Burning Ambition (DCS Palmer and the Serial Murder Squad Book 7)

by B. L. Faulkner

  ‘We stop it. Once it gets into London traffic he could hop off and run at anytime. We stop it.’

  He gave the order to the pursuit cars and they pulled back onto the main carriageway, turned on the sirens and blues and in no time had pulled the lorry over onto the hard shoulder. Palmer’s car pulled up in front, and he walked slowly to the cab with three armed officers flanking him and another three stood at the rear of the lorry, their rifles raised. The driver leaned out of his window above them as Palmer approached.

  ‘Don’t tell me I’ve got a load of illegals in the back, I was checked out as all clear at Swansea docks.’

  ‘Not as far as we know, driver. Anybody in the cab with you?’ Palmer asked with a smile.

  ‘No, just me.’

  ‘Okay, step down if you would and I’ll explain.’

  The driver opened the door and stepped down. An officer stepped up and looked inside.

  ‘All clear in here, sir.’

  Gheeta had her laptop open and the dot was flashing.

  ‘He must be in the back, sir.’

  ‘What are you carrying?’ Palmer asked the driver.

  ‘Two hundred and eighty-two sacks of potatoes.’

  ‘Okay, we think that a dangerous person who is on the run might have got inside at some stage, and we need to take a look. My chaps will lift the side flaps, but you go and stand well away; he may be armed.’

  The driver didn’t need telling twice, and hurried away to stand behind the far police car. Palmer waited for a break in the traffic, which had started to slow down as drivers became inquisitive as to what was happening. When a break came, he shouted an instruction into the lorry.

  ‘George East, we know you are in there. Throw out the weapon and come out with your hands showing. I have armed officers surrounding the lorry, so don’t be stupid.’

  Nothing happened. Palmer nodded to the officers.

  ‘Okay gents, let’s open the nearside curtain. Slowly.’

  One officer knelt on the ground below the lorry’s floor level, reached up to slip the retaining hook from its eye and slowly pulled the curtain along, bringing a stack of twenty kilo potato sacks into view, six sacks high.

  Palmer tried again.

  ‘Come out East, or the dog comes in.’

  Nothing. Palmer beckoned the dog handler forward from the car.

  ‘Put him in please.’

  Unleashed, the dog was off up onto the sacks like a streak of lightning. They waited, hoping not to hear a gunshot. Nothing happened for a short while. The dog re-appeared, tail wagging and looking to its handler for instructions.

  ‘There’s nobody on that wagon, sir,’ the handler said. ‘If there was he’d have barked a signal. It’s empty.’

  Palmer turned to Gheeta and raised his eyebrows. She showed the laptop screen.

  ‘It’s still flashing, sir.’

  ‘Ring it,’ said Palmer, realising what had probably happened. Gheeta used her mobile and keyed in East’s number. Somewhere in the back of the lorry, a ringtone rang out and repeated itself.

  ‘Sir,’ an armed officer said, pointing into the sacks near the back. ‘It’s in here.’

  Palmer joined him and peered between the rows of sacks where East’s phone was lit up and ringing

  ‘The crafty bastard, he dumped the phone in here. He must have cottoned on that we had the number covered.’

  ‘He could have just turned it off,’ Gheeta said as she joined him.

  ‘He could have, yes; but by doing this little trick he had us going one way while he probably went the opposite. Damn… Okay, get Claire to put out a ‘stop and detain’ at all UK exits. Make it a red one, care needed.’

  Gheeta went back to the squad car and called Claire with the order.

  CHAPTER 18

  George East pulled into the concourse at Bristol Temple Meads station and parked at the back of the parking lot. He left the car, and avoiding the CCTV cameras walked up to the drop-off point, blending into the busy crowd of travellers and commuters entering and leaving the station. He watched carefully as cars and taxis pulled up, disgorging their passengers. He was looking for his next mode of transport.

