Truth or Dare

by Tania Carver

‘I’m not fucking her.’

  Tiny nodded slowly. Eventually he spoke. ‘Better get out of here, man. Got things to think about. You’re not welcome here today.’

  Moses opened his mouth, made to argue, but realised there would be no point. Instead he turned, walked away.

  Feeling like a target had just been put on his back.

  68

  P

  hil stood in front of his team, silently repeating his newfound mantra to himself: Don’t sound like a failure… Don’t sound like a failure…

  ‘Thank you,’ he said to the assembled room. ‘Thank you for still being here.’ He scanned them, saw bleary, bloodshot eyes, overtired minds and bodies. He had to lead them, inspire them. Encourage them to renew their efforts, put in a proper shift. He couldn’t sound like a man who had let their prime suspect escape with his intended target and allowed one of his own to be injured in the process. He had to be the person who would lead the team on from that. Communicate his passion, the intensity he felt for finding the Lawgiver.

  He noticed his hand was absently rubbing his chest once more, looking for signs of pain. He quickly took it away. That wasn’t helping anyone.

  ‘You all know what happened last night,’ he said. ‘Most of you were there when it happened. Detective Sergeant Sperring, Ian Sperring, is still in intensive care. The doctors are hopeful. They say he’s comfortable, not critical.’

  Phil caught Nadish’s eye. The younger officer looked like he was distraught but trying to hide it. Or as best he could.

  ‘He’s stable,’ said Cotter, standing at Phil’s side. A show of support. ‘In good hands. With luck he’ll recover. Hopefully fully.’

  ‘Which is good news,’ said Phil. ‘But we mustn’t let the loss of one of our own deter us from what we have to do. Or cloud our judgement about how we go about it. We have to find the Lawgiver. Find him, bring him in. And find Glen Looker too. Before the Lawgiver can do anything to him.’

  A ripple of unease ran round the room. Phil noticed the team weren’t totally on his side after those words.

  ‘Yes, I know most of you have had the somewhat dubious pleasure of crossing swords with Mr Looker but this is something different. He’s been taken into the hands of a maniac, one we still know next to nothing about but one who is lethal. And we have to do our best to find him, despite what we may think about Glen Looker. And who knows,’ added Phil, attempting a smile, ‘if we find him alive he might not sue.’

  The laughter was polite but it broke the tension.

  ‘Right,’ said Phil, ploughing on while he still had the attention of the room, ‘we haven’t got much to go on, so with that in mind I had a preliminary psychological profile drawn up of our Lawgiver.’ He held up a piece of paper. ‘Here it is. Any comments, chip in.’ He began to read from it.

  ‘Lawgiver seems to be suffering from some kind of psychotic condition.’ He looked up. ‘Obviously, we’ll know more about that when we catch him.’ He kept reading. ‘This person is extremely focused. Single-minded, even, on a single project.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Nadish, ‘we got that.’

  ‘He’s educated. Well educated, probably. But here’s the interesting thing. He’s probably experienced something traumatic in his life. This has caused his perception of the world to become warped. Through doing what he’s doing, he’s trying to regain his own balance and make sense of the world again.’

  ‘So how would you classify him?’ asked Imani. ‘Psychopath, sociopath, emotionally numb, what?’

  ‘I don’t know,’ said Phil. ‘That’s for us to discover. He wants us to see things his way. And he’s willing to do anything, even kill, to do that.’

  ‘So he’s a psycho then,’ said Nadish.

  ‘Not necessarily,’ said Phil.

  ‘So what are his weaknesses?’ asked Imani. ‘How are we going to catch him?’

  ‘He’s a planner,’ said Phil. ‘Meticulously so. But he’s also getting cocky. Think of last night. Had he planned that all along or did something happen to make him feel like he could get away with it? I don’t know. But if his plans are upset then he’ll start to unravel. And that’s how we’ll catch him.’

  ‘Let’s hope it’s sooner rather than later,’ said Cotter.

  ‘Exactly,’ said Phil. He put the paper down on his desk, mentally thanked Marina for that. ‘Right. With all that in mind, what do we have so far?’

