by Ben Cheetham
When Jim arrived at the hospital, Garrett heaved a sigh as if wearied by the sight of him.
‘Where’s Mark?’ asked Jim.
‘He’s still in with the doctors. I’m told we shouldn’t have to wait too long to see him.’ Garrett’s voice took on a conspiratorial tone. ‘I’ve informed the Chief Superintendent about what was found at the barn. We’re going to have to be very careful how we handle this development. If word gets out that the Chief Superintendent personally vouched for Henry Reeve, it could create a scandal that affects us all.’
Jim gave the DCI a look of open contempt. People were dead – good people – and Christ knew how many other people’s lives had been scarred beyond repair. And all this prick gave a fuck about was his career. He resisted the urge to tell Garrett exactly what he thought of him, knowing he would be wasting his breath. He sat down a couple of chairs away from him and waited in silence.
He didn’t have to wait long. Soon enough, a doctor approached. ‘How is he?’ Jim asked eagerly.
‘About as well as can be expected. He’s asking for a Detective Monahan.’
‘That’s me.’
The doctor motioned for Jim to follow him. Garrett started to stand, but the doctor said, ‘Mark was very specific that he only wants to see Detective Monahan.’
Garrett’s jaw tightened in irritation, but he sat back down without a word.
The doctor led Jim to a room with an armed constable stationed outside it. Mark was propped up in bed, looking pale and drawn but alert and determined. ‘How are you feeling?’ asked Jim.
Mark shrugged as though that was of no consequence. ‘How’s Detective Sheridan? They won’t tell me.’
Jim’s eyes dropped away from Mark’s question, but his pained expression made the answer clear.
‘She’s dead, isn’t she?’ said Mark.
The hard lump in his throat bobbing, Jim managed a nod.
His voice vibrating with grief, Mark continued, ‘Two good people have died today because of me—’
‘No, not because of you, Mark,’ cut in Jim, lifting his gaze. ‘Because of the evil that was done to you. You’re not to blame for any of this.’
‘I don’t blame myself. I just don’t want any more people to die.’
Jim opened his mouth, but closed it without speaking. You and me both, he’d been about to say. But he found himself wondering whether the words would have been true.
A moment of silence passed, then Mark asked, ‘Did you find Doctor Reeve?’
‘Yes.’
‘What about the other man, the one who kidnapped me?’
Jim shook his head. ‘Is he the Chief Bastard?’
‘No. He’s a hired killer.’
‘How do you know that?’
‘Because I spoke to the Chief Bastard. He phoned me to gloat.’
‘What did he sound like?’
‘He sounded like the man from my dream.’
Wrinkles of surprise formed at the corners of Jim’s eyes. He’d fully expected Mark to say the Chief Bastard had a thick local accent, like Bryan Reynolds. ‘Are you sure it wasn’t Doctor Reeve you spoke to?’
‘Yes. This guy’s voice was…’ Mark gave a swallow as he remembered the nauseating sensuality of the Chief Bastard’s voice, ‘different.’
‘Then who is the Chief Bastard?’
‘No idea. All I know for sure is what Grace told me about him.’ Mark gave Jim her description of the Chief Bastard.
‘Bald with tufts of brown hair above his ears, and brown eyes,’ echoed Jim, the wrinkles on his face turning into ridges. However unlikely, Bryan Reynolds could have put on a voice to talk to Mark. But it was beyond doubt that with his long blonde hair and blue eyes, Reynolds didn’t match up to Grace’s description of the Chief Bastard. He’d been wrong all along. Bryan Reynolds wasn’t one of the men in the film. But in that case, who was the Chief Bastard? And if Stephen Baxley and Bryan Reynolds weren’t bound together by a mutual perversion, what was it that had made Reynolds take the fall and go to prison for his fellow debt collector?
Jim rubbed at his suddenly pounding temples. ‘I want you to give me the whole story of what’s happened since this morning.’
As Mark recounted the details of his kidnapping, guilt churned through Jim. The knowledge that his name had been used to lure Mark from the hospital gave added weight to the sense that he bore some indirect responsibility for Amy’s death. ‘Did you tell anyone other than the police operator that you wanted to talk to me?’
