Many Rivers to Cross

Chapter 10

On Saturday night, Zelda waited until nine o’clock before she entered the bar and grill at the Hotel Belgrade. As luck would have it, there was a vacant seat at the bar between two couples, both far too interested in their respective partners to pay her any attention. She was also pleased to note that her style of dress was not at all out of place. The dressed-down crowd might be sitting at the tables, but up there at the bar, most of the men and women were dressed for an evening out. She looked just like a woman waiting for her date.

When the barman asked her what she wanted, Zelda ordered a vodka and tonic. The only thing she really missed was smoking. She wished she could light up while she was sitting there with her drink. Not only was she feeling a nicotine craving, but her nerves needed calming. The barman placed a bowl of mixed nuts and nibbles in front of her, but that wasn’t quite the same. She tried one piece; it tasted like salty cardboard.

There was a flat-screen television behind the bar, and Zelda half-watched The Voice with the sound off. It was better that way. She could hardly sit and read her book at the bar tonight. She was too nervous to concentrate, anyway. She kept glancing at her watch. The knife was in her handbag, and she felt so conscious of it she was certain the whole place knew about it, that everyone knew what she was planning to do. What if he didn’t come? What if he didn’t pay her any attention? Was she attractive enough?

Then, around the same time he came in the previous evening, she saw the familiar figure reflected in the mirror behind the bar and held her breath. He paused in the entrance from the hotel lobby, straightened his tie and surveyed the bar. She couldn’t be certain, but she thought his eyes may have lingered on her a fraction longer than on anyone else. She hoped it wasn’t because he recognised her.

There was no room at the bar, and she could hardly move somewhere else. Besides, it would be too obvious. If he was interested, he would find a way to her. It shouldn’t be too hard to attract him, as she was the only unaccompanied female at the bar. Their eyes locked in the mirror, and Zelda thought she noticed a glimmer of interest.

She noticed him studying her back as he walked towards the bar in a direct line, perhaps making sure she was alone. She made a point of looking at her watch and drumming her fingers on the bar, appearing vaguely annoyed. She held her breath as he stood slightly behind her and the couple beside her, leaning forward between them to catch the bartender’s attention. He caught her eyes in the mirror again and gave a little smile. As he leaned, she felt his arm brush against her bare shoulder, nudging her just enough to jar the drink in her hand.

‘Sorry,’ he said. ‘It is very crowded here tonight, yes?’

Zelda remembered the voice, though the accent had smoothed out, become more Americanised, over the years. She felt her throat constrict. She somehow managed to smile and nod.

‘Please, let me buy you a drink,’ he went on.

‘It’s not necessary.’

‘But I insist.’

‘Well, in that case...’

He was wearing the same white suit as he had last night, though this time with a purple shirt and yellow tie. She guessed he had been in his late twenties when he and his brother abducted her just over thirteen years ago, so he had now probably just turned forty. He seemed to be on familiar terms with the barman, who didn’t even need to ask him what he wanted but served him a large measure of whisky along with another vodka and tonic for her. The whiff of peat from his glass told her it was an Islay single malt.

For a while he stood there beside her drinking and chatting easily with the barman. It didn’t take him long to get through his first whisky. Then the couple to Zelda’s right left. Tadić took the seat next to hers with the slow, easy motion of a confident man and signalled for another drink. He glanced towards her, raised an eyebrow in question and nodded towards her glass. Zelda shook her head. ‘No, thanks,’ she said. ‘I’m still working on this one.’

‘Are you waiting for somebody?’

‘Is it so obvious?’

‘You were looking at your watch.’

‘Yep,’ she said. ‘He’s late.’

‘Have another drink with me while you wait. Go on. One more won’t do any harm.’

‘OK,’ she said, pushing her glass forward. ‘Thanks. You’re not from around here, are you?’ She was hoping he wouldn’t catch on to her accent. Most people didn’t.

‘No,’ he said. ‘Zadar. Croatia. Goran is my name.’ He held his hand out to shake.

Zelda shook it. Her little hand was lost in his, and she could feel the strength in his grip. She was five foot six, and he must be at least six inches taller. She began to have grave doubts about the success of her mission. There was no way she could put the pills in his glass here in the crowded bar, she had already realised. They would have to wait until he got her up to his room, which she predicted from the look in his slightly hooded eyes wouldn’t be very long. Not one for extended conversation, Goran Tadić.

‘Cathy,’ she said. ‘Lovely country, Croatia.’

‘You go there?’

‘Once. Just the tourist spots — Split, Dubrovnik. But I remember Zadar. Isn’t that where the sea plays music? I was on a cruise with my husband.’

He seemed thrilled that she knew Zadar. ‘Yes, is sea organ. Beautiful music.’ Then his face took on a disappointed expression. ‘You are married?’

‘Divorced. I should have said ex-husband.’

‘And this man you wait for? Boyfriend?’

‘Nobody important.’

‘You stay here at this hotel?’

‘No.’

‘You live here? London?’

‘Yes.’

‘It is a fine city.’

‘You like it here?’

‘Oh, yes. Many beautiful women.’

She smiled shyly and looked down. ‘You’re a real charmer.’

‘But you are the most beautiful. This man is not coming. He must be very foolish.’

‘Very rude, I’d say.’

He clinked glasses. ‘Bottoms up. Is that what you say here?’

Zelda laughed. ‘Some people do.’

‘It is so difficult here to know what is right. English language so difficult. Very easy to make mistake, say wrong thing.’

‘Your English is very good.’

‘You think so?’

