Chapters (73)
- Rabbit Hole
- Also by Mark Billingham
- Title Page
- Copyright
- Dedication
- Epigraph
- Preface
- PART ONE
- ONE
- TWO
- THREE
- FOUR
- FIVE
- SIX
- SEVEN
- EIGHT
- NINE
- TEN
- ELEVEN
- TWELVE
- THIRTEEN
- FOURTEEN
- FIFTEEN
- SIXTEEN
- SEVENTEEN
- EIGHTEEN
- NINETEEN
- TWENTY
- TWENTY-ONE
- TWENTY-TWO
- TWENTY-THREE
- TWENTY-FOUR
- TWENTY-FIVE
- TWENTY-SIX
- TWENTY-SEVEN
- TWENTY-EIGHT
- TWENTY-NINE
- THIRTY
- THIRTY-ONE
- THIRTY-TWO
- THIRTY-THREE
- PART TWO
- THIRTY-FOUR
- THIRTY-FIVE
- THIRTY-SIX
- THIRTY-SEVEN
- THIRTY-EIGHT
- THIRTY-NINE
- FORTY
- FORTY-ONE
- FORTY-TWO
- FORTY-THREE
- FORTY-FOUR
- FORTY-FIVE
- FORTY-SIX
- FORTY-SEVEN
- FORTY-EIGHT
- FORTY-NINE
- FIFTY
- FIFTY-ONE
- FIFTY-TWO
- FIFTY-THREE
- FIFTY-FOUR
- FIFTY-FIVE
- FIFTY-SIX
- FIFTY-SEVEN
- FIFTY-EIGHT
- PART THREE
- FIFTY-NINE
- SIXTY
- EPILOGUE
- ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
- Back Cover
‘I wouldn’t bank on it.’ She gives me a knowing look.
‘You’re fucking kidding me,’ I say. ‘Again?’
‘Graham put three different cameras out of action on Sunday.’ She holds up the requisite number of fingers. ‘The dining room one, the one outside the 136 and the one in the corridor that covers the women’s toilets.’
‘Unbelievable.’
‘You were talking about making things safer?’ she says. ‘Back in there? First thing we should do is get Graham moved to another ward.’ She hunches her shoulders. It’s getting nippy out here. ‘The coppers who were here gave Marcus a real bollocking about it. Lecturing him about “serious lapses in security”, like it was all his fault.’
‘Yeah, well that’s because it’s made their job a lot harder.’
I stand there saying nothing for a while and thinking about two murder investigations, both with massive spanners in the works thanks to the security cameras covering the scenes being buggered. Yeah, Graham pulls this shit a lot, but even so. Once is seriously unlucky, but for that to happen twice is a hell of a coincidence.
I wonder if the police are thinking the same thing.
‘You weren’t very fond of Debbie, were you?’ Malaika says from nowhere.
‘Who told you that?’
‘Well, Debbie said something.’
‘What?’
‘No . . . nothing specific. Just that the two of you hadn’t really bonded.’
I stare at her. ‘What does that even mean? Have you bonded with Lauren or with Bob? I’d be amazed if you had. You just hit it off better with some people than you do with others, right?’
‘I suppose,’ Malaika says.
‘To be honest, there’s times when I don’t know how you stop yourself giving most of the arseholes in here a bloody good slapping.’
She smiles. ‘It’s a struggle,’ she says.
I’m not sure Malaika’s being completely upfront about what Debbie said or didn’t say to her about me. Still, if she doesn’t already know about it, I don’t see much point in telling her what I’d said to Debbie a couple of days before she was killed. What I’d accused her of.
I can’t change that, can I?
Even now she’s dead, I certainly don’t take it back.
We stub our cigarettes out on the wall behind us and Malaika says, ‘Come on then . . .’
I don’t move, because suddenly all I can think about is meeting Billy out here a couple of weeks ago. Those spare joints I stashed inside a pipe, just a few feet away from where we’re standing.