Dark Angel: a fast-paced serial killer thriller (The James & Sandersen Files Book 2)

by P. J. Nash

  ‘You can tell James my beef with him is over too,’ said Bain with a sigh. ‘I’ve lost everything I loved, it’s time to cash in my chips and try and make the best of what I’ve got left.’

  ‘What you’ve got left?’ said Munu.

  ‘The big C – they’ve found a shadow on my lung. I might have a year, eighteen months. Anyway, I’m out of here. You can take this too. Just make sure you feed the fish,’ he said, passing over a leather folder.

  Munu opened it. It was the deeds to Bain’s house and a set of keys. ‘Are you fucking serious?’ asked Munu.

  ‘Yeah, why not. It’s in a trust so you can’t sell it, but you can live their ad infinitum.’

  Munu was bowled over.

  ‘Look, fella, you tried to be a good guy, some white trash thought you weren’t one of their redneck fuck buddies, decided to fit you up and you got trashed. I know what it’s like to be an outsider. Enjoy.’ Bain got up from the table, walked outside, got into a taxi and disappeared into the night. Munu’s head was spinning. He’d planned on getting out ASAP and leaving the country for Europe. But now, there was a reason to stay. He’d already got a fake passport, driving licence and bank accounts set up. Then, inspiration flashed upon him. Going back into the kitchen, he turned on all the rings of the gas cooker and then shut the kitchen door. Then, stuffing the folder in his bag, he lit a candle on one of the tables and fled through the front door.

  Alchemy Investigations Office, Victoria Police HQ, Melbourne

  An AFP arrest team had nabbed Martin Scudamore outside his home as he was about to drive to his RAAF base. As he was being booked in, his face had dropped as he saw his bewildered mother being processed in the custody suite. They’d given him enough time to give him a look, but not long enough to get chance to try and speak to her. In an effort to keep a lid on leaks, Scudamore had been bought to Alchemy’s offices in the annexe. Presently, he was handcuffed to a chair. Two chairs with adopted arms and bolted to the floors had been installed for this purpose a few days before. James and Dewhirst were facing him. Scudamore had been playing the tough guy, until he had seen his seventy-eight-year-old mother in cuffs.

  ‘She’s got nothing to do with the money,’ said Dewhirst, repeating what Scudamore had said earlier.

  ‘That my friend is what we call a “significant statement”,’ said Dewhirst.

  ‘You can’t prove anything, copper,’ snarled Scudamore.

  ‘For one, I’m not a copper, and for two, I can prove a whole raft of things,’ said James.

  ‘Whatever, Ironsides,’ said Scudamore.

  James was up and out of his wheelchair like a lynx. A vicious right jab hit Scudamore in the jaw and burst his bottom lip.

  ‘Aggh, you fucking cunt,’ said Scudamore.

  James flopped into his wheelchair.

  ‘Just for the record, you’re still officially in a cell down the way there. It says so on custody record. So, whatever happens in this room never happened,’ said Griffiths. Adding weight to his words, he picked up a Monadnock auto lock baton and cranked it, it flicked from a short handle into twenty-one inches of weighted steel nastiness. Scudamore flinched ducking his head downwards.

  ‘What do you say I even up the odds here,’ said Griffiths, jabbing the baton into his knee.

  ‘You’re fucking cracked,’ screamed Scudamore.

  ‘Look, mate, you’re bang to rights. It’s not a case of keeping stum and hoping for the best. You’re fucked. It’s not how you fall, it’s how you land. You give us Cyrus Bain, you get five to ten in a Federal prison and witness protection. If you play hardass with us, we give you back to AFDIS and you get ten to fifteen in the glasshouse. You won’t be alone, AFDIS have rounded up your little helpers over in Afghan. Fancy sharing a cell with them, waiting for a shiv in the dark?’ said James.

  ‘I tell you what. We’ll leave you with the Doc for ten minutes. Then, we’ll be back. You let us. It’s Deal or No Deal, and I’m the fucking Banker,’ said James. They left Scudamore to the more delicate charge of the Force Medic.