‘Sure.’

His arm brushed lightly against hers, and she had to remind herself not to flinch. Her stomach was in knots already. The drink helped, but she would have to be careful. She didn’t want to end up drunk and being taken advantage of. On closer inspection, he wasn’t bad-looking, in a macho sort of way. The salt-and-pepper hair and five-day stubble suited him and gave him an aura of maturity and authority he hadn’t possessed back then. His clothes sense could perhaps have been a bit more subtle. The suit was Hugo Boss, but the shirt and tie were definitely over the top. Still, he looked as if he had gone up in the world, and he probably didn’t make long drives to abduct young girls from orphanages in Moldova any more. Not that any of this made a scrap of difference to Zelda. His slightly hooded cobalt blue eyes seemed restless, and when they fixed on her, she felt as if she were being undressed, just as Faye Butler had said.

She also noticed a crescent-shaped scar high on his right cheek and wondered if it had been there on the night he and his brother abducted her. She couldn’t remember it, but then she hadn’t had anything on her mind other than fighting him off and escaping. She reached out and touched it gently. ‘Have you always had that?’

He put his hand to his cheek self-consciously. ‘Accident. When I was very young.’ He downed his whisky and ordered another with a snap of his fingers. He glanced at her glass, which was still half-full, and she shook her head. He was on his third large whisky already, certainly giving her a start by drinking so much so fast, she thought. It ought to speed up the action and effects of the flunitrazepam. On the other hand, maybe he was one of those people with a constitution that could stand just about anything. She would soon find out.

‘Is getting more busy here,’ he said as someone leaned over him and shouted out a drinks order.

‘Yes. I must say, I’m dying for a cigarette.’

His expression brightened. ‘You smoke?’

‘Yes. I know, I know, it’s a terrible habit and—’

‘No. No.’ He pointed at his chest. ‘Me. I smoke, too. So difficult these days.’

‘We could go outside,’ Zelda said tentatively.

‘I have room here,’ he said. ‘We can smoke there.’

‘But aren’t all the rooms non-smoking now?’

He just smiled. ‘Bah.’

‘Well... all right,’ she said. ‘Shall we leave our drinks here, for when we come back? I’m sure the barman will—’

‘We take them. Drink and smoke good together. Right? I have more whisky in room.’

Zelda smiled. ‘Right.’ She grabbed her bag and followed him out, drink in her other hand. As far as she could tell, nobody paid attention to them leaving. Both bar and grill were noisy and crowded now, and the lights were dim.

It was mid-evening, and Banks was listening to Nico’s The End and thinking about Samir when he heard his doorbell ring. He wasn’t expecting anyone, so he moved cautiously to the front door and looked through the sitting room window. There was an unfamiliar car out front. He hadn’t heard it pull up because he’d been in the conservatory at the back of the house. It was hard to make out exactly who was standing there, just from his profile in the twilight, but Banks had an inkling that turned out to be right when he opened the door and saw Detective Chief Superintendent Richard ‘Dirty Dick’ Burgess on his doorstep, large as life.

‘Banksy,’ Burgess said, stretching out his hand.

Banks shook. He had given up trying to get Burgess to stop calling him Banksy. The harder he tried, the more the bastard did it. ‘What the hell do you want at this time of night?’ he asked.

‘Well, that’s a fine northern welcome,’ Burgess said, stepping into the room. ‘I thought you lot were supposed to be friendly. It’s all right. Don’t worry. I’m not after a home, or even a bed for the night. Got a young lady here, have you?’

‘There’s nobody here but me.’

‘Sad, Banksy, sad. And I used to envy you your good luck in that department. Especially that lovely young Italian bint you had a few years ago. Well, the two of us can have a nice uninterrupted drink and natter about old times, can’t we?’

Banks led the way through to the conservatory, where he had been watching the rose and lilac traces of sunset in the sky through the dip in the hills between Tetchley Fell and the Pennines.

‘Lovely,’ said Burgess, rubbing his hands together. ‘Nice view. I don’t believe I’ve been in the inner sanctum before.’

Banks realised that was true. In all the years they had known each other, neither had been in the other’s home.

‘What’s this music?’ Burgess asked.

‘Nico,’ Banks told him.

‘Hmm. If the dead could sing... Give me a shake if I fall asleep. Anything to drink?’

Banks used his remote to turn off the music halfway through ‘Secret Side’, one of his favourites. Annoyed as he was at the interruption, he had to admit that Burgess had a point; there was something definitely otherworldly about Nico’s songs and voice. ‘What do you fancy?’

‘Got any lager?’

‘I might have a can or two of Stella left.’

‘Stella? Aren’t we posh? OK. That’ll do fine, I suppose.’

Banks went into the kitchen and got a tin out of the fridge and a glass from the cupboard above. He also picked up the bottle of Negroamaro he had just opened. He would probably need another glass of that, maybe two. One often did with Burgess.

‘To what do I owe this pleasure,’ he said after handing Burgess the tin and glass and refilling his own. He noticed that Burgess had taken his favourite chair, the one with the best view, so took the one at a right angle to it.

‘I suppose you know I’ve been working quite closely with the NCA lately?’ Burgess said.

‘I’d heard,’ said Banks. ‘How’s that going?’ Burgess seemed healthy, he thought. He’d lost a bit of weight around the middle, and the bags under his cynical grey eyes had grown smaller. He still had that seen-it-all, world-weary look, which had perhaps escalated to a seen-even-more and still-world-weary look. Banks had been feeling more world-weary himself for the past couple of years. It was getting to be that kind of world. Wearying. He didn’t know whether it showed in his eyes, or in the bags underneath them. No one had told him that it did.

