Hush Hush

He was also pretty big on YouTube, having his own channel and promoting Steele’s Gym with his charisma as much as his advice. Eddie pressed on a video clip now, tears of anger welling in his eyes as he listened to Josh’s voice. Seeing him racing around the screen as he threw right hooks at a punchbag, it was hard to think that he was dead.

He took another sip of whisky and gazed through the office window into the empty gym behind it. Rows and rows of exercise machines stood as if on duty. Not a murmur could be heard except from the hum of the drinks machine. The emergency lights were on, giving the whole place an eerie glow.

A noise startled him. He turned, standing quickly. It sounded like a door closing, but he knew he was in the building alone. He reached for the baseball bat he kept by the side of his desk and went out into the corridor. Stepping slowly along it, he made his way into the gym, glancing around in every corner.

After a few minutes, he realised it was nothing. There had been no door closing. It was probably the heating clicking on or something stupid like that, something that shouldn’t have been enough to spook him.

Eddie went back to his office. There was crime scene tape across the side of the car park with no access, but was he risking it sitting here on his own? Was he next? Or had Josh’s murder been a one-off? He thought of all his rivals. He had as many as Josh. Was it someone with a grievance?

Tomorrow he would start getting word out to see. Once the police were gone, he would be doing some investigating of his own. He was going to root out the bastard who had done that to his friend. He would cut his eyes out. He would burn him too. And there would probably be someone behind the person who had carried out the attack, paying them to do their dirty work. He was going to find out who was at the top of the tree.

One last mouthful and, with the drink gone, he threw the glass at the wall, taking great delight in the noise and the mess that it made. It was better than using his fists, which was what his father would have done.

THIRTEEN

Sleep was the last thing on Grace’s mind as she arrived home just before midnight. She was famished, having only had time to eat a sandwich and the doughnuts throughout the day. She popped two slices of bread into the toaster and flicked on the kettle.

Well, the day hadn’t gone as she had planned but she certainly hadn’t thought of the date much. It hadn’t even had time to infiltrate her thoughts. Meeting her half-siblings in that manner had been immensely awkward. She suspected Eddie and Leon were going to be trouble and go out of their way to stall things. Or maybe they would surprise her and work with her to solve the murder, and simply want to get the police off their backs as quick as possible. It seemed that had been the case after the murder of George Steele had gone unsolved. She would have expected them to be coming in for weekly updates until the suspect had been caught.

Still, it must have been a shock to find someone dead on their premises. And such a high-profile person too. Parker shared tips on personal training and had quite a large following on social media. His murder might not only affect the club revenue; the funeral would be huge and the attention brought to the gym would be massive. She could bet Eddie wouldn’t like that.

She thought Leon, on the other hand, would lap it up. He seemed sharp, untouchable and a little ruthless. He tried to act as if he cared about Josh, but she could see it wasn’t sincere. Whereas Jade, she thought, seemed to be the only one with real tears. Whether that was because she was not as insensitive as her brothers remained to be seen.

Perry had been pissy again today. She’d thought she was getting through to him, that he might ease off with the catty remarks and the undermining comments. She knew he missed working with Allie because he mentioned her all the time. Allie did this and Allie did that. Grace had to bite her tongue on several occasions.

She also knew he wanted to be in control, but she’d got the job, not him. She’d give him a few more days and if he hadn’t changed his attitude she would have to talk to him about it. It wasn’t something she would look forward to but she had to start as she meant to go on.

The toast popped up, burnt around the edges and hardly touched in the middle, but she slathered it with butter all the same. Coffee made, she went through to the living room and sank into a deep orange armchair. It had been Matt’s favourite chair, so she hadn’t been able to part with it; instead, she’d bought a clashing bright blue leather sofa to fit alongside it perfectly. Even though she had never really felt settled here on her own, the house had such a homely feel to it without her even trying. She’d only had to add dashes of colour to help, alongside cream painted walls and light wooden flooring.

