONS WILL BE THOROUGHLY SEARCHED BY THE CUSTODY OFFICER. IF YOU HAVE ANY PROHIBITED ITEMS ON YOUR PERSON OR IN YOUR PROPERTY TELL THE CUSTODY AND ARRESTING OFFICER NOW.

Then she read another: YOU HAVE BEEN ARRESTED. YOU WILL HAVE YOUR FINGERPRINTS, PHOTOGRAPH, DNA TAKEN RIGHT AWAY.

She tried to think exactly how much she had drunk last night. Two glasses of Sauvignon Blanc in the pub – or was it three? Then a Cosmopolitan at the restaurant. Then more wine over dinner.

Shit .

The door beyond her slid open. The officer gestured for her to go through, then followed, staying close to her. His prisoner.

She walked into a large, brightly lit room dominated by a raised semicircular central station made from a shiny, speckled grey composite and divided into sections. Behind each section sat men and women dressed in white shirts with black epaulettes and black ties. Around the edge of the room were green metal doors and internal windows looking on to what were probably interview rooms. It felt like another world in here.

In front of one section she saw a tall, balding, slovenly man in a shell suit and trainers, with a uniformed police officer wearing blue rubber gloves at his side, searching his pockets. In front of another, there was a gloomy youth in baggy clothes, hands cuffed behind his back, with an officer on either side of him.

Her own officer steered her across to the console and up to the counter, which was almost head-high. Behind it sat an impassive-looking man in his forties. He wore a white shirt with three stripes on each epaulette and a black tie. His demeanour was pleasant but he had the air of a man who had never, in his entire life, allowed the wool to be pulled over his eyes.

On a blue video monitor screen, set into the face of the counter, at eye level, Carly read:

DON’T LET PAST OFFENCES COME BACK TO HAUNT YOU.