by Nick Oldham
He glared at Gallagher.
‘Get out,’ he spat.
Gallagher held a finger up. ‘One second,’ he said.
He placed the open briefcase on the coffee table next to the custody record and slowly swivelled it round so Taylor could see what it contained.
On top of the contents was a note, printed in capital letters. It read: THERE IS £10,000 IN USED BANK OF ENGLAND NOTES IN HERE. YOU MAY COUNT IT IF YOU WISH. ALL YOU HAVE TO DO TO RECEIVE THIS MONEY IS TO ALTER THE CUSTODY RECORD AND HELP A FRIEND IN NEED. ERIC, PLEASE HELP ME. The signature could have belonged to Henry Christie. Taylor wasn’t sure.
He looked at the note and the money underneath it.
Then his eyes met Gallagher’s over the lid of the briefcase.
Gallagher gave him a quirky smile.
It was a lot of money, for not much effort.
‘You’ve made me leave, John,’ Isa said. Glassy tears were twinkling in her eyes. ‘I wanted to love you ... I do love you ... but you’ve spoilt it.’ She bent down and picked up her suitcase.
‘There was absolutely no need to do what you did. No rhyme, no reason, no excuse. Cold-blooded murder.’ She shook as she said the words.
‘I didn’t have a choice, Isa,’ Rider said simply. They were standing in the lounge area of his basement flat, the bedsits above. There was a huge crash from the room above which juddered the whole ceiling. Probably the couple in the ground-floor flat having one of their usual domestics. Rider was not bothered by what was happening above. It was his own, fairly subdued domestic dispute which was his problem at the moment. He was very tired now. The action of the day had sapped everything, including his resolve to keep Isa. He was too weary to put up much of a fight, although he knew what was happening was very important. He wished it could be put off until tomorrow when he was feeling stronger.
‘Everybody has a choice. You made yours without even thinking about me - and after what we said, promised each other, only hours before.’
‘He killed innocent people. They burned to death on my property. I was responsible for them.’
‘Did he kill them? How the hell d’you know that for sure? Where’s your evidence? It could just as easily have been one of your crack-crazed residents out of his tiny mind. Those idiots are capable of anything.’
As if to confirm what she said, there was another crash from upstairs. They both looked at the ceiling, then at each other.
‘Why didn’t you tell the police? You had the opportunity.’
‘Because they’re useless, corrupt bastards. Munrow would have paid them off, like Conroy does. You know what I think about cops.’
‘John, you are a fool,’ she said sadly.
‘So is this it?’
‘Yes.’ It was a quiet, almost inaudible word. One she did not wish to utter.
She walked to the door, opened it and went through without looking back. Rider made no attempt to stop her, even though something inside him was willing him to do so. He knew he was being pig-headed and stupid.
He heard the front door close softly and saw Isa walk up the steps past the net-curtained window.
Maybe tomorrow.
Another crash from upstairs.
Rider’s nostrils flared. Noisy bastards. He was going to throw them out on their arses right now if they couldn’t damn well behave.
He stormed out of the room to the door in the short hallway which gave him access up a flight of stairs to the flats above without having to go outside. He unlocked the several bolts and chains and opened the door, treading carefully onto the darkened and narrow stairway.
They burst into the flat before he knew what was happening.
Two men. Blue boiler suits. Heavy boots. Hoods with eye and mouth slits.
One had a straight, extendable baton.
The other had a gun.
At the moment Shane Mulcahy opened his door, the one with the baton rammed it into his stomach, causing him to bend double; the baton was then expertly smacked across Shane’s face, breaking his nose with a sickening crunch of bone.
Shane was bundled back into the flat and his thin spidery body was slammed face down onto the bare floor where the red gush from his nose flooded out. The one with the gun knelt on Shane’s back, one knee planted firmly on his spine just between the shoulder-blades, the gun thrust into his cheek.
