by J. D. Weston
"Do you ever think about anything else but money?"
Donny stepped forward and leaned on the fence, directly above where Harvey was laying. Harvey stayed perfectly still, he was tucked under the growth of grass and thorns.
"Yeah, I do," he said sullenly. "Often."
"What goes through that mind of yours? What eats you?"
"Ah, Jamie. We've done a good job so far of keeping our relationship purely business-like. Let's not get too familiar, eh?"
"What are you hiding, Cartwright?"
Donny took a breath and held it, "We all have our skeletons, Jamie. Where do you keep yours?"
“I’d love a skeleton or two, Donny, but that would mean letting people in. Something I was never good at.”
“You don't need to let people in to have skeletons. Sometimes they arrive uninvited. Then destroy everything you have.”
“Sounds painful.”
“It is.” Donny sounded subdued. “My father had it all, you know that?”
“Yeah, everyone knew John Cartwright.”
"He started with one bar and built up an empire. Pretty soon any bar in East London that was worth having either belonged to, or owed money to, the Cartwrights. That’s where I learned about business, from my old man. I stood to inherit all of it. I would have been set up for life, Jamie." He laughed. "What a joke, eh? Now look at me, I'm in the bloody prostitution business. My old man would do his nut if he could see me now. He hated hookers."
“What actually happened to him?”
Donny looked across at her suspiciously, the question had been quick. "No-one knows, Jamie."
"Yeah, yeah. I know that’s what your lot say when someone’s in hiding."
"God’s truth. The Thomsons had me marked, they were-"
"The rival family, yeah, that was all public knowledge."
"Right, well, they put a hit out on me. Nearly worked as well." Donny reached up and touched the scar tissue on one side of his face. "I survived though, and my dad saw it as a good time for me to pretend to be dead. So I was sent off for a few months. By the time I got back, it was all gone. The bars, the banks, the men, the houses. And my dad. There was nothing left."
“You haven't heard from him?”
"I doubt I ever will to be honest. He's either dead or working on his tan. He won’t be back either way."
“But you’re his son. How could he just forget about you?”
"Listen, Jamie, when you're up to your eyeballs in the life we lead, the moral compass gets a bit off balance. Know what I mean?"
Jamie nodded.
"We did things that none of us were proud of. Things that we never spoke about again. We never really stopped to consider what would happen if the truth were to come out in the open. Or if the people we cared about found out about those terrible things. We didn't even consider the consequences of those things ourselves, let alone how they would impact the people around us." Donny took a lung-full of air and noisily blew it out through his nose. "My old man has long gone. I don't deserve anything he could offer anyway."
"That’s a shocking thing to say, Donny." Jamie almost had a caring tone to her voice.
“Don't pity me, Jamie. What doesn’t kill us makes us stronger. I’m coming back, Jamie. I’m making my own money.” He turned to face her; half his face was lit by the bright white lights from the barn, his scar was hidden in shadow. “And that is what will make my old man proud of me, more than anything else in the world.”
The lazy starter motor of the mini-digger broke the night’s silence, and they both turned to see Bruno’s massive bulk inside the small digger’s windowless cab. The arm of the machine dug greedily into the soil.
The two walked away, and Harvey breathed out. Donny had been his foster brother for as long as he could remember, but he’d never ever witnessed any kind of emotion from him other than hate, spite and anger. The feelings had been mutual. Harvey was the lost kid who inadvertently stole his father’s attention when they were young. If Donny had scored a goal at football practice, John would have missed it because he was tying Harvey’s shoe. If there was extra meat at dinner, Harvey would have it because, although he was younger, he was already bigger and needed more food.
When they'd grown older, Harvey was still treated differently. Harvey didn't cry, whine, or complain to John. He dealt with his own issues, while Donny wondered why nobody heard his cries. It was by Donny's own design that he was kept at arm’s length.