‘Well...’ Burgess went on. ‘It means a lot of drug cases, a lot of gang stuff, organised crime. That world’s changing fast; the new boss isn’t the same as the old boss. He’s just as likely to slip a knife between your ribs as he is to give you a Christmas bonus. Anyway, that’s not what I’ve come to see you about.’

‘What is it, then?’

‘Do you know a woman called Nelia Melnic?’

‘Can’t say as I do.’

‘She’s some sort of local artist. Goes under the name of Zelda.’

Banks paused, his drink halfway to his mouth. ‘Zelda? Yes. Of course. That’s Ray’s partner.’

Burgess nodded. ‘Only her name came up, and when I found she was living in North Yorkshire with an artist called Raymond Cabbot, my antenna immediately started twitching. Isn’t your DI called Annie Cabbot? Your old squeeze.’

‘That’s right.’

‘So who’s Ray, then? Her brother?’

‘It’s her father,’ said Banks. ‘He moved up here from Cornwall last year.’

‘Her father! Bloody hell. Have you seen her? Nelia? He must—’

‘Be old enough to be her father, yes. Grandfather, maybe. I know.’

Burgess shook his head slowly. ‘What a bloody waste.’

‘Oh, I wouldn’t say that.’ Banks paused to drink some wine. ‘Think about it. You’re easily old enough to be her father, too, when it comes right down to it. Anyway, what does the NCA want with Zelda? As far as I know she works for them as a consultant.’

‘Super-recogniser. Yes, I know.’

‘Then...?’

‘I also know a little bit about her background, what a hard time she’s had of it. Though I must say, from the photo, that she—’

‘Yes,’ said Banks. ‘She’s a looker all right. Stunner, you might say. But why are you interested? Apart from the obvious.’

‘You do me a disservice, Banksy. This isn’t about her looks. I was just making a passing comment, that’s all. No matter what you might think of me, I’m not insensitive. When I think about what she must have suffered over the years it makes me want to throttle someone.’

‘So what’s wrong? Has something happened to Zelda?’

‘No. No. Nothing like that.’

‘So the point of your visit is...? Not that I’m not happy to see you, of course.’

‘Naturally. My point? Does it make her want to throttle someone? Not literally, you understand. Or maybe it is literal. I don’t know.’

‘She goes down to London every now and then and spends a few days studying photos and videos of suspected sex traffickers and their contacts and gives what information she can to the NCA for their database. That’s all I know about her job. I asked for her help when she said she saw a photo of Phil Keane in London with a Croatian trafficker she recognised. She never told me his name. Classified, I suppose.’

‘Probably Petar Tadić,’ said Burgess. ‘He’s a real piece of work. Operating over here now far too often for our liking, and someone we’ve been very interested in lately. Is Keane the bloke who set fire to your house?’

‘Yes.’

Burgess whistled through his teeth then gulped some lager. Banks watched his face. He seemed to be mulling over something that had just occurred to him. ‘What happened?’ Burgess asked finally.

‘Nothing,’ said Banks. ‘She drew a blank. That was just before Christmas.’

‘What you’ve just told me puts a new complexion on things,’ Burgess said. ‘I need a moment to reshuffle.’

Banks worked on his wine and listened to the silence stretch.

Finally Burgess spoke. ‘OK,’ he said. ‘This goes no further, understood?’

‘Understood,’ said Banks.

Tadić didn’t make a move in the lift, for which Zelda was grateful. The hotel room was small and seemed to be dominated by the bed, but that was London hotels for you. At least it was tidy. Zelda was willing to bet he hadn’t been there since the maid service earlier in the day. As soon as they got in, he hung the DO NOT DISTURB sign on the door, switched on one dim corner lamp, put his drink down on the desk and said, ‘I must use toilet.’

He went in and she soon heard the splashing of his powerful stream. Hands shaking, she took the three two-milligram capsules of flunitrazepam from her handbag and dropped them into his whisky, then used the wooden stirrer she had brought from the bar to stir it up. Next, she lit a cigarette with shaking hands and went to stand by the window. It looked out on the square below. The streetlights had just come on and it was quiet at that time of the evening. Twilight. She inhaled the acrid smoke deep into her lungs before exhaling it in a long plume. The irony of using the date rape drug on the man who had raped her wasn’t lost on her. She wasn’t sure whether she had given him enough or too much, but Tadić was a big man and six milligrams ought to be enough. Christ, she hoped it worked. The alternative didn’t bear thinking about. She was pretty sure that he didn’t know who she was. And being arrogant and stupid in equal parts, he was so certain of his own attractiveness that he wouldn’t think for a moment he was being set up. Especially by a woman. If he did know, he was a far better actor than she had given him credit for.

As it turned out, solubility didn’t really matter. As soon as Tadić came out of the bathroom he tossed back the rest of the drink in one and drained the glass. Without even looking at any dregs there might be, he picked up a half-full bottle of Glenmorangie from the little nook where the tea and coffee makings were kept and filled it up again. Zelda let out the breath she had been holding.

‘You want?’ he said, offering her the whisky.

Zelda turned her nose up. ‘I don’t like whisky,’ she said.

He opened the minibar and took out a miniature vodka. ‘Good? Yes?’

Zelda nodded and he poured for her. She stubbed out her cigarette in a saucer, added tonic water to the vodka and smiled. She had no intention of drinking any more.

