Chapter 85
‘Tell me what it is you’re doing again,’ Esmerée said. ‘I need to learn this shit.’
‘Why?’
‘I can’t stay here for ever. And because I don’t officially exist, I can’t apply to med school like the doc did.
I heard you telling that butthead Gilliard that private dicks in this country don’t need no licence.
I figure I could maybe be one. Maybe I could even work for you and Tilly. You know, like an apprentice?’
Poe put down his mug. ‘Listen, Esmerée,’ he said.
‘I will get to the bottom of who you are. And if you don’t like what I find, then so what?
Tilly will give you a new identity. You will exist, and it’ll be in any form you want.
If you want to study medicine, that’s what you’ll study.
Any university in the country. In the world. ’
‘What if I don’t want to be a pathologist, though?’ she said. ‘Will Estelle not be pissed?’
‘No. She’ll be happy if you are.’ He leaned in conspiratorially. ‘Between you and me, being a detective is much more fun than being a doctor anyway. Don’t tell the boss I said that, obviously.’
He turned over the sheaf of documents. He’d been through them and either removed the pornographic ones or put Post-it notes over the performers’ genitals. ‘No peeping,’ he said. ‘Now, tell me what you see.’
‘What am I looking for?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Then how the hell can I find it?’
‘Welcome to my world, kiddo,’ he said. ‘A case like this is a giant jigsaw puzzle. Sometimes you’ll have the right bit in your hand, but it’ll look like the wrong bit.
You think it’s sea but really it’s sky. You could stare at this bit of the puzzle a gazillion times, but until you put it next to another piece of sky, it won’t make sense.
And it won’t provide the answer. If we’re lucky, it’ll show us the next question to ask.
Sometimes it’s something that’s not there, sometimes it’s something that’s there that shouldn’t be.
The important thing is to keep going. To move forward.
Cases die without momentum. Sometimes that momentum is this.
Sitting at a table with a pot of strong coffee.
Thinking of a question that no one’s thought to ask.
So go on – have a look. Tell me what you see. ’
Esmerée said nothing. She stood and took in the whole table. She leaned in and studied individual pictures. After ten minutes, she gathered up the crime-scene photos that Poe had taken at Mark Buckby’s house and put them to one side.
‘Why did you do that?’ Poe asked.
‘They ain’t relevant.’
‘I’m sure his family thinks differently.’
‘Yeah, yeah, it sucks to be them. My point is, he’s not relevant to us. Mark Buckby died because he knew the name of the man who recognised my pretend mom’s tattoo. That’s his only connection to the case. Therefore, he’s irrelevant.’
Poe nodded. ‘Cold, but true,’ he said. ‘What else?’
Esmerée went back to the table. She put the notes he’d taken after his conversation with Chance Ryzcek, the man who’d performed with Océane Blue, next to the notes and photographs from the interview with Toby Knight at Pure Pulse Productions. She pushed everything else aside.
‘These are the ones to focus on,’ she said.
‘These Red Chamber dickwads might know stuff about my pretend mom, but we don’t know what that is, and at the minute we have no way of finding out.
But this porn actor dude and the asshat who made the film might know more.
Stuff they didn’t tell you, or more likely stuff they’d either forgotten or didn’t think was important. ’
Poe was impressed. He’d pretty much come to the same conclusion.
He rifled through the pile she’d made. Pulled out a picture with a Post-it note on it.
Chance Ryzcek was standing behind Océane Blue.
He tapped it. ‘The tattoo on her shoulder,’ he said.
‘That’s a question we haven’t asked yet.
You say she didn’t have it when she lived in New York? ’
‘Definitely not,’ Esmerée said. ‘And I’m not guessing. She spent most of her life butt-naked or semi-naked. I’d have seen a tattoo on her shoulder.’
‘OK, this is a question we can kick around for a while. Your mum – because we don’t know for sure she isn’t your mum – is running for her life.
She manages to get out of the States. For some reason she flees to England.
England’s a small country. Parts of it have saturation CCTV coverage.
But she feels compelled to get a new tattoo.
Why? Exposure like that is a risk. A way to be remembered when that’s the exact opposite of what she’s trying to achieve.
What was important enough to take that risk? ’
‘Maybe she was covering up a scar?’ Esmerée said.
‘Tattoos don’t work like that. Scar tissue doesn’t absorb ink the way skin does. Anyway, if the scar was bad enough to be covered up, it would be bad enough for a tattooist to remember it. Maybe even report it.’
‘Like doctors in the US have to report bullet wounds.’
‘Exactly.’
Esmerée nodded. Looked thoughtful. ‘I wish we could wave a magic wand and get a better look at it. It’s all out of focus in these photographs.’
‘Detectives don’t wish for things to happen, Esmerée, they make things happen. But go on, I think you’re on to something.’
‘You do?’
‘I do.’
Esmerée flicked through the pictures until she found the clearest one. She unlocked her new iPhone and took a photograph of the tattoo. She then pinched out and expanded it. Her brow furrowed in concentration. ‘It ain’t writing,’ she said. ‘If it’s an “I Hate Esmerée” tattoo, she’s used emojis.’
‘It’s a drawing,’ Poe agreed.
‘My pretend mom belonged to that Vincent du Buk asshole, right?’ she said. ‘She was like his property or something. She even had a brand on the sole of her foot.’
‘Right.’
‘So what if she tried to make it on her own but didn’t know how to? What if she’d gotten so used to having everything done for her that she became like retarded when it came to managing stuff for herself?’
‘Retarded isn’t a nice word, Esmerée,’ Poe said. ‘But go on.’
‘Are you messing with me?’
‘I’m not. If this is going where I think it’s going, it’s a line I haven’t considered.’
‘OK, well what if my pretend mom didn’t like living under her own steam.
What if she went out and found herself another Vincent du Buk.
And what if this new asshole also wanted her to wear his brand.
Or maybe he’s a pimp and she’s one of his whores.
Either way, you have something to check.
Maybe you can speak to your old contacts.
See if there are any pimps in the UK who tattoo their women. ’
Poe nodded. It was a good idea. ‘I’ll make some calls.’
Which was when his phone rang. It was Melody Lee. He showed Esmerée the screen.
She shrugged. Faked being casual. ‘Go on, answer it.’
Poe did. He listened for a bit, spoke for a bit. After a minute, he said, ‘OK, thanks, Special Agent Lee.’ He ended the call. Looked at Esmerée. ‘Seventeen years ago, Vincent du Buk paid for Océane Blue’s tubal ligation reversal.’
‘What the hell does that mean?’
‘It means she is your mother.’