Then the final straw had been when Donny and Sergio had raped Hannah with Jack. Hannah had brutally killed herself. John had known what happened. Not much got passed the old man. But he protected both Donny and Sergio from Harvey. He needed Sergio to run the business and Donny was his own flesh and blood. But the incident had caused John’s wife, Barb, to leave him, and John hadn’t fully trusted Donny ever since, choosing to nurture a relationship with Harvey instead. Someone more befitting his trust and fatherhood.
Harvey understood now. Donny’s perspective had slotted things into place. Donny would still die a slow and awful death, but he had unwittingly answered some of Harvey's questions.
He checked the tank, it was still sitting there. As far as the investigation was going, Melody and the boys would have indisputable evidence of Mr Narakimo going in and Mr Narakimo leaving, and then a hole being dug for a body. The evidence against Mr Narakimo would not be irrefutable, but Donny, Jamie and Bruno would be in a very bright spotlight, and there was always DNA to fall back on.
When the digger was turned off, Harvey watched Bruno stumble in the darkness, then shuffle into the barn. He disappeared and re-emerged carrying the young girl's dead body. She was dark haired, very petite and her limbs hung loosely from Bruno's strong arms. Bruno laid her on the plastic sheet and folded one side across her. Then he rolled her until the lump in the sheet was unidentifiable, and folded both ends of the roll inward, securing them with gaffer tape. He placed the tape back on the shelf, then hoisted the long blue parcel onto his shoulder.
Harvey was sickened. He had seen death for most of his life. He'd even played the role of death and dealt it out with his own two hands. But that had been to people who had, in Harvey's mind, deserved pain and suffering. The girls that the brute was dumping in the ground deserved nothing of the sort. Harvey would seek their retribution. He would make sure the sins against them were paid in full.
Harvey heard the dull thump as the body hit the ground. Then the scraping of soil on the shovel began as Bruno began to fill the hole. He worked slowly in the dark. His only light was the two harsh lamps from atop the cab of the digger.
Donny and Jamie had disappeared inside the barn.
When he was done, Bruno once again broke the silence of the night and drove the digger back to the barn. He switched off the engine and silence resumed.
"Boss, all done," he announced.
"Great, let’s go home, Bruno."
"But, boss…"
"Sorry, buddy. You can have some fun with them tomorrow," said Donny in a quiet voice, so that Jamie wouldn't hear. Bruno's face lit up. He'd become like a simpleton and Donny was manipulating him. That was Donny's style. "Lock those sliding doors up, Bruno."
"Jamie, see you tomorrow," Donny called.
She came out from the kitchen. “You’re leaving?”
“Well yeah, what else is there to do?”
“Maybe wait for me,” she said.
“Ah Jamie, you’re a big girl.”
Bruno pulled the two large sliding doors closed. The space outside was plunged back into the darkness of the countryside, and Harvey heard the metallic sound of locks. Then the single door opened, and Donny and Bruno walked out. They both got into their separate cars. Donny didn't wait for Bruno, he started his long and bumpy trip in his Mercedes, while Bruno pulled in behind him. The Toyota SUV handled the bumps just fine, although Harvey saw that the driver's side was considerably lower.
Harvey watched as Donny and Bruno drove away. He needed Donny alone, but Bruno was
always there by his side.
The single door opened, and Jamie stepped out. She clicked the button on her key fob; the BMW's indicators flashed once, the locks popped open, and the interior light slowly came on. She was about to lock the door when she noticed the light was still on, so she stepped back inside. Harvey vaulted the fence. He ran quietly to the car, opened the passenger door and slipped his watch under the passenger seat. He saw the lights turn off, so shut the door quietly and crouched down low, slowly moving back into the darkness of the waste ground. He turned and motioned to the tank, tapping his wrist with two fingers.
Jamie climbed into the car, and the interior light dimmed. She tapped out a message on her phone, then dropped it into the centre console, selected drive, and accelerated away.
Harvey took a walk around the back of the barn again to see where Bruno had buried the new body. He wondered if he was making new holes, or just dumping fresh bodies into the same pit. He found the fresh dirt. Bruno had dug a fresh hole right next to the first one. The job wasn't neat, but Harvey expected that was to do with Bruno's inexperience with the digger.