  He turned to the murder board behind him. Instead of providing the links and clues that it usually would, it looked more like a puzzle that couldn’t be completed due to a lack of pieces. Pictures of the victims were up there, arrows linking them when possible. A photo of Moses Heap with a question mark beneath it next to a picture of Letisha Watson, a dotted line linking her to Darren Richards. A solid line linking Richards with Chloe Hannon. Then in another part of the board, a photo of John Wright. No lines linking him with anyone else on the board. And along from that, a photo of Glen Looker. Lines linked him to both Darren Richards and Moses Heap.

  ‘That’s it,’ said Phil. ‘That’s what we have. Victims but no perpetrator. Not even a picture, only a description. How does he find his victims? Does he know his victims?’

  ‘Maybe he just picks the ones that are high profile,’ said Imani, ‘in the case of John Wright, and researches them.’

  ‘That makes sense,’ replied Phil. ‘But what about the others? They’ve all got Looker as a connection.’

  ‘Maybe he started looking at Looker,’ said Nadish, ‘then found out about the others from him. Went after Darren Richards first because…’ He tailed off.

  ‘Because he could?’ suggested Imani. ‘Because he was nearest, because he was easiest, plenty of reasons. Start off with the simplest, build his way up.’

  ‘True,’ said Phil. ‘Or at least simplest in terms of access.’

  ‘Right,’ said Imani. ‘Maybe he went after him because Looker would be someone he would have to build up to? Especially the way he carried it out.’

  ‘Yeah,’ said Phil. ‘That makes sense. So if that’s the case, if Darren Richards was easiest and nearest, the opening one of the account, then have we anything on where he was picked up?’

  ‘Nothing,’ said Imani. ‘He was supposedly on his way to his friend’s house in Winson Green. He never turned up. Same with Chloe and Shannon Hannon. No one saw anything, heard anything.’

  ‘That kind of area,’ said Nadish.

  ‘Certainly is,’ said Phil. ‘So bearing in mind we’ve got nowhere with that line of enquiry, does the location of where he was found matter? That semi-demolished building? Does that mean something to him, the Lawgiver, d’you think? Nadish?’

  Nadish checked his notes. ‘We’ve looked into the history of the building. Nothing. Been bought by a development company to knock down and replace with flats or something.’

  ‘Who owned the original building?’

  ‘A holding company. Nothing suspicious as far as we could make out. Got people looking into it but I reckon it’s a dead end. SOCOs are still going over it but they haven’t found anything. Jo Howe doubts they will.’

  ‘Post-mortems on the two victims?’

  ‘As we first suspected,’ said Imani. ‘Crossbow bolts. Nothing on them. Could have been bought at any sports or gun shop. Or even off the internet. It’s being followed up, but…’ She shrugged.

  ‘Okay. What about the door-to-door? That give up anything?’

  Nadish paused before answering, is if weighing something up in his mind. ‘Nah, nothing.’

  ‘You sure?’

  ‘Yeah. Nothing out of the ordinary.’ He nodded, almost to himself. ‘Yeah.’

  Phil wasn’t wholly convinced by his reply but had no reason to question him further. ‘Fine. But if you think of anything or anyone who was acting out of turn, let me know, okay? It might come to you later. Let me know.’

  Nadish straightened up. It looked like he was starting to feel victimised. Or at least embarrassed in front of his colleagues. ‘Y
eah, course. But I know what I’m doing.’

  ‘I know,’ said Phil, aware of the effect his questioning was having. Don’t look desperate, he thought. Don’t grasp for something that isn’t there. Alienate the people you rely on. ‘I know you do. Right. Moving on. John Wright. What’s the state of play with him?’

  Matt Trevor, a DS who had been seconded in from another department to help out spoke up. ‘Hotel’s been gone through. Clean.’

  ‘No sign of the Lawgiver having a room there?’ asked Phil. ‘Changing?’

  ‘We didn’t find one. But to be honest, that would be like looking for the proverbial needle in the proverbial haystack. The rooms are cleaned as soon as the guests have gone.’

  ‘And nothing was left in any one?’

