‘You mean like happened to everyone else?’ George’s voice took on an edge.
‘No. That isn’t what I meant. Just that you’re on some sort of rampage. Look, I get it. This is real personal for you. I understand, but I can’t support you. I won’t be here tomorrow, I’m sorry. I’ll speak to the bosses, tell them that I want to go back up to the north of the county. I’m already way over my time down here, it’s always been made clear that I can go back at any time.’ Emily got to her feet and carried her plate over to the patio door.
George remained seated.
‘Finish your food, yeah.’ Emily glanced at his half-full plate. ‘I’ll see you around, maybe.’
Chapter 21
At seven the next morning, George Elms sat at a desk tucked away in an alcove opposite his office. It was used for reviewing sensitive information. He knew Emily well enough to know that she meant what she said. She wouldn’t be back. He would need to be his own source of local knowledge from now on. He used her list as his starting point.
A cup of tea — his second — steamed away under the screen.
He heard a thud, followed by the sound of a mug bouncing on a carpeted floor. It seemed to come from his incident room. George checked his watch. It was early for anyone to be in.
He got to his feet and paced into the incident room, expecting to see Paul Baern. It wasn’t. Instead of a balding, middle-aged man with a lopsided smile he found a slim, twenty-something woman, bending to pick up a blue notebook.
‘You okay?’ The girl jumped like George had dug a stick in her ribs. She winced and put her hand to her side, as if he had done just that.
‘Sorry,’ she spluttered. ‘I knocked off, cleaning.’
George recognised Jana, the regular cleaner. ‘It’s okay. Here, let me help.’ He bent and picked up the mug, which had rolled under a desk. Then his eye went to the notebook. Jana still held it, pressed tight to her chest.
‘Did you need that?’ George gestured towards it. Jana started, and almost dropped it again. She put it on the desktop.
‘I try not to move too many things. They say I should wipe the desks down. I don’t get chance in here, the door locks.’
‘It does. I’m in early today. It’s fine, it’s nice to have it clean. If there’s no one in here, though, don’t worry about cleaning. Okay?’
Jana nodded. ‘Okay, sure. Would you just like me to leave a cloth? Some polish maybe? Other rooms with locks, they ask me to just leave some cleaning and I replace it. Just leave the bins outside the door and I change for you.’
George smiled at her. ‘Sure, good idea. I’m sure we can manage to wipe our own desks.’ Jana smiled back, seeming less nervous now.
‘Are you in pain? What happened?’ George gestured at her hand, still held to her side.
‘Yes, I sleep bad.’
‘You hurt yourself in bed?’ He stared at her.
‘Yes, I wake up and sore. I don’t explain so well, sometimes my back, sometimes the side.’
George shrugged. ‘Maybe you need to get yourself a new bed, one that treats you better.’
She smiled again. ‘Maybe.’
George looked at the name stitched on her chest. ‘Jana. Did I pronounce that right?’
‘Jana, yes.’
‘You take care of yourself, Jana, okay?’
She backed away, turned quickly and left.
George was still standing in the middle of the room when Paul Baern came in. He had seen Jana leave.
Paul grinned. ‘Still the old charmer I see.’
‘She was in here.’
‘Yes, she was,’ Paul replied.
‘See what you can find out about her, Paul. I’m going to see where she goes.’ He moved towards the door.
‘I imagine she goes to the next part of the building that needs cleaning,’ Paul offered. ‘Look, is there any chance you can bring me up to speed? I can be a lot more useful if I know what the fuck is going on.’
‘Just let me make a call, Paul. I want to find out what time she clocks off. The cleaners here, you only ever see them early in the morning, right? She could be off soon.’
Paul shrugged, took his bag off his shoulder and put it on the nearest seat. He indicated the desk in front of it. ‘Anywhere, I presume.’
But George already had his phone to his ear. He nodded at his mate and switched on the kettle.
