Cut Adrift

by Chris Simms

  Mykosowski took a few more breaths, eyes bulging as he gauged his options. The tension went from him and the club was lowered back down. ‘The Americans.’

  Salnikov gave a single nod. ‘The Americans.’

  Mykosowski’s shoulders dropped lower. ‘But they said . . . they said—’

  ‘Whatever they said, you should not have believed them. You’re about to die, Slavko. You must decide how fast you want it to be.’ His eyes flicked to the golf club.

  Mykosowski’s fingers uncurled and it fell to the floor with a thud. He tried to take a breath in, but his chin abruptly dipped, lips coming apart as he retched lightly. He swallowed and raised his eyes. ‘What do you want to know?’

  ‘Everything. When did you make the call?’

  A tremor passed through him. His voice rose. Pleading. ‘If . . . if I tell you everything, can I live?’

  Salnikov shook his head. ‘If you tell me everything, I’ll make it so you don’t suffer.’

  Shaking now, Mykosowski stared at the other man. Then his head jerked to the side and a mouthful of steaming coffee erupted from his lips.

  Twenty-Four

  ‘I can’t believe the Express hasn’t called you back.’

  Rick grunted at Jon’s comment, forefinger hovering a millimetre from his computer’s screen. ‘There you go – the Lesya Ukrayinka. It left Felixstowe on Monday the eighteenth. Went via Rotterdam and is due to arrive in Baltimore . . . let’s see. Christ, later today.’

  ‘Which just gives us time,’ Jon said, ‘to get word to the US authorities.’

  Rick nodded. ‘And they can intercept whatever’s in that container before it’s unloaded.’ He started to stand. ‘Let’s tell Buchanon.’

  ‘Hang on. We want to be watertight on this. Especially after that business with Mykosowski. Where had it travelled from?’ he asked, leaning over Rick’s shoulder and trying to make sense of the table. Different national flags formed a colourful end column, followed by the ship’s name, the type of vessel it was and its weight in tonnes. After that, the boxes just contained meaningless words and numbers.

  Rick scrolled across, finger tracing the Lesya’s entry. ‘The port of Umm Qasr, Iraq.’

  ‘Iraq?’ Jon pictured the MI5 officers who’d closed in on them at Euston station. ‘What was the section of MI5 involved in this?’

  ‘JTAC. The Joint Terrorism Analysis Centre.’

  Jon looked back at the screen. ‘How far back can you trace the ship’s route?’

  Rick continued scrolling. ‘Karachi, Pakistan. It left there on the fourteenth of July and before that it was docked at Shenzhen, China.’

  ‘China,’ Jon murmured. This was it. We’re finally getting to the heart of the thing. ‘This business with the rubber ducks. They were originally manufactured in China, weren’t they?’

  ‘Yes.’ Rick began tapping a biro against the edge of his desk.

  ‘This is all fitting together. Aside from the cargo, the Lesya was carrying illegal immigrants – bringing them up from Iraq and other places. Then something happens off the British coast; a group of them end up in the water, along with the Russian crew, or whoever they are, and thousands of those ducks.’

  ‘Pretty much how I had it. Keep going.’

  Rick thought for a moment. ‘According to the letters, the raft drifts for a few days before the crew on the lifeboat turn up. Throat scars transfers to his mates. Then the lifeboat and raft get separated. The Russians are found by the fishing trawler. Then, some time after, the ducks start being washed up along the south-west coast.’

  They looked at each other for a few moments.

  ‘I reckon we must be almost there,’ Jon replied. ‘But how did they all end up in the sea in the first place?’

  ‘A storm. That’s what the early letters went on about, didn’t they?’ Rick opened up a new tab on his computer. ‘This site has all the letters in chronological order. First one’s yet to be found. Letter two, here we go, a raft of wooden pallets. “This we held on to during the storm. Surrounding us are the yellow ducks. There are many thousands of them.” Letter three ends in another storm. “Ali and the man with throat scars have made a mast with some long pieces of plastic and the mirrors are tied to the top.”’

  Jon looked at the rest of the office. Colleagues were talking on phones, leafing through paperwork or typing away. None had the slightest inkling of what was unfolding feet away from them. This moment, thought Jon. Savour this moment. He took a deep breath, feeling his scalp tingle. ‘The man with throat scars. It’s him. She is talking about our man.’

