by Conrad Jones
Brick
CONRAD JONES
Brick (July 2016)
Detective Alec Ramsay Series
The Child Taker
Criminally Insane
Slow Burn
Frozen Betrayal
Desolate Sands
Concrete Evidence
Thr3e
Soft Target Series
Soft Target
Soft Target II ‘Tank’
Soft Target III ‘Jerusalem’
The Rage Within
Blister
The Child Taker
Unleashed
Hunting Angels Diaries
A Child for the Devil
Black Angel
Blood Bath
The Book of Abominations
Copyright © 2016 Conrad Jones
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 153473306X
ISBN-13: 978-1534733060
Author’s note;
On March 20th 1993 I was the assistant manager of McDonalds when the IRA exploded two bombs without warning in the town of Warrington. It was the day before Mothering Sunday and very busy. The bombs in bins created shrapnel that killed three-year-old Johnathan Ball and five days later 12-years-old Tim Parry lost his life. 54 others were seriously injured. The incident shocked the nation and gained worldwide publicity. As an eyewitness, the incident and the images from that day have hardly faded.
After the bombing, numerous organisations came together in a spirit of reconciliation and formed the Warrington Ireland Reconciliation Enterprise (WIRE). The parents of Tim Parry, supported by Johnathan’s parents (Johnathan’s parents have since passed away) wanted to gain an understanding of why they lost their children. Colin and Wendy Parry were then taken by BBC Panorama to Northern Ireland, the Republic of Ireland and the USA. During that visit, they saw some of the work going on to create peace. They came back inspired, like many other victims, to try and make sure nobody ever experienced what they had gone through. They formed a charitable foundation with many of the donations that had come in after the bombing. A scholarship commenced in Tim’s name bringing together young people from different sides of the conflict to try to understand their differences and also share their commonalities. Every year they hold a charity ball to help fund their foundation. In 2016 they approached me and asked if we could offer an auction prize and Wendy suggested that we offer the highest bidder a ‘part’ in my new book; a character named after them.
The highest bidder was Adrian Burns. I hope you enjoy your role in the novel, Ade!
You can find out more about the foundation at;
http://foundation4peace.org/who-we-are/
PROLOGUE
“Let’s take a selfie with your phone, upload it to your Facebook page and see how many likes, shares and comments you get before you bleed to death,” Tucker said with a twisted smile. The man who was strapped to a chair in front of him was semiconscious. His eyes rolled backwards into his head and blood filled saliva dribbled through his broken teeth onto his chin before trickling onto his chest, dangling like a gooey stalactite. Tucker switched the Samsung to camera mode and held it above the injured man. He adjusted the phone so that the image would have maximum impact, his swollen face, twisted fingers and the bullet holes in his kneecaps, all included. “You had better hope that someone you know wants to save your life, David or you’ll die here.” He squeezed Johnson’s shattered knee with one hand and took the photo with his other. The injured man’s body convulsed with pain. “Or you could stop all this by telling me where my container is.”
David Johnson whimpered; the sound was like a mewing cat. His bloodshot eyes pleaded for mercy but none was forthcoming. Tucker typed a message above the photo, pressed the share button and posted the image onto Johnson’s Facebook account. He grinned as the seconds ticked by; shocked responses appeared on the timeline almost immediately.
“Last chance saloon, David,” Tucker said holding up the phone to his face so that he could read the responses. “I don’t understand why you’re protecting them. Either your brother or one of your retarded cousins stole it didn’t they?” the injured man shook his head in the negative and mumbled incoherently. Blood dripped onto a plastic sheet that had been spread beneath the chair, sounding like the ticking of a clock, each drop a precious moment of his life, gone forever. “Just tell me where it is.” A garbled moan. Another drop of his lifeblood hit the plastic.
“Nine times out of ten, if a container goes missing from the docks, you tossers have stolen it; this time you’ve stolen the wrong one.” He poked his index finger into the bullet hole on the left knee, one eye on the phone. Johnson jerked violently, the blood flow faster now. “I want my property back, that’s all. You understand that this isn’t personal don’t you?” Johnson whimpered again and blood and saliva dribbled from the corner of his mouth. The phone began to beep as dozens of notifications came through. The reaction to the image was both quick and overwhelming, friends and family unsure if it was a twisted joke or something dreadful was happening before their eyes. Tucker read them as they appeared and smiled. “Wow, that has caused a stir, hasn’t it?” he said almost conversationally. Johnson moaned, weaker now. “Oh, your mother has got a nasty mouth on her hasn’t she, little wonder that you’re a turd is it?” Tucker seemed genuinely offended. “She’s rude, can you read that?” Despite the serious swelling around his eyes, he held the phone up for Johnson to see. “Look at that, thirty comments and rising fast. I’m impressed.” Tucker nodded like a man watching a rival team scoring a brilliant goal. “There are some very concerned comments here, David. Some think it is a sick joke, which I suppose you would, wouldn’t you.” Tucker nudged Johnson as if they were old mates sharing a joke. “Oh, now some people are being very aggressive and making nasty threats. That’s understandable.” Tucker shrugged. “Some have actually liked and shared it. Now that’s a bit weird isn’t it?” he nudged Johnson again, causing more goo to dribble from his chin. His eyes rolled to the back of his head. “Mind you when you look at the names of the people who liked it, they’re the people who don’t really like your family aren’t they?” Tucker looked at Johnson for a response and kicked the chair leg when none came. “This is for your benefit, are you listening?” David Johnson started to shake violently, his body twitching. His eyes all but disappeared into his head, only the whites visible now.