Chapter 22
George spotted the signs. Jana strode away from the police station, looking back too often over her shoulder. She was either surveillance aware, or paranoid. George was hoping it was the latter. He was observing from a ground-floor window. He wanted to see which way she turned before he made his move. The street was wide and empty and he would be visible if he emerged too soon.
Jana continued straight on, and then got into a taxi which was facing east. It pulled away just as George came out of the police station.
‘Dammit!’ The taxi was maybe 100 metres away and disappearing from view. He was confident he recognised the make and model and he could just make out the Langthorne Taxis sign at its back window. That should be enough to track it down.
George felt in his pocket and took out a key. The small Skoda seemed to have become his for keeps. The taxi office was a five-minute drive away. He checked his phone and found a missed call from Paul Baern. He switched on the ignition and called him back.
‘George! Where are you? What’s going on?’
‘I’m in the car park with the engine running. I’ll see you in a sec.’ George hung up. There would be plenty of time for getting Paul up to speed. Right now he was more intent on finding out something he knew nothing about.
* * *
They drove to the taxi rank in silence. Paul was pissed off. He had expected to come back to a slick team of detectives, chasing down the man that had given them so much pain. Instead, here he was with a man still harbouring trust issues and who was not giving up any information. And where were the rest of the team?
‘Where’s Emily?’ he asked eventually.
‘She quit. She doesn’t want to be part of this thing, and since I haven’t got time for anyone who feels like that, it’s worked out well.’
Paul left it there. He was being left in the dark. Fine. But he wouldn’t put up with it for long. George pulled up at a taxi rank.
Paul didn’t bother to unbuckle his seat belt. ‘I suppose you don’t even want me to come in.’
George got out. After a few seconds he ducked back in.
‘I found that cleaner in our office this morning. It seemed odd to me. I just want to make sure she’s not our leak.’
‘She’s a cleaner. She goes into every room. There must be more, surely?’
‘No. Not really. It just didn’t feel right. I’m sorry, but I’m extra sensitive right now, Paul. You might have to let me strike a few misses.’
Paul shrugged. ‘Does she work here too?’
‘No. I saw her get into one of their taxis when she left the nick. I want to know where they took her. If I can get her home address it’ll be a start.’
‘The start of what? A stalking episode?’
‘She was holding Ryker’s daybook. And the way she reacted to me, you know, it just wasn’t right.’
‘Alright, I get it.’ Paul opened his door. He had to wait for the traffic before he could get out. By then, George was in the taxi office, holding up his badge and berating the staff.
‘Of course you can tell me! It’s important. I’m leading an investigation here and I need to know where that driver was heading.’ George sounded frustrated and impatient. A sure-fire way to get people’s backs up.
‘And you didn’t get the registration number?’ The lad behind the Perspex screen looked annoyed.
‘No. It was a black Volkswagen Passat estate and it looked new. There can’t be many of them on your books.’
‘We don’t have books. All the drivers are self-employed. They drive their own cars.’
‘Well, thanks for the
economics lesson. Is there an adult here I can speak to at all?’
Paul could see that the lad was about to clam up. He put a hand on George’s shoulder and muttered, ‘Give me a sec.’
Paul smiled at the lad. ‘Hi, mate. What’s your name?’
‘Liam.’
‘Thanks, Liam. I’m Paul. This is Detective Sergeant George Elms and we need your help to trace a journey. How many drivers have you got on today?’
‘He don’t need to speak to me like that. Just ’cause he’s a sergeant or whatever.’
‘You’re right. We’re all a bit stressed out at the moment. Sometimes we really need some information but we can’t tell people why, you know? We can’t tell them that it’s a matter of life or death, for example, even if we really want to. Do you get what I mean? Some of our greatest heroes have been normal civvies who never even knew what they did.’
The lad leaned forward in his seat and his eyes lit up. ‘Is this like a kidnapping or something?’
