Marked for Death

by Tony Kent

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘I mean if Joanne was right and the victim really is a judge. Your husband’s some big-shot trial lawyer, right?’

  ‘My fiancé’s a barrister, yeah. Not sure I’d call him a big shot,’ Sarah answered. ‘And that wouldn’t give me any angle I can see. There are a lot of judges and a lot of lawyers. They don’t all know each other. Besides, we’re not sure if what Joanne overheard was right.’

  Sarah was being disingenuous; the cub had called it. Michael’s profession was the reason she had been sent. And far from being unsure about the victim, Sarah had known since just after 10 a.m. that the murder scene was the address of former Lord Chief Justice Phillip Longman. There were few upsides to the marathon legal dinners she had to endure for Michael. Having contacts at the Ministry of Justice was one of them.

  ‘Joanne heard what she heard,’ the man insisted. ‘She doesn’t miss much. Then she reports back to ITV and suddenly she’s gone. Replaced by the big guns. That seems fairly cut and dried to me.’

  ‘You may be right.’ Sarah relented, still with no intention of sharing her information. ‘But if they do know something back at the network, they haven’t shared it with me. I wish they would. At least I’d know I’m not melting out here for offending someone.’

  The murmur that passed between the three was hard for Sarah to read. It could be agreement. It could be disbelief. Frankly, it didn’t matter. And before anyone could speak again, the automated iron gates began to open.

  ‘Nathan.’ Sarah was ready. Her cameraman was not. ‘Nathan!’ The second call was louder than the first, her exasperation clear. It worked. Benson’s lens was quickly up and pointing in the right direction.

  The gates had been closed since at least 9 a.m., when the press had started to arrive. Since then a mix of uniformed and white-suited police officers had been moving in and out of the house. Now they walked out en masse, twelve in all.

  ‘Her,’ Sarah whispered, gesturing towards the only person on the driveway who wore neither a police uniform nor a forensics suit. ‘That’s who we need to speak to.’

  Benson adjusted his lens with the press of a button, zooming in on the woman Sarah had pointed out. A glance at his camera’s screen confirmed Sarah’s deduction: the woman in plain clothes was in charge.

  NINE

  Detective Chief Inspector Joelle Levy had no issue with the press. They were necessary. They could even be helpful. There were any number of murder investigations that would have failed without them, she knew. Despite this, some of her colleagues were far from media-friendly. Some actually saw reporters as the enemy.

  Levy had noticed that those same colleagues often had the most to hide.

  ‘Is there anything on me that shouldn’t be there, Steve?’

  Detective Inspector Steven Hale reacted immediately; it was a drill he and his DCI had perfected long ago. Levy was about to speak to the press after two hours in a messy crime scene. If so much as a spot of Phillip Longman’s blood were to show up on screen it could be a PR disaster. And so Hale studied her carefully.

  ‘You’re clean,’ he finally offered.

  ‘Thanks.’

  Levy reached up and removed the band that held her hair tight to her head. She felt her heavy black mane fall against her neck, settling just above her shoulders.

  ‘Wicked Witch to Scarlett O’Hara,’ Hale said with a smile.

  ‘Very funny,’ she shot back. Levy had no particular interest in her appearance but she was a realist. Like it or not, as a woman she would be judged. Hair pulled back equalled stern. Hair down equalled approachable. Any detail that brought the public onside was worth doing.

  She turned towards the now fully opened gate. ‘Bring them in.’

  Hale gestured to the officer at the gate, who promptly led the reporters and cameramen onto the driveway. Towards where Levy and Hale stood by the property’s front door. The questions started even before the small press pack had come to a halt.

  ‘Officer, can you comment on reports that the victim was a senior judge?’

  ‘Is it correct that a judge has been murdered inside the house?’

  ‘Officer, is there any connection between the victim and any ongoing court case?’

  ‘Ladies and gentlemen, we can’t and won’t answer any questions that can identify a victim of crime at this sensitive time.’ Levy’s answer left no room for discussion. The questions stopped.

