Dark Circles

by Derek Fee

  ‘You didn’t think that by putting them on my radar you might be putting me on theirs.’

  ‘You’re an honest copper, Ian. I think that maybe you are already on their radar.’

  ‘We’re off the record, right.’ Wilson waited until McDevitt nodded. ‘I think Sammy Rice was responsible for the murders of Malone and Grant and was probably in O’Reilly’s apartment when he went through the window. I intend to prove that before this investigation is over. Are you trying to tell me that Sammy Rice is a member of this Inner Circle?’

  McDevitt laughed. ‘Not a chance, I have no doubt that he’s their creature. They use people like Rice to do their dirty work. They’ve learned from the cell system developed by the Communists and terrorists. Rice probably hasn’t any idea who is in the Inner Circle. He will have dealt with someone on the periphery who himself may never have met an Inner Circle member. It’s the spider at the centre of an extensive web.’

  They were both silent and took a drink together.

  ‘If I were to believe you, I wouldn’t even bother to go to work tomorrow,’ Wilson said.

  ‘It’s the opposite. If you believe that the Inner Circle exists, it should be the primary reason for you to continue to solve crimes. Every time you put someone evil away or any time you put a block on one of their plans, you shake their web. Maybe they’ll come after you and that might expose them.’

  ‘So I should become the sacrificial goat?’

  ‘No, you should just do your job to the best of your ability. The belief that the Inner Circle exists just adds an additional layer to your thinking. Maybe the next time you look at a dead body, you’ll think that there might be an unseen hand behind that death.’

  Wilson looked at his watch. ‘It’s time I was off.’

  ‘Pity,’ McDevitt said. ‘I was looking forward to an evening of getting pissed and hearing a couple of saucy rugby stories from your past. I think in a parallel universe we could be friends.’

  ‘I don’t do friends.’ Wilson stood up. ‘But if I did, maybe you’d be one of them. Tread easily on this Inner Circle shit. It might return to bite you.’ He opened the snug door and walked into the bar. It was like passing through the Looking Glass in reverse. What happened in the snug was the fantasy. The bar filled with the noise of chatter and laughter was the reality. Most people just wanted to have a good time and enjoy themselves. He was not so naive to believe that there were not those who seduced and sucked the life out of others like a succubus. He made his way through the crowded bar and pushed into the street. He took a deep breath savouring the smell of the city of Belfast. The air was not sweet and without pollution. He loved this city with all its faults and failings. Belfast people were some of the best in the world. They were witty, friendly and intelligent. On the flip side, they could be religious bigots and murderers. But they were all human beings. The members of the Inner Circle, if it existed, were phantoms. Figures without substance, what could they have in common with the ordinary citizens of this great city.

  CHAPTER 65

  Something was seriously wrong. Sammy Rice had been pacing back and forth for nearly an hour in the front room of his Ballygomartin home. He’d phoned one of his contacts in the PSNI but there were no reported accidents on the road to or from Tullymore. There was only one possible conclusion for the absence of contact. There was a screw-up. He was doped to the gills and that had increased his feeling of unease and paranoia. His mobile phone rang, and he snatched it from the coffee table. ‘Yeah,’ he said as soon as he’d made contact.

  ‘Sammy?’ The voice on the other end said.

  Rice’s first conclusion was that this wasn’t Boyle. The accent wasn’t straight Belfast. ‘Who’s this?’

  ‘It’s Ray Wright,’

  ‘What’s the problem Ray?’ Rice had the words out before he remembered that Wright was Big George’s uncle. He and Wright were tight during the ‘Troubles’. Sometimes he’d had Wright’s back, and often it was the reverse. They hadn’t been in contact for several years.

  ‘Big George is with me here in Ballymena.’

  Rice said nothing. He was thinking as fast as his brain would allow. Fuck, it had surely gone pear shaped. Big George was alive and there was no contact from Boyle. It wasn’t hard to draw the conclusion that Boyle was no longer in the land of the living, or at the very least hurt so badly that he couldn’t communicate.

