Cold Revenge (Willis/Carter #6)(34)

‘I am very sorry, Roy, I have some sad news,’ said Carter. ‘Melanie has been killed.’ He reached out his hand and put it on Roy’s paper-thin-skinned and bulging-veined hands. ‘Was she a good friend of yours? Did you know her well?’

‘Oh, God . . .’ He nodded and dragged in the breath and his eyes bulged as his face turned purple. ‘Poor Melanie.’ He shook his head mournfully. ‘How? Why?’ He spoke with the mask on his face. His chest heaved and his lungs made a withering sound as he exhaled.

‘She was killed by someone who entered the flat. We don’t know why or who yet, Roy, that’s why we are piecing together her last movements. You said you saw her yesterday, can you tell us about that please?’ Carter put his hand back onto Roy’s. ‘When you’re ready, you take your time.’

Roy took a few minutes to collect himself as he waited for his lungs to stop screaming.

‘She popped by, to see if I need anything, the way she always does.’ Roy nodded. ‘Every day, like clockwork.’ His face cracked and he sobbed into the mask.

Willis moved back from the window to look at Roy’s shelves, which held few possessions.

He started to cry. His sobs looked to be in danger of killing him as Carter got out of his seat and leaned over him to give him a hug. Roy clung to him as he dragged in a breath.

‘Can I get you some medication, Roy? Do you need me to call someone?’ asked Carter.

Roy shook his head and released Carter with a smile of gratitude. ‘Honestly, I want to help. Give me a few minutes. I’m such a useless old bugger.’ When he was ready, he took off the mask.

‘How did Melanie seem yesterday?’

‘Melanie never said how she felt, she just listened to me moaning on.’

Carter got up to feel if the radiator was on in the room; it wasn’t.

‘You should have the heating on, Roy. Where’s the switch?’

Roy pointed to the kitchen. Carter went in to see, found the boiler and checked the programme. He put it on timer. The boiler fired up.

‘What time did Melanie come by yesterday?’ asked Carter.

‘In the afternoon . . . about two. I was waiting for my carer . . . he didn’t show up . . . Melanie helped me take a bath.’

‘What time did she leave you?’ Carter asked.

‘I fell asleep, but I think about six.’ He shook his head, he couldn’t talk any more, his lungs were squealing, his body exhausted.

‘Can we get you someone or something?’ Carter asked.

‘You said Melanie came by every day?’

‘Yes . . . or she called me . . .’ He jiggled his iPhone in the air to illustrate. ‘To see if I needed anything . . . from the shop. Not alcohol . . . I couldn’t ask her for that. Not that, oh God, no!’ He shook his head, tried to laugh, started coughing, began dragging in the oxygen again through his mask. He stayed silent for a few minutes.

‘Take your time, Roy.’

He took off his mask again to talk. ‘She just wanted to be left alone but she had a good heart, she always came to help when I needed her.’

‘How long had you known her?’

‘Over a year. I don’t know exactly. She was a good friend to me. Private person.’ He held up his hand to show he needed to wait, to calm. When he was ready he smiled at Carter. ‘Bloody cigarettes. We all have our little vices, demons, don’t we? Last Chance Saloon, this place is. We’re all fuck-ups in this place, all of us on the lower floors anyway.’

‘What about Melanie, was she also?’ asked Carter.

Roy looked at Carter and nodded. ‘She had her secrets; do you know who she is?’

‘We believe she is Nicola Stone.’

Roy nodded. ‘She told me. I was shocked, at first, but she was good to me.’

‘Did she ever talk to you about that time in her life?’

He shook his head. ‘She said she had served her time, done her penance.’

‘Did she talk about Douglas getting out?’

‘The other day, I asked her was she looking forward to seeing him again. She didn’t think it was fair that she had to hide away like she did, the public really hated her. All she did was give an alibi to the man she loved.’

Roy waited for a reaction from Carter but he didn’t get it. Instead, Carter asked, ‘Do you think she could have been in contact with anyone from her past?’

‘She talked a lot about them recently, she even showed me some photos of them.’

‘Do you have any idea who was in them?’

‘She pointed them all out to me, all the people I’d heard about. She said they were people she still felt enormously bonded to. I’m so tired. Sorry, I am so sad and tired.’ He lay back on his pillow and shut his eyes.

‘We’ll be sending along an officer to help you through this, Roy.’

Roy didn’t answer.

Outside, the ambulance pulled into Cedar Road. Willis stood at the door of number six as Nicola Stone’s body was wheeled out and through to the ambulance that would transport her to the mortuary at the Whittington Hospital. She stayed inside the cover of the tent over the door as she watched Dermot bagging and labelling furniture for removal. He stopped what he was doing and waited for her to ask her question. She always had one, in his experience.