Good Bait

‘Not working today?’

She shrugged. ‘Keep cutting back, don’t they? Three days a week at the moment, that’s all there is.’ She touched the curve of her belly. ‘Not as that’ll matter much pretty soon.’

‘When’s the baby due?’

‘June. June 15th.’

‘And is this the dad?’ Karen pointed at the photograph framed above the television, a young man in military uniform, staring out.

‘That’s Ryan, yes. He’s with the Royal Engineers. A corporal.’

‘Nice-looking man. Handsome.’

Pride reflected in the younger woman’s eyes. ‘He’s in Afghanistan. Helmand.’ She pulled at a stray length of hair. ‘He’s always telling me, don’t worry, don’t worry, I’ll be fine. An’ I know he will. He’s careful, Ryan. Not like some of them — things he’s told me. But even so — you see these things on the news, you know, his family has been informed, and all them people linin’ the streets …’

She turned away to hide the prick of tears.

Karen rested a hand on her shoulder and she flinched.

‘I don’t know about you,’ Karen said, stepping back, ‘but I wouldn’t mind a cup of tea.’

‘Yes, of course. Sorry, I didn’t think …’

‘Why don’t you let me …?’

‘No, no, You sit down. Please.’

Karen stood by the window instead. A short, bow-legged dog, some kind of bulldog cross, was waddling its way across the patchy grass below. A young woman in a puffa jacket, no more than late teens, surely, went past along the other side of the street, one child strapped into a buggy, another lagging behind. Over the crowded hotchpotch of rooftops, the sky was begi

The tea came in bright mugs, placed carefully on coasters. ‘I didn’t know if you wanted sugar …’

‘No, thanks. This is fine.’

They sat for a moment, awkwardly, one leaning forward, the other back. Jayne Andrew avoiding Karen’s gaze. The tea, as Karen’s grandmother might have said, looked as if it lacked the strength to stand.

‘Wayne Simon, how did you know him?’

‘Before, you mean?’

‘Yes, before.’

‘That were ages back. Before I met Ryan. I was out wi’ me mates. Sat’day night, you know. Wayne was there on his own, this pub we were all in. Up here working. Construction, what he did. Started chattin’ to us, just, you know, friendly like. I thought he were nice. Not loud or rough or anything.’ She looked directly at Karen for the first time. ‘When I heard what he’s supposed to have done. His wife and kiddie. I couldn’t believe it. Just couldn’t.’

‘Back then, though, you went out with him?’

‘For a while, yes. A few months, maybe, six at most. That were all.’

‘It was serious, though?’

‘He thought it were.’

‘And you didn’t know there was somebody else? Down in London?’

‘Course not.’

Karen swallowed down a mouthful of weak tea. ‘So what happened?’

‘Nothing. Nothing really. No row or anything. Not then. Wayne went back down to London when the job he was working was over. Like all of a sudden it didn’t matter.’

‘And you were upset?’

‘Not really. Like I said, it were always more serious for him’n for me.’ She pushed her hands up across her face. ‘Only set eyes on him the once after that till now. Just the once. Fetched up here, didn’t he? Out of the blue. Bangin’ on the door. Shoutin’ all kinds of things. Filthy things, some of them. Been drinking, mind you, but all the same. I was with Ryan by then and thank God he were out, cause Ryan’d’ve killed him. Still would, if he found out what was happening.’

‘And now, he’s been what? Making a commotion? More of the same?’

‘No. That’s it. He just stands there, right up against the shop window. One minute he’s there and when I look again he’s gone. As if I’m making it up, but I’m not. Most times I’m on the till, see, close by the door and there’s only the glass between us.’ She shivered. ‘The manager, he’s complained to security but that don’t seem to make any difference ’cause the next time you look he’s back again.’

‘And he doesn’t say anything?’

‘Just the once. I hadn’t even seen him, not that day, didn’t know he was there. An’ all of a sudden he comes up behind me. “How come,” he says, “you filthy slut, you whore, you’re carryin’ another man’s baby?” Whispers it, right in my ear. I started crying, couldn’t help it. Then when I dared look round he’d gone.’

She reached out for Karen’s hand.

‘I’m frightened. Frightened he’ll do something. Hurt me. Hurt my baby.’

Karen squeezed her hand. ‘It’s okay. I had a word with the local police on the way up. Maybe they weren’t taking this as seriously as they should. I’ll go and see them in person before I leave. Suggest a panic button. The minute you see Wayne again, if he approaches you, you activate that, it’ll go right through to the station. I’ll ask for a drive-by outside here every hour through the night. And see if we can’t get someone in plain clothes in the shopping centre to help out security.’ She squeezed the small hand again. ‘Nothing will happen. He’s not going to hurt you, I promise.’

‘But if he-’

‘I promise. You’ve got my word.’

Another saying of her grandmother’s started jinking round inside her head as she stepped back out on to the street, something about promises being like pie crusts, crumbling, she thought, at the merest touch.

She was back on the motorway, heading south, headlights spindling about her, when her mobile rang and she pulled over on to the hard shoulder.

Ramsden’s voice, off-pitch, urgent. ‘On your way back down? Might want to make a detour. Stansted. Something you ought to see.’

32

She had read it somewhere: the smell of a slaughterhouse, blood and piss and shit and fear. The sweet bite of vomit at the back of the throat.

For a moment, she swayed, eyes glazed.

She had seen death before, too many times, but not like this.

She had to force herself to look again, to see.

Kebab shop, she thought. That’s what it reminded her of. A kebab shop, late at night: walking home, two, three in the morning, head furred and thick from too much vodka, too many cigarettes, the overlapping stink of sweet chilli sauce and slowly turning meat; the man behind the counter, bored, tired, wiping his fingers down the front of his filthy apron before slicing the meat into veinous, bloodied strips. Except that these slabs of scored meat, hanging from the aluminium struts of the roof, had arms and legs and heads; the latter barely recognisable, burned, gouged, torn.

Bile caught in her mouth and she held it there while her body juddered before swallowing it back down.

Her head swam.

The belly of the nearest man hung down in folds, half covering his shrivelled cock and balls.

‘Outside,’ Ramsden said quietly, close behind. ‘Talk outside.’

He touched her arm at the elbow; started, gently, firmly, to steer her towards the doors.

As Karen stepped through into the air, Scene of Crime officers turned aside.

The light bit at her eyes.

The parking area, surrounded on three sides by multi-level storage units, was busy with police vehicles, ambulances, unmarked cars.

Karen counted, slowly, one to ten inside her head.

‘What do we know?’ she asked.

‘Found by a delivery team from the airport. Come to collect a container, evening flight to Ankara. Poor bastards, got more than they bargained for.’

‘The bodies. Any idea how long they’d been there?’

‘Best guess so far, early hours.’

‘This morning?’

‘Be a sight worse, else.’

He gave it a moment, watching her eyes. ‘Security comes round every couple of hours. Two men usually, sometimes one.’

‘This morning?’

‘Just the one.’

‘Handy.’

‘Nothing noted in the log. Call out now for him to come back in.’

Karen looked up at the CCTV cameras attached to several of the buildings; another, mounted on a high stand, slowly revolving, centrally placed.