Tadić bent over a cupboard under the drinks area and Zelda saw he was entering his code for the safe. When he had got it open, he brought out a plastic bag of white powder, a small mirror and a razor blade, and grinned at her. ‘You like?’

Christ, the last thing she needed him to do was start snorting coke. That would probably nullify the flunitrazepam completely, or at least delay its onset. She didn’t want a coked-up Tadić on her hands. ‘I like,’ she said and moved as sexily as she could. ‘But maybe later? When we are tired?’

Tadić shrugged, then lounged on the bed, propped up against the pillows, and patted the place beside him. There was really nowhere else for Zelda to go except a hard-backed office chair at the desk under the window, so she sat and leaned back beside him. The pills were supposed to take between twenty minutes and half an hour to start working, and Zelda didn’t think that would be fast enough, the way time seemed to be dribbling slowly away right now. It was a lot of time to keep Tadić occupied, and she very much doubted that conversation would do the trick. She picked up a remote control and switched on the television, hoping it would distract him.

He turned it off. The next thing he did was light a cigar. That would give her a bit of time, she thought, as the smoke spiralled, caught in her throat and took her back to the nightmare car journey across Romania. There was no ashtray, but he brought over the saucer from the tea and coffee tray.

‘Do you have any music?’ Zelda asked.

‘Music?’ He switched on the bedside radio, which was tuned to a station that was playing old standards by Frank Sinatra, Sarah Vaughan, Tony Bennett and the like.

‘What you do?’ Tadić asked, puffing on his cigar, drink in hand.

‘Advertising,’ Zelda said.

‘Ah. Is good job, yes?’

‘Not bad. You?’

‘Importing goods.’

That was one way of putting it, Zelda thought. She glanced sideways, hoping for signs that the drug was taking effect. He hadn’t shown any yet, but it was early days. She felt as if her heart was going to burst through her chest if it beat any harder or faster, and her muscles were stiff with tension. She was also feeling nauseated by the cigar. If he didn’t collapse soon, she thought she would just have to make a break for it. Abort the mission. She calculated the distance to the door. She thought she could make it. He slipped off his tie and opened a couple of buttons on his shirt so that Zelda could see the thick gold chain around his neck, and his salt-and-pepper chest hair.

She lit another cigarette, a further delaying tactic. Tadić, cigar in mouth, got up and refilled his glass. Luckily, he seemed to have forgotten about hers, which was still full. How long had it been?

Zelda noticed that his movements were beginning to seem a little uncoordinated. Perhaps it was just the booze, but it was a good sign. He put his glass down on the bedside table after one large gulp. His hand brushed her bare shoulder and arm. She felt herself shiver, but not with pleasure. He clearly misinterpreted the signal because he took her cigarette from her hand, put it out in the saucer, then leaned over to kiss her. The next thing she knew, his rubbery lips were squirming on hers, tasting of cigar smoke, his hand squeezing her breast so hard it hurt. He took her hand and placed it between his legs, so that she could feel his erection. She thought she was going to be sick and disengaged herself as quickly and gently as she could. ‘Whoa. Easy, boy,’ she said. ‘There’s no hurry, is there?’

‘What you want? You don’t want coke. You don’t want fuck. What you want?’

‘What I really need,’ said Zelda, ‘is to go to the toilet.’

‘I come with you. I like to watch.’

‘No.’

Tadić grinned and lay back on the pillows, one hand casually stroking her breast. She thought she could see traces of confusion in his eyes; they were losing their sharpness and focus, as if becoming aware of something wrong. She got up and went to the toilet, closed the door then put the seat and the top down and sat. How long would it take? How long could she get away with? She could hear the muffled sound of the radio — a song she knew from her childhood in the orphanage, Frank Sinatra singing ‘High Hopes’ — but nothing else. The smell of cigar smoke had got everywhere and was making her feel even more ill than her nerves were.

Finally, she thought she couldn’t get away with staying in the toilet any longer, so she opened the door slowly and peered out. Tadić was as she had left him, slumped on the bed, only now his shirt was undone all the way. His trouser belt was loose, his zipper down, his eyes closed; his drink balanced on his chest, which rose and fell slowly. But he must have heard her come out, for he stirred as she edged towards the bed, and his hooded eyes half-opened.

‘Take your clothes off,’ he said, slurring his words. ‘Strip for me. Strip for Goran.’

‘What?’

‘Undress for me. Now. Please.’

He gave his head a shake, as if to clear the cobwebs, and let it fall back against the pillows with a dull thud. He almost missed the bedside table with his glass as he put it down to wave his hand at her. ‘Go,’ he said. ‘Strip.’

The drugs were working, Zelda thought, with a surge of relief. His coordination was going. The waving hand might have belonged to someone else. She couldn’t tell what he said next, as his voice was so muffled. He tried to get up again but couldn’t seem to manage it. But his eyes were still open and he was still looking at her. Time. She needed more time. Slowly she moved to the bottom of the bed, sliding her sandals off. She reached around and unfastened the tie at the back of her neck, letting the halter neck fall slowly over her throat to her breasts. He smiled and made a deep grunting sound, but his eyes remained fixed on her and she thought she could see him nod.

She slid the dress all the way down and stepped out of it. He tried to sit up but couldn’t make it. Just when she thought she didn’t need to go any further and was thinking of reaching for her bag, he barked another command for her to keep stripping. Frank Sinatra was singing ‘Try a Little Tenderness’, which was hardly suitable striptease music, but she did her best. Zelda swayed in time with the music, reached behind her back, unclipped her bra and let it fall to the floor beside her dress.