‘Definitely not. And your driver isn’t in any trouble. But we need to know where he went.’
‘Alright, I’ll give him a call.’
‘Just give me his number and I’ll call him.’ George put out his hand.
Paul pushed the hand aside. ‘I’ll speak to him.’
‘Your sergeant don’t have to be like that, not with me. I ain’t done nothing wrong.’ He wrote down a mobile number, and handed it to Paul.
‘Thanks for your help, Liam.’
* * *
‘Why were you giving the kid a hard time in there?’ Paul switched off the car radio.
‘He was pissing about.’
‘He was doing his job. He nearly told us to fuck off, and if I had been in that seat I would have told us to fuck off too.’
‘You mean me.’
‘Yeah, I mean you. He ain’t the bloke we’re pissed at.’
‘Paul, I keep trying to make people understand that we don’t get close to this bloke by being nice. We can’t work how we usually do. We need results and we need them instantly. If people are getting in the way, we need to do a bit of bulldozing.’
‘If he had wanted to, that lad in there could have made us fill out some ball-aching data protection form. Then forced us to wait a couple of days while it was signed off by somebody higher.’
‘He was never going to do that. The lad was out of his depth the second we walked in there.’ George pulled the Skoda out into the stream of traffic.
‘Don’t be treating people like that when I’m with you, or I will be rethinking my decision to come back. You appear to have alienated yourself from the rest of your team, so I reckon you need me. Whether you like it or not.’
‘I’ll drop you back, Paul. And I don’t need anyone.’
* * *
When they stopped at Langthorne House, George didn’t watch Paul walk away. He had his mobile phone in his hand, already punching in the numbers from the post-it note that Paul had slapped onto the dashboard. The phone rang once. It sounded like someone using hands-free and moving.
‘Colin, Langthorne Taxis.’
‘Colin, I got your number from your office. Do you have a fare on board?’
There was a pause. ‘Not at the moment. I don’t normally take direct calls. Where do you want me to come to?’
‘Langthorne police station.’
‘Okay. And where can I take you?’
‘It’s nothing like that, Colin. I just need to speak to you. I need a few details on your last fare. I’m a detective sergeant based here.’
Another pause. ‘Well, okay, but I’ve just dropped in Dover so I’ve got maybe fifteen, twenty minutes back.’
‘Dover? Don’t worry, I’ll come to you. Whereabouts in Dover are you?’
‘Western Heights, by the castle.’
‘Perfect. Pull into the coach park opposite the castle and I’ll be there as soon as.’
‘Well, okay, but time is money for us cabbies.’
‘I’ll make it worth your while, don’t worry.’
* * *
Colin was waiting, the only car in the place. He stood beside it, an e-cigarette billowing out a cloud of smoke. He was small, with hair like an ageing rocker and boots to match.
‘Take it you’re the police sergeant?’
George entered the vaped cloud. ‘Cherry?’ he asked.
‘Could be. They do all sorts of flavours. I never know what one’s what.’
‘Good as the real thing?’
‘Not even close, but the wife, you know, she’s keen for me to give it a go.’
George nodded. ‘This won’t take long. I’m interested in the girl you took home from the police station.’
Colin looked confused. ‘Interested?’
‘Yeah, as part of a criminal investigation. Don’t get me wrong, she’s not the criminal. I just want to be sure we can protect her if we need to.’
‘I know what you mean. I get them all the time in ‘ere.’ He gestured with his thumb. ‘The way a lot of these blokes talk to their girls, threats and that, you know? You wouldn’t do it in my day. My wife would knock my block off!’
‘It’s a lot more common than people think.’
‘Pretty thing too, the little blonde I mean. You’d think a man would treat that right, you know? Keep hold of what you’ve got.’
‘You would. Listen, I just need to know where you dropped her. Did it seem like it was her home address?’
‘Yeah, it was. We talked. I try and talk to ’em all a bit, you know? I think people expect it these days.’