Jodie, Shane’s much-abused girlfriend, had been trying her best to breast-feed the baby which was cradled in her arms. One poor-looking breast and nipple were exposed. She reacted instinctively, drawing her arms around the baby and cowering in a chair for protection.
The one with the baton said to her, ‘If you speak or scream I’ll whack this across your head and then the baby’s.’
Jodie did not speak because, although not having experienced this type of scenario before, she was sufficiently street-wise to know when to shut up. She had immediately assumed these people were drugs dealers come to collect an unpaid debt. It was the culture she inhabited and she knew her best chance of survival was acquiescence.
She nodded nervously.
The baby, deprived of its meagre supply of milk, sucked air desperately.
‘Now then, Shane, old bean,’ the man with the gun said, lowering his mouth near to Shane’s ear. ‘You’ve been a naughty, naughty lad, haven’t you?’
The young skinhead could hardly breathe, let alone speak. Blood had gagged in his throat. He coughed and choked, spitting a fine spray of red saliva.
‘I don’t owe you owt,’ he gurgled.
‘Oh yes you do, you owe us a great deal.’
Despite herself, Jodie let out a wail of anguish. The stupid idiot had obviously neglected to pay his drugs debts and from the sound of it they had amounted to a tidy sum. Now collection time had come and if they could not find the money, Shane’s brains might be joining his nasal blood on the floor.
The baton arced through the air towards Jodie’s head. She saw it coming, braced herself for the impact. It stopped a millimetre from her left temple. Her eyes focused on the end of it.
‘Next time,’ the man warned, ‘I take your fucking head off. Now, shut it, bitch.’
She bit her lips and hugged her child which whimpered pathetically, picking up on the tension in her body. She rocked it.
The man holding the gun ground the muzzle into Shane’s cheek. He thumbed the hammer back. Shane closed his eyes tightly and lay there paralysed with fear. Tears formed in his eyes.
The man with the baton walked over to the TV set which was perched on a small table. He tapped the screen with the tip, lined himself up like a golfer before a tee shot and swung it into the screen, which exploded.
Jodie let out a gasp.
The baby in her arms jumped and started to cry.
Their TV had been destroyed. The TV set Jodie was tied to for all her entertainment. It had been her lifeline.
The man then kicked it off the table. It crashed to the floor.
Shane’s eyes strained in their sockets to look up at what had happened. He watched the man with the baton take a couple of steps over to him. The man with the gun, keeping it firmly implanted in his cheek, stood up, relieving the pressure on Shane’s spine.
It was a short-lived relief. Shane was then given much the same treatment as the TV set with about a dozen well-aimed, hard blows across his back and ribs.
When he’d finished, Shane lay curled up on the floor, emitting horrible grunting noises.
The gun was still in his ear. The man holding it said, ‘You may wonder what this is about, Shane.’
The baton man then demolished the stereo with a series of expertly wielded strikes, destroying a cheap but perfectly acceptable system which, again, Jodie relied on for her sanity. Her whole pathetic world was being decimated and she was unable to do anything to save it. As with the TV set, the stereo was kicked to the floor where it landed with a loud crash, the plastic parts splintering all around the room.
The man returned to Shane and tapped him gen
tly a few times on the knee-caps and shins. Shane’s thin legs would have been very easily broken and probably damaged for ever. The baton man let the tip rest against a shin whilst the gunman spoke.
‘Now then, Shane,’ he said reasonably. ‘Listen very carefully. All you have to do is this: tomorrow morning, you go into Blackpool police station and present yourself very smartly at the front desk, with your solicitor if you like ... with me so far? ... and be very nice and pleasant and say that you wish to retract the complaint you made against me, Detective Sergeant Christie. Now that’s all you have to do Shane, pal, old buddy, old mate. And don’t even think of mentioning this little get-together here, because if you do ...’ His voice sank to a terrifying whisper. ‘Do you understand?’
Shane nodded.
‘Good.’
