A Place of Safety. Helen Black
‘You’ll never make it stick, and when it unravels you’ll be left explaining why you wasted so much time and money.’
DI Moodie laughed.
‘Something funny?’
‘DI Bradbury told me all about you.’
Lilly put her hands on her hips. ‘And what did he say?’
‘That you were difficult, intransigent and bloody-minded.’
Lilly was smarting but refused to show it. ‘Did he also mention that the last time we crossed swords I won?’
Lilly slammed the door behind her, leaving DI Moodie staring after her.
‘Sadly, he did.’
The cell was cold.
Lilly stepped over the tray of fish fingers and beans and made her way to the bench at the far end. She patted the girl’s arm. Her clothes had been taken for examination and her police-issue white paper suit rustled like dry leaves.
‘Can’t blame you for leaving it. I wouldn’t feed it to a dog.’
Lilly looked into the girl’s face. So very beautiful and so very sad. Her full lips were already set with lines. Where nature had been generous, life had not been kind.
‘I’m Lilly Valentine.’
‘I’m Tirana Duraku,’ she said. ‘Everyone calls me Anna.’
Lilly nodded. ‘Milo asked me to come today. To help you.’
‘To help me.’ Anna rolled the words around her mouth as if trying them out for the first time.
‘I can get you an interpreter,’ said Lilly, ‘if English is a problem.’
‘No.’ The girl’s tone was sharp. ‘Sorry I do fine with English.’
Lilly wasn’t sure—but the girl’s English was pretty good.
‘The police intend to charge you with conspiracy to murder.’
‘I didn’t kill no one.’
Lilly held up her hand. ‘I know that, but they’re saying you and Artan had a plan together, and that plan was to kill those boys.’
Anna shook her head and wisps of glossy hair whipped her translucent cheeks. The contrast in colours was unnerving.
‘There was no plan,’ she said.
‘Artan didn’t tell you what he was going to do?’ asked Lilly.
‘He don’t tell me anything.’
‘And you didn’t wonder,’ Lilly asked, ‘why you both needed a gun?’
Anna shrugged and Lilly felt her impatience begin to rise. ‘Not good enough, Anna. People don’t find themselves with guns for no reason. Where did you get it?’
‘Artan give it to me.’
‘Where did he get it?’
Anna shrugged again.
‘Why did he need a gun?’
‘Protection.’
‘From what?’
Anna’s eyes filled with tears. ‘From everything.’
‘Why on earth did you take it, Anna?’ asked Lilly. ‘Why didn’t you refuse?’
Without warning, Anna fell forward, clutching at the neck of her suit.
‘Anna?’ Lilly fell to her knees. ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Pains,’ the girl barked like a seal. ‘Pains in chest.’
Lilly leapt to her feet and banged her fist against the cell door. ‘We need a doctor here, now.’
The automatic gates of the station car park began their slow arc. Normally Jack would be tapping his finger against the steering wheel, revving the accelerator, but today he idled in neutral.
There was no prisoner awaiting interview, no custody sergeant breathing down his neck to get on with it and free up a cell. No urgent statements to be tweaked and mailed out. No impatient colleagues needing access to his notes. For the first time, for as long as he could remember, Jack had nothing to do. He’d only come in this evening to collect his photos of Lilly and Sam and to clear his desk of anything that could decompose.
He pulled into his usual spot and contemplated how to spend his free time. His flat could do with a clean. He hadn’t been able to take the jam out the fridge this morning, so firmly set was the jar to the now-opaque shelf.
And there was the paper. When had he last read more than the headlines?
He had to look on this suspension positively. He could double his running and lose more weight. Maybe get a body like your man Milo.
Then he saw the Mini Cooper.
Lilly cringed when she saw Jack lumbering towards her. She felt like a naughty schoolgirl caught smoking by her dad. ‘I was just holding it for my friend, honest.’
‘What are you doing here?’ he asked.
She hedged her bets. ‘A case.’
He stood, arms crossed, his face giving nothing away.
‘A client in custody,’ she said.
‘I’m a copper, Lilly, I’d worked that much out for myself.’
Lilly put up her hands in surrender. ‘I just came down to give her some advice. I’m not taking on her case.’
‘Mary Mother of God,’ Jack yelled. ‘I thought we’d been through this.’
They stood looking at one another for a moment. Lilly reached out and stroked the leather of his jacket. It was warm and creased from years of wear.
‘She’s in a terrible state, Jack. The doc says she’s having horrendous panic attacks.’
‘You can’t take on the case.’
Lilly nodded. ‘I’m not taking on the case.’
Steve’s car smelled as bad as the man himself, and Alexia wound down the window. She shifted in her seat, her skirt sticking to the plastic. And who the hell still owned a manual?
She supposed it was better than the bus. The salary of a junior reporter on a local rag didn’t stretch to her own transport, so she grudgingly accepted the use of her boss’s and tried to ignore the ash that clung to her black wool suits.
‘I bet Kate Adie doesn’t have to put up with this.’
As she crunched into third, she banished from her mind the Alfa that Daddy had bought for her twenty-first. A gorgeous little red number with tan upholstery and a walnut dash. It had broken her heart to give it back.
She pulled in front of the gates of Manor Park and admired the floodlit countryside that flanked it on all sides. It reminded her of Benenden, her own alma mater, with its tennis courts and clock towers.
Until seconds ago she had remained sceptical that the report was true but the multitude of press vans and cars stationed at the foot of the sweeping drive made her heart pound. A shooting—in a place like this? Fantastic…
She parked the battered Honda and entered the throng. All the nationals were here and the main TV stations.
Alexia smiled at a man fiddling with the boom on his camera.
‘What’s the story?’ She tried to sound as casual as she could.
‘Police won’t let us in,’ he said. ‘No one’s saying anything.’
‘So we don’t even know if it’s true?’
He shook his head and went back to his boom.
Alexia