“He’s going to bleed to death,” Joseph Tucker’s younger brother Tommy said nonchalantly. His white decorators’ overalls were heavily stained with blood. “We need to stop those bullet wounds bleeding.” Joe nodded in agreement looking unconcerned, if not a little disappointed. His expression changed when Johnson’s mobile rang. The word ‘Bro’ flashed on the screen.
“You took your time, Mathew,” Tucker said chirpily. “Poor old David is in a bit of state here but I’m glad you saw his selfie. He’s not looking his best is he?” His tone changed completely. “Where is my fucking container?”
“Who is this; how have you got Dave’s phone?” Mathew Johnson asked angrily. “Is this some kind of sick joke?”
“It’s doesn’t matter who it is, you’ve got my container.”
“And you’ve just posted a photograph of my brother bleeding to death, who is this?”
“Tucker,” he answered with a throaty growl, referring to himself as he was known across the underworld. The silence at the other end of the phone indicated the fear that his name instilled in others. “Where is my container?”
“Fucking hell, we didn’t know it was yours, Joe.”
“You do now. David is struggling here, where’s my container?”
“Don’t hurt him anymore. It�
��s an empty container for fuck’s sake. We took it to sell on quickly,” Mathew Johnson said in a panic. “We wouldn’t have taken it if we had known it was yours.”
“I’ll ask you again.” Tucker kicked out David’s ruined knee and put the phone next to him. He cried out in pain, an agonised gurgling sound. “Where is my container?”
“Don’t, don’t, don’t; stop it now, please!” Mathew snapped. “Don’t hurt Dave any more, please, Joe. Not over an empty container,” Mathew pleaded, his voice as calm as he could keep it. “Dave doesn’t know where it is.”
“I figured that out for myself,” Tucker said with a shrug. “So for the last time, where is it?”
“It’s been stashed but he doesn’t know where it is, honestly!”
“Honestly?” Tucker scoffed. “Do you even know how to spell that word?”
“Look, I’m really sorry,” Johnson said. He was racking his brains for the next words. “We didn’t know. There’s no way that we would have taken it if we had known it was yours.”
“You’ve said that already,” Tucker said dismissively. “Your brother is bleeding to death...where is it?”
“That’s the thing, Joe,” Mathew said, his voice breaking. “We steal the empty ones to order.”
“What are you talking about?” Tucker’s voice was menacing.
“I’ve moved it on but I’ll get it back,” he tried to sound convincing. “It will be tricky but I’ll speak to the buyer and I’ll get it back. I’ll put it on a lorry myself and bring it to you.” Silence on the line; he wasn’t sure if Tucker was still there. “Don’t hurt him anymore, Joe, please. I’ll bring the container to you myself just tell me where and when.”
“You had better be quick, Mathew,” Tucker sounded aloof. “He’ll bleed to death otherwise.”
“Get someone to take him to a hospital and I’ll bring you the lorry. You have my word on it.”
“Your word?” Tucker laughed.
“Give me an hour and I’ll meet you wherever you want me to. Get Dave to casualty.”
“I don’t think so, Mathew. Bring me the container and you can take your brother to hospital yourself.”
Mathew thought about his options for a second. He had none. “Where?”
“Do you know the old B&Q on Edge Lane?”
“I know it.”
“There’s a car park behind it, used to belong to the bowling alley before they all shut down.”
“I know it.”
“You have an hour.” Tucker waited for a response. “Did you hear me?”
“I heard you. How do I know you’ll let him go?”
“You don’t, Mathew.” The line went almost silent, only Tucker’s breathing could be heard. His voice was cold, full of malice. “You can’t be sure that I won’t skin you both alive but one thing you can be sure of is that David will die unless I get my container back, understand?”
“Yes. I’ll be there.”
Tucker ended the call and looked at the screen for a while. He removed the back of the Samsung and flicked out the battery and the SIM card so the GPS couldn’t be tracked.
“Are we going to let them go, Joe?” Tommy frowned.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Tucker dropped the phone onto the floor and stamped on it. “Stop his bleeding. I need him alive for the time being. Put him in the van and make sure you bring the petrol.”
CHAPTER 1
Bryn popped his head into the living room where his elderly parents were slowly rotting away inside a cloud of cigarette smoke. The oversized television droned in the corner, the only source of light in the room. It flickered across the heavy drapes that blocked out the daylight while they watched daytime television. A bitter stench drifted from an overflowing ashtray that sat on a low coffee table between their armchairs. It mingled with the greasy aroma of bacon and sausages that had hung in the air since breakfast and that would still be there until teatime. They ate the same thing every morning, relishing their cholesterol soaked breakfast washed down with a mug of tea and a Marlboro. His older brothers called them ‘mum’s artery hardening butties’. Bryn knew that their chronic ill health was the result of their lifestyle and he worried continually that he would be left an orphan before finishing his education. They smoked as much as they liked, ate whatever they wanted without thinking about the nutritional value and drank every night until the bottle was empty, never moving from their armchairs except to go to the toilet. Their idea of ‘five a day’ was the number of cans of extra strong lager they drank between meals.
