Cold in Hand

by John Harvey

  There was only one light showing, faint beyond the front door, in the building where SOCA had their offices. Resnick was on the point of walking away when a woman came out and closed the door behind her, standing on the top step long enough to reach into her bag and light a cigarette. In the flare of the lighter he saw a roundish face with narrowed eyes. Thirty? Thirty-five?

  ‘Damn,’ Resnick said, moving briskly forward. ‘Don’t tell me I’ve missed him.’

  Startled, the woman backed away.

  ‘Detective Inspector Resnick,’ he said, taking out his wallet and holding it towards her without ever really letting it fall open. ‘London bloody train. Signal failure outside Loughborough. Sat there the best part of forty minutes.’ He smiled. ‘Shouldn’t have been late otherwise.’ He nodded towards the first-floor window. ‘Stuart. Stuart Daines. We had a meeting. I tried phoning, somehow couldn’t get through. You haven’t had trouble with the line? Nothing like that?’

  ‘No,’ the woman said. ‘No, not as far as I know. I’m only temping, though. Secretarial, like.’ Her accent was local.

  ‘Shame,’ Resnick said. ‘I tried his mobile, too. Switched off, apparently.’

  ‘There’s nobody there now,’ she said. ‘I was the last. Just finishing off this report. Last minute.’ She smiled a little nervously and drew on her cigarette.

  ‘It was important, too. Something we needed to discuss before the morning.’

  ‘Daines, you said? He’ll be here first thing, always is.’

  ‘You don’t know where he’s staying, I suppose? This mobile number – maybe it’s the wrong one.’

  ‘No, no idea. I’m sorry.’ A quick smile. ‘My bus. Got to go.’

  Level with him, she stopped. ‘I did hear one of them say they were going for a drink. That place over Maid Marian Way. China China, I think that’s what it’s called. Down on Chapel Bar.’ Her laugh was almost a giggle. ‘Dead posh, that’s what I’ve been told.’

  Resnick waited them out. Daines and three others, sitting over towards a small corner stage that was empty save for a black glitter drumkit and a small electronic keyboard. No signs of a band. The interior was busy and dark, with minimal lighting recessed into the ceiling and, near where Resnick was standing, a cluster of small green lights hanging down amidst a nest of wires. Daines and one of the others were drinking cocktails of some kind, the other men bottled beer – Sol it might have been, Resnick thought, though he couldn’t be sure. The music coming through the sound system was rhythmic and just loud enough not to get lost in the rise and fall of conversation. Cuban, he wondered? Brazilian? Most of the men were smartly turned out – smart-casual, was that what it was called? – anything less would have been turned back at the door; the women sleek and sophisticated until they opened their mouths.

  One of the quartet Resnick was watching left quite soon after he arrived, and another shortly after that, leaving Daines and one other, short with reddish hair, in close conversation.

  Twenty minutes or so later, their glasses empty, Daines began to make his way towards the bar. Midway there, he stopped suddenly, his head swinging round towards the far, deep corner, left of the door, where Resnick was standing and Resnick held his breath, fearful that he’d been spotted, but then Daines excused himself past someone and continued on his way.

  The music rose in volume and the conversation in the room grew louder, as if in compensation. Back at his table, Daines leaned closer towards his colleague and said something that made them both laugh out loud. A few minutes later and they were heading for the exit.

  Resnick turned aside, waited, and then followed.

  At the end of Angel Row they separated, the redhead walking up Market Street towards the Theatre Royal, while Daines carried on along the upper edge of the Old Market Square. Heading for one of the Lace Market hotels, perhaps, Resnick thought, or the Travelodge, just past the roundabout on London Road. A quick right and left, however, and they were out on to Belward Street opposite the National Ice Centre and Daines was veering towards the tall block of serviced apartments on the left.

  Resnick lengthened his stride, moved quickly across the foyer and into the lift before the doors had closed.

  ‘What the fuck?’

  Daines had already pressed one of the buttons to set the lift in progress and now Resnick pressed another, halting it mid-floor.

