Dead To Me - [24]

‘The cab picked her up on Shudehill?’ Gill tapped her forefinger on the papers. ‘Had she got any shopping then or not? Where had she come from? Rachel, Kevin – CCTV. Trace her backwards.’ She saw the clench of annoyance on Rachel’s face. ‘Crack on, then,’ Gill said to them all. ‘Keep it up.’

‘Nice call,’ Janet said to Rachel, chancing to be in the Ladies at the same time. Janet brushing her hair, Rachel washing her hands.

‘Hard to tell,’ Rachel said. ‘Godzilla wasn’t giving anything away.’

‘You were late, you weren’t prepped – two strikes.’

‘Three and you’re out?’

‘Not quite, but some rules are best not broken. She’s a stickler, she has to be. And she expects the same from us.’ Janet pulled her hair back, fixing it with a barrette, and made to leave.

‘There’s something else,’ Rachel said quickly, unsure whether to mention it, knowing it was iffy, tenuous.

‘Go on.’ Janet paused at the door.

‘We picked up a rape, back in 2008: Rosie Vaughan. She’d been in Ryelands.’ It was a brutal attack, which made it all the more frustrating that they’d never pinned it on anyone. ‘There could be a connection,’ Rachel said.

‘Because they were both in Ryelands?’ Janet said incredulously, giving a look: You thick or what? Eyebrows high, mouth turning up, half a sneer.

‘They’d both been in Ryelands, but both were living independently when it happened.’

‘Ours is a murder, not a rape,’ Janet argued.

‘It could be a rape, too – we don’t know. He used a knife.’

‘Vaughan – did he stab her?’

Rachel shook her head.

‘That it?’

Rachel wished she’d never raised it now.

‘There’s thin and then there’s non-existent,’ Janet said.

‘But two attacks within eighteen months, both girls from-’

‘They’re not the same,’ Janet insisted. ‘Besides, you run an analysis of crime stats and feed in that demographic and you know what you’ll get. The very fact that they were in care increases the likelihood of becoming a victim of crime, including a victim of serious sexual assault, several times over. Dig enough and you could find more rapes, domestic violence, assaults – it doesn’t mean we’re looking for a serial offender.’ Janet looked at her, face screwed up in disapproval. Snotty cow. ‘Did you have anyone in the frame?’

‘The neighbour, for a while. He’d done a stretch for previous and he’d been hassling her, but we had nothing. She refused to press charges, wouldn’t tell us who’d done it. She knew him, I’m convinced of that. Sean Broughton picked Lisa up when she was still in Ryelands. Maybe he’d done the same with Rosie. You’re going there anyway, to Ryelands, aren’t you? It wouldn’t do any harm to ask if Sean was known to them back then.’

‘DNA?’

‘The rapist used a condom. We had traces in the flat from the neighbour, but that could have been from a previous visit. He used to call round for a cup of tea, he said, watch porn together. We’d unidentified DNA too – hair and skin cells, no hits. Case is still on file. She was a fruitloop, anyway. The whole thing was a mess.’

Janet was shaking her head. ‘Sean’s in the system. If he was your rapist, there’d have been a match.’ Rachel could see it in her eyes, on a hiding to nothing, mind made up. Maybe someone made a mistake, Rachel thought, it has been known. She gave it one last try. ‘Look, I could at least find out if Rosie knew him.’

‘You could,’ Janet said flatly, ‘or you could actually do what you’re supposed to be doing.’

When Rachel got back to her desk, she’d an email through from Lisa’s phone company, a document attached, with the cell-site locations. She pulled up the mapping software and entered the coordinates. The first call, to Speedy Cabs, was made close to the end of Cross Street, near the Arndale Centre and the big wheel. The other calls, the ones Lisa received from Sean and Denise, were both taken at points along Oldham Road on the way to Fairland Avenue. It dovetailed with their information so far. Rachel felt a glow of satisfaction.

Rachel went and knocked on her ladyship’s door. Her Maj waved her in, impatient rather than welcoming. Rachel held up the printout. ‘Cell-site locations, it’s all good.’

Gill nodded, pointed to a tray on the table by the filing cabinet. Returned to her screen.

You’re welcome and fuck you too, ma’am.

Kevin was waiting for her as she came out. ‘We’d better get going. You and me, a dark room, popcorn…’ He gave a sleazy grin.

‘Zip it, pal,’ Rachel said, ‘or I’ll zip it for you,’ letting an edge of the streets through. And she was that close; another inane bleat and she’d lamp him. ‘I’m off for a fag, see you in the car park.’

Luckily for Kevin, luckily for Rachel’s prospects in the Manchester Metropolitan Police, he took heed. Sidled off muttering something about lezzies under his breath.

13

RYELANDS HOUSE WAS a converted Edwardian manse set in its own grounds near Phillips Park in Newton Heath. It would originally have been the mill owner’s property, built away from the cluster of narrow streets on the other side of the park. Nice view over the trees to the gasworks.

Janet had had dealings with the institution back when she was on Division. Mainly petty burglaries that led to the kids there.