Necessary as Blood

CHAPTER TWELVE

In its heyday, the pub [the Bethnal Green Arms] had been the haunt of the Kray twins and various other East End underworld figures and thugs. But since then, its popularity had dwindled, possibly because the décor and ambience dated back to the same period.

– Tarquin Hall, Salaam Brick Lane

“I have to ring the social worker.” Standing in the street with Kincaid, beside their respective cars, Gemma fumbled in her bag for her mobile.

“Slow down, love,” Kincaid said. “We have no idea if it’s true, to begin with. Could be just a rumor, or could be the girl misheard or misunderstood, or she might even be making things up for a bit of drama. It sounds as if her life is going to be pretty grim without Naz Malik in it.”

“Yes, well, maybe so. But I don’t think she’s making it up. Tim said Sandra didn’t get on with her brothers at all.”

“That’s hearsay, and even if the brothers are involved with drugs, that doesn’t mean Sandra’s sister is as well. I’m sure the little girl will be fine.”

“Charlotte. Her name is Charlotte,” said Gemma, and was surprised by her own vehemence. “And you can’t know that she’ll be all right. She’s already lost both parents, at least as far as we know.”

He sighed. “Okay, you’re right. Call the social worker. But those decisions are hers to make, not yours. And-” He held up his hand like a traffic cop to stop her interrupting. “And I’ll see what I can dig up on Sandra Gilles’s brothers. According to the reports, they did have alibis for the time Sandra Gilles disappeared. But we don’t know yet about the day Naz was killed. Now”-he glanced at his watch, which suddenly seemed to Gemma an infuriating habit-“I’ve got to get back to Bethnal Green. I’ll ring you if we come up with anything concrete.” He kissed her cheek. “Go see your mum.”

Gemma watched as he got in his car, waving to her as he pulled away. She suddenly felt ridiculous, standing in the sun in the middle of a street whose name she didn’t remember, feeling angry with Kincaid for no reason other than that he had been bossy and slightly patronizing. If she were going to get her knickers in a twist any time a man behaved like that, she’d long ago have given up her job. It must be the worry over her mum getting to her.

She would go to the hospital, of course. But first she was going to ring Janice Silverman. And then, after she’d seen her mum, she was going to pay another visit to Tim Cavendish. Tim had been reluctant to tell them about Sandra’s rumored relationship with the mysterious club owner because he was protecting Naz. And if he’d held back one thing, were there others? Had Naz told him about Sandra’s brothers?

“Okay, what have we got?” Kincaid looked round at the occupants of the incident room at Bethnal Green station, who looked as bedraggled as the room itself. Polystyrene cups and plastic sandwich boxes littered the tabletops; papers had drifted out of folders and onto the floor; articles of clothing had been draped over chair backs-all signs of what Kincaid hoped had been a productive afternoon. While he’d been out someone had got the whiteboard organized and tacked up a set of the crime scene photos.

He cleared space to sit on one of the tables as the female constable who’d been taking the public calls said, “Nothing on the phones, sir. A couple of nutters-we’ll check them out just in case-but nobody who sounds reliable has reported seeing anything in the park. I’ve pulled a photo of Naz Malik from the Gilles file and had it copied. We’ll get it posted round the park, and will have someone take it door-to-door in the nearby streets as well.”

“Nice initiative,” Kincaid said, trying not to notice that the constable had stripped down to the barest of tank tops and didn’t appear to be wearing a bra. “And you’re-”

“Ashley, sir.” She pushed a damp wisp of hair into her glossy brown ponytail and smiled. “Detective Constable Ashley Kynaston.”

“Newly promoted to CID,” put in Sergeant Singh, with the emphasis on newly, apparently not disposed to tolerate grandstanding by another attractive female officer.

“I’m beginning to think this is better than working at the Yard,” Kincaid murmured to Cullen, who had just come in, but Cullen looked at him blankly. Kincaid sighed. No wonder the poor bugger couldn’t get a date.

He addressed the group again. “Okay, no joy there. Anything from forensics?”

“Nothing immediately useful from the park,” said Singh, briskly taking charge. “But they’ve filed samples for comparison in case they’re needed later-a few unidentified shreds of cloth as well as the soil and leaf mold. It was too dry for prints. Nor was there anything of note in Mr. Malik’s personal effects. The techies have turned the mobile over to us, and I’ve got someone going through the numbers. All the most recent calls were from his friend Dr. Cavendish, his nanny, and his partner.” She spoke without notes, and Kincaid guessed he had her organizational skills to thank for the whiteboard and photos.

