The Fall - By Claire McGowan

Part Four



Charlotte

The next thing that happened was a trial date came through. Of course Dan didn’t tell her, wouldn’t even accept her letters, so Charlotte only found out when Hegarty phoned to let her know.

She was on her way to work, walking down Tottenham Court Road. ‘Pardon? Oh, sorry, the traffic is so loud. What did you say?’

‘The trial date. Just heard it on the grapevine. CPS’ll let you know, but I reckoned you’d want to hear soonest.’

She stopped walking. ‘When?’

‘October. They don’t like to hold big trials in summer.’

The traffic was deafening, and for a second Charlotte felt she might choke on the dust and fumes. ‘Does he know? Did they tell him?’

‘Well, sure, he’s meant to have time to prepare his defence.’

‘He needs a lawyer. Did he say he would get one?’

His voice was gentle down the line. ‘I only saw him for ten minutes, like. Didn’t really get on to that.’

Christ. She’d had such a sharp stab of hope when Matthew – DC Hegarty – agreed to go and see Dan in prison. But nothing had changed. No one talked about Dan. No one thought of him. It was as if he’d vanished from the world, and nobody even cared. Except her.

‘Charlotte? Get ready for your witness summons. Prosecution’ll almost definitely call you.’

Charlotte pictured them suddenly, waiting to testify, side by side in court and Dan across the room in a wooden box. ‘And Keisha?’

‘Not unless she makes a statement. I did look into her story, but . . .’

‘But?’

He sighed. ‘I couldn’t find anything. No taxi records, nothing.’

‘Oh. Listen, I’m so sorry about how rude she was when you came round. She’s just not ready. Could I – could we meet up again, not at my place? Another coffee or something?’

He didn’t ask why she wanted to see him again, and in the long pause she could hear her own heart beating.

‘Thing is, I’m about to go away for a while. Mate of mine’s getting married out in Australia.’ She heard him sigh. ‘Or dinner?’ he said finally. ‘If we can do it before I go – tomorrow, maybe? I know somewhere not far from you.’

She couldn’t breathe. ‘That would be lovely. Will you text me the place?’

No one in London made last-minute plans like that. But he’d offered and she’d said yes. She started walking again, on shaky legs.

Charlotte’s latest job was in a homeless shelter, and she was nervous. Odd to think of this place being here, just behind all the nice shops and the shiny company offices. It wasn’t far from her old office, in fact. Imagine seeing Chloe or Tory or someone on her way into a homeless shelter.

Then there it was. Just as it had hit her when she’d passed the engagement restaurant, she’d turned a corner and the bar was there. That was the problem with always working and going out in the same area – soon the streets became almost haunted, crawling with the ghosts of old lovers and friends, old nights out. Old kisses. And she’d forgotten, in all her worries, she’d forgotten that she had to avoid this street.

Although the morning was muggy, Charlotte shivered in her white work shirt. Let’s go to Q, he’d said. I’ve got a card. We can have a nice quiet chat there. And she, God help her, only a week in her first big PR job and still excited at having a desk and an in-tray and an email address, she’d thought he was gay – if she’d even thought of it at all. He wore cardigans, for God’s sake. He drank Vodkatinis and called everyone ‘sweetheart’. And then when she realised she was wrong, well, it was too late, and she was staggering to the tube the next day in her heels and dress, making up some lie to Dan about having to stay at Chloe’s.

Oh God. There it was, shuttered and closed, and the space in her mind was as raw as ever, like the soft bit in her jaw where the tooth was missing. Oh God, bloody hell. But she was already late, so she had to swallow the shock of the memory and walk on, thinking, The bastard, the f*cking bastard.

Outside the homeless shelter people were gathered, a group of men and women with cans of Stella in plastic bags. She kept her head down, walking fast, and heard one of the woman saying something like, ‘Can I borrow your Visa card?’ and they all laughed. Blushing, she buzzed in, wishing she could lose whatever it was about her that so screamed middle-class. Whatever she wore and even if she tried not to say things like ‘Pardon’, they could always spot it a mile off.

The woman who came to meet her, ‘Just call me Trina’, clearly thought Charlotte was middle-class too. Like many of the clientèle she had dreadlocks, even though she was white, and tattoos on her arms. ‘What happened to Irina? We always get Irina.’

‘Er, she went back to Poland, I think.’

‘Oh.’ Trina looked Charlotte up and down. ‘Well, come on.’

She’d moved into the dining room and the noise was so loud Charlotte couldn’t hear her. ‘Pardon?’ Oh, crap.

Trina glared at her. ‘You’re on lunches, I said. Ever been in a homeless shelter?’

‘Course,’ Charlotte lied, following her into the bleach-smelling kitchen. She was a bit sick of people like Trina disapproving of her, to be honest. It wasn’t her fault she’d gone to nice schools, was it?

Lunch was beans, of course, it was always beans, the better to ruin your good Oasis shirt with. It was like any other job, really, putting out bread rolls, ladling gloop, emptying and washing all the massive pots till her hands were raw and stinking of detergent. She tried to be nice, like on every job, smiling and saying, ‘Would you like beans? Bread roll?’

Also like on every job, she was doing everything wrong, apparently. They weren’t allowed butter and jam, Trina said. She shouldn’t smile at them. ‘It’ll create attachment. They need boundaries, yeah?’

A great queue of people passed her ladle of beans, skinny shaking men (drugs, abuse), loud women with dirty hair and no teeth (drink, family breakdown). After an hour her hand ached and her face was sweating. All in all, a long way from happy Charlotte Miller, the girl who’d gone to the club that night just a few months ago. About to be married, so happy she was sure the world ought to spin round on her axis. So it wouldn’t be surprising if someone who’d seen her before didn’t recognise her. But then, she didn’t know him either, not really. After all, she’d only seen him in a blurred picture from a phone, and maybe, once, pushing past her into an alley.

He was far down the end of a long straggling line, when Charlotte was long past gagging at the smells of bad breath and unwashed clothes, and had already lost all feeling in her hand from ladling. ‘Beans or sweetcorn?’ She wasn’t even looking up. ‘Beans or sweetcorn?’ A bit more impatient this time, since there were still about twenty people waiting.

The man on the other side was thin, and had a shaved head, but he didn’t have that engrained grime of the streets, the teeth rotting and falling out. Trina had said not everyone who came to eat was on the streets; sometimes they were ‘experiencing negative financial situations’. She really did say things like that.

‘So . . . beans?’ She tried again. The guy’s hands were trembling, maybe he was a druggie. He was staring at her and she began to feel uncomfortable. Maybe Trina was right about not being too nice. His eyes were very blue, she noticed. Had she seen them before somewhere?

‘Naw . . . naw. Sorry.’ Muttering, he pushed out of the line, spilling some of his tea onto the floor.

Charlotte looked round at the hovering Trina, who was tutting at the spillage. ‘Someone’ll have to clean that up, it’s against health and safety.’

‘What was all that about?’

‘Who knows?’ Trina was dialling for cleaners. ‘Had a guy once who thought I was his mother. Convinced of it, he was. Never mind, just get the rest served.’

