Free Dead Wrong by Helen H. Durrant Page B

relished. She might look like a hard nut, but it was always a front. This was a rough place to live, and the Hobfield Estate gave no quarter. If you didn’t have a big mouth, if you didn’t fight back, then you had no chance.
    Donna Edwards looked like a volatile woman. She probably knew this visit meant trouble, and she was on edge. She busied herself, nervously knocking a couple of cushions into shape and throwing them back onto the sofa.
    “What’s the little bastard done now?” She grabbed another cigarette from a pack on the table. “If it’s anything to do with money then it’s no good looking at me, cos I’ve got none. No good little scroat should be working. He owes me, and then there’s Kelly and that babe of hers. She was here earlier in the week, looking for him and asking for help, poor cow.”
    “It’s nothing to do with money, Donna.” He heard Ruth clear her throat behind him, wanting him to get on with it. “I’m afraid it’s bad news. Ice — Ian. He is dead. He’s been killed.”
    Donna Edwards stared at him, not quite grasping what she’d been told. The female PC walked forward and ushered her onto the sofa. Calladine watched all this happen in slow motion. Now it would begin. Within hours, perhaps less, the whole estate would know.
    “Accident?” Her voice was a whisper.
    At that moment Calladine wished with all his heart that it had been. The explanation would have been easy then, uncomplicated. A few words of comfort and they could leave her to get on with it. As it was, he couldn’t tell her the truth, not in its unadulterated form, not yet.
    “No, Donna, not an accident. I’m afraid Ian was murdered.”
    Her eyes went wild. She looked frantically from one officer to another, and then pushed the PC’s arm from her shoulder.
    “No!” she screamed. “Not Ice. He’d never let that happen. He is . . . He knew about the dangers.”
    “What dangers? What are you talking about, Donna?”
    She stared at him with a look of pure hate and clutched the sides of her head, shrieking. “I’ve already said, I’m telling you nowt! He was my boy and it’s not his fault.”
    Donna Edwards collapsed to the floor, wailing and screaming. The PC tried her best to get her to a chair, to comfort her, but it was no use.
    “Donna, when did you last see Ian? I’m sorry I have to ask these questions, but the information might help us find who did this. You do want us to find out what happened to Ice, don’t you?”
    She stared at him with glazed eyes. She looked frightened, an added layer of distress that aroused the detective’s curiosity. What was on her mind? What did she know that she wasn’t saying? Ray Fallon?
    “Was there anything going on? Was there a feud? Had Ice crossed someone he shouldn’t, Fallon for example?”
    There, he’d asked the question. Uttered the name. Calladine doubted very much she’d tell him, but he had to ask.
    She shot him an angry look then shook her head. “No. He’s not stupid. He’d never mess with that bastard. He knew which lines never to cross.” Her voice had dropped to a whisper. “He knew well enough what Fallon’s like, what’d happen if he crossed him. He runs this shithole — Fallon, not the police.”
    Calladine shook his head. Fallon was in Strangeways prison, so how come he was still running things on the Hobfield? Via his goons, that was how.
    “Anyway, he never said nothing to nobody. Fallon trusted him. He did a good job and never put a foot wrong.” She hesitated. “I would have known if he’d messed up. There are folk out there who’d be only too pleased to tell me. You’ve no idea what it’s like round here. It’s damned hard, and people are quick to hate. Plenty hated Ice because of what he did, the drugs and that . . .” She was sobbing. “But there’s more that’ll miss him now he’s gone. No one would dare cross him, not with Fallon to call on. The place has ticked over nicely, dead quiet like, since last