Flesh and Blood

by Emma Salisbury

  ‘There’s always crowdfunding, Sarge,’ Krispy piped up, causing both of them to turn in his direction. ‘Sorry,’ he reddened, ‘I didn’t mean to eavesdrop.’

  Coupland had never heard of crowdfunding. ‘Go on lad,’ he prompted.

  ‘Well, it’s a way of raising money from a large number of people via the internet.’

  Alex nodded. ‘There was a fella in Newcastle, he was homeless I think. Anyway, he’d been mugged, or assaulted, can’t remember which but anyway this girl took pity on him, set up a web page and so much money was raised he was able to move into his own place.’

  Coupland looked from her to Krispy. ‘Seriously?’

  ‘It would be a way for Donna to be with her grandkids.’

  Coupland regarded his eager DC. Had he ever been so keen, he wondered. So desperate for things to turn out right in the end? ‘If you’re going to get on in this job you’re going to have to toughen up, Son. When a job’s finished you move on, no matter what the debris looks like in your rear view mirror.’ He rifled through the in-tray on top of his desk, pulled out Angelica Heyworth’s crumpled business card. ‘Call this journalist and tell her she owes me a favour. If she’s finished hanging me out to dry maybe she’d consider doing something worthwhile with her time.’

  ‘You might want to consider re-phrasing that,’ Alex suggested, widening her eyes at Krispy.

  ‘The lad knows what I mean,’ said Coupland, ‘She could help start up the bloody campaign.’

  Alex grinned at him, ‘Deep down under that sullen exterior you’re a big softie, aren’t you?’

  ‘Breathe a word to anyone and I’ll deny it,’ he warned.

  *

  Coupland arrived at HQ an hour early; it didn’t pay to piss Professional Standards off. As it was he was made to wait until his allotted time in a waiting room that stank of air freshener. A framed poster on the wall showed off bright eyed officers with shiny teeth and every skin tone imaginable. They all looked happy, as though unpaid overtime and abuse from gob-shites were perks of the job. Coupland scowled. Wondered which of his many misdemeanours would be thrown in his face today. He pulled out his phone and turned it to silent, moved over to the window. The traffic below crawled by. A dog walker inspected the contents of his nose while his dog squatted on the kerb.

  ‘Think there’s something wrong with my prostate,’ Colin Ross said as he returned from his second trip to the gents since they’d arrived.

  Coupland turned to look at his union rep. ‘Could be all the tea you’ve been drinking,’ he replied, indicating the empty vending machine cups on the table in front of him.

  *

  A woman wearing full dress uniform opened the meeting room door. She had more make-up on than was right for her age and eyebrows that looked like glued-on liquorice sticks. ‘We’re ready to see you now,’ she said, standing back to let Coupland, followed by Colin Ross, enter.

  She pointed at two chairs opposite a mean looking man with a goitre the size of a grapefruit. He wore standard issue uniform with an inspector’s pips on his epaulettes. His colleague took her seat beside him. Coupland whistled inwardly. Two inspectors for the price of one, they were pulling out all the stops, then.

  ‘Sit,’ Inspector Goitre demanded, as though Coupland was a wayward dog that needed reminding who his master was.

  Coupland’s jaw clenched but he did as he was told, eyeballing his federation rep as if to say See, I can play ball when I need to. The officers introduced themselves, Inspectors David McAndrew and Sarah Smedley, rearranging their faces into serious frowns as they explained what was going to happen.

  ‘I get it,’ Coupland butted in. ‘You’re going to hang me up by my testicles and I’m going to squirm.’

  Liquorice Eyebrows sat bolt upright in her chair, yet neither brow moved, making Coupland wonder if Botox was involved. Inspector Goitre flared his nostrils, ‘If you don’t treat this process seriously I will have no option but to suspend you pending further investigation.’

  The Federation Rep swore under his breath before turning to Coupland. ‘Remember what we discussed, Kevin? About you following the advice I give you? Well shut it until I say so.’ His voice was neutral but his eyes bore into him. He’d been cool during the journey across the city. Courteous, but nothing more. He didn’t bring up that he’d seen Coupland talking to a notorious gangster so Coupland decided not to bring it up either. Even so, something hung in the air, unsaid.

