The DCI Isaac Cook Thriller Series: Books 4 - 6: Murder (The DCI Isaac Cook Thrillers Series Boxset)

by Phillip Strang

  Smythe appreciated driven personalities, and even though Sue Christie could never be trusted, she’d make an attractive addition to his lifestyle and he’d make sure she was well supported. As for Ed Barrow, the man had served his purpose. He had kept the department functional, but he had found no one with the ability to conclude Woolston’s work. A decision would need to be made in the near future, but first the files that Sue had supplied had to be checked.

  He phoned Sue. ‘Tonight?’ he said.

  ‘Later. I’ve got to deal with Ed Barrow first.’

  ‘Thursday night?’

  Sue Christie smiled. Two men, both reeled in hook, line, and sinker. She had always known her impact on men. It was not that she was the most beautiful woman, nor the one with the best figure. She knew her breasts were too small, her hips too large, but it was the complete package that men lusted after, and she knew how to work it. Not only did she have a general, but she also had Ed Barrow, and she’d seen Malcolm Woolston mentally undressing her in her flat the other night when he had forced his way in. She knew that with Woolston, she would have the trifecta.

  Chapter 22

  Helen Toogood walked into the patent office in London at 10 o’clock on a Friday morning. She registered a document in the names of Malcolm Woolston and Helen Toogood. At precisely 11 a.m. she made a phone call. ‘I’ve done what you asked. Are you sure about this?’

  ‘Your name is registered as well. Even if I cannot take advantage, then you can,’ Woolston said knowing that the possibility existed of government intervention in the patents’ office.’

  ‘Surely our research belongs to the government?’ Helen said.

  ‘Once my technical paper has been published, they’ll not be able to claim it. The ability to misuse it has been removed. Do you think they’ll want to admit to my torture, the fact that Ed Barrow is involved with people of ill-repute, that Harold Hutton was a bastard, and that General Claude Smythe and his brother are involved in illegal arms dealings?’

  ‘But you can never benefit.’

  ‘I’m not important, my family is. I trust you to share the rewards with them.’

  ‘I will. What will you do now?’

  ‘There are a few loose ends.’

  ‘Ed Barrow?’

  ‘I’m uncertain about him. It would upset Gwen if he died.’

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me you were alive?’

  ‘I wasn’t certain that I was coming back.’

  ‘Why did you?’

  ‘I knew that Bob Robertson had alerted them to me. I had to act.’

  The phone call ended. Helen Toogood, the only person Woolston knew he could trust, the person he had first contacted when he had returned from the dead, had done her part.

  At 8 p.m. the door swung open at Sue Christie’s flat and she walked in. ‘Malcolm, what are you doing here?’

  ‘You’ve sold out. I saw you with Smythe. Are you screwing him as well as Ed?’

  ‘What’s it to you?’

  ‘Did you know what they did to me, all those years ago?’

  ‘Yes. Ed said it was necessary.’

  ‘Those files you gave Smythe are as worthless as you are.’

  ‘You set me up?’

  ‘I needed to know who I could trust.’

  ‘Helen?’

  ‘She has done her part. Now you must do yours.’

  ***

  Isaac Cook received the phone call at 8 a.m. the next morning. It was not often that he spoke to self-confessed killers. Typically, they preferred to keep their deeds under wraps, but Malcolm Woolston needed to talk, to someone he hoped would understand. ‘I had to do it,’ Woolston said.

  Isaac signalled to Bridget on the other side of the department. She came running. ‘Woolston,’ he mouthed to her. Bridget retreated to instigate a check on where the phone call was being made from.

  ‘Don’t bother,’ Woolston said. ‘Our phone conversation will not take long, and besides, it’s untraceable. Now listen.’

  ‘I’m listening.’

  ‘Even if you do not understand, there are reasons why my original research must remain hidden. It is why I continue to remove people who jeopardise that wish.’

