“Come on,” DS Brennan says gently to the father, “you must be beside yourself with worry. But this won’t help. Why don’t we go and find somewhere quiet to talk?”
His face crumples and she’s about to lead him away when Pete Diamond appears at the gate wearing an Ibiza Rocks T-shirt.
“What’s going on?” he says. “I need to get my car out. You’ll have to move.”
And the dad breaks away from DS Brennan and screams in his face. “My little girl’s dying. You’ve got her blood on your hands!”
“Of course I haven’t,” Pete shouts back. “Your little girl was popping pills. I’m not responsible for that. . . .”
Tracy’s dad gets hold of him, banging his head against the railings and yelling abuse. I realize I’ve got my hands over my eyes. Like when I was a kid. Looking through my fingers when something scary was happening. I can still smell the sharp smell of my grubby hands as I crouched down, away from it. Looking but not looking. Hoping not to see.
Pauline starts shrieking for them to stop and DS Brennan fights her way between them. Her head gets jerked backward and the little hair slide goes flying. I pick it up for her but she’s busy shoving Pete inside the gate and putting her arm round the dad. He’s sobbing, and he goes down on his knees on the pavement. His mates huddle round him. But the anger is coming off them in waves.
“This isn’t over,” one of the men mutters as they lead him away.
Seven
SATURDAY, AUGUST 24, 2019
Elise
DS Caro Brennan tapped on the window as Elise tried to take off her backpack without using the muscles in her upper body. She jolted at the sound and let out a groan.
Ronnie stood to help her. She’d appeared through the door as soon as Elise had got back from a jog on the beach—“Just doing my ward rounds,” she’d said, and stayed.
“Give me that,” Ronnie said. “What were you thinking of? Going for a run after all that drama last night?”
“I walked most of the way. I’m fine. Come in, Caro,” Elise shouted. “Are you up at the festival site?”
“Yeah, I’m helping out. So I heard you were first to the victims.”
Ronnie started singing, “？‘I need a hero . . . ’？”
“Thank you, Ronnie. Yes, they were unconscious when I reached them.”
“Never mind that—I’ve had the ambulance report, thanks. What were you doing at a pop festival?”
“Ask her! Caro, this is Ronnie, who lives next door. It was her idea. I’d rather have set fire to my feet.”
“That’s what you’re saying now. . . . What did you wear?”
“Shut up.”
“What did she wear, Ronnie?”
“Leopard-skin bodysuit like the rest of us . . .”
Elise sighed and let them enjoy the moment.
She should never have gone to that bloody festival. Obviously. But apparently Elise had agreed. Her neighbor Ronnie might have been forty years too old for dancing in a laser storm but she’d insisted.
* * *
—
“You need to get out, Elise,” she’d said. “How old are you?”
“Er, forty-three, and what’s that got to do with anything?”
“The longer you stay in, the harder it’ll be to get out there again. Look, it’s at the Old Vicarage in Ebbing, not a field off the M25. There’ll be toilets and it’ll be a laugh. I’m married to a man who whittles. Let me have some fun. . . .”
And she’d found herself queuing to have her bag searched by a bored teenager who’d confiscated a bottle of booze from the young couple in front of them. He hadn’t bothered to look in hers or Ronnie’s.
“Thank you, ladies.” He waved them through.
“Just because we’re older doesn’t mean we’re not smuggling in heroin or knives,” Elise snapped at him.
The lad’s eyes practically popped out of his head. “Er, right. Are you?”
“What do you think?” Ronnie said. “She’s joking. . . .”
“This security stinks,” Elise muttered. “Drugs must be flooding in.”
“Hush, Detective Inspector King,” Ronnie muttered back. “You’re not back at work yet.”
Elise took a breath and Ronnie produced drink vouchers she’d bought at the gate.
“I’ll have a Cheeky Vimto,” Ronnie told the barman, and Elise gave her a look.
“We don’t do cocktails.” The barman smirked.