‘No, which was one of the things that made me wonder whether…’ Mark tailed off uneasily.
‘Whether what?’
‘Well… whether PC Stone really was who he claimed to be. I mean, how else could he have known what he did?’
‘Most probably by listening in on a police frequency. What were the other things that made you wonder?’
Mark told Jim about his kidnapper’s phone conversation with the Chief Bastard, adding, ‘The way he talked reminded me of how police talk to each other.’
Jim’s thoughts turned to Chief Superintendent Knight’s friendship with Doctor Reeve. Was it possible? Was the DCS—
He cut his thoughts off with a sharp twitch of his head. If he was going to go down that route, he needed to be as certain as a doctor diagnosing a terminal illness. ‘Not only police talk like that. This guy could be an ex-soldier.’
Mark continued his story. Emotion threatened to choke off his words as he described Amy’s fatal confrontation with PC Stone. Jim closed his eyes, fists clenched in helpless rage. He opened them when Mark recounted his conversation with the Chief Bastard. Jim noted down in bold letters: ‘CHIEF BASTARD HAS A COPY OF THE DVD’. He raised an eyebrow at the line, Once a pleb, always a pleb. The Chief Bastard clearly harboured an aristocratic disdain of the nouveau riche. More importantly, he also knew of Stephen Baxley’s humble origins. Maybe he was someone in the same line of business, a fellow industrialist or entrepreneur who’d inherited rather than built his fortune.
When Mark mentioned the code his kidnappers used to phone each other, Jim broke in on him again. ‘I want to make sure I’ve got this right. Three rings, hang up, wait ten seconds, then another three rings.’
Mark nodded, then resumed his story. He described how the hitman had tortured him to bait Grace into coming to the barn, and how a while later he’d heard gunshots. ‘I thought that was it,’ he said hoarsely. ‘I thought I was about to die, but then Grace took the bag off my head and… and I can’t tell you how that felt, to go from certain death to possible life within the space of a few seconds.’ Tears brimmed in his eyes. He wiped them away, his voice quickening as he relived the fight with the hitman.
Jim showed no surprise on hearing that Mark had stabbed the hitman. Time and again over the past few days, Mark had displayed an incredible will to fight for his survival. ‘Which eye did you stab him in?’
‘The left one.’
‘I’ll be back in a moment.’ Jim hurried from the room. Garrett was waiting with eager, questioning eyes.
Jim handed the DCI a written description of the hitman. ‘We need to put an alert out on this guy. He’s most probably driving a black Range Rover. I don’t have a reg. But I do know that he’s urgently in need of medical attention to his left eye.’ Before Garrett could say anything, Jim turned to head back to Mark and his story.
When Jim heard how Grace had been desperate to return to the barn for a book, a sharp gleam of interest came into his eyes. Surely it was a safe bet that the book contained a list of the Winstanleys’ clients or club members. ‘And did she?’
‘No. It would have been suicide.’
The light in Jim’s eyes faded into disappointment. He listened grimly to the story of how Grace had fallen in with Stephen Baxley. His eyes glimmered again at the mention of The Minx. So Reynolds was involved after all. The question was, how deep did his involvement go? Had he known what Baxley needed the flat for? If so, he’d taken a big risk, letting him keep
a fifteen-year-old runaway there. Yet more proof that the two men had shared some kind of bond that gave the industrialist an influence over the gangster that not even his most powerful enemies possessed. There was a soul-destroying inevitability to the abuse Grace had suffered subsequently. Over the years, Jim had come into contact with dozens of runaway children who’d been sexually exploited. Usually the perpetrators of such crimes were bottom-feeders, the dregs of society. Such people tended to be relatively easy to identify. Money and social status, on the other hand, gave offenders a mask of respectability to hide behind. But rich or poor, their motivation always came down to the same two things – money and lust.