The thing was, she thought she’d seen him somewhere before. That smell, like sweat but something sweeter, a type of cologne. She’d smelled it before. It stood out among the reek of boiled food and unwashed clothes like a streak of glitter in the air. When she’d finished serving and went to clear the dirty plates, she searched the room for the guy with blue eyes. But there was no sign of him at all.

The next thing that happened was Sarah came.

Charlotte was exhausted after her shift at the homeless shelter. On top of the usual bodily tiredness she had from every job, aching right down her back and into her feet, there was something else. She had never understood just how much hopelessness there was in the world. So many people with hands shaking, eyes staring, teeth falling out. And what was she even doing in that place? She’d been to a good university. Her father worked in banking. Just two months ago she’d had a job in shiny offices a stone’s throw from the shelter. From the place where all hope had drained away like fat down the sink.

Charlotte dragged herself off the tube, then stopped. It was afternoon, the days long and gentle, summer at its height. Had she heard something? She paused at the turning to her street and looked over her shoulder. She could have sworn she’d heard footsteps.

The road was empty behind her, a summer breeze rustling in the trees. But she thought of the man with the blue eyes, and walked quickly away. There was something about his smell – why couldn’t she remember?

She reached her flat bone-weary and scrabbled around in her bag for the keys. She noticed that the strap on her Mulberry bag, so lovely when new, was fraying from being scuffed around on kitchen floors and bundled into staff lockers. Was it hopeless for her too? Or did having a trial date mean hope of Dan’s release? Ten years at least, he’d said. And although DC Hegarty hadn’t told her much about his visit, she guessed Dan hadn’t been in a good way then either.

Keisha was in the kitchen when she went in, yawning and boiling the kettle. Charlotte registered that she was still in her work T-shirt.

‘You’re late back,’ Charlotte said. ‘It’s three o’clock.’

Keisha didn’t meet her eyes. ‘You wanted me to hang about, didn’t you? The boss, he’s showing me cooking.’

‘That’s this Ronald guy? The brother?’

‘Huh? Yeah.’ Keisha fiddled with the tea bags.

Charlotte thought of the man with blue eyes, and considered for a moment telling Keisha. But what was the point in scaring her? It was no one, just some loser, just her imagination. ‘Listen. Dan’s trial date’s through. It’s in October.’

Keisha stopped with a mug in her hand. ‘So what now?’

Charlotte sat down on the sofa, struggling under the weight of it all. The hopelessness. It was like she’d carried it home on her skin. ‘Need to find a lawyer, persuade Dan to plead Not Guilty . . . And your statement.’

The kettle shut off with a snap and Keisha poured the water out, ignoring Charlotte. ‘You want one of your smelly perfume teas?’

Christ, it was never going to end. She’d be forty and still here in this flat, with Keisha moaning about the tea bags. ‘I need your statement.’

‘Eh?’

‘Keisha – will you just stop for a second? It’s been months now. Are you going to help or not? Can you not even just write it down, to have like a dossier?’

‘A what-ier?’

Charlotte glared at her – she knew by now that Keisha was about ten times quicker than she acted. ‘You want Ruby back, don’t you?’

‘You know I do. For f*ck’s sake. S’complicated.’

‘Well, then you have to tell your side. Explain about Chris. We should both write down everything we know, before we forget. Look, they won’t want to keep Ruby, will they? Not if they think it’s OK to turf her back to you. Cheaper, isn’t it?’

Keisha narrowed her eyes. ‘She’s safe where she is,’ she muttered. ‘Anyway, you still didn’t tell me what you saw that night.’

Charlotte pushed away the thought of the man. ‘I told you, it’s hazy.’

‘Just seems weird, you still wouldn’t remember, after all this time.’

‘Well, that’s how it is. Come on. PR them a bit,’ said Charlotte, handing her a pen. ‘I don’t know much, but I know how to do this.’

That was when Sarah arrived. They weren’t expecting anyone – obviously, no one ever dropped in on you in London. So when the buzzer went, Charlotte’s heart thumped, thinking of the paint on her step, the footsteps behind her . . .

Keisha froze too. ‘Who’s that?’

‘I don’t know.’

‘Well, get it.’

‘Hello? Hello?’ Charlotte’s heart slowed when she heard Sarah’s bossy tones on the intercom. Then she thought, Oh crap, Mum’s sent her to check up on me. She buzzed the door open and peered down as Sarah climbed the stairs. ‘What are you doing here? What a surprise.’

Her step-sister stomped up and hugged her efficiently. She was in her cycling gear and carrying her ugly helmet under one arm. ‘Gail said she called here and some girl answered. You know, she worries.’

Keisha was managing to blend into the cupboards. ‘Er, yeah. That was me.’

‘Keesh, this is my step-sister,’ Charlotte said. ‘Sarah, Keisha’s staying with me. She’s like, a friend.’ A friend? Flatmate? How the hell would you explain what it was that brought them together? Sarah was looking at Keisha in an imperious way that was about five seconds from pissing her right off, Charlotte could see. ‘Keisha just made some tea.’

Sarah was peering round the flat. ‘I’ll take mint, thanks. Did you get rid of your cleaner or something, Char?’

‘Sarah – sit down, will you? I just heard that Dan’s trial date’s come through.’

‘I know. That’s why I came.’ Sarah plonked down her helmet and Keisha brought the mint tea, at arm’s length.

Of course, Sarah always knew everything through work, that was her thing. And bloody annoying it was too. ‘How was Bangladesh?’

‘Hot. Smelly.’ Sarah kept staring at Keisha, blowing on the tea to cool it. She swallowed, and made a face. ‘Hard to go back after real mint tea.’

Charlotte didn’t dare look at Keisha. ‘Work’s OK?’ That was usually good for a half-hour rant.

‘Don’t have time to draw breath, as per. One a.m. I got home last night.’

Once Charlotte had tried to play this game with Sarah, totting up how many extra hours she did and how busy and important she was. Now, through Keisha’s eyes, she saw how stupid it was. She raised her eyebrows at Keisha in a silent apology. ‘Listen, now you’re here, Sarah, I had an idea. The trial’s coming up, and there’ll probably be a lot of media interest, yeah?’

‘Yep. It’s on our calendar.’

‘So, I was thinking about doing some counter-PR. To tell my side. I know you’re not allowed to be biased about the case, but you could interview me, couldn’t you?’

Sarah put down her cup barely touched. ‘Is that such a good idea? Dan’ll be crucified by the press. Everyone hates bankers just now. They blame them for the recession. Even us – we laid off twenty reporters last month. And for God’s sake, he killed a black guy. You must see. Gail said you already got fired over it, and most of your friends won’t talk to you.’

‘I didn’t get fired. And he’s not been convicted, so can you please not say he killed someone?’

Sarah was giving her a pitying look. ‘They have his prints, and the CCTV. I’m sorry, but you need to face it. Didn’t he tell you himself to let him go?’

With difficulty, Charlotte kept her voice calm. ‘Keisha was there that night. She’s got evidence. Really, we don’t think Dan did it.’

‘Hmm. So that’s why she’s here.’

‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ Finally Keisha spoke, from where she was backed into the kitchen corner.

Sarah laughed. ‘Nothing. Just that Gail may have been right for once.’

Charlotte said, ‘Sarah, please . . . I need your help. Please help me. It’s Dan, for God’s sake. You know Dan.’

‘OK.’ Sarah sighed. ‘Bloody hell. Send me what you have and I’ll see. But I can’t go out on a limb, OK? Even for you, I can’t.’

Charlotte felt awful. ‘I know. I know. But I have to at least try, do you not see that?’

‘I suppose.’ Sarah patted her shoulder awkwardly. ‘We just hate to see you do all this for him, when he might be a killer. Your job, Charlotte! Doesn’t that matter to you? I mean, are you really working as a waitress now?’

‘It’s just a blip.’ Charlotte was staring at her work-roughened hands, trying hard not to cry.

‘Listen, I can’t stay. Call Gail, will you? Even your dad’s been on to her.’

‘He has?’ Charlotte hadn’t contacted her father since their disastrous dinner. As far as she was concerned, he was just some other person who’d let her down.

‘And you need a lawyer. Jamie might know someone – he’s worried too. I went to see them last week.’

‘You did? Oh. I didn’t know.’ Jamie was Charlotte’s brother, not Sarah’s, but she hadn’t seen him in months.

‘Yeah, well, don’t take it the wrong way, but everyone’s very upset by what happened.’ Sarah was getting up and starting the laborious task of donning her cycle gear. ‘So you’ll call them? Everyone’s worried about you. I’m working flat-out and I still came round.’

Worried about you. It sounded nice but it was just another way to say they thought you’d ruined your life, wasn’t it?

‘Guess you’re right,’ said Keisha, after Sarah had clumped down the stairs.

‘Hmm?’ Charlotte was still sitting there, a little shell-shocked.

‘We need to write it down. No one believes stuff if it’s not written down, do they?’

‘No.’ She dragged herself up. ‘Sarah’s right, sort of. I’m going to ring my parents.’

Gail was in full flow. ‘Oh darling, you know you’ve always been just a bit naïve. Dan did take care of you, but now I worry. Some of these people are just waiting to take advantage of a girl like you.’

A pause. ‘What do you mean, like me?’

‘Well, darling, you have that big flat, and I imagine his parents will see you right, even if your father won’t. And, well, you’ve never been so good at looking after yourself, have you? Remember at college, when you had all that mould in your kitchen, and I had to come down and clean it?’

‘For God’s sake, Mum, I was eighteen!’ This was rich coming from a woman who wouldn’t even drive on her own when her husband left her. They’d taken buses for a year until Phil came along, Charlotte and her mother and Jamie.

‘You know what I mean. Sarah says he won’t even see you at that place.’ She could hear her mum’s pursed lips. Bloody Sarah! She deserved to break another toe, if not all of them.

‘He’s ill, Mum. They think he might have epilepsy. It’s just not right, him being in there.’

Gail hesitated. ‘It just seems, darling, that if he doesn’t want you to go—’

‘What?’

‘Maybe you shouldn’t.’

‘And just leave him there?’

‘Oh, I know, it’s so hard! I thought he was wonderful too, dear, at the start anyway – although last time we saw you he was odd, wasn’t he, quite cold and jumpy. I actually said to Phil . . . Well, anyone can be wrong, sweetie. Look at me and your father.’

Charlotte gritted her teeth. OK, a lot of what Gail said was true, but he was still her dad.

‘And then this strange girl just moving in with you. Sarah already told me. What is she anyway, half-caste?’

‘MUM! You can’t say that!’

‘I don’t know anyone like that, do I? What should I say? Coloured?’

‘No, for God’s sake. She’s mixed-race. Why do you have to call her anything?’

‘Because, darling, it’s what she is.’ It was blindingly obvious to Gail, and Charlotte suddenly wondered, was she the same? Was part of her desperately aware that Keisha was different to her, and handling the fact as carefully as a porcelain vase? But you couldn’t help how you thought, surely. It was what you did and said that mattered. Wasn’t it?

Although Charlotte rang off from her mother dazed and confused, Gail’s final comment had struck home: ‘Call your father, why don’t you? It’s about time he did something for you.’ And she was right. It was.

Charlotte had never been good at working out time differences. She’d always asked Dan before, and now she got it wrong, phoning her father’s apartment at what was about four in the morning, Singapore-time.

‘Wei?’ A woman’s voice. Did she have the wrong number?

‘Hello? Is Jonathan there? Sorry, I don’t speak . . .’

The woman switched to English, with an accent. ‘Charlotte?’

‘Yes! Er – Stephanie?’

‘Yes.’ There was a long pause. ‘How are you? I’m sorry about your wedding.’

‘Thank you. It was bad, yes.’ Stephanie hadn’t been invited, since Gail had flat-out refused to go if ‘that Dutch woman’ came. ‘Actually, things aren’t great, Stephanie. Dan, he, well, he won’t see me. He won’t get a lawyer, and his trial date’s just come up.’

‘Ah. You want your father.’

‘Please. I’m sorry, is it early there? I never know.’

‘Yes. But we get up early.’ Stephanie set the phone down and spoke a different language – Dutch? Did her father know Dutch? She tried to picture him in this flat she’d never seen, with this woman only dimly remembered from when she was ten. Charlotte had spent the whole of their dinner at the Hard Rock Café leaning in to catch her perfume smell, deciding that when she was grown up she’d also walk round in a cloud of lovely scent.

‘Hello?’ Her father always sounded gruff on the phone. ‘It’s the middle of the night.’

‘I’m sorry, Dad. I messed up the time difference.’

‘Never mind, we’re up now. Are you all right?’

She hesitated. ‘Not really, no. Can you help me?’ She remembered how she’d called him Daddy when he came to her house that day, and felt she might cry again. ‘I need to find a lawyer for Dan. He won’t get one himself – and I can’t afford to pay for it.’

‘All right, let’s not get upset.’

‘S-sorry.’ Her father hated crying. ‘Do you know anyone, any lawyers?’

‘It would have to be a good criminal barrister, preferably with appeal experience. You’ve left it rather late, I’m afraid.’

‘I’d have to trust them too. I mean, the way the evidence looks . . . they’d have to believe me.’

She heard her father hold the phone away and speak the other language again. She waited. ‘All right. Stephanie knows someone here. Australian girl, qualified in the UK, she says. Not a full QC yet, on the young side, but in your financial situation, well . . . And I suppose we can discuss some help with fees, too.’ He said it grudgingly. ‘Although I should warn you I can’t cover it all.’

‘But how would I meet her?’

‘You’d come out here, of course.’

Had her father ever asked her to visit before? ‘Really? But I can’t . . .’

‘I’ll help out with the fare. You can get away? Your mother said you weren’t working any more.’

‘I am, actually, but I can get off. When?’

‘You’d need to instruct as soon as you can. It’s quite late already.’

‘Oh, OK.’ They made more small talk – something her father was truly awful at – and she hung up and went back into the kitchen, feeling dazed.

