Chapter 1
Patricia Harding felt bile rising in her mouth as she realised that her friend was dead but knew she had to hold herself together. She couldn’t vomit at a crime scene.
An hour before midnight, in a nook under Southend Pier, he was meant to be safe, sleeping in his usual place. But not tonight. Tonight, he was a lifeless bundle of rags that no one cared about, almost no one.
An hour earlier, Pat had passed a sandwich and an emergency blanket to one of her friends.
‘Cold tonight.’ The girl had taken the offerings.
‘Have you seen Jake? He looks bad.’
‘Is it the cold?’
‘Yeah, right. That doesn’t help. He needs a shot. He was shaking; it might have been the cold or, you know. Look, he needs this stuff more than me.’ She went to pass the space blanket and sandwich back to Pat.
‘I’ve got more. You keep them.’ The girl answered in the slow, deliberate voice Pat had come to recognise.
‘Thank you very much.’
‘Where was Jake when you saw him?’
‘Usual place under the pier.’ Pat knew the spot; dark and smelling of urine, but dry and as safe as anywhere on the streets in January.
After a few minutes of conversation, Pat made her way along the promenade towards the pier and the hidey-hole that Jake had carved out for himself. Beyond the pier and the fairground, she doubled back along the seaward path. Tonight the tide was in, and the chill wind brought a fine mist with it, making the cold more intense. She pulled her goose filled anorak around her and swore to herself.
‘Bloody cold.’
Just before the pier, she eased herself through a broken fence and across the frozen flowerbed to Jake’s haven, as he called it.
Two nights earlier, she had squatted with him in the same spot and laughed.
‘See, you’ve got what people want; a nice house and money. What I’ve got, no one wants. A couple of bottles and a bit of draw.’ He’d showed her some marijuana and papers in a plastic bag. ‘You have to lock your door at night. I’m as free as a bird.’ She’d handed over some packs of sandwiches and squatted drinking coffee with him. It was the same routine each night, and gradually, Pat had learnt to respect his wit and knowledge. Now visiting him was not a chore; he was last on Pat’s round so that she could chat.
Pat flicked on her tiny LED torch, pulled back the loose cladding and instantly knew something was wrong.
The cold of the alcove swept over her. It felt like opening a freezer door. Up against the wall, in his usual place, was the bundle of rags that Pat recognised as Jake. Thin-faced and slight, with a permanent smile for anyone who looked or listened to him. Jake could be in his mid-thirties or as young as twenty; it made no difference now; he wouldn’t be getting any older.
She pointed her torch straight into his face, and her shoulders slumped.
Even though she knew, she had to make sure. Picking her way across the floor, avoiding old bottles and artefacts, Pat bent down to rouse him. As soon as she touched him, she knew; he was as cold as his den.
Jake was as cold and lifeless as a piece of meat on a butchers slab.
The truth swept over her, and she backed away from him and stood looking down at what had been a funny, smiling, welcoming but flawed individual. Jake was always last on her round, because he made her smile. He lifted her spirits on the walk back to her luxury home on Thorpe Bay, but he wouldn’t leave her with a piece of philosophy to ponder tonight.
Suddenly Pat swung around and kicked an empty beer bottle, and it smashed against the wall, and the sudden eruption of noise stopped her. Someone had to pay for this, and the crime scene had to be preserved.
She stepped out of the alcove and dialled the police. Ten minutes later, the machinery of death in a public place kicked off. All flashing blue lights and high visibility jackets, and Pat knew she had failed to save another life.
Half an hour later, she wrapped her arms around herself to stop the shaking but knew it would take more than a warm drink to calm her down. As she walked away, Pat knew exactly the last time she had seen a face that colour.
It was the icy cold, lifeless lump of meat that had once been her lively, lovely brother, lying on a stainless-steel mortuary table.
Twenty years earlier, she had nodded to the officer and signed the form, her mother couldn’t face, and in her heart, she knew, like Jake, it was a death she could have prevented.
