“Where?” Havers asked this. “Not a lot of places to hide, you ask me. We’ve been in the flat.”
“There was a clothes cupboard.”
“In her bedroom? A bit risky, that.”
“What choice did I have? There’re two large cupboards for storage near her door, but I couldn’t get to them, and I wasn’t thinking straight. I couldn’t claim I’d just come upon her. She’d name me when she regained consciousness. I didn’t know who was about to walk in and I didn’t know what else to do. So I hid and I waited and I hoped whoever it was would leave.”
“Without coming to her aid?” Lynley asked.
“Yes. No. I don’t know,” she said.
“But that didn’t happen, did it?” Havers asked. “He didn’t leave.”
“He didn’t . . . ?” She looked confused. “It wasn’t a man,” she said.
CHELSEA
SOUTH-WEST LONDON
When he rang off from talking to DS Nkata, Tani sat on the edge of the bed in the St. Jameses’ spare room that he had been using. He stared at his trainers, their laces untied. He rocked slightly. He didn’t want to think. He’d tracked down the Peckham cousin, who was astonished to hear from him, so long had it been since their family had become estranged. How was Tani? How was Aunty? How was Simisola? Did Tani know about the marriage of his sister Ovia? Had Tani been told? We got to get together, we do, Tani. What’re you doing these days? Have you taken up with any fine ladies?
It was clear that Monifa and Simisola weren’t there. His cousin in Peckham hadn’t heard from any member of the Bankole family in at least five years. So he rang Halimah just in case, but she’d not seen Monifa since Monifa had left Mayville Estate with the police detective. She’d not spoken to her either. Nor had she spoken to Abeo.
Halimah asked if there was something wrong, but Tani didn’t tell her the truth for a simple reason. He didn’t know what the truth was.
He developed a few ideas, though. When he rang the detective sergeant and told him what he’d learned about the whereabouts of his mum and his sister—nothing—Nkata’s response was not reassuring. “I’m on it,” he said. “Heading to the Belgravia Station,” and to Tani’s “D’you think—” Nkata cut him off with, “Lemme get back to you. But stay there, yeah? I need to know where you are, at least.”
Tani said he’d remain in Chelsea with the St. Jameses, but that was very low on the list of what he truly wanted to do. Every nerve ending in his body was shouting at him to take some kind of action. His mother was not a resourceful person. There was a limit to what she’d be able to do when it came to protecting Simi. If—and he was forced to think it—she intended to protect Simi at all.
He rang Sophie. He said to her, “Mum came for Simi. I don’t know where they are.”
“But that’s good, Tani. Isn’t it?” Sophie said. “I mean, she’ll keep her away from your dad.”
“Right. Yeah. But, Soph, here’s what it is. She said she was takin’ Simi to Brixton, to stay with the fam’ly of that cop. Only, she di’n’t.”
Sophie was silent. He could see her in his mind, considering the question, twisting a lock of her short hair round her index finger in that way she had. “But that’s positive, isn’t it?” she said. “What I mean is if your dad turns up like she thinks he will, he can’t force you to tell him what you don’t know. That’s what she’s thinking, your mum. She’s got to do everything she can do to keep Simi away from your dad. And once he turns up in Chelsea . . . Are you still in Chelsea?”
He told her he was. He told her that the police detective Nkata had rung him asking about Monifa. He told her Nkata had asked about places his mother might have taken Simi. He said at the end, “Soph, I think there’s something gone wrong. When Mum came, she said the police’d let my dad leave the station and there was a taxi waiting—”
“But Tani, what else could she do but take a taxi? If your dad was on his way, she had to be quick.”
“Tha’s what it is, Soph. He never came here.”
“Then he probably went to see . . . what’s her name?”
“Lark.”
“Right. Lark. I mean, last time he was there in Chelsea, he got hauled off by the police. Makes sense he wouldn’t do the same thing twice. He’s with Lark and he’s making a new plan. You wait and see.”