by Adam Croft
They were sitting on her sofa, watching a dreadful film about a group of teenagers who could predict when people were going to die. It was the sort of thing that was never going to win any plaudits or critical acclaim, but was a relaxing way to spend the evening.
She felt comfortable with him, but at the same time she wondered if that’s all it was. She’d spent her life being comfortable. She needed more than just comfort.
‘I was speaking to Ryan at work earlier,’ she said, making it sound like a casual comment.
‘Mmmmm?’
‘Yeah, she asked about the inspector’s exams.’
‘Which ones? The last lot?’
‘Yeah. Well, in general I think. She asked if I was thinking about going for it again.’
‘What did you say?’
‘I said I’d think about it.’
The silence was almost deafening, but Wendy knew Xav wouldn’t be thinking anything of it. He’d probably barely even registered what she’d said.
‘You should,’ he said, not taking his eyes off the screen.
‘You think?’
‘Yeah. I think you’d be great.’
‘That would almost certainly mean we wouldn’t see each other as often, though. There’s no way all the extra time and pressure would help us in any way.’
‘No, but the point is that it’s the best thing for you, isn’t it? You only get one shot at life. Besides which, you’re a bloody good copper. You’re a bloody good shag, too, but I think I can handle a downturn in that department if it makes the streets a bit safer,’ he said, laughing.
Wendy smiled and elbowed him in the ribs.
‘I’m being serious, Xav. I’d like to think it mattered to you that we might not be able to see each other much any more. It could even… Well, it might mean we don’t get to be together at all.’
‘I don’t see it would do that. I like a challenge, anyway. And if I end up getting a job at Mildenheath we’d see each other all the time anyway.’
Wendy sighed. ‘Yeah, that’s what I’m worried about. Revolving a whole relationship around work is going to make it doomed to failure.’
‘Well let’s buck the trend, then. You’ve got every right to go as far as you can career-wise. It’ll be best for you. It’ll help you conquer your own demons.’
Wendy looked at him. ‘Demons?’
‘You know what I mean. Your mental block in not being able to move forward and do things for yourself. I’ve got to know you pretty well over the past year or two. Probably better than you know yourself. I think I’ve got to know the real you, and I know this’ll be good for you.’
Wendy didn’t know what to say.
‘Listen,’ Xav continued, ‘Who’s to say you can’t have it all? And yeah, they might be right. But so what? You’ve got to give it a shot either way. It’s far better to regret doing things than regret not doing things.’
Wendy was confused. She felt as though she was getting mixed messages. ‘What are you trying to say, Xav?’
‘I’m trying to say I’d like to move things to the next stage. I called a lettings agent earlier today, to see what they reckon my house would get on the rental market. I’m still not keen on having total strangers living in my house, so I’ll probably see how long I can go without renting it out, but hey. I’m willing to commit, Wendy. I’ll move in with you and we can take things to the next stage.’
Wendy felt almost on the edge of tears. She leaned forward and kissed him.
‘But you have to make me one promise,’ he added. ‘You have to promise me you’ll go for the exams.’
She looked him in the eye, and realised in that moment that Xav was far more special than she’d given him credit for.
‘Alright,’ she said. ‘I promise.’
46
There wasn’t much more the team could do that night, even with the new information. On the face of it, all they had were reports that the property was being used as a male brothel, and a man driving Martin Cummings’s wife’s car was seen going into it.
If everything was as it seemed, the enormous operational sensitivities meant that they’d need to tread extremely carefully, and couldn’t risk going in all guns blazing.
Although he’d initially been shocked and stunned by what Steve and Frank told him, Jack had lain awake that night working through the ramifications of what it meant. It would, of course, end up in the newspapers. The tabloids were so opposed to elected Police and Crime Commissioners that there’d been a veritable witch hunt in the early days, with numerous PCCs having resigned over expenses scandals, extra-marital affairs and even the odd mis-timed tweet. The moment they got wind of this, they’d hang Cummings out to dry.
