Another Good Killing: An exciting, fast-paced crime thriller (Detective John Marco crime thriller Book 2) (Detective Inspector Marco)

by Stephen Puleston

  ‘Let’s get back to Queen Street,’ I said, making for my car. I had wasted enough time already and I needed to contact Lydia. None of the previous sergeants I had worked with had made themselves as indispensable as her. I cursed when I saw the parking penalty notice stuck to the windscreen and I tore it away and thrust it at Wyn. ‘Sort that out, for Christ sake.’

  Minutes later we were pulling up at the car park behind Queen Street. I stabbed the code into the security pad before taking the stairs two at a time to the second floor. My mobile was pinned to my ear as I dialled Lydia’s mobile again. Her voicemail message started so I finished the call and threw my mobile onto the desk. From my computer I found Lydia’s home telephone number, alongside an address in Pontypridd. If she had slept late I was going to give her a dressing down but it was so unlike her and her home telephone just rang out.

  I realised that I’d not heard from her since last night. A knot of anxiety developed as I scanned through the emails in my inbox.

  I should have welcomed my mobile ringing, but I snarled at the caller. ‘DI Marco.’

  ‘It’s Ian Lewis, Inspector. We met this morning—’

  ‘What is it?’

  ‘There are streams of people crossing the concourse in front of our building. They’ve got placards and they’re shouting—’

  I stood up abruptly. ‘We’ll be there as soon as we can.’

  I shouted at Wyn and Jane and then we galloped out of Queen Street and found a pool car that Wyn hammered down Churchill Way towards the Bay.

  ‘Any news about Lydia?’ Jane asked.

  I was peering out of the front windscreen. I turned and looked over at her. ‘No answer from her mobile. And I tried her home number before we left.’

  Jane frowned. Wyn mounted the pavement with the nearside wheels. We ran over towards the offices. There must have been two hundred people congregated outside. And there were more streaming in from each corner of the square in a coordinated approach. They gathered outside the bank. I saw Henson opening a small stepladder. Then someone passed him a megaphone and he began a tirade about the redistribution of wealth, demanded the introduction of a Robin Hood tax, all to the cheers and encouragement from the swelling crowd. Wyn tugged at my jacket sleeve. ‘The TV crews have arrived, sir.’

  I looked over to the far end of the square where Wyn was pointing. ‘For Christ sake. That’s all we need.’

  I reached my hand into a pocket and stared at my mobile hoping that in the middle of all the activity around me I had missed the sound of Lydia’s call, but the screen was blank. Her lack of contact was entirely out of character and the irritation it caused had now developed into real concern.

  The television crew walked over towards the assembled crowd. It all seemed stage-managed as though Henson had choreographed everything to the finest detail. He finished and cheers erupted from his audience just as a journalist stuck a microphone under his face. I kept looking around hoping to spot Lydia.

  Then I rang area control who put me through to the desk sergeant in Pontypridd. He was reluctant at first but eventually he agreed to send someone to Lydia’s home. As soon as the television cameras left the mood in the crowd changed. A section peeled away towards the lawyers’ offices. The same number headed for the front door of the bank. The security officers didn’t have time to lock the doors and the group flooded in, shouting abuse.

  ‘What do we do, boss?’ Wyn said.

  I was thinking the same thing. But there was no breach of the peace, yet. The first group had been swelled by more protesters and they were flooding into the foyer of the law firm. Then my mobile rang and I heard Ian Lewis’ ragged voice. ‘These people have gone through our entire building. They are everywhere. Surely you can do something about it.’

  I turned to Wyn. And then Jane. ‘One of you call the sergeant in the Bay and the other the sergeant on duty in Queen Street. We need some uniformed lads down here. Now.’ I jogged over towards the main entrance.

  A deafening scream made me stop in my tracks. I stared around, and then from the side of the building I heard a woman shrieking.

  Chapter 37

  I raced over to where I’d heard the scream and noticed a crowd had gathered. I heard someone shout for an ambulance. A woman pushed past me and promptly spewed up on the pavement. I elbowed my way through the throng. There were snippets of conversations that barely registered. Then I heard my voice shouting. ‘Police. Move to one side.’