She flicked on the television. Their investigation might get a small mention on Sky News. It would gather momentum soon, because of who their victim was.

She sat back and thought of the day. Although she would never admit it to anyone, when she’d met her half-siblings she wished she could have spoken more with them, to see what it had been like for them as children. Of course she would never share what had happened to her in great detail, but she would always wonder if it had happened to them too. Or had it stopped with her and her mum?

The news clip she was waiting for came on and she turned up the volume. She had seen it earlier, but it was always something she liked to keep abreast of as fresh clips came through. Flowers had started to appear along the perimeter railings of the gym when people started to hear the news, but since the press release had gone out, people had turned up in their droves. Now alongside them were teddy bears, cards, candles. A football strip from both of the city’s football teams, which she bet didn’t happen very often. In a weird way, the outpouring of grief for Parker had been good to see. A lot of murder victims went unnoticed.

Yet she’d heard a few rumours today of Josh’s habit for hard knocks and doing whatever it took to get what he wanted. Perhaps they would find some good leads because of who he was. He must have had lots of loyal fans as well as enemies. Although his face was now damaged beyond recognition, he’d been exceptionally good-looking from what she had seen of his images everywhere, and he was a powerhouse of muscle underneath his clothes. She knew how many hours’ training that would have taken and, even though it sounded strange, it was a shame to see all that hard work go to waste.

She wondered if the senior CSI guy – what was he called? – had worked out cause of death. Dave Barnett, that was it. She picked up a notepad and wrote down his name. So many people met in one day had made her face-blind and she hated forgetting people’s names. In her line of work, you needed all the favours you could get; the last thing she wanted was to annoy someone because she couldn’t remember the basics.

Exhausted, she went back through to the kitchen and loaded the dishwasher with its lone plate and mug. Then she thought better of it and washed them.

With one last glance at Matt’s image at the bottom of the stairs, she checked the doors were locked, switched off the lights and set the burglar alarm. Going upstairs with its gentle beep in the background was reassuring but nowhere near as good as having someone coming to bed with you, to wrap their arms around you.

Grace had always been a loner, having only a handful of close friends growing up. It took her a long time to trust people, always having a guarded attitude. That way, she couldn’t get hurt. It was obviously something to do with her childhood. Luckily, Matt had had the same kind of personality.

They had been an insular couple from the moment they had got together. They’d met at a bowling alley when she had been out with some of the girls from the station she’d been working out of and he’d been with a group of his friends. Her girls had been whooping and hollering and his group had started doing the same. After a lot of catcalling, they’d merged and she’d paired up with Matt. By the end of the evening, he’d invited her out for a drink and they’d been together ever since. They’d bought a house within two years and married a year later.

Things had been going great until the diagnosis. Sometimes they had laughed together but mostly there had been tears. It had been tough to go through, but she hadn’t been the one dying so she had tried to keep their spirits raised. Matt had been determined not to give in until there had been no hope. He’d finally lost his faith when he had been admitted to the hospice. He’d been given weeks to live but had lasted only three more days. It was as if he knew that he wasn’t going to see out the end of that month. And who could blame him? He’d been in so much pain, ending his life as a shadow of his former self. Their life together now gone.

After he’d passed away, Grace remembered the empty feeling she’d experienced going back to their home. Even so soon after his death, it was as if he had never lived there. An emotion she couldn’t describe to anyone had washed over her – the grief, the anger, the fear, the relief; all mixed into one. Her work colleagues had rallied round, as too had her mum, but it hadn’t been enough to keep the loneliness at bay. She’d stopped going out for a while, her job giving her the ultimate excuse to work long hours and have no time for socialising.

She paused halfway up the stairs, squeezing her eyes shut tightly so she couldn’t see anything but coloured spots. She missed Matt so much, but she needed her sleep right now. She had to keep her head clear for the days ahead.

It was going to be emotional.

