4. Gray Retribution

by Alan McDermott

  Harvey rattled off the address to give to Wallace, and once Gray had read it back, he hung up, promising to be in touch once everything was in place.

  Gray toyed with the slip of paper, and knew it was time to make plans of his own. He called Sonny and told him to be at the office within the hour, then threw on a jacket and made his way there.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Wednesday 23 October 2013

  Gray read the note one more time before stuffing it back into the envelope it had arrived in that morning. Like the first one, he had no idea who’d sent it, but it fit nicely into his plan.

  He zipped his jacket and got out of the car, running the fifty yards to the front door of the police station while a gale blew the rain horizontally. Despite being exposed for mere seconds, his jeans were soaked and his hair was plastered to his scalp.

  ‘Nice weather we’re having,’ the duty sergeant said, clearly thrilled at being desk-bound for the day. ‘What can I do for you?’

  Gray gave his name and asked after Wallace, and then took a seat while the officer made the call to one of the upstairs rooms. The detective inspector arrived a few minutes later and showed him into an empty interview room.

  ‘What can I do for you, Tom?’

  ‘I was wondering if you had any new developments,’ Gray said, but Wallace shook his head.

  ‘Sorry, but I wouldn’t want to get your hopes up. I think we’ve done all we can right now.’

  Gray pulled the envelope from his pocket and handed it over, studying Wallace’s face as he absorbed the brief missive.

  Hart is coming for you in the next few days.

  Wallace handed it back with a shrug. ‘I’m sorry, but I’m not sure what I can do with this.’

  ‘Can’t you at least run it through forensics?’

  ‘If we did, we’d have to interview and eliminate a dozen people from Royal Mail, not to mention the people who work in the stationery factory. That takes up a lot of time and resources and I can’t justify that if a crime hasn’t been committed.’

  Gray let his frustration show, thrusting the letter back into his pocket. ‘Then what about protection? Can’t you have a couple of armed officers outside my place for a couple of weeks?’

  ‘Have you read the news recently?’ Wallace asked. ‘We’ve had our funding cut so much, we can’t even put bobbies on the beat anymore.’

  Gray pulled out a piece of paper and handed it to the policeman.

  ‘I didn’t think so. That’s why I’m taking my daughter away for a few days,’ he said, ‘just in case this isn’t all bullshit, which is what you seem to think. If anything comes up, you can find me here. I lost my mobile phone a couple of days ago and won’t know the landline number until I get there, but if you need to contact me, just send someone round with a message.’

  ‘I’m sure I won’t need to, but I’ll hang on to this, just in case.’

  Gray turned to leave, his disgust obvious, but Wallace stopped him.

  ‘I really am sorry, Mr Gray, but you have to understand the constraints we’re working under these days.’ Almost as an afterthought, he said, ‘This Hart guy is resourceful. If the threat turns out to be real, you might want to be prepared.’

  Gray nodded, and Wallace followed him into the lobby, ensuring Gray had left the building before pulling out his alternate phone.

  ‘It’s me,’ he whispered, when Hart picked up. ‘Meet me at the same garage. One hour.’

  He hung up before the gangster could reply and went to get his coat.

  William Hart was already sitting in the smoke-filled office when Wallace arrived at the body workshop five minutes early. The big man wore brightly patterned clothes that looked garish on his large fighter’s frame.

  ‘What’s so urgent, Frank? I’m supposed to be playing golf.’

  The thought of Hart playing golf—in the rain, no less—almost made Wallace smile. ‘I thought you hated golf.’

  ‘I do. Waste of fucking time, if you ask me, but my playing partners are respectable businessmen, and it doesn’t hurt to move in their circles. One of them’s in finance and is helping me shift some of my loot offshore.’

  Wallace feigned interest, but couldn’t care less what Hart got up to anymore.

  ‘Gray is taking a few days away,’ he said, handing over a piece of paper. ‘He’ll be there tomorrow night, but I don’t know how long he’ll be staying, so you’d better hit him quick.’

  Hart looked at the address. ‘Anyone with him?’