“And the house?” he asked.

“Still working on it. We’ll need prints for comparison, but there’s nothing obvious. They’ve taken two computers in for analysis.”

“All right. They can carry on, but I’ll want to have a look myself at anything interesting in the house-papers, diaries, photos.” These were the items he always preferred to see himself, as it was often the things you weren’t looking for that turned out to be the most helpful. And in this case, particularly, when they might be dealing with not one crime but two, he wanted to get a sense of this couple, this household.

Gemma had seemed to feel a connection with them, and with their child-perhaps too much of a connection, he thought, remembering their last conversation. “Sergeant Singh, when you investigated Sandra Gilles’s brothers after she disappeared, was there any suggestion that they were involved with serious drugs? As in dealing?”

“I can tell you that.”

Turning, Kincaid saw a man leaning against the doorway, hands in the baggy pockets of his trousers. He still wore the jacket of his gray suit, which stretched across his broad shoulders, but the tail end of his tie hung from the jacket pocket. His graying hair was buzzed short, accentuating the pouches under his eyes.

“DI Weller,” said Kincaid.

“Got it in one.” Weller came into the room, propping himself on the edge of Singh’s table, and Kincaid sensed a subtle shift in the room’s alliances, a withdrawal. None of the Bethnal Green crew would want to be seen sucking up to Scotland Yard in front of their boss.

“Kevin and Terry Gilles are not the brightest clams in the pail,” Weller went on. “I can’t see them doing more than threatening kids for their lunch money. One of them, Kevin, I think it is, has been taken in a few times for disorderly conduct, had his driving license suspended. Apparently has a bit of a problem with his drink, but that’s a long way from drug kingpin.”

“Duncan Kincaid, by the way. Scotland Yard,” Kincaid said, ignoring Weller’s slightly mocking tone. The DI was doing a fairly good job of playground bully himself, but they were all going to have to get along nicely if they were to get anything accomplished. “And this is Sergeant Cullen,” he added, and Cullen gave Weller a wary nod. Kincaid glanced at his watch, smiled at the rest of the room. “Long day, everyone, and good job. Let’s reconvene first thing in the morning, shall we?” He turned back to Weller. “Inspector Weller, can we buy you a drink?”

They sat at one of the few tables squeezed onto the pavement outside a pub in Commercial Street. Kincaid had chosen the establishment because it was within spitting distance of Naz Malik’s Fournier Street house and he wanted to check on the forensics team afterwards. Weller had chosen the table on the pavement because he wanted to smoke.

“I quit for six months,” Weller admitted when Cullen had gone for their pints. “But my son got married this weekend, and then this case…” He shrugged and lit a Benson Hedges. Squinting past a stream of exhaled smoke, he held out a hand to Kincaid. “It’s Neal, by the way. Sorry if we got off on the wrong foot. Bad day.”

Cullen returned with three carefully balanced pint glasses and managed to set them down with only a slight slosh. Weller nodded his thanks and held out a hand to him as well. “Neal.”

“Doug.”

Proper introductions settled, Weller drank, then wiped the foam from his lip. “I was saying. Didn’t get a conviction today on a bastard we’re certain is a serial rapist. Jury considered the evidence circumstantial and the judge couldn’t convince them otherwise. Eighteen-year-old kid looks like a choirboy, and then there was me. Who’re they gonna believe?”

“Tough luck,” Kincaid agreed.

“For the next woman he lures into an alley.” Weller crushed out his cigarette with unnecessary force, then sighed. “But that’s neither here nor there, is it? You want to talk about Naz Malik.”

“First, I want to talk about Sandra Gilles,” Kincaid said. “What do you think happened to her?”

Weller shrugged. “What are the options? One-the most likely-domestic row turned ugly, husband got rid of the evidence. But within an hour of her leaving the kid at Columbia Road, Naz Malik was seen very publicly waiting for his family in a bus-turned-restaurant in Brick Lane. What could he have done with her in that hour? His office wasn’t far, but we went over every inch of the place and found nothing. And if she were meeting her husband, why leave the kid? And why not tell the friend at Columbia Road that she was meeting her husband?” Weller drank more of his pint and Cullen shifted in his chair, as if anticipating being sent to fetch the next round.

