He looked around the room. The furnishings were rudimentary: a table, two chairs, bare walls. Cardboard coffee cups and old sandwich wrappers on the table. By the window, pointing outwards, were two tripods, one holding a top-of-the-range digital camcorder, the other a telephotoed Nikon.
A surveillance setup.
The Asian man looked down at Donovan. ‘Examined you as much as I could. They gave you a going-over, but I don’t think there’s any lasting damage. Nothing broken.’
‘Did I pass out?’
‘More like fell asleep. Thought it best not to wake you.’ His voice was flat and calm, like still lake water trailing undercurrents of Geordie dialect and cultural origin.
Donovan pulled himself on to his elbows. ‘How did I …?’
‘Get here?’ He told him. He had heard the commotion, ran to the street and stepped in. ‘Don’t think they fancied mixing it, so they went away. I’m Amar, by the way.’
‘Joe Donovan.’
Amar smiled. ‘I know.’
Donovan tried to stand up from the camp-bed. His head spun. ‘What?’
The door opened. He looked at the new entrant. A blonde woman. He knew her from somewhere …
‘How are you feeling, Mr Donovan?’
He continued to stare.
‘We met outside the hotel on Friday.’
‘Yeah …’ He climbed off the camp-bed, rose unsteadily to his feet. ‘But … What …’
‘I think we need to talk, don’t you?’
She talked. Donovan listened.
Amar handed round mugs of tea.
‘Peta Knight. Knight Security and Investigations.’
‘Please, no jokes about private dicks,’ said Amar in his campest voice. He sat on the camp-bed, Donovan and Peta on the chairs. Donovan didn’t feel as bad as he thought he would have done. He felt disorientated but nothing broken, just badly bruised, scratched. Like he’d been spinning in a washing machine with a couple of pairs of paratroopers’ boots.
Peta ignored Amar, continued. ‘We’ve been watching Father Jack’s house for quite a while now. It’s supposed to be a safe house for teenage runaways.’ Bitterness entered her voice. ‘But, of course, we know better.’
Father Jack. Real name Daniel Jackson. Started out in social work, playing an active part in running several children’s homes. Eventually, with the aid of private finance and charitable donations, set up the home he has now. However, this is all a front. His real business is trading in teenage flesh.
‘He does the usual thing,’ said Peta. ‘You know, picking up the stragglers, befriending, empowering, then hitting them with the bill. Hiring them out on the network.’
Donovan nodded. ‘Bet he was abused as a child.’
‘My heart bleeds,’ said Peta, eyes like stone. ‘It’s the predatory bastard that he is now we have to deal with, though.’
His business is run under the protection of certain local councillors and police officials who ‘have first-hand experience of what’s going on there and take a cut of the profits. Very lucrative.’ Consequently the regional media has never been interested in taking him on. He has a gift for self-promotion; the first whiff of trouble and he was out sound-biting up his good works.
‘And stonewalling,’ added Amar.
‘No,’ said Peta. ‘His protectors do that for him. Along with delivering threats.’
With no one challenging him, Peta had decided, proactively, to investigate Father Jack. They had tried to hack into his financial affairs but got nowhere. They had tried to gain entry, have Amar pose as a customer and plant cameras and mikes, but that proved impossible, too.
‘Vetting,’ said Amar, all trace of earlier campness gone from his voice. ‘Invite only.’
So Knight S&I had adopted twenty-four-hour surveillance, logged every coming and going. Amassing a whole dossier of evidence.
‘Then we’ll go public with it,’ said Peta. ‘Nationally. TV, broadsheets, tabloids, whatever. As long as it breaks big. Destroy the operation, take everyone down with it.’
‘And what do you get out of it?’ asked Donovan.
‘Knight S&I, my company, is going under.’ Peta took a sip of her tea, swallowed hard. It was cold in her mouth. She placed the cup on the table, left it alone. ‘Just me and Amar at the moment.’
‘Why’s the company in trouble?’ asked Donovan.