  ‘Big George wants to meet,’ Wright said. ‘He’s confused and so is his story. The bottom line is that something went wrong between him and Owen Boyle in Tullymore today.’

  Rice badly needed a clear head but the cocaine was in the ascendance. If you wanted something done, you had to do it yourself. Boyle was given a fairly simple task and he’d fucked it up. Rice put on his calm voice. ‘I sent those two muppets to Tullymore to bury something. What happened?’

  ‘Not on the phone, like I said we need to sit down and go through this thing. Maybe you can make sense out of Big George’s story.’

  ‘I’ll come to your place in Ballymena.’

  ‘No. George wants to be with his mother. We’re coming to Belfast.’

  ‘I’ll wait for you in Ballygomartin.’

  ‘Not on, the Peelers have been scouring Belfast for Big George today. They even went to my sister’s house. The Peelers want him and it seems they want him badly.’

  Rice knew that Wright wasn’t lying. ‘What do you have in mind?’

  ‘There’s a warehouse in East Belfast that you use sometimes.’

  ‘The one in Ballymacarrett Road?’

  ‘That’s the one. We’ll meet you there in an hour. Come alone. Big George is a bit skittish. What with the Peelers looking for him and what happened in Tullymore.’

  ‘Tell him we can work this out. We’ve been friends since we were able to walk. I’ll sort out the thing with the Peelers no matter what it costs.’

  ‘I’ll tell him. He knows he can count on you. We’ll see you in an hour.’ Wright broke the connection.

  Rice sat down and held his head in his hands. It was all going to shit. Boyle screwed up. Big George was alive and well and wanted an explanation for whatever happened in Tullymore. He had one hour to come up with something that would be believable. There was only one possible story that would wash. It was all Boyle’s idea. He had wanted to get close to Rice and realised that Big George had the inside track. So he decided to off Big George. He himself knew nothing of Boyle’s plan. Wright and Big George might buy that story, but that would still leave George alive and kicking with the Peelers on his tail. Forget the fucking story. He needed Big George dead and there was only man he really trusted to handle the job. Himself. He walked to the mahogany desk in the corner of the living room and opened one of the drawers. He took out a Beretta 92 automatic. It was his pride and joy. A beautiful weapon that only the Italians could have designed. He checked the magazine and smiled when he saw it was full, fifteen rounds of 9×19 mm Parabellum. That would be plenty enough to take out Big George and his uncle. In a few hours, his remaining problem would be floating in the Lagan.

  CHAPTER 66

  Wilson sat in his room on the third floor of the Europa Hotel. In front of him were the two suitcases holding all his worldly goods. Before Kate and he had decided to live together, he had been the owner of a fine four-bed house in Malwood Park that was stuffed to the gills with knickknacks his wife had bought. When he sold the house, he had auctioned all their goods. Despite the current state of his relationship with Kate, he didn’t regret selling either the house or its contents. He long recognised that he had remained in the house in an effort to cling on to the past, and he welcomed the move to Kate’s stunning apartment as an opportunity to move on. Something he should have probably done as soon as his wife died. The result of the sale of the house and the de-cluttering was that he had a substantial cash amount in his bank account. He looked across to where the remnants of a club sandwich and a beer sat on the dressing table. This was not going to be his new life. He might, or
he might not, be able to rekindle his relationship with Kate. In either case, it was time for him to decide on what his life was going to be moving forward. It had only taken him a few hours to conclude that his future life would not include being based in a hotel. So he put a limit of one week on his stay in the Europa. Tomorrow he would start looking at apartments. Initially, he would rent but as time passed he would select something suitable to actually live in. He could kick himself in the behind that he had left the proceeds of the sale of the house and contents in a bank just gathering dust. Since Kate and he hadn’t really gone the full distance on commitment to their relationship, he should have had a place that he could at least have called his own. Their relationship might be over, but life still goes on. As soon as the dust settled on his current case load, he would sit down and decide what his future life was about. His second decision was that the PSNI could no longer be the centre of his world. Everything had changed. He was watching the news bulletin when the phone in his room rang. He rushed to pick up the handset.