  ‘And what about your wife and daughter? Don’t you place them at risk?’

  ‘That is why they need protection.’

  ‘But we cannot guarantee total protection.’

  ‘I will help to ensure they are safe. You have met Sue Christie?’ Woolston asked.

  ‘Yes, on a few occasions.’

  ‘She was willing to sell out if the price was right.’

  ‘And what are you going to do.’

  ‘It has been dealt with.’

  ‘How?’

  ‘132 Craven Terrace, ground floor. I suggest you check it out.’

  ‘What will we find?’

  ‘Sue Christie.’

  ‘Is she?’

  ‘Dead. Yes, she’s very dead. An attractive woman in her time, but I could not let her live.’

  ‘This is madness. You kill people and then phone me up. What kind of person does that?’

  ‘Someone who understands who he is dealing with.’

  ***

  ‘The man’s psychotic,’ Isaac said as he stood in Sue Christie’s flat, the signs of a struggle clearly visible. A cat sat in one corner of the room; some flowers in a vase. The body of the woman sprawled across the floor. She had been strangled, her legs kicking out in her panic. Until now Isaac had been willing to concede that Woolston may have had an obscure, but valid reason for disposing of people, at least in his mind. Not that it excused him, but there had been murder enquiries in the past where the politics of the country had conflicted with the truth, and where the politics had taken precedence.

  The average man in the street held the begrudging belief that the political masters had the best interests of the people at heart, but neither Isaac Cook nor his department, and certainly not his DCS, believed in that totally. Isaac knew of three deaths in previous cases that were government-sanctioned and would never be solved. But now he could no longer grant the man the benefit of the doubt. Woolston, for all his postulating, was a murderer without conscience.

  ‘You don’t need me to tell you who the murderer is this time, do you?’ Gordon Windsor, the crime scene examiner, asked.

  ‘It’s Woolston. I’ve no idea what the man is playing at. His wife and daughter are in plain view. He must realise the risk that he’s placing them under.’

  ‘And you always thought the man was rational.’

  ***

  Malcolm Woolston sat in his flat. The nightmares that had plagued him before his time on the street were returning. He was losing his ability to rationalise between reality and fiction, his capacity to distinguish between right and wrong. Sue Christie’s death had been right, he was sure of that. After all, he had seen her give Smythe the files, or had she? She had left the office that day, deposited the files in the bin that he had told her to, and then carried on to meet one of the two military men that he had seen Ed with all those years before.

  He had liked Sue, yet he had killed her, but what had she done, what could she do? The knowledge they wanted still resided with him.

  She had struggled, he remembered that. Why had he enjoyed taking her life, he did not know. Maybe it was a deviancy, a repressed sexual desire, to want the woman, yet knowing he couldn’t have her. She had pleaded with him for her life, even would have let him make love to her in return, but what had he done? He had sucked the life from her and left. And now there were others that needed to die, and soon.

  Ed was a certainty, but his wife had betrayed him, slept with another. Did she need to die as well? And what about his daughter? She had shown affection for Barrow, even allowed him to walk her down the aisle when it should have been his responsibility. How could she? He paced up and down the flat, feeling the walls pressing in on him, thinking thoughts, not sure if they had attempted to force the solution out of him or whether it had been a dre
am.

  He knew that he needed help. He phoned the only person who would understand. ‘DCI Cook, I am not sure,’ Woolston said.

  ‘You’ve murdered Sue Christie.’

  ‘What if none of it is true? What if I only imagine it? Could it be that I spent all those years living rough because of madness?’

  ‘No one deserved to die, you know that. Why don’t you come into the police station and we can discuss it?’

  ‘Not yet. I need to decide.’

  ‘Decide what?’

  ‘If what I believe is true or not.’

  ‘How can you tell?’

  ‘I will wait. Rest, that is what I need.’