She felt so exposed and vulnerable that she was close to tears, and she thought she wouldn’t be able to go on, but her memories gave her strength. He tried to push himself up from the bed with his arms behind him; he managed to get to a sitting position, but his upper body seemed to be wavering and a sweat had broken out on his forehead. He was making a groaning sound deep in his throat. Zelda hooked her thumbs in the top of her panties, gritted her teeth and slid them down over her thighs. If this was the price she had to pay, so be it.

When she had finished and stood there naked in front of the bed, the music still playing, Tadić gasped, fell back and gave a long sigh, then went silent. Zelda stood stock-still for a few moments, watching, listening, but he made no movement. His eyes were closed. Carefully she moved closer to listen to his breathing. It was slow and shallow, but he was still breathing. She lifted an arm and let it fall. It thudded back on the bedcover.

Zelda took the knife from her handbag and sat astride his chest. With both hands, she lifted the blade high in the air and... she froze. She couldn’t do it, couldn’t kill a sleeping man. Not even a monster like Goran Tadić. She let her hands fall and clutched the knife to her stomach. Come on, you fool, she chastised herself. This may be your only chance. Don’t forget what this man did to you, did to all those others and will do to others to come. The world will be a better place without him. Kill him. The images rushed through her mind, the pain of his rough thrusts, the scratching of his beard against her shoulder, the sickly cigar smoke and soundtrack of pounding rap music.

Again she raised the knife high, but again she couldn’t plunge it. For a moment, it was as if she was looking down on the scene from above, seeing this half-crazed naked woman holding a knife, and the man unconscious beneath her. She watched herself lower the blade, hold it against his throat, and she willed herself to push. She couldn’t. The blade pricked his skin. Blood welled up. She held it over his heart and tried there. Still nothing. Once more, she raised the knife.

He opened his eyes.

He reached for her, grasped her breasts.

Then she was inside the half-crazed woman again. She was the half-crazed woman.

She brought down the blade as hard as she could.

The knife struck him full in the throat. Zelda pulled it out. Blood sprayed on her thighs and belly. His hands went to his throat, and his breath started coming in sharp bubbling rasps. Zelda raised the blade again, and hardly watching where it went, plunged it down into his left eye. He gave one last twitch, almost tossing her from her perch on his chest, and that was it. She felt the blade go all the way through and stick in the inside of the back of his skull. She wiggled it loose, and as she pulled it free, his eyeball slipped out and dangled over his bloody cheek. She didn’t need to feel his pulse to know that he was dead. There were no more gurgling sounds, no more movement.

Zelda collapsed with a sob on the other side of the bed, crying, shaking from head to toe. She didn’t know how long she lay there before stirring, making her way back to the bathroom, vomiting down the toilet and running the shower. She stood under it as long as she could and as hot as she could bear it, then dried herself off. She washed the knife in the sink, watching the diluted blood trickle down the plughole. Christ, she had done it. She had killed Goran Tadić. Now, after the release, the numbness set in. She felt nothing when she walked back into the bedroom and saw his bloody corpse on the bed, but she knew the reaction would come later.

Zelda dressed quickly and gathered her things together, making sure she didn’t leave anything behind. As one final measure, she took a towel from the bathroom and wiped off every surface she thought she might have touched. She didn’t think anyone would be checking for fingerprints or DNA, but it seemed the sensible thing to do, the thing people always did in the movies. The thing Modesty Blaise would do.

There was no way Tadić’s people were going to allow any sort of official police investigation into what had happened to him. They would probably find his body first. Then they would cut it into pieces, get rid of it and clean up the room. Nobody would ever find it or know what happened. Before Zelda left, she took one more look at him lying dead on the bed, the matted bloody hair on his chest, the eyeball hanging out. Christ, how she hated him. Now he wouldn’t be able to harm anyone ever again.

She checked the corridor, saw there was no one about, left the DO NOT DISTURB sign in place, then took the lift down and walked out through the front door without looking back. Around the corner, she hailed a taxi and took it straight back to her hotel. There would be no more trains tonight, but she would be on the first one tomorrow morning, back up to Yorkshire to wait for Raymond, to resume her life again and try to put all this madness behind her.

‘Nelia Melnic worked for a man called Trevor Hawkins. Old style NCA, if you can imagine the organisation being old enough to have such a thing. He ran a department out of Cambridge Circus dealing with sex-trafficking in all its ugliness. But you probably know that already. Last weekend, Trevor Hawkins was killed in a house fire. Investigators say it was a chip-pan fire, though no one figured Hawkins for a chip eater, unless they were triple-fried in goose fat. Anyway, the body was too badly burned to reveal any signs of drugs, and there were no indications of physical violence on the bits that remained. There’s no forensic evidence of criminal activity, but the investigating team knows that fires can easily be made to look like accidents. That said, there are no signs of a break-in, and nobody saw anyone visiting the house that evening. Not that that means anything. Most of them were either out or watching telly behind closed curtains. His immediate neighbours were away. His wife was visiting her parents in Bath for the weekend. No one even noticed the fire until it was too late.’

‘So you think—’

‘I don’t think anything, Banksy. I haven’t finished yet. We were concerned about outside interference. And quite rightly. It’s an international matter. But you’ve just given me a bit of information I didn’t have; the NCA doesn’t have. That Nelia Melnic saw a photograph of Keane with a Croatian trafficker. No doubt Hawkins saw it, too. And then Hawkins dies in a mysterious fire. What would you think?’