“So maybe she went home for something, caught her husband unexpectedly in the house with someone else,” Cullen suggested.

Weller shook his head. “Again, not enough time. Malik went straight from the restaurant to Columbia Road, took the kid home, and when his wife hadn’t turned up by dark, he called the police. When would he have disposed of a body? And there was no evidence in the house. Same as the office, it was clean as a whistle. So, option two.” He shook another cigarette from the pack and lit it.

“Sandra Gilles decided she was tired of being a wife and mum and simply disappeared from her life, either on her own or with someone else. It happens. Maybe she hitched a ride and is working as a fry cook at a Little Chef halfway to Scotland. I’d like to think so.”

“But you don’t,” Kincaid said, knowing the answer. “And option three?”

Weller’s eyes hardened. “Somebody snatched her off the street in broad daylight. Somebody like that psycho who got off today. Maybe he pulled over in a car, asked for directions, and dragged her in. Maybe everyone just happened to have their lace curtains closed at that very moment. And if that’s what happened, God help her. I hope it was quick.” He finished his drink in one long draft and Cullen stood up obligingly.

“Guv?” Cullen nodded at Kincaid’s glass, but Kincaid shook his head.

When Cullen had gone inside, Kincaid said. “What about her brothers? Apparently Naz thought their alibi was dodgy.”

“They were drinking in a pub near the Bethnal Green tube station. Not a nice place, to put it politely. Clientele mostly drunks and punters, and yes, some of them were mates of Kev and Terry. But the landlord didn’t care for the brothers, and he vouched for them regardless. And even if their alibi hadn’t checked out, what would they have done with her? Kev’s car, a clapped-out Ford, was up on blocks on the council estate, and they live with their mum, so it’s not likely they took her home.”

Cullen came back with a new pint for Weller and a glass of what looked suspiciously like tonic water for himself. “A scrum in there,” he said, edging his way past two standing drinkers to slip back into his chair.

The after-work crowd had now spilled out of the pub’s open doors. Most of the men and women wore suits, but Kincaid spied a patron or two in jeans and T-shirts, and one girl in full Goth regalia, black fingernails included.

“The City is moving in.” Weller eyed the suits with obvious distaste. “I suppose that’s a good thing-lowers the crime rate anyway, less work for us. But most of them are bloody wankers. They get jobs at some City bank, buy some overpriced tarted-up flat that’s barely been cleared of rats, and they think they belong here.”

“So who does belong here?” Kincaid asked, thinking about their earlier conversation with Alia Hakim. “The Bangladeshis? The Somalis? The artists?”

“There is that,” Weller agreed. “Not very many true Cockneys left-but what were Cockneys but poor immigrants who shoved out the immigrants who came before them?”

“Must have been a bit glamorous in its day, though, the old East End,” said Cullen. “The Kray twins-”

“Vicious bastards. I worked with blokes who’d seen the Krays’ handiwork up close-they had stories would make your hair stand on end. No”-Weller glanced round at the crowd-“good riddance to the Krays and their ilk, but just because the villains are less visible doesn’t mean they aren’t there.”

“What about this Ahmed Azad that Naz Malik and his partner were defending?” Kincaid asked.

“Ah, he’s a villain, all right, although certainly more civilized than the old-style gangsters. A first-generation immigrant as a teenager, he worked his way up in a relative’s restaurant while taking night classes in English and accountancy. Now he owns the restaurant and runs it well. He’s a wily old sod, with a foot in both communities.”

“Sounds like you know him well.”

“He’s been the complainant more often than not, when the white gangs have wreaked havoc in Brick Lane. And while it’s rumored he has a finger in a number of questionable operations, I haven’t heard him linked to murder.”

“Louise Phillips told us that the prosecution’s star witness in a trafficking charge against him has vanished. If Azad was responsible, and Naz Malik found out-”

Weller shrugged. “If Naz thought Azad had removed a witness, he might have declined the case, but I can’t imagine Azad taking out his own lawyer. Might damage his prospects for future representation just a bit.”

“What if Naz thought Azad was involved in Sandra’s disappearance?”

“Sandra Gilles had no connection with Azad.”