Keisha was back on the sofa with Friends on, her feet up on the table again, an open bottle of Coke leaking rings onto the cream carpet beside her. Charlotte thought about what her mother had said: People are just waiting to take advantage, darling. On the table was another sheet of printer paper. It looked as if Keisha had started on her statement, this most vital document, and given up after a few lines.

‘Listen, Keisha, I think I might have to sell the flat, when I get back.’ She was surprised to hear herself say it. But how else would she help Dan, without making sacrifices?

Keisha didn’t seem to take it in. ‘Oh yeah? Back from where?’

‘I’m going to Singapore,’ Charlotte said, marvelling to herself that it was true.

Keisha didn’t look up. ‘What’s that, a takeaway?’

Did she say them on purpose, these things? Was she really going to let this girl stay here in her house, with all her things, while she was gone? And what about the man? But no, it was nothing. Her imagination. Charlotte looked down at the scrawled-on piece of paper again. ‘It’s a country. I’m going away for a while.’

Charlotte had decided to make an effort for her meeting with DC Hegarty the next day. Maybe because she was tired of looking at her own face, worn and sullen, tired of pulling on and off the same frayed pair of jeans. It was sort of nice to get dressed up again.

Keisha watched Charlotte drying her hair into loose curls. ‘You fancy him or something?’

Charlotte shot her a look. ‘He might be able to help.’ But suddenly she was embarrassed by the black slingbacks she’d paid so much for, and the mist of perfume drying on her neck. What was she doing? ‘It’s rude not to dress up for dinner,’ she said snootily, and saw Keisha raise a cynical eyebrow. Sighing, Charlotte tousled her hair one last time and ran down the stairs to meet him at Kentish Town. No cabs now; she laced on her trainers and carried her heels wrapped up in a Tesco’s bag. It was starting to rain so she held her bag over her head. When she got to the bus stop near the restaurant she leaned awkwardly on the slanted bench and pulled on the heels – the first time she’d worn them since That Night. The night when everything went wrong.

He was waiting in the place he’d chosen, checking his watch and looking nervous. It was a small and cheap Malaysian restaurant with fairy lights on the wall, and it was BYO so she wondered if he’d picked it because it wouldn’t cost much and he would try to pay.

He was anxious. ‘It looks a bit, you know, I know, but the food’s good, I promise.’

She flipped open her menu. ‘It’s fine. I like it.’

‘I’m sure you’re used to something fancier.’

‘Honestly, I like it.’ Suddenly she wasn’t at all bothered what she ate. She looked up at him. He met her eyes and looked quickly away.

‘Drink? I got wine, beer . . . Whatever you like.’

They didn’t talk about the case, as it turned out. A tea-light was placed on their small table, panpipe music in the background. They were almost the only people there in the quiet of the rainy night. The food when it came was sweet and hot on her tongue. Charlotte ate as if starved, sweet potato and coconut and fluffy roti bread. It was spicy, but damned if she’d let him see, she sipped her drink discreetly. He’d brought red and white wine as well as beer. ‘I didn’t know what you’d want.’

Afterwards she could never remember what they talked about for so long, just the soft roll of his Cumbrian accent, smudged round the edges with London, and how his wiry forearms sat on the table, shirtsleeves pushed up, the chink of his metal watch against his beer bottle. Looking up and looking away, each time with a lurching certainty in the pit of her stomach that she hadn’t just come about Dan. She almost didn’t even want, in the drowse of the beer and candlelight, to bring it up. What kind of person was she? She tried to focus. ‘Listen, my dad just asked me to go to Singapore, to meet this lawyer he knows.’

‘That’s good. Will he see them?’ Neither of them seemed to want to say Dan’s name.

‘Who knows?’ She laughed thinly. ‘I have to try. I think I’m going to have to sell the flat to pay for it.’

‘Well, getting away for a bit, that’ll do you good.’ He sounded like her mother.

‘Sure. You said you were off to Australia soon?’

‘In a few days.’

‘Well, I was thinking . . . do you come back by Singapore?’

His voice was casual. ‘Haven’t decided yet. There, or Hong Kong.’

‘Well, if you do – maybe I’ll be there too.’ God, he was making it hard. ‘I could show you about.’

‘I don’t know if it’d be that easy.’ He looked wary.

‘Why not, if we’re both there?’

‘Well, if we are. I dunno.’ He laughed. ‘You rich girls. Let’s meet up halfway round the world, just like, all right, let’s meet up for coffee.’

‘I can’t see why not.’

He thought about it. ‘Suppose I can’t either, now you put me on the spot.’

‘OK then.’ They applied themselves to the food for a while.

‘Why did you go into the police?’ she asked, chewing.

He tore off a piece of bread and offered it to her. He said, ‘I worked in an office first, for a year. When I left school. We don’t go to uni in my family. Waste of money, my dad said.’

‘My dad would’ve killed me if I hadn’t gone.’

‘I’ll bet. So this office, it was selling toilet seats. Bathroom fittings, you know. “Hello, Bathroom World.” That was me. Solitaire, soggy sandwiches, crap coffee – mind you, I still get that now. But I thought, Sod this, I can’t spend the rest of my life smelling Alan in Accounts and his pickled onions.’

‘My office was like that,’ she said, thinking how young he seemed, compared to Dan. ‘Everyone was sort of really shiny and never ate anything, never mind pickled onions, but it’s still other people all day long, clearing their throats and going on Facebook – you know.’

He nudged the chicken closer to her, cooling in its thick coconut and coriander. ‘Have a bit more there.’

‘I’m stuffed, thanks.’

‘You don’t miss it then – your work?’

She thought about it. ‘Maybe just having to look nice every day, having somewhere to get up for.’

‘You look lovely now,’ he said, and blushed violently. ‘I’ll get the bill.’ She took out her little designer purse, and he said, ‘Please, don’t.’

‘But—’

‘No. Please, Charlotte. I invited you.’

Touched by his pride, she let him pay. ‘Thanks. It was nice, wasn’t it? I ate tons.’

‘You need it,’ he said. When the bill was paid he crunched one of the hard white mints left on the saucer. ‘So. You didn’t want to see me to get my thrilling life story.’

She was almost sorry he’d brought it up. ‘The thing is, I think I’ve found out a few new things.’ She could see his face change. ‘I know it must be annoying, but you see, this is his life – Dan’s.’ It felt so bad to say Dan’s name between them, at the table they’d sat at for two hours gone.

‘Tell me,’ Hegarty sighed.

‘Well.’ Charlotte didn’t know how to begin. ‘After you came last time, and Keisha was sort of . . . you know. Well, she found out a few more things.’ And she told him about the gang rumours and the club owing money and the blue-eyed man at the shelter, how she thought maybe she’d been followed. ‘I don’t know for sure, but I thought . . . I sort of thought I’d seen him that night. At the club. I didn’t tell Keisha. She’ll never make her statement if she thinks he’s back. God, that sounds awful, doesn’t it?’

He said nothing for a while. ‘This is very dangerous, what you’re doing. You and your friend.’