FOURTEEN

THURSDAY – DAY 3

The morning team briefing at eight thirty found over twenty people in a conference room that comfortably fitted only twelve. Grace had been lucky to bag a seat. Perry was standing behind her; Sam and Alex sat across from them; Nick was at the head of the table next to DCI Jenny Brindley. The rest were uniformed officers who had been drafted in to help.

‘Welcome to Operation Wedgwood.’ Jenny glanced around the room, waiting for someone to catch her eye. ‘The Parker case. What’s come in so far?’

Grace cleared her throat before speaking. ‘There are lots of house-to-house calls to continue with today and Sam has been actioning anything against the ones yesterday. We still have a list of people to get through, those who were at the gym between six and ten p.m. when it closed. And after the appeal for people to come forward went out during the press release, we have a lot more to interview this morning.’

‘What about his family? Friends? Acquaintances?’ Nick glanced around the room. ‘I know he must have a list a mile long of people that he knew, but are we making headway at all?’

‘We ran through about fifty per cent of them yesterday,’ Grace said. ‘And we’re planning on getting to the rest today. I’m sending my team across to the gym. We obviously can’t use the car park yet, but they’ve been arranging to interview people at the same time to save them all coming here.’ She pointed across the room to where a young man was sitting. ‘PC Mick Higgins has been drafted in to help us for a few hours too.’

‘At your service,’ Mick beamed.

Grace tried not to laugh. His eyes were as wide as his smile, reminding her of how much she’d resembled an eager puppy when she had first started as a beat bobby. He was mid-twenties at a push, his auburn hair cut short, his baby face sprouting the makings of a beard – all the fashion at the moment, but not an accessory she was enamoured with. She couldn’t understand the craze – give her a clean-shaven man any day.

Jenny nodded. ‘Anything else?’

‘We know Parker was on his own when he left the building,’ Grace continued. ‘You can clearly see him on the security camera coming outside.’

‘So he was at his car before anything happened. But no sign of anyone else?’

‘No, Ma’am.’

‘There are fields at the back of the gym.’ Mick chewed his bottom lip. ‘Do we think our suspect could have escaped that way?’

‘It’s possible,’ Grace acknowledged. ‘I don’t know the area as well as you guys, but I can see the canal towpath is a few minutes away on foot. It could take our suspect to any number of places where they could come out unnoticed.’

‘Or there could have been a car parked nearby,’ Perry suggested.

Nick nodded and turned to Alex. ‘Can you get Grace familiar with George Steele’s murder? Let’s see if there are any similarities.’

‘Will do.’ Alex nodded.

Grace cleared her throat to speak out in protest, but Nick chose not to look at her and continued with the briefing. Once he’d brought everyone up to speed, he stood up to signal the meeting was drawing to an end.

‘Preliminary PM results might be back for team briefing this evening.’ He gave out a few more orders before clapping his hands. ‘Right, people, you have your tasks. Go and do what you do best.’

When Grace returned to her desk, there was a jiffy bag in her in-tray, her name and the address of the station typed on a large white label. She leaned across and picked it up, wondering what it could be. Turning it over, she pulled on the red cotton that would open the seal. Seeing something wrapped in pink tissue paper, she popped her hand inside and drew out its contents. Unwrapping it revealed a Barbie doll: Moonlight Rose.

Grace frowned. She’d had the exact same doll when she was a girl. It had been a present from her father. She could specifically remember him saying that it was a rose for his rose. She shuddered at the thought. Who on earth would send her this?

Sam looked over Grace’s shoulder as she walked past. ‘A Barbie doll! Where’s that come from?’

‘I don’t know. There’s no note with it and the label isn’t handwritten so I can’t even hazard a guess.’ Grace held on to the toy. ‘I think it’s someone’s idea of a joke.’

‘I loved my Barbie. Did you have one when you were young?’

‘Yes. It was my favourite doll.’

‘I got one for my fifth birthday. I think I took it to bed with me on that first night.’ Sam giggled. ‘Come to think of it, I think I took it to bed with me until I was about twelve.’