“That you know of.” Kincaid locked eyes with Weller. “You didn’t know about Lucas Ritchie either.”

“We questioned everyone who had an immediate connection with Sandra Gilles. But we had no evidence that a crime had actually been committed. We had no reason to go through the woman’s client list.”

“If you didn’t think you had missed something, or that there was a connection between the wife’s disappearance and the husband’s murder, you wouldn’t have called us in.”

For a long moment, Weller stared back belligerently, then his shoulders relaxed and he drained his pint. “Point taken,” he said, carefully aligning his glass on the beer mat. “Rashid sent me the tox report. If he’s right-and he usually is, the smug bastard-it would be a very odd coincidence if Sandra Gilles disappeared and three months later someone just happened to kill her husband. But I’ll be damned if I know who to move to the top of the list.”

“How about we start with Azad,” Kincaid suggested.

Weller frowned. “Butter wouldn’t melt in his mouth, Mr. Ahmed Azad. I don’t think you’ll get very far.” He pushed his empty glass aside. “But I can introduce you to him, if you like. He lives right round the corner.”

Gemma wasn’t sure if her call to Janice Silverman had reassured her or made her more anxious about Charlotte.

“Oh, not to worry about the sister,” Silverman had said. “We ran a check on her. She’s had half a dozen reports filed against her-neglect, too many boyfriends coming and going, her three little boys showing up at school with the unexplained bruise.”

“She still has her kids?”

“For the time being, although they’ve had a couple of short-term stays in foster care.” She sighed. “We can’t put half of London permanently in foster care, so we do the best we can. Her caseworker is making regular visits.”

Gemma passed on what Alia had told them about Sandra’s and Donna’s brothers.

“I’ll send a note to Donna’s caseworker. Her boys may not have regular contact with their uncles, but the information should go in the file. Thanks. And thanks for recommending Mrs. Howard, by the way,” Silverman added. “A nice woman, and she seems to be doing a good job with Charlotte. Nice of you to visit, as well. The more interested parties, the better, in our business.”

Gemma had said she’d look in on Charlotte again as soon as she could, and hung up feeling a warm rush of pleasure at the idea that she might have made a positive difference.

That soon faded, however, as she chewed over scenarios involving Sandra Gilles’s brothers and drugs. If the brothers dealt in heroin, it made it more likely that they would have access to the Valium and ketamine that had been used to drug Naz.

But why would they have killed Naz? And how could they have got the drugs into him if he refused to have any contact with them?

She did her best to put the questions aside while spending an hour with her mother at the hospital. But when she could see Vi beginning to tire, she kissed her good-bye and drove to Islington.

When she pulled up, she found Tim sitting on the front steps of the house, drinking a mug of tea and watching Holly play in the front garden of the house next door. The treetops in the communal garden had begun to filter the late-afternoon sun, and Gemma sat down beside Tim gratefully, watching the slightest ripple of breeze through the foliage.

“Too hot to stay in the house,” Tim said. “Too hot to drink tea, really,” he added, inspecting his mug. It had been one of Hazel’s favorites, Gemma remembered, with a pattern of leaves and cherries on a cream background and lettering that spelled out TIME FOR TEA. It looked awkwardly feminine in Tim’s hand. “But it’s that time of day, and too early for beer,” he continued. “Would you like some?”

“Beer, or tea?” Gemma asked, teasing. She thought he looked exhausted. “No, thanks, really. I’ve just had a liter or two of industrial-strength brew at the hospital.”

“How’s your mum?”

“Better. They’re sending her home tomorrow. She’s rather proud of her chemo port-calling herself a bionic woman and showing it off to all and sundry.” She didn’t say that Vi had looked frighteningly frail. Settling more comfortably on the step, she watched the children. Holly’s playmate was a dark-skinned little boy, perhaps a year or two younger, and Holly was giving him intricate instructions that Gemma couldn’t quite hear. “She’s quite the little martinet, isn’t she?”

“Dictator in the making,” Tim agreed with a chuckle, then sobered. “She does have a soft spot beneath all the bossiness, though. Hearing that Charlotte’s dad died upset her, and she’s taking being separated from Hazel very hard.”

