by JANICE FROST
They pushed through a set of double doors and into the ward. Neal put a finger to his lips and they advanced silently..
And now they were standing outside the room. All was quiet inside, and its curtained window revealed no hint of the drama playing out within. Ava glanced at her watch. Half an hour since PJ’s momentous call.
The whole ward was deserted. There were gaping spaces where some of the beds had been wheeled away, other beds empty, their covers cast aside, belongings strewn all over. Signs of a hasty exodus. The staff had reacted with lightning efficiency.
Ava wondered if Neal had a plan. He hadn’t said. Was he merely acting on his wits, there being no time for anything else? Signalling to the others to keep back, Neal approached the door.
“PJ. It’s DI Neal. Are you alright?”
“Yes, sir.”
“Ruth? Cam?”
“They’re okay too.”
For now. Ava longed to add some words of reassurance to her friend.
“Darren? Can you hear me?” Neal said.
“You took your time.”
“We’re here now. My name is DI Jim Neal. I want to help.”
“Have you brought Fin?”
“He’s outside. In the car park. I’m not bringing him in here.”
Don’t rattle him, Ava chided in her head. Before Darren could respond, Neal spoke again.
“I know you think Fin was responsible for your brother’s murder. You’re grieving, Darren. Grief can distort the way we think. It keeps us from seeing the truth.” He paused. “Fin had nothing to do with Liam’s murder. We believe someone ordered a hit on your brother.”
Neal’s police radio crackled. It was Tom. Armed assistance had arrived. Almost simultaneously, the double doors to the ward were edged open, and two heavily suited, armed officers crept in. Somehow the sight of them moving cautiously down the corridor wasn’t as reassuring as it should have been.
“That’s bollocks.” Darren’s voice sounded rasping, laboured. He was injured, she remembered. There could be blood loss. He could be weak. Ava didn’t dare hope.
“It’s . . . complicated,” Neal was saying now. “There are things you don’t know about. Things we can talk about if you surrender your gun to DC Jenkins and come outside.”
No response. The armed officers were taking up position. At a signal from Neal, they would storm the door and bring an end to this nightmare. It could all be over in a couple of seconds. But at what cost? Anything could happen in a couple of seconds. Startled by their entry, all Darren had to do was squeeze the trigger. Someone would die. Oh, Peej, don’t let it be you. Ava shut her eyes, and tried not to cry.
Neal was talking again. “Darren. The people in that room with you have nothing to do with all this. I know you don’t really want to hurt anyone.”
Ava glanced at Blunt and saw him frown. Had Neal just made an error of judgement? Maybe Blunt should be doing the talking. He was more familiar with Darren’s world, after all.
An ominous silence followed Neal’s words. What the hell was going on in there? Was the time for talking over? Ava tensed, and willed herself to stay put.
A series of loud wails rent the air and everyone jumped. It was Cam, crying at the top of his lungs.
Ava glared at Neal, willing him to make use of the distraction. What was he waiting for? Why didn’t he give the order?
And then he did.
* * *
At first there was only noise and confusion, and an agony of fearful anticipation. At Neal’s signal, the armed officers kicked the door, which splintered from its frame, and stormed the room, yelling, “Armed police! Let’s see your hands!”
Instinctively, Ava covered her ears, waiting for the crack of gunfire, but it didn’t come. Instead of shots, calls of “Clear!” and “Suspect disarmed,” rang out from inside the room.
Ava was on the move in an instant, racing forward to see what had happened, if PJ was safe. Her eyes swept the room. There, face down on the floor, lay Darren Sharp, one officer cuffing his hands behind his back, while the other trained his gun on him. In the far corner, cradling a still wailing Cam, Ruth Marsh crouched, wide-eyed and visibly shaking. And here, right next to Ava now, was PJ, telling her that she was alright, no need to panic. It struck Ava as almost comical that PJ should be the one offering reassurance. How very like her.
Still, the repeated assertions of “I’m okay, I’m okay, I’m okay” sounded a little like shock. Blunt disappeared and returned with two blankets, which he wrapped around Ruth and Cam, and around PJ.
Tom Knight materialised in the doorway, accompanied by a near-hysterical Fin.