‘Did you only have the one?’ Grace asked.

‘Yes. I didn’t want any more. I remember my friend having several and I thought at the time it was greedy. How can you give attention to more than one thing at a time? They’re collectors’ items now, you know.’ She clicked on to Google. ‘That one has a sixty-quid price tag.’

‘Maybe Ken will be delivered tomorrow,’ Alex smirked, butting into the conversation.

‘I’m surprised you know she had a beau!’ Grace laughed.

‘I have two older sisters. They used to nick my Action Man and hide him all the time.’

‘You wuss! You let them girls walk all over you,’ Sam teased.

As everyone took a few moments out to join in with the toy-related banter, Grace ran a hand around the inside of the envelope again, but there was nothing else inside it.

‘Do you think it’s anyone from your Manchester crew, winding you up?’ Perry asked.

‘I bet it is,’ Grace said, but she felt strangely unnerved.

Would it be someone she knew? She wouldn’t put it past any jokers at the station where she used to work, although they would probably have done something like this during her first week here. But how would they know about this doll? Could it be a coincidence?

She opened a desk drawer, placed the doll back into the envelope and popped it out of sight for now. When she looked up, Nick was beckoning her into his office.

‘Can you go and see Kathleen Steele?’ he asked as she got to him.

‘Yes, sir. I’ll take Perry with me,’ Grace said.

‘No, go alone – try and get her at home. Pry gently, if you know what I mean.’

Grace knew exactly what he meant. Go against their DCI’s instructions. ‘I don’t think—’ she started.

Nick put up his hand. ‘It’ll be fine. I’ll square it if necessary.’

FIFTEEN

Then

She woke to the sound of screams and sat up quickly in bed.

‘Mummy?’ Pulling the covers back, she tiptoed across the carpet. When she reached the door, she hesitated. What if Daddy was so cross that he hit her again?

‘Leave me alone!’

A bang. She jumped and almost ran back to hide under the covers, but there was another scream. She couldn’t leave her mummy in the hands of a monster.

She opened the door. Another bang and the sound of breaking glass. She padded across the tiny hallway. The living room door was ajar so she peeped around the corner of the frame. Mummy and Daddy were on the floor. Daddy was on top of Mummy, but Daddy had his hands around Mummy’s throat. Mummy was going red in the face.

‘Mummy!’ she screamed.

They both turned towards her, the room dropping into silence except for the sound of heavy breathing.

‘Get back to bed.’ Daddy pointed at her.

‘You’re hurting Mummy!’

‘If you don’t move by the time I count to three, it will be my hands around your neck.’

‘Go back to bed, darling,’ Mummy said. Her voice didn’t sound like Mummy. It was all croaky and had a shake in it.

She shook her head.

Daddy got to his feet slowly. She froze as he clenched his fist and came towards the door. Then he slammed it shut in her face.

She ran back to her room. Because she knew what would happen next. Her plan hadn’t worked. Grabbing her teddy bear, she crept into the wardrobe. She covered her ears with her hands to block out the sound of Mummy’s screams. On and on they went.

‘Don’t hurt my mummy,’ she sobbed.

She hated it inside the wardrobe. It was dark and things dangled over her and scared her. But it felt safer than being in bed.

And then it went quiet. She squeezed the teddy to her chest. She could hear Mummy crying too.

‘Don’t hurt her, George, please,’ she begged. ‘She’s only six.’

‘Get her in here.’

‘No, let her be.’

There were bangs, as if someone had fallen. She heard Mummy groan. And then the bedroom door opened.

‘I’ll break every bone in your body if you don’t come out from where you’re hiding.’

Daddy’s voice was so loud and scary. She held her breath, trying not to let him know where she was.

The wardrobe door was flung open. Daddy stood there. He had taken off his belt and wrapped it around his hand. She could see the buckle hanging down.

‘Please don’t hurt me, Daddy,’ she cried.