  Jane had raised her voice too as we struggled through the mix of protesters and onlookers. A gap opened abruptly and I stood looking down at a mangled body.

  Harper must have died instantly. The cord of a lanyard hung around his neck and tied to the end was a plastic envelope. One More Greedy Bastard was typed on the paper in the same large font as before.

  I shot a glance up at the top of the building.

  I turned to Jane and Wyn. ‘Wyn, you secure the scene until we get a full CSI team here. And get the names of witnesses. Jane, you come with me.’ I turned and barged my way back to the square through the thinning crowd.

  I called Ian Lewis who answered immediately. ‘Get the front door closed. Now.’

  I finished the call without waiting for a reply. Then I called area control and gave clear instructions about the CSI teams needed. A siren sounded and I saw an ambulance mount the pavement and then travel down the square towards us, quickly followed by a paramedic car covered in the bright-yellow livery. The siren died but then another screeched as two police cars neared.

  I reached the main entrance: two security guards stood inside looking helpless alongside the noisy protesters. I hammered a fist on the door until I caught the attention of one of them. He squeezed open the door and a bank of sound escaped. Discarded placards littered the floor, demonstrators milled around, and the staff all looked uneasy and frightened.

  I headed for reception, Jane close behind me.

  ‘I need to see Ian Lewis,’ I said to a terrified receptionist. ‘Now!’

  She nodded to the lifts. ‘Third floor.’

  I jabbed at the button calling the lift and it lit up at the third attempt. The lift indicator told me it was at the first floor. But it had been there for ages. The seconds dragged, I couldn’t delay. I looked around for the stairs just as the doors opened. I had to find how Harper fell to his death. I had to find out from where. And I had to find out if Henson was in the building. Ian was waiting for us when the lift doors opened. ‘Is it true?’ His face was three shades paler than when I had seen him that morning.

  ‘Where did it happen?’ I said.

  Lewis jerked his head down the corridor and we followed him. ‘There’s a small balcony area on the next floor. It has views over the city and sometimes we use it to impress clients and have drinks parties in the summer.’

  He led us through various offices with staff huddled together in groups. I noticed a group of the younger girls wiping away tears.

  ‘Do you have CCTV in the building?’ I said.

  ‘In the public areas only and there’s a system in the lifts. But not in the offices.’

  It had been too much to hope that CCTV would give us a nice clean image of the killer grabbing Harper, dragging him to the fourth-floor balcony and then hurling him over to his death. We reached a door to a staircase and Ian led us up towards the balcony area.

  My mobile rang. It was Alvine. ‘Where are you Marco?’

  ‘On the fourth-floor balcony. I need a team by the body.’

  ‘Done.’

  ‘And another team up here. And Alvine,’ I hesitated. ‘Is…?’

  ‘No. Tracy’s on her rest day.’

  Part of me was relieved, another annoyed that I had wanted to see her again.

  A gentle breeze warmed my face once Ian opened the door. He stepped over the threshold and let Jane and I walk out onto the balcony. I stopped for a moment, listening to the faint chatter of voices from the square below. I didn’t have any latex gloves with me, nor covers for my sh
oes. So I stepped around the perimeter of the balcony and, careful not to touch it, peered over the handrail. I could just about make out Wyn, various paramedics and the CSI team that were busy establishing a perimeter. There were only a few spectators dawdling on the square near Harper’s body.

  I stepped back, turning to Ian. ‘Who has access to this balcony?’

  His shoulders sank. ‘Anybody really. It’s not restricted.’

  ‘Did Harper have any personal problems?’ I had to eliminate every possibility.

  Ian snorted. ‘Don’t be absurd. He was the most well-adjusted person I have ever met.’

  ‘Any financial problems?’

  Ian stared at me, scarcely believing my question. ‘He was one of the senior partners of this firm. He has made a fortune over the years from banking and commercial work.’

  The door behind us opened and Alvine stepped onto the balcony. She scanned our shoes and hands.

  ‘I haven’t touched anything and we haven’t walked over the main part of the balcony.’