  Trevor checked his notes. ‘Couldn’t find anything.’

  ‘Keep looking,’ said Phil. ‘Double check. Just in case. What about the victim’s injuries? How are they progressing?’

  ‘He lost a lot of blood,’ said Imani.

  ‘Not to mention fingers,’ said Nadish.

  ‘Thank you, Nadish,’ said Phil.

  Imani nodded, continued. ‘There was talk about whether to attempt to reconnect them. I think they’re trying but what with the state the fingers and thumbs were found in, not to mention the overall state he was in, I don’t think they’re holding out much hope. But I’m sure he’ll be getting the best possible treatment that money can buy.’

  ‘If he’s got any left after the Lawgiver wiped out his accounts. Where are we with that?’

  Another new face, DC Vicki Hazzard, looked up. She had been brought in for the investigation, a specialist in financial crimes. ‘He was very thorough,’ she said. ‘Very thorough. He knew his stuff, knew what he was doing. To take down accounts like he did and in that space of time shows some serious nous. He must have been planning that a while. Real financial hacktivist moves.’

  ‘Is that an avenue to look at?’ asked Phil. ‘Could he be with, I don’t know, Anonymous, a group like that?’

  ‘No,’ said Elli, speaking up for the first time. Everyone looked at her. She reddened, but continued. ‘I’ve already checked. I have some hacktivist contacts that I’ve spoken to. They all claim it’s nothing to do with them.’

  ‘Can we trust them?’ asked Cotter.

  ‘As much as we can trust anyone,’ said Elli. ‘The ones I spoke to said that while they might agree with his targets and his aims, they don’t agree with his methods.’

  ‘But presumably Anonymous is just that,’ said Phil. ‘An amorphous organisation. He could be one of them.’

  ‘He could be, yes,’ said Elli. ‘But given what I’ve heard from those I’ve talked to, I’d say it’s unlikely.’

  Unlikely, thought Phil. But something niggled about that. He filed it away. There were more pressing matters to be dealt with.

  69

  L

  etisha Watson walked through her flat like a ghost. She would walk into one room, not remember why she was there, go back to the room she had come from, wonder what she had been doing in there in the first place. On and on, haunting herself all morning.

  She hadn’t been able to sleep. Her encounter with Moses, and especially Tiny, the day before had left her more shaken that she would have thought possible. Yes, she knew it was going to be difficult to go in there but what was happening now, especially between Moses and her, had to be confronted. She couldn’t just ignore what had happened. And it wasn’t just sex. It was the connection, the being wanted again for who she was, not just her availability.

  She knew what they called her on the estate. Whore. Prostitute. Slag. Slut. She knew all that. And not behind her back, either, right in her face sometimes. In the estate pub, the shop. Whenever someone wanted to have a go, felt like they had the right to. And worse of all, sometimes Letisha agreed with them.

  When she had fallen, she had fallen hard. From being Julian’s top bitch to nothing. In about the time it took to say it, it felt like. When Julian died Letisha was nothing. Cast out, shunned, only her clothes and jewellery for comfort. And they didn’t last long: sold or pawned for ready cash. She had expected Moses to help her, had pleaded with him for help but he had shunned her too. Nicely, saying it was best they never met again, she must understand, it was for the best, even if neither of them wanted it. He had given her what he could moneywise, but that had run out pretty quickly too.

  Desperate, she threw herself on her mother’s mercy. But all she received was a lecture. Repent of her sins, give herself to God, be healed, cleansed and saved and then she would consider it.

  Fuck that.

  So she did the only thing she knew how to do. Got by on using her body. Selling it to whoever wanted it, for whatever they were willing to pay. She tried to set herself up as high class at first, visiting transient, lonely businessmen at their hotels, getting what she could out of them, charging top dollar for her services. Wearing what labels and bling she had left in an effort to impress. She didn’t last long. The hotels were a closed shop, run by escort agencies she couldn’t get a look-in with. There wasn’t much demand for a mixed-race ex-gangsta’s girl. No matter how many labels she wrapped herself in she still smelled of the street, as one agency boss had delicately put it to her.

