Backlash

by Nick Oldham

  ‘That’s OK. I think she’ll be a different proposition in the morning when they get to her – all soft and pliable.’

  ‘Rather like me,’ Makin suggested, then stifled a yawn and laid a hand on Henry’s chest. ‘Excuse me.’ She shook her head and slid her hand slowly down his shirt, her eyes fixed on his. She checked the time – nearly 2 a.m. ‘Time I got to bed. What time do you finish?’

  ‘Six.’

  ‘Another four hours! I’ll be all tucked up and warm.’

  ‘I’m sure you will.’

  DI Jane Roscoe stood just inside the door to the custody office, out of the eyeline of both Henry and Makin. She was watching their verbal and non-verbal exchange, but was unable to hear any of the words passing between them. Henry seemed stiff and stilted. Nervous. Worried, maybe.

  Roscoe could see why. The woman was all over him.

  It was so bloody obvious, Roscoe thought angrily, that the woman, whoever the hell she was, was coming onto Henry in a big way with the preening gestures: touching the hair; smoothing her clothing down; a hand on her hips which were pointed towards him; that clumsy hand on Henry’s chest, which Roscoe had seen with delight, had made Henry jump as though stung by a wasp; her increasing attempts at eye contact. Henry was not responding, but Roscoe could see it was only a matter of time before the woman dragged him into her web.

  For some inexplicable reason, she found herself fuming as she walked towards the couple as nonchalantly as she could, confused over why she should be feeling this way. After all, she did not even like Henry very much.

  ‘I’m sure you will,’ she overheard Henry say to the woman.

  ‘Henry – have you got a moment?’ Roscoe interrupted breezily.

  As they both turned towards her, Roscoe was pleased to see a shimmer of annoyance cross the woman’s face.

  ‘Hello, Jane,’ Henry said. ‘Have you met Detective Superintendent Andrea Makin? Metropolitan Special Branch.’

  ‘No.’ The single syllable sounded curt, rude and unprofessional.

  ‘Call me Andrea,’ Makin said coldly. She did not offer a hand, merely a faint smile.

  ‘This is DI Jane Roscoe,’ Henry said, completing the formalities. ‘She’s investigating Mo Khan’s murder.’

  ‘Ahh – so I’ve heard.’ Makin regarded Roscoe with a smirk. Suddenly Roscoe felt she wanted to crawl away and hide under a stone somewhere because she realised what a God-awful state she was in. Although she had washed and freshened up since the riot, her make-up was long gone and she probably reeked like an old settee and her rat’s tail hair was a disgrace. The complete opposite to Makin, who was damned near perfection, the bitch. Makin looked up at Henry with soppy eyes. ‘Anyway, Henry, no doubt you’ll be able to fill her in on the details she may need about Joey Costain. Goodnight.’ She shot Roscoe a false smile and swayed off with a last glimpse over her shoulder at Henry, who completely missed it.

  Roscoe dropped her shoulders in relief and opened her hands.

  ‘What?’ Henry said, perplexed.

  ‘I’m surprised she didn’t shag you here and now.’

  ‘Who? Andrea? What do you mean?’

  ‘Are you a complete numbty?’ Roscoe hissed. She would have said more, allowed her mouth to run away with her, but held back because she was not yet sure where she was coming from with this. She shook her head sadly and almost said, ‘Men!’

  The gaoler returned from the female cell area.

  ‘Said she wants to speak to you, boss,’ the PC said to Henry. ‘Off the record.’

  ‘Right, thanks. Coming?’ he asked Roscoe.

  ‘I’ve just got back from the hospital,’ Roscoe said to Henry’s back as they walked to the cell. ‘I’ve come in to let you know how Dave is getting on.’

  Henry continued to walk and waited for the news, guts churning.

  ‘It’s touch and go,’ Roscoe said. ‘He’s critical, in intensive care. Badly burned upper chest, neck and face. He’s breathed in smoke and fire which has caused major injuries to his mouth, throat and respiratory system. He’s in a very bad way. The doctors say we did well to keep him alive.’

  ‘More by luck than judgement on my part,’ Henry said.

  ‘No it wasn’t,’ Roscoe stated firmly. ‘It was professional life saving. You did a great job. Don’t do yourself down.’

  ‘And so did you,’ he responded genuinely. ‘But enough of this mutual congratulation and back slapping. Let’s just hope he pulls through. Are his family aware?’ he asked over his shoulder.

  ‘Hmph,’ Roscoe snorted. ‘Two ex-wives, neither interested. A daughter of twenty-six who hasn’t spoken to him for three years and doesn’t want to start now, and a son somewhere in Europe on his year out, or whatever they call it, between school and university.’

  ‘Parents?’

  ‘Both dead.’

