Tastes Like Fear (D.I. Marnie Rome 3) (27 page)

‘DI Rome?’

Time slowed. She felt it unravelling, each strand separate and static.

She stopped, three feet from Stephen.

He hadn’t moved from his side of the glass.

Light stripped the blood from under his skin, rendering his face in black and white. She was close enough to see the details in his irises.

‘DI Rome?’ Paul Bruton was standing in the doorway to the visitor room.

Marnie could see him without looking, without breaking eye contact with Stephen. Her hands hurt. She’d clenched them into fists.

She stepped back. Relaxed her hands. Turned to face Bruton.

‘Jodie’s ready for you.’ Bruton was looking past her at the glass door, but he was too far away to see what Marnie had seen in Stephen’s eyes.

Under the hostility, the freshly forged aggression, was a smile.

Stephen was smiling.

Glad to have her here, but more than that.

Glad to have her hating him.

And fearing him, at last.

39

Marnie wasn’t the only one afraid of Stephen Keele.

Hunched over in her chair in the visitor room, Jodie Izard was chewing her cuticles in concentration. When the door opened, she flinched upright.

Paul Bruton said, ‘This is Detective Inspector Rome. She needs to ask you some questions, Jodie. If you like, I can stay with you.’

‘You’re all right.’ She slid her stare past Bruton’s shoulder to Marnie. Her ash-blonde hair was chopped to shoulder length, its roots burned by too much peroxide. She wore a black nylon skater’s skirt over thick black leggings, Adidas trainers. A clingy white yoga top headlined the fake tan streaked across her shoulders and the visible portion of her chest. Her face was an oval, ghosted over with cheap make-up, a halo of lipgloss around her mouth, a partially healed piercing in one thin nostril. Her eyes were pretty. Sea green, scared.

She waited until Bruton had left the room before saying, ‘You’re his sister.’ Her voice was low, with a Somerset burr. ‘You’re the one he …’ She put her tongue between her teeth and bit it.

The one he …
What? What had Stephen told this girl he’d done to Marnie?

‘I’m here to ask you about Grace Bradley.’ She made her smile encouraging but not gullible. Stephen had said Jodie was a good liar, and he would know. ‘What can you tell me about Grace?’

‘Knew her on the streets, didn’t I?’ She couldn’t stop staring. ‘In Gloucester, a year ago, bit longer maybe. It was cold, I remember that. Hard as a cat’s head, Grace. Broke all the rules, did whatever she liked, but she hated the cold. Got an offer, so she cleared off. I should’ve been so lucky.’ She rattled the information out, wanting to move on to other things. ‘He killed your mum and dad. Said he stabbed them—’

‘Where did Grace go? You said she got an offer. What kind of offer? Who made it?’

‘I suppose she thought it was safe. You get into all sorts of shit when you’re sleeping rough. Spat on, pissed on. People think you’re a piece of meat. Sex. That’s if you’re lucky.’ She leaned forward under the ceiling strip of light, her pretty eyes glinting, catlike. ‘He says it’s what you wanted. That you and him—’

‘Grace got an offer of sex, is that what you’re saying?’

Marnie didn’t want to hear whatever lies Stephen had told this girl, and possibly the rest of Sommerville too. All the time she’d been coming here, those strange looks from the kids when she walked in and out. She’d thought they stared because she was a detective, their eyes itching at her skin. It fell into place now. Under the lip of the table, she clenched her hands, concentrating on the blunt pressure of her nails in her palms. ‘Who made an offer to Grace? And what was it?’

‘Not sex,’ Jodie said, tonguing her cheek. ‘We’re not all perverts.’

Above them, the light snarled as if a wasp had flown into the fluorescent tube.

‘Then what? Where did Grace go?’

‘Somewhere safe.’ A shrug. ‘It’s what we all want, isn’t it? Somewhere safe.’

‘Where did Grace go that was safe?’

‘Off the streets. Someplace warm. It’s not like we can all go
home
.’ She said the word like an obscenity, still digging at Marnie’s face with her eyes. ‘Grace couldn’t. Her stepmum wanted to change her name, said
Grace
was old-fashioned and she should be
Ray
or some shit like that. Threw out all her stuff, clothes and toys. Wanted her in a bridesmaid’s dress, made her grow her hair so she’d look nice at her dad’s wedding, made Gracie call her
Mum
like that wasn’t weird, like it didn’t fuck with her head. Gracie said she wiped her out. That was her
home
and she wiped her out.’