‘She’s not my friend – I mean, she’s involved. She came to me. It’s her life too, you see. He killed her mum, you know that?’

‘Sorry, I didn’t know that, not at all.’ He folded up his wallet with maddening calm. ‘I’m telling you, it’s very dangerous to sniff around men like Chris Dean.’

‘But we’re not. Keisha just works at the club. She’s allowed to work there.’

Again he stayed so calm, as she was becoming increasingly petulant.

‘Of course. But please, both of you, be careful. If it’s like you say, he’s very violent, this man.’

‘I told you what he did to their little girl?’

‘Yes. So you see, you need to be careful.’

‘You believe me then? You’ll look into it?’

He was quiet for a long time. ‘I put him away – Dan. It was my case.’

‘So? You want him in jail even if he’s innocent?’ Something burst up in her, anger, terrible fear, and she stood up to go.

‘Wait!’ He held up his hands. ‘That’s not what I meant. I can’t use anything you got by deceit or trespassing.’

‘She works there! There’s this guy, Ronald, he’s the brother of the man who died.’ She still couldn’t say who was killed. ‘Ronald will give you a statement, I’m sure of it. So – anyway . . . You should call him.’ She fumbled in her bag for Ronald’s business card, swiped by Keisha off his desk. ‘Please, just ask if he’s found out anything. He won’t come forward, it’d be like betraying his community. You see?’

‘You don’t wear your ring any more,’ he said, catching up her hand, the cuticles ragged from biting.

Immediately she was angry. ‘It’s none of your business. You’re the police, aren’t you? I’m asking you to look at new evidence, real evidence, and you just – I don’t know why I pay taxes.’

He almost laughed at this, as she threw on her raincoat and jangled furiously out of the door.

‘Wait, Charlotte – come back!’

Charlotte marched to the bus stop, ears ringing with anger. How dare he – how incredibly rude. After a few steps she realised it wasn’t just chill rain running over her face – she was crying. Screw him. Screw them all, as Keisha would say. F*ck ’em.

‘Wait! Charlotte!’ She turned. The candy colours of the traffic-lights were shiny with rain, the gutters rushing with it, and DC Matthew Hegarty was chasing her down the street in Camden, in just his shirt. ‘Please wait.’ He caught her sleeve, breathless. He smelled of strong mint, and schoolboy aftershave, the heavy drenched smell of the rain.

He was so different from Dan, this policeman. He looked so young, with his Adam’s apple working over his collar and eyes so intense, as if they couldn’t look at anything but her. His hand was still holding the arm of her raincoat and his shirt was getting soaked in the rain, a cheap shirt, his thin body showing pink underneath. How long was it since someone had run after her down the street, since someone had looked at her like this? Years. Maybe never.

‘Wait,’ he said again. She put her hand to his chilled face, cold as bone, and he shivered. She was so very cold, she realised, and so very lonely, so very tired.


Hegarty

All the way on the plane from Australia, Hegarty couldn’t settle. He kept thinking everyone knew what he was up to, that it was only his second time flying, like that stewardess with all the make-up who kept smiling at him. ‘Everything all right, sir?’

‘Grand.’ In fact, he couldn’t sit still. The cramped seat wasn’t kind on his six-foot-one frame; he felt like a piece of paper stuck in a too-small envelope. He ate all the foil-packaged meal they brought on a tray, beads of moisture clinging to the butter, joggling his bony elbows into the fat bloke on the other side. Then he put on the eyemask and the socks and blew up his travel pillow and tried to sleep, but his body didn’t understand what time it was, and anyway he was too excited about it all, his first proper foreign holiday, Tom’s wedding behind him, and then as if that wasn’t enough – Singapore. Singapore and her. He must have slept then because he was woken up some time later by the shades going up on a harshly pure light, and the stewardess handing him another foiled-wrapped tray of almost identical food; breakfast.

Staggering off the plane, Hegarty breathed in new air that was free of recycled farts. There was a smell that was nothing like England, a hot and wet frying smell like the end of a sizzling day. He was here, and so was she.

After the night of the rain, he’d known he had to tell someone. It was against regulations, it must be, and if there was anything he was good at, it was sticking to regulations. He wasn’t Maverick Mike, doing it old-school, sharing cigs and punches with suspects on the way to the station.

As discreetly as he could, he looked into it. Was there anything in the rules about not meeting up with a girl in an exotic foreign country, if it just so happened you’d booked her fella a few months back for murder? If chances were you’d have to testify against him come the trial, was there any guidance on it being OK to take his missus out for dinner and then chase her down the street in the rain like something out of f*cking Notting Hill? And he would have kissed her then, he knew it, if she hadn’t pulled away.

He couldn’t find anything specific. Maybe because no officer’d even been so stupid before. He was sure they all knew, too. The lads in the station stopping a laugh just when he walked up to make himself a drink. Of maybe he was paranoid. He tried asking the boss during their ‘chats’ if there’d been any talk about the daft DC and the killer’s missus, but the boss, missing the point, just told him earnestly what a ‘valued member of the team’ he was. Hegarty couldn’t think how else to bring it up.

There were other worries on his mind, too, especially after what Charlotte had said. ‘Sir? You ever have any doubts on this Kingston Town case?’

The boss looked worried. ‘Why? Have the press been about?’

‘No, not that.’ As if the press were the worst thing that could happen. ‘You know, there was that other case, same MO. And you know the other witness from Kingston Town?’

The Inspector looked like he was struggling to remember. ‘The white fella?’

‘Yeah. I, er, might have some intell on him. Off the record.’ He couldn’t meet the boss’s eyes.

‘The name?’

‘Christopher Dean.’ He felt like he was betraying Charlotte, saying it.

‘Hmm. Can you get it on record?’

‘Dunno. Maybe.’

‘You’re doing a great job, Matthew,’ said the boss heartily. ‘Carry on.’

‘You like Stockbridge for it, then?’

Bill Barton hadn’t risen so far without choosing his words carefully. ‘That’s who we’ve got, isn’t it? You made a case.’

Yes, he’d made it. That was the problem. Hegarty cleared his throat. ‘OK, sir. Getting nowhere on that second stabbing. The victim’s recovering though, so we could try him again with E-fit. You know I’m off on Friday.’

‘Oh, yes. The Land of Oz. Well, chuck some steaks on the barbie for us, eh?’

‘Yessir.’ The guy had no idea. Sometimes Hegarty was jealous of that.

Now here he was again, at the end of a week of barbies and crocodile watching and whatever else Tom’s new missus had set up. He’d barely slept, spaced-out with jet lag and drinking. His second wedding in less than a month and what was he doing? There’d been girls at the wedding, of course, a never-ending stream of them chucked out by Lizzy and Tom. On the way to the airport they’d even said, ‘So, nobody catch your eye then?’

‘Thanks, I’m sorted,’ he heard himself say. And that was the truth of it. He wasn’t interested in any of these Marys or Kellys or whoever, because there was just no room left. That position had already been filled.

Hegarty put up with the slowness of the passport queue and the trundle-trundle of the baggage wheel. He nearly grabbed his passport back off the immigration man, and then finally he was out into the big glassy airport, and there was a girl waiting by the fountain. She was standing with her back to him, wearing a denim dress, red belt. Sunglasses on top of her fair head, curls damp on her neck.