Gemma hated to let go of the few minutes of peaceful reprieve, but now that Tim had brought it up, there was no putting it off. “Tim. About Naz. We’ve had the toxicology report. They found very high levels of Valium and a veterinary tranquilizer called ketamine. He-”

“But that’s not possible.” Tim smacked the mug down with a scrape of porcelain against concrete that made Gemma wince. “I’ve told you-Naz wouldn’t touch-”

“They’re not saying he did.” Gemma touched Tim’s knee in reassurance. “The pathologist thinks someone else dosed him.”

“But how-”

“We don’t know. Tim, did Naz ever talk about Sandra’s brothers being involved with drugs?”

“Sandra’s brothers? Could they have done this?” At the sound of her father’s raised voice, Holly looked over from next door, her small face creased in a frown.

“Daddy?” she called, dropping the plastic spade she’d been using as a stick horse and coming towards them.

“It’s all right, love.” Tim took a deep breath and waved her away. “You play with Sami while I talk to Auntie Gemma for a bit longer.”

Holly went back to her playmate obediently, but cast worried glances their way. With the muting of the children’s voices, Gemma noticed how quiet it was in the street. A car swished by in the next road; somewhere a small dog yipped, but even those sounds seemed faded. No birds sang. The evening itself seemed drugged with heat haze, and it was hard to imagine the things that had happened to Naz Malik on an equally tranquil Saturday night.

“Do you think Naz would have gone somewhere with them?” she asked Tim.

“No. Not unless-not unless it had to do with Sandra. But they were cleared of having anything to do with Sandra’s disappearance.”

“So they were,” Gemma mused. “But that doesn’t necessarily mean they didn’t know anything about it. Tim, are you sure that Naz didn’t tell you anything else? I know he was your friend, and I know you don’t want anyone to think badly of him, or of Sandra, but-”

“No.” Tim’s whisper had the force of a shout. “I’ve been racking my brain. We just talked about, I don’t know, ordinary things. Our childhoods. University. Kids. Naz said”-Tim looked away-“Naz said he didn’t know what he would do if he were separated from Charlotte.”

Suddenly, Gemma saw what Hazel had seen so clearly. Tim had needed a confidant as badly as Naz. Someone to sympathize, someone who understood what it was like to have the foundations of your life snatched away.

She asked, knowing she had no right, “Tim, did you tell Naz about Hazel?”

“Of course not,” he said, too quickly. “Well, just that we were separated, obviously, but nothing more.” He picked up his cup again, staring at the dregs of tea as he swirled them, then looked up at her. “Gemma, I’m worried about Hazel. I’ve been ringing since she left here yesterday. She won’t pick up and she won’t return my calls. She only has a mobile, so she should have it with her.” He wrapped his arms round his knees, dangling the mug by its handle. It made him look like a gangly, overgrown boy. “I know if I showed up at her place, she’d be furious-she hasn’t even invited me inside when I’ve dropped Holly off.”

A cooling feather of air touched Gemma’s cheek. The wind was shifting, a milky scum of cloud creeping over the sun. She glanced at her watch-it had gone six, and she was suddenly anxious to be home, although she had spoken to Kit and Toby on her way to Islington. She felt an irrational need to have everyone she loved corralled, like errant ducklings, and she wanted to talk to Duncan. He hadn’t rung her since they’d parted at Alia’s.

“I wouldn’t worry,” she told Tim. “But I’ll ring her, and I’ll tell her to ring you.” Although their friendship had never been physically demonstrative, she leaned over and kissed Tim’s bearded cheek, then stood. “Or else.”

She’d meant to wait to ring Hazel until she reached the house, but the image of Hazel as she’d been on Sunday, gaunt, unwashed, brittle with rage, unnerved her and she couldn’t focus on her driving. Pulling off the Caledonian Road, she stopped the car in a quiet street near the canal.

Although she’d told Tim not to worry, she hadn’t reassured herself. Why hadn’t she called to make sure Hazel was all right? What sort of friend was she?

The thought of Sandra Gilles and Naz Malik leapt unbidden into her mind-the specter of meetings not kept and phones not answered, of things gone terribly wrong.

Switching off the Escort’s engine, she took her phone from her bag and punched in Hazel’s number. A gull cried out over the canal, and as the signal connected, she felt the rumble of trains from nearby Kings Cross, a bone-deep counterpoint to the shrill and persistent ringing of Hazel’s phone.