‘I’m sure they do. So where was it you dropped her?’
‘She was telling me that it’s a bit rough round there. You might be interested, actually. She was saying she could smell weed just about all day from the flat over the corridor, said it was constant like. She said maybe there was someone in there growing the stuff. Could be a good bust for you, that.’
‘Yeah, thanks. I’ll do the necessary. Now you just need to tell me where you dropped her.’
‘Devonshire Road.’
‘Devonshire? Don’t know it.’
‘She don’t live actually on Devonshire Road. There’s a block of flats at the junction there. I forget the name of the actual road. Trevaine Court, that was it.’
‘Trevaine Court. Did you see what flat she went into?’
‘Nah. She didn’t say either. I saw her go in through the main entrance bit. All the bins are lined up either side. I remember thinking I wouldn’t want that outside my place, having to walk past that every day. Like a bin man’s guard of honour!’
‘That’s ideal. Thanks for your help, Colin.’ George fished in his pocket and pulled out a crumpled ten pound note. ‘For your time. I know I’ve got in your way today.’
Colin waved it away. ‘Nah, you’re all right. I don’t mind helping you people out. I’ve called on you a couple of times in the past, and I might have to again one day. Just remember me then, okay?’
‘Deal. Good luck with the smoking thing.’ George gestured at the e-cigarette.
Colin looked down at it. ‘I’m gonna need more than luck, I reckon. A bit of tobacco might do the trick.’
George watched Colin pull away. He pulled his work phone out of his pocket, it had been buzzing in his pocket. Three missed calls from Paul. He considered calling him straight back but decided against it. He would either be after some explanation or looking to continue their argument. Either way he didn’t have the time. He needed to get to Trevaine Court right away.
It was in a reasonable part of Dover. The Tower Hamlets area consisted mostly of small, terraced houses in neat rows. Trevaine Court was a block of flats stuck on the end of one of them.
George parked up where he could see the front entrance. He had done a quick recce of the building and this was the only way in or out.
His phone vibrated again with an incoming call. ‘Paul, listen, we’ll talk later about how this is going to work. Just let me get this done now . . .’
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‘George Elms.’ George recognised the voice at once. It sent a chill coursing through his body. He thought fast. Even though he’d expected contact, this had caught him out.
‘Kane Forley. You took your time. I got out days ago.’
‘I know.’
‘Well, of course you do. You still got your rats scurrying around my building, then?’
‘We had this conversation already, George. Seems there’s no shortage of people willing to assist for a bit of remuneration.’
‘There’s nothing you could offer me though, Kane. So why call me? I’ll be seeing you soon anyway. The whole world knows we’re looking for you.’
‘You’re right about one thing, George. You will be seeing me soon. You’re wrong about me having nothing to offer you though. What about your wife and daughter?’
George looked away from the entrance.
‘They’re safe. I got them safe. You call us predictable, well, I knew you would go after them.’
‘Yes, you did. You did a good job too, George. I couldn’t find her, and none of my people could either. But I could find you. You weren’t difficult at all, and you found her, didn’t you, George? Stuck something to her car. What was that about, George? Are you having to track your own family now?’
George said nothing.
‘They’re fine, by the way. But you know how this game plays out. You need to do something for me. Their safety depends on it, etcetera, etcetera. So let’s skip the small talk and I’ll tell you what I need.’
‘You’ve already got your plans. What I do will make no difference, so don’t pretend like it will.’ George spoke through gritted teeth. ‘You have your issue with me. Just leave my family out of it. We’ll meet, on your terms, and you can have your moment.’
‘I will have my moment, George. And it’s already on my terms.’
George said nothing. He was floundering. Yet again, Kane had him on the back foot. He’d known all along that as long as he could keep his wife and child away from this man, he would have a chance. He no longer cared about anything else. And then he’d led Kane right to them!
END GAME a gripping crime thriller full of breathtaking twists Page 10
