The Burning Man

by Paul Finch

  ‘No chance.’ He shrugged, walking on, as if it was ridiculous that she’d have any doubts. ‘Shawna’ll pull through. Plus, this time we’re frying a much bigger fish. It isn’t personal.’

  ‘And I’ve told you not to. That would be even more of a reason, wouldn’t it?’

  He nodded. ‘Lots of motivation to keep this one by the book.’

  Gemma still looked unconvinced. It wouldn’t have been the first time he’d soft-soaped her to try and buy himself extra leg-room. She knew perfectly well that Heck and Shawna were more than just work colleagues. They’d never been lovers, but they’d known each other virtually since the commencement of their two careers, and that was a huge thing in cop terms; on top of that, as fellow natives of the Northwest exiled in London, they’d drawn additional strength and comfort from each other’s presence in that curious, indefinable way that only those of close heritage did when thrown together as strangers in a strange land.

  ‘That’s as long as the Organised Crime Division don’t muscle their way in,’ he felt it necessary to add, though immediately he could have kicked himself for saying this. Whatever your inner turmoil, you didn’t give Gemma Piper conditions. It could literally be a red rag to a bull. But on this occasion – despite working her lips together tightly, as if she was strongly tempted to say something sharp in response – her reply was cool and measured.

  ‘They won’t. They’re making a lot of noise at present, but they’re also a bit shamefaced about blundering in on our operation. They know they’re walking on thin ice.’

  ‘Who’s doing the shouting?’

  ‘DSU Garrickson.’

  ‘Garrickson, eh. For a minute then I thought it’d be some clueless, inept tosser.’

  She glanced sidelong at him, and he raised his hands.

  ‘I know, ma’am, I know. It’s completely wrong and unforgivable to discuss a senior officer in such irreverent terms. But wasn’t Mike Garrickson the one you spoke to when you first logged with OC that we were looking into syndicate activity in Peckham?’ Gemma’s lack of response implied that it was. ‘And it somehow slipped his mind to inform the rest of his team?’

  ‘I expect he assumed that if they had any leads on new cases they’d have come to him before acting on them,’ she said. ‘And with some justification. Reg Cowling was out of order, Heck. He’s the one who blew that obbo. No one else.’ They stopped beside Gemma’s Merc. ‘Mind you –’ she remained cool, but frustration lay visible underneath ‘– it would have helped if all I’d had to do was walk upstairs and tell them. Like I used to be able to.’

  There was a time when all departments of the National Crime Group had been based in the same building at Scotland Yard, and very convenient it had been. As Gemma said, it was certainly easier back then to exchange intel. But cost-saving changes were under way all across the British police service. Though both squads still came under the umbrella of the National Crime Group, Organised Crime had been moved to new, state-of-the-art offices at London Bridge, while the Serial Crimes Unit had relocated to a somewhat less remarkable building at Staples Corner in Brent Cross. SCU had only been in place there a couple of months, and it still felt a long way from anywhere, though, situated at the heart of the North London transport infrastructure, it was actually well placed to house a national investigation team.

  ‘Anyway,’ she said, pointedly changing the subject – Heck was a devil for teasing out her true feelings regarding her fellow top brass – ‘remind me why you’re in court again?’

  ‘Regina versus Wheeler.’

  ‘Oh, yeah … that charmer.’

  The previous spring SCU had arrested the so-called ‘Wimbledon Rapist’, a masked predator responsible for raping two young women and one schoolgirl at knifepoint after accosting them while they were crossing the Common early in the morning. The team had first homed in on local man Charlie Wheeler when his taxi was spotted on CCTV several times in the right area and at roughly the right time, but they only became actively suspicious when Heck noted that Wheeler never seemed to be transporting any passengers.

  ‘He’s banged to rights,’ Heck said. ‘Two days and he’s topped and tailed.’

  ‘Well, let’s make sure. You can put all this aside until it’s done.’

  He nodded.