Peta smiled. No humour in it, only sadness. ‘No natural client base. Apparently, so I’ve been told, private detectives are all seedy, middle-aged blokes employed by other seedy, middle-aged blokes. To spy on their wives, usually. Or their business partners. Well—’ she shrugged. ‘—those people don’t trust me. They think I’ll side with the wife in divorce work and don’t think I’m intelligent enough to handle their business partners.’
‘Why?’
‘Because not only am I a woman, but I’m a blonde woman. The fact that I’m an ex-copper and a black belt in tae kwon do apparently count for nothing. We had some great operatives. For security, too. Really good.’ She sighed. ‘But not any more. Because if you haven’t got half a dozen fat-necked, steroid-pumped skinheads with fifty-six-inch chests on hand, or geeks in twonky-looking uniforms itching to go postal, you’re not giving value for money. Honestly. Stuff like that you can pick up from any JobCentre.’
‘Employing a gay Asian doesn’t earn you many brownie points either,’ said Amar.
‘Despite the fact that you’re the best surveillance expert I’ve ever worked with.’
Donovan shook his head. ‘Hasn’t the twenty-first century hit the north-east?’
‘To hear them, Newcastle is a flagship city for Britain’s future. But the cloth cap is still there,’ she said. ‘It’s just worn on the inside now.’
Donovan nodded. ‘Ex-copper?’ he said. ‘Was it the cloth-cap mentality made you leave?’
Peta nodded, her eyes clouded, face masked. ‘Something like that.’
‘Glass ceiling,’ said Amar quickly. ‘You know what it’s like for women in those kinds of institutions.’
A look passed between Peta and him. He said no more.
‘So …’ Donovan gestured round the room to the cameras. ‘All this … you want the big payday?’
‘We need the big payday. Otherwise we go bust.’
‘And we thought we were nearly there,’ said Amar. ‘But then you turned up. Joe Donovan, Herald journalist.’
‘And you thought,’ said Donovan, standing up, grimacing, ‘that I was just going to walk in, steal your thunder and walk off with the story.’
Peta leaned forward, threat implicit in her words. ‘That did cross our minds, yes.’
Donovan walked to the window, looked across at the house. All was silent.
‘Well, I’m not,’ he said, turning back into the room. ‘That’s not why I’m here.’
‘Why, then?’ asked Amar.
‘I’ll tell you,’ said Donovan. ‘But could I have another cup of tea first?’
Amar moved towards the kitchen.
‘A drinkable one, this time.’
Amar scowled at him. ‘Want me to finish off what the kids over there started?’
Donovan shook his head, smiling.
‘Thought not.’
Amar sashayed into the kitchen, a look of mock petty triumph on his face.
He talked, Peta listened.
Amar handed round mugs of tea.
Donovan told them about Jamal. Gary Myers. The minidisc.
The rest he left out.
His tea, for all Amar’s complaining, was much better than the last one.
He finished talking, sat back. Peta and Amar looked between themselves, then at Donovan.
‘Different but parallel interests,’ said Peta.
‘But mutually beneficial,’ said Amar. ‘We should team up. Your paper publishes our story and in return you get surveillance and strong-arm. It makes sense.’
Donovan looked between the two of them. Before he could speak, his mobile rang. He answered
it. Maria.
‘I’ve got the result of Gary Myers’ post-mortem,’ she said without any preamble. Her Salford vowels had returned. ‘You’d better take a look. Come back to the hotel.’
‘OK,’ he said. He looked around the room. Liked what he saw, made a decision. ‘But I’ll be bringing a couple of friends with me.’
He ended the call, looked at the two of them. Smiled.
‘Grab your coats, partners,’ he said. ‘You’ve pulled.’
The kids had returned from their gleeful attack on Donovan still hyped up. A couple had tried to trash the living room before being smacked around by Si. Music had been played loud, jumped around to, violent DVDs viewed. Another couple had been so charged they had started having sex.
Father Jack had been placed on the kitchen table, knife protruding from his blood-soaked groin.
‘Get it out! Get it out!’