  Rick scrolled down. ‘Letter five. “The man with throat scars guards the drum. All day we drift . . .”’ He skimmed forward. “The wind is moving us north.”’

  ‘North,’ Jon murmured. ‘Hang on.’ He pulled his mobile out and keyed in the number for the owner of the fishing trawler. ‘Mr Davis? It’s DI Spicer again. I spoke to you earlier about the Russians you picked up? Yes. A quick question, for you. If they’d drifted for several days, where would they have drifted from? Would they be just going round in circles, or what?’ He listened for a few seconds. ‘Yes, I’ve heard of the Gulf Stream. OK. OK. Connected to this high pressure we’ve been having lately? And depending on wind speeds. Storms? Right. That’s great, thank you.’ He flipped his phone shut. ‘He reckons they could have originally gone into the water as far south as the Bay of Biscay.’

  Rick blinked. ‘Off Spain. One of the early letters described Portuguese men-of-war, remember?’

  Jon nodded. ‘He also said it’s notorious for storms. Freight ships frequently have to steer out to sea to avoid them. If they went overboard during a storm down there, the Gulf Stream would have carried them in a north-easterly direction towards the British coast. Depending on wind, they could have taken about a fortnight to drift this far.’

  Rick leaned across and grabbed the world atlas off Jon’s desk. Using his biro, he pointed to Iraq. ‘Umm Qasr, up through the Suez Canal, round Gibraltar and along the Spanish and French coasts to the English Channel.’

  Jon’s head was bobbing in a series of nods. ‘Know what, mate? We’ve cracked this thing.’

  ‘What I don’t get is this: why didn’t the Lesya go back for them? Isn’t that one of the fundamental rules of the sea? If people are in trouble, you drop whatever you’re doing and go to help.’

  ‘The cargo. Whatever MI5 has been tracking. The master wasn’t prepared to jeopardise its delivery, even for people going overboard.’

  Rick sat back. ‘That’s a chunk of his crew and, what, thirty passengers? And he’s prepared to make that sort of decision. What the hell is on that ship?’

  ‘Maybe we’ll be told, eventually. In the meantime,’ Jon said, ‘we’d better get this to Buchanon.’

  Rick held a hand out. ‘Good work, partner.’

  As Jon took it, he looked wistfully to the window. ‘Know what I’d give to get that slimeball Mykosowski in an interview room so I could see his face when we ran all this past him?’

  Rick wrinkled his nose. ‘What you’d give? I don’t know what twisted fantasies go through your head. A night with Angelina Jolie?’

  Jon thought for a moment. ‘You’d have to do better than that.’

  ‘Come on, let’s see Buchanon.’

  Jon’s surge of elation suddenly lost strength. ‘This is all our work. And it’s just going to be handed on a plate to those pricks in London,’ he muttered.

  Rick placed his palms on the desk and stood. ‘No choice,’ he announced. ‘The longer we sit on it, the harder it will be.’

  Jon thrust his hands into his pockets. ‘It makes me sick.’

  Rick attempted a smile. ‘Let’s get it done. We can be in the pub in no time.’

  ‘I bet we don’t even get a thank you,’ Jon complained, following Rick towards Buchanon’s office. ‘And another thing: they don’t give a shit about our murders. And they certainly don’t give a shit about the dead refugees.’

  ‘Maybe. Mayb
e not.’

  Jon gave a snort as Rick knocked on Buchanon’s door before pushing it half open. ‘Sir? More on the dead Russians.’

  Buchanon put his pen down and crossed his arms. ‘Really? And the cannabis farm?’

  ‘We’ve completed door-to-doors in the street,’ Rick replied. ‘A couple of vehicle descriptions are worth looking into.’

  ‘Sir,’ Jon cut in. ‘What we have on the Russian murders is urgent, to say the least.’

  Buchanon waved them to the chairs on the opposite side of his desk. ‘So, you’ve made no meaningful headway tracing that Nissan Navara?’

  ‘Not so far,’ Jon announced, registering Buchanon’s cold stare.

  ‘What have you got then?’ Buchanon uncrossed his arms and turned to Rick.

  ‘This morning, we pointed out how our prime suspect could well be the man with throat scars referred to in the letters published this morning by the Express.’