Hegarty’d never understood it when people said that their heart skipped a beat or that their heart stood still or any of that crap. But when he walked into Singapore airport arrivals hall, sweaty and crumpled in his shorts and Burton T-shirt, and he saw Charlotte waiting for him, he sort of got it. God, it was sad.

‘That’s the Raffles Hotel. Stephanie took me there the other day. We’ll go for a Singapore Sling, it’s the best.’ Charlotte was so different. She talked all the way in the taxi she made him get – ‘Honest, the bus takes forever.’ Not a hint of tears or that sad, strung-out look she’d had in London.

‘You look well,’ he said awkwardly. ‘Got a good colour.’

‘Oh, thanks.’ She examined her rosy arms. ‘There’s a pool at Dad’s apartment block.’ She pointed out of the window. ‘There’s the zoo, if you have time. Can you really only stay one night?’

Christ, she wanted him to stay. ‘Depends.’ He was running out of cash, truth be told. He’d had to pay in the end to stop over in Singapore. But she didn’t need to know that.

She paid for the taxi with a big wad of notes. ‘Come on, let’s get a drink.’ They were getting out at the harbour area, the sea shiny. ‘Isn’t it gorgeous?’

‘Glad you came over, then?’ He felt different too, out of his depth. He’d no badge here, no notebook, no authority. She seemed to fit right in, leading him through the hot streets to an outdoor market where you bought satay chicken on sticks and ate at plastic tables in the spicy air.

‘Hmm? Oh yeah, really I wish I’d come sooner. Daddy and Stephanie are so good to me – well, she is. He’s working as usual. But she’s really nice! She really understands about everything. And it’s been so good to get away.’ She leaned back, sucking hard on some kind of pink drink she’d made him get from a vendor. It tasted like sugared roses, so sweet it made him gag. It was so different from the last time he saw her, in the chilly rain of London. They were both acting as if that night had never happened. ‘You know, I was so unhappy before. I was, wasn’t I? I was a wreck. I can only see it now I’m away.’

‘Found a lawyer yet?’

She nodded, slurping. ‘Stephanie’s got a meeting set up with some Australian barrister. Supposed to be very good at this kind of case. I’m sure she’ll be nice, if she’s friends with Stephanie.’

‘Well – that’s good then, isn’t it?’

‘Yes.’ A pause, and she looked up at him, and turned away. Was she thinking of the same thing as him, of the rain, and him running after her down the street?

He made a face, and she noticed. ‘What is it, the pink stuff? Too girly?’

‘A bit, yeah.’

‘I’ll get you a chai – it’s spicy tea, you’ll like it.’

He watched her go to the stall, ducking between the tables in her wedge heels. Everything was different here, the air, the smells, her, him. In London he was the copper who followed the evidence and arrested her man. She was the witness looking for a way out, probably pointless, the whole thing. But here? Who were they?

Charlotte was coming back with a steaming plastic cup. She was smiling as she came towards him and he was smiling back, couldn’t help it.

‘Here.’

He gulped it down – like over-sweet PG Tips with curry powder in.

‘Nice?’

‘Yeah,’ he lied. ‘Grand.’

Charlotte was unstoppable. The creeping tropical heat felt to him like carrying a wet blanket round your shoulders; he could hardly move. But she was fine, apart from the curly wildness the humidity brought to her blonde hair.

The day was packed, the Indian quarter, the sea-front and shops, lunch, on to the Changi Prison museum. Here Hegarty went silent before the displays. His grandfather, Big Mick, had been a prisoner in Burma, and although he came home, he never spoke a word of what happened out there. Sort of put it all in perspective, the worries he had in London.

A fan was whispering overhead, stirring the heavy air. Charlotte came back from the bookshop, springing on her cork shoes. ‘All right?’ She pulled her hair away from her neck, fanning her flushed face with the visitors’ guide.

No, he wasn’t all right. He was all at sea.

As the day went on, he noticed once or twice how she would brush against him when they walked along, or stand so close when reading a display that he could smell the clean sweat of her forehead. In the Botanical Gardens she asked a woman to take their picture, and put her arm over his shoulder. For the ten seconds it took to snap the picture, Hegarty was dizzy with the heat and flowers and her.

Then, over lunch, she pulled her chair in close to his as they ate fried noodles in a cheap canteen, and he felt her bare feet scuff over his legs. The hairs stood on end.

‘Sorry,’ she said, pulling them away. ‘My feet were too hot. Here, want to try mine?’ She held out a chopstick-full of noodles.

Finally it was dusk. The taxi was idling through the crowded streets of the Indian quarter, music and light spilling out from the shops, as they went to drop Hegarty at his hotel.

‘So, what for dinner?’ Still she was full of energy, while he felt like a wrung-out sponge.

‘My flight’s at eight a.m, you know. Maybe I should get an early night.’ He had the money ready in his hand in case she tried to pay again. It felt greasy to the touch, different to UK money.

She fiddled with her hair, drawing it up in her hand. ‘I was going to say we could get Dim Sum. It’s sort of like Chinese tapas.’

‘I know,’ he said, even though he didn’t. ‘You want me to stay out then? You think there’s stuff in Singapore still to do?’

She met his eyes. ‘Maybe.’

‘Yeah?’

‘Well, it’s a big place.’ She looked out of the window and he thought she was blushing. ‘Look, we’re here.’

He opened the door. ‘Meet you in the same place at seven?’

She smiled; it lit up her face. ‘Brilliant.’

Hegarty got into his windowless cupboard of a room and had a shower, washing off all the tropical sweat of the day. He couldn’t help smiling at himself in the steamed-up mirror. She wanted him to stay. And right that minute she was probably in the shower too, getting ready to come and see him, picking out a dress, combing out her wet hair over her bare shoulders.

Christ. Still with the daft smile, he drank one of the warm beers he’d bought in the shop next door. He tried to control his hair with wax, and he put on jeans and a clean, if crumpled, white shirt. He slapped on some of the Acqua Di Giò he’d got in duty free. Then, just as he was about to head out, already imagining he might try to hold her hand as they walked along, his mobile rang.

Charlotte was already there when he finally got out of a taxi at the pier. She had her phone out as if she’d been waiting, and God she looked amazing, her hair piled up and sparkly earrings brushing her neck.

Shit, Hegarty thought, waving over as he paid. Shitting hell. Why me? ‘Sorry,’ he called as he jogged over. ‘Got a phone call.’

‘OK.’ She was nervous, he could tell. She looked up and away, fiddling with a silver bangle on her arm. ‘Anything serious?’

‘Yeah.’ Crap, why now? ‘Listen – they’ve arrested Chris Dean.’

‘Oh, I see.’

‘There was a bar stabbing a while back, and the victim just made an ID. I think I should try to get an earlier flight. Sorry.’

‘No, it’s . . . Does this mean they’ll interview him about Dan’s case?’

‘Maybe. I’ll try to make them, if I get back in time.’

‘Right. Thank you.’