The baton man gave Shane a loving tap on his shin.
The gunman stood up.
Both crossed to the baby’s cot, picked it up and between them and threw it against the wall where it disintegrated into matchsticks.
Then they left.
In the hallway outside the flat, they turned right and ran for the rear exit, pulling their hoods off as they went.
Neither one of them saw the figure of John Rider ascending the darkened staircase which led up from the basement flat below.
Chapter Twenty
There was an air of jubilation in the murder incident room next day when Tony Morton announced that all three men arrested yesterday were going to be charged with the murder of Geoff Driffield and the other people in the newsagents. The one they had failed to arrest would be circulated as wanted.
In just one week they had a major result, and all the detectives and uniformed police officers involved in the case were invited to a celebration that evening in the club upstairs. 5 p.m. start. It would be a long, boozy evening.
Henry experienced a certain degree of satisfaction. He had been instrumental in the arrest of the gang leader, Anderson, and had nearly died for his trouble.
As the officers cleared the room, Henry caught sight of Siobhan talking earnestly to Tony Morton, occasionally glancing across at him. She looked upset, on the verge of tears. Henry wondered if she’d had some distressing news or something. He did not even begin to think she could be upset about last night and the coitus interruptus. He had reflected on her behaviour and concluded he did not really blame her ... but on the other hand she had said some nasty things. Threats, almost.
She and Morton walked out of the incident room towards the office he had been allocated for the duration of the investigation.
Henry went to the CID office and sat at his desk where he re-read a photocopy of the post-it note Derek had left for him on the night of his brutal murder. What the hell did he want to see me for? Henry asked himself. Was it the reason why he was murdered? Henry could only speculate. The note was bare and said little...
His mind wandered back to the previous evening when he had called in to see Annie Luton on his way home. She had given him a whole package of work-related stuff that Derek had taken home over a period of time. It was all in a carrier bag.
‘There’s everything there he ever brought home in relation to work,’ Annie said. ‘I’ve been round the house from top to bottom, gathering all this together. It was all over the show ... he was so untidy. I even found some under our bed.’ Her eyes moistened as she talked.
Henry glanced casually at the contents. None of it seemed to be of major importance. Copies of reports, statements ... the type of bumf most young officers probably had at home. Henry had been like that years ago. Taking work home. Feeling the need to write up reports off-duty so he could spend more time out on the streets when on-duty. Yeah, he could relate to that.
These days he took nothing home.
He had spent about half an hour with Annie. She was very rational and together, though a desperate and tragic figure. Henry saw resilience in her and guessed that sooner rather than later her life would be back on track.
He left with a hopeful, positive feeling inside him. The carrier bag she had given him was dumped on the back seat of his car, forgotten.
Then he went home to Kate.
He could hardly bring himself to look at her, so ashamed was he of his actions with Siobhan. Did Kate pick up his body language? Could she see right through him? Did she intuitively know that not long before, he had literally been on the verge of making love to another woman?
Henry would not have been surprised.
Wives were so perceptive about their husbands’ every little transgression.
Thankfully she seemed far more concerned with his injuries and getting him into a hot, soothing Radox bath and subsequently to bed. She fussed around him like a mother hen, or at least someone who cared very deeply for him and to whom his wellbeing was her main concern. Inside, he boiled angrily with himself whilst on the outside he revelled in the blue water and the glass of Jack Daniel’s which Kate placed in his hand as he lay back and soaked his soul.
He was beginning to think he had the makings of a serial adulterer, but maybe he was exaggerating the problem.
His daughters, Jenny and Leanne, were another reason for this self loathing. With the soap bubbles covering his rude parts, they sat on their knees next to the bath, whilst Kate took a back seat on the lid of the loo, and listened wide-eyed at the story of his day, culminating in him being shot and the fight in the clothing displays of M & S. He proudly displayed his chest-wound for them to see. It had turned the colour of black grapes. He also carefully removed the bandage on his ear to show them how chewed it was.