Harvey thought about digging a hole for Bruno, an extra large one. He might even make him dig his own hole, then bury him alive while the girls watched. The thought process was all part of Harvey's planning process. One thing was for sure, he would make sure the guy paid for his sins.
9
Time
Melody carried Sneaky-Peeky to the entrance of the driveway. She set it down in the grass to the left of the track. Reg immediately took control, and the tank began to trundle away towards the fence that ran adjacent to the driveway.
She headed back to the van unseen and walked around the rear to where Reg was sat with the large single rear door wide open. He sat on a modified office chair that had the casters removed so it wouldn't roll around on the wooden floor of the van.
In front of him were two screens and a laptop. The laptop showed the main interface of LUCY. In the centre of the screen was a satellite image of Harvey's tracking chips. It was a mess. His watch chip was in a field behind the barn. His motorcycle chip was nearly a kilometre away several fields behind his watch. His phone showed as being exactly where Melody stood, which it was, holding the audio confession of Barnaby Brayethwait. The chip from Harvey's leather jacket was on the side of a country lane in a ditch around five miles away.
The main screen showed a high-resolution live feed of Sneaky-Peeky's turret camera. It was moving extremely slowly through long grass beside the fence.
"That's a pretty clear image," said Melody.
"I modified a DSLR. Sneaky-Peeky has two built-in SD cards and a 70-300mm telescopic lens. It's capable of recording 4K resolution onto the SD cards and providing live feed at full HD, which I can record from this end. It gives us a little bit of resilience against the loss of Sneaky-Peeky itself." Reg grinned.
Melody sighed, “Okay, Reg, I know you want to tell us more, go on.”
"Thought you'd never ask," he said. His smile was nearly as wide as his face, "Not only can it operate for close to five hours, due to the configuration of batteries," he added, "but, I tore some of your surveillance hardware apart, and integrated the technology with the DSLR." He continued to grin and waited for Melody to ask more.
"Well?" she said, "What does all of that mean to simple folk like Denver and I?"
"I stole your NV goggles and stuck them on the turret with the camera. It’s fascinating inside those things. I'll take a closer look when I get a chance."
"You stole my night vision goggles?" asked Melody.
"Only one pair, you still have another pair," he replied defending his actions. "Besides, now Sneaky-Peeky has night vision, and you can sit in the nice warm van." He turned to her, he was beaming. "Sometimes, Melody, you can almost taste my genius."
"Eyes on the road, genius," she said, nodding at the screen, "or you'll be tasting the sweet scent of grass because it will be you that has to run down there to ask for your toy back."
"Oh, how she mocks. Denver, are you hearing this?"
"I am," said Denver, who was watching the road in front for any sign of traffic that might be slowing for the turn into the farm. "But I wish I wasn't."
"Do you both honestly think that I would send Sneaky-Peeky, my beloved creation, into the wilderness without a map?"
Melody raised her eyebrows.
"Sneaky-Peeky has built-in GPS. I just plug in the coordinates and hit go, and it'll go straight there. I can enter sets of coordinates if I want it to follow a particular route, or if we have the CAD file of a building, it can read the directions from LUCY."
"Can we send it to Burger King then?" said Denver.
Melody smiled at the dynamics of the two, “Where exactly are you sending it?”
“Right here where the two fences meet.” Reg pointed at the spot on the screen. “From there we’ll have an uninterrupted view of the front of the barn.”
“We need eyes on the driveway. I want a heads up when cars come in or out.”
“I only have one Sneaky-Peeky, Melody, but soon I shall have a fleet.” He said the last words with a sinister undertone and winked at her.
"Looks like I am going for a walk after all," she said, and left to prepare herself. She slid open the side door of the van and pulled her kit bag from under the passenger seat. She took an extra clip for her Sig, a small Maglite, and fitted her ear-piece before pulling on a tight, black woollen hat. She grabbed her jacket from the front seat and pulled it over her black Norwegian army sweater, then stuffed her NV goggles into a small pack.
