As I stepped inside, Kathryn Brown said, “I thought you might be the police. Except maybe for…” She gestured to her own face, meaning she’d noticed my new scars. And who wouldn’t?
“The police?” Aye, check the innocent tone.
She led me through to the kitchen. The sliding French doors that led out to the rear of the property had been broken; glass shattered and spread out across the linoleum. “Happened before I came home. Five years I’ve been here, and no trouble.” She nodded out across the back garden to the silhouettes of the high rises. “Sometimes wonder if the problems are worse in people’s heads.”
I said, “Comes to us all sooner or later.”
She nodded. “You’re sure you’re not the police?”
I smiled. “Used to be.”
She nodded. “You have the walk.” She kept her back to me, started examining the shattered window, assessing the damage. A B&E, executed with no hint of subtlety.
I kept back. Looked around the kitchen. All the utensils were packed away. All the work surfaces sparkled.
Funny thing was, I would have expected more chaos in the wake of a B&E.
When I looked back at Kathryn Brown, she offered me a sad little smile and said, “I think I scared them off when I came home.”
“You saw someone here?”
She ignored the question: “When you mentioned Deborah, I was ready to shut the door in your face.”
“You know where she is.” Not a question. A statement of fact. She couldn’t argue with me.
“Who are you again?”
I pulled out a card, laid it on the kitchen worktop. She looked at it, but not closely.
“Unusual job,” she said.
“It pays the bills.”
“Oh? Surprised we don’t have more of you, then.”
“Discretion,” I said, “is the key.”
She smiled, picked up the card and slipped it into the inside pocket of her suit jacket. She moved to the sink, grabbed a glass from the draining board and poured herself a water straight from the tap. Let it run for a few moments before placing the glass in the stream.
Splash back bounced off her hand.
“Tell me why you left the police.”
I didn’t say anything.
“I mean, what kind of man gives up on that? Goes on to become –”
I had to smile. “Aye, I know the reputation we have. Sleazy. Last resorts. Ray Winstone plays us on the telly as overweight, out of shape and morally dubious. Think the profession would keep going if we were really like that?”
She smiled.
The temperature in the kitchen was close to freezing with that hole in the rear door.
“Really,” I said. “We need to talk about Deborah.”
“I haven’t heard from her in fifteen years.”
“Then why did you let me in? I turn up, say I know you’re hiding something, and you just let me waltz through your front door?”
“Couldn’t have you outside,” she said. “There’s a frost lying.” She led me into the living room. The room was lit by standing lamps from Ikea and the television was on Sky One. the volume turned low. A repeat of Stargate. She looked at the telly and then at me. Smiled uncomfortably and said, “I just like to have something on for the company. Why are you here and not the police?”
“The police never made the connection,” I said.
“And you? How did you make it? What’s your interest in any of this?”
“You mean am I just hunting glory?”
“It’s a big story. You find the missing girl, it means a lot of coverage and a lot of business.”
I nodded. “Remember the word discreet?” Business wouldn’t pick up. An investigator’s reputation with his clients often relies on their business not hitting the front pages.
She perched on the sofa across from me. Gestured for me to take a seat in the armchair opposite.
“I was looking into Mary’s disappearance,” I said. “Working with the police. Not in any official capacity. More as a…consultant.”
She looked at me, one eyebrow raising of its own accord. Aye, what reason did she have to believe anything I said?
Trying not to sound uncomfortable, I said, “I got involved because of a friend. A reporter working the story. He asked me to keep an eye on the situation.”
She nodded. “Hardly noble.”
I shrugged. “What is, these days? I was working the case, figured the connections with David Burns. And then I met a man who told me about your sister.”
She stiffened. Knew who he was before I said anything.
Of course she did.
You don’t forget a guy like Wickes.
“He came to me,” I said, repeating myself a little. Trying to force the fact we had no connection. Would I trust anyone who said he knew that bastard? “He’s looking for your sister. Get the feeling you know who I’m talking about? Calls himself Wickes.”
She nodded. Still didn’t say anything.
Who was to tell her I wasn’t working with Wickes?
I tried not to sound too much like I was begging for her belief. “He gave me some story about how your sister kidnapped her daughter. I don’t think it’s entirely true.”
“He’s unstable,” she said. “A head-case, you know?”
I almost said, “He says the same about her,” but caught myself in time.
Did this mean she believed me, or that she was testing me?
She looked at me with a flat expression.
I nodded. Reached up and touched the new scars on my face. “I guessed that one.”
“You got off lucky,” Kathryn Brown said. “He’s a killer.”
I nodded. Sat forward in my seat. Said, “Tell me.”
She hesitated.
“He’s looking for your sister,” I said. “If Wickes is as dangerous as I think he is, and half as smart, then he’s going to find her. She can’t keep running.”
I paused for a moment, let that one sink in. “I guess you already know that. She can’t do this alone. You can’t do this alone. Let me help you. Let me help her.”
“And Mary,” she said. “More than any of us.”