  He didn’t have to wait long. A dark KIA pulled into the kerb a few feet in front of him; the passenger was obviously the daughter of the driver, probably being dropped off by dad on her way back to university as the boot opened to reveal two suitcases. Dad and daughter both got out and went to the boot, each hauling out a case, and then Dad shut the boot. His cheery smile turned to a look of horror as his car moved away from him, down the concourse and onto the road with East at the wheel. Dad’s big mistake was to have left the engine running as he emptied the boot – just what East was waiting for.

  He drove off to the A4 and towards Bath and London. He stopped once just past Bath at a petrol station and filled up using cash, keeping his face off the CCTV camera at the pay-point. He hoped that it would be sometime before the car was linked to him. Why would it be? It was just another car theft for Avon Police to log and send out the details of; only when the car he’d parked at the station was found and matched to him would the details be sent through to Palmer and the link made. Plenty of time. He wasn’t taking the motorway, so no Motorway Patrol car or CCTV cameras would make a hit with the onboard CPNR computers.

  CHAPTER 19

  Frank Alexander was waiting at his home for a second phone call on the landline. He’d dozed off a few times in the arm chair since East’s first call, and Gail was asleep on the sofa. Time seemed to drag ever more slowly as the hours went by. He picked it up quickly when it rang at just gone four in the morning.

  ‘I’m back,’ George East announced.

  ‘Don’t come here,’ said Alexander. ‘They’ll be watching the house. Did you ditch the girl and the phone?’

  ‘Yes, I’m on a payphone’.

  ‘Where?’

  ‘Victoria. I ditched the old car in Bristol and blagged another one.’

  ‘Dump it, then get a taxi.’

  ‘Where to?’

  ‘Not here. Go to the snooker hall, I’ll get somebody to go down and open up the back for you. Did you get rid of the gun?’

  ‘No, I might need it.’

  ‘What for? You bloody fool, that gun will have been tied to all the murders so you don’t want to be caught with it! Clean it and dump it.’

  ‘I’m not going to get caught. That gun got me away at the Mint, I’ll dump it when I’m clear.’

  ‘What’s your plan?’

  ‘I need to go to my safe deposit box in the morning and get some cash out first; then speak to a few people and get out of the country.’

  ‘I thought that box was your pension?’

  ‘It was, but needs must.’

  The phone went dead. Alexander turned to Gail, who was now standing beside him.

  ‘Bloody fool’s still got the gun.’

  ‘I told you ages ago he was trouble,’ said Gail. ‘He always was. Now look at what he’s done. Bloody trouble.’

  ‘I’m in the clear. Nothing can be pinned on me, and I think it’s time me and George East parted company.’

  ‘How are you going to do that?’

  ‘One phone call. But not a traceable one.’

  He took a ‘burner’ mobile phone from his pocket and dialled.

  East was not anywhere near Victoria as he’d told Frank; he was in a telephone box opposite the snooker hall in Greenwich. He left it and walked a good distance up the street before moving into the darkness of a shop doorway from where he could see the snooker hall. He didn’t have long to wait until what he thought might happen did happen.

  Silently, two unmarked police cars drew up a little way down the street from the hall and six armed officers got out and moved silently to the hall, two staying at the front while the other four disappeared into the alleyway leading to the rear.

  East watched, and then moved quickly and quietly away from the area.

  CHAPTER 20

  Th
e next morning Palmer stood in the Team Room, studying the progress chart and stifling a yawn. It was two in the morning when he had finally got home, and he had managed to grab a few hours sleep before coming into the Yard. Gheeta was already in, and seeing that she couldn’t have got home much before him he was surprised at how fresh she looked. He put it down to age difference; he’d lost count of the number of times he’d looked at Daisy when he’d got home at some unearthly hour and said: ‘I’m getting too old for this.’

  Beside the progress chart Claire had pinned up a large map showing the road route George East and his gang had taken to Wales, and the route East had taken back again; it ended in London, which was just an assumption.

  Claire and DS Singh were working at their keyboards. Johnson and Simms came into the room carrying coffees and joined them. Damn, they looked fresh as well. Palmer stifled another yawn.