  ‘You’ll be pleased to learn that I’ll be leaving Belfast tomorrow.’ The voice of Helen McCann came over the line. ‘My business in Belfast is almost concluded.’

  ‘And what business was that?’ he asked. ‘The business of getting me out of Kate’s life.’

  ‘I assure you I had nothing to do with Kate’s decision to have a temporary break.’

  ‘I wondered what all the whispering and the secret conversations were about.’

  ‘When you look into your heart, you’ll see that you were responsible for Kate’s feelings towards you. I suppose insensitivity goes with your job.’

  ‘And you’re the sensitive one?’

  ‘I love my daughter and only want the best for her.’

  ‘And I’m not the best?’

  ‘I never said that. But you are consumed by your job. Look at the David Grant business. That pathologist woman declares it murder, and you’re away like a hound after a stag. Kate has needs too.’

  ‘You’ve had a bee in your bonnet about that case from the start. Several people have tried to block that investigation. Has someone asked you to interfere?’

  ‘Absolutely not.’ The tone was indignant.

  ‘Ever heard of Carson Nominees?’ he asked.

  There was silence on the line. ‘Carson Nominees,’ she said. ‘No, I’m on the board of several financial companies, but I’ve never heard of Carson Nominees. Who are they?’

  ‘They’re just some shadowy financial outfit that seems to have its fingers in a lot of pies here in the Province. Strange that you haven’t run across them in your business life.’

  ‘Don’t give up on Kate, Ian. She’s worth fighting for. I’m sorry but I have a dinner engagement.’ The phone went dead.

  Moira and Brendan Guilfoyle were snuggled up on the couch in her flat. Before them on the coffee table was the detritus of an Indian takeaway. Moira had received an email confirmation that Wilson had approved her request for a leave of absence and had forwarded it to Personnel. Hierarchical approval was a given and she would be on her way out of the PSNI in a matter of weeks. Brendan was ecstatic, and she would have liked to have the same feeling. Despite having made the decision, she was still unsure that she was doing the right thing.

  Brendan leaned across and kissed her for the twentieth time. ‘You’re going to have a ball,’ he said. ‘Boston in the summer is something else. We’ll spend a lot of the time on the Cape with my parents. They can’t wait to meet you.’

  ‘It’s all happening so fast,’ she said.

  ‘You’ll love it and it will love you. I’ve heard back from the department, and you’re on track to audit the criminal psychology course next year. It’s a win all the way.’

  Then why doesn’t it feel like a win, Moira thought. She kept telling herself that it wasn’t a permanent break. She was going for a minimum of one year. If things didn’t work out with Brendan, she would be back and she would have Harvard on her curriculum vitae.

  ‘Where are you on the death of those two guys?’ Brendan asked.

  Moira brought him up to date on the investigation.

  ‘Stellar job.’ Brendan smiled. ‘You guys really are the bomb.’

  ‘I’m afraid I didn’t contribute much to the result. My mind has been a million miles away. Well at least three thousand miles anyway.’

  ‘It’s all about the team. At least you get to finish on a high.’

  She broke down and cried. Brendan held her, stroking her large expanse of red hair.

  CHAPTER 67

  Sammy Rice parked his Audi A4 on Ballymacarrett Road and walked in the direction of the unused warehouse. He dropped his hand into his pocket and felt the comfort of the Beretta. He was going to blow the shit out of Big George and his shit-arsed uncle. Two bodies dumped in the Lagan would show people what he was made off. He pulled at his nose. Snot was running freely and he leaned over the side of the road, pinched his nose between his first finger and his thumb, and expelled a thread of snot into the road. He felt strong. He was going to clear all his problems. After George and his uncle, he would take care of his bitch wife and then take aim at McGreary. Tomorrow, he would squeeze some names out of Jackie Carlisle. He would torture the old bastard to within an inch of his life, but he would have some names. He stopped outside the warehouse and removed the key for the lock from his pocket. He looked down and saw that he wouldn’t need it. The lock had already been broken. He smiled. The muppets had already arrived. They had no idea what was waiting for them. He pulled the door aside and entered the large open space. He looked around. There was no sign of either George or his uncle. He moved into the warehouse. ‘George,’ he shouted. ‘Ray, where the hell are you?’ He heard a noise behind him and turned quickly. He found himself staring into a Browning Hi Power held by Davie Best.