  ‘What I can do is share with you the bare bones of what we have, and as always if you play ball with us now, you’ll have the benefit of our thanks later. Everyone on board?’

  ‘Quid pro quo?’ The question came from the only reporter who, until now, had stayed silent. Levy recognised her as Sarah Truman. ‘Whatever comes out later, we hear it first?’

  ‘That goes without saying, Miss Truman.’

  ‘Not always.’

  Levy smiled. She respected professionalism, in her own industry and in any other, and she was well aware of Sarah’s reputation.

  ‘Then take it from me personally. All four of you will get priority on any information we can release, as and when we can release it. Just as long as you’re all onside for now.’

  ‘Good enough for me.’ Sarah moved sideways as she spoke, giving her cameraman the clearest view as Levy prepared to make her statement. ‘Ready when you are.’

  TEN

  The Thames shimmered as Michael looked down from Waterloo Bridge. The cloudless sky reflected blue in the otherwise murky water. An illusion that added to the beauty of London’s finest view.

  Michael had always enjoyed this walk. Waterloo Station to Middle Temple. A bare mile, door to door, the route took him across Waterloo Bridge and its unmatched vista of London’s most iconic landmarks. Each one a reminder of how far Michael had come from the grim streets of his childhood. It was why Michael had chosen this spot – dead centre between the Strand and South Bank – to propose to Sarah only twelve months after they had met.

  That memory had only increased his fondness for the bridge.

  In its own way Michael’s destination was just as impressive. The Temple area of London – just a short walk from the end of Waterloo Bridge – was living history. Built around a nine-hundred-year-old church, the area had been the English home of the Knights Templar. Following the violent destruction of the Templar Order in 1312, the district had passed from owner to owner at the whim of a succession of medieval kings. A hundred years of uncertainty finally ended at the end of the fourteenth century, when the lawyers arrived to stake their claim. A near millennia of barristers had come and gone since that time, and still the majority called the Temple home.

  Michael glanced to his left as he walked the first hundred yards of Fleet Street, towards Middle Temple Lane. After all these years, he still found the sight impressive. London’s Royal Courts of Justice had been built at the peak of the British Empire. The power Britain had then possessed was evident in the building’s sheer scale. The largest court building in Europe, its massive stone edifice had bewitched Michael from his first glimpse.

  Middle Temple Lane itself was less impressive but no less unique. Its entrance was an inconspicuous white gate directly across from the court building. Michael had walked through that gate almost every working day of his career, and yet still he marvelled at the dichotomy of the threshold. On one side – the Fleet Street side – was the modern world: a typical bustling London road. On the other was a scene from the past. Cobbled streets. Gas lamps. Centuries-old buildings that leaned sideways with age. It was a Dickens novel brought to life, and it fascinated Michael now as much as it had on his first day.

  Michael looked at his watch. 1.15 p.m. His decision to walk had made him late. It had also made him sweat. He had not factored in the heat. Pulling his mobile phone from his trouser pocket, he saw he already had a text message: Tardy bastard.

  The message was expected. Michael knew its author without a glance at the name.

  Two minutes. Sorry, he
texted back.

  Michael accelerated as he covered the last short distance to Middle Temple Hall. Once there he ran up the short stone staircase and through the black iron gates that led inside.

  Middle Temple Hall – like the streets that surrounded it – was a glimpse back in time. Built in the sixteenth century by order of Queen Elizabeth I, the Tudor hall had stood almost unchanged since its construction, as had its purpose. Hall, as it was simply known, had always been a working building. A place for lawyers to meet, to eat and to discuss their cases. Difficult though it was to reconcile the five-hundred-year-old beams, the antiquated oak tables and the marble statues with an office canteen, for hundreds of London’s barristers, Hall was exactly that.

  Michael spotted Derek Reid in an instant. He was impossible to miss. At six foot three, Reid stood two inches taller than Michael, but it was not just his height that made him distinctive. When the two had met seventeen years before, when Michael had began his practical training as Reid’s pupil, Reid had been much heavier than was healthy. Now aged fifty-seven, he had become almost spherical.