  ‘Where are you now, Mr East?’ asked Palmer of nobody in particular. ‘Where oh where?’

  Gheeta broke off from her terminal.

  ‘Not at the snooker club, that’s for sure. Bit of a stitch-up that was, sir.’

  ‘What was that?’ Simms asked.

  Palmer exhaled in a resigned manner.

  ‘Your people at Greenwich had a call from an untraceable mobile last night saying East was at the Snooker Club. He wasn’t. Rayson sent a TFG on a wasted journey.’

  ‘Why would anybody bother to give a false lead?’

  ‘Maybe it wasn’t false when they phoned it in, but East left before we got there,’ Palmer said. ’Or perhaps East himself rang it in while he went elsewhere for the night.’

  ‘So if it wasn’t false and he was there for a while, who called? Who wants East caught?’ asked Gheeta.

  ‘Yes, I’ve been pondering that myself. The main suspect has got to be Frank Alexander. The last thing he wants is to be implicated in murder; that would really dent his carefully built-up reputation as a clean businessman. But then again, it might well have been East himself, nicely tucked up with one of his mates in Manchester or Liverpool giving us the run-around’

  Claire turned from her screen.

  ‘The circumstantial evidence points to him being in London, sir. Have a look at this.’

  She pointed to one of the large screens on the wall above the computers. It lit up with a map of the roads between Wales and London. A red line followed the M4 from Wales into Bristol.

  ‘That is East’s original car, picked up on the NRCs. Last seen on British rail CCTV parked all night at Bristol Temple Meads station car park, without a ticket so when the parking attendant booked it in it was flagged up as ‘of interest’ to us, and Avon Constabulary emailed the info through.’

  ‘Did it pick up East parking it there?’

  ‘Picked up a figure, but too dark to positively identify. He parked it well away from the cameras in a far corner of the car park.’

  ‘Right, so East dumped it there and presumably got a train to somewhere? Get the station CCTV checked.’

  ‘Not necessarily sir, no.’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Well, maybe he did. But a car was stolen from the station concourse at ten o’clock last night, twenty minutes after he arrived there. The driver left the engine running as he got suitcases out of the boot, and somebody jumped in and drove off.’

  ‘East?’

  ‘Can’t say for sure – no real description from anybody, it all happened very quickly. But, this is the route that car took according to NCRs.’

  A green line left Bristol and took the A4 all the way to London.

  ‘That is too much of a coincidence, isn’t it? That has to be East.’

  ‘We may be able to determine that, sir,’ said Gheeta. ‘If it was East then he’d be very careful not to draw attention to himself. He wouldn’t want a patrol car to pull him over, so we have input a constant speed of 40 to 50 mph on the journey between each NCR. It all tallies except for one leg of the journey. This one.’

  A portion of the green line flashed bright and dark.

  ‘It’s an eighteen-mile stretch between the two cameras and it took the car forty minutes.’

  ‘Bit slow, isn’t it?’

  ‘Exactly, so we think he must have stopped somewhere for some time.’

  Palmer got the picture.

  ‘Petrol.’

  Gheeta nodded.

  ‘Or food. I’ve asked Avon and Wiltshire to check any places on that stretch of road that were open after ten last night. They have East’s mugshot to show around.’

  ‘Good work, well done. It has to be him, doesn’t it – it all ties together: dumping one car, nicking another and driving to London. It’s the obvious place for him to come to, he’d know a safe house or two. Be handy to find the car so Forensics could go over it.’

  ‘What do you want done with the rest of the gang? They’re all still locked up in Wales, sir?’ Gheeta asked.

  Palmer thought for a moment.

  ‘Not going to get much from them, are we? Except Kershaw, he was important because of his brother-in-law. Get them released on unconditional bail, but have Kershaw brought here; I’d like a go at him. He must know who set this robbery up.’

  ‘What about us, sir? Still need us?’ Johnson asked, tentatively hoping for a ‘yes’.

  Palmer caught his drift and remembered the times when he was a young detective, and his excitement when seconded to a team on his first big murder case.