  ‘Move one fucking muscle, and I’ll blow your head off,’ Best said. ‘I mean it, Sammy. Put your hands behind your head and kneel down.’

  Rice opened his mouth to speak.

  ‘Hands behind your head and kneel,’ Best shouted. ‘You can talk later.’

  The gun in Rice’s face was rock steady. He put his hands behind his head and knelt on the rough concrete floor of the warehouse. What the hell was Davie Best doing at the meeting? Synapses were rushing between his amygdala and his subcortex. He had already decided that an attempt to make a fight of it would be futile. This was one he was going to have to negotiate his way out of.

  ‘Good boy,’ Best said. ‘Now lie forward with your hands spread out.’

  Rice lay down and spread his hands wide like the crucified Christ.

  He heard a shuffling behind Best and looked up from the floor to see the obese figure of Gerry McGreary.

  ‘Gerry,’ Rice said from his prone position. ‘Tell your boy to get that gun off me.’

  ‘No can do,’ McGreary said.

  Rice heard more shuffling, and two other figures appeared. He looked up from the floor and saw Richie Simpson and Ray Wright standing beside McGreary. His heart sank. He might have been able to handle Best. He might even have been able to handle Best and McGreary, but four to one were very bad odds for him.

  ‘He’s definitely carrying,’ Best said. ‘Search him, Ray, and don’t stop until you find his gun.’

  Wright came forward and stood over Rice. He started patting him down and found the shape of the Beretta in his pocket. He took out the gun and showed it to the other three men.

  ‘Keep going,’ Best said. ‘We don’t want any surprises.’

  Wright slipped the Beretta into his pocket and continued the search but found nothing. He moved back to the other men.

  ‘Stand up, Sammy,’ McGreary said.

  Rice stood up slowly. He knew that he was in mortal danger and that the only possibility he had of walking out of the warehouse alive was to make some concessions to McGreary. ‘Gerry, we go back much too far for business like this.’

  Wright brought a chair from the rear wall of the ware
house and put it beside Rice.

  ‘Recognise the chair,’ Best said keeping the gun on Rice. ‘It’s the one that you tied me to when your guys lifted me. You let them beat the living shit out of me.’

  ‘But I didn’t kill you,’ Rice said.

  Best smiled. ‘Maybe that was a mistake.’

  ‘Where’s George?’ Rice asked.

  ‘He couldn’t make it,’ Wright said. ‘Don’t worry he’s okay. Which is more than can be said about your pal Boyle. The asshole tried to shoot George but only clipped him in the ear. The gun jammed, and George hit him with a spade. Took his head off and then stuffed him in the hole he was supposed to go in.’

  ‘Boyle was acting off his own bat,’ Rice said. ‘I had no idea he was going to off George.’

  ‘George told us everything,’ Wright said. ‘He was the driver on the Malone and Grant kills, and he was the one who tossed that guy out of the window in Castle Street. That was why he had to go.’

  Rice turned to McGreary. ‘Okay, Gerry, what do I have to do to make things right?’

  ‘You’re out of control, Sammy,’ McGreary said. ‘We’re passed the point where we could have sorted this out. You’ve been in the position I find myself in now, and you know what’s going to happen. You should try to take it like a man.’ He turned and started for the door. ‘I don’t need to be here.’ He kept walking until he was through the warehouse door.

  Best turned to Simpson. ‘Get that piece of shit out of your pocket.’

  Simpson took the gun, which he had procured earlier, from his pocket.

  ‘Do him,’ Best said. ‘Go behind him and put one in the back of his head.’