There was an awkward pause while the Indian waiter brought their lagers.
‘No, well,’ Lloyd went on, ‘I’m probably jumping ahead. I’m sure he’ll consult with everybody before he puts the more draconian measures into practice.’ He leaned forward conspiratorially.‘It’s the timing that’s so perfect,Kathy.Cheers.’
‘Shut up, Lloyd,’ Tom growled, ‘for Christ’s sake. You’re not funny.’
‘What do you mean, about the timing?’ Kathy asked.
‘Well, he can’t go back to Branch now, can he? Not now.’
Tom made to say something, but Kathy cut in.‘Why not?’
‘Hasn’t he told you about that,either?’Lloyd’s face was a picture of innocent bafflement. He turned to Tom, then to Nicole, one of whom had apparently kicked him under the table.‘What?’
‘Why?’ Kathy said, trying with difficulty to make her voice sound light and amused.‘Why can’t he go back to Special Branch?’
Lloyd shrugged, looking as if he suddenly realised he’d gone too far.‘Personality clash,Kathy.Tom’s boss is an old woman.’He frowned, realising that wasn’t the right thing to say either. ‘A geriatric desk-jockey at forty. Sad case. Resents like hell the fact that this guy has balls.Well, you’d know all about that . . .’
‘Oh please.’ Nicole finally stepped in. ‘That’s enough. He’s been drinking this afternoon, Kathy. Take no notice of him. I know we all work for the Met, but do we have to talk shop?’
‘Hear hear,’ Tom said.‘It’s slightly shop, but Kathy and I got a flight with Air Support this afternoon.’
‘Oh really! Where did you go?’
It was a good try, but it would have taken a better actor than either of them to make it sound convincing. Lloyd gave Kathy a sheepish look and muttered,‘Yeah,they’re right,take no notice of me. I’m pissed. Had a bad week. Almost killed a guy . . .’
And so the conversation veered off, but Kathy hardly heard it.
Not half a mile away, Brock also was seated at a restaurant table, but in much more relaxed company. The Grants had insisted he join them and the musicians for a meal and now the conversation flowed easily around the table in the mood of post-performance euphoria. They were all so likeable, he thought, modest and talented and full of youthful optimism,talking excitedly about their plans for when they finished at the Guildhall later in the year. Elizabeth had been accepted for the Artist Diploma program at the Juilliard in New York, and her mother was proud but anxious about her move away from them.
At the end of the meal Brock made his good nights and set off home, stopping along the way to phone Suzanne. She sounded pleased to hear from him, and they agreed that it had been good to see each other, and they would do it again soon. They were both careful in what they said, but warm, definitely warm. The atmosphere of the restaurant still clung to Brock and he hummed a snatch of Tango Nuevo as he went on.
The atmosphere of the restaurant clung to Kathy, too, as Tom drove them away. She waited for him to say something, but when he remained silent she started.
‘So what was that all about, you not being able to go back to Branch?’
‘I told you I’d been having problems there lately.’
‘Not really.You haven’t really told me anything about what’s been happening.’
‘Like Lloyd said, it’s a personality clash. It happens all the time.’
‘And what about your plans?’
‘I’m just playing it by ear.’
‘That’s not what Lloyd said. He and Nicole seemed to know all about them.’
This was the nub, of course, that her friend Nicole, who’d never met Tom until she’d introduced them, seemed to know more about what was going on inside his head than she did.
‘Oh, it’s nothing. I bumped into them one lunchtime and was shooting off my mouth about stuff, that’s all.’
Kathy bridled. Tom didn’t shoot his mouth off to strangers. He was secretive and highly selective in what he said. ‘Stuff you haven’t told me.’
‘Look, it’s difficult sometimes to discuss certain things with you.You’re involved, with me, with Brock . . .’
‘Brock? What about him?’
‘You’ve been with him a long time.You’re very loyal to him, understandably so.’
‘And I would see your thoughts as disloyal?’
‘I’m just saying that it’s difficult sometimes to air ideas freely without feeling they may be taken the wrong way.’
‘Whereas with someone who’s practically a total stranger, like Nicole, you can feel free to shoot your mouth off? That’s bullshit.’
She felt the knot tightening in her stomach.What also irked her was the way in which he hadn’t discussed where they were now going, but had simply driven north towards Finchley on the assumption, presumably, that he would be inviting himself in.
They were almost there now, and she was just preparing some line to challenge him when he pulled over and said,‘I’m sorry,Kathy, we got off on the wrong foot tonight. It was Lloyd’s fault. Let’s leave it for now. We’ll catch up tomorrow or Monday and talk about it. Okay?’
Stung, she unfastened her seatbelt and got out of the car, and then, looking back in through the window, she caught a glimpse of him checking his watch impatiently before he waved and took off. She stared after him and thought she saw a familiar shadow draw out behind him as he crossed the junction down the street, but this time she didn’t phone him.
Sunday, a dark overcast morning, and Kathy woke after a disturbed sleep. The knot of tension in her stomach was still there, and she found she couldn’t swallow the coffee she made. There was only one cure she knew of, and that was work, so she took an empty tube train into the city and walked to Queen Anne’s Gate. The offices, too, were deserted and she felt like an intruder in the silent building.
Loose ends, Brock had said. She went back over her case notes and identified a few. They still hadn’t been able to contact the owner of the red BMW sports car she’d seen in Tallow Square, a Mrs Coretta Wilkins with an address in Chigwell, and Kathy tried the phone number again without success. They had no record for Mrs Wilkins,whose car hadn’t been reported stolen,and it seemed that her improbable presence there must be coincidental. Then there was Mrs Lavender, whom Father Maguire and Brock had mentioned from the old days in Cockpit Lane, but hadn’t been on Michael Grant’s list. She could try to track down people who worked at the old Studio One club on Maxfield Street where the three victims used to go, or trace ‘Rhonda’, who had possibly had a boyfriend called Robbie, perhaps the third and most elusive victim. Or she might find out more about Teddy Vexx and Jay Crocker, and their dodgy laundrette.
She worked for five hours with little success, finding nothing that stirred any real interest in her, until the silence began to get her down. She switched off her computer and left, walking across St James’s Park to Trafalgar Square and on past Leicester Square to Gerrard Street where she had a quiet meal in a tiny Chinese restaurant she knew. Afterwards she went to a movie, feeling as if her life were on hold, waiting for something significant to happen.
The following day she was called to a meeting with the Crown prosecutors,and it wasn’t until the early afternoon that she returned to her desk, determined to draw up a report for Brock, along with a request to be taken off Brown Bread. There was one new bit of information waiting for her on her computer, a list of car numbers courtesy of the Greenwich Rainbow Coordinator, taken from the golf club camera in Shooters Hill. Comparing them with her list of numbers of interest was what her old schoolteacher would have called busy-work, but there was a kind of mindless entertainment in it, like playing a poker machine, hoping for a random match. When she had eliminated all the numbers known to belong to Roach family members she had a list of their visitors’ cars for the past six days.Unfortunately this didn’t cover the night of the Singhs’ intimidation,for the camera tape had been reused since then,but in any case, there was no sign of Vexx’s Peugeot or Crocker’s Mondeo on the list. She began to run checks on the unknown numbers and soon came to one that made her sit up-Mrs Wilkins’ red BMW had been a frequent visitor to The Glebe.Kathy checked the times.