  ‘Just him and his daughter,’ Wallace said.

  That drew a rare smile from Hart. ‘I’ll take a few of the lads round. Should be a fun evening.’

  It should indeed, Wallace thought. What he wouldn’t have given to be a fly on the wall as Hart finally got his comeuppance, but he had his own affairs to deal with.

  ‘Don’t forget your alibi,’ Wallace said, as he rose and made for the door.

  ‘Never a problem,’ Hart called after him in a jaunty voice. Clearly he was looking forward to an evening of real sport.

  Once in his car, Wallace headed back to the station, the final part of his plan in place. The getaway car was safely parked near the beach, the ticket for the short hop to Orly Airport in Paris was booked, and then it was just twelve hours to Rio de Janeiro.

  Wallace looked at himself in the rear-view mirror and managed a smile.

  ‘I’m gonna miss you, Frank.’

  As Tom Gray drove through the rain, something didn’t add up.

  If Wallace wants me dead, why did he warn me to prepare for Hart?

  He thought about it as he drove to the hospital, but couldn’t understand why the policeman would want him to be ready for Hart’s arrival. He checked the clock on the dashboard and saw that he still had three hours before Melissa was due to be discharged, so he pointed the car towards the office.

  When he arrived twenty minutes later he found Len Smart sitting at his desk and taking a phone call. Smart held up a finger, so Gray used the time to call Sonny Baines.

  ‘How soon can you get to the office?’

  Sonny promised to be there within fifteen minutes, and Gray made the same request of Campbell and Levine.

  Smart hung up the phone and explained that he’d managed to convince one of the major clients to stick to the contract.

  ‘Now that you’re no longer running the show, they seem a lot happier to hang around.’

  ‘Oh, well, I’m glad it’s nothing personal,’ Gray said. ‘That reporter’s got a lot to answer for.’

  ‘Forget Boyd,’ Smart said. ‘We’re doing fine despite the son-of-a-bitch. So what brings you here?’

  Gray said he’d rather wait for the others to arrive, so they grabbed a coffee from the kitchen and discussed the plan for Melissa.

  The trio arrived within five minutes of each other, and Gray waited until they got their drinks before convening the session. He brought Campbell and Levine up to speed on the last couple of days, then recounted his meeting with Wallace at the station.

  ‘So let me get this straight,’ Campbell said. ‘Wallace and Hart are working together and they want you dead, but the copper is warning you to watch your back?’

  ‘That about sums it up,’ Gray said. ‘Only question is, why?’

  ‘Looks like he doesn’t want Hart to succeed,’ Sonny suggested.

  ‘I agree,’ Levine said. ‘Maybe he wants you to take Hart out for him.’

  Carl’s words brought the moment of clarity Gray had been seeking.

  ‘Wallace sent me those notes,’ he said.

  Now it all made sense. Wallace wanted Hart out of the picture, and who better to take him down than a man with a history of taking the law into his own hands?

  ‘Why doesn’t Wallace just arrest him?’ Campbell asked. ‘He must have so much information about Hart’s operations, it should be an open and shut case.’

  ‘Maybe Hart has something on him,’ Sonny said. ‘Photos, recordings, or perhaps he’s just scared of w
hat Hart might reveal during a trial.’

  The others nodded, seeing it as the only logical explanation.

  ‘Okay, so we’re agreed that Wallace wants me to take Hart down,’ Gray said. ‘Now we just need to figure out why.’

  ‘And what to do about it,’ Sonny added.

  For the benefit of Campbell and Levine, Gray explained what Andrew Harvey had planned for Hart.

  ‘Then that’s it sorted,’ Levine said. ‘They arrest Hart at the scene and bring Wallace in later. I’d say that was job done.’

  ‘Really?’ Sonny asked. ‘You think Hart’s just going to take life in prison on the chin?’

  Campbell nodded. ‘He’ll come after Tom again, even if he’s behind bars. That type have friends on the outside, and Tom’s never going to be safe.’

  ‘And you agreed to Harvey’s plan, Tom?’ Levine asked.