  ‘Of course I still want you two on the team. You know the manor, the criminals on the manor and their habits. Get back down there and sniff around; lean on your contacts and see if anything gives. Then relieve the chaps on watch at Alexander’s house and keep your eyes open. Unless you want to go back with DI Rayson and nick a couple of shoplifters?’

  ‘No, sir,’ they said in unison.

  ‘I didn’t think you would.’

  He gave them a sly wink.

  ‘Off you go then.’

  Johnson and Simms left with a bounce in their walk. Palmer pointed after them. ‘Good pair of coppers, that pair. Pity we haven’t more like them.’

  ‘I think you just added two more members to your fan club, guv,’ Gheeta said.

  ‘Really? I expect that’s a big club,’ he said, putting on a self-important smile.

  Claire nodded.

  ‘Yes. Counting me, the membership is up to three now.’

  ‘Three?’ said Palmer, feigning disappointment. He fixed accusing eyes on Gheeta. ‘I would have expected four, at least. I hope your membership application is in the post sergeant?’

  She held a hand in front of her and wobbled it like a small boat on a choppy sea.

  ‘Not yet, guv. The jury’s still out.’

  Robert Kershaw arrived at the Yard early that afternoon, and Palmer took the five flights of stairs down to the basement interview rooms two at a time. When he got to the bottom his sciatica twinged and told him he should have taken the lift instead. He greeted George, the duty officer who sat at the end of the corridor signing suspects, prisoners and officers in and out.

  ‘Afternoon, George. You okay?’

  ‘I’m fine, Justin. You?’

  ‘So far so good, George. Robert Kershaw is the chap I’ve come to see; my sergeant tells me he is all present and correct?’

  ‘That he is, complete with his brief.’

  ‘Anyone we know?’

  ‘Duty solicitor,Freddy.’

  ‘Oh good, we won’t have any silly stalling then.’

  Freddy Fredericks was a duty solicitor, one of a small band of local solicitors that would be happy to be assigned to each new prisoner being brought in for interrogation that did not have their own solicitor. Palmer and the other detectives liked Fredericks because he was one of the old school briefs who could see which way an interview was going, and not try to forestall the inevitable by advising the client to ‘no comment’ every question when the weight of evidence was so heavy a ‘guilty’ verdict was beyond doubt.

  Palmer swapped pe
rfunctory nods with Fredericks as he entered the interview room and took a seat opposite Fredericks and Kershaw. He leant and switched the interview recorder on.

  ‘Interview room four, Tuesday 5th, 10 am. I am Detective Chief Superintendent Palmer, and present are Mr Fredericks the duty solicitor and Robert Kershaw, who I wish to question about several murders and the attempted robbery of the Royal Mint.’

  He looked directly at Kershaw.

  ‘Mr Kershaw, you are under caution. Do you know what that means?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Good, then let me go over the events so far. You were unlawfully released from a prison van by George East and others to take part in a robbery at the Royal Mint in Wales. The other prisoners in the van were executed by a .22 handgun and their bodies set alight; they were Ali Kalhoud and Peter Shore. George Shore, the brother of Peter Shore, was also shot dead elsewhere, his body then put in the van and also set alight. The reason, as far as we know, for you being taken off that van was to take part in a robbery at the Royal Mint in Wales, where your brother in law Frederick Knoble worked as a security guard on the rear delivery gate. He was also later shot, but thankfully not fatally.

  ‘The robbery was timed to take place on the very night that a substantial amount of gold bullion was being delivered. It is a reasonable assumption that you were the instigator of this robbery and a major player, without whom it would not take place; otherwise why take you off the prison van. So we have a total of three murders. A further Shore brother, Harry, was also shot dead earlier that day making four. All the shootings were carried out by the same gun associated with this job, and there – bang in the middle of this web of death – is you. You may not have pulled the trigger, but it would seem you organised the shootings and bear the same responsibility in the eyes of the law as the shooter.’

  He took a breath and hit Kershaw with his next shot.

  ‘I will be charging you with being an accessory to the murders unless I hear anything from you to change that.’