  ‘Mark,’ Gemma said, ‘I don’t want to fall out with you on this one.’ She regarded him carefully, still spoke in that measured tone. ‘Whatever happens, whatever Shawna decides, she’s a grown woman, and if she leaves the job it’s because she wants to.’

  ‘Yeah, but … we owe it to her to get this right.’

  ‘We do indeed. So we’re onside, yes?’

  ‘Ma’am, this was my case from the beginning. I want John Sagan, and not just for Shawna.’ He shrugged awkwardly. ‘Look, he could’ve tortured a hundred people for all we know. He could’ve murdered that many too. OK, they might be worthless vermin just like him, but that doesn’t give him a free pass. In fact, we don’t even know for sure that they’re all worthless. He may not draw the line anywhere. What’s to stop him targeting regular citizens if the price is right? Trust me, I’m giving no one any reason to kick me off this case.’

  She nodded and climbed into her Merc.

  And yet here he was, he thought, watching her reverse out and drive away – already withholding from her the whereabouts of the grass who’d deliberately set the disaster up in the first place. Whether protecting Penny Flint in this way was likely to pay any kind of dividend he simply didn’t know. He just hoped he wouldn’t have to wait too long to find out.

  Chapter 6

  Following one behind the other, Heck and Gemma crossed the Thames at Tower Bridge and cut northwest through the City, Shoreditch, Islington, Camden Town and Finchley, before heading west on the North Circular. It all sounded quick and straightforward on paper, but in midday traffic it still took close to two hours, and the new HQ at Staples Corner was a very unrewarding sight for those who’d had to fight through rivers of exhaust fumes and contraflows to get there.

  It had previously been some kind of transport office, and it looked the part: a functional, flat-topped structure resembling three stacks of overlarge shoeboxes jammed unceremoniously together, its roofs covered with dishes and TV antennae. It wasn’t exactly prefabricated, but it had the distinct air of something that had never been intended to last. Its once weedy car park had been tarmacked over, and, as a beefed-up security measure, the rusty metal fence that had formerly encircled it had been replaced by a tall perimeter of slatted, spike-headed steel. But its best defence was still its anonymity. It could have been any one of the thousands of nondescript semi-official buildings dotted across the various boroughs of Greater London, blending perfectly into its drab but noisy location.

  Heck and Gemma parked next to each other, and headed in through the personnel door, which was at the back. The ground floor housed the SCU garages, equipment and evidence store, and armoury. Admin and civvie staff were located on the first floor, while the detectives’ office, or DO as it was known in the unit, was on the second. The Command Centre and Press and PR Suite were on the third. There was also a conference room up there, but that had now been co-opted by Wandering Wolf as an Incident Room.

  It still felt like alien territory to Heck. They had only been in here a few weeks, having made the move from Scotland Yard in late February. Certain members of the team, who’d been assigned to enquiries elsewhere in the country at the time, were only just arriving and discovering their new workplaces. Two cases in point were DCs Andy Rawlins and Burt Cunliffe. When Heck entered the DO, they were arguing bitterly.

  ‘What’s going on?’ he asked, pulling off his jacket.

  Cunliffe and Rawlins occupied facing desks in a recessed bay, with a large, horizontal window directly behind them, though at present both were standing nose to nose.

  Cunliffe gave his side of the story first, demanding to swap desks with Rawlins as otherwise the sun would shine in his eyes all day. Rawlins’
s response was to argue that if he was next to the window, he’d get vertigo.

  ‘OK, here’s the deal,’ Heck said tonelessly. ‘Burt, the sun is not going to shine in your eyes. You’ve got a motorway over the top to block it. And you, Andy, are not going to get vertigo! Now plant your arses where you’ve been told, and get some sodding work done!’

  ‘This dump’s crap,’ Cunliffe muttered under his breath.

  ‘Yeah, welcome to the rest of your career.’ Heck turned from the disgruntled twosome in time to see DS Eric Fisher amble in from the side-stair leading up to the Incident Room. Fisher had a pile of buff folders in his arms, which he slammed down on Heck’s desk.

  Heck regarded him blankly. ‘What’s this?’