It hadn’t always been like that. Barbara and Robert Evans met when they were ambitious young managers at a tour operator chain. They spent their best years working for them, travelling the world to review new destinations and maintain communications with existing ones. As holidays moved online the company struggled and then eventually crashed. Knowing nothing else, their lives spiralled out of control. Following the collapse, neither of them managed to hold down a job for more than a few years and their health began to deteriorate. They defaulted on the mortgage and lost their marital home, forcing the family to move into social housing and the bailiffs took the car on the back of a low loader.
On benefits, their life was very different, no more foreign holidays, no treats for the kids. They fell into a mutual depression anaesthetised by alcohol and rarely ventured out onto the estate. Simon and Mark, their eldest boys, were older and coped better. Bryn was born late in their lives and had grown up watching them sitting in their armchairs losing the will to live. The television was their only window into the world and they spent their waking hours glued to it.
Bryn glanced at the widescreen television; one of their favourites was on. Jeremy Kyle was spouting his usual pompous shite at a succession of intellectually challenged benefit leaches who couldn’t work because of numerous disabilities but could manage to have sex and churn out children at the same rate as a small African nation. His parents being on disability allowance was a major embarrassment to Bryn at school but at least they didn’t flaunt the fact, not like the spongers who lined up to go on Kyle. He wondered if having no front teeth was a prerequisite to being invited onto the show. His teenage imagination was baffled by the concept of the programme and why people wanted to go on it. Surely the stigma would stop most people, especially the liars. What about their poor kids at school? As if it wasn’t hard enough to get on in the inner city schools without your mum being on Kyle to find out who your dad actually is, rather than, who she thought it could be. What on earth were they thinking?
‘I am lying to my girlfriend about shagging her best mate, so the best thing to do is phone Jeremy Kyle and ask him to conduct a lie detector test so that rather than just her knowing that I’m a lying bastard, half the country will know?’ It didn’t make sense to Bryn’s young mind. He wondered how the interviews to appear on the show were conducted.
“Have you decided how many men could be the father of your third child?”
“Not for sure. I slept with two or three but definitely no more than that.”
“Are any of them your current husband?”
“Oh, I forgot about him. That would be four if we include him.”
“Smile into the camera, please. No front teeth, perfect. She’s on. Make sure she doesn’t wash her hair before the show and give her some leggings a few sizes too small from wardrobe, perfect. That’s Tuesday’s show sorted.”
Leaning against the doorframe, Bryn shook his head and smiled at the scenario while Kyle lectured another dentally challenged Muppet about using a condom.
‘Next time, put something on the end of it...’ Bryn shook his head. He wondered how the interviewee had managed to find a woman to have sex with once never mind a second time. Bryn had had a few girlfriends but not even a sniff at sex. He had felt Casey Welling’s tit through her jumper but then her brother had come home and glared at him. That was as far as his sexual journey had progressed thus far. His friend Leon reckoned he had fingered his girlfriend Suzie, who
was a year above them, after she had drunk three Bacardi Breezers but she wouldn’t let him touch her since. Leon reckoned that they were waiting until her parents were away at their caravan in Towyn so that they could actually do it.
Bryn could get his head around that but how the cretin on Kyle had had multiple sexual partners, multiple times was beyond him. It didn’t add up. In school you had to have the latest hairstyle, like the best music, wear the best brands, the newest trainers, smell of the right fragrance and it still wasn’t happening for anyone that he knew. It seemed obvious to Bryn that the Kyle creatures didn’t care who they shagged. His English teacher had set the class a four hundred word essay to be completed before the end of the week. It had to revolve around family values. He didn’t think that she watched Kyle or she would know that there were no family values left in the world. Unless your name is Jeremy of course, then not only do you have values but you can preach them daily and introduce a stream of fatherless children to their creators for the amusement of the nation. A nation fascinated by the sexual exploits of their lesser intelligent but genetically related fellow humans. Adults were weird.
“I’m taking Alice for a walk,” Bryn said loudly. Neither parent responded, glued to the Kyle programme. He stepped into the room and talked to the mirror sarcastically. “Are you taking the dog out, Bryn?” he said in his father’s voice. “That will be nice. You be careful in that park,” he said pointing to his reflection with his index finger, warning himself of the possible dangers. “Don’t talk to any of the dirty old perverts that hang around the toilets.” He paused for a reaction, looking at both their faces; none was forthcoming. “Unless your uncle John is with them, he’s a nonce but he’s our nonce. You can talk to him.”
“Stop being such a knob and don’t talk about your uncle John like that,” his mum, Barbara said without taking her eyes from the screen. “He’s not a nonce. That was a misunderstanding.”