  Sisters of Mercy, Retirement Home, Northern Territory

  Johnson was raking up leaves in a half-assed manner when the two black clad figures appeared on the lawn. One of them pitched an egg-shaped device towards the gardening van. It disappeared in a pout of flame. Blasted to his feet by the force of the explosion, he reached for his pistol. Before he could get a bead on them, they had moved towards the smoking wreck and were hosing the wreck with automatic fire. A burning figure staggered from the van and was chopped down. Johnson fired off half a clip and ran down the drive. He was outgunned, and only had a few precious rounds left.

  The two figures made for the main building. A fire alarm was trilling, and the nursing staff were evacuating the elderly residents onto the lawn. This has been the agreed procedure. It was stressful for the residents but caused confusion amongst the attackers. They reloaded and ran inside. Staccato reports of gunfire came from inside. Johnson ran to the gardener’s shed and unlocked the door. He roused the elderly priest and pushed him outside into the heavy cover of the trees on the edge of the lawn. Johnson got out his mobile phone with shaking hands. The call connected to Marsh.

  ‘It’s all gone to fuck. They’ve got fucking automatics and grenades. Toohey’s fucking dead,’ screamed Johnson. ‘I’ve got the old man out I’m going to head for the road.’

  There was a series of booms from inside the building, and then, the two figures appeared on the drive again. He dropped into the trees and began to pray.

  Alchemy Investigations Office, Victoria Police HQ, Melbourne

  ‘Singing like a choirboy,’ said James.

  He and Sandersen were in a kitchen cum dining room at the back of the suite of offices. A chef and assistant, who was also acting as waiter, was buzzing between the kitchen and table. With James in his wheelchair and Sandersen just learning to use her new prosthetic arm, the two felt more comfortable in the semi-private surroundings. They had never been that comfortable eating out, really. Both working in law enforcement they both knew about the “wall”.

  The wall was two-fold. For any cop, there was supposed to be a “wall” between being on duty and off duty. When you were in uniform or on duty, you were sworn to do your duty, make arrests and sort things out. When you were off duty, you were a joe civilian, just like everyone else. The trouble was, scumbags didn’t play ball. The police badge is burned on the skin, the training hard-wired. See that guy giving his wife grief, threatening her with all kinds of shit? You don’t turn a blind eye, you go in and redress the balance. You’re in a clothes shop and see those two guys acting furtively? You bust them for shoplifting. It’s called Copper’s Nose, a sixth sense that tells you that’s something wrong or not right. An addendum to the “lizard brain” that all humans have. The prickling feeling that tells you there might be a sabre-toothed tiger in the cave, don’t go in.

  So that “wall” works about as well as a white picket fence around a supermax. Of course, it didn’t mean you got involved in everything, but it was the radar working twenty-four seven that put the edge on being out and about in public, off duty. The real “wall” was the one that quickly but imperceptibly grew between cops and civilians. Being a cop wasn’t a job; you didn’t punch in and out. Your work came home with you, it came to your wedding, it was in your bed while you were making love. It was with you at your kid’s school sports day. The porcelain white junkie stretched out on the piss-stained mattress, the toddlers in dirty nappies playing among dirty needles as you searched their parent’s shitty flat, their future already down the shitter. The bruised young women with fear in her eyes telling you she tripped and fell, who won’t meet your gaze. That was a wall they didn’t tell you about. But being on the same side of that wall had acted as a catalyst for James and Sandersen and a bedrock for a successful marriage.

  ‘He turned Queen’s evidence. We’ve got enough on Bain from him and a couple of others to nab him. All we need is enough for an arrest. On
ce “Mr Smith” is fingerprinted and his is DNA swabbed, he’ll set off alarm bells across the whole country. Then, we can bury him,’ said James, spearing a piece of salmon.

  ‘That’s good police work,’ said Sandersen.

  ‘We threatened to jail his elderly mum, and I belted him in the mouth and knocked out three of his teeth,’ said James.

  ‘He was a man who’d swore to fight for his country and was using an Air Force plane as a taxi for heroin,’ she said.