  ‘I did indeed.’ Gray stood and asked Smart to fill the boys in, before heading for the door.

  ‘Wallace must have a backup plan, just in case Hart manages to get to me. We need to figure out what it is.’

  Everyone nodded, and Gray checked his watch.

  ‘I’m going to pick Melissa up. I’ll see you guys later.’

  Chapter Thirty-Three

  Thursday 24 October 2013

  ‘We’ve got a car approaching. Looks like four up.’

  ‘Understood.’

  Harvey looked at his watch for the hundredth time that evening and wondered if this was false alarm number fifty-three. It was just before midnight and for the main part, the street was quiet. The exception was the house two doors along, where the occupants had decided to hold an impromptu party after the pubs had kicked out the last customers. Harvey could feel the beat of the music that had started thirty minutes earlier, and cursed his decision not to nip it in the bud. That would have meant officers out in the open, and he couldn’t risk scaring Hart off.

  As it turned out, there’d been no sign of the gangster, and he knew he would have to put up with the drum and bass until the operation was over.

  He peered through the window of the top floor bedroom as the target vehicle cruised slowly past the building, then continued on to the end of the street.

  The car turned the corner, and Harvey sat back in his chair, wondering where Hart was. His men had seen Hart being picked up from his house three hours earlier, only to lose the car in traffic. That meant Hart and his people had had ample opportunity to change vehicles, collect others, and do God-only-knew what else.

  He hated when missions started off with a balls-up, but that was often the nature of the game.

  ‘Go round again,’ Hart said. ‘I want to make sure no-one’s expecting us.’

  The driver did as ordered, and the occupants of the car scanned the area for suspicious vehicles.

  ‘It looks clear,’ Aiden said.

  His brother Sean agreed. ‘There’s fuck all out there.’

  ‘Okay,’ Hart said. ‘Go back to the house and pull over.’

  The driver cruised along quietly, not wanting to alert anyone by roaring down the road.

  ‘You got my bag there, son?’

  ‘Got it,’ Sean said, holding it up so that his father could see it in the rear-view mirror.

  ‘Good lad. Now listen, when we get in there, you leave that fucker to me. I don’t want you shooting him before I’ve had a chance to work on him.’

  The boys agreed, knowing full well what the consequences of upsetting their father were. Both had taken enough beatings from the man, and though neither was a genius, that was one lesson they’d learned pretty early in life.

  The car came to a stop and the driver asked if he should come along.

  ‘No,’ Hart said. ‘You wait here and keep an eye out for plod. If we need you, we’ll shout.’

  The doors opened and the Hart family headed towards their evening’s excitement.

  ‘Heads up, that same car is coming round again.’

  Harvey was immediately alert, and he watched the car once more turn into the street and park up a few yards from the house.

  ‘Wait for my signal,’ Harvey said, as he watched the doors open. The rain lashing against the window made it difficult to make out the faces, but when he saw one of the rear passengers emerge with a dark holdall, he knew something was about to go down.

  ‘Go, go, go!’

  He’d barely finished barking the command into the radio when the first of the armed response units sped into the street, disgorging firearms officers who yelled for the occupants of the car to get down on the ground.

  The men appeared shell shocked, standing in the middle of the road, the rain soaking them to the skin.

  ‘Armed police! Down on the floor, now!’

  The severity of the situation began to dawn, and they complied with the commands, lying face down with their arms spread-eagled. The officers approached in numbers, two for every suspect. Each of the prostrate figures had an MP5 trained at them while another officer cuffed them before performing a comprehensive body search.

  Harvey ran out into the street as the men were being read their rights.

  ‘Any weapons?’ he asked the squad leader.

  ‘Nothing so far.’

  Harvey spotted the holdall and asked a gloved officer to open it, not wanting to contaminate any potential evidence.

  The man slung his rifle and knelt down, carefully opening the zip before letting out a long whistle.

  ‘Man, these guys know how to party.’

  He pulled out a bottle of Glenlivet and held it up for Harvey to see.

  ‘That’s it?