  ***

  Richard Goddard was not in a good mood, which did not surprise Isaac. He’d let him express his customary criticism, his self-recrimination as to why he had let DCI Cook continue with the investigation when obviously he was not up to it.

  After a few minutes, Goddard calmed down. ‘What’s this that you’re saying? That you believe that the man is psychotic and no longer rational?’

  ‘It’s a possibility.’

  ‘What if he is? How does that affect the current situation? How do you think this reflects on the department, on me?’

  ‘Badly, I suppose.’

  ‘Dead right, it does. Are you saying that none of the reasons that he gives for murdering four people are correct, and that we’re just dealing with a mad genius, is that it?’

  ‘It’s probable.’

  ‘Then you’d better find out,’ Goddard said.

  ***

  Ed Barrow was in a panic. Everyone who was close to him was dead, including Sue Christie. He realised, on hearing the news of her death, that he had liked her more than he would admit to. They had been together in that office for fifteen years and lovers for nine of them. He remembered the last time they had made love, only two days earlier, and that she had been full of life, optimistic for the future. Now she was dead.

  All those who had been involved when Woolston had been detained and tortured were dead, apart from him. It was clear that the man was tidying up loose ends, and that he, Ed Barrow, had lasted longer than the others, but he was still a target. Woolston had told him that over the phone that one time. Sue Christie should have been protected. The woman was neither naïve nor stupid, yet somehow Malcolm Woolston had managed to get into her flat.

  And what was she killed for? She had not been involved with Woolston’s treatment eleven years previously. She knew about it, he had told her, Ed realised that, but her reaction had not been agreeable. To her, it had all been too sordid, although a percentage of any deals that might be made was attractive to her. Ed Barrow knew one thing: he needed to protect himself. He needed his wife’s assistance.

  ‘You’ve heard about Sue?’ he asked Gwen in the front room of the house they shared.

  ‘Tragic. Was it Malcolm?’

  ‘No doubt.’

  ‘Then he will be after you as well.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘According to Sally, he was maltreated all those years ago. The reason he faked his death.’

  Ed Barrow could see no way to avoid the truth, or at least some of it. ‘Malcolm was idealistic, holding onto a belief in the goodness of man.’

  ‘You knew about this?’

  ‘Not immediately, but some powerful people wanted him to talk,’ Ed said, knowing full well that he had lied.

  ‘Did Sue?’

  ‘Not at first.’

  ‘You’re lying, I know it. She was killed because she was involved, the same as you. What Malcolm told Sally is all true. Why did you marry me? To keep an eye on me in case Malcolm knocked on the door? Is that it? And don’t lie. And don’t give me that innocent boy look that you do when you’ve been screwing Sue.’

  ‘But...’

  ‘But nothing and don’t deny it. It didn’t worry me at the time, it won’t now. You’re a bastard, a charming bastard. I didn’t want to be alone, and you were the nearest thing there was to Malcolm, and Sally adored you.’

  Ed Barrow sat down, a look of disbelief on his face. Gwen, a woman who had adored her first husband, had seen through him from the very beginning. ‘There is no reason for Sue’s death,’ he said.

  ‘Whatever it is that you and she had cooked up, it was responsible for Malcolm faking his death, and then coming back and killing people. What is this great secret that forces a man such as him to behave in this manner? Are you going to tell me, or are you going to sit there whimpering? And there’s no point crying to your mistress, she’s dead, and no great loss to society. You two are total bastards, you know that.’

  ‘I love you,’ Ed said.

  ‘Maybe you do, but Malcolm’s out there on his own. The man may have had his faults, but he never cheated on me even when Sue was giving him the eye.’

  ‘We need to work together on this. What if Malcolm comes for me?’

  ‘Why would he? What is it that you and Sue were involved in?’

  Ed wasn’t sure what to say. Should he level with her and tell her what he knew, what the plan was, how it was going to make them all rich, Malcolm included, if he had played ball. ‘I need to return to the office. It’s complicated. We’ll talk later,’ he said as he left the house.