  Seeing who it was, Daines laughed, as much out of relief, perhaps, as anything else. ‘Took you for some bastard mugger, after my wallet. Never can tell.’

  Resnick positioned himself with his back towards the door.

  ‘I thought I saw you earlier, in the bar,’ Daines said. ‘Couldn’t be sure.’

  Resnick looked back at him, impassive.

  ‘So,’ Daines said. ‘I have to guess what this is all about?’

  Resnick still said nothing, taking his time.

  ‘Let’s go on up,’ Daines said. ‘We can talk in the flat. Or go back out on to the street at least. Get another drink, maybe. Not too late.’

  ‘This is fine,’ Resnick said.

  Daines shrugged. ‘Suit yourself.’

  ‘The night Lynn Kellogg was killed,’ Resnick said, ‘she’d been down to London, the house where Andreea Florescu had been living. The same place the two of you visited a few days before.’

  ‘So? Why are you telling me this?’

  ‘She thought, Lynn, that whole business, that you were in too deep.’

  Daines scoffed and shook his head.

  ‘Something between yourself and the Zoukas brothers that she didn’t trust. She started to ask questions and you warned her off.’

  ‘She was way off limits.’

  ‘You threatened her.’

  ‘That’s ridiculous.’

  ‘That evening, outside the Peacock. “Don’t make me your enemy.” She told me, less than twenty minutes later.’

  ‘She was exaggerating.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  ‘I don’t recall saying any such thing.’

  ‘“Don’t make me your enemy.”’

  ‘That’s what I’m supposed to have said?’

  ‘Word for word.’

  Daines’s expression changed. ‘Maybe you should take heed too.’

  ‘Now you’re threatening me?’

  A hint of a smile crossed Daines’s face. ‘Look,’ he said, ‘I can understand why you’re so wound up about this. You and her. It’s personal, I can see that. I can sympathise. But the last I heard, unless it’s been rescinded, you’ve been invalided out. Unfit for duty, isn’t that the phrase? And for what you’re doing here, keeping me against my will, you could be in deep, deep shit. I could press charges. That incident at Central Station, an unprovoked attack on a civilian, and now this, you’d be lucky to hang on to your pension. So let’s both take a deep breath, okay?’ Daines gestured with his hands. ‘I know you’ve been under a strain and I’m prepared to forget any of this ever happened. What do you say?’

  ‘Alexander Bucur,’ Resnick said, ‘you phoned him that evening, the same day Lynn went down on her own . . .’

  ‘Jesus! You don’t let go, do you?’

  ‘You called him back that evening after she’d gone.’

  Daines’s tone changed again. ‘Who says? Is that what he says? Bucur?’

  Resnick nodded.

  ‘His word against mine.’

  ‘Yes? Which phone did you use? Office phone or mobile? It shouldn’t be too difficult to check.’

  ‘Okay, that’s it,’ Daines said. ‘I’ve had it with this.’

  He reached for the controls and Resnick blocked him off.

  ‘You knew which train she’d be catching,’ Resnick said. ‘What time she’d be getting in. Not difficult to calculate how long it would take from the station.’

  ‘Meaning what? What difference would it make if I did?’

  As soon as the words were out, he read the answer in Resnick’s face.

  ‘You think I killed her,’ Daines said, incr
edulous. ‘That’s what you’re saying? It is, isn’t it? You think I killed her.’

  ‘No, you’d be too careful for that. But you could finger her to somebody else who would.’

  ‘You’re crazy.’

  Daines pushed past him and pressed the button and the lift slipped into motion.

  ‘Someone,’ Resnick said, ‘who’d feel safer if she were out of the picture and not starting to dig around. Someone, maybe, who was bearing a grudge.’

  The lift stopped on the fourth floor and as the door slid open, Daines stepped out.

  ‘You are crazy,’ he said. ‘Absolutely off your fucking head.’

  The door began to close and as Resnick jammed his foot in its path, he had a sudden urge, a near-blind impulse to throw himself at Daines, seize him by the shoulders and slam him back against the wall, then beat him with his fists.