‘Charlotte? Can I ask you something?’

She paused before she said, ‘OK.’

‘Do you really think he didn’t do it? Dan, I mean. You believe that?’

Again a pause. ‘I have to.’

Hegarty couldn’t stop himself. He reached out and pushed back a strand of the hair that fell over her face. He looked hard at her. ‘Well, then. Make sure you get a lawyer who believes it too, yeah?’

‘Wait.’ She put up a hand to stop him, it rested on his arm. He was tense as a bow and arrow. ‘You’re just leaving me?’

‘You’ll thank me for it, if I can get them to question him.’

She took her hand away, nodding as if she understood what he was doing for her. ‘Thank you.’ She leaned up and kissed him on the cheek, a quick kiss, sticky with lipgloss. For a second he breathed in the perfume of her hair.

‘Safe journey,’ she said, stepping away.


Keisha

‘What’s that, then?’

‘I dunno, I told you.’

‘Come on, woman. Try and guess.’

‘I dunno, ginger?’

‘Ginger!’ He burst out laughing.

‘I told you, I don’t know.’

‘But still, you mix up ginger and cumin, your curry’ll taste like cake, innit.’

‘Shut it.’ Keisha elbowed Ronald, sending up a cloud of the spice.

‘Watch it. Come on, mix it in. Oi, not that much.’

Ronald was teaching her to make curry – slowly, messily, with lots of making fun of her. The empty club kitchen, scrubbed bright and silver, was full of hot frying spices.

‘Right, you watching? This is curry paste.’

The last time it was jerk chicken. Before that, fried plantain – starting her off easy. Ronald’s first jobs had been cooking in bars and restaurants and now that he owned them he hadn’t forgotten how.

She shoved him again. ‘You don’t need curry, mate. WeightWatchers, that’s what you need.’

‘Aw, what’re you chatting about? At least I got an arse.’

Her stupid pale skin turned red. ‘I’ve an arse. F*ck off.’

‘Come on, chop up that beef.’

Yuck, meat was horrible raw, all pink and wobbly like what came out of her when she had Ruby. Ronald scooped the beef up and added it to the pan, then when it had cooked a bit he threw in a tin of coconut milk. ‘Smell that, eh?’

Keisha breathed in. ‘Not bad. Maybe I’ll make it for Char when she gets back. She’ll drop down dead if it’s not Pot Noodle.’

‘That’s your mate you live with?’

‘Yeah.’ She didn’t normally say much about herself to people she worked with, especially not now when she had so much to hide. But he was easy to talk to.

‘She’s away?’ Ronald stirred the good-smelling mixture.

‘She went to Singapore. Her dad lives out there, see.’ Ronald wasn’t really listening, he was just being kind, but she carried on. ‘Yeah, her dad moved there when she was like eight or something.’

There was no reason for her to tell him all this stuff. But she had to say something about Charlotte’s dad, or else she would say what was really on her mind – that she’d been looking for hers, too.

When Charlotte went away Keisha had started to feel weird in the flat. Like she had no right to be there. She waited for ages before going out in case the old woman or the couple from downstairs would be there and give her a look. She hadn’t forgotten it was the man who let her in the day she first came, clutching onto the purse as though it was a magic bloody key or something.

She tiptoed round the flat, listening to the noise of far traffic. Sometimes the phone rang again, on and on, but if she ever picked it up to stop it, no one was there. There were gaps in the furniture now Charlotte had sold the best things, some chair that was worth loads apparently, a painting that Ruby could’ve done better, bits of jewellery. It had helped keep the flat for those months, but Keisha had always known it wouldn’t last. Sometimes she heard Charlotte on the phone to the bank, pleading in that sad voice of hers. So, the place would be sold, and she’d be moving on. Where to?

To get away from all the quiet, the feeling that maybe someone was watching, she’d started spending lots of time at the club, where Ronald also seemed to practically live. It was easy, just hanging out with him, not having to go out on the street and worry she’d be followed. After the news that Chris had turned up at the club, she’d considered quitting the job. Making a run for it. But where to? And besides, Ronald somehow made her feel safe. You couldn’t imagine anything bad happening with him around. And anyway, there’d been no sign of Chris since. Maybe it wasn’t even him. Rachel could have been wrong.

Every day she left the flat and the first job was to check her bank balance, which was coming along nicely from her club wages. Enough to think that maybe, one day, a flat . . . Ruby . . . They could move away, and Chris wouldn’t get them, and there’d be no need to find out what Charlotte knew or tell the police about the door and – everything else. Maybe.

Sometimes she walked about as she had when Chris had first hit her. Always looking over her shoulder in case he was about. Around Camden, as far as Russell Square, sometimes. She didn’t ask herself why she went to that particular place so much. She’d sit on the benches under the trees in that little square near the fountain, wondering if anyone would think she was a student. If someone looked at her and said, ‘What are you doing here?’ she’d tell them anyone was allowed to sit on a bench, for f*ck’s sake. Then when it was time for work, she’d go to the club, and Ronald would be there waiting for her. She sort of knew he’d always be there, even if they hadn’t arranged it.

As the summer ended the people changed and the square got busier, new people hanging about, students still at school by the looks of some of them, wet behind the ears. Down for ‘open day’, she overheard, whatever that was. One day Keisha was sat watching a little kid on the other side of the grass. It seemed like a million years before Ruby would be back to school and she could watch her coming out again. During the summer it was like she’d gone to the moon or something.

The student sitting next to her – a boy in clothes his mum must’ve bought – went over to the group calling his name (‘Hey, Jasper!’). He left behind a sort of booklet, colourful, nice shiny paper. Keisha picked it up, turning it over in her hands. It was a brochure of all the things going on at the university, talks, seminars, all kinds of stuff. Imagine being a student, nothing to do all day but sit and listen to people talk! She was flipping through and there it was – the name. Ian Stone.

She sat up and looked at it again. Ian Stone, it said. Professor of Legal Studies. Emeritus Fellow of Civil Liberties. There was a small picture of a man with a ponytail. An earring, for Christ’s sake. Ian Stone – her dad, probably – was someone who had long hair and wore an earring. And he was speaking on a public panel in just a few weeks. Keisha got up, stuffed the flyer away in her bag, then set off to work.

On the bus she started thinking about the brochure. There was a quote on top of the bit that said what the lecture was about. A quote from Ian Stone: Even if you’re not a law student, we can all fight for justice. Every one of us has to stand up for it. Then at the bottom another quote from someone famous: For evil to triumph, all it takes is for good people to do nothing. Keisha looked at that for a long time, as the bus pushed towards Camden through the summer streets, people outside bars, laughing, drinking. Kids on bikes. The canal all shiny in the late afternoon sun. No one trapped like her, running away from everything but still stuck. Looking over her shoulder before every step she took.

Write it down, Charlotte had said. For Ruby. To try to explain. How could she, how could she show them she’d been staying away for the kid’s own good, to keep the bad people away from her? Would Ruby understand, if she told her one day?

She thought about everything she knew. The blood. The shoes. Sometimes she thought it was all going to crush her.

