make you a coffee? Or maybe you’d like a wodka?’
That was unexpected. He sensed a fear of rejection in her averted face. Was she propositioning him? Compassion, good sense – and yes, temptation, too – wrestled briefly in his heart, and then a vision loomed up before him – the stern face of that old killjoy Father Pietruski.
He shook his head. ‘Another time, darling, I’ve got a lot on tomorrow.’
‘You’ll let me know when you find out where Nika is?’ said the girl, anxiety ridging her forehead.
‘You’ll be the first to hear,’ he said.
He watched her walk into the block, and two or three minutes later a first-floor light came on in what he guessed was her flat. He lingered, thinking that she might appear in the window, but was then distracted by the screech of a big dark-coloured car pulling out from the estate. Gunning its engine, it tore off down the street. When he looked back up at the block, the curtains had been closed on the oblong of light. Feeling a pang of loneliness, he threw down his cigar stub and left.
For DC Kershaw, the following day would turn out to be what her Dad might have called a game of two halves.
As she stretched herself awake in the pre-dawn gloom, her triceps and calf muscles delivered a sharp reminder of how she’d spent the previous evening – scaling the toughest route on the indoor wall on Mile End Road, handhold by punishing handhold. It was worth it, though. Climbing demanded a level of concentration so focused and crystalline that it left no headspace for stressing about the job. And she was getting pretty good, too – last summer she’d ticked off her first grade 7a climb, up in the Peaks. She hadn’t been tempted to mention her feat at work, obviously, because that would mean the entire nick calling her Spiderwoman … like for ever.
Still half-asleep, she stepped under the power shower, and found herself assaulted by jets of icy water. Gasping, she flattened her back against the cold glass and spun the knob right round to red, but it didn’t make a blind bit of difference. A quick tour of the flat revealed all the radiators to be stone cold, too – the boiler must be up the spout. Cursing, she pulled on her clothes, then her winter coat, and hurrying into the minuscule galley kitchen, turned on all four gas rings.
While she was scaling K2 last night, the rest of the guys had gone out on a piss-up to celebrate Browning’s birthday. She’d almost joined them, but luckily Ben Crowther tipped her off – with a look that said it definitely wasn’t his thing – that the birthday boy wanted to hit a lap-dancing club in Shoreditch later. No thanks. Being ‘one of the guys’ in the office was one thing, but she could live without the sight of Browning getting his crotch polished by some single mum with 36DD implants and a Hollywood wax.
The milk she added to her brewed tea floated straight to the surface in yellowy curds. Bugger. After making a fresh cup, black this time, she took it into the living room. As she sat on the sofa in her coat drinking the tea – too astringent-tasting without the milk – she fretted about how she would find time today to hassle the letting agents, let alone wangle a half-day off for the boiler repairman. Life had been a lot less stressful when Mark had lived here. Not that he was some spanner-wielding DIY god – Mark drove a desk in a Docklands estate agents and the only gadgets he’d mastered were the remote controls for the telly and the Skyplusbox – but it was so much easier when there were two of you to sort out the tedious household stuff.
As she attacked her last surviving nail, unshakeable habit and source of much mickey-taking at the station, her gaze fell on the dusty surface of the TV cabinet and the darker rectangle where the plasma screen used to sit. She’d let Mark take it when they split up last month.
How did I get to be sitting alone in a rented flat that I can’t afford, drinking black tea in my coat? she thought suddenly, and felt her eyes prickle.
She reminded herself how unbearable the atmosphere between her and Mark had become in those last few weeks, when their dead relationship lay in the flat like a decomposing body which they stepped over and around without ever acknowledging. By comparison, the previous phase had been preferable. The rows had started a couple of months ago, after she got the job at Newham CID and started coming home late and lagered-up two or three times a week. If she was in luck, he’d be asleep when she crawled into bed beside him, but if not, there’d be trouble. He’d complain she reeked of booze and fags, but they both knew that wasn’t the real issue. Mark never really accepted her argument that she went drinking with the guys not because she fancied any of them, but because bonding was fundamental to the job. The argument would get more and more heated, and then he’d start in on her language. Since you joined the cops, Nat, you talk more like a bloke than a bird.
The last accusation hit home; but you couldn’t spend all day holding your own with a bunch of macho guys, then come home and morph into Cheryl Cole. Sometimes she felt like she’d actually grown a Y-chromosome over the last few years.
Kershaw had always felt comfortable around men – probably because she’d been brought up by her father. The photos of her as a kid said it all – playing five-a-side with him and his mates in the park … holding up her first fish – a carp – caught at Walthamstow Reservoir … draped in a Hammers scarf on the way to the footie. Dad told her, more than once, that he never missed having a son, because with her he got the best of both worlds – a beautiful, clever little girl who could clear a pool table in under ten minutes.
Two years ago, when they told him the cancer was terminal, he confided, in a hoarse whisper that tore her heart out, that looking back, he had one regret: I should have remarried after your Mum died, he said, so you had someone to teach you how to be a lady.
Checking her watch, Kershaw gave a very unladylike sniff, wiped her face, and told herself to stop being such a wuss. Then, gulping the rest of the lukewarm tea down with a grimace, she picked up her bag.
As she closed the front door behind her, she heard her dad’s voice.
Up and at ’em, girl, it said, up and at ’em.
Parking in the minuscule car park attached to Newham nick was the usual struggle, and it didn’t improve Kershaw’s mood to see Browning’s car was already there. The little creep always got in early for his shift.
There was an email from Waterhouse in her inbox. The PM report had come back, and even better, the lab must have had a quiet week because they’d already done the tox report on DB16. It confirmed the cause of death as overdose by PMA – the dodgy drug Waterhouse had mentioned. Yes! She printed out the report, and surfing a wave of adrenaline, made a beeline for Streaky’s desk.
Later on, she would reflect it might have been better to wait till Streaky had downed his first pint of brick-red tea before she started waving the report around.
He didn’t lift his gaze from the racing pages. ‘Sarge …’ she tried, hovering over him, ‘Sorry to …’
‘Fuck off, I’m busy,’ he replied, without looking up.
‘The PM report on the floater …’
He lowered the paper, and fixed her with a bloodshot stare.
‘Which part of the well-known Anglo-Saxon phrase, “fuck off” don’t you understand? Go and wax your bikini line or something.’
With that he swivelled his chair to turn his back on her and circled a horse in the 2.30 p.m. at Newmarket. Face radiating heat, she slipped the report into his in-tray, and returned to her desk by the window. Browning, whose desk faced hers, caught her eye, his face a study in faux-sympathy.
‘Hangover,’ he hissed, leaning across the desk. ‘It turned into a bit of bender last night.’
‘Oh yes?’ said Kershaw, opening her mailbox.
‘You