  ‘So, the ends justify the means?’ asked James.

  ‘Leave that shit to the philosophers,’ said Sandersen.

  ‘I just want the same as you – Bain in a concrete box. Everyone knows the war on drugs is lost. It’s like trying to bail out the Titanic with a leaky thimble,’ James took a sip of wine.

  ‘Sadly, it’s Amen to that. This salmon is fabulous, though,’ And for the first time in a long while, they both laughed.

  St Theresa’s Retirement Home, Northern Territory

  Alice scanned the front of the building again. It was quiet. A few old-timers were being pushed around the grounds in wheelchairs. A couple of old crocks were smoking cigarettes, not that smoking them would harm them any at their decrepit age. What kind of fucking abomination were priests, anyway? She smirked as she thought about how her friend Martine at school had waxed lyrical about the hypocrisy of priests telling young girls about birth control.

  ‘Why should a man who’s wearing a dress, who’s sworn not to have sex, tell me about who I should have sex with and whether I should have children or not?’

  She wished she’d taken one of the MP5s; she’d have drilled the fucking lot of them. Guilty or not, they were foot soldiers of the same army who had abused and covered up the crimes across the globe. The wages of sin we’re death that was their own book. The “cleansing fire”, her dad had called it. What had she done in a past life? Whatever it was, she must have pissed someone off big time. Karma wasn’t just a bitch, it was most of her life. She was about seven when some guy had started touching her up.

  And then, finally, she thought she had met a man she could trust. Well, look how that turned out. She would kill him for his treachery.

  She had read about the “Dark Angel”, the serial killer in Prague. That guy, Lawrence James, had been involved in her death. And now, he was after her. Was he some kind of woman-hater? Katerina Manes was her name. She was the same as Alice, fucked up by men. Perhaps they would have been friends. They could have worked together. A Thelma and Louise reboot for the twenty-first century. She slapped herself on the cheeks a couple of times and got back into the zone.

  She slipped into the dayroom where a bunch of old duffers we’re drooling and snoring out their last days. The nurse’s outfit worked a treat as another carer gave her a nod as she hit the main corridor. She was looking for Thompson…room 227.

  She turned right and stood outside the door. After taking the Stanley knife out of her back pocket, she locked the blade home and slid it up her left sleeve. She knocked on the door, and a voice murmured. ‘Come in’

  After pushing the door open, she saw the elderly man slumped in the chair, some kind of manky teddy bear clutched in his lap. He looked bigger and younger than she had expected.

  ‘You’re not my usual nurse,’ he said, peering at her through badly fitting glasses.

  ‘Sorry, I’m agency. You know what’s it’s like with all the cuts.’

  There was silence. She hadn’t bargained on small talk or losing the psychological advantage. ‘Not really. What cuts? I thought the diocese we’re in surplus.’

  She was getting pissed off with the old fucker now.

  ‘Why are you wearing a red uniform? I thought agency nurses wore white. Are you Little Red Riding Hood?’ he said.

  What the fuck was he on about? Forget the drawn-out speeches, she’d slash the old fucker and get out.

  ‘I can be, if you want me to be.’ She smiled, drawing knife out of her back pocket. She was poised ready to strike.

  ‘That’s a shame,’ he said. Reality dawned on her, she saw behind the glasses and wig. The bear fell forwards, and the room erupted in sound and fury. Marsh fired once, twice, three times with the .38. He jumped up.

  ‘Because I’m the Big Bad Wolf,’ he said, raising the gun and shooting her twice in point blank in the head.

  Sisters of Mercy, Retirement Home, Northern Territory

  Johnson had finally stopped shivering as he wrapped the silver foil space blanket around him. The old priest was safely ensconced in a local hotel being guarded by a host of uniform cops. Johnson was sitting on the back step of an ambulance just outside the security cordon. The two gunmen had barricaded themselves inside the home, taking thirty elderly priests and seventeen staff, mainly female, hostage. They had no clear demands. Unlike most other hostage situations, the utilities had been left intact, given the vulnerability of the hostages. Toohey’s bullet-ridden and burned body had been zipped up in a body bag. The burnt-out van was being used as cover by a sniper team. Johnson’s phone rang. It was James.