That thought pleased Jack, although he’d never say it publicly. He’d known there was something wrong about that slimy little shit for years, but he never would’ve guessed what it actually was. Cummings had wound him up from day one — as he had with many others — and he couldn’t wait to see him get his comeuppance.
To think that Cummings’d had the cheek to sit in Hawes’s office and ask them both to endorse his re-election — a request that was verging on illegal anyway — when all the time he’d been sneaking off into a town-centre brothel and having his wicked way with young trafficked males from Eastern Europe. Very little surprised Jack Culverhouse after so many years in the police force, but this had been a watershed moment for him.
He’d managed to get an hour or two’s sleep, but was up at the crack of dawn to head into work. He knew the Chief Constable would be in today as he had a mid-morning meeting arranged with him, and Hawes was nothing but punctual. He’d be in his office on the dot of eight o’clock, regardless. Jack waited outside his office for him to arrive, which he did, a few minutes before eight.
‘Morning, Jack. You’re keen this morning,’ Hawes said as he fumbled to unlock his office and push the door open with his shoulder.
‘So would you be, sir, if you’d received the information I received last night.’
Hawes stopped and looked at Jack. ‘Go on.’
‘A colleague saw something outside the property on Alexandra Street yesterday evening. Something which I think you’ll find very interesting.’
Hawes sighed. ‘What do you mean when you say “saw something”? You rejected my offer of surveillance.’
‘He was passing. He just happened to see something while he was passing.’
‘Who?’
‘DS Vine, sir.’
‘And what did he see?’
Jack took a deep breath. ‘He saw Martin Cummings going into the building. Wearing a baseball cap and a big jacket. He parked up nearby in his wife’s car.’
Hawes sat down, and gestured for Jack to do the same. ‘Jack, you know as well as I do that intelligence is only as kosher as the means by which it was obtained. And I’ve known you long enough now to know when you’re lying through your front teeth. Tell me who saw this and how they saw it. And tell me the truth.’
Jack paused for a moment before speaking.
‘We had access to a building opposite. DS Vine and DS Wing were watching the brothel to see if anything happened which could give us a lead.’
‘What the hell gave you that idea? You know we won’t be able to use any of it in court. If the CPS or defence team get wind of it even happening, the whole thing will be thrown out. You could’ve jeopardised the whole investigation.’
‘They won’t,’ Jack said. ‘Nothing is on the record. There’s nothing they could possibly find.’
‘Right, and how do you suggest we do anything about Cummings without disclosing how we came across that information?’
Jack had thought about this for hours, and he was pretty confident he knew exactly how they could approach it.
‘Carefully, for want of a better word,’ he said. ‘Let’s assume for a moment that everything had been done completely above board. Cummings doesn’t even know how much a pint of milk costs, never mind an undercover surveillance ope
ration. He’s not to know you would’ve needed extra-budgetary approval. If an investigation broke, it’d have to be dealt with by another force. We couldn’t investigate one of our own. It’d be massive. Front page news. Cummings would be destroyed, whether the evidence stood up or not. Whether it even existed or not. It’d be irrelevant. He’s going to want to do all he can to keep this under wraps.’
Hawes leaned forward. ‘Are you saying we should cover this up, Jack?’
‘No. Not at all. But I am saying we should use it to our advantage. Let’s face it: we don’t know what Cummings was doing there. We’ve got no evidence of any wrongdoing. He might’ve been going to see a friend and got the wrong address. We don’t even know for definite it was him. But he doesn’t know any of that, does he? For all he knows, we’ve got men on the inside, photographs, recordings, witness statements, the lot. He knows how interviews work. He knows it’s a drip-feed of intelligence, only letting on that you know stuff bit by bit, whenever you need to reveal it to expose their lies. He’s not to know that we’re going all-in with everything we know from the start.’
