Ferreira wanted to take him down inside but Adams vetoed the idea. She didn’t push it, not after he made it clear she shouldn’t even be there.
The fact that she’d done all the legwork on the attacks counted for nothing while she was under investigation and forbidden from any active involvement in the case. It stung, more than she’d admit, but she wanted to be here for this at least. Witness Lee Walton’s arrest, have him know she was the one who’d brought him down.
‘Don’t say anything, don’t do anything,’ Adams told her, as they approached the hospital’s main entrance, the four uniforms with them peeling off to take up discreet positions which would keep them out of direct sight as Lee Walton came through the doors.
‘What about if he gets you in a headlock?’ she asked.
‘Not even then.’
She shrugged. ‘Your funeral.’
Morning visiting hours were in progress. Friends and family coming and going, bringing food and magazines and faces plastered with worry as they passed the inevitable gaggle of smokers. Ferreira wanted a cigarette but didn’t know if she had time. It was the nerves as much as a nicotine craving; she could feel the adrenalin coursing through her veins and knew she wouldn’t get to use it.
This would be quick and clean, Adams insisted.
His phone bleated and he checked the display, whistled to put the waiting uniforms on guard. The nurse on Dani Shaw’s ward had confirmed he was there, arriving to take her home, had promised them a heads-up when he left.
A minute passed and Adams was getting antsy, watching the door.
Then they emerged, Dani Shaw painfully rising from the wheelchair and thanking the porter who’d brought her down, struggling to stand, her hand going to her bruised ribs. Walton took hold of her upper arm, appearing to steady her but Ferreira saw how tight his grip was as they walked out into the morning sun, his fingers squeezing harder still when Adams stepped into his path.
‘Alright, Lee, you know the drill.’
‘Are you fucking kidding me?’ he said. ‘I’m taking my girlfriend home. She’s had an accident. Don’t you people have any decency?’
‘We’ll see she gets home safely,’ Adams told him. ‘Which is more than you can do for her.’
The uniforms moved in, bristling at the promise of a ruckus. Walton looked at them, sneered.
‘Five of you?’ Flicked his eyes towards Ferreira. ‘Six, sorry. Didn’t see you there.’
Next to him Dani Shaw was visibly shrinking, waiting for some sign how to react, so completely ruled by the man that she couldn’t even decide for herself how she felt about what was happening.
‘Come along easy, or don’t,’ Adams said. ‘You know what I’d prefer.’
‘Are you arresting me?’
‘Lee Walton, I’m arresting you for the rape of Ryan Bhakta—’
Dani gasped, and at that the uniforms moved in, turned him and cuffed him as Adams finished his speech, spitting out the final words.
‘This is bollocks!’ Walton craned his neck towards Dani. ‘This is rubbish, babe.’
PC Jackson held his shoulder, the other hand on the cuffs, started walking him away. Walton was stumbling over his feet, trying to turn to Dani again.
‘Don’t listen to them.’ They marched him to a patrol car. ‘Don’t believe a fucking word that bitch says to you.’
She was crying, fat tears rolling down her cheeks, and she looked helpless, clutching a small pink wash bag with ‘Princess’ punched along its front in diamanté points, a plaster on the back of her hand where a cannula had been removed.
‘Dani, Sergeant Ferreira is going to take you home now, okay?’
She glared at Adams, eyes small and wet. ‘Why are you doing this to us?’
Adams sighed regretfully, frowned at her. ‘You know what he is, Dani, and you know what he’s capable of. This is what we do to men like him. We stop them.’
‘He didn’t rape a man. Whoever said that’s lying.’
‘DNA doesn’t lie.’
‘You made a mistake then.’ She looked to Ferreira, who showed Dani the most sympathetic face she could muster. ‘Lee isn’t like that. He wouldn’t. He just wouldn’t do that.’
‘It isn’t a mistake,’ she said, going over to her. ‘Come on, let me take you home. You don’t want to wait around here for a taxi, do you?’
Dani let herself be walked across the road, moving tentatively, holding her side. Ferreira opened the passenger door of her car and helped Dani in, seeing how she winced as she sat down.
Adams looked at her across the top of her car, waiting before he got into his own, said, quietly, ‘You’re the good cop, remember.’
Dani Shaw said very little on the drive through the city centre and Ferreira was glad the traffic was slow, Bourges Boulevard heavily congested, as usual, because she needed time to think, work out how she was going to get this woman to open up after she’d spent years covering for her boyfriend.
‘I broke a couple of my ribs once,’ she said. ‘There’s no pain like it, is there? Every time you breathe, you move. It’s like being stabbed.’
Dani didn’t answer but Ferreira kept going.
‘Did they give you a prescription for painkillers?’
‘Yes.’
‘We should stop and get it filled. The ones they gave you at the hospital will be wearing off soon.’
‘I don’t need to stop anywhere,’ Dani said, her high-pitched voice clogged with the tears she was swallowing down, trying to do what she thought Lee would want her to. ‘I’ve got plenty at home.’
‘Ibuprofen isn’t going to be up to the job, believe me. You need codeine at least.’
‘I’ve got codeine.’
From the last time he did this to her, Ferreira thought. But she didn’t say it. She was being the good cop and that meant biting her tongue until she could taste blood.
They passed the Crown court and the cathedral, Ferreira slowing again at another set of red lights.