  She nodded. ‘It’s chaos downstairs.’

  Another investigator carrying bags of equipment joined her in the doorway.

  ‘We’ll need to get started.’ Alvine was already reaching for plastic covers for shoes and snapping on latex gloves.

  We retraced our steps to the third floor and Ian led us into his office. I had telephone calls to make, officers I needed to organise. There were dozens, maybe more, of demonstrators in the building, all of whom needed to be spoken to, and their details taken before we started on staff and visiting clients. Among them somewhere was a killer with a motive for the deaths of Dolman and Turner and now Harper. My excitement was raw at the certainty of being within touching distance of the murderer.

  ‘I need a list of all your staff. Everyone that was here this morning.’

  Ian nodded.

  ‘Were there any clients visiting the building?’

  ‘The visitors’ log should give us that information.’

  ‘And I want CCTV tapes from every part of the building sent over to Queen Street immediately.’

  Charlotte Parkinson appeared at the door of his office with two men in their mid-thirties wearing expensive-looking suits, crisp white shirts with equally expensive-looking ties.

  ‘Is it true?’ she said.

  Ian stumbled over something to say. One of the men standing with Charlotte put a hand over her shoulder. ‘Mr Harper was fine this morning. He was looking forward to his meeting today,’ he said.

  Ian nodded. ‘The police,’ he glanced over at me, ‘are treating it as suspicious.’

  ‘What!’ Charlotte gasped.

  The second man – I had assumed they were all lawyers from their clipped measured tones, almost as bad as accountants – chipped in. ‘You mean somebody killed him?’

  ‘We’ll need to speak to you all in due course.’

  Then I remembered that Lydia had still not been in touch. I reached into my jacket pocket, fumbled and almost dropped my mobile. Then I dialled her number – straight to voicemail again. I rang Queen Street – she hadn’t called in either. Then I tried her landline number but as it rang out it only increased my anxiety.

  Then my mobile rang and I noticed Cornock’s name. ‘We found Lydia’s car.’

  *

  After hammering along the A470 towards Merthyr Tydfil and then taking the junction towards Quaker’s Yard I jolted my car to a standstill on the pavement outside an old dilapidated industrial unit. A bad feeling developed in the pit of my stomach when I realised we were nowhere near the property where she had been last night. A patrol car was parked diagonally across the entrance and after carding the uniformed officer I strode past him.

  There were six units with electrical sectional doors, each firmly closed. One of the units was occupied by a double-glazing company, a second by a business selling solar heating panels, where two brightly coloured vans had been parked outside. The other units were all securely locked and barred. I saw Cornock looking through the driver’s side window of Lydia’s Ford and I walked over towards him.

  ‘I understand that she was on surveillance last night.’ Cornock used a measured tone.

  ‘All the team did a few hours.’ I should have known the surveillance would be pointless. What could we have possibly learnt?

  ‘I’m going to see if anybody saw anything.’ I glanced over towards the units behind me.

  ‘Bring me up to date as soon as you’re back in Queen Street,’ Cornock said before walking towards his car.

  I paced over to the double-glazing company. The door was a PVCu variety that squeaked when it opened. A well-endowed woman with startling blond hair sat behind a desk. Her make-up cracked as she smiled. ‘What do you want, love?’

  The accent reminded me of my childhood in Aberdare.

  ‘Have you seen anybody with the Fiesta that’s parked in the corner?’

  She gave me a blank look. ‘What car is that then?’

  ‘The silver Ford. You must have seen it.’

  ‘Sorry, love. Does it belong to somebody you know?’

  ‘Who owns this place?’

  ‘You’d have to ask the boss. I just do the paperwork. He doesn’t own it, mind. Some property company or other. But they don’t look after the place. I’ve got a bucket by here: the rain pours in through a hole in the roof.’

  I didn’t need a summary of the property’s condition so I turned my back and left, hoping that the carpentry business next door would be more helpful. I was disappointed. The woman behind the counter could barely string a few words together. She gave me the contact number for her boss. Some instinct made me check the front doors of the three other units. They were all safely secured and then I scrambled around the back hoping there might be an open window or a broken door. But there was nothing to suggest recent activity.