He reached inside the wardrobe, grabbed a handful of her hair and pulled her to her feet.

‘Come here, you little bitch.’

SIXTEEN

After dropping her team off at Steele’s Gym, Grace headed for the north of the city. It was an address she hoped she’d never have to revisit and just the thought of it was enough to make her want to drive to the M6, the city’s nearest motorway, and go anywhere instead.

Moreover, she wondered if maybe after her chat with the DCI she shouldn’t be going to this address alone, but ultimately this wasn’t Steele’s Gym, and that was the only place she’d been explicitly warned about.

Brown Edge was a small village built on one of the south-westerly spurs of the Pennine Chain and looked particularly colourful now that autumn was creeping up on them. After she had passed fields and farms to get to the address in Woodhouse Lane, she pulled in at the side of the road and took a deep breath. Hardman House had been her childhood home. It wasn’t a happy place. Even after this length of time away, there would still be ghosts of the past around, and in, every corner.

She got out of the car and walked up the driveway. Her footsteps were heavy, her heart beating as loud as a soldier’s on a quick-march. The house was a pre-war detached with a double frontage and large bay windows. Years ago, her mum had told her that George had inherited it from his parents and hadn’t spent any money on it so it had deteriorated, along with their marriage. The building itself was exactly as she remembered it, bar replacement windows and doors and a lick of paint here and there. The concrete on the driveway was old and breaking up, revealing pebble lakes that she walked around.

All at once, she remembered the places she used to hide: behind the bin store, the outhouse that led out to the garden, the attic with its winding staircase that George found hard to negotiate when he’d had a drink, the cupboard under the stairs – until he’d put a lock on it and used it to keep her in.

And the place where her nightmares had started.

She knocked briskly on the front door and took out her warrant card. A woman who appeared to be in her late fifties answered it. Her face was made-up as if it had been professionally done, her clothes immaculate. She pushed long tendrils of dark hair, flecks of grey apparent, behind her ears. She looked well, no clear signs of age interfering with her health. Her eyes reminded Grace of Jade, but her colouring was like Eddie and Leon’s.

She almost bounced forward a step on heels as Grace held up her warrant card.

‘Mrs Kathleen Steele? I’m DS Allendale and—’

‘I know who you are,’ the woman interrupted, smiling brightly. ‘Come on through.’

Trying not to show surprise at Kathleen’s over-friendly manner, Grace stepped inside the hallway, flinching as the door was closed behind her. It had always seemed dingy in her memories, but now it was light and airy. The wooden panels were still on the bottom half of the wall but the colour above them was a bright baby blue rather than the oppressive red she could remember.

She looked up to see the large opaque window above the stairs had been replaced with coloured glass, the image of a sunflower as bright as the sun coming through it. Yet even though the decor had most likely been changed several times since the night Grace and her mum had left, no one could erase the memories of those torturous years from within its walls.

If she stepped into the kitchen, which was the doorway at the far end of the hall, she would see George Steele holding her mother by her hair, a hand raised up ready to slap her. If she went into the dining room, she would see her mother flat out on the floor after he had hit her too hard and knocked her out. If she went upstairs to the family bathroom, she would see her curled up in a ball after he had assaulted her.

As she followed Kathleen Steele into the living room, a memory washed over her so vividly that fear gripped her insides and her stomach tightened. Blood rushed to her head and she had to sit down on the settee before her legs gave way.

‘Are you all right?’ Kathleen questioned. ‘You’ve gone deathly pale. Would you like a drink?’

Grace could only nod, thankful for a few moments to regain her composure while she was alone. An image had come to her mind. George Steele coming at her with a knife. She’d had no recollection of it until then, but the memory was of her mum stepping in front of her to shield her. Was that where the scar on Martha’s forearm had come from? Would George have killed her if her mum hadn’t been there?

Kathleen came back into the room with a glass of water. Grace took it from her gratefully.

‘I’m sorry to sit down uninvited,’ she said. ‘I don’t know what came over me.’