‘That’s where he did it,’ she said, pointing to the entrance of the cathedral precincts. ‘Down there. He followed this man out of a club, knocked him down, smashed in his face, and raped him.’
Dani refused to look, staring down into her lap. ‘Lee isn’t gay.’
‘The man he attacked was dressed as a woman at the time.’ Ferreira pulled off again, over the crossing, towards the next one, but the lights changed, another stop. ‘Lee knew it was a man though. Underneath.’
‘I don’t believe you.’
‘We recovered Lee’s DNA from the man’s clothing. It was all over the dress the victim was wearing.’
‘You’re fitting him up,’ Dani said. ‘I know how you people work.’
Dani kept her eyes fixed dead ahead, but Ferreira could see her reserve wobbling, the dimples in her chin. She’d seen it at the hospital. There was more than just shock on Dani’s face. She’d been disgusted and Ferreira knew that somewhere, deep down, she knew it was true.
‘Did you know Lee was attracted to cross-dressers?’
‘He isn’t,’ she snapped.
‘Do you check his computer?’ Ferreira asked, flicking her indicator as she turned off the roundabout, going past the gasworks, the tower sitting low today. ‘You go through his search history?’
‘No.’
‘Never? You’re not curious what he looks at?’
‘No.’
‘You should be,’ Ferreira said. ‘It’d tell you everything about him.’
‘I know Lee.’
‘Yeah, you do, don’t you?’ Up onto the parkway, out towards Werrington, and she eased off the accelerator, buying more time.
Dani wasn’t reacting.
She was used to staying silent, Ferreira realised. Lee Walton had ground her down across the years, through a combination of threats and rewards. He’d broken her but hardened her too and getting through wasn’t going to be easy.
‘You’re worth more than this, Dani,’ she said softly. ‘How many times has he put you in the hospital?’
‘I fell.’
‘We’re not on record here,’ Ferreira said, tucking the car in behind a slow-moving lorry. ‘It doesn’t matter what you say to me. This is just us. But aren’t you scared he’s going to kill you one day? Or your son?’
‘He loves us.’
‘He’s using you. Your relationship makes him look respectable. You normalise him, Dani. And when he attacks someone you vouch for him.’ She brought her voice back down. ‘And how does he repay you for this? He beats you up.’
‘I told you, I fell.’
‘We both know that’s a lie. Why did he hit you this time?’
Dani’s fingers curled around the armrest on the door and she pressed her mouth shut. Ferreira could hear her breathing, slow and shallow, knew she was trying to minimise the swell of her lungs against her ribcage, but it was getting harder to do because she was agitated now.
‘You don’t need to keep defending him.’ They were at the edge of the estate. ‘He’s going to prison. He won’t be able to touch you any more.’
‘No.’
‘We can help you,’ Ferreira said, hearing the edge of desperation in her own voice. ‘There are charities, refuges, we can get you and Robbie far away from him. Don’t you want Robbie to have the very best chance he can in life?’
‘Lee’s his dad.’
‘And do you want him to grow up like that, too?’
‘We’re getting married,’ Dani said, fist striking her thigh.
‘No, you’re not. Lee’s going to be locked up. I promise you that. We’ve got him this time. No excuses, no doubts, he can’t bully this victim into backing down. He’s being questioned right now and charged and he’s going to go straight into prison and he will not get out.’ Ferreira pulled off the road, into a lay-by, turned to face Dani. ‘You don’t need to be scared of him any more.’
‘He said you’d do this. You’re trying to get inside my head.’
‘He doesn’t love you,’ Ferreira said. ‘If he loved you he wouldn’t want anyone else. He wouldn’t be roaming the streets raping people, would he?’
‘I want to go home.’
Ferreira took out her phone, found the photograph of Ryan Bhakta done up as Jasmine, smiling at the camera, all glitter and fake lashes and cheekbones.
‘This is what Lee wants.’ Dani recoiled from the image. ‘Do you see this dress he’s wearing? We’ve recovered Lee’s semen from it.’
Dani slammed her hand into the dashboard. ‘Shut up! Shut up, you lying fucking bitch!’
‘It’s the truth, Dani. Lee isn’t the man you think he is.’
Tears were running freely down Dani’s cheeks and she wiped them away angrily, her neck flushing, face burning.
‘Think about how he’s treated you. Is that love? Do you see that in films? Nobody ever made a romantic comedy about a man who breaks his girlfriend’s ribs.’
Dani buried her face in her hands, huge racking sobs shaking her shoulders and among them moans of pain as the tissue around her ribs screamed. How could she live like this? Ferreira thought despairingly. How could anyone exist in this bubble of physical pain and emotional desolation and still be convinced it was love?
‘You can move on, Dani. Find someone who deserves you. A good man, someone who’ll be the kind of father Robbie needs.’
‘I can’t.’
She shook her head but the fight was draining out of her.
‘Dani, listen to me. I want you to think of every time he raised a fist to you, every slap, every hair pull, every time he made you have sex when you didn’t want to. Think about every insult and threat and lie he told you.’ She was almost whispering, using the firm but quiet cajoling voice which cut through tears and anger. ‘I want you to think about the times he came home reeking of another woman, with blood on his clothes, and how wrong you knew that was. Remember how that felt? Not being able to question him, not daring to say anything. Think about everything you’ve taken from him and how strong you are, deep down, because a weak woman couldn’t have survived it. Think about all of that and tell me you don’t deserve better.’