‘I wouldn’t jump to conclusions,’ said Banks. ‘I’m sure that Hawkins and Zelda saw pictures of lots of traffickers in the course of their work. But I agree it might be more than a mere coincidence. Zelda didn’t tell me his name, but she did say that he’s evil and he likes to hurt the girls.’

‘Would she have identified Keane for them, too?’

‘Probably not. She didn’t know who he was until Annie showed her the photograph of Keane we have. It was the other man she recognised.’

‘Tadić? That makes sense. The NCA team are very interested in him now he seems to be spending a lot of his time over here organising transport and destinations for the trafficked girls. But the point is that this Zelda woman walked by Hawkins’s burned-out house earlier this week. One of our men was photographing everyone who passed by, just in case.’

‘I suppose she was curious,’ said Banks. ‘He was her boss, after all.’

‘That’s exactly what she said. But would you go to the trouble of taking the tube to walk past your boss’s house if it burned down?’

‘Surely you can’t think Zelda had anything to do with the fire?’

‘We know she didn’t start it. She was in Croatia at the time. We’ve checked with the airlines. We’ve no idea where she went, but she rented a car from Franjo Tudman Airport in Zagreb. And we don’t believe she hired someone to do it in her place. In fact, we have no reason to believe that she had anything to do with Hawkins’s death at all. But she did walk past his house. We were wondering why, what it is she’s after. And after what you’ve told me, we now have in Keane a man who likes fires, and kills. So you tell me.’

Banks shook his head. ‘I have no idea. I haven’t seen Zelda in a while, and Ray’s away in America. You want me to talk to her?’

‘If you would. She’s in London, but she’s been informed she can head home as soon as she likes. We need to keep this low-key, Banksy, and the impression I get from the investigating team is that she doesn’t much like cops, even though she works for them. The chief investigators, Paul Danvers and Deborah Fletcher, have interviewed her twice now, and they said she was quite bolshy on both occasions. Mind you, Danvers walks around like he’s got a stick up his arse, and as for poor Debs, well, frigid stick insect would be a compliment. But I thought this Zelda might respond better to a casual chat with a friend, rather than a police interview.’

‘I’m a cop, too, you know.’

‘I know. But you’re also a friend of hers. And I know your liberal sympathies, your soft centre. You’re exactly the right kind of sucker for a story like hers. See if you can find out what she knows that we don’t, and what she’s up to.’

‘If you think I’m going to try to trap her into—’

‘I’m not expecting you to do anything of the kind, Banksy. I know you and your sense of loyalty all too well. It’s admirable, if a tad inconvenient at times. Be as up front with her as you like. It doesn’t matter. As I said, she’s not a suspect. We just want to know why she’s so interested, and if she knows or suspects anything about Hawkins she’s not telling us. If you want to bring down Keane, my friend, whether it’s for personal revenge or whatever, you could do a lot worse than have the NCA owing you a favour.’ He held up his empty tin and waved it back and forth. Banks went into the kitchen to get another for him and refilled his own glass at the same time.

‘What do you know about this Petar Tadić character?’ he asked Burgess when he came back.

‘Not a lot,’ said Burgess. ‘He’s got a brother called Goran. Croatians. They both started out in the transportation side of the sex trafficking business quite a few years ago, based in Serbia but working all over the eastern Balkans — Romania, Moldova, even Ukraine and Belarus. Wherever the beautiful, vulnerable young girls were. And the ones they couldn’t persuade to travel overseas with fake offers of modelling careers and secretarial college, they simply snatched off the street. But they’ve worked their way up to the exploitation level now. They work more with the end-users. That’s why they’re spending so much time over here.’

‘Pimps?’

‘Sort of. Certainly no better than. But not directly. They’re more like pimps to the pimps. They supply the needs of pimps. They don’t stand at the brothel door and take the money. They do the strong-arm stuff as well, if it’s called for. In fact, they’re quite brutal. They flatten the competition if they have to, and they don’t spare the rod with the girls, either, if they step out of line. Literally.’

‘Drugs?’

Burgess shook his head. ‘Only insofar as they need to supply the girls from time to time to keep them subdued, and to give themselves the occasional snort, of course, or fuel a sex party. A little happy powder now and then. But not operationally, no. They might consort with dealers and suppliers, mind you. It’s a mixed-up world they’re in, and where you find one crime, you’re as likely as not to find a dozen more. Most of the drugs are down to the Albanian Mafia, these days, and the Calabrians, the ’Ndrangheta. And you cross them only at your peril.’

Tadić sounded like the sort of supplier Connor Clive Blaydon might be working with on his pop-up brothels, Banks thought. Neither of them exactly down on the shop floor, but pulling the strings from a distance — Blaydon as someone who had access to the properties for use and Tadić with access to the girls and drugs. And of course, Tadić might also be rubbing shoulders with the Albanians, especially Leka Gashi. ‘Do you think Zelda’s in any danger?’ he asked.

Burgess thought for a moment, then said, ‘Depends. I’m assuming she’s not stupid enough to go stirring up a hornets’ nest, so there’s no real reason why she should be. On the other hand, if she’s got some sort of crazy plan in mind, who knows...? But she, more than anyone, ought to know how dangerous these people are, what they’re capable of. I don’t imagine she’s been running around asking questions about Keane, has she?’

‘Not that I know of,’ said Banks. ‘And I certainly advised her not to. Like I said, it came to nothing. Why do you think this Hawkins chap was killed, if indeed he was?’

