Fuck! What now? I dashed downstairs, but my own two police officers (since when had they becomemine?) were already at the door.
‘Shhhh,’ the female officer was hissing as the two men practically fell into my kitchen as one. ‘There’s a child asleep upstairs. That’s all we bloody need again…’
‘Shhhh!’ I reiterated, furiously. ‘My eleven-year-old daughter’s upstairs asleep. If it’s me you want to talk to, I’m here. Cut out theStarsky & Hutchmacho stuff…’
‘Who?’ The younger detective pulled a face.
‘Starsky & Hutch.’ I tutted. ‘From the 70s. My husband’s got all the episodes on DVD.’
‘Where is he?’ the older one asked.
‘Who?’ the younger one asked, turning to his much older partner. ‘Starsky or Hutch?’
‘Mrs Butterworth,’ the older cop said, shooting his mate a filthy look. ‘It’s your husband we want to talk to.’
‘My husband?’ I stared. ‘Dean? Dean Butterworth? And could you keep your voices down?’ I indicated with a nod of my head, a reminder of my sleeping daughter upstairs. My two police officers joined in, fingers on lips like irritable nannies, nodding skywards. They obviously knew of the shit that was going to hit the fan once the big guns were told a raid had taken place earlier that evening with children on site.
‘Is he in?’
‘He doesn’t live here any more,’ I said. ‘And the way you’ve raced up my drive, I’m assuming you want to do rather more than talk to him.’
‘This is the address we have for him.’
‘It will be,’ I said, trying to talk quietly, ‘but he moved out, moved back in, and now he’s moved back out once more.’
‘Got a problem, has he? Likes to do the hokey-cokey?’ The younger detective turned to his superior for approval of his witty banter.
‘He lives next door,’ I said.
‘Next doorhere?’ the younger one asked, nodding to Mum’s adjoining wall.
‘As opposed to next doorwhere?’ I asked. I was suddenly dead tired, fed up of the whole thing and just wanted to go to sleep and make it all go away.
‘Is he at home?’ the younger one went on.
‘You’re the detective,’ I said, immediately wishing I hadn’t. I didn’t want to be arrested for obstructing the police in the course of their duty. ‘Look, as far as I know, he isn’t. I’ve left messages for him to come and be with our daughter soIcan help you with your investigation.’
‘Any idea where he might be?’ The older one looked pointedly at me.
‘Probably with one of Charlie’s Angels.’ I was so tired I couldn’t for the life of me remember her real name.
‘Starsky and Hutch?Charlie’s Angels?’ The older detective stared. ‘What American TV world do you live in?’
‘What do you want him for?’ I asked. ‘He’s got absolutely nothing to do with what went on down at Queen’s Gardens this evening.’
‘His bike was found down there.’
‘And how do you know it was Dean’s?’
‘Apart from the luminous DB monogrammed onto it?Very sensibly, Mr Butterworth had registered the bike on a national database. He was on Bikeregister – easy to find his details.’
‘Must be the first sensible thing he’s ever done.’ I smiled, playing for time.
And then another car on the drive had us all turning expectantly towards the closed kitchen door.
‘Shhh!’ the nanny police officers and I hissed automatically as the door opened without any preamble.
‘Jess, what’s going on? You OK? Lola all right?’ Mum almost ran towards me, eyes wide in panic as she took in the uniformed officers as well as the plain clothes ones all standing in my tiny kitchen. ‘Jess, what’s happened? I’ve had a message from the police and missed calls from you. We were at the theatre in Leeds… phones turned off… Where’s Lola?’
