by Peter Boland
“You are going to tell me what you did to Luke, or we’ll put you in the back of this van and bury you.”
“I swear, I don’t what you’re talking about,” Bonafide Ride spluttered.
“Our friend Luke. Last time we were here you said, and these are your exact words, ‘You’re a dead man. I’ll come after you. You won’t know what’s hit you,’ remember?”
“I don’t remember.”
“Burying it is, then.” Savage pulled Bonafide Ride away from the van, holding him around his neck with one arm. With his other hand Savage reached into his pocket and tossed the keys to Tannaz. “Open the back doors.” Tannaz fiddled with the keys and opened both doors wide.
“No, no!” Bonafide Ride screamed, struggling against Savage’s grip. A pointless effort, as he had about as much muscle power as a stickman. Savage hurled him into the back, then climbed in after him. Savage turned to Tannaz. “Shut the doors behind me and get into the driver’s seat. We’re taking a trip to the forest.”
The doors slammed shut. The guy started crying. “Please, please. I have no idea what you’re talking about, I swear.”
Savage knelt over him. “Now I would usually hit you at this point, but there’s no reason to. In about half an hour, you’ll be in the earth.” Just at that point the engine started and Tannaz put the van in gear and drove out of the car park. Savage steadied himself, looking out of the back windows as she turned onto West Quay Road, the main drag out of Southampton.
Bonafide Ride squirmed and writhed, blood and tears splattering all over Savage’s nice clean floor. Breathing spasmodically, he could hardly talk as he bargained for his life. “Please. I don’t know what you’re talking about. I’ll tell you anything.”
“You remember us?” Savage asked.
“Yes.”
“You remember the guy we were with?”
“S-sort of.”
“Well that guy you sort of remember is now dead, and you’ll join him unless you give me answers.”
Bonafide Ride scrambled into a sitting position, wiping his bloody nose on his sleeve, pushing his backside into the corner, as far away as he could get from Savage, which wasn’t very far in the van’s little cargo area. He sucked in a ragged breath. Thought hard. “I’ll tell you anything. Please don’t bury me.”
“That’s a start,” said Savage. “Tell me… Tivoli Gardens, is that your regular sales base?”
“Until your girl broke my mate’s wrists. We took him to A&E like you said, told them he’d fallen off a skateboard.”
“Then what happened?”
“When my boss found out, he went mental. Said if we like playing with skateboards then we can work the skate parks. Split us up, put me on Mayflower Park.”
“How’s that a punishment?” Savage asked, although he already knew the answer.
“’Cos it don’t make much. We get a cut of what we sell. I’m making a fraction of what I made at Thornhill.”
“How come?”
“Thornhill’s full of Simon Wellington properties. They’re a gold mine. There’re loads in Southampton. Full of losers, alcoholics, freaks and junkies, always buying. There’s a joke that if you need to find one of Wellington’s places, ask a drug dealer or a paramedic because they know the address of every one. The drug dealers for selling to junkies, and the paramedics for when they OD.”
Savage shook his head in disgust. “And you’re happy to be part of that little ecosystem?”
“Got no choice. No other work round here.”
“And this Simon Wellington, what does he think of people selling drugs outside his properties?”
Bonafide Ride sniffed back some blood, wiped his nose again. “He takes his cut from my boss. Only guy my boss is frightened of. Everyone is, you must know that.”
“I’m not from around here.”
“Simon Wellington runs this city. The guy’s the biggest gangster around.”
“I thought his son took over, Ben Wellington?”
The guy snorted out a laugh, causing his nose to start bleeding again. “He’s not in charge. If you ask me Simon Wellington still pulls the strings. They say he gets up to some weird stuff with his tenants.”
“What weird stuff?”
“Don’t know for sure. Just rumours. Makes them do things for him.”
“What sort of things?”
“No one talks about it, they’re terrified of him. Frightened he’ll kick them out or worse.”
“What do you mean or worse?”
“I ain’t saying nothing.”
