As Karen watched, a bulky, broad-shouldered man, quite dishevelled, clothing awry, lurched up from one of the rows near the back of the room and, shouldering bystanders aside, pushed his way out through the rear doors.
"It is the firm determination," the Assistant Chief concluded, "of every one of us on this platform, and of every officer in this Force, to bring those responsible for this heinous crime-the shooting of an unarmed officer in cold blood-to justice as soon as possible."
When Resnick had finally returned from the hospital in the early hours of the morning, he had stumbled around the house blindly, throwing open doors to rooms he barely recognised. Once, in the bathroom, he caught sight of himself in the mirror, shaggy-haired, unshaven and hollow-eyed, without knowing who he was. In the kitchen, he found the sections of the stovetop coffeepot on the drainer and started to reassemble them before giving up, the task too great.
Lynn.
Lynn.
The word stuck, like something vast and indigestible, in his throat, and he thought that he might choke.
Without his knowledge, time passed.
The cats, who would normally have fussed around his feet, steered clear, as if aware of his distress.
Marooned in the living room, he found his way falteringly to the shelves holding the stereo and pulled a CD out from the rack, but left it unplayed.
"You want me to meet you at the station?" he had asked.
And then her voice, jarred out of focus by the background noise of the train. "No need. I'll get a cab."
No need. No need.
You're sure?
Sure.
Oh, Christ! It came to him like a knife blade slipped cold against the heart. If he had gone, if he had gone… if, instead of listening and accepting what she'd said-pleased to hear it really, if he were honest, half-pleased at least, no need to get up from his easy chair and venture out into the relatively cold night air, no call to stop listening to Brookmeyer's sour trombone relishing the chords, the melodies of "There Will Never Be Another You"-if instead what he had done-as in the first flush of their relationship he would have without fail-was to have hurried from the house to the car and made sure he was at the station well before the train arrived, waiting at the head of the stairs and gazing into the mass of passengers as they bustled towards him, seeking out her face, the smile that his presence would produce when she saw that he was there after all, the look of pleasure that would become a kiss, an embrace, her arms, her body, clinging to his-if he had done all that, Lynn would most likely be alive now.
But…
No need. I'll get a cab.
You're sure?
Sure.
Oh, Jesus! Sweet, sweet fuck! What had he done? What had he failed to do?
He stood there, numb and shivering, lost in the centre of the room, while grief shocked through him like cold waves breaking over his battered heart.
Karen had spent the afternoon and early evening taking soundings, getting her bearings. She spoke briefly to the SIO in charge of the case Lynn Kellogg had been working on immediately before her death, the double murder out at Bestwood, wondering if there might be any connection, then pulled together as many as she could of the team which had investigated Kelly Brent's death-Anil Khan, Catherine Njoroge, Frank Michaelson, Steven Pike. She had them take her through the circumstances of the shooting, the accusations made by the victim's family, the circumstances leading, haphazardly, up to Lee Williams's arrest.
After reviewing what was so far known about Lynn Kellogg's murder, she sat in the canteen with the young PC who had been the first officer to arrive at the scene, still shaken by what he had found. Then, on a borrowed computer, she studied a map of the specific area, the narrow, winding road-little more than a lane-which led off the main Woodborough Road towards the house where Kellogg and Resnick had lived-and where she had died.
Two shots.
Head and heart.
A professional hit, Karen thought. Paid for, organised, preordained. Either that, or blind luck. That close, she reasoned, and given a steady hand, it would have been difficult to miss.
Time would tell.
She resisted several offers of dinner in this restaurant or that in favour of room service at the hotel, amazed as ever how it can take the best part of an hour for most self-respecting kitchens to rustle up a toasted-cheese sandwich. Her room was small and neat and clearly not designed with a near-six-foot woman in mind; no way her feet weren't going to stick over the end of the bed, and she had to bend almost double to get her head under the shower. And whoever had decided a bright raspberry bedspread adorned with cream squiggles went with bright purple curtains, biscuit-coloured walls and a ruby red carpet, needed, she thought, to retake her final exam in interior design. But at least, as the hotel literature proudly proclaimed, it was only two minutes' walk from the railway station. Handy, if she changed her mind.
From tomorrow she had been promised a serviced apartment with a fully equipped kitchen, an LCD digital television, wireless broadband and breathtaking views across the city.
She could scarcely wait.
She'd phoned Mike Ramsden earlier and given him the good news: there was a train out of St. Pancras at 6:35 that would get him into Nottingham at 8:29. The first meeting with the enquiry team was set for 9:00 A.M.
"You know what you are, don't you?" Ramsden growled.
"Aside from your boss?"
"Yeah, aside from that."
Karen laughed. "See you tomorrow, Mike. Best have breakfast on the train."
All those thoughts rolling round in her head, she didn't reckon on getting to sleep easily, and she was right. After fifteen minutes of restless rolling and turning, she threw back the covers, splashed cold water on her face, rinsed her mouth, pulled a stiff comb through her hair, and put on a sweater, jeans and padded jacket. New Balance trainers on her feet. Two minutes to the railway station was just about right.
The driver at the front of the short line of cabs was sitting with his door open, reading through the paper for perhaps the fourth or fifth time and listening to the local radio station.
Karen gave him the address and climbed into the back. Just time to adjust her seat belt before they pulled out on to Carrington Street and the bridge over the canal. The same journey Lynn Kellogg would have taken the night she died.
Tape was still stretched across in front of the house, preserving the scene. The house itself was dark, the curtains partly drawn across, the faintest of lights showing through from one of the rooms at the rear.
The taxi had disappeared from sight.
There were few signs of life from higher up the street.
The sound of traffic from the main road seemed more distant than it was.
Karen zipped her jacket tighter and started to walk slowly towards the house, then stopped. Someone was standing at one of the upstairs windows, looking down. A man's shape in silhouette, bulking large against the glass. She could just see the outline of the face, the faint pale blur of skin. She stood there for a moment, looking up, then raised a hand, as if in salute, and turned away.
She picked up another taxi easily enough on its way back into the city. In her room up on the fifth floor, she sat on the bed, slowly drinking a vodka and tonic from the minibar, and thought about the man in that house alone, trying and failing to feel her way into his mind, what he must be thinking, going through.
When her head finally touched the pillow, she fell, almost immediately, asleep.
Twenty-five
Mike Ramsden's train was on time. He arrived at the Central Police Station with anger still buzzing inside him after reading the newspaper account of the fatal stabbing of a young PC, who had been called to an incident early the previous morning and attempted to restrain a man who had already attacked two members of the public with a knife. Stabbed in the neck and the shoulder, his protective vest had been to no avail; less than three years in the service, he left a young widow and baby behind. All this at seven in the morning, a nondescript shopping centre in a nondescript town. What the fuck, Ramsden thought, was this fucking world coming to? His bit of the world. It was enough to make you weep.