‘Who made Grace an offer, and where did she go? Somewhere in Gloucester?’

‘Doubt it. Never saw her again.’ She touched the scabbed piercing in her nose. ‘Good luck to whoever took her, though. Probably bashed his head in and nicked his wallet. She’s fucking mental.’

‘Did you see who took her?’

‘Maybe.’

For the first time, her stare slid away from Marnie. She was lying. Just as Stephen had said she would. Unless … Had he
told
her to lie? To keep Marnie here?

‘If you saw who took her, I need to know. Two girls are dead. Girls like Grace who couldn’t live at home, but who weren’t safe on the streets. Not lucky enough to get convicted for shoplifting and end up in here where it’s warm. They’re dead. If you have information to help us find whoever did that, then you need to give it to me right now. Forget whatever game you’re playing for Stephen Keele, or anyone else. Tell me.’

The girl’s eyes had snapped to attention at the speech. She glanced towards the door as if she’d remembered where she was. Fear found its way back on to her face. ‘I wouldn’t disrespect you, yeah? You’re his sister.’ Not afraid of the police, or Marnie. Afraid of Stephen.

‘Tell me,’ Marnie repeated. ‘What you know about who took Grace.’

‘I didn’t get a proper look, but it could’ve been him. Yeah. The one off the telly, the one you’re looking for. It could’ve been him.’

Marnie didn’t say Ledger’s name, waiting to see whether Jodie would. If she’d seen Ledger in the flesh, then his name would have registered when she heard it on the news. Even if she hadn’t known it a year ago, the name would have registered. Jodie said nothing, looking at Marnie with her pretty eyes, anxious to please because she wouldn’t disrespect Stephen Keele’s sister. If that was her motivation, then Marnie could use it.

‘Let’s talk about Stephen. He told you what to say to me, didn’t he? Gave you orders, instructions. And you didn’t want to upset him, so you went along with it.’

‘I never.’ The girl sucked her mouth small. ‘I
saw
Grace. Right? I knew her.’

‘But you didn’t see who took her. You didn’t see Jamie Ledger – or anyone – take her off the streets. Did you?’

Jodie hesitated, weighing up her options, torn between two brands of fear.

‘If you lie to the police,’ Marnie told her, ‘that’s a criminal offence. It will add time to your sentence, and it will piss me off. You don’t want to do that. Why would you?’

‘You’re not in here.’ Through her teeth. ‘
He
is.’

‘Not for much longer. He’s being moved to an adult prison. You’ll have perjured yourself for no good reason. Did you see who took Grace Bradley?’

Jodie shook her head. But she said, ‘You should’ve kept him out of here. You
could’ve.
Kept him out, given evidence—’

‘What evidence?’ Marnie demanded.

‘You could’ve told them why he did it.’

‘
I
could have told them?’ She was incredulous. ‘You think
I
know that?’

As if all this time she’d had the answers she was seeking tucked up her sleeve like a magician’s trick. Exactly what lies had Stephen told this girl? The same ones he’d told Marnie?

‘He did it for you,’ Jodie said. ‘Because of what you had, the two of you.’

The same lie, again.

Marnie was sick of hearing it.

Anger spiked through her, the way it used to when she was fifteen, a bright, hot spike.

‘Because of what we had? We had
nothing
.’

Jodie shook her head. ‘You could’ve told them, but you didn’t. That’s why he’s pissed off with you.’ She sucked a breath. ‘That’s why he’s going to finish you.’

40

The street boomed bright and empty, steel-coloured, on the brink of rain. Christie stood blinking, unsteady on her feet. Outside was always a shock. In jeans and a coat, but she felt naked. Just for a second she wished it was two years ago. Back when she was invisible.

Harm was at his window, watching her go. She felt his stare dimming as she reached the turning in the road. He’d forgiven her, he said, for Grace and Ashleigh.

But, ‘Bring me a new girl,’ between his teeth.

She crossed between parked cars, hiding her hands up her sleeves. Too far for him to be watching now, but she felt the tug of the thread connecting them as if she’d stitched it herself – pierced her skin with a needle, sewn the other end to the blades of his back or the lids of his eyes. Keeping watch on her even as she ducked into the tube station.

Packed with people, their smell swallowing her up. She worked numbers into the ticket machine with her fingers jumping, stashed the credit card back in her pocket, headed for the barriers.

One stop, a lot of stairs.