‘Danvers believes he was, and that it was because he functioned as the traffickers’ man on the inside. These high-powered criminal enterprises don’t get very far without insiders, and they create corruption on as wide a scale as they can. One or two upper-echelon traffickers have managed to avoid capture this past year or two, and the most obvious explanation seems that they were warned in advance. Danvers thinks Hawkins was on their payroll and something went wrong. Mind you, he’s got no evidence to back this up. Hence his interest in the girl.’

‘And you?’

‘I’m not entirely convinced. Hawkins may simply have got too close to Tadić or his organisation for their comfort.’

‘And they sent Keane to kill him?’

‘Why not?’

‘Because Keane’s a forger, not a hit man. Surely they’ve got people they can use for jobs like Hawkins’s?’

‘Of course. But Keane likes to set fires. Maybe they wanted a bit of variety? Maybe Keane wanted the job? Maybe it was his way of proving something to them? After all, he set fire to a narrowboat and to your house up here in Eastvale. It’s clearly a hobby of his.’

‘Maybe,’ said Banks.

‘And a fire has the advantage of pretty much destroying any evidence there might have been — paper trails, that sort of thing.’

‘It’s possible.’

‘We have the photograph of Tadić with Keane, and maybe we also have Hawkins either on Tadić’s tail or on his payroll, depending on which theory you believe. Either way, he could have become a liability. So they set the fireman on him. Maybe Tadić’s usual killer was on another job, out of the country, in jail, whatever, and he used the best means he could find to hand.’

‘Where do you think Zelda fits in with all this?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Burgess. ‘Given her history, you have to assume she might have come across Tadić at some point or other. How long has she been out of the game?’

‘She wasn’t in the game,’ snapped Banks.

‘Sorry. That’s not what I meant. Wrong choice of words. Don’t be so sensitive. She’s been over here about four years, right?’

‘I think so,’ said Banks. ‘Ray met her about three years ago in London, and she went to live with him first in Cornwall, then up here. I’m not sure how long she’d been in London before they met. She had been working as a pavement artist down there and was apparently a bit of a ragamuffin back then, so maybe not so long.’

‘Let’s say she’s been free four years, then,’ said Burgess. ‘The Tadić brothers have certainly been in the business much longer than that. Where’s she from?’

‘Moldova.’

‘That’s part of the area the Tadićs operated in. Their paths could have crossed. Maybe when she saw the picture of Petar Tadić with Keane she told Hawkins you were interested in Keane for reasons of your own. I don’t know. That may have set him on a dangerous path. But look on the bright side. She’s got you to protect her. Her knight in shining armour.’

‘Come on,’ said Banks. ‘I’m being serious here. I like the woman. And I like that she and Ray make each other happy. If you’re going to take the piss out of me, fair enough, but try to be serious when it comes to her safety.’

‘I don’t know what you expect me to do. Put her under protection? You know as well as I do that we don’t have the resources to provide guard duty.’

Banks ran his hand over his hair. ‘I know,’ he said. ‘I only hope you’re wrong about all this.’

‘Take hope, then. I often am.’ Burgess downed the rest of his lager and glanced at his watch. ‘Sorry, I have to love you and leave you,’ he said, groaning as he got to his feet. ‘I’ve got an early morning meeting in Newcastle and a room waiting for me at the Mal.’

When Zelda got back to her hotel, she knew there was no hope of sleep. She undressed, showered again, hot and long, then fell back on the bed trembling, eyes wide open.

Why did Tadić have to open his eyes? If he had just fallen unconscious, as he was supposed to do, she wouldn’t have gone through with it. It had been different with Darius; she had been fighting for her freedom, for her life, and he had been the last thing standing in her way. But this time was different. This time it had been premeditated, cold-blooded murder.

She was a long way from Modesty Blaise now.

Zelda got up, took a vodka from the minibar, downed it in one then poured herself another, which she set down on the bedside table. She picked up the TV remote and turned it on. There was a talk show on with an idiotic host and even more idiotic guests trying to sell their latest movies or shows. But she needed background noise; in the silence she would go mad.

She went over the scene in her mind, the craziness of it all. Even now, so soon after, when she tried to picture herself sitting at the hotel bar waiting for Goran Tadić to come in and pick her up, she could hardly believe what she had done. Or the journey up to his room, the nearness of him in the lift; the cigar smoke on his breath, choking her, bringing back memories of that terrible car journey; his musky deodorant fighting a losing battle against sweat and testosterone; the hurried doctoring of the drink, his greedy slurping it down; then the almost interminable wait, the striptease, ‘Try a Little Tenderness.’ After that came the moment that cut the person she was now off from the person she had been until then. The murder. Brutal, bloody. And perhaps the worst thing of all was that, despite her fear, her hesitations and her protestations to herself, in some deep, dark part of her soul, she had enjoyed it.

She reached for the second vodka and sipped it, feeling it burn all the way down. Had she done everything that needed to be done? She went over her actions again — the clean-up, wiping off her prints, the blood, showering. She knew there was no way she could rid the room or his body of every trace of her, that if a police forensic team went over it, they would find something to point to her. But she also knew it would probably never come to that.

Then she realised with a shock that she had forgotten to do one thing. Get rid of the knife. She had cleaned it, but it was still in her bag. And the rest of the set was still in the drawer. She could keep them all, of course, take them home and use them, in plain view like Poe’s ‘The Purloined Letter’, but it would be more sensible to get rid of them all.