  ‘Yes. That information has been sent to JTAC.’

  ‘Any response?’ Jon asked.

  Buchanon shook his head. ‘Not as yet.’

  ‘Well,’ Rick continued, ‘we believe we now know the name of the ship they came from.’

  ‘Are you sure?’ Buchanon sat up. ‘That would be any journalist’s wet dream.’

  ‘I had considered seeing what the papers might pay for it,’ Rick said light-heartedly. ‘It’s called the Lesya Ukrayinka and it’s registered to a shipping company called Myko Enterprises.’

  Buchanon’s lips slowly peeled apart. ‘Are you sure?’

  By the time Rick had finished, their senior officer was staring at the Border Agency photo of the man calling himself Vladimir Yashin. Eventually, he looked up. ‘Credit where it’s due, lads. Bloody good work. Bloody good work.’

  Jon caught Rick’s smile. I’d be happy, too, he thought, if I didn’t think Buchanon is about to take all the credit for this himself.

  ‘OK, I’m alerting Gower immediately,’ Buchanon continued.

  ‘While I make the call, I want you two to bring through all your background material. After that, I want to see something happening with the cannabis farm murder.’

  Rick’s smile faltered.

  ‘You’ve been neglecting it too long. Now, go. Get me the other files you have.’

  Back at their desks, Rick looked at Jon with disbelief. ‘Back working the cannabis farm job?’

  Jon attempted a smile as Rick gathered up the information Buchanon had asked for.

  When they re-entered the DCI’s office, he was still talking on the phone, smiling as he did so. ‘No problem, sir. As I said, the ship is actually due to dock later today. Baltimore, yes. Absolutely. OK, speak to you soon.’

  As he hung up, Jon could see a proud glow in the man’s cheeks. Nothing like a pat on the back from upstairs, he thought.

  Buchanon pointed to the corner of his desk. ‘It can all go there, thanks.’

  Once they’d put the paperwork down, Buchanon sat back. ‘Rick, can I have a minute with DI Spicer?’

  What now, thought Jon.

  Rick turned round without a word and walked to the door. Once it had shut behind him, Buchanon turned to Jon. ‘The progress you’ve made on this case doesn’t make saying this easy.’ He held up a form. ‘This turned up in the internal post earlier on.’

  Jon eyed the sheet suspiciously. ‘What is it?’

  ‘A memo from the PSD.’

  Jon sent a glance up at the ceiling. Professional Standards Department. ‘Braithwaite.’

  ‘Braithwaite,’ his senior officer echoed, voice heavy with feigned surprise. ‘Imagine that. He submitted a complaint against you this lunchtime. He’s really gone for it – even including a supporting statement from his wife.’

  Jon’s head dropped. Shit. ‘What’s he claiming?’

  ‘You know what he’s claiming.’

  ‘And he’s prepared to account for why he’s been frequenting an area known for prostitution?’

  Buchanon lifted the sheet of paper and began to read. ‘“On several occasions over the last few weeks, I have attempted to locate a patient of mine. The young lady has left the home of her parents and is believed to be working as a prostitute in the area around Fairfield Street in the city centre.”’

  ‘Yeah, right,’ Jon sneered. ‘And does he give the patient’s identity?’

  ‘Lucinda Waddell. Daughter of Guy Waddell.’

  ‘Who’s he?’

  ‘The Conservative Member of Parliament for Altrincham.’

  Jon felt himself sag. ‘Is Waddell prepared to confirm that?’

  ‘As long as it remains in confidence.’

  ‘That’s me fucked, then. What happens next?’

  ‘I’ve spoken to Braithwaite.’

  Jon looked up. ‘Really?’

  Buchanon placed the form back on his desk then pushed it away, as if an offensive smell was rising off it. ‘I don’t need this in my syndicate. So I nipped it in the bud. I persuaded him the best way to deal with this is by local resolution.’

  Jon straightened his shoulders. That meant the Independent Police Complaints Commission wouldn’t be involved. It also meant no formal disciplinary proceedings could result from the investigation. Result.

  ‘Don’t look like you’re off the hook, Jon. Braithwaite might not realise you can’t now be dragged over the coals officially, but if you think he’ll be happy with you getting a slap on the wrist, you’re wrong. The man was livid.’