Si pulled the blade free, used a tea towel that could have been an al-Qaeda testing ground for biological weapons to stanch the flow. The others crowded round to watch, Jamal, ignored, at the back.
Behind them the TV blared, unwatched, bodycount building.
Si’s emergency procedures continued.
‘You should go to a hospital, Jack,’ he said. ‘I’ll call an ambulance.’
‘I’m … not going … to a fucking … hospital …’ Jack gasped, grimacing from the pain, body making involuntary contractions as he spoke. ‘I’m going … to get … the bastard that … did this …’
Si had Father Jack’s clothes pulled apart, was trying to locate the wound.
‘First-aid kit … cupboard … bandages …’
Father Jack pointed to the cupboard under the sink. Si was immediately down there on his hands and knees, throwing cans, bottles and never-used cloths aside until he pulled out the green-plastic box.
‘Gimme it …’
Father Jack snatched it off him, attempted to haul himself up into a sitting position. Blood pooled in the creases of his stomach, the tops of his legs. He pulled out a bottle of Dettol, found the point of entry with his fingers, poured it on.
Liquid hit open wound. Father Jack howled again.
‘Towel … towel …’
Si handed him the tea towel, now a sodden crimson. Jack held it against himself, ordered Si to make up a dressing from cotton wool, gauze and tape. Si did so. Father Jack turned to his onlookers.
‘Did anybody see … where he went?’
They all looked at him, at each other.
‘Did anyone see where that cunt went?’ The words spat, a command.
‘With that—’ one of the boys began, ‘—that Paki.’
Nods, assent.
‘Them flats opposite …’
‘Over the road …’
‘That Paki, aye …’
‘We’ll get that Paki …’
‘Aye, Paki bastard …’
Father Jack spoke over them, silencing them.
‘Get the phone,’ he said to the nearest boy, ‘I’m going to call in some favours. Dr Blake. And someone to get that bastard. Now …’
The phone was brought. Si continued to apply the dressing. When they saw nothing more was going to happen, when all the thrill had been leached from the scene, the children drifted away.
Jamal drifted away first, not wanting to be singled out by Father Jack, reminded that he was the one who had brought Donovan into the house. He tried to read the other children’s reactions. Some looked concerned on seeing Father Jack in distress; some had smiled, registered pleasure, but tried to keep it to themselves. Jamal understood. There was no such thing as pure, unmixed emotion when your benefactor was also your abuser.
The TV was still playing. The film finished, back to terrestrial channels. A local news broadcast. That same photo – the half-familiar middle-aged man, features dancing on the edge of Jamal’s memory. He heard the soundtrack to the image:
‘… as to the whereabouts of the missing chemist, Colin Huntley. Last seen leaving his home in the Northumberland village of Wansbeck Moor a week last Tuesday …’
Tuesday, thought Jamal. The day he came to Newcastle.
Tuesday.
And then it clicked. With a lurch in his stomach that left him feeling faint, legs trembling, he remembered where he had seen that face before.
Not some half-anonymous punter.
‘Look, Mr Myers –’
‘Call me Gary. If it makes it any easier for you.’
A sigh, then: ‘All right. Gary …’
King’s Cross. The hotel room.
Life and death. Life and fucking death.
He slumped to the sofa, almost hyperventilating.
The disc. Never mind just talking, he had to get the disc.
And then get out of there.
He looked around, checked the kitchen. Si was still fussing over Father Jack. Neither looked like they would be going anywhere any time soon. He scoped the living room. The kids were regrouping, sitting round, already mythologizing their own actions. No one paying him any attention.
He stood up, moved to the door. Into the hall and up the stairs as quietly as possible, two at a time. He stood on the landing, holding his breath. No one about.
He extended his arm slowly, as if the very act of doing that would attract unwanted attention. He slowly pushed open the door to Father Jack’s room, let it swing wide, then stepped inside, closing it silently behind him.
Jamal scoped the room. It looked as he had last seen it.
