Tim smiles. ‘Good to hear, Jen. Look, you probably think I’m overdoing it. But I’ve seen these cases go wrong because someone who’s got a chum in the CPS drops a name over a beer. Has a laugh about a “no good” case. Lets slip a little strategy titbit because it’s all cosy-cosy, old pals’ chat. But then – wham! The old CPS mate happens to know exactly who is working on that case, exactly who’d like a tip-off and suddenly the other side have the inside track, and you might as well give up your case there and then.’
I nod. It makes sense. Maybe a bit paranoid, but it’s his case, not mine.
‘Normally, I wouldn’t care,’ he says. ‘But this case, this Rhea Stevens – it matters, OK? I want it to go right. Don’t want this girl robbed of any more life chances by careless talk.’
‘I understand,’ I tell him. And I do. It feels a lot like a lecture I had ten years ago about careless talk – that there are some things you don’t tell anyone. Ever. ‘I promise, I’ll keep it confidential.’
‘Good. I’d like to think my fellow partners here aren’t ones to gossip after a few drinks but I don’t know all of them that well yet, you know? And for God’s sake, don’t tell Lucy about it – I think after yesterday she’d happily blab just to get even with me.’
I nod again. Pleased to be working for one of the good guys at last, I pick up the file Tim indicated and take it back to my desk.
I flick through the file first to see what’s there. Lots of handwritten notes, clipped together with their typed-up counterparts. First witness meeting, copies of letters to the CPS, transcript of the committal hearing. Nothing about a court date yet, so far as I can see, and it doesn’t look like there’s been much from the CPS by way of advance disclosure.
A photo of Rhea. She’s beautiful. Her skin is the lightest caramel, with a smattering of darker caramel freckles across the bridge of her nose and her high cheekbones. Her eyes, sitting beneath perfectly arched eyebrows, are a deep brown, almost black. I’d like to say they shine. But they don’t. They are dulled by goodness knows what. I flick back to the beginning again and read the notes from the first witness meeting.
RS sitting hunched, mood bad. Try to do intros – no response. Explain here to help. Ask usual questions – how treated, remember police caution etc. No response. Thought might be crying. No sign of mistreatment.
Ask how she wants to plead.
Says: I didn’t do it.
Explain there isn’t an ‘it’, a string of offences.
Yeah, well how the shit am I to make the money without using this? Gestures to her body.
Tell her she seems bright and can do better. She snorts.
Says: Anyway, you know there’s an it. It’s the wraps, innit? I don’t do that crap.
Ask: So why did the police find it at your address?
Says: What ‘my address’? You think I’m like lady of the manor now, is it, with my own house and a big driveway? Shares with four other people.
Ask her about them, what they do.
She asks me what I think they do.
Ask her if they all work for the same person. She shrugs.
Ask her if one of her customers could have left something there. Says she doesn’t bring men back there. Uses cars, car parks etc.
Try different approach. Move on to her background. Why did you turn to this work?
Tells me it was the careers adviser at the children’s home. He gave her some practice an’ all.
I blink away tears.
Poor Rhea.
She could be so many of the girls I met along the way. I heard stories of hands where they shouldn’t be and yes, the worst. Rape. Don’t call it ‘serious sexual abuse’. It’s rape. It’s vulnerable young people torn and confused because the people they were told to trust have just helped themselves and yet they still have to pretend to trust them. Because there’s that whisper in the ear afterwards – if you tell anyone about this, you can forget about having a warm bed, you can forget about a future, because no one will believe a screwed-up kid from a shitty family over a man with a job like mine.
Or so I’ve heard.
And now there’s some lawyer guy, interrogating her. Tim hasn’t even explained, unless it was in the intros, that he was trying to help her. Why should she trust him, any more than anyone else who has fucked her up over the years?
I read on.
Ask: Have you ever seen any of your flatmates with drugs?
Says: They wouldn’t fucking dare.
Ask: Why’s that?
Says: Because I’d shove it right up them, probably where it came from, because I’m not having my daughter growing up like that.
Christ. She has a daughter.
Ask: But you’re willing for her to grow up knowing you’re a prostitute.
Fucking hell, Tim. Don’t say that. Say ‘How old is she?’ Or ‘What’s her name?’
Don’t preach hellfire.
RS doesn’t respond.
No shit.
***
‘Knock knock.’
Someone is banging on my desk. I look up. It’s Tim.
Tim, for whom I have a whole lot less respect than I did five minutes ago.
‘Hi, Tim. Just looking through the Rhea Stevens file.’
Tim looks around and puts a quick finger to his lips.
‘Best come into my office, Jen,’ he says, his voice low.
Grudgingly, I get up from my desk and follow him into his office. All these secrecy games don’t make up for how he’s treating Rhea.
Once we’re in his office, and he’s shut the door, he talks to me in his normal voice.
‘So. Bit of a fix we’re in, isn’t it?’ he says.
‘She says she didn’t do it.’
‘Yes, well she would, wouldn’t she?’
‘But what if she didn’t, Tim? Maybe she’s telling the truth – why would she put her kid in danger like that? Maybe we just need to treat her a bit more … respectfully.’
Tim looks at me thoughtfully. There’s a pause. It grows uncomfortable. Is it me that’s showing a lack of respect, now?
‘Sorry, Tim, I just thought …’
‘No, no – don’t apologize. That’s exactly the sort of fresh insight I was looking for. Listen, I’ve got a conference with Daniel set up for two. I’ve got lunch with another of the barristers over there, so I’ll see you at chambers. OK?’
‘Sure thing.’ I nod. How can you be worried about your lunch, when Rhea is perishing in a jail somewhere? I want to ask him. How can you be so cold? Or maybe he doesn’t get it. Maybe he doesn’t know how to listen between the words, hear the sounds of a chaotic world. A victim, not a culpable culprit.
‘If you wouldn’t mind bringing the files too, that would be great. Thanks, Jen.’
He ushers me out of his office, and away he goes.
***
I arrive early to Daniel’s chambers. In the mirror in the lift up to his floor I see how pale I am. I quickly slide on some lipstick. Too pink for my thoughts, but maybe that’s the point of make-up. I remember that delicious plum colour that Chloe used to wear. Made her look more inviting than she