  So the street was where she went back to. What she knew. Turning tricks on street corners and dark alleys, getting into strangers’ cars, wondering if she was ever going to get out of them again. Sometimes the johns wouldn’t pay, wanted to smack her around instead, test their car’s side windows with her head after she had sucked them off, their lust coalescing into anger at her, self-loathing for themselves. She would be dumped from the cars, battered, bleeding, bruised. Not able to work for a week. And, starving and desperate, would sometimes even get back inside the same cars, knowing what was coming, hoping that she could get away with just a bit of money this time. Any optimism she had was soon forcibly dragged out of her.

  And then she met Darren. He wasn’t much to look at, wasn’t much in bed, had no kind of future that didn’t involve getting stuck in prison’s revolving door. But he was kind to her. He treated her well. He never beat her up, never hurt her. She had good times with Darren. Getting high as many different ways as they could. On the town, having a laugh. She didn’t love him, didn’t have time for any shit like that, wouldn’t lie to herself. But she was grateful to him for coming along when he did.

  She clung to him, like he was her life raft. So when he met that slag Chloe Hannon she was devastated He made her life, her job, bearable. Stopped her getting too hard, too cold. She was scared of what she would become without him.

  That was why she fought for him. But it was too late. That slag was pregnant with his kid. And even though he had always said he didn’t mind and was happy to be just with her, she knew he wanted kids. Or even just one kid. And she couldn’t have them. Too many violent johns had seen to that. So she knew when that happened she had lost him.

  And when she lost him, she lost herself again.

  She had existed in a kind of limbo for months, not moving forwards, not moving back. Just doing what she did, enduring what she had to. Surviving.

  Then the police turned up.

  And then Moses.

  And she thought her life was about to begin again. Fair enough, that feeling only lasted for the night he was with her. He soon showed her how wrong she was the next morning. And she understood that. She really did. But hadn’t enough time gone past now that it shouldn’t affect them? That they could move on? Apparently not. As Moses had said and as her trip to the studio had demonstrated. Now, she didn’t know what to do, or what the future held for her. But she knew that unless she pulled herself together, thought fast, then it wouldn’t be good.

  A knock at the door.

  She jumped, the noise pulling her back into the present. Was that the police again with their snide insinuations, hoping she would crack and tell them everything? Or worse?

  She stayed still, not darin
g to move. Knowing that if she opened the door and the wrong person was standing there then that would be it. All over.

  Another knock.

  But would that be such a bad thing? Maybe her mother was right, maybe God was waiting to forgive her, welcome her into heaven. Maybe she would get a long, long rest.

  Or maybe not.

  Another knock. Accompanied by a voice this time: ‘Come on, Letisha, I know you’re in there.’

  A tsunami of relief washed through her. She rushed to the door, opened it. Moses almost fell inside, so hurried was he to get off the landing.

  She grabbed him, arms round him straight away.

  ‘I thought you’d… I thought you’d…’

  Not without gentleness, he took her arms away, moved into the living room. Turned to her.

  ‘Who’s been here? Today?’

  ‘No one. Just… just you.’

  ‘You haven’t been followed, no calls, nothing like that?’

  ‘No. What does —’ She stopped speaking, looked at him. There was something in his eyes that she hadn’t seen for years. Something that caused them to live apart since then.

  Fear.

  ‘We’ve got to move fast,’ he said.

  70

  ‘R

  ight,’ said Phil. ‘Which brings us back to you again, Elli. CCTV. How you getting on with that?’

  ‘Nowhere, really,’ she said. ‘Going backwards, I’ve looked at the footage from last night. We can’t get a bearing on the woman at all. It’s like she knew there would be cameras on her so she’s kept her face shielded as much as possible. Her hair’s all down around her face and when she talks she uses her hands a lot, covers her mouth. She also keeps her head down, angled away. Glen Looker has to lean in several times to hear what she’s saying.’

  Phil nodded. Felt like another brick wall had just been erected in front of him. ‘Have we got anything on her? Even some shots that we could put together to try to make up some kind of composite e-fit picture of her?’