  Inspector Goitre shuffled the papers in front of him and began to read. ‘Seems you’ve been excelling yourself, DS Coupland,’ he observed. ‘I understand you were taken off a case recently.’

  Coupland gripped the armrest on his chair but said nothing. ‘I would ask that we focus our attention on the current complaint, Sir,’ his rep piped up. ‘DS Coupland has been asked here to answer to the allegation made against him by Mr Austin Smith, nothing more.’

  ‘As if that wasn’t enough,’ Inspector Goitre observed, shuffling his papers some more before dropping them onto the desk as though they were contaminated. ‘We’ve read the complaint Mr Smith has made against you, and we’ve watched the footage of you bringing him out of the premises on Bury New Road where you arrested him. I don’t think the injury he sustained is in any doubt here.’

  Coupland shook his head. ‘I never said it was.’

  ‘So what do you have to say, DS Coupland? How do you intend to answer his allegation that you brutally assaulted him while discharging your duty as an officer of GMP?’

  Coupland stared at him, his gaze moving to liquorice brows then over to Colin Ross. He made a sound that resembled a slow puncture. ‘What do you want me to say? That I didn’t mean it?’ Before his rep had a chance to reply Coupland whipped his head round to give both inspectors his full beam glare. ‘Of course I didn’t mean it! I was trying to apprehend someone who was trying to get away, how many times…?’

  Inspector Goitre’s mouth twitched. ‘Indeed, DS Coupland, but this isn’t the first time you’ve gone gung-ho into a situation, regardless of the risk to the people about you, is it?’

  Coupland’s brow creased. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ Confused, he looked to his rep but he just shrugged, as if to say New one on me…

  ‘Correct me if I’m wrong but weren’t you involved in an incident last year, apprehending a suspect who fell to his death from the top of a multi-story car park?’

  Coupland stared at him askance. ‘Are you for real?’ Coupland asked.

  ‘This has nothing to do with the current complaint,’ his rep cut in.

  ‘No, but it sets the scene doesn’t it? Paints a picture of the type of man you are representing.’

  Coupland’s expression darkened. In his mind’s eye he saw the response they were looking for. More conciliatory. Agreeable. A wringing of hands before bending over and letting them do the honours. He swallowed down bile threatening to rise in his mouth. Coupland had never taken the easy option in his life, and he wasn’t going to start now.

  ‘Have you ever walked up and down the streets of this city?’ he asked.

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘Time for me to confer with my client I think,’ interrupted his rep.

  Coupland ignored him, his hand raised palm outwards warning the officer to butt out. He turned his attention to the two inspectors opposite. ‘Ever put yourself in a situation where you think your number’s up? Where you wish you hadn’t been narky at home the night before, so your Missus has something good to cling onto when she gets the knock?’

  The federation rep looked up at the ceiling. Inspector Goitre glared. ‘My career isn’t the one under scrutiny DS Coupland.’

  ‘Nor mine,’ chunnered liquorice brows, sitting forward in her chair.

  ‘Twenty-four years.’

  Inspector Goitre knotted his eyebrows. Coupland stole a glance over to Liquorice Brows but they hadn’t budged. ‘Sorry, I don’t follow.’

  ‘That’s how long I’ve served on the force,’
Coupland said. ‘Twenty-four years chasing arseholes, putting my life on the line so the people of this city can go about without fear. Have I made a difference? I doubt it,’ he shrugged. ‘Every day I make choices that’d make you piss in your pants. Up there on your high moral ground you can’t taste the fear of two dozen refugees as they’re led away to safety, the smell of their shit in your nostrils while you square up to the tough guy that drove a child to her death. You don’t see the husk of her body crammed into a bag when you sleep. I deal with dangerous men, Sir, Ma’am. Men that kill as soon as look at you, and you know what? I’m proud to defend this city and the people in it, yet sitting here in front of you I’m made to feel ashamed. Austin Smith had access to weapons, you know that don’t you? It says so in your report.’ Coupland’s mouth twisted as he said this, as though he’d tasted something foul. ‘If he’d been able to reach them he could have shot a civilian, a serving officer, that or been taken out by the tactical unit and not able to give evidence in the trafficking trial. At least I brought him out alive.’

