Sam turned round to look at Luke, just to gauge his mood. Lukes eyes betrayed no emotion. They were cold, precise.
If you want to leave, you can, Sam said to him. It was a cue, but Sam wasnt sure that Luke understood it: leave now, while you still have the chance.
You do know why your client is here, dont you? said Egan from behind Sam, sounding hostile.
Sam turned back around. You tell me all about it.
Egan sighed, already tired of the game. We would have come for him anyway. We think young Mr King might have some information in relation to a murder investigation. We were hoping he would help us, so we can eliminate him from our inquiry.
Sam leaned into Egan, as if to whisper. Egan leaned in too, couldnt stop himself. Sam spoke quietly, almost a hiss, his eyes wide in mock-excitement. Did you say a murder?
Sam saw the female officers mouth flick upwards in a smile, but she stopped herself when Egan stepped back, his anger flushing its way up his cheeks.
Dont try to be funny, Mr Nixon.
There is nothing funny about being linked with a murder, said Sam. Unless you can assure me that my client is not under suspicion, he does not want to speak to you.
Egan breathed through his nose, his lips twitching, saying nothing. Laura intervened.
Weve received information that your client was nearby, she said, and she flashed a quick smile at Luke, disarming, friendly. He might have seen something that could help us. He could be a vital witness.
Smart answer, thought Sam. Egan looked angry, like he had lost some ground.
Hello, said Sam to Laura. Have we met? He asked because he knew it would annoy Egan.
Laura was trying to look stern as they exchanged details. Sam caught an accent, south of England.
Ive spoken with my client and he has nothing to say.
Except when it comes out of your mouth, said Egan, looking at Luke. So why is he here, in his best suit?
Because if he hadnt come, you would have hauled him out of bed in his pyjamas, probably with a photographer on your tail, just to get your perma-tan on TV.
Laura looked down, smirking.
Look, Inspector, Sam continued, trying to sound reasonable, Mr King has nothing he wants to say to you. If you want to make him, you have to depose him at court. But for that you need to charge someone else, so if you want to hear what he has to say, either arrest him or someone else.
Sam turned around and took hold of Lukes arm to escort him out of the station. He tried to move quickly, but Egan was quicker, moving fast, gripping Lukes other arm.
Luke King, I am arresting you for murder.
Sam was shocked. He could tell from the look in Laura McGanitys eyes that she was too. That was good. It meant that Egan had acted off the cuff. It meant that there wasnt any evidence against King yet. The custody clock would tick away, and it would put pressure on the police. This was a high-profile arrest, and Dermot Egan had made it without any evidence.
If they had done nothing, Egan could have watched Luke at leisure, covertly. Now he had shown his hand, moved too quickly.
Luke looked the calmest of all of them, almost serene.
Sam stood to one side as Egan cautioned Luke, giving him the usual right to remain silent bull. You can say nothing, but if you do, the prosecution will use it against you. Didnt seem like much of a right to Sam.
As Luke was led away, Sam looked down at his hands. Killers hands. Then he looked at Lukes face.
Luke was smiling.
I moved away from the door of the police station. Laura had kept her back to me, but I could tell that Luke King had been arrested.
And I knew that Laura was dealing with the murder investigation. I smiled to myself. Now that Jimmy Kings son had been arrested, the story had just got better.
As I walked back towards the court, I saw Terry McKay again. He was sitting on the court steps, receiving a green bottle from one of the others swaying near him. He barely looked up as I stood over him.
Where does King live? I asked.
His eyes focused on me slowly. He shut one eye as if the sun had blinded him, but it was almost certainly the sherry that had made his pupils sluggish.
Who wants to know?
I grinned at him. I do.
He looked me up and down, and then laughed to himself. His friends stepped back and looked at me strangely, as if I was from another world. And I suppose I was in a way. They lived their lives in a haze as they stumbled from one bottle to the next, never really taking part in society. They regarded me as an intruder, a reminder of the life they had stopped living when the drink took full hold.
He waved me away and lifted the bottle to his mouth.
I thought our dialogue had ended, and I had turned to walk away, when he slurred at me, Some big fucking house past Whitwell. On the road to fucking nowhere.
I reached into my pocket and floated a twenty down. I had a sense that we might speak again, so it seemed like dialogue in the bank.
Get drunk on some decent stuff, I said. No more of that shit.
Terry didnt 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.
Chapter Twelve
How did Egan handle the interview?
Laura turned to look at Pete. It was the first thing he had said since theyd left the station.
They were heading out to Luke Kings 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 hadnt 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, hell 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 Egans 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 didnt 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 Egans 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 Egans 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.
Thatd 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 didnt laugh.
Laura watched him for a while as he just stared straight ahead. Whats the thing between you two? she asked.
Pete didnt 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 Id 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. Ive 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 didnt 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 didnt 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 dont know, but why didnt 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 hes 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 lets face it, hes 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 shed 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. Id asked at a local garage for the exact location of Jimmy Kings 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 fathers 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.
Chapter Thirteen
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.
He scuffed his feet on the floor, the noise of his soles in the dust loud, as if the surroundings werent used to sound. The walls were thick with cobwebs, the ones above the oil-lamp dancing in the heat of the flame, grey flicks as they waved in the half-light.
He stood up and stretched. He knew he couldnt stay there all day. He knew the boy would be all right. There was still enough sedative in him to keep him quiet until the next morning. Just one more night and then it would all be better.
He leaned over the boy, watched his face for a moment. His hand reached down and moved the boys hair to one side, as if to keep it out of his eyes. He smiled, almost paternal, and then leaned forward to kiss him on the forehead. His lips touched softly, just a light brush.
He would be back, to make things right.
I always knew there was money in property, said Pete.
Laura looked up, and through the windscreen she saw what he meant.
They were approaching a pair of high steel gates sitting between brick pillars, the central point of long brick walls that surrounded a house she could see at the top of a sweeping gravel drive.
The house stood out as a blemish in a quiet green valley, Laura thought. It was too new for the setting, the ivy planted around the base of the walls not up to the ground-floor windows, so that the brickwork still gleamed. Maybe in a hundred years or so, when the roof had dipped in a few places and the walls had weathered darker, it would look desirable, but Laura thought that it seemed more lottery-win than country-set.
Pete had to bark stern words at the intercom to get the gate to open, but within a couple of minutes his tyres crunched on the gravel and they had parked in front of the large oak double doors at the front of the house. Jimmy King stood on the front doorstep. He was wearing a shirt open at the neck, but the rest of his attire was smart, with crisp pleats in his pinstriped trousers and a deep gleam to his shoes.