Hawes seemed to consider this for a few moments. ‘So you’re saying we bring him in, tell him we know he’s been visiting the brothel… Then what, Jack?’
Jack looked at him and smiled. ‘Then we play him like a fucking banjo, sir.’
47
Martin Cummings strolled into Mildenheath Police Station like a peacock in mating season. He was a man who loved to feel important, so responding to the Chief Constable’s request for an immediate meeting had been music to his ears.
He opened the door to Hawes’s office without even knocking, and walked in.
‘Ah, Detective Chief Inspector Culverhouse. I’ve got an important meeting arranged with the Chief Constable, so if you don’t mind.’ He gestured towards the door.
‘Actually, DCI Culverhouse will be a part of this meeting. It’s to do with Operation Counterflow.’
‘That’s the two boys found buried near Middlebrook, right?’ Cummings asked.
‘Yes. We’ve been doing a bit of digging, if you’ll pardon the pun, and we think their deaths might be linked to something a little more sinister.’
Cummings looked between Hawes and Culverhouse. ‘Oh?’
The men could see that he was either a bloody good actor, or he genuinely hadn’t realised the connection between the brothel and the murders.
‘We believe they may have been trafficked from Eastern Europe and brought over here as male prostitutes, working in the town.’
It was now clear that some sort of penny had dropped in Cummings’s mind. ‘Right,’ he said. ‘Go on.’
‘We’ve had independent reports about a brothel in Mildenheath, where young Eastern European males were being held against their will and being made to perform sex acts for paying clients. Some of them in positions of power.’
Cummings was as still as a waxwork. As Hawes watched him, he didn’t even notice the man blinking or breathing.
Culverhouse interrupted proceedings.
‘Where were you yesterday evening, sir?’ he asked Cummings.
Cummings raised his head slightly, blinked twice and swallowed.
‘What’s this all about?’
Hawes lowered his voice and locked eyes with the PCC.
‘Talk.’
Cummings seemed to summon up some energy and courage. ‘Chief Constable, you of all people should be familiar with PACE. Are you going to arrest me or not?’
The Police and Criminal Evidence Act dictated very clearly the role and responsibility of officers in the arrest procedure and ensuring that all interviews were carried out under caution, so their content could be used as evidence in court.
‘We certainly can do,’ Hawes replied. ‘I’m sure the papers would love to hear about it. Of course, I wouldn’t be in a position to tip off any journalists. Far from it.’
‘A rogue officer who just happened to overhear the arrest, on the other hand…’ Culverhouse said, from his position looking out of the office window.
‘I’m fairly sure that’d be your pension gone,’ Hawes said. ‘Not to mention your chances of running as a Member of Parliament. Although, from what I hear, it might actually improve them.’
‘Are you blackmailing me, Chief Constable?’
‘No, sir. I’m telling you that you can either cooperate with our investigation and tell us everything you know, or I can’t be held responsible for what one of my officers might accidentally let slip in his next phone call with a newspaper journalist.’
For a few moments, the two police officers thought Cummings was going to try and find another way to squirm from their grip. When he spoke, it was calm and muted.
‘I don’t know who runs the place. I bumped into someone at a social gathering, a friend of a friend. He seemed to know about my true sexuality. Call it a gaydar, call it whatever you want. But we got talking and one thing led to another. He told me about this place where men like us go. None of the boys were ever underage. You need to know that. This wasn’t a… It wasn’t one of those places. It was just a place where men could meet other men.’
‘Where men could meet Eastern European men who were being held against their will, you mean,’ Culverhouse said.
‘I didn’t know that bit. I knew they lived there, but it was all consensual. The first time I went I was given a name and an occupation, which I had to use. Over the past few months I’ve seen three different boys and had three different IDs to use. They barely spoke English. They wouldn’t have known who I was.’