It was part of Jim’s job to get into the minds of criminals. He understood the ones who were in it purely for the money – the pimps, drug dealers, thieves and thugs. The type he’d always struggled to understand were the ones who were in it for the pleasure – the perverts, freaks, sadists and psychopaths. Stephen Baxley fell into the latter category. And what had happened in the Winstanleys’ basement took his crimes to a different level of incomprehensibility. As Jim listened to how the Chief Bastard had hit Grace until she gave in to his warped desires, all he could think about was finding him and making him feel the same pain and fear that she’d gone through.
Her ensuing descent into depression and suicidal impulses was almost as inevitable as the abuse. How was anybody – anybody who wasn’t a sexual deviant, that is – supposed to cope with such a memory?
Jim shook his head in disagreement when Mark mentioned Grace’s belief that Stephen Baxley had shown he cared by preventing her from dying of an OD. ‘Men like him never care for their victims. She was just a plaything to him, a commodity. If he kept her alive, it was either because he had further use for her, or because he was too much of a coward to let her die.’
‘Well he must have been a coward, because he didn’t have any further use for her. After she attempted suicide, he had the friend who let them use the flat arrange for her to work in a brothel in Newcastle.’ Mark’s face twisted with hate. ‘The bastard used her, then got rid of her like an unwanted pet.’
Reynolds’s involvement went deep, thought Jim. The question now was, had Reynolds known what went on at the Winstanley house? Or was he merely doing yet another favour for his friend? Jim was inclined to think the latter more probable. If Reynolds had had dealings with the Winstanleys, surely they’d have come onto the police radar before now.
The path Grace’s life had taken after she was trafficked off to Newcastle was a depressingly familiar one. The cycle of prostitution and drug addiction would doubtless have continued for the rest of her life, but for the violent pathology of her formative years. Grace was like an unexploded landmine which had lain buried for fifteen years until Ryan Castle stepped on it. His murder was the catalyst for the spree of killings that brought the story full circle.
Mark briefly related what had happened at the Kirbys’ house. Then he fell silent with a long breath, his eyelids drooping, as if telling the story had drained his final dregs of strength.
‘Get some rest now,’ Jim said gently.
Fear flashed in Mark’s eyes as the detective started to turn away. ‘I don’t want to be alone.’
‘You’re safe here, I guarantee you.’ Even as Jim spoke, he wondered what his guarantee was worth. He pushed the thought aside. Even if – and it was an if so enormous he could barely comprehend its size – Chief Superintendent Knight was guilty of anything more than the desire to avoid a scandal, it would be insane to make an attempt on Mark’s life in the hospital. ‘Close your eyes and sleep.’
‘I don’t think I’ll ever be able to sleep properly again after today.’
‘Yes you will.’ Jim’s voice was full of tender admiration. ‘You’ve got a strength in you that I’ve rarely seen in anyone.’
‘Do you really mean that?’
‘I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t. I don’t think I could’ve survived what you’ve been through.’
A wry smile touched Mark’s lips. ‘It’s funny, Stephen Baxley always made me feel like a weak person, a good-for-nothing mummy’s boy.’
‘Yeah well, you showed him just how wrong he was. If I…’ Jim hesitated briefly, before continuing with a trace of awkwardness. ‘If I was your father, I’d be proud of who you are.’
‘If you were my father, none of this would have happened in the first place.’ Mark cast a furtive glance at the door. His voice dropped low. ‘There’s one more thing I haven’t told you yet. Grace knew your name. You were helping her, weren’t you?’
Cautious uncertainty glazed Jim’s eyes. Mark held not only his career but also his freedom in the palm of his hand. He’d tipped off a murder suspect that the police were coming for her. Official misconduct, obstruction of justice and possibly even accessory to murder were just a few of the charges he could be hit with. And in light of what had happened next, even taking all his years of service into consideration, the courts would have no choice but to come down hard on him.
‘Don’t worry, Detective Monahan,’ continued Mark. ‘You can trust me like I trust you. I promise I won’t tell anyone.’
The thought of Mark making himself an accessory too was almost enough to make Jim wish he would tell someone. He looked at Mark a moment longer, his eyes troubled. Then he turned and left. Garrett was on him the instant he stepped out the door. ‘You’ve been in there a hell of a long time, Detective. He must have had a lot to say.’