  ‘Jeez, that’s a shame,’ said Henry. He blinked a tear away at the thought of Seymour’s lonely predicament, only because it made him realise he could so easily end up in a similar position. The prospect of becoming a sad, old, lonesome bastard hit him with the force of an express train. He could end up on the verge of retirement with no one to care for, or to care about him. He swallowed dryly and thought: What the hell have I done with my life? Just cocked up time after time after time. That was the stark reality of adultery.

  At Geri Peters’ cell door Henry dropped the loosely fitting inspection hatch and looked in. In her white, oversized zoot suit, the prisoner reminded Henry of the Michelin man. She was sitting on the edge of the low bed, head in hands, desperately alone. She looked up through her fingers. A little girl lost.

  ‘You wanted to see me.’

  ‘Yeah, yeah,’ she snuffled, wiped her eyes on a paper sleeve. She crossed the cell, stood by the door. The crying had abated. ‘What’ll happen to me?’

  Henry shrugged. ‘Put it this way – don’t bank on seeing next Christmas, or the one after that,’ he said cruelly. ‘And if we make everything stick, you’ll be eating cold turkey Christmas dinner a lot longer than that, even.’

  She closed her eyes despairingly, then raised them to the ceiling, rocking unsteadily on her feet. Henry thought she was going to fall over.

  ‘I’m frightened. Frightened of being here alone. Frightened of what might happen to me.’

  ‘You should be.’

  ‘I didn’t bomb that police officer.’

  ‘You’re the only suspect we have at the moment, dear, so I’m sure we’ll do a pretty good job of placing you at the scene and the petrol bombs we found in your possession are pretty good supporting evidence – unless you want to tell us who actually did it, and the name of the person you were with.’

  She leaned her back against the door, arms folded.

  ‘If you didn’t do it, who did?’ Henry probed, picking up on the vibes emanating from her. She wanted to save her own skin, he could tell. ‘Or do you want to take the rap for committing murder – that detective could well die.’

  ‘Shit, shit, shit,’ she said, banging the back of her head on the cell door in time with each word. She whacked it hard, making Henry wince with vicarious pain. ‘I don’t know what to do,’ she whined pitifully. ‘I’m afraid to tell you the truth.’

  ‘It’s your decision. I can’t influence it, other than by laying the cards on the table.’ Henry was cooing now, knowing full well he was seriously influencing her thought process. ‘What’s the point going down for someone else?’

  She did not respond and shuffled back across the cell, and sat heavily on the bed, looking down, blanking Henry out.

  Slowly he closed the inspection flap.

  He winked at Roscoe and gave her a thumbs up. ‘She’ll crack,’ he said positively.

  They turned away from the cell door and were slightly surprised to see Dermot Byrne, Henry’s patrol sergeant, standing behind them. Neither had heard his approach.

  ‘Boss,’ Byrne said. ‘Ma’am,’ he acknowledged Roscoe with a bluff nod of the head. ‘I’m tur
ning out to have a look round Shoreside. It all seems to be quiet, but I thought I’d give it the once over and if it is, we could start standing patrols down.’

  ‘Good idea. I’ll come with you if you can hang on for twenty minutes so I can make sure I’m up to date with the custody office. And then I’ve got a few things I need to brief you about, very pertinent to this week. We need to have a heads-together to sort something out.’

  Byrne looked intrigued. ‘Right. I’ll catch up with you shortly.’ He walked on, ahead of Henry and Roscoe.

  ‘He seems pretty good,’ Henry said to her.

  ‘Mmm,’ she sounded doubtful. ‘He gives me the creeps.’

  ‘Oh, right. So, what are you going to do now, Jane?’

  ‘If I can keep awake, I’m going after Joey Costain. The sooner he’s off the streets, the better. I could do with a chuck-up, though, maybe borrow a few bods? I’d like to spin a few drums simultaneously.’

  ‘Sure. I’ll see who I can spare.’

  ‘And you have some information for me, I believe,’ Roscoe said. ‘That . . . that Met superintendent seemed to suggest you had something to tell me.’ Roscoe hoped she had kept the dislike she felt for Andrea Makin out of her voice, but she doubted it. Then, without warning, it struck her why she had reacted so strangely to Makin’s obvious come-on to Henry.

  She was jealous.

  Apart from wanting to clear the decks in the custody office, which he managed to do in about ten minutes, Henry also wanted to try and catch Karl Donaldson before he left the building.

  After concluding his custody reviews, he hurried out of the office and saw Fanshaw-Bayley returning from the underground car park adjoining the police station.

  ‘Is Karl Donaldson still here?’ he asked FB.

  ‘No – gone. He’s staying at the Jarvis, which I presume is the answer to your next question.’

  ‘Thanks.’ Henry tried to edge past FB in the narrow corridor. FB’s hand shot out across Henry’s chest, stopping him.

  ‘A word.’ FB applied some pressure, then lifted his hand off Henry’s chest and pointed towards the car park. ‘Out here.’ He brushed past Henry, who followed.