  ‘I’m sorry I’m late.’ Michael noticed an empty used plate on the long oak table in front of Reid. The time had not been wasted. ‘Wandsworth dragged.’

  ‘Doesn’t it always?’ Reid pushed his first plate away as he slowly rose to his feet. ‘I’m still bloody starving. Let’s get some food in and then you can moan about prisons and trains.’

  The two men made quick work of filling their plates. Regular lunch companions, they had the hot roast carvery down to a fine art. Within minutes they were back at the space Reid had secured, their plates piled high with roasted meat, potatoes and vegetables.

  What Reid had already eaten did not seem to have dented his appetite. His plate was five potatoes and an extra portion of beef lighter before he spoke again.

  ‘So how was he?’ Reid asked between mouthfuls.

  ‘Just like you said he would be. He’s scared.’

  Reid nodded thoughtfully before tackling another potato.

  ‘Do you think you’ll manage to break through?’ he finally asked, sending two flecks of potato to the corner of his mouth. ‘Enough that he’ll help himself at least a little bit, anyway?’

  ‘I doubt it,’ Michael replied. ‘Not on today’s showing. That kid doesn’t have what it takes to name names.’

  ‘Yeah.’ Reid wiped his mouth as he spoke. ‘Yeah. That’s what I thought.’

  Reid pushed his now-empty plate away. As he always seemed to do, Michael found himself marvelling at his friend’s ability to put food away; his own plate was still three-quarters full.

  ‘If Simon could find the courage to stand up for himself,’ Reid continued, ‘you could nail O’Driscoll and show up Colliver for the lying – and probably murdering – little bastard that he is. All Simon has to do is untie your hands and let you do it. Twenty minutes with those shits in the witness box and you’d have them coughing to the lot, if you were allowed to. I know you will.’

  ‘Thanks for the vote of confidence.’

  Michael realised that his response sounded flippant the moment he said it, and he regretted it just as quickly. Whether Reid knew it or not, his trust in Michael’s ability to pick apart a witness meant everything to the younger man. The fact that Michael, as a QC, was now the senior of the two was nothing but a twist of fate. Michael regarded it as a scandal that Reid had not attained the rank himself – and years ago at that – but to him it did not change a thing. With or without those letters, Derek Reid was the most talented barrister he had ever known.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Reid responded. ‘I know you don’t need the ego boost.’

  Michael knew his friend hadn’t taken offence at his words, but he still felt uncomfortable. And now Reid was looking at him searchingly, sensing his discomfort.

  ‘Listen to me, Michael.’ Reid’s tone had changed, becoming more serious. It made Michael sit up and take notice, as though sixteen years had not passed since they were pupil and pupil-master. ‘I know what’s wrong with you, and you have to stop. You can’t keep feeling bad about taking the case. It was leaving me as soon as the judge granted a silk’s certificate. At least it’s gone to you. With you, Simon’s still got a chance.’

  The compliment made Michael’s heart beat a little faster and brought a smile to his face. A reaction which both embarrassed him and reminded him of the strange relationship that would always exist between a barrister and his former pupil-master. For six months, aged just twenty-one, Michael had been Reid’s shadow. They had worked together, travelled together, eaten and – most of all – drank together. It was an experience unique to being a pupil barrister; no other profession involves such intense proximity in its training. Sometimes it doesn’t work. Mostly it works well. And sometimes – most rarely – it forms the basis for a lifelong friendship and mutual respect. Michael and Reid were very much within that rare third category, and yet it did not take much for Michael to feel like that twenty-one-year-old kid again, basking in his pupil-master’s praise.

  He wondered if that would ever change.

  ‘They still should have kept it with you.’

  ‘Water under the bridge.’ Reid’s tone signalled an end to the matter. ‘Now tell me: have you met your junior yet?’

  ‘Not yet.’

  It was common in the most serious cases for a defendant to have two barristers instead of one. A leader – often a QC – and a junior. With both usually chosen by the solicitor, it was not rare that the two would not know one another before taking the case. And so it was not unusual that Michael had never met Jenny Draper.

