“Crooked as they come.” Jason knew he’d been a bad boy, but to his mind there was nothing worse than a man who pretended to be an upstanding citizen and ruined lives on the quiet. He was sure the honest coppers were glad to pack him away—but clearly at least one among them mourned his loss.
“I’ll call up a list of everyone he ever worked with in Bangor and cross-reference it against the current staff at Central Police Station. I’ll set Ana to it now, but it might take a while—he had a long and illustrious career and he was sent down twelve years ago.”
Something else was missing. “Why did they wait until now to break him out?”
Amy shrugged. “Opportunity, maybe. Didn’t have a hacker until they recruited Damage.”
“Or maybe they were waiting for the dust to settle. Might be that they’ve been shaking off the scandal in Bangor or working their way up the food chain ever since.”
A strange look came over Amy’s face. “What’s the name of that detective who interviewed you? Roger-something? Where’s he from?”
“Ebbings? Swansea, by his accent. Why?”
Amy tapped at her screen a few times. “He was a rookie detective in Gwynedd South from 1996. Transferred out nine years ago and came down here.”
Jason suddenly felt cold. “That fits the time window exactly.”
Amy winced. “He’s Bryn’s boss, isn’t he?”
“We are going to give the detective a coronary.”
Amy swiped her fingers across the screen. “I’ll look into the Thomas Morris case. There must’ve been other coppers implicated or suspected. I will hunt them down.”
The image of Amy hunting down terrified coppers while brandishing a tablet was both amusing and faintly terrifying. Jason would never want her to hunt him.
“What should I do?” he asked.
Amy grinned. “Make the tea.”
Chapter Forty-Three: Come Together
When the cell door opened, Bryn was already waiting.
Owain said nothing to him but walked out at his side. Bryn guided him away from the main entrance and towards the little-used side door. Thankfully, the reporters were fixated on a press conference Roger was giving—about Jason, not Rich. Roger had decided that a detective sergeant’s suicide wouldn’t exactly inspire confidence in Cardiff’s finest, and Bryn conceded that the press would probably tear them apart over the poor lad’s death, whatever the cause.
Once inside the car, Bryn expected Owain to open up, protest his innocence, make his case to his mentor. But he said nothing at all, apparently lost inside his own head.
Bryn let him be for a few minutes as he negotiated Cardiff’s Saturday traffic, but as he hit the long, straight A roads, the silence began to get to him.
“It could be worse, you know,” Bryn said conversationally.
Owain stared blankly at his hands but eventually spoke. “How could it be worse?”
“They could’ve brought you up before the magistrate, charged you and remanded you in custody. Some boy like Jason Carr would’ve lamped you one and then your pretty face wouldn’t do nothing for the ladies no more. That would’ve been a tragedy.”
Owain made a small noise, half laugh and half sob.
Bryn just drove, not daring to look over and see what state the boy was in. “Or you could be dead like Rich Porter.”
Owain winced. “Rich is dead? Just like Jason told it.” He hesitated. “If Rich Porter was there when Dai Jones was killed, he would’ve told, wouldn’t he?”
“I know he would,” Bryn said, immediately. Whatever else Rich might’ve been, he wouldn’t just stand aside while a kid was killed. He would’ve talked—and quick. Bryn could give him that, at least. Money for talk wasn’t the same as turning a blind eye to a murder.
“Who did for him?” Owain asked warily.
Bryn knew they shouldn’t be talking about this but it felt good to have Owain back, to bounce ideas off him again. He turned onto the M4, heading out to Owain’s house in Bridgend, and gave Owain a brief rundown of Indira’s findings, trying not to think of that cocky little wanker lying so still and cold in a deflated orange dinghy. It was so hard to hate the dead.
“It’s a pretty elaborate suicide,” Owain said, when he’d finished. “I mean, someone went to a lot of trouble, when they could’ve just hanged him from the rafters or topped him in the bathtub.”