  ‘So we should be grateful. Is that what you’re suggesting?’

  ‘I don’t want gratitude,’ Coupland sighed. ‘A bit of respect might be nice though.’ He shuddered involuntarily. Christ, he was beginning to sound like Tunny.

  ‘DS Coupland has had to deal with some very difficult circumstances,’ his rep piped up. ‘I am sure he would be responsive to training, or undergo counselling, if you saw fit.’

  Coupland spun round in his chair so quickly his rep blanched. ‘What? So some shrink can point to a moment in time and say that’s the cause? Jesus wept, man, that’d be some list. Look, I get it, we all have shit to deal with, but we have to live within the rules. If I don’t believe that then I’m in the wrong job.’ He threw his hands in the air. ‘I was out of order, I overstepped the mark…if you want to suspend me or put me back in uniform for Christ’s sake, put me out of my misery and get on with it.’ He pushed himself to his feet, ignoring the glare from the officer meant to represent him.

  Inspector McAndrew lay down his pen and leaned back in his chair. He glanced at his colleague; a nod told him to continue. ‘We’ll make our decision known to your superintendent, DS Coupland. I’ve no doubt he’ll be in touch.’

  Coupland stared at him. Was that it? His career was in the balance but time for a commercial break? He was about to say something else when he caught Colin Ross’s eye. If a look ever conveyed, ‘Shut the fuck up,’ that was it. Besides, both inspectors had shuffled their papers away into shiny briefcases, were already discussing the menu of the gastropub off the slip road of the M62.

  He’d been dismissed.

  *

  There was a bottle of something fizzy on the table. Three glasses beside it. He’d phoned Lynn and told her how the hearing had gone the moment he’d got into his car. Nothing about his version of events suggested a celebration was in order. ‘We won on the lottery or something?’ He could but live in hope.

  ‘Better than that. Amy’s decided on a name.’

  ‘I’m sticking with Jaxxon,’ she said, looking up at him. Lynn was already tearing the foil off the prosecco.

  ‘You know I’ll call him Jack,’ Coupland warned, ‘Or Jacko even, that has a ring to it…’

  ‘I know, Dad!’ Amy groaned, but her eyes were smiling the way they used to, back when he’d been the most important man in her life. He looked down at baby Jaxxon and supressed a smile. In terms of relegations it wasn’t all bad, he supposed. He didn’t mind playing second fiddle to this bruiser one little bit. The sound of a cork popping made him look up; Lynn filled a glass and passed it to Amy, the second glass she handed to him before pouring her own drink.

  ‘We can start planning a naming ceremony,’ Lynn began, heading into the kitchen for a notepad and pen.

  ‘While we’re on the subject,’ Coupland said, moving to sit beside Amy on the sofa where she leaned back, exhausted, ‘I think we should speak to a lawyer, get some papers drawn up so that if anything happened, you could be sure Jack would come to us.’

  ‘You’re a ray of sunshine, Dad!’

  ‘I’m serious, Ames, you never know, further down the line, if something were to happen to you, his other relatives might crawl out of the woodwork, lay claims you might not have wanted.’

  Amy stared at him.

  ‘Besides, I guess this is my ham fisted way of saying to you that he’s one of us, and for as long as I’m around I’ll do all I can to make sure it stays that way.’

  ‘You’re not ill are you?’

  ‘No love,’ he smiled. ‘I’m going nowhere, just trying to make amends.’

  ‘Then that’s champion,’ she smiled, digging the remote from between the sofa cushions and flicking on the nightly round up of Strictly, though she was asleep on his shoulder before the celebrity massacring the foxtrot had finished.

  Lynn had taken Jaxxon upstairs, was elbow deep in Sudocrem when the doorbell rang. Coupland cursed, propping Amy up with cushions as he got to his feet. They weren’t expecting visitors. Whoever was at the door could bugger off.

  He could tell they were cops the moment he clapped eyes on them, yet there was an awkwardness about them, in the way they cleared their throats and failed to meet his gaze that put him on alert. He didn’t take in their names; they were from Eccles, that’s all he registered. He’d played five-a-side footie with a DC from there back in the days when following an exercise regime meant more than watching it on the TV. He stared at their heads while he tried to compute why there were on his doorstep, their features set to neutral.