Savage looked out the back windows, he could see big, ugly industrial buildings scrolling past, the kind that are quick to put up and an eyesore forever, clad in crinkly metal with no windows and big garish signs. They drove onto a flyover, and the view gave way to a large arc of Southampton Water and a muddy foreshore beside the road. The tide was out. Suddenly the view was obscured by a blur of trees, filling the back windows. They were in the forest.
Savage turned his attention back to the drug dealer. “Well, you’re going to tell me because we’ve just entered the forest.”
“Don’t care. I’m dead already if Simon Wellington finds out I’ve been talking to you.”
Savage could tell the guy wasn’t lying. It was the way he answered without hesitation. Normally people who lied paused to think about their answer or looked around for clues as to what to say, or shuffled their feet. Not this guy.
“So who killed our friend Luke?”
“Not me. Not anyone I know. I swear. After that day we haven’t been back to Tivoli Gardens. Was that where he lived?”
“No. He lived in London. His dad lived there. We came by to pick up some of his stuff, but Simon Wellington had already taken it. We tried to get it back, called Wellington’s office, demanded they return it.”
Bonafide Ride started to shake, his face switched from scared to terrified. “You did what?”
“Phoned them up,” Savage replied. “Demanded they give back his dad’s stuff—a record collection.”
“You’re joking?”
“Nope.”
The guy looked around the van, as if he wanted to claw his way out of there. “Are you crazy? No wonder your mate’s dead. You don’t threaten Simon Wellington. Oh, man, this is bad, very bad.” His breaths came rapidly, heavily; his hands trembled. “Shit. I gotta get out of here. Gotta get away from you two. Can’t be seen with you.”
Bonafide Ride panicked, scrambled past Savage and tried rattling the doors, as if to try to jump out the back, even though Tannaz was doing about fifty miles an hour.
“Hey.” Savage grabbed him by the arm, dragged him away from the door. “I haven’t finished with you yet.”
The guy shook his head back and forth manically. “If you’re going to kill me you’d be doing me a favour. Don’t you understand? Simon Wellington is like Keyser Söze in The Usual Suspects, you know the film?”
Savage nodded, surprised that he’d seen the movie or maybe he’d just heard about it from someone else.
“Wellington’s the devil. Keyser Söze. Plays with people, toys with them.”
“In what way?”
“I don’t know. But you should leave it alone. Or we’re all dead. Just like your mate. If you’re looking for his killer, you can bet Simon Wellington had something to do with it.”
Savage thought for a moment. “This sounds like you’re spinning me an urban myth, a bogie man.”
“You ask anyone in Southampton. They’ll all say he’s a psycho. Please, you gotta let me out.”
“If that’s true why hasn’t he been arrested?”
Bonafide Ride looked at Savage as if he were the most naïve person in the world. “He’s smart. He doesn’t leave any loose ends, which is why I’m dead unless you let me out now.” He suddenly looked very young, very sc
ared, as if he were about to start crying for his mum. Unless he was an actor of the highest calibre, that look was very hard to fake, especially for someone who’d been trying their whole life to look mean.
“Turn the car around,” Savage said to Tannaz in the front. “We’re taking you back to Southampton, we’ll drop you back at Mayflower Park.”
“No,” said the guy. “Pull over here. Now. Let me out.”
“But we’re in the middle of the forest,” said Tannaz.
“Good. Don’t want anyone to see me getting out of this van. I’ll cut across the forest, safer that way.”
Tannaz pulled onto a verge, halfway between Totton and Lyndhurst. Trees lined either side of the road, with deep, damp forest stretching off behind as far as the eye could see. She got out and opened the van’s back doors. The guy shuffled forward on his behind, towards freedom. He leapt out of the van and sprinted across the road without looking. A second later, he was gone, as if the forest had swallowed him up.
Savage fell onto his back, lying on the van’s floor, staring up at the ceiling. Tannaz perched on the edge, just above the bumper.
Savage swore. “I think my actions might’ve killed Luke.”
