BETRAYED. Jacqui Rose
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Money for old rope. Take last week – he’d managed to successfully get the perpetrator off even though the man’s own children had given evidence against him. But juries were hesitant to convict. They couldn’t understand why women stayed. Why women couldn’t seek the help they needed. Didn’t understand and wouldn’t understand, which played beautifully into his hands. All he needed to do was get the woman on the stand and make out she was either neurotic or embittered, and the jury would be happy to go along with it – and Alan was happy to be paid handsomely.
Rapists were nearly as easy to get off. Make out the woman hadn’t really said no, just regretted it the next day. Had drunk too much; no one liked a lush. There were all sorts of defence strategies and again, all he needed to do was put a doubt, however small, into the jury’s mind.
Paedophiles and child killers were harder to get off. The jury, especially the women, went gooey-eyed at a picture of a child. But then Alan did always like a challenge, and never did a malt whisky taste as good as when he managed to get the indefensible to walk free.
Leaning back in his chair, dressed in his tailor-made navy pinstriped suit, Alan lit a cigar.
A knock at the door interrupted his thoughts. His secretary put her head round the door. She was new and keen. Two qualities Alan Day liked. He felt the first stirrings of an erection. Give it a couple of weeks, she’d be begging for it. They always were.
‘Mr Day. There’s a visitor for you. I told him he’d have to make an appointment but he wouldn’t go. I’m not sure quite what to do.’
‘What’s his name?’
‘Julian. Mr Julian Millwood.’
For the first time in years, Alan Day felt nervous.
6
‘It was this big.’ Star Barker-Williams stood opposite a laughing Del and Bunny with her arms outstretched and her blue eyes wide open with excitement. Bunny grinned, speaking with warmth to her daughter. ‘Are you sure it was that big, Star?’
Del laughed and nudged Bunny in her side. ‘Listen, when the child says it was that big, it was that big. Ain’t that right, Star?’
Star nodded profusely, a mop of blonde hair falling across her face. ‘Yep. It was huge. Almost as big as this building.’
‘And then what happened?’ Claudia spoke as she leaned forward in her chair, getting nearly as carried away in the story as Star was.
Star looked round the room, delighting in everyone listening. She squeezed her hands together, her face lighting up. The nuns at school always told her not to be so silly when she tried to tell them about what she saw. To stop making things up. But she wasn’t making things up. She really did see pirates. Pirates and cowboys. In fact, though she hadn’t told anybody yet, she was sure the deputy head at school was a pirate in disguise. He had a glass eye and no one but pirates had glass eyes. The other girls at school said he’d been in a car accident but Star knew better. She knew how he’d got it. In a battle on the high seas. And one day she’d prove it, but for the time being it was going to be her secret.
Smiling, she turned back to Claudia, continuing with her story. ‘Then when I went up to the pirate boat, I saw someone.’
Bunny grinned, ‘Who? Oh wait let me guess … a cowboy.’
‘Nope.’
Del shouted out, ‘A lion tamer.’
Star laughed. ‘Nope.’
Bunny tried again. ‘A fairy.’
Star pulled a face. Her mum was always trying to make her like fairies and dolls. And even though her mum bought her a new doll nearly every week she hated them nearly as much as she hated fairies. They were for sillies. She looked at her mum. ‘No way!’
Bunny raised her arms up in the air, grinning. ‘Go on then, we give up. Who was on the pirate boat?’
Star lowered her voice into a whisper. ‘A little girl, and she was tied up.’
Bunny’s smile dropped. She looked tense. ‘That’s enough, Star.’
Del’s head whipped round to Bunny, surprised at the sudden change in her tone. As he frowned at Bunny, Star continued to talk.
‘She looked dead scared and just as I was going to try to rescue her I heard a scream and …’
Bunny stood up, her face red and her voice raised. ‘I said enough, Star! Don’t you know when enough’s enough? You have to stop with these silly stories. No wonder you’re always getting into trouble at school.’
Star’s eyes filled with tears as she looked at her mum. Annoyed at the way Bunny had spoken to Star, Del snapped.
‘What the hell’s wrong with you, Bun? She’s only telling a story.’
‘Well, maybe I don’t want to hear her story at the moment.’
Claudia walked over to Bunny, speaking gently to her.
‘Bun, you’re being harsh, babe. Star’s only having fun.’
Bunny said nothing. She looked at Del, who was staring at her in amazement, then at Claudia, before finally crouching down to look at her daughter, whose expression was a picture of hurt. Shame swept across Bunny’s face.
‘Star, I’m sorry. I don’t know what got into me. Mummy’s just tired. Can you forgive me, babe?’
Star wiped away her tears. She hated tears. A moment later she threw her arms round Bunny’s neck in a loving embrace, but not before noticing the tiny glance exchanged between her mum and Claudia. A smile appeared on Star’s face. There were secrets everywhere.
Teddy Davies adjusted his seating yet again in an attempt to get comfortable on the tatty sofa. He sat back watching Gary Cole crouched down against the wall, hugging his knees in despair.
Teddy rubbed his chin feeling his twenty-four-hour stubble and sighed. He hated missing children cases. They took too long and he was expected to be sensitive.
He had things to do. He needed to deal with Del. What had happened in Whispers was chewing at him. It was clear the man thought it was all right to humiliate him. He had a bad feeling about it all. Del was up to something and he wanted to get to the bottom of it before it was too late. He’d worked too long and too hard to lose control of Soho. But instead of being able to deal with it straight away he was stuck with Gary Cole, who was struggling to even talk.
He’d already wasted over an hour. He needed to speed things up a bit. Besides which, he could do with a few lines of quiver to pick him up, take the edge off his anxiety. Turning to Gary, Teddy spoke.
‘Mr Cole is there nothing you can think of that may help?’
No answer.
Teddy tried again.
‘Are you sure your daughter couldn’t have just got up and gone out on her own?’
‘No. I know she wouldn’t have.’
Teddy indicated the rizla papers and beer cans on the table. ‘So what went on last night, Gary? Looks like you had some sort of party.’
‘What? Sorry. No … no, there was no party. I had a few drinks. Oh Jesus.’
Teddy rolled his eyes, listening to Gary’s sobs. ‘You need to try to concentrate, Mr Cole. These melodramatics won’t help anyone, least of all your daughter.’
The gasp in the room came from the other detective who held Teddy’s gaze with a look of disgust. Teddy stared back, cutting his eye at his colleague. He didn’t give a shit what he thought. Gary was gasping, clearly having some kind of panic attack.
‘I can’t breathe … I can’t breathe.’
That was