never asked me about Penderecki's boy.' Lowering herself back into the chair, she pushed her hair behind her ear, and dropped her eyes to the table. 'I thought we was going to talk,' she murmured, out of the side of her mouth.
'No.' He bent over and put his hands on the table, his face close to hers. 'No, Tracey. I'm tired of being dicked by your sort.'
'I know something.'
'I don't think so. You're lying to me, but it's not the first time and, believe me, it's no novelty to me.'
'1975,' she said, 'in the autumn.'
Caffery, who was taking a breath to reply, stopped. He stared at her, his eyes moving across her face. He shouldn't let himself be pulled in again she was just putting up another smokescreen and if Penderecki had told Carl about Ewan then there'd be no mystery about when it happened. But, of course, you can't let it go, can you. He sat down again, subdued, crumpling into the chair and putting his head in his hands. He sat like this for over a minute, resenting her, hating her, and wanting to hit her. 'Go on then.' He looked up, wearily drawing his hands down his face, knowing. 'Roll out the spiel.'
'Nah.' Lamb looked sullenly at him. She scratched under her armpit and sniffed loudly, looking around the room with her nose tipped up. 'Nah,' she said, looking at the ceiling. 'You need to try a little harder than that. 'S not that easy, is it?' She summoned up phlegm, spat into the polystyrene cup, wiped her mouth and raised her eyebrows at him. 'You've got to convince me. You've got to prove you ain't nothing to do with the dirty squad. Because it's funny how they come sniffing around right after you did, isn't it?'
He nodded, and sat looking at her, stroking his chin, a therapist assessing a patient. Had Tracey Lamb known more about him she would have stopped there. She wouldn't have blatantly fed his mood pure oxygen. 'Well?' she asked, cocking her head and smiling. 'Come on. It's your turn to be nice to me.'
And with that she'd crossed the line. It was too late. He sat forward and spoke very quietly: 'Don't dick with me, Tracey.' He said it into her face. 'Because if I ever see you on the street I'll kill you.'
'Oh,' she said archly, her lips white. 'Well, fuck you, then, cos maybe I don't know anything after all.'
'Well, what a surprise.' He got to his feet. 'The only difference is I mean what I say.'
He walked to the door, pulling up his sleeve to reveal the little security stamp. An officer appeared at his side, jangling keys on a long chain and guided him to a small black box, pushing his hand under the UV. 'Under the light. That's it.' The stamp on his hand lit up and she looped the keys, unlocked the door and held it open for him. He paused, half turning to look back to where Lamb stood, her hands on the table, glaring at him. She mouthed something and raised her eyebrows, but Caffery turned away, thanked the officer and carried on out of the door. He was trembling.
Fuck. Lamb fell back into the chair, kicking angrily at the table legs. She couldn't believe he'd gone. She had been so close. So fucking close. She looked around her, at all the mothers and the daughters and the babies, and knew she was alone. Totally alone.
She was sullenly sticking her fingernails in the side of the styrofoam cup when she saw the senior officer watching her. 'Yeah?' she said, raising her eyebrows sarcastically at her. 'What you staring at?'
Thirty-one.
The incident room was emptying for the day. Most of the computers had been turned off and Kryotos had washed up all the cups. She was already half-way out of the office, pulling on her jacket, when she saw him coming out of the lift. She knew Caffery. She knew not to argue with him when he had that look on his face. My God, that look. 'Come on, then,' she said, taking off her jacket without even waiting for him to speak. They went back into the incident room where she booted up the ageing PC and tapped in the new fields he gave her: prison sentences beginning in 1989, attacks on police officers using a knife or razor blade, and addresses in SW2, specifically addresses on the perimeter of Brockwell Park.
'Where'd you get all this, Jack?' Souness was in her braces and shirt-sleeves, a cup of coffee in one hand, a docket in the other. She'd wandered out of the SIO's room and come to stand behind Kryotos and Caffery. 'Where's this all been massaged from?'
'I dunno.' He didn't meet her eyes. 'Just a hunch.' Even as he said it he felt her eyes snap down on him, in that wry, all-seeing way of hers, and he had to turn his head slightly sideways so she couldn't look in through his face.
'Jack?' He moved away, towards the SIO's room, but Souness had him by the tail and she knew it. She could take her time working her way up, hand over hand. 'Don't walk away from me, Jack.' She followed him calmly. 'I know you too well.'
'Just a bit of fucking privacy, Danni.' He sat down at his desk. 'If that's not too much to ask.'
But she stood in the doorway, leaning against the frame, sipping her coffee. 'Jack Caffery's got a wee secret.' She looked over her shoulder, closed the door and came into the office. She put the coffee on the desk and bent down to him, her voice a low whisper: 'Jack, I wish ye'd tell me more.'
He pushed his face nearer hers, his voice matching hers. 'What ant I supposed to tell your he whispered. 'Danni?
'You're supposed to tell me if something's happening to ye something that could affect your future in the force.'
'OK, then,' he said, sitting back and opening his hands. At last it was happening. 'Come on out with it. I've been waiting for this.'
She shushed him, holding her finger to her lip. 'Why's the love of my life suddenly so interested in you, Jack? Why's Paulina started subtly bringing you into the conversation all the time?' She jerked her chin at the phone. 'I've just had her now, in her snaky little way bringing the conversation back to you.'
'I don't know, Danni. Do you?'
'Don't be sarcastic with me.' She looked at him, her chin dropped, her eyebrows raised. 'If she was just shopping around, looking for a bit of quick recreational dicking, I'd understand. You look like you could do the honours, I'll give ye that. But it's not that, is it? It's something else.'
He didn't answer. Souness's face was close to his.
He dropped his eyes and stared at his hand where it lay on the desk, opening and closing it. He didn't want to be the first to say it. He wanted her to have the opening shot.
'Who is it?' she said eventually. 'Eh? Who is it's got you looking like you want to blatter someone?'
'No one.'
'You're lying. You've been gone all afternoon and now you come back with a face ready to take someone apart. And it's the same person gave you those new parameters.'
He shook his head. 'No.'
'If something's happening I won't be coming to your aid. Ye do know that?'
'You won't have to.'
'I'll forget your name if it means I can cover my own arse.'
He nodded. 'It won't come to that. I promise.'
'Jack.' Kryotos was at the door, a cool smile on her face. Souness straightened like a guilty child, immediately dropping this hard-faced, ping-pong match.
'Marilyn,' Caffery pushed back his chair, 'what?'
'This.' She was holding a single page printout. 'Detained under Section 41 – a genuine loony tunes. Can I go home now?' She was right to be so smug. She had poured all the new search parameters into the database and out of the soup one name had bobbed up.
When Caffery saw it he shook his head. 'Shit.' He handed the paper to Souness. 'I know that name.'
No one answered the door. They'd hammered and called, and now, in the little uncarpeted landing, they had a silent audience of neighbours standing in the doorways, arms folded, the Brookside titles playing in living rooms behind them. Caffery lifted the letterbox and peered in.
'What do you think?' Souness murmured next to him. Neither she nor Caffery had mentioned Paulina all the way here. It was just as if they'd agreed to drop it until this was dealt with. 'Well?'