  After he left, Gwen picked up her phone. ‘Sally, I want to see your father.’

  Chapter 23

  Claude Smythe had enjoyed the time that he had spent with Sue Christie, the snatched weekends in the country away from his wife. As a general in the British Army, he had had her checked out. He knew about her men, about Ed Barrow and their clandestine affair. He also knew that she was devious and could not be trusted, and that her tolerance of him, a man past his prime, was not because of love, but because of a lust for money, and with his contacts, she could achieve that.

  The thought of her lying dead in her flat did not concern him. He’d seen enough death in his lifetime, and a woman in her forties, even one such as Sue Christie, was not going to faze him. He had seen Barrow with Woolston’s widow, and whereas he did not like the man, he had to admit that he had good taste in women.

  His brother would not have been interested, even if he broached the subject, which he had no intention of doing. With Cameron, it was always business, and especially the business of foreign arms trading, illegally if possible.

  ‘Arbuthnot could have brought this off, kept us out of it,’ Cameron Smythe said.

  ‘No point in speculating. Woolston killed him,’ Claude said.

  ‘Woolston’s a nuisance. What are you doing to bring this man in?’

  ‘We’ve some people undercover looking for him.’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘Leave that to me. You just keep the contacts open.’

  ‘There’s a facility where he can go when you find him.’

  ‘In England?’

  ‘As you’ve just said, leave it to me. We’ll have him out of the country within hours.’

  ‘One-way trip?’

  ‘He’ll not be coming back. They’ll extract whatever they want, force him to complete the project, and then…’

  ‘When he’s outlived his usefulness, they’ll rid themselves of him.’

  ‘Bullet to the head, that sort of thing.’

  ‘Nasty.’

  ‘Does it concern you?’

  ‘Not at all.’

  ‘Then how will you flush out Woolston?’

  ‘There’s only one way.’

  ‘You’ve got the people?’

  ‘Once we agree.’

  ‘Are we there yet?’

  ‘The files he gave us were fake. It was just a ruse to flush out Sue Christie.’

  ‘It worked.’

  ‘He’s working to a plan. If he knows about us, then we’ll be in his line of fire.’

  ‘For a self-proclaimed pacifist, he certainly has no issue with murder.’

  ‘He’s the same as all of them. If it’s a noble cause, then anything is justified.’

  ‘Is it a noble
cause?’

  ‘This project of low-cost energy? I suppose it is, but the alternative project is of more interest to us.’

  ***

  Isaac brought the team together in Challis Street. Sue Christie’s death had brought renewed focus on the Homicide department to find Malcolm Woolston.

  ‘Woolston didn’t kill her without reason,’ Larry said.

  ‘Woolston’s told me that already. If she had sold out, as he claimed, then that means Ed Barrow has too.’

  ‘That’s never been a secret that Woolston intends to kill Barrow as well.’

  ‘Is he the last on the list?’ Wendy asked.

  ‘We’ll not know unless the man contacts us.’

  Isaac’s phone rang. ‘There are people after me,’ Woolston said.

  ‘We are,’ Isaac replied.

  ‘It is important that these people do not catch me.’

  ‘What do you mean?’

  ‘They will force me to complete a weapon of immense destructive capability.’

  ‘You could refuse.’

  ‘That will not be possible.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘They will threaten my family.’

  ‘Why didn’t you stay dead?’ Isaac asked. ‘Leave well alone?’

  ‘I knew Bob Robertson’s surfing the net would cause trouble. I had to pre-empt them.’

  ‘What do you want us to do?’

  ‘I want you to know in case anything happens to my family or to me.’

  ‘We can’t protect your family any more than we are now, and besides, if you surrender yourself to us at Challis Street, you’ll be protected.’

  ‘There is no protection there for me. I just wanted you to know.’

  ‘Where will they take you?’

  ‘You will never find me, they’ll make sure of that.’