The armed police hauled Darren to his feet and led him away, ashen-faced and barely conscious.
“What happened?” Ava asked PJ. “Are you okay to talk?”
They all moved outside, leaving Ruth, Fin and Cam together for a moment. Blunt took out his cigarettes and excused himself. Neal, Tom, Ava and PJ sat down at the abandoned nurses’ station.
“Take your time, PJ,” Neal said.
“Fin was picked up to be taken to his interview with you and DI Blunt,” PJ began. “I think he foresaw something like this happening. He was reluctant to go, and asked me to sit with Ruth and Cam until he got back. I thought I’d just stay for a little while, and then make my way back to the station. I was just about to leave when Darren showed up. That’s more or less when I phoned you, Ava.”
“How did he seem?” Neal asked.
“His frame of mind? He seemed a bit crazy. Definitely agitated. I didn’t realise he was wounded at first. Then I saw the blood, and I realised he must be feverish. He must have lost a lot of blood. His shirt was soaked through, even though I think he’d bandaged himself up a bit. He was in pain too, I could tell. I think that’s why he behaved the way he did, why everything was so . . . so . . . sort of . . . urgent.”
Ava rolled her eyes. “Don’t make excuses for him, Peej. He would have killed you all and not given a shit.”
PJ looked sad. “I hate to agree, but you’re probably right. I saw the look in Darren’s eyes when the DI said that thing about him not really wanting to hurt anyone. Whether because of the fever . . . or . . . or . . . I don’t know what . . . I sensed he’d pull that trigger.”
“It’s alright, PJ,” Neal said, sounding almost angry. “Carry on.”
PJ looked embarrassed, and she sounded more hesitant. “I, um . . . know what you were trying to do, talking to him, but I don’t think . . . I mean . . . he wasn’t, um, listening to you. Everything you said only seemed to make him more agitated. He just wanted you to bring Fin. I don’t think he could think past that in the state he was in.”
If Neal was disappointed that his intervention had made no difference, he didn’t show it. Ava was aware that in this job it was never okay to act recklessly. Still, she couldn’t help feeling a bit annoyed at Neal for not giving the signal to break down the door sooner. Perhaps she’d see it differently later on. For now, she was grateful that there’d been a successful outcome.
Tom said helpfully, “I bet he was doped up too. No one could predict what he’d do in there.”
“So, just before Cam started crying,” PJ went on, “Darren seemed to be having difficulty breathing. And he was shaking. Shuddering, really. I thought he was going to pass out. He was leaning against the wall, like it was all that was holding him up. He was still agitated but I think he was starting to lose his grip. And not just metaphorically.”
They all stared at her, not understanding. “He dropped the gun,” she explained. “Cam’s sudden outburst startled him, and he literally let go of it. And then the door exploded.” PJ gave a strange half-smile. “There was no need for all the drama in the end. Bit of an anticlimax really.”
“That’s one way of putting it,” Ava said.
Blunt had reappeared and caught the end of PJ’s account. He was eager to question Fin over the shooting on his patch.
“Give him a bit longer,” Neal said. “Hi
s partner and his son could have died in there.”
“Do you want me to call Steve?” Ava asked PJ.
“No.” PJ almost snapped.
“Well, let’s go up to the canteen. Get you a cup of something hot and sweet.”
“I’d rather go somewhere else,” PJ said. “If you don’t mind. I’ve had enough of this place for the time being. And I could do with something a bit stronger than a cup of tea.”
Twenty minutes later, PJ and Ava were sitting in a pub, some distance from the hospital. On duty or not, Ava felt her friend deserved a stiff drink after everything she’d been through.
“What’s up?” Ava asked. “Have you and Steve had bad news?”
To her surprise, PJ gave a sardonic laugh. “Depends how you look at it. It’s not bad news for Steve. Pretty good news for him, actually.” Her tone was increasingly bitter. “So good, in fact, that he’s decided he’s got a lot of other things he wants to do with his life instead of settling down with me.”
“Oh, Peej. I’m so sorry. He got the all-clear, then?”