  ‘We’ll see,’ Resnick said instead and pulled his foot away so that the lift door closed and Daines was lost to sight.

  43

  Instead of reading about it first in the papers, as Resnick had suggested might be the case, Karen heard about it on the radio when she stepped out of the shower, and then, pulling on her robe, a towel wrapped round her hair, she switched on the television to catch what was still being billed as breaking news. In the early hours of the morning, officers from SOCA, the Serious and Organised Crime Agency, assisted by officers from the Metropolitan Police’s Central Task Force and the Operational Support Department of the Nottinghamshire Police, had carried out raids on a number of addresses in north London and Nottingham. It was understood that firearms officers from the Nottinghamshire force and from CO19, the Met’s Specialist Firearm Command, had also been deployed.

  Pictures of armed police in all their gear, cars wellying along city streets and flashing lights were screened behind the newsreader’s head, all stock footage, Karen was sure.

  By the time she had dressed, more details had been released. Raids had been carried out on several shops and homes in the Wood Green and South Tottenham areas of London, in addition to warehouses in Paddington and Finsbury Park. In Nottingham, police and SOCA teams had targeted buildings on an industrial estate in Colwick, east of the city, as well as in the Lace Market area of the city centre itself. A number of arrests had been made and items seized were believed to include a considerable quantity of weapons and ammunition. There were reports, as yet unconfirmed, of shots being fired.

  The pictures this time were real.

  Video quickly released by the Met’s public relations team were mixed on screen with poorly focused images emailed in by members of the public who had been awake enough to capture some of what had happened on their mobile phones. For a few unclear moments, the building housing the sauna where Nina Simic had been killed came into view, the front door hanging off, a police officer standing guard.

  Karen rang Dixon and then Daines, but, perhaps not surprisingly, neither was answering his phone. When she rang Chris Butcher he spoke through a mouthful of toast.

  ‘You watching this?’

  ‘You bet,’ Karen said.

  ‘Any idea what’s going on up there?’ Butcher asked.

  ‘Only what you see on screen. How ’bout you?’

  ‘Give me an hour.’

  ‘Will do.’

  Wandering into the kitchen area, she made coffee, switching from national news to local and back again as she waited for it to brew. Firearms officers in Nottingham had fired eleven rounds and in London an unconfirmed number. It was not yet known if any of that gunfire had been returned. Estimates as to the items taken varied, but sources close to the Serious and Organised Crime Agency were suggesting that as many as six hundred illegal weapons had been seized, together with several thousand rounds of ammunition. The weapons, in the main, were Baikal IZH-79 pistols which were believed to have originated in Lithuania. According to the Reuters News Agency, the Lithuanian Police Bureau, in a carefully coordinated operation, had carried out a number of arrests in different parts of the country, including Rauba and the capital, Vilnius.

  Karen finished her coffee while she was fixing her make-up.

  She was on the point of leaving the apartment when Chris Butcher phoned. A total of fourteen individuals had been arrested in London, seven more, he thought, in Nottingham. She could check that herself. No Viktor Zoukas, no Valdemar. The police had gone to the house where Viktor was meant to be residing, but he wasn’t there.

  ‘Somebody tipped them off,’ Karen said.

  ‘Looks like.’

  ‘How about Lazic?’

  ‘No sign.’

  ‘Jesus Christ!’

  ‘My thoughts, exactly.’

  ‘I’ll be in touch.’

  ‘Do that.’

  A brush through her hair and Karen was on her way.

  At Central Police Station, rumours were ripe as flies fastening on a dead dog. The number of firearms officers who had discharged their weapons varied from seven to two; shots on target from four to none. That a brief exchange of fire had taken place seemed certain, only the scale was so far open to question. One man who had taken a flesh wound to the back of the thigh was currently under police guard at Queen’s Medical Centre; claims that a second man had been hit when he himself had opened fire on the police were so far unsubstantiated; none of the accident and emergency departments in the area had reported anyone else suffering from gunshot wounds. No officer had been hit.