  Fisher was the unit’s main intelligence analyst, and a permanent inside-man these days given that he was now in his mid-fifties with a waistline to match.

  ‘You’re taking Shawna’s gigs, apparently.’ He rubbed the lenses of his glasses with a handkerchief so grubby that it surely couldn’t make any difference.

  ‘Already?’ Heck protested. ‘I was just about to come upstairs.’

  ‘Forget it,’ Fisher replied. ‘Apparently you’re at the Central Criminal Court tomorrow?’

  ‘Yeah … so?’

  ‘So Gemma says there’s no point you coming back on Wandering Wolf until you’ve been discharged from the trial. That means there’s no point you coming back today either – so you can crack on with this lot. New referrals from Division. Yours plus Shawna’s.’

  There was a muted snigger from the direction of Rawlins’s desk.

  ‘This is all?’ Heck said.

  ‘Hey, there’s a bigger pile on my desk if you want some of them.’ Fisher sloped off towards his own corner of the room without awaiting a response.

  Heck slumped into his chair, glowering at the tower of documentation. One of the least enjoyable aspects of working in the Serial Crimes Unit was trawling through paperwork forwarded to it from other divisions. SCU had a remit to cover all the police force areas of England and Wales, and had recognised expertise with regard to serial violent offenders – mainly murderers. If they weren’t pursuing investigations they’d generated themselves or had been assigned to by the Director of the National Crime Group, SCU would provide operational, consultative and investigative support to other forces who might have uncovered evidence that they had a serial murderer or rapist on their patch. A national general order now ensured that details of all homicides or violent sexual attacks satisfying certain specified criteria (the ‘weird and wonderful’ as Heck tended to think of them) must be sent to the SCU office for assessment at the first opportunity.

  Heck grabbed himself a tea before leafing through the top two folders on the pile.

  At first glance either one might have heralded the arrival of a new kid on the serial killer block. A female torso had been found on a rubbish tip in Hull; it had been identified as belonging to a forty-year-old prostitute who had vanished two weeks earlier. OK, there was only one victim here (thus far), but immediately there were signs of excessive violence and bizarre post-mortem behaviour in the form of the dismemberment, while the aggrieved party had been a sex-worker – so that was three boxes ticked straight away. The second file described two homicides in the space of two weeks in Coventry. An elderly bag-lady had been found in a subway, her skull shattered by an estimated twenty blows from a hammer. Six days later, a homeless man was found brutally kicked and beaten in a backstreet some three miles away. He was alive when discovered, but died en route to hospital without ever regaining consciousness. That case carried the ultimate red flag in that already there was more than one victim.

  Both these submissions required analysis, yet conclusions could never be jumped to.

  Murder was rarely what it appeared to be at first glance.

  It could be that the Hull prostitute had been a victim of domestic violence – apparently her common-law husband, from whom she was estranged but whom she’d fought with constantly while they were together, had dropped out of sight several months ago and his whereabouts were still unknown. Likewise, violent assaults on street-people were sadly common. The old Coventry woman had been a known heroin-user, but was not in possession of any drugs or drugs paraphernalia when her body was found, so the motive in her case might have been robbery. In contrast, the homeless male had a reputation for being an argumentative drunk, so he could have been beaten simply because he’d picked a fight with the wrong person.

  Heck would need to wade through the directory-thick wads of affixed notes and photos sent down from the investigation teams up at Humberside and West Midlands before he could make a judgement. But before he had a chance even to start on this, his mobile rang.

  The name on the screen was Penny Flint.

  He walked out to the adjoining corridor before answering it.

  ‘Don’t take me off the register,’ she said.

  ‘Give me one good reason why I shouldn’t.’

  ‘I can still be useful to you, Heck.’

  ‘Penny, you should be thinking about being useful to that kid of yours. Get your tail out of town before someone comes along and really damages it.’

  ‘You want Sagan?’ she said.

  He moved to the window. ‘However did you guess?’

  ‘I’ve not lost track of him totally.’

  Heck stiffened. ‘What’re you on about now?’

  ‘He’s left London.’