PJ nodded. “Clean bill of health. Apparently the experience has taught him that he should” — she made air quotes — “‘live for the day.’ He wants to ‘embrace life with open arms, get out there and experience everything.’ Because ‘you never know what’s round the next corner.’ I think he swallowed a cliché generator.”
Ava squeezed her friend’s arm. “I’m sorry,” she said again.
“Well, don’t be,” PJ said, suddenly cheerful. “You know what? I’ve just had my own brush with mortality. And guess what it’s made me realise?”
“What?” Ava asked, confident she knew the answer. PJ squeezed her arm in return.
“This,” she said. “This is what’s important. Friends, family. People you love and who love you.”
“Oh, PJ, I think you’ve known that all along,” Ava said, and smiled.
Chapter Nineteen
Neal sat facing Fin in the interview room, with Blunt beside him. After a nod from Neal, Blunt got the proceedings underway.
“First off,” Blunt said, “I’d just like to say how glad I am that your partner and son are okay. None of us wants to think about what might have happened . . .” He paused. “Which prompts me to ask, what was it all about, son? You’ve been involved with these characters before, haven’t you? Remember DS Bob Fletcher? He knew you back in the day.” Fin nodded. “Now, why the hell would you want to get mixed up with that lot again?”
A lot of it they knew already, from Hector, but they needed to hear the story from Fin himself. As Fin went over the details, what emerged most strongly was his love for his partner. He’d been willing to risk everything he’d achieved so that Ruth could keep her secret.
Fin echoed PJ when he said that he had tried to make Ruth accept that she hadn’t murdered her cousin. “In her mind, she really believes that she deserved to go to prison. If only her father hadn’t sworn her to secrecy, and if Lizzie hadn’t latched onto her the way she did, Ruth might have spoken to someone and got some help. Instead, she bottled it all up and, over the years, it’s taken its toll on her mental well-being.”
Blunt nodded, but he was more concerned with hearing about the events leading up to the shooting on his patch. “So when Hector stole the coke from him, Liam sent Darren to you.”
“I’d vouched for Hector, so Liam would have held me responsible for his behaviour. And he would have taken it as an insult. That’s the kind of twisted thinking you get in his world.”
Blunt nodded. “But you managed to get Hector a reprieve.”
“Yes.”
“And how did Hector intend to repay Liam?”
“Last time I saw him, he told me his father was taking care of it.”
“And that was, when, early this morning?”
Fin nodded.
Blunt looked at Neal. Only hours before Liam had been fatally wounded and his brother injured. If Paul Cornish had had anything to do with the shooting, he must have acted fast. Still, all he had to do was pick up the phone. There would have been nothing to connect the incident with his family. That Liam had survived the shooting long enough to mention Hector and Fin was a stroke of bad luck that Paul couldn’t have foreseen, and a gift the police hadn’t dared hope for.
“And Hector didn’t elaborate when he said his father had ‘taken care’ of it?”
“No. I imagine that, like me, he thought his dad had arranged to repay Liam.” Fin stared at them. “You think Paul Cornish had something to do with it? Like a hit or something?”
“It’s one theory,” Blunt said. “Of course, Liam Sharp had other enemies. An organised gang is gradually taking control of his patch. Liam was small time, but he was doing good enough trade to piss off the serious dealers that wanted to move in.”
And there was the problem, Neal thought. ‘Respectable’ businessman versus lawless, territorial drug gangs. Didn’t need to be a genius to predict who would come out looking dirtier. Just then his phone rang. It was Ava.
“Sir. Just had a report come through. Val Marsh was attacked in her home earlier today. From the description of the intruder, I think it might have been Darren Sharp, before he turned up at the hospital. Gail Cornish raised the alarm after finding Val tied up and gagged.”
“Why didn’t we learn about this sooner?”
“Don’t know, sir. Possibly the attending officer didn’t make the connection with the case we’re investigating. Val Marsh was in shock when they arrived, maybe she wasn’t able to tell them much. She and Gail Cornish are at the hospital now.”
Neal sighed deeply. Blunt raised an eyebrow.
“Ava, can you and PJ go back to the hospital and take statements from them?”
“On it, sir.”