She jumped up off the bed, dressed quickly in jeans and a cashmere jumper, tied her damp hair at the back of her neck, then took out the knife from her handbag and placed it back with the others in the box the set had come in. As an afterthought, she ripped the cellophane off the cardboard box, so the water would get in and make sure it sank under the weight of the knives. Not that it mattered. Even if they floated out to sea, no one would be able to trace them to her. But best be careful.

It was a mild evening and there were plenty of people strolling along the riverside. Couples holding hands on their way home from restaurants or pubs, parents with grumbling children returning from a long, tiring day of sightseeing. Pleasure boats went by, lit up for the night-time champagne cruises, all the romance of the Thames.

There was nowhere Zelda could be completely free of passers-by, so she chose a dark spot far enough away from any restaurant or bar — and, as far as she could tell, CCTV — and crossed the stretch of grass that separated the path from the wall. There was no one else standing near her, and the path was now a good ten or twelve feet behind. She leaned her elbows on the wall as if contemplating the view. The tide was well in and the water just below her swirled black and oily. Some of the windows in the office buildings across the river were still lit up, and she could see the occasional silhouettes of late workers walking about in the offices. But they were too far away to see what she was doing.

When there were no boats passing in front of her and no one behind, she slipped the box of knives out of her bag and dropped it over the side. It made a satisfying plop, and she felt a sense of relief, seeing it go down, as if by getting rid of the weapon she had shed some of the burden of the crime.

Just then, she heard a voice behind. ‘Is everything all right?’

She turned sharply, hand on her heart and saw a young man in jogging gear standing on the grass in front of her.

‘Only you were looking a bit lost,’ he said, sounding less sure of himself now he could see her at least partially in the city darkness.

‘I’m fine,’ Zelda said, dredging up a polite smile.

‘It’s just... you know, sometimes people... I don’t mean to be...’

‘Honest. I’m fine,’ Zelda reassured him. ‘I wasn’t thinking of jumping. I was just enjoying the peace and the view.’

‘Oh. I’m sorry I interrupted you, then, if everything’s OK.’

‘It’s fine, really. I’m going now, anyway.’

The young man studied her for a moment, as if to make sure she was telling the truth, then he nodded and set off jogging along the path again. Her heart still pounding, Zelda made her way back to her hotel room.

Banks stood at the front door watching the car churn up gravel as it headed down the drive. When the sound of the motor faded, there was silence except for Gratly Beck. It was a warm evening — perhaps the warmest of the year so far — and Banks realised it had been a long time since he had sat by the terraced falls and enjoyed a nightcap al fresco. It was already dark, a clear night, with stars glittering in the sky, so he went back for his wine, then climbed the wall and sat on the grassy bank of Gratly Beck by the terraced waterfalls, looking down on the lights of Helmthorpe in the valley bottom.

Talk of Keane had brought back memories of the night it happened. Much of it was blurred, as he had been drugged, but he remembered the sensation of being unable to move a muscle while also being aware that the flames were rising all around him. He remembered ‘Death and the Maiden’ playing on the stereo and thinking it was the last music he was ever going to hear. He had thought it was all over, then he felt himself being manhandled, and the next thing he knew he was lying on the gravel drive with Annie and Winsome bending over him.

He came back to the present at the sound of a night bird in one of the trees that lined the banks of the beck further down the slope, towards Helmthorpe. He thought of what Burgess had told him and wondered whether Zelda — and therefore Ray — really was in danger. Nobody in the trafficking organisation would know she was doing the job for the NCA, or where she lived, unless there was an informer working there. And if that informer had been Hawkins, he could easily have tipped off Tadić that Zelda was working there, with her special knowledge and skills. But if he had done that, why hadn’t something happened already? Couldn’t they find her? Was it more to their advantage to have her doing that job? The devil you know...

Burgess wanted to know how much Zelda knew, or suspected, and perhaps when Banks knew that, he would be better able to gauge any danger to her. Burgess was right, though; neither he nor Ray could protect her full-time, and they couldn’t expect the police to do it. He could only hope that she was not in danger. If she was, it was probably his fault for bringing Phil Keane to her attention in the first place. But that photograph of Keane with Tadić, if that was who it was, hadn’t led to anything. Surely Hawkins would have had nothing to report about her, even if he had been working for the traffickers. Zelda wasn’t the only one in her office, the only threat to them, and Tadić’s gang could hardly murder them all. The thought calmed him down a little, but even then, he couldn’t get rid of that nagging worry at the back of his mind. He would call her tomorrow, find out when she was coming home.

As he finished his wine, Banks found his thoughts turning to Samir. He was still feeling depressed from his meeting with the boy’s uncle and aunt on Thursday. Samir had come on ahead to ‘light the way’ and make money to send his family so they might follow him, but somehow or other he had lost the address of his aunt and uncle and had probably — so Banks thought — ended up drifting into, or being forced into, working for a county lines drug dealer. Perhaps he was earning good money, or perhaps, like so many trafficked refugees, he was working off a debt which only grew bigger day by day. For Samir, in a way, had been stolen from his normal life, just as surely as Zelda had been stolen from hers. They had both made long journeys and encountered many obstacles. And the damned thing was that Samir’s parents had been killed in an explosion after he had left Syria, and he had had no idea that they were dead. He had been working to make money that could never bring him what he wanted. His family. And now he was dead, too.

Banks drained his glass, climbed back over the drystone wall and crossed his gravel drive to the cottage. Perhaps just a touch more Negroamaro and some Dylan before bed. The Nico moment had passed. He had been listening to the fragments and outtakes of Blood on the Tracks recently, and for some reason that had given him the desire to listen to its predecessor, the underrated Planet Waves, for the first time in a few years.