  The SOCA office in the city had, as far as Karen could tell, failed to open that day and calls to its London HQ were put on hold. Graeme Dixon’s line at the Central Task Force was permanently busy; whoever he was talking to, Karen thought, it wasn’t her.

  She and Euan Guest shared some minutes of mutual regret that Ivan Lazic had so far avoided capture.

  After that, Karen tried to occupy herself with the small mountain of paperwork she’d been studiously avoiding, but it proved no antidote to her sense of annoyance and frustration. She was about to go and prowl the corridors in search of someone to berate when her phone sounded. Resnick at home.

  ‘I’d like you to tell me,’ he said, ‘if Lazic was involved that he’s in an interrogation room somewhere right now spilling his guts.’

  ‘Not quite as much,’ Karen said, ‘as I would myself.’

  ‘Got away?’

  ‘We don’t even know if he was around.’

  Resnick was silent for several seconds. ‘You’ve talked to London?’

  ‘I’d talk to the devil if I thought it would help.’

  Certainly did a lot for Robert Johnson, Resnick thought, but he kept it to himself; however keen she might be on Bessie Smith, he didn’t think Karen would be up to exchanging small talk about blues singers right now.

  ‘Could do worse,’ he said.

  ‘So they say.’

  After Resnick had rung off, Karen had another brief conversation with Chris Butcher, but he had little to add to what he had told her before. She fought with a few forms, checked in with Mike Ramsden and told him to hell with it, she was going out to get some lunch.

  ‘As long as you’re buying,’ Ramsden said, ‘I’ll string along.’

  ‘Not this time, Mike, okay?’

  If he was disappointed, he hid it well.

  Karen walked down past the Victoria Centre, along Bridlesmith Gate and turned left towards the site of the new centre for contemporary art on Weekday Cross. Just along High Pavement, there was a large converted church which was now a Pitcher and Piano and, on the opposite side, further down, a pub called the Cock and Hoop – not too crowded, not too large and with a menu that looked promising. She was two bites into her rib-eye steak, and enjoying it, when Frank Michaelson called on her mobile. She even hesitated a moment before taking the call.

  ‘Sally, boss,’ Michaelson said. ‘From the sauna? She’s this minute rung. Ivan Lazic, she says she knows where he is.’

  ‘Knows?’

  ‘That’s what she said.’

  ‘Nothing more?’ />
  ‘She said I have to go in, talk to her in person.’

  Karen cut off another piece of tender, reddish meat. ‘Where are you now?’

  ‘That’s the thing, I’m up at HQ.’

  ‘Out at Sherwood?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘All right. I’m just round the corner. I’ll go along.’

  ‘Okay.’

  ‘And Frank . . . ?’

  ‘Yes, boss?’

  ‘Phone Mike, let him know.’

  Karen popped the piece of steak into her mouth and pushed the plate regretfully aside.

  There were stone steps, worn down at the centre, leading up towards the front door, which was still attached by only one hinge and sagged against the frame. A hastily written sign had been fixed inside the sex-shop window, Closed until further notice. On the floor above, curtains had been pulled tight across. The sign above the door had been switched off. Karen pressed the bell and waited. Pressed the bell again and identified herself into the small mouthpiece alongside. Glancing up, she thought she saw a small movement at the right-hand window, the fold of a curtain falling back into place. She wasn’t sure.

  A car went slowly past along the street behind her, looking for somewhere to park.

  Karen manoeuvred the door open carefully, closed it behind her and walked towards the stairs; dust had gathered in the corners of each tread and the carpet running up the centre was well worn. There was a light ahead.

  On the landing, she stopped and called Sally’s name.

  No response.

  Opening another door, she went along a short, narrow corridor and then out into what she imagined was some kind of reception area, a counter to one side, settee and chairs to the other, a few magazines strewn around, posters showing naked girls with unlikely breasts on the walls. At the back of the counter was another door, a small sign reading Office between two panes of frosted glass.