All of a sudden, things were starting to fall into place for Jack. That was why there were differing descriptions of the judge — because it wasn’t the same person each time. Numerous people were using that identity, safe in the knowledge that it would hinder any potential investigation if the witnesses couldn’t even agree on what the perpetrators looked like.
‘How many times have you been there?’ Jack asked.
Cummings shook his head. ‘I don’t know. A dozen, maybe? Once a week, sometimes once a fortnight.’
‘Ever any more often than that?’
‘Sometimes. I’ve been three days in a row before. When I was at my lowest.’
‘And you pay for this?’ Hawes asked.
Cummings nodded. ‘A grand a pop.’
‘Jesus Christ. Surely you could get what you needed for less than that.’
‘You pay for the discretion,’ Cummings said, tears visible in his eyes. ‘The place has been running for years. People with money and power go there. They guarantee absolute discretion. No-one’s ever been exposed. Not until now, anyway.’
‘Who else goes there?’ Hawes asked.
‘I don’t know. I really don’t. My contact who introduced me is a former politician. I got the impression it was that sort of circle, but I really don’t know. That’s the whole point of discretion, isn’t it? That’s all I know. Seriously. I’ve told you everything I know.’
Hawes nodded. ‘I’m fairly sure you have.’
Cummings seemed to consider this for a moment. ‘Now what? That’s not the endgame. I know it isn’t.’
‘No. You’re right. The endgame is that you’re going to help us to end this. Nothing needs to make the papers, but we can’t do anything without someone on the inside.’
‘Are you serious? These guys probably have links with the Russian Mafia or something. I’ll wake up with a bloody horse’s head on my pillow.’
‘It’s either that or your own head plastered all over the front pages of the papers. Your choice,’ Hawes said.
Cummings thought for a moment, then spoke quietly. ‘What do you want me to do?’
‘We need you to bring us hard, solid evidence.’
‘You don’t understand. There’s nothing. They’re so careful, there’s no way I could do anything.’
‘At least two people have managed to escape from there,’ Culverhouse barked. ‘It can’t be that fucking secure.’
�
��I need witness statements from the inside. From the boys,’ Hawes said.
‘That’s ridiculous. How do I know they’re going to talk?’ Cummings asked.
‘That’s a risk you’re going to have to take.’
‘And how am I meant to get them out of there?’
‘You aren’t. We’ll sort that out. But we need you to confirm that at least one of the lads will talk.’
‘Don’t be so bloody stupid. I bet you any money the rooms are all bugged. I’ll be holding up a flyover within hours.’
‘That’s not what I’ve got planned. You’re going to take in a sheet of paper which you’ll hand to the next lad you go to… visit. It’ll tell him we can help him if he helps us. All we need is a sign from him that he’ll cooperate with us, and we’ll raid the place. Once one of them talks, they’ll all talk. The clientele at the place aren’t really our concern. It’s the organisers we’re after. People trafficking, running a brothel, holding people against their will, modern day slavery… the list goes on.’
Cummings swallowed. ‘And then what?’
‘And then you quietly announce that you’ve changed your mind and you’re not going to run for the PCC election next month. You withdraw your candidacy and leave with a nice little pension pot.’
‘What, and let the Andrews woman get in?’
Hawes gave him a look that told him he didn’t give two shits who the next PCC was. There were more important issues at stake.
‘If you help us catch the people involved and close this place down, I can make sure it doesn’t reach the papers. Your wife doesn’t need to find out. Your legacy remains intact. And we won’t press charges against you, either.’
Cummings considered this for a few moments. ‘And why would you want to do that? Why not just arrest me now and put my head on the block at the same time? Surely you’d get much more pleasure out of that. Two for the price of one.’
‘Because I don’t kick a man when he’s down,’ Hawes said. ‘I understand the value of working with people rather than against them. I know what cooperation and joint action can do, and I want to give you a chance to redeem yourself. I mean, if you want me to arrest you and do this all publicly, I’d be more than happy to do so. Just give me the word.’