  ‘Nope. They’ve also got a bottle of vodka and a dozen beers. Oh, and a rugby strip that needs a good wash.’

  Harvey went over to the first of the suspects and indicated for the officer to get him to his feet.

  ‘What are you doing here?’ Harvey asked.

  ‘We were invited to a party,’ the man said, nodding towards the booming house. ‘Go and ask Sue. She lives there and rang us fifteen minutes ago.’

  Harvey wiped the rain from his face, the weather matching his current mood.

  ‘Get ’em out of here!’

  The armed officers removed the men’s cuffs and the protestations began immediately.

  ‘Hey, I’m fucking soaking here. What the fuck was that all about?’

  One of the suspects walked over to Harvey and spun him round.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Harvey said flatly. ‘The officers will take your details and we’ll be round to make a full apology in the next few days.’

  ‘Fuck the apology, I want to make a formal complaint. What’s your name?’

  Even though the man towered a foot above him, Harvey wasn’t in the mood for histrionics.

  ‘Look, son, you just fucked up a highly sensitive police operation, and I’ve a good mind to have you arrested for obstruction. I could have you all searched for drugs and tear the car apart looking for evidence.’

  The man was speechless, the drug remark having obviously struck a chord. He was considering a comeback when Harvey’s earpiece burst into life.

  ‘Another car just indicated into the street, then changed its mind. There were three up.’

  Great, Harvey thought. Any chance they had of catching Hart in the act was probably blown, and with a number of people braving the rain to see what was going on, there was no way things were going to return to normal in the next few hours.

  ‘Okay, wrap it up,’ he said into his collar microphone. ‘Teams one and two, stay at the flat, alternate shifts. Let me know if he shows up. The rest of you, stand down. I repeat, stand down.’

  The tall suspect decided that wet clothes were preferable to losing his stash, and he picked up the holdall before heading towards the party, leaving Harvey the unenviable task of explaining the mess to Ellis.

  The Harts walked the hundred and fifty yards to the cottage, sticking to the bushes that ran along the side of the country road. They were soaked by the time they
reached the wooden gate that led to the thatched building, but their minds were on other matters.

  One of the upper floor rooms was illuminated, and they could see Gray standing by the window, holding a bundle in his arms.

  Sean started towards the door, but his father grabbed his coat.

  ‘We stay here until he’s asleep,’ Hart said, leading them behind a large rhododendron bush.

  As if on cue, the light went out and the garden was bathed in darkness, the late autumn clouds blotting out the faint glow from the third-quarter moon.

  ‘How long?’ Aiden asked.

  ‘At least half an hour,’ Hart said, though he didn’t particularly relish the thought of waiting. The alternative, though, was to take on a wide-awake ex-soldier who, by his own accounts, had killed more than his fair share of men.

  Hart was by no means a coward, but he knew when to play it safe.

  The minutes dragged, but with every passing moment, Hart felt more confident. The plan was for Sean to break in through a rear window and open the back door, then Hart would climb the stairs and subdue Gray with the Taser he was carrying in his pocket.

  Once he was tied up, they would extract the information they’d come for, perhaps using the girl to demonstrate their resolve.

  ‘It’s been half an hour,’ Aiden said, and Hart nodded.

  ‘Follow me,’ he whispered, and led the boys to the rear of the house.

  ‘In there,’ Hart said, pointing to the kitchen window.

  Sean pulled a knife from his pocket and went to work on the wood until the window gave silently. Within seconds he was inside and he unlocked the door for the other men.

  Hart took the lead, motioning for the boys to stay close as he climbed the stairs to the first floor landing. After getting his bearings, Hart knew that one of the two doors on his right was the front-facing bedroom where they’d seen Gray. The first door they came to was open, and inside they found a toilet and bath.

  This one, Hart mouthed, and on the count of three, they burst into the second room.

  Hart went in first and spotted the mound under the blanket that covered the double bed. His Taser sent two barbed electrodes towards the dark outline, and as he kept his finger on the trigger, fifty thousand volts ran through the wires.