  ‘Look, I’m sorry about Toohey, but there’s new information … Marsh just blew Alice Havilland’s head off at St Theresa’s. She’s dead. So, someone’s got to tell the guys who are holding the hostages there’s no fucking dice. I’ll text and email you the pics. Look, mate, you don’t have to go in there, but you know it’s a matter of life and death.’

  Johnson cut James short. ‘You don’t have to fuckin sweet talk me, I’ll do what needs to be done,’ he said, cutting the call.

  Sisters of Mercy, Retirement Home, Northern Territory

  What the fuck had happened? It had all gone to shit. They’d gone in like a blaze of glory. He’d pitched the grenade like a ball smashing the bails off a wicket. The pig’s car had blown up, and then, Geoff had shot the human Roman Candle. Perfect. But then, those bitch nurses had pushed all the old paedos out onto the grass. Groups of dementia-ridden old bastards Hail Marying all over the fucking place. He and Jarvis had found the old bastard’s room and chucked a couple of grenades in there.

  Then, over the din of the fire alarm, the bassy whump of choppers. He knew it wasn’t a fucking delivery from Domino’s. Grabbing a group of the old fucks, he’d pushed them back inside. Some old Irish bitch had kicked off. She’d reached for something he couldn’t see. So, he blasted her on full auto. She’d jigged a funny dance as she fell, minus a lot of chunks of flesh. He’d turned her over with a booted toe.

  In her liver-spotted wrinkly hands, a rosary. His accomplice, Collin Jarvis – an acolyte of Bain – lay slumped inside the day-room. Two of the nuns had slashed and stabbed him with a kitchen knife whilst pretending to give first aid to one of the old codgers. Bullets were faster than nuns, though, and their blood and viscera were now solidifying on the walls. Those who still remained alive were scattered along the corridor in various states of shock and terror, traumatised into silence.

  ‘You, inside, we’re sending in water and medication with a trained paramedic. He is unarmed, repeat, he is unarmed,’ blared the voice.

  From behind the bank of blazing floodlights, a solitary figure made their way up to the front steps. It was a man, carrying two cool boxes one in each hand. Cairncross was transfixed as he watched the man make his way up the steps. The adrenaline had worn off, and he was woozy.

  ‘Can I give you a hand?’ he said, letting his submachine gun drop to his waist on its webbing strap. The man placed one of the boxes on the floor and came up with a Glock 17.

  ‘Your bitch is dead, so you might as well give up,’ said Johnson.

  He held a phone in his hand. Cairncross squinted to get a better view. Sure enough, there was Alice, minus most of her face.

  ‘You bas–’

  Cairncross’s word was cut short as the rifle bullet blew his head apart like a melon. Johnson fell on the floor.

  ‘Hail Mary,’ he shrieked. The paramedics reached him just after the armed cops and pushed a syringe of sedative into his arm. A
fter several decades and the numerous loss of innocent human lives, “The Dingo” case was finally closed.

  Near to Undisclosed House, Melbourne

  James was sitting in his vantage point eyrie, looking at the operation unfolding eight floors below. In the next room, commanders and team leaders radioed orders to their minions below. James felt like Napoleon as he watched the elements of the raid fall into place. The house was in the swanky Deepdene district set back off what was already a secluded road.

  Two unmarked panel vans pulled up a couple of hundred yards short of the house. The rear doors opened and the two squads of back clad figures jumped from the vehicles. The front pairs worked in unison, one moving low and clutching a rectangular ballistic shield as the other moved in unison with them, sighting their carbines over the top of the shield. On the roofs of the houses either side and opposite, two officer sniper teams, a sniper and spotter, were training their rifles and binoculars on the target house. On side streets, marked vans were parked discreetly ready to disgorge their uniformed officers to make up the outer cordon. There was a buzz of excitement in the next room.