When Keisha got into work, and saw the office empty, and the computer sitting unused, it seemed like everything was just coming together perfectly. She sat down and started to type as quickly as she could, making lots of mistakes. She just wrote the words straight onto the screen, what had happened, what she remembered. Everything she’d never said. And it was good, it was good for once to spill it all out, let out everything she’d been carrying round in her head like a too-full suitcase.

She was so taken up with what she was doing she forgot about cooking with Ronald. The door of the office clicked, and she looked up. Froze.

Ronald was standing in the door. ‘What you doing?’

She looked down at her fingers on the keyboard, the computer no one was supposed to use. ‘I was just—’

‘You can’t be on there. No one’s meant to be . . . F*ck.’ He was striding across the room at her, and she was fumbling with the mouse trying to save what she’d done and click out of the screen.

‘Wait, hang on! I was just—’

‘You can’t be in here, Jesus Christ, what are you . . .’ He yanked the keyboard from her hands and she was suddenly afraid, because it was just like before, in the kitchen with Chris, and then he’d—

Keisha didn’t know she’d screamed until she saw Ronald’s face. ‘Hey, I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Keesh. I wasn’t gonna – I just can’t let you see stuff.’ He looked so ashamed. ‘I swear, I’d never hurt you.’

She was breathing again. ‘I know you wouldn’t.’ And she did, she realised. He’d never knock someone out, never break a bottle, never . . . He was standing over her. Light was glinting off his dark skin. ‘I’m sorry, Ron. I was just – eh, doing a course application, s’all. I never looked at nothing, honest.’

She saw him try to calm down. ‘S’OK, s’OK. It’s just got private stuff on there. But that’s good, applying for a course, good to study.’

He was so bloody nice all the time. That was the trouble. She went to get up. ‘I’m in your seat.’

‘Wait. Keesh.’ He put out his hand and stopped her by the desk. He was half a foot taller than her. ‘You didn’t show for cooking today. I waited. I was worried, I guess.’

‘Sorry. Just busy.’

‘I missed you, you know.’ He was bending down. ‘You don’t trust me, is that it?’

‘Course I do.’ It was herself she didn’t trust.

‘Well, what’s wrong? I never meant to shout at you. I’m sorry, yeah?’

‘It’s not that.’ She opened her mouth to tell him what a liar she was, but before she could speak, his face was coming at her and his rock-hard arms were round her, and he was kissing her.

She pulled away eventually, breathless.

Ronald looked a bit shocked at what he’d done. ‘I . . . er . . . Sorry.’

She stared at her shoes, trying to stop a smile breaking out over her face. She couldn’t help it. ‘That was a surprise.’

‘Yeah. Yeah. Me too.’

She pulled herself together. ‘Better go . . . my shift’s starting.’

‘Yeah. OK.’ Still looking shell-shocked, Ronald stood back to let her go out.

When she came home after her shift, Keisha was so much on a cloud she didn’t realise for a moment that Charlotte was back. She was so taken up with remembering every second of the kiss, every breath, every move. Then she saw the passport on the table and the trail of clothes leading to Charlotte’s bedroom. New things, tags on them. Charlotte was in the room unpacking. Her face looked burned and raw.

‘You’re back?’

‘Yeah.’

‘Have a good time?’

‘Yeah.’ Charlotte didn’t look round from her suitcase.

Hmm, and f*ck you very much too. Something had happened. ‘Listen, I been doing my statement like you said. Started it anyway. I was thinking, you know, I’d give it a go.’ Keisha was walking out to the kitchen again and Charlotte followed behind. She came into the room and leaned rigidly against the doorway, shoulders hunched.

Keisha met her eyes. ‘What?’

‘I have to tell you something.’ Charlotte looked miserable.

‘F*ck. What’ve you done?’

‘Nothing – well. It’s Chris. They’re arrested him. While I was away. And I think . . . I think I saw him, before I went. At the shelter, when I was working. And I think maybe . . . he knows you’re here.’

Keisha thought for a minute she might faint.

‘I’m sorry! I didn’t know for sure, and I didn’t know if – if you’d change your mind about helping. Look!’ Charlotte grabbed the prison letter from where it was shoved in the fruit bowl. ‘Look – Dan’s ill. It’s killing him in there! I need to get him out.’

Keisha felt it in her blood, roaring through her veins, the anger back again. She had to smash something or break something or hit someone. The never-used wooden fruit bowl was right in front of her. She knocked it off the table, and it bounced off the kitchen cupboard, and rattled to a slow stop, like one of those kids’ toys, those tops that go round and round.

‘I can’t believe you did this. You saw him, and you never told me? F*ck, all this time I been here on my own, and . . . You don’t even trust me one f*cking bit, after all this.’

‘I do!’

‘Don’t f*cking patronise me.’

‘I didn’t know if you’d go to him! I see you still looking out for him, every time you leave the house. I had to help Dan.’

‘Dan? Dan doesn’t give a shit about you any more and you know it. Dunno why you don’t just give up and go off with your f*cking copper.’

Charlotte was going to cry again. ‘I love Dan.’

‘Sure you do,’ Keisha sneered.

Charlotte gave a little sob and dropped her shoulders. ‘I’m so sorry. I didn’t – oh!’

Keisha marched into the little room and started throwing things into her mum’s embroidered bag. The stuff from Mercy’s house, some clothes, whatever. She could hardly see straight. ‘You can just put my stuff out. I’ll come back and get it later.’

‘But you can’t – Keesh, no! I’m sorry!’

‘Well, you should have thought of that before you f*cked me over.’ She went out, slamming the door so hard it rattled.

She’d meant to leave. Really she had. The bang of the heavy door shutting in Charlotte’s face had been a good sound. She’d be off, back to her life before Miss Meddling Cow here, with her blonde hair and innocent face. But halfway to the tube Keisha stopped. Ronald had kissed her last night, tasting like ginger cake. If she turned up now at the club, what’d he think?

Write it down, Charlotte had said – interfering cow. Tell the story, you’ll get Ruby back. Was it fair to be cross at Charlotte for keeping secrets, when there was so much Keisha knew herself – so much she had never said?

A breeze went through the trees on Belsize Crescent, and Keisha shivered. This weird time, it was going to end soon. Chris was in jail. Ronald had kissed her. There’d be a trial. And somewhere not far away, Ruby would soon be going back to school.

Ruby.

Keisha picked up her bag and started to walk back. Charlotte was standing on the pavement outside the house, shivering in her shorts and T-shirt.

She started to cry as Keisha came round the corner. ‘I knew you’d come back. Oh God, I’m sorry, I never should have done it, I’m so sorry.’

Keisha put the bag down again. ‘You gotta trust me. Me too – dunno if I can trust you now. You never told me you saw him, and you know he’s after me. He’s after my kid.’

‘You can trust me. Oh Christ, I’m so sorry.’ She threw her thin arms round Keisha, the first time they’d hugged – and Keisha could hear the girl’s breath catching like she was trying to stop crying. She stiffened up at the feel of someone so close, but then she patted Charlotte gently on her shoulder. ‘Come on, it’s freezing.’