He was sure the disc was in this room. He began pulling videos and DVDs off the shelves; slowly at first, then with more abandon. Careful to check that the contents matched the sleeves. Nothing.
He tried cupboards, pulled out sex toys, lubricants, condoms. Nothing.
He lay flat on the floor, looked under the bed. Nothing but dust, used condom wrappers, soiled underwear.
In the wardrobe, checking the pockets of Jack’s tent-like clothes, upending and shaking his neatly arrayed rows of comfortable, slip-on shoes.
Nothing.
He did find Jack’s wallet, left hanging in a jacket pocket. He helped himself to the large wad of notes in it, put the wallet back.
Another look around. Where was left?
The bedside cabinet.
Kneeling before it, he tried the door. Locked.
‘Fuck.’ His voice whispery fast.
He needed something to prise the door with. Something long, heavy, sharp …
His eyes darted round the room. Came to rest on a restraining bar among the pile of sex toys. A chromed, heavy-metal bar with ankle manacles at either end. Perfect.
Fitting.
He hefted it in his left hand, placed the edge of the bar against the edge of the door, put his weight behind it, pushed.
It slid off, clattering to the floor, hurting his hands and leaving a gouged trail through the wood of the cabinet.
‘Bastard …’
He picked it up, tried again.
Pushed down hard, found purchase.
The door began to give slightly.
Heartened, Jamal, grimacing, pushed harder …
Heard the sound of wood reluctantly splintering round the lock.
Harder … One more push and it would spring open …
‘What the fuck d’you think you’re doin’?’
Startled, Jamal dropped the bar, turned round.
Si stood in the doorway, staring down at him. Jamal quickly stood up. Si advanced into the room.
‘I said, what the fuck d’you think you’re doin’?’
‘Look, man,’ said Jamal, hands before him, palms out, ‘I don’t want no trouble. I just want what’s mine, yeah? Then I’ll blow.’
‘You mean that disc?’ Si sneered. ‘You’ve kissed goodbye to that.’
Jamal’s heart was beating so hard he felt it would smash open his ribcage and escape. He needed to do something, take some positive action. Get out of there and away.
‘Look, man, please.’ He heard a
voice whining, begging. Was surprised to find it was his own. But not surprised enough to care, to stop. ‘Please. Just gimme that disc an’ I’ll be gone. An’ this whole world a’ trouble with it.’
Si laughed. ‘I’ll give you something.’
Jamal saw the blow coming, managed to sidestep. Instead of his face, Si’s fist connected with his shoulder. Only slightly, but it still hurt.
‘Bastard …’
Si lunged again. Jamal lost his balance, fell on to the bed. Si tried to jump on top of him, hands aiming for his throat. Jamal scurried out of the way. He scrambled on to the floor, tried to pull himself to his feet, ended up half kneeling, half standing.
‘No more trouble, yeah? I’ll go, yeah?’
His words had no effect. Si kneeled on the bed consumed by anger, driven by rage, looking for an outlet. His face spilled into a snarl. Told Jamal he had found his outlet.
Jamal knew the blond boy was ready to attack, beyond listening to anything he could say. He needed a weapon. His eyes landed on the discarded restraint bar. Jamal quickly picked it up as Si came for him.
He swung the bar hard, putting all his strength behind it. It connected with the side of Si’s forehead, above his left eyebrow. Si stopped moving. Stared at him.
Jamal, arms shaking, hands sweating, looked at the blond boy. He didn’t know what to do. For good measure he swung the bar again, connecting in the same place.
Si went down like a detonated chimney.
And then the blood started to pump.
‘Fuck …’
Jamal looked around, looked down at Si.
He was unmoving.
‘Oh fuck …’
Jamal threw the bar into the pile of sex toys and looked down at the bedside cabinet.
No time for that. He had to get out of there.
He ran down the stairs and out of the door.
As fast as he could go.
‘So,’ said Maria, looking around the crowded hotel room. ‘Short version or long?’
‘Short,’ said Donovan. ‘Layman’s terms. Pretend you’re a tabloid editor.’
The Mercy Seat Page 16