“Nothing about this bloody case adds up,” Bryn groused. “We’re missing something, not least that Amy reckons you’ve been set up—both of you.”
“No one will listen to Amy,” Owain said in a small voice. “Just like none of us listened to Jason.”
“Is that why you said nothing? Because you saw what happened to our boy?”
“Condemned for being a liar and a murderer,” Owain said, and Bryn felt his eyes on him. “Have they found him yet?”
“Officially, they’re still looking, but most of the armed officers have gone home. They reckon he got on a boat to Ireland.”
“Do you believe that?”
Bryn snorted. “Boy’s got Wales in his veins. He’s somewhere about.”
“Amy knows.”
Bryn said nothing. He was absolutely certain Amy knew, not least because he could hear two lots of breathing down the end of the phone. He might be getting on but he had hearing as sharp as a fox. Not that he was going to let on—it always paid to have folks underestimate you.
“I’ve lost my job, haven’t I?” Owain said finally. His tone was matter-of-fact, calm, logical.
“Probably,” Bryn admitted. “Unless you want to tell us why you had that bag of cocaine on you.”
Owain sighed. “Doesn’t matter though, does it? Possession is possession.”
“It matters a great deal. Was it evidence you hadn’t logged? Confiscation from a CI? I know you didn’t walk up to Stuart Williams and buy it.”
“Drop it, okay? I’m exercising my right to remain silent.”
Bryn hadn’t been born yesterday. “This is about a woman, isn’t it?”
A quick glance showed him that Owain had turned scarlet. “No comment.”
Bryn laughed. “Really? Come on, Owain, Does your lady love really want you to take the fall for her?”
Owain was silent for a long time but, when he finally spoke, he sounded wretched. “Bryn, please. Don’t ask me again.”
Bryn let it slide. When this was all over—and he hoped to God it would be over—there was going to be lot of clearing up to do, not least straightening out who deserved their charges and the crimes on their heads. Bryn was too much of an old-fashioned cop to let such injustices slide.
As they pulled up outside Owain’s house—the spit of the ones either side of it and the one opposite—Bryn fixed him with a look. “I hope she’s worth it. That’s all. All right?”
Owain got out of the car but leaned back through the door. “She is, Bryn.”
He walked away towards his front door. For a moment, Bryn was stung that he hadn’t been invited in for a cup of tea.
But then the door opened and Cerys Carr flung herself into Owain’s arms, hugging him as if she were drowning in the middle of the ocean and he were her only hope of survival. Owain clung to her, burying his head in her shoulder and pressing their bodies so close together that it was hard to tell where one ended and the other began.
After a moment, Bryn looked away, colour rising on his cheeks. “Poor sod. Boy’s got his hands full with that one.”
He just prayed that Jason never found or that, when he did, Amy had him on a leash.
* * *
It was all drawing together, like the final stitches of a master tapestry detailing the work of an empire. His empire.
Once his work was finished and the press had all gone home, Zook texted the final location to Stuart Wil
liams and Mickey’s lackey. In some ways, he respected Mickey’s paranoia around technology—it was how he had stayed off the grid all these years—but ultimately it was a barrier to progress. You couldn’t teach an old dog new tricks, and Mickey was of the ancient and noble order of gutter scum that Zook had spent the best part of his life crushing beneath his heel.
It was those qualities that led him to use Mickey’s boys for Rich Porter’s timely demise, and wasn’t that working out splendidly? It took all Zook’s effort not to walk around whistling his delight.
Stuart...now Stuart was something he could work with. If the boy had an ounce of survival instinct, Zook could make something of him. But unfortunately, he was at best a low-level gangster, made for posturing and gesturing at the bulge in his coat pocket. Stuart had watched too many movies.
Part of the reason for moving tonight was Stuart Williams and his gangster loyalty. Somehow, he’d got a bee in his bonnet about Mickey being responsible for Damage’s death. There was that instinct to protect his own, take sides, stick with one’s own kind. A herd instinct more befitting cattle.
