‘Taking a risk, aren’t you?’ she said in a strong German accent.
‘Better the devil you know. I thought he’d recognised me at the market, but I needed to be sure.’
She gave a long sigh. ‘I hope you know what you are doing.’
Maggie was woken by the sound of the front door slamming, then Jack coming up the stairs. She hoped he wasn’t drunk or in one of his black moods.
‘Are you awake?’ he asked, opening the door.
‘Yes. I’ve been worried about you all evening. You could have at least rung me or answered my text.’
‘Sorry, I got caught up.’
‘With what?’
‘Tell you in the morning.’ He went to the bathroom. She heard him whistling. She had not seen him so relaxed and pleased with himself in ages, as if the boyish quality she loved in him had returned. He came out of the bathroom wearing only boxer shorts. He threw his jeans and T-shirt onto the floor, then sat on the bed to remove his socks.
Maggie turned off her bedside lamp, lay back and let him put his arms around her. They hadn’t been this comfortable with each other for a long time, so she decided it was not the time to discuss her conversation with Penny.
‘Sorry for leaving the house earlier,’ Jack said. Then he sighed and leaned back against the pillows. ‘I didn’t intend to go back there, Mags, but I thought I recognised him and I was right.’
‘Who are you talking about?’
‘Adam Border. That’s who I’ve been with.’
‘Adam Bo... the man Josh was talking about?’
‘Yes, he took me to his studio.’
‘Oh my God, what are you going to do?’
‘Nothing. Listen, Mags, years ago I made a deal with him for evidence that closed a huge case. That’s all. I doubt anyone’s going to be interested now. I had an interesting conversation with him.’
Maggie wanted to know more but Jack appeared to have gone to sleep. She, on the other hand, was wide awake now, remembering how Josh had described Adam Border as a murderer. She wondered if having Jack’s ‘old self ’ back was going to be a good thing or not.
Chapter 7
Janet Williamson lived alone in a small, rented flat above an estate agent in the local village. It was a temporary rental as her retirement date was only a few weeks away. She was a fully qualified nurse who had worked most of her career in UK prisons. After Holloway closed, she’d been offered numerous placements, and she chose to be the senior nurse in the hospital wing at Bellview prison in Southeast London. It was a Category A men’s prison, with a high security unit housing some of the UK’s most dangerous and violent criminals in squalid single-occupancy cells. It was overcrowded, run-down and in need of refurbishing, as well as having a reputation as a brutal prison, with constant gang fights and assaults on staff — but the pay was consequently very good.
Added to that, Janet had seen it all during her career, and there was little that surprised or disturbed her, having treated Category A inmates and others who were drug addicts, alcoholics or who had mental health issues. Working in the hospital unit for inmates who were too ill to be examined on their wing suited her just fine.
The only downside was Doctor Zardari, the new prison doctor, who worked as a local GP two mornings a week and spent the rest of his time at the prison. He seemed unsure of himself and couldn’t get the hang of the prison rules and regulations.
On Sunday morning, Janet had a lie-in until 11 a.m. before going shopping at her local Tesco. She filled her trolley with frozen meals, one for every day of the week, and was just reaching for a carton of milk when she heard a voice behind her.
‘Sorry to bother you... but is your name Janet?’
She ignored the voice and walked towards the cold meat section, but the man followed her.
‘My name’s Josh Logan, a friend of Laura’s, the police detective. We met at that big Met event some time ago. I’m a detective on the New York drugs squad.’
She turned, frowning, having no recollection of him, although she vaguely remembered meeting a policewoman called Laura somewhere. She had no idea that he had followed her from her flat to the supermarket.
‘Oh, do you live round here?’ She noticed his shopping basket contained a bottle of wine, crisps and prawn crackers.
‘No, I’m staying at a B&B down the road. I’m doing drugs awareness lectures at prisons across the country before I retire. I remember you said you were a prison nurse.’
She nodded. ‘At Bellview. But I’m retiring soon too.’ Looking at him properly, she realised he wasn’t bad looking. ‘I’m sorry I didn’t remember you straightaway.’
‘And there was me thinking I was unforgettable,’ he smiled, and she laughed.
As they headed to the car park, Josh helped carry Janet’s groceries. She noticed his limp and asked if he had a bad knee. He explained he’d been shot on an undercover assignment and his knee had got worse over the years.
‘Family?’ Josh asked.
‘Divorced. My daughter lives in New Zealand.’
‘Long way,’ Josh commented.
‘I’m going to visit when I retire,’ she said. ‘Marion went over there to be with the love of her life, but he dumped her and broke her heart, as well as leaving her six months pregnant. It’s hard for her, being a single mother. She’s got a good job as a bookkeeper for an insurance company, though.’
She was, by now, very chatty and offered to give him a lift. He did his best to make her laugh describing the underwhelming B&B he was staying in, and was rewarded when she asked if he would like to have lunch at her flat. Still got it, Josh thought to himself.
Janet’s kitchen was as bland as the rest of the flat. Josh opened the bottle of Merlot and sat at the table with its worn plastic table-cloth while Janet put a frozen bolognese in the microwave and two small baguettes in the air fryer.
‘I’ve not had anyone here since I moved in,’ she admitted. ‘I like my own company, but I do sometimes feel like an inmate doing time... I suppose I am in some ways. Bellview houses some horrific bastards, mind. You wouldn’t want to be in the same room with them if you knew what they’d done, but it goes with the job.’
The microwave pinged. Janet removed the bread from the air fryer and got two dinner plates out.
‘Not like dining at the Ritz, I know, but help yourself.’
‘It smells delicious.’ Josh poured them both a second glass of wine and tucked in. When they were finished, Janet made them both mugs of instant coffee.
‘So, tell me, why does a big shot New York detective like you want to go round giving talks at shithole prisons over here? Because I can guarantee there won’t be any of the buggers listening. If they turn up at all, it’ll just be an excuse to get out of their cells.’
Josh explained about the horrors of synthetic opioids and the havoc they were wreaking in the US. ‘If I can do anything to stop it happening here, it’ll be worth my time. Maybe some of them will listen. Can I ask — how many fatalities have occurred in Bellview from fentanyl overdoses?’
‘Listen, love, ours OD on heroin, Vicodin, OxyContin and Percocet, and stopping drugs from being smuggled in is a losing battle for prison officers. They’re so short-staffed it’s impossible to do strip-searches and watch the visitors all the time. Some inmates deal drugs, and if they are in a cell 24 hours a day, they have plenty of time to devise clever ways of getting relatives and friends to smuggle the gear in.’
Josh nodded, knowing virtually every prison in the US was in a similar situation. ‘There is a new drug exploding onto the market you may not have heard of. It’s called xylazine or “tranq”. It’s a veterinary tranquilliser. Dealers are mixing it with fentanyl, methamphetamine, cocaine, and downers. In the US, it’s being found more and more in lab-tested samples of seized heroin and fentanyl. The problem is, it literally eats away your flesh from the inside out, and the only way to stop it from spreading is by amputation.’