“You believed that guy?” asked Tannaz.
“He wasn’t lying. I know when people are lying and I know when people are scared. He was telling the truth and he was terrified.”
“That doesn’t mean Simon Wellington killed Luke.”
Savage sat up. “Oh, come on, Tannaz. It looks pretty obvious to me. And I gave him Luke’s name, spelt it out for him.”
Tannaz screwed up her nose, unconvinced. “It still doesn’t make sense. Why go to all that trouble to kill someone over a few records? And Luke was hardly a threat. It’s not like he had some dirt on him.”
“Maybe he did. Or maybe Dave did. Perhaps Wellington was being neat and tidy, like the guy just said, tying up loose ends. Worried Luke may have known what his dad knew. Who knows? Maybe Dave Mosely’s death wasn’t a suicide and neither was his son’s.”
Tannaz took a cigarette from her pocket, lit it and spoke as she blew out grey smoke. “Why go to all that trouble? Why hide Dave Mosely’s body up a tree? That’s got to be the most awkward way of getting rid of a body. And why fake his son’s suicide? Why not just bury them both in the forest in a deep hole or throw them in the sea with some bricks? Far simpler.”
“No idea. One thing’s for sure, I’m on the world’s worst guilt trip. Like I caused Luke’s death, kick-started it.”
“We don’t know Luke’s death had anything to do with Wellington.” Tannaz paused to take a drag, then continued. “And if it did, how were you to know this would happen? You were just trying to help out a friend’s kid. Do a good deed.”
“It’s too much of a coincidence,” said Savage. “Like you said, we show up at one of Wellington’s places then Luke’s found hanging from a noose. I should’ve been more cautious. Checked this Wellington guy out, before I went in guns blazing.”
“I’d hardly say you went in guns blazing. You just phoned up his office and asked for some stuff back. Not exactly World War Three. I don’t feel that great either. Just headbutted an innocent guy and kidnapped him.” She flicked the cigarette into the dirt and ground it out with her foot.
“I wouldn’t lose any sleep over that,” said Savage climbing out of the back of the van. “You headbutted and kidnapped someone who sells drugs to schoolkids and vulnerable people, whose best mate sexually assaulted you while he stood by and did nothing. I’d hardly say he was innocent.”
Tannaz thought for a moment, reached into her pocket and pulled out another cigarette. “You drive back to London. I’m going on my laptop. If there’s any dirt on Simon Wellington, I’ll find it.”
“You’re not smoking in the van,” said Savage. “And you dropped this,” he picked up the cigarette butt and handed it to her. “This is an area of outstanding natural beauty, remember?”
“Don’t like nature,” Tannaz remarked. “It’s too organic. Can’t wait to get back to London.”
“That will have to wait,” said Savage. “There’s something else we need to see while we’re here.”
Chapter 10
Savage pointed the van in the direction of Dead Maids Wood. It was either a murder or a suicide and, to help him determine which, Savage had to see where it had all happened. It was the starting point; the essential place to begin any investigation. Ideally, he would have liked to have seen the bodies, or at least the coroner’s report. That would be out of the question. There was no way the police would let Tannaz and Savage near the bodies or their findings. Autopsy results weren’t public record, and they already knew the police verdict: suicide in both cases, which meant all evidence pointed to Luke and Dave taking their own lives. But Savage and Tannaz needed to keep an open mind, be led by what they found. Not by their feelings; feelings were untrustworthy. So the next best thing was seeing where Dave and Luke both died. Not that there would be much to see; any evidence would’ve been bagged up and taken away. Nonetheless, in Savage’s experience, everything changes once you’re on the ground.
About forty minutes after they’d released the fledgling drug dealer into the wild, they pulled into the deserted gravel car park of Dead Maids Wood. The dull light threw dark ugly shapes and shadows into the dense woodland, as if the trees might come to life at any moment.
“It’s like Fangorn Forest in there,” remarked Savage, as he switched off the engine.
