The Creeper

10

Mickey Philips flipped his notebook shut, put it in his jacket pocket and crossed the road, walking away from the river.

The businesses along the quay hadn’t yielded up anything of value. Mickey hadn’t been made welcome. When he approached with the uniforms, orders were shouted in languages other than English and bodies dissolved into shadows. Rags were thrown over number plates in workshops, objects were put hastily into desk drawers or beneath counters. He was met with too-wide smiles and helpless shrugs, and eyes that looked anywhere but at him. Even when he told them it was a murder inquiry and that he didn’t care what else they had going on, the smiles dropped but the shrugs continued. No one had seen anything, no one knew anything. He heard it so many times that eventually he thought it might even be the truth. Eventually he left the uniforms to it, instructing them to take extra notice of anyone giving them a particularly hard time, and walked off down the road.

He preferred working alone, in spite of what DI Brennan had said about mavericking. It was when he could drop the persona and be himself, not have to be one of the lads, play the game. Remember he was a university graduate and not just a Nuts mag cookie-cutter copper. He’d been there, done that. And seen what it had almost cost him.

The job wasn’t for the weak-willed, he knew that when he signed up, but the Drugs Squad was one of the most full-on outfits in the force. He had gone into it looking for glory, for collars, for headlines. Knowing the rewards could be big, ignoring the fact that the failures could be bigger.

As a DC he had thrown himself into the life. One of the gang, never missed a night out whether it was playing pool or poker, off for a curry or out to a strip club. Bonding, he told himself. Helping to make them a team, a unit.

And what a unit they had been. What a force on the street. Cocks of the walk, the Met’s finest, like The Sweeney reborn, with Danny Dyer playing him in the film version. And with a clean- up rate second to none. And if some of their haul never made it to evidence, so what? Bit of charlie never hurt anyone. Perks of the job. And if one drug dealer was allowed to flourish at the expense of another because he kept the boys supplied with both information and product, how was that wrong? And if they made a little cash looking the other way occasionally, so what? No harm done in the great scheme of things.

Except there was. As his girlfriend pointed out one day when, blood running down his nose and the backs of his eyes feeling like they were pincushions for burning needles, he pulled his fist back and screamed that she didn’t have a fucking clue what she was talking about. And not for the first time. She made him see his life ahead of him. The ghost of Christmas yet to come. And it wasn’t pretty.

So that was it. Fix-up time. Get straight, ship out.

And he had. Narcotics Anonymous. Alcoholics Anonymous, too, just to be on the safe side. Even thought about church. But not very seriously. Took the sergeant’s exam, filled an opening up in Colchester, Essex. Played up the arrests, played down the rest. His girlfriend didn’t hang around, though, she’d had enough. But that was OK. He deserved it.

So, Colchester. Clean slate, new start.

He made a mental note not to keep trying too hard with his new squad members and checked his watch. Gone eleven. And he hadn’t eaten since God knows when. Well before he’d thrown up. Not even a cup of tea. As if on cue, his stomach rumbled.

He looked ahead. And smiled. A burger van was parked at the side of the road. He quickened his pace.

‘Bacon sandwich and cup of tea, please, mate,’ he said to the guy behind the counter. He was big, fat and greasy-looking. A bad advert for getting high on your own supply, thought Mickey.

‘You with that lot over there?’ the bloke said, slapping a couple of rashers of bacon down on the grill, standing back as they started to spit.

‘Yeah,’ said Mickey, staring at the bacon hungrily.

‘Looks pretty bad,’ the bloke said.

‘It is,’ said Mickey. ‘Very bad.’

‘If you’re gonna be here long,’ the bloke said, ‘send them over here. I’ll do discount.’

‘Cheers. You not busy, then?’

‘Been here since crack of dawn. Same as usual. Those places along the river start early. But the recession…’ He sniffed. ‘Customer’s a customer, innit?’ The bloke moved the bacon round the griddle, picking up old, black grease but still looking tasty.

‘It is,’ said Mickey, hoping the bacon wouldn’t take long.

‘What is it then, murder? Body or somethin’?

Mickey nodded. ‘Yeah. Awful.’ A thought struck him. ‘Hey, you’ve been here all hours. See any activity on the quay this morning?’

‘Like what?’

‘Dunno.’ He shrugged, tried to keep it light. ‘Vans, people coming and going. Maybe quickly, maybe acting like they shouldn’t have been there. That kind of thing.’

He stared at the grill, kept the bacon moving. ‘Don’t know nothin’ about that.’

At the bloke’s reaction, Mickey felt that thrill. The copper’s thrill, the one that meant a breakthrough.

‘You did, didn’t you?’

The bloke said nothing, just became intensely interested in the grill, willing the bacon to cook quicker, prodding it with his spatula.

‘What did you see?’

‘I… nothin’. Didn’t see nothin’. Keep me out o’ this.’

‘Listen. Someone’s been murdered over there. A young woman. It was the worst thing I’ve ever seen. In my life. Now, if you’ve seen something, you’d better tell me.’

He took the bacon off the grill, stuck it on a slice of white bread, slapped another one on top of it, put it on the counter. ‘On the house.’

Mickey sighed. ‘I didn’t want to do this, but…’ He shrugged. ‘Like you said, over there is swarming with coppers. Now, I can either direct them across to here when they get a bit hungry and thirsty or I can get this van impounded and off the road.’

The man held his spatula in the air. ‘What for?’

‘I’ll think of something. Health and safety’s a godsend for stuff like that.’

‘Bastard.’

‘Or…’

The man looked around the inside of his van like it was his own little kingdom, one he would never see again. He sighed. ‘All right, then. I’ll tell you.’

He did.

And Mickey got that tingle again, that frisson that said he was on to something. And it felt so damned good. He had forgotten just how good. In fact, he was in such a hurry to get back to the quay he almost forgot his bacon sandwich.

Almost.

11

Suzanne closed the door, put the bolts in place, the chain across, flattened herself against it. Sighed like she had been holding her breath underwater.

She looked down the hall of her flat. At first glance, everything looked the same as it always did, but, looking more closely, she noticed differences. Things had been moved out of place and not put back. Doors and drawers left open that she would usually have shut. And vice versa.

The police. She hoped.

This should have been the place she felt safe, could take refuge in. Not any more. There was nowhere she