  I walked over to Lydia’s Fiesta and stared in. Nothing had changed since I’d done the same thing a few minutes earlier but repeating the exercise was reassuring. A small Scientific Support Vehicle drew up on the main road. A single crime scene investigator emerged and exchanged a few words with the uniformed officer before walking over towards me, bag in hand.

  I stood and watched him unlock the Fiesta. I snapped on a pair of latex gloves and then rifled through the papers Lydia had stuffed into the storage compartment in the doors. In the glove compartment there was a CD of a Bizet opera and another of Nabucco. Satisfied that I could leave the investigator to his work I told him to contact me soon as he’d finished.

  I drove back to Queen Street, my mind a complete haze. I thumped the steering wheel as I cursed myself. There had been texts every few minutes from Wyn and Jane bringing me up to date with the activities at the lawyers’ offices in the centre of the city. My frustration caused me to miss a red traffic light and I narrowly avoided an accident with a BMW whose young driver raised his middle finger at me.

  I don’t recall parking or punching in my security code or taking the stairs to the second floor of Queen Street. But when I arrived Wyn and Jane were speaking in animated tones on the telephone. There was a pile of paperwork strewn all over the desks and the telephone in my office rang off the hook.

  And then my mobile rang. It was Cornock, chasing no doubt for an update even though he knew full well I’d report progress as soon as I could. I curbed the irritation, hoping it wouldn’t show in my voice.

  ‘Just got back, sir.’

  ‘This is even more serious than we thought, John. You need to get over here.’

  Chapter 38

  Watching the video in Superintendent Cornock’s office curled a taut knot in my stomach. I was convinced I would never eat anything again. The lighting was the same, the voices were the same but I couldn’t take it in. I watched the screen a second time, staring at Lydia’s face. Her hair was a mess, her mascara had blotched the skin around her eyes and she looked as though she hadn’t eaten for days.

  ‘It was posted on YouTube in the last hour.’
<
br />   I nodded. ‘Play it again.’

  I watched, mesmerised.

  ‘The ordinary people will not stand for the banking system causing harm to millions. If the government won’t punish the bankers then we the people will. And anybody protecting the bankers and their associates will be punished. Ordinary working class people will not stand idly by and see their lives destroyed and homes lost, just to pay bonuses for sick greedy bankers. Anyone working with the bankers to protect their interests is a legitimate target.’

  The message was the same as the previous videos. But this time a police officer had been abducted. Lydia had been taken: her life was being threatened.

  Cornock stood by my side; a hard, determined look on his face. A muscle twitched on his jaw. ‘This changes everything.’

  He pointed the remote at the television again and replayed the video.

  My mouth dried; there was no saliva to run my tongue over my lips. The two people standing either side of Lydia resembled both men from the previous videos. So it was impossible to describe them. They wore a one-piece dark suit and had their faces covered in black balaclava masks – even their mouths had been covered. Only their eyes were visible. I squinted at the camera hoping for a glimmer of recognition. Then I listened again to the monologue – it was the same as before. A voice fed through some electronic machine.

  As it ended the telephone on Cornock’s desk rang. He paused the screen.

  ‘Yes, sir,’ he said. ‘He’s with me now.’

  There was silence. Cornock nodded, still clenching his jaw. I guessed the chief constable was on the telephone. ‘I don’t have that information, sir.’

  He glanced at me, narrowed his eyes.

  ‘We’ll do what we can.’

  Cornock finished the conversation. ‘The press are all over this like a rash. The first minister in the Welsh Assembly has been in contact. And the chief constable wants a full report into what happened.’

  ‘I’ll get onto it.’

  ‘Forget the report for now. Just find her, John.’

  In the Incident Room Jane and Wyn stood up as soon as I walked in. They seemed to have aged since first thing that morning. Both opened their mouths to speak but the right words failed them. I knew what I wanted to establish – whether Henson was in the building at the time of Harper’s death. My excitement mounted as I read his name on the list of demonstrators.