  ‘DS Coupland, we’d like you to accompany us to the station.’

  Coupland’s face grew serious. ‘What the hell for? I’ve not long finished my shift.’ They exchanged glances, and he felt almost sorry for them as he sensed their reluctance to be there.

  ‘Austin Smith was found dead in his cell this afternoon. An anonymous call has been made, implicating you as a result of the complaint he made about you following his arrest.’

  ‘Is this some sort of sick joke?’

  ‘I’m sorry, Sarge, no.’

  He pictured Tunny sitting in the back of his car, window wound down. He recalled their conversation. ‘I hear you’re still getting grief from Reedsy. I can take care of him if you like…’ Hadn’t he been clear enough in his refusal? Had Tunny arranged this as the payback he’d promised. Or to stir things up? Either way Austin Smith’s death was down to him… Coupland was sure the tightness across his chest was all that prevented the contents of his stomach from rising into his mouth. He heard Lynn’s footsteps hurry down the stairs. She’d have seen the patrol car from the baby’s room. She paused in the hallway, as though sensing the tension, calling out ‘Is everything OK?’

  Coupland felt like he’d forgotten how to breathe. He turned, nodding slowly before following the officers to their car.

  He heard, from the bedroom upstairs, the sound of Tonto crying.

  THE END

  About The Author

  Emma writes full time from her home in East Lothian. When she isn’t writing she can be seen walking her rescue dog Star along the beach or frequenting bars of ill repute where many a loose lip has provided the nugget of a storyline. Find out more about the author and her other books at: https://www.emmasalisbury.com

  Have you tried Emma’s Davy Johnson gangland series? Why not try the first chapter of TRUTH LIES WAITING…

  Chapter 1

  It’s funny how the do-gooding public think prison is the answer, like a magic wand that wipes your criminal scorecard clean. Only it isn’t like that, the problems you leave behind are still waiting for you when you step back out into the daylight, except now they’re much bigger, and this time you don’t have as many choices. I was one of the lucky ones, moved back into my family home and into a job that paid decent money. I should send a shout out to my probation officer; she came up trumps, getting me in at Swanson’s rather than pretend work on a poxy job creation scheme. OK, packing
cardboard boxes is boring as Hell, but you can have a laugh with the guys on the shop floor and turn the radio up when you run out of things to say.

  Even so, only one day in the job and already things started going pear-shaped. I was heading towards the bus-stop at the end of my shift when a small boy riding a BMX bike mounted the pavement, circling round me a couple of times like a playground bully eyeing his victim. Close up he was older than I’d first thought, maybe thirteen or so, with shaved blond hair and a forehead that was way too wide for the rest of his face. His eyes were sunken and further apart than was right and a mouth that hung open as though his lips were too heavy for his jaw.

  ‘You Davy?’ it came out as a statement rather than a question, but I nodded anyway.

  ‘Gotta message f’ya.’ The kid had a nasal whine, the kind that’d get on your nerves if you had to listen to it all the time. I wasn’t worried by the sight of him though; a boy on a bike makes a bee-line for you and says they’ve got a message; it’s not that big a deal round here. As far as I know, Hallmark and Interflora don’t stock ‘Glad you’re out of chokey’ gifts and where I’m from your first stretch inside is a rite of passage. News of my release is bound to have got around.

  ‘Mickey’s givin’ ye till the end o’ the week to make your first payment.’

  I nodded in agreement, his terms seemed reasonable; he was hardly going to write off my loan because of my spell inside.

  ‘Said to tell ye he’s adjusted the figures.’

  Ah. Bike Boy’s voice was beginning to grate but he had my full attention. ‘Said something ’bout the credit crunch an’ compound interest, or was it compound fractures?’ the boy stated maliciously. ‘Either way he said I wasn’t tae worry if I forgot the gist, so long as I told ye how much yer payment has gone up tae.’

  I had a feeling I wasn’t going to like this. Bike Boy paused for effect, as though I was an X Factor contestant about to learn my fate: whether I was to stay in the competition or return to the life I’d been badmouthing every week.