  Yeah, Jon thought, recalling Mrs Braithwaite’s look of annoyance when he’d appeared at her door uninvited. The cheek of doing such a thing.

  ‘He wants something to be done,’ Buchanon continued. ‘He wants you punished. Now, I managed to divert him, to some extent. Pressures of your personal situation, et cetera. A lapse in judgement.’

  Jon nodded, making an effort to keep his mouth shut. Pressures of my personal situation? I could be enjoying the happiest day of my life, he thought, and I still wouldn’t trust that fucking stick-insect crawling around inside my house. ‘Thanks, sir.’

  ‘I also explained that there have been several complaints from residents living in the vicinity of Fairfield Street. I mentioned that its use by prostitutes is something we’re aware of.’

  ‘So I was there as part of an operation?’

  ‘I let him make his own connections.’

  ‘He accepted that?’ Jon asked, surprised the man had been palmed off that easily.

  ‘It’s a plausible story,’ Buchanon replied, ‘but no, he probably didn’t. Luckily for you, he doesn’t want to bring attention as to what he was actually doing there.’

  Of course, Jon thought. That would risk his Tory MP friend’s little secret getting out.

  ‘But as I said, he still wants to see you punished.’

  Jon nodded.

  ‘So, as far as he’s concerned, you’ll be going on a course or two. Ones that offer advice on improving professional conduct, that sort of thing. I also told him you’ll be on quarterly appraisals for the next two years.’

  ‘Was he happy with that?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘No? What else does he want? A letter saying sorry?’

  Buchanon stared back.

  ‘No,’ Jon groaned. ‘Don’t say I’ve got to apologise to the prick.’

  ‘His wife, actually. For the distress you caused her.’

  ‘Distress? That hard-hearted bitch isn’t capable—’

  ‘Christ, Jon,’ Buchanon snarled. ‘I’ve dug you out of a shit pile of your own making. And all you can do is argue. Unbelievable. You will write her a letter. You’ll state, without going into any specifics, that your actions were inexcusable. You will state that you deeply regret any distress caused. Got that?’

  Jon lowered his eyes. ‘Yes, sir.’

  ‘Good. Now clear out of my office.’

  Twenty-Five

  ‘What was that about?’ Rick asked despondently.

  ‘Where do you want to start?’ Jon replied, lowering himse
lf into his seat. He remembered his file notes on Yashin and unclipped the catches of his briefcase.

  Rick raised his arms and linked his fingers behind his head.

  ‘Nice to feel appreciated.’

  Jon started searching for the folder, hand stopping when he realised the stuff was still at Carmel’s. All he could find was the printout with the phone number and directions for Myko Enterprises. Placing the sheet of paper on his desk, he wondered sadly how Carmel was. He brought up her number and pressed green, but the call went through to answerphone. Probably ignoring my calls, he thought, glancing at Braithwaite’s office. Sorry sir, you won’t be getting all the case notes straight away. He looked again at the sheet on Mykosowski’s company, mind going to all the work they’d put in. Feelings of frustration beginning to grow, he looked at his phone positioned to the side of his monitor. His fingers twitched. Sod it. ‘You might want to nip out and get some food or something.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I’m calling Mykosowski.’

  Rick’s eyes widened. ‘What? Don’t be so bloody ridiculous.’

  ‘Don’t worry, I’m not going into specifics. A few open-ended questions. A little rattle of his cage.’

  ‘Jon, we’re off the case,’ Rick whispered. ‘Why not just march in to Buchanon’s office and call him a frizzy-haired fuckwit to his face?’

  ‘As you said, we’re off the case. They’ll be waiting for the Lesya when it sails into Baltimore. But we could have had Mykosowski – and through him we could have found Yashin. I can’t stand the thought of that oily-haired wanker sitting in his flash offices, surveying the Houses of Parliament and thinking he got one over on us.’

  ‘You can’t bear to lose, can you?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Even if it jeopardises your career.’

  ‘My career? Gower’s got a soft spot for me. I won’t get sacked over this call. It might not do my prospects of promotion much good, mind you.’

  ‘So, just to prove a point you’ll . . .’ He threw his hands out. ‘You’re right. I’m off to run some errands in town. I’m not having anything to do with this.’ He got up and started heading for the doors.