Neil White - LOST SOULS

‘Get drunk on some decent stuff,’ I said. ‘No more of that shit.’

Terry didn’t look at me. Neither did any of his friends. They were looking at the note, and it was as if all they could see was their next bottle floating towards the pavement.

‘How did Egan handle the interview?’

Laura turned to look at Pete. It was the first thing he had said since they’d left the station.

They were heading out to Luke King’s house, where he lived with his parents in a palatial new-build many miles from Blackley They were heading north and were driving along single-track country lanes, over pack-horse bridges, twisting between long hedgerows, the fields dotted by trees and painted in that brighter green which seemed so much more like summer, broken only by the white dots of sheep.

‘Egan was like I expected,’ said Laura.

Pete laughed. ‘Like an arsehole then.’

Laura looked out of the window and smiled. ‘Your words, not mine.’

‘Any hissy fits from the defence?’

Laura thought back to the interview. It had been like a long fight, starting from when Egan tried to get the defence lawyer to sit in a corner, well away from his client. From then on the defence hadn’t co-operated. It was a tricky balance, Laura knew that, the need to throw the defence off-kilter, to try and get a confession, but without turning it into bullying. If it went too far, the confession could be kept away from the jury. Murderers had walked free because of that.

‘One or two,’ she said. ‘Maybe when Egan gets one of his confessions thrown out of court, he’ll do things differently.’

Laura turned to look out of the side window. She had taken a gamble in coming up to the King house. The interview with Luke King had ended when a superintendent interrupted and asked to discuss tactics with Egan. Laura had guessed from Egan’s face that someone with influence had placed a call, that the tactics were more about getting King out than keeping him in.

For all the things about Egan she didn’t like, Laura thought he was right to be suspicious about Luke King. And arresting him would get DNA samples from him, from his hair, his fingernails. Anything else was best to look for while he was still locked up. This was a murder investigation, and Jess Goldie deserved more than favours called in from the golf-club bar. Maybe the inside of the car had blood smeared on the steering wheel or on the seat, or his clothes contained traces of her blood or hair.

Laura had needed Egan’s consent to search the house, and he was the only inspector she was prepared to ask. He had nodded quickly, hoping that she would find something to justify his decision to make the arrest. Laura had been ready to go on her own, but she sensed that it would be a no-loser for Pete: he would either play a part in Egan’s downfall or he would find something useful. Either way, he would get to raise a glass.

‘How was Egan with you?’ Pete asked, back to his favourite subject.

‘Familiar,’ she said, but she sensed that Pete guessed it anyway.

‘That’d be about right,’ he replied, still staring straight ahead. ‘He tries it on with everyone, especially new meat like you.’

‘You know how to make a girl feel special,’ she said jokingly, but Pete didn’t laugh.

Laura watched him for a while as he just stared straight ahead. ‘What’s the thing between you two?’ she asked.

Pete didn’t react at first, and Laura started to wonder whether he had heard her, but then he sighed and replied, ‘We started as cops at the same time. I ended up on the Support Unit before he did, so by the time he arrived I’d learned a few tricks of the trade.’

Laura raised her eyebrows at that. She knew about the Support Unit. In jumpsuits and boots, they patrolled Saturday nights, looking to split up fights. Or maybe prolong them. The ‘distraction strike’ was their favourite technique, where an officer under threat could strike the attacker hard, the distraction of the pain making time for an arrest. Best delivered as a hard punch to the nose, it suited those who liked a ruck. As Laura looked at Pete, she guessed that he had fitted in well in the Support Unit.

‘Did you have the van door rule?’ she asked.

He tilted his head, and then started to smile. ‘So they had it in London too?’

Laura looked forward again. ‘I’ve heard of it.’ And she had seen it in action, the rule that if the back doors of the van had to open, the cops didn’t leave the scene until someone was in the van with them, for the handcuffed ride back to the station with plenty of hard braking. The spread of CCTV had stopped much of the fun for the Support Unit, but until they put cameras in the vans, most people would still arrive at the station on the van floor, the victim of one too many emergency stops.

‘What did Egan do that upset you so much?’

‘He didn’t like our methods, so he reported them, and then backed a prisoner up on a complaint.’ Pete glanced at Laura. ‘Maybe he was right, I don’t know, but why didn’t he tell us first?’

‘What happened to you?’

‘I got shoved into Custody for a couple of years. It was only the arrival of civilian jailers that got me out, and by the time I did he had arse-kissed all the way to his pips.’

‘So he’s not the most popular person in the station?’

Pete shook his head. ‘Not below him. Those above him like him, admire him for his courage, all that shit. And let’s face it, he’s only looking up.’

Laura shook her head and looked out of the window. She felt her phone vibrate again. ‘ Meet for lunch? J xx ’

Laura sighed. It sounded like a great idea, but she knew it was a no.

She texted back. ‘No can do. Off for drive in country. Make sure Bobby ok from school’

She put her phone back in her pocket and thought about the long nights in she’d shared with Jack in London just a few weeks earlier. As she looked at the countryside flashing by, they seemed like part of a different life.

* * *

I smiled when I got the message. I had expected the police to head out to the house. It was a common formula: have an interview to set up the lies, and then search the house to disprove them.

I had parked half a mile from the house. I’d asked at a local garage for the exact location of Jimmy King’s house, showed them my press badge and said I was late for an interview. I was still driving my 1973 Triumph Stag, in Calypso Red. It had been my father’s old car, washed and treasured by him every Sunday until his death. I loved the car myself now, it reminded me of sunny weekends watching Dad polish it, but I knew that Laura would recognise it in a flash if I parked it too close to the house.

I was sitting in a tree, fifty yards from the house and across a secluded lane. I was looking down into the garden, a long green lawn, striped, with colourful borders all around. Pink, blues, violets. They looked well-maintained, and at the end of the garden were trees, willow and pine, although they were still small, some years to go before they created the country-garden look they were trying to achieve. The house itself stood out against the old stone cottages dotted around the valley. The bricks were fresh and new, with white pillars against the church-style front door and two large gables at the front, so that the house was H-shaped, grand and imposing. I guessed that the grilles on the gate were so people could see in, rather than the Kings see out.

All I had to do now was wait.

The boy was still asleep, the television off now, just the flicker of the oil-lamp for company.

He leaned forward, watched the rise and fall of his chest, the slight movement of his lips as he breathed. He looked angelic, young and untroubled, a long way from the problems at home. In that light, unaware of his surroundings, he was just another young boy.