Zook was a new breed. He needed bright young things. He needed pawns and soldiers, aging children like Damage Jones. Except without a conscience. It had been a shame, really, that Damage had to go. But his brother’s impending transfer had obsessed the boy, driven him to perfecting his technique until he was certain of it.
Pity it would never be used on Lewis Jones. They had wasted that particular opportunity on Jason Carr, still elusive or dead, but he doubted LOCDunne would learn from it. When the time was ripe, that door was still open to him. But Morris could languish in prison a little longer, as long as he had funds, social currency. And Zook could ensure that forevermore.
But first, tonight. Tonight was the launch party, the gala event of the season. Roll up, roll up, come see Bazooka and his Amazing Ants. Watch them jump! Watch them dance!
Watch them die.
* * *
“Thomas Morris had a wife.”
“Poor woman.” Jason emerged from the kitchen, tea towel over his shoulder, and crossed to the sofa to lean over Amy’s shoulder. He grunted as he braced himself against the back of the sofa. Was it his fractured ribs? His raging pneumonia? Or had he aggravated his broken nose? So many injuries, and Amy had failed to protect him from all of them.
“They divorced before the trial. She moved back in with her parents—and she took her son with her.”
“A son? He’d be what now? Teens? Twenties?”
“Twenty-one.”
Jason squeezed Amy’s shoulder in delight. “You found him!”
Amy twisted to look at him. “He took his mother’s maiden name. But he was named for his father.”
She could see Jason’s mind ticking over, and then—”Farmer Thomas.”
“Thomas Wertham. Born 1993 to Thomas Morris and Maria Wertham. Sole occupant of Pen-y-Bryn Farm just off Junction 36 of the M4. And if I’m correct in my suspicions...”
She tapped away at the iPad while Jason waited patiently. Even jailbroken, the tablet didn’t have half the capabilities of AEON, and Ana the Ancient was the one doing the work through the cumbersome and painfully slow Polish server. Amy silently willed the data to her fingertips. If AEON was the latest roller coaster at Alton Towers, this setup was a doddery old dodgem on Barry seafront.
“Yes! In deep financial difficulties until May of this year when he received an unexpected bailout. And then a regular sum every month since. Anonymous cash, labelled as some kind of florist.”
Jason jumped. “Florist! That’s what the man in the alley said, about the coke. It was fronting as a florist on his bank statement.”
“No one suspects a florist.” If she had a moustache, she would twirl it.
Jason grinned. “I dunno. I once cut my thumb on a rose thorn and it stung like—”
“Your charming city-boy story aside, it’s a decent cover.” Amy saved a copy of the bank statements for future reference. “But why the ongoing payments? Surely swinging open one rusty gate isn’t worth that kind of hush money.”
“They’re setting up a new operation, right?” Jason said, using the slow, ponderous voice of the thoughtful. “Large scale, new kid on the block, posting and packaging—you’d have a hell of a time hiding that from the cops in Cardiff, especially with the National Crime Agency setting up a stall. But a barn in the countryside, right next to the M4? You’d be laughing.”
It made perfect sense. The only problem was... “How the hell do we prove it?”
Jason grinned. “Go down there and have a look.”
Amy glared at him. “Hilarious. Just drive straight up to them and say ‘Excuse me, do you have a cocaine processing plant here?’”
“I was planning to be a bit more, y’know, subtle.”
“Subtle and you have never met, Jason. You are about as opposite as the Arctic Circle and the Sahara Desert.”
Jason put a hand to his chest as if she had mortally wounded him. “I can be subtle.”
“Like Brian Blessed in Flash Gordon.” Amy gestured towards the front of the house. “And you don’t think the cops spying on us will notice when you drive off in the Micra?”
“I’ll take the Harley.”
“Do you have a death wish? Who’s going to back you up?” Amy’s heart rate was increasing just thinking about it. Outside the city limits, she had no metal spies—he would be totally alone.