Jim handed his notepad to the DCI. ‘It’s all there.’ Except for Mark’s suspicions about the hitman’s background, he added silently.
Garrett’s gaze skimmed over Jim’s notes, his expression impenetrable except for fine lines of strain around his eyes. When he was done, he was silent for a long while as if struggling to digest the welter of sordid details he’d devoured. Finally, he said, ‘It seems you were right about Bryan Reynolds.’
‘I think I was right and wrong. Clearly Reynolds knew about Stephen Baxley and Grace Kirby. But I’m no longer convinced he had anything to do with what went on at the Winstanley house. I think he did what he did because Stephen Baxley had a hold over him.’
‘What kind of hold?’
‘I don’t know.’
‘Well it’s high time we tried to find out.’
‘Do you want me to bring him in?’
‘No. In fact, I can’t allow you to have any further involvement in this, or any other investigation, for the time being.’
Jim frowned. ‘What the hell are you talking about?’
Garrett’s voice took on a shallow veneer of concern, through which traces of relief were detectable. ‘I’ve been informed you were admitted to this hospital earlier tonight with chest pains.’
‘Yes, but I’m fine now. The doctors say it wasn’t a heart attack.’
‘That’s good to hear, but regulations state that I must remove you from active duty with immediate effect pending a clean bill of health. I’m sorry, Jim. I know how much this case means to you.’
Jim scowled. ‘Bollocks you’re sorry. You’ve been looking for a way to kick my arse into touch for months.’
Garrett gave a little wince as though the accusation hurt. ‘I don’t know what gave you that idea. You’re a valued team member and it’ll be a big blow to lose you, especially in the middle of such a difficult investigation.’
Jim pushed his face towards the DCI. ‘Nothing better happen to that boy in there.’ His voice was low and hard. ‘If it does, I’m going to hold you personally responsible.’
Garrett pulled his head back, his eyes round with astonishment. ‘Are you threatening me?’
‘That’s not a threat, that’s just how it is.’
‘Let me tell you how it is, Detective,’ Garrett returned authoritatively, quickly recovering his composure. ‘I’m going to put what you just said down to all the stress you’ve been under recently, and you’re going to go home before you say something else that harms your career beyond repair.’
‘I don’t give a toss what you put it down to, or what happens to my career, just so long as no harm comes to Mark under your watch.’
The muscles of Garrett’s jaw worked as though he was chewing on the sour taste of Jim’s words. As Jim headed for the ward’s exit, he called after him, ‘You’re way out of order, Detective!’
23
The house was as devoid of life as Grace Kirby’s corpse. Jim stared at the living room’s flowery wallpaper that Margaret had chosen, thinking, You’re going to die here. Alone. The thought was like a cold wind blowing through him. He fought down an urge to get back into his car and start driving again. Where would he drive to? As much as he’d come to despise the house, it was all he had left. He shook his head. No, it wasn’t all he had left. Not quite. Not yet.
He picked out photos of Mark and Stephen Baxley and Bryan Reynolds from amongst the case-notes spread over the coffee-table, and lined them up with Stephen at the centre. He sucked intensely on a cigarette, his eyes shifting between the three faces. What was the connection? Back and forth went his eyes. Round and round the facts of the case went his mind.
Stephen and Bryan grew up together on Park Hill. They went to the same school. They worked together for a short while. Bryan swallowed a prison sentence for Stephen in ‘88. Stephen moved in with his future wife Jenny Shaw a month or so later. Jim reached for a photo of Jenny and placed it between Stephen and Bryan. She was a curvaceous, busty redhead a couple of years older than Stephen. Definitely not his type. More the kind of woman Bryan liked to have hanging off his arm. So why had Stephen not only got together with her, but married her when she was pregnant with someone else’s kid? Was it about building a facade of normality around himself? Or was there some other reason? Jim went through the dates once more. Bryan Reynolds was jailed in March ‘88. Four months later Stephen married Jenny. Two months after that Mark was born. What was the fucking connection? Was there even a connection, or was he just grasping at straws, searching vainly for answers where there were only random events?