  ‘What’s she like?’ Michael asked

  ‘Very bright and very hardworking.’ Reid was almost smirking as he spoke.

  ‘The perfect combination.’ Michael smiled. He could read his friend like a book. ‘But that’s not telling me what she’s like, is it?’

  ‘Blonde and attractive.’ Reid laughed aloud. ‘So be bloody careful.’

  Both men broke into laughter at the conversation’s sudden turn.

  ‘As if you need to tell me that,’ Michael finally managed to say. ‘I’m not in my twenties any more!’

  ‘Piss off,’ Reid replied, making no attempt to keep his voice down. ‘You were just as bad in your early thirties. And you’d still be now if you hadn’t met Sarah.’

  ‘But I did meet her, Derek, didn’t I?’

  ‘More’s the pity for her, poor girl.’ Reid lowered his voice again. ‘But seriously, Michael. Jenny Draper’s got a reputation. The girl likes a silk.’

  Michael had heard the same thing. That his new junior had been involved in some messy relationships with more than a few QCs, or ‘silks’ as they were often called by other members of the Bar, a reference to their robes being made of silk instead of the coarser material worn by a junior barrister.

  ‘You mean that’s the only reason she’d be interested?’ Michael asked, feigning both outrage and ignorance. ‘Well now you’re hurting my feelings.’

  ‘Stop pissing about.’ Reid had a point to make. For once he wanted it taken seriously. ‘Just be careful of her. That’s all I’m saying.’

  ‘Derek, I’m not about to risk my relationship with Sarah. Especially for someone who’s only interested in the letters I’ve got after my name.’

  Michael pushed his plate away and placed his napkin on the table.

  ‘Now forget about all of that. We’ve got more important things to occupy us: that dessert trolley over there’s got your name on it.’

  ‘I don’t need telling twice,’ Reid replied, getting to his feet with his eyes fixed on the dessert selection that sat thirty feet away. ‘On either point.’

  ELEVEN

  Russell Longman sat and stared at the wall. His eyes did not focus on any of the laminated signs and paper posters that covered the room with medical information. Barely an inch of the room’s white paint was visible.

  For Russell Longman, the wall could have been blank. His
mind was somewhere else entirely. Lost in an unbearable mix of grief, shame and dread. The grief was natural. The shame less so, brought on by the fact that months had passed since he had last visited his father. That it had been weeks since they had spoken. And dread at the thought of what was to come next: identifying his father’s mutilated corpse.

  I can’t do this. The quiet voice in Longman’s head seemed to come from somewhere else. Somewhere distant. At first he could hardly hear it, but its volume grew with each repetition.

  I can’t do this. I can’t do this.

  Slowly he began to realise what he was hearing. And he began to listen. To agree. He couldn’t do this. It was asking too much.

  I CAN’T DO THIS!

  Russell Longman was not an impressive man. He had enough self-awareness to know that about himself, and to know that he was simply not capable of what he was about to be asked to do. It was devastating enough that he had lost his father. But to have to witness what had been done to him? To see with his own eyes what his father had suffered?

  It’s too much. It’s too much.

  Longman rose to his feet, his thoughts now stumbling from his mouth.

  ‘It’s too much,’ he repeated. ‘It’s too much.’

  He could feel his heart race wildly as he scanned the room, looking for the belongings he had dropped absentmindedly when first shown to his seat. With his mind spinning, it took Longman longer than it should have to spot his discarded jacket. A fact which only increased his growing anxiety.

  Aware that nothing in the room – not even the walls – now felt as stable as they should, Longman steadied himself against the door frame and forced down a series of deep breaths.

  Perhaps the breathing would have worked. Perhaps not. Either way, Longman was forced to stop and take a step back as the door to the room opened and Joelle Levy entered.

  Levy’s arrival broke through Longman’s growing confusion. At first he was relieved to see her; a welcome distraction from his own frantic thoughts.