Jason folded his arms like a sulky teenager. “Let’s see what Bryn says.”
“He will tell you you’re being a moron. He can send cops out there to suss it out.”
The iPad started to beep, a slow, steady throb like her heartbeat wasn’t, and she scrolled through the apps trying to find the culprit. “Oh. The van is moving.”
Jason peered down at the screen. “Mickey’s boys’ van?”
“The one in Dylan’s garage. Where’s it going?”
They sat in silence, watching the van negotiate the post—rush hour streets, before finally turning onto the A48 and the M4. Heading towards the farm.
“We could catch them in the act,” Jason said in a conspiratorial whisper. “That’s way better than just stumbling across the stash.”
“No,” Amy said, automatically, reflexively. It had been terrifying watching him ride into Canton last night, with only her sister and CCTV to protect him. But to let him stumble into God-knows-what in the Valleys, where it was difficult to even send a text? Not a chance.
“At least call Bryn!” Jason pleaded.
“And tell him what? It’s all speculation! We don’t know there’s anything on that farm except sheep and the son of a criminal cop. The payments could mean nothing at all.”
Jason was intense, determined. “When have you ever walked away from a mystery? What are you scared of?”
“You dying because I can’t protect you!”
The words hung between them like pale spectres in the air. Jason was stiff, stunned, and Amy buried her head in her tablet, hiding away the riot of emotions she felt.
“Amy...”
The iPad trilled, more wail than alarm. Amy knew that sound. “The perimeter has been breached.”
She isolated the source of the alarm and pulled up the rear camera—two figures in black scaling her gate. Coming for them.
Chapter Forty-Four: The Marketplace
For a long moment, she was paralysed, just watching the men draw closer.
Then Jason grabbed her arm and yanked her off the sofa. “We have to go.”
Amy looked at him as if he’d gone stark raving mad and tried desperately to understand him. “Downstairs. Next door!”
She started down the corridor, but Jason held on to her arm, stilling her against him. “No—we’ll trap ourselves. We need to get out.”
He let her go for a moment to retrieve her hoodie from the back of her office chair and thrust it into her arms. He jogged into the kitchen and she could hear him rummaging around in the cupboard.
Glancing down at the screen, she saw the figures climbing the balcony. She felt strangely detached from it, as if she were watching a movie. This couldn’t be happening to her. Not again.
Another alarm beeped. They had reached the top. All that stood between them and her were the French doors in her bedroom.
And Jason.
He rocketed out of the kitchen, brandishing his car keys, and grabbed her hand. “We are going to lead the cops right to them.”
He pocketed her phone from the desk and pulled her towards the door.
“Wait.” She yanked her hand away from him, still numb and detached. They were picking the lock now. It had taken Jason just over two minutes to break in, and he’d had hypothermia. They would break the lock in about thirty seconds.
She dived into the box of wires under AEON’s desk and pulled out a cardboard box the size of a cereal packet, hoping she’d stuffed all the connectors back in.
Jason seized her waist and dragged her backwards. She clung on to the box, the iPad and her jumper as he shoved her into the corridor.
A blast of cold air ripped through the house. They were inside.
The lift doors opened too slowly and Jason pushed her in. A noise like thunder tore through the air, and something hot and silver flew past her temple. The doors shuddered shut, as metal hit metal, a dull ping above them as the lift descended.
“They shot at me,” she said faintly.
Jason took the box and iPad off her and pressed a small brown bottle into her palm. “I picked these up.”
Amy looked at the label, unscrewed the cap and shook them directly into her mouth.
“Hey! You only ever take one!” Jason snatched the bottle back off her, aghast.
“Desperate times,” she said around the pills and swallowed them down. Fuck, she was going outside. For the first time in ten years. Could she really do this?
If you stay, you die.
Code Runner (Amy Lane Mysteries Book 2) Page 25