  ‘Penny, you’re in hiding. You’re not talking to anyone if you’ve got any sense. How can you possibly know this?’

  ‘I have my informers, just like you do.’

  ‘You’d better hope yours are more reliable.’

  ‘Do you want this intel or not?’

  Heck gazed across the river of traffic flowing along the North Circular.

  ‘What do you propose, Pen?’

  ‘I give you info on Sagan’s new location, and in return you keep me on the register and never tell anyone that I’m the one who set Cowling and Bishop up.’

  The mere thought of this stuck in Heck’s craw.

  ‘Penny … a police officer died.’

  ‘I told you, Heck, that wasn’t the plan. It was Sagan who was supposed to die.’

  ‘Tell me what you know and I’ll tell you what it’s worth.’

  There was a lengthy silence at the other end, as she considered this. She knew Heck didn’t trust her any more. The question was: did she trust him?

  ‘He’s gone north.’

  ‘I need specifics.’

  ‘Not at the moment. Not till I get what I want.’

  Heck pondered. Though he was loath to admit it, it kind of helped him out. A good lead was something he could take straight upstairs to Gemma. It might also help him clear his conscience about the info he was currently sitting on.

  ‘I’ll need to tell my gaffer what you’ve been up to,’ he replied.

  ‘No way. They’ll lock me up.’

  ‘Not necessarily. If your intel bears fruit, chances are they’ll make an executive decision to keep using you. And it’s not like you pulled the trigger on Cowling yourself. All we have to say is that you tipped off your various police handlers. It wasn’t your fault the OC guys decided not to tell anyone what they were doing.’

  ‘No deal, Heck. I know your gaffer. Piper, isn’t it? She’ll chuck the fucking book at me.’

  ‘Not if I can persuade her otherwise.’

  ‘Sorry, no deal.’

  ‘Listen, you stupid cow!’ He checked there was no one else in the passage behind him. ‘A copper died! And you’re asking me to sit on vital information. Not just now but maybe for the rest of my career. If you seriously think I’m carrying that burden, you can forget it.’

  ‘Heck –’

  ‘Shut up, Penny! This is how we play. I’m going up to the Incident Room in approximately one minute’s time. And I’m going to tell Superintendent Piper exactly what I know, namely that you contrived that clusterfuck. I’ll pr
obably get suspended for not telling her sooner, but even that’s better than looking over my shoulder for the rest of my career on the off-chance you suddenly get tempted to spill the beans and drop me in it. The alternative is that I go up there with your red-hot tip and the mitigating circumstances I’ve just laid out. You don’t have to be a genius to work out which’ll be better for you.’

  When Penny spoke again it was in a distinctly worried voice. ‘Even if they don’t lock me up, won’t they at least take me off the register?’

  ‘Not if you’re giving us good stuff. Why would they? It’d be shooting themselves in the foot.’

  ‘I don’t want to go into protective custody or anything like that.’

  He laughed. ‘You’d be lucky. It’s not easy selling supergrasses to the top floor these days. Anyway, it depends what you know.’

  ‘Manchester,’ she said sullenly.

  ‘Manchester?’

  ‘Somewhere in the Manchester area. That’s where Sagan’s parked himself. It’s the usual thing. He’s gone there as muscle, and he’s getting well paid for his services.’

  ‘Somewhere in the Manchester area?’ Heck said slowly. ‘Seriously? That’s the best you can give me?’

  ‘Christ’s sake, Heck! I’m not his babysitter. I just hear things. He’s in the Manchester area, and he’s signed on for a firm who are in a bit of trouble. Jesus wept, you know his form … it’s not like you won’t know what to look out for.’

  He didn’t answer.

  ‘So where do we stand?’ she asked.

  ‘Get out of London, Penny.’

  ‘You deceitful bastard! You just said –’

  ‘I said I’d put a good word in for you, which I will. But if you get out of London – like now! – I won’t know where you are if they decide to pull you in as an accessory, will I? On top of that, I can’t protect you from yourself, love. Whichever mob you’ve fucked over south of the river, they’ll be looking for you as we speak.’