* * *
After overhearing Ruth’s confession, Lizzie Hamilton stumbled out of the hospital, not knowing where to go or what to do. In the short stay car park, she stood outside her car, fumbling with her keys, uncertain whether she was capable of driving. In the end, she walked away, continuing along the road leading to the top end of town. Tears blurred her eyes and memories flooded her mind. She thought of Will, of Craig, and all the years since their deaths that she’d spent hating Russ Marsh for putting work before her son.
All those dinner parties she’d endured, all those social occasions — the birthdays, Christmases, family events. At all of these, she’d suffered Russ’s presence for the sake of remaining close to Val. And above all, close to Ruth.
Val had been right. She had indeed latched onto Ruth as a substitute for Will. Lizzie clearly remembered the moment it had happened, at Will’s funeral, when she’d looked along the row of family members and witnessed Ruth, overcome with grief, her shoulders shaking under her father’s comforting arm.
She had been somewhat surprised at Ruth being so upset. She and Will had got on well as far as it went, but Lizzie wouldn’t have said they were particularly close. Lizzie’s heart had gone out to her niece in that moment, and ever since she’d felt they had a special bond.
Special bond! Thinking of it now made Lizzie sick to her stomach. What she had taken for grief on Ruth’s part had been guilt, fear even. Now, as Lizzie grasped its true significance, the memory was sullied for ever.
Russ was still to blame, she thought. Ruth’s revelation did not completely exonerate him. Lizzie still felt nothing but relief at the thought of her brother-in-law lying slumped over his desk, his head blasted to smithereens. In her opinion, justice had been done.
Stromford Cathedral loomed up in front of her, its thousand years of history reminding her that, in the long run, everything passes. When she met Stephen Hamilton, she’d believed that given time, her grief over Will would transmute into acceptance. Ruth’s confession had sent her hurtling back, through grief and pain, to her worst nightmare.
Lizzie looked up at the spires of the cathedral piercing the sky. Just months ago, a man had been pushed to his death from up there. It had saddened her at the tim
e, the thought of him falling through empty space towards certain death. Now she envied him. To fall, weightless, into oblivion seemed a kinder fate than to have to live the rest of her life with this burden of sadness. Slowly, with measured steps, Lizzie began walking towards the heavy timbered doorway of the west entrance.
* * *
“They’re saying we can see your daughter now.”
Gail had left Val in the waiting area while she went to ask at reception if there was any more news about Ruth. Val had come round in the ambulance, and begun babbling about her attacker, a man with a gun who was looking for Ruth’s partner, Fin. In the middle of his tirade, the phone had rung and Ruth’s voice had piped up on the answerphone. She’d mentioned Fin and the hospital, and on hearing this, the gunman had dashed off, leaving Val tied up and unable to raise the alarm.
By the time Gail and Val arrived at the hospital, something was evidently going off. There were police cars everywhere, and one of the paramedics said he’d seen a couple of armed police officers enter the building. Both women had feared the worst.
No one seemed to know what was going on. The most they could glean was that the police were responding to a serious incident on the children’s ward. That had been enough to tip Val into hysterics. There were rumours that the ward had been evacuated, of a possible hostage situation.
Now, after a long, anxious wait, they’d been given the go-ahead to see Ruth and Cam. “Are you okay to walk, or shall I fetch one of those wheelchairs?” Gail asked. Val stood up, looking indignant. Once the shock of her ordeal had passed, she hadn’t required any treatment.
Together they made their way along the tunnel-like corridors to the children’s ward, where a police officer posted at the door was initially reluctant to let them in. Luckily, the nurse who’d accompanied them reassured him that Val was the mother of one of the hostages, and they were admitted.
There was still a police presence on the ward. Ruth and Cam had been transferred to another room, where another officer was posted sentry. Gail waited outside while Val and Ruth shared an emotional reunion. She listened in from the corridor, and got the gist of the story. When she heard Ruth mention Hector’s name, she slipped inside and stood, unnoticed, behind the open door. She couldn’t believe what she was hearing. What was this? Hector involved with an East End drug dealer? Hector blackmailing Ruth and her partner over the death of Ruth’s cousin?