She turned away from the van and took a few steps. She tapped the ear-piece button, "Comms check."
Her voice rang clear from the speaker next to Reg’s laptop, “Received, repeat,” he replied.
"Loud and clear," she said. "Okay boys have fun without me."
"Wait one," said Reg. He found Melody's tracker chips in the directory on the left of LUCY's interface, and ticked the box next to her name, so all of her chips showed up on the satellite image.
"Good to go, three chips live. Phone, watch and purse," said Reg. "You're up on LUCY."
"Okay, I'll just be across the road there with eyes on the driveway. I won't get close as the tank-"
"Sneaky-Peeky," Reg corrected her.
"Sneaky-Peeky has the front covered."
She slipped away, and the two men watched her cross the road and duck into the thick tangle of bushes that lined the far side.
The light was fading as she made her way along the fence that ran behind the barn. She pictured the eyes on the barn. The tank was at the front looking directly at the doors, and Harvey was behind the fence to the side of the doors. He would have a clear view inside if the large doors opened. And Melody was tucked behind staring at the side of the barn with no windows or doors. The sky grew dark until she could no longer make out the shape of the building. She moved closer, and found a spot hidden from view. She could see the driveway clearly but not the doors. Reg would need to handle that.
Three cars arrived within thirty minutes of one another. The BMW SUV arrived first with a female driver. That was Jamie Creasey. She reported it over the comms and Reg confirmed. Then two more cars arrived; another SUV and a large, black Mercedes saloon.
"Confirm, the second car is Donald Cartwright," said Reg.
"Who's in the first car?" Melody asked.
"Hold on, I'm just on Sneaky's night vision. I don't have a name for him, but holy crap he's big."
"Say again."
"I said, the man is big. He just had to turn sideways to walk through the door."
For the next thirty minutes, Melody sat in the dark. It was frustrating not being able to see the doors, but she knew that nothing was happening there either. The action was on the inside.
Another car turned into the driveway.
"It's busy tonight."
"Can you see the plate?" asked Reg.
Melody read the plate number to him as the car dr
ove past her. She heard it come to a stop and two doors open and close.
"The car belongs to one Narakimo. Unmarried. Owner of several Japanese export firms, he has offices in Threadneedle Street, EC2. He's of Japanese descent and has a value of... wow." Reg went quiet.
"What’s wrong, Reg?" asked Melody.
"I'm counting zeros."
"Okay, so he's rich."
"That's a fair statement."
She heard the door bang closed.
"You think he's a client or a partner?" she asked the two men.
"Client," said Denver.
Melody was intrigued. Denver rarely voiced an opinion, he was the strong and silent type.
“What makes you say that, Cox?”
“How much is he worth?”
“Many, many zeros,” replied Reg.
"Okay, so the guy’s a successful businessman. Clearly, he has a head for the ins and outs of business."
"Right, where are you going with this?" said Melody quietly into the mic.
"Do you honestly think that a guy with that many zeros after his name would start a brothel? And would he start a brothel with a known criminal?"
"You're right, he's just a sick and twisted rich man," said Reg.
"So, if he's a client who wants sex, why come to a barn in the middle of nowhere? Why not have hookers sent to his plush apartment in the Docklands?" asked Denver.
"Because what he wants to do can’t really be done in his plush apartment," said Melody. "Guys, I can’t sit here while a girl dies in there."
"Melody, we're observing remember. Sit tight."
"No, Reg. How can I honestly live with myself knowing that I sat behind a barn when on the other side of this wall someone was being raped and murdered?"
"Reign it in, Mills. Come on, no emotions here, put them away," said Denver, the voice of reason.
"Cox, someone is going to die here tonight, she might be dying now."
"If we blow this and they get away then the girls who have already died did so for nothing. Come back to the van, Mills."
"Since when do you give the orders, Cox?"
"When you're out of control. Get back to the van and let's talk it out. If it makes sense, we'll call Frank, and he'll get us back up, but right now you need to get back to the van."