He was their hero and although he knew the truth - he had been completely terrified most of the time - he never revealed it to them. Their dad. The hero.
The serial adulterer.
Kate ushered them out of the bathroom after the story.
She sat back on the loo, looked him straight in the eye and said, ‘I think you’ve got something to tell me.’
The words hit Henry harder than the bullet.
‘How did you know?’
Were there claw-marks down his back he hadn’t realised Siobhan had inflicted on him? Teeth-marks around his foreskin?
‘The fact you were in Lancaster for one thing. Then you had a gun. And you were arresting people for that multiple killing job. You’ve already moved onto, what’s it called, North-West Crime something or other?’
‘North-West Organised Crime Squad,’ he corrected her, trying to cover the relief in his voice. ‘No, I’ve just been helping them out, that’s all, so they can look at me and I can look at them. See if we like each other.’ He went on to explain the possibility of a six-month secondment, followed possibly by a full transfer, and how right he thought the job was for him.
He didn’t mention Siobhan at all.
‘OK,’ Kate said, tilting her head. ‘If that’s what you want - chasing criminals with guns all over the place, fine by me. If you’re happy at your work, I’ll be behind you. Just please don’t let it get in the way of us this time, Henry. That’s all I ask.’
‘I won’t,’ he promised meekly.
And once again, Kate, his wonderful, beautiful wife, had surprised him with her generosity. And through no fault of her own, made him feel like an absolute bastard.
Maybe that’s my lot in life, he’d reasoned.
Henry was brought bang into the present as the phone went, interrupting his recall. It was Karl Donaldson.
‘Karl, how you doin’?
‘OK, buddy,’ Donaldson said, but Henry picked up a bum note in the American’s voice. ‘I need to see you pretty urgently, Henry.’
‘About what?’
‘Not over the phone. Face to face. I’m gonna travel up, bring Karen along too. Settin’ off shortly. Looking at four-five hours maybe with traffic and weather. Can you accommodate us?’
‘Sure, sounds important. Nothing over the phone?’
‘No clues, bud.’
‘I’ll see you at home then.’
/> The phone went dead. Henry hung up, mystified and slightly worried. He had no time to ruminate, however. The phone warbled again.
‘DS Christie - get up into my office now.’
Rather like Siobhan’s open-handed slap last night, Henry was caught unawares by what happened next.
He meandered down the corridor towards Morton’s office. When he was a few feet away from the door, it opened dramatically and Siobhan burst out, virtually into his arms. Tears were streaked down her face and she was heaving with loud, gut-wrenching sobs. She looked up at Henry and reacted instantly as though she had walked into the monster from hell.
‘Get off me, get off me!’ she screamed, making a great show of disentangling herself from him. She was not entangled by any stretch of the imagination. She drew back, slapping the air like she was trying to free herself from Spiderman’s web. ‘Leave me alone. You’ve done enough damage.’
‘Siobhan!’ Henry was wrong-footed completely. ‘What d’you mean?’
‘You bastard! Don’t come near me again.’
With that she ducked to one side, swept past him and scurried off down the corridor towards the ladies toilets. Henry watched her retreating back with shock. He turned. Tony Morton was standing in the doorway of his temporary office.
‘What was all that about?’ Henry asked, nonplussed.
Morton said nothing for a moment, but surveyed Henry with a calculating look which made him shiver.
‘Come in and sit down.’
Morton stayed by the door. Henry slid by him into the office. He sat down, intertwining his fingers on his lap in a gesture of submission.
Morton closed the door softly and walked to his seat behind the desk, putting a large space between him and the Detective Sergeant and peering down at him from a greater height. Henry could not help but be awed by the old-fashioned power psychology. It always worked on him.
What the hell was going on?
Morton did not speak for a few moments, but allowed Henry to savour the atmosphere.
Then he dropped the bomb.