“What the hell’s Fangorn Forest?” asked Tannaz.
“Lord of the Rings. You know, where the trees come to life?”
Tannaz shrugged, shook her head. “Never seen it.”
Savage pretended to fall off his seat in shock. “You haven’t read or seen Lord of the Rings?”
“That’s what I just said.”
“How come?”
“Because I’m not a geek.”
“But you’re in IT, aren’t you all geeks?”
Tannaz looked at Savage in disgust. “We’re not all into Dungeons and Dragons and comic books. Such a stereotype, I’m surprised at you.”
“What was it you called that big guy at Tivoli Gardens? Fat Gandalf.”
“So what? Everyone’s heard of Gandalf. I’m sure you’ve heard of Kim Kardashian. Doesn’t mean you follow her on Instagram. Anyway, you were a soldier, you’re not supposed to be into all that nerdy stuff.”
Savage feigned offence, mouth hanging open. “Says who? We used to watch films when we were waiting to get the green light on a job. Sometimes it took ages, so to calm the nerves we’d put on a movie or two. Sometimes we’d watch loads back to back. I guess I never got out of the habit.”
“Yeah, well, you know far too much about the wrong kind of movies to make me feel comfortable about hanging out with you.”
“The ‘wrong kind of movies’. What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You like all the corny blockbusters, the crowd pleasers. You should try watching something more challenging. Something that makes you think.”
Savage snorted. “You mean arty.”
“No, I mean something that’s not all CGI and dumb storylines.”
He pulled the keys out of the ignition. “I think you’re just trying to hurt my feelings. Come on, let’s take a look before it gets too dark to find our way out again. We’ll finish this debate later.”
Savage got out of the van but Tannaz stayed put. “I’m not going in there, it’s giving me the creeps. Plus, I feel weird about seeing where Luke died.”
Savage leant against the open van door. “I understand. Painful though it is, it’s always good to get a look at the murder scene, if that’s what we’re dealing with.”
Tannaz chewed her lip, then gave a fragile smile. “You’re right.” She got out of the car and followed him through a narrow gap beside the wide, padlo
cked metal gate that barred cars from going any further. A sign bolted to it read: ‘Keep Clear’. Beyond, a gravel fire road wound its way between the twisted trees.
“Jeez, this is not a place you’d want to be on your own,” said Tannaz. “Oh,” she said more optimistically, holding up her phone. “Well it’s not that bad. I can still get a signal and WiFi.”
“I worry that your wellbeing all depends on your ability to get online or not.”
“That’s the way of the world, Savage,” Tannaz replied, ignoring the evil-looking trees closing in around her, concentrating on her phone’s brightly lit screen. Savage wondered whether she really was interested in her phone or just using it to distract herself from the sinister surroundings and the fact that they were on their way to see where Luke had been found dead. Savage had to remember, he was used to people dying around him, Tannaz was not.
After a minute’s stroll, barely out of sight of the car park, a lonely oak came into view with thick, low-hanging branches. As they got closer, they could see long, slender metal stakes driven into the soil around it, holding up blue-and-white police tape, most of it sagging or broken. It was the tree where Luke had been found hanging.
“So this is the place,” said Savage.
Tannaz kept quiet.
“You, okay?” he asked.
“Yeah,” she said, staring wide-eyed at the tree in front of them. “Just a bit numb, that’s all. You know, one minute we’re having tea with him and the next minute he’s found hanging here.”
The rope had gone, taken away for forensics no doubt, but they could see a ring worn into the branch where it had been looped around.
“I know,” Savage replied. “There’s nothing we can do about that now, apart from finding what really happened to him, and his dad, and making the people responsible pay.”
Tannaz nodded, shook away the sadness, and started taking shots of the tree from different angles.
Savage circled the trunk, hoping something would jump out at him. It didn’t. Apart from the faint ring in the branch, there was nothing to suggest anything untoward had happened there. He turned his attention to the ground around the tree. Again, nothing but dirt and dead leaves.