Up into the blue light of a shop selling coffee and pastries. Its smell made her stomach clench. So long since she ate good food.
Bad
food. She ate properly now. Coffee dehydrated you, and cake was just empty calories slowing you down, making you sick. Her reflection in the shop’s window was hungry, hollow-eyed. She forced her face to smile.
Hot chocolate
. Her tongue touched her lips, tasting it sweet and fatty in her mouth, and just for a second she wanted to run. Snip the thread. Get free, get
away
. Too late, it was too late now.

She swung away from the shop, in the direction of the tunnels.

The subway sat with its mouth open, turned towards the road. Its roof dripped as she ducked inside, out of the rain.

Suddenly, it wasn’t London. The noise she’d carried with her was gone, and so was the metal-meat smell of the Underground. Orange light in rectangles from boxes fixed to the walls, but the light rolled away, back into the tunnel’s throat. Dark, and dry. She remembered this. How weird it felt to be warm when there was no door and the rain could blow inside. Pipes under the floor ran all the way back to the power station. Harm had taught her that. Miles and miles of pipes taking excess steam to the council estate across the river.

Four kids on the floor, faces inside hoodies, empty bottles at their feet. Sitting like cave-dwellers, hands hanging, heads down. If Christie did this right, there’d be three kids tomorrow.

‘I’m looking for Neve.’

Two of the faces turned towards her, slackly. She ignored the flare of contempt from under her ribs and made a judgement based on instinct. The girl with the big eyes, she was the one. The one Harm would choose. Just a kid, lost-looking.

‘Neve,’ Christie repeated. ‘Any of you seen her?’

‘No.’ One of the boys, speaking for the group. Tough, or pretending to be. If he was tough, he wouldn’t be running in here at the first sign of rain.

‘Shit.’ She leaned into the wall, then slid until she was sitting on the floor of the subway. ‘
Shit
.’

The boy stared and moved his mouth. ‘What?’

‘I think she’s dead.’ Christie put her head back against the wall, under the sign that said
Fearz.
‘Neve. I think she’s dead.’

‘Who is she?’ The girl with the big eyes had spikes in her voice.

‘My sister.’ Christie wiped her face with the cuff of her shirt. ‘She’s my sister.’ It was near enough to the truth. Harm’s sister, the one he’d given up for dead. ‘Been everywhere, all across London. Everywhere she used to go.’ She kicked at the scarred tilework. ‘Fuck.
Fuck.
’

‘We haven’t seen her,’ the boy said. ‘Sorry.’

‘Forget it. She’s gone. Just can’t stop looking, you know?’

Silence. The seep of heat under her legs. Miles of pipe packed with steam from the long-dead chimneys of the power station. Like the core of the earth coming up.

‘D’you think she was killed?’ Big Eyes looked twelve, maybe thirteen. Wild hair like black brambles. Clothes too big for her, just like her eyes. Spikes in her voice and in her stare.

‘I don’t know,’ Christie said. ‘Maybe. It happens.’

‘It’s happened recently,’ Big Eyes said. ‘More than once.’

The boy nodded, looking important. ‘The police were round here earlier. We had to wait until they’d cleared off. They’re looking for a killer.’

‘Yeah, I heard about that.’

‘D’you think it happened to your sister?’

‘Don’t know.’ She shut her eyes. ‘Stupid thing is, I’ve a place to stay now, somewhere safe. That’s all she wanted, and if she’d just waited, two or three weeks …’ She broke off, shaking her head.

‘Where?’ Big Eyes asked.

‘What?’ Rolling her neck tiredly, as if she didn’t care about the question or its answer.

‘Where’re you staying? Somewhere safe, you said.’

Big Eyes was quick, not another Aimee. Harm wouldn’t see that, not right away. He’d see her face looking lost in its tangle of hair, and how she hugged herself. He’d like her, until it was too late. He’d choose her. Until it was too late.

‘Yeah. I got lucky. Too late for Neve …’

‘A squat?’ The boy had a home to go to. Only someone with a home would say,
A squat?
like it was somewhere cool he’d read about in a book or on a website.

Christie opened her eyes but turned her head away. ‘Not a squat.’

Big Eyes was watching her. She had a hot stare, like Harm’s. It made Christie angry. ‘Look, piss off, okay? There’s no room, anyway. No room for anyone else. We’re full.’

‘How long’s she been missing?’ Big Eyes asked. ‘Neve.’

‘Weeks. Months.’ That was not good. She should know exactly how long. She should be counting every hour. ‘Thirteen weeks and four days.’