  FB walked a few metres down the car park, stopped, glanced round edgily. No one was nearby. He beckoned Henry closer.

  ‘I’ll let you into a little secret, just between me and you.’ On ‘me’ he pointed at himself; on ‘you’ he pointed sharply at Henry. His voice was no louder than a whisper. Henry had to cock an ear. ‘Just so you know where you stand – OK?’

  Henry wondered what the hell was coming this time.

  ‘It’s imperative I make a good impression this week,’ FB said flatly. His eyelids were half-closed, nose tilted upwards slightly, looking down at Henry and reminding him of Kenneth Williams. ‘A very good, lasting impression. That is because very good things could happen for me if everything goes well – which is where you come in. You have to do your job, I mean, really pull out your tripe this week, and keep Blackpool well under control. You do not allow a bunch of yobs to take over – understand?’

  Henry’s eyebrows knitted together.

  FB huffed in frustration at Henry’s apparent lack of comprehension. ‘Because if you think that being a uniformed inspector in Blackpool is bad enough, how would you like to be one in Barnoldswick, or Bacup for God’s sake? Out in the sticks with members of the public who resemble the cast of Deliverance? Or maybe Skelmersdale, full of fucking scousers? Because I’ll tell you now, Henry Christie, if you don’t keep a lid on it, you’ll end up in some Godforsaken hole where the only pastime is whittling and making people squeal like pigs – and I’ll do it in such a way that everyone’ll think you’re an incompetent cunt.’

  Henry’s jaw cracked. ‘Why?’ he croaked.

  ‘Because Basil Kramer is my ticket out of here, my passport to promotion. He has the home secretary’s ear and if this week goes well, under my leadership, I’ll have the choice of plum jobs at the HMIC or NCIS.’ FB delayed a second for effect, letting his words sink in. ‘Now do you get my drift? He is my meal ticket. And you never know – if you do well this week, maybe you’ll get a CID job back sooner than you thought. You scratch my back . . .’ He arched his eyebrows, but then his face became very dark. ‘If you cock up, you’ll suffer big style. Get me now?’

  ‘I think so,’ Henry said.

  ‘Good.’

  Without a further word, FB patted Henry patronisingly on the shoulder and left him standing in the chill of the car park.

  ‘It’s been a very good night,’ David Gill said. ‘The movement has started.’

  ‘Yes, you’ve done well,’ Vince Bellamy said down the phone. ‘We’ve all done well but I have a little problem that has cropped up which needs sorting out. David, I know it’s asking a lot, but I want you to oblige.’

  ‘Tell me,’ Gill said.

  After Bellamy had explained the situation, Gill paused in thought for a long time. ‘That’s tough,’ he said. ‘It could really backfire on me if I’m not a hundred per cent careful.’

  ‘David, you are always a hundred per cent careful. I want you to try. Do your best – it’s all I ever ask of you.’

  Nine

  In the new scheme of things, being a manager of resources as opposed to an old fashioned jack, it wasn’t actually Jane Roscoe’s job to go round kicking doors down anymore. Which was a shame. It was something she enjoyed doing: bursting uninvited, sometimes even lawfully, into people’s property at unexpected times of day, backed up by a bunch of hairy-arsed bobbies – it was one of the last perks of being a cop these days. Not many things could touch the buzz of seeing a door leaving its hinges in the middle of the night.

  The modern DI was expected to be distanced from such front-line activity, to deploy, delegate and plan. But fortunately in the early hours of that particular Tuesday morning there weren’t enough other officers on duty for Jane Roscoe to do that sort of management crap. They were badly understaffed and it would have been criminal for her not to make up the numbers. Nor, she thought selfishly, would it do any harm for her credibility rating in the eyes of her subordinates. This was how she justified leading an arrest squad to hit one of Joey Costain’s known addresses, while a detective sergeant led the other.

  She changed out of the suit she had been wearing earlier, which had been damaged during the petrol bombings at Khan’s shop, into the scruffy black jeans and T-shirt she always kept in her locker (formerly Henry Christie’s) for such situations as this: when a skirt and blouse would be totally useless for climbing through half-beaten-down doors or smashed windows. It felt great to get out of the clothes she had been wearing for almost eighteen hours since the previous morning.

  Mark Evans, the detective sergeant leading the second team, accompanied her as she strode confidently to the ground-floor parade room where officers had gathered for the briefing. She could sense there was something on his mind and had a good idea what it was.

  ‘Spit it out, Mark,’ she ordered him.

  ‘The lads are on pins. They feel they should be getting into that petrol bomber, the one who did Dave. They’re not bothered about Joey Costain at the moment. After all, all he did was whack a Paki.’

  Roscoe came to a sudden halt.

  ‘I understand your sentiments, Mark. It’s only natural you want to get whoever burned Dave, but that’s going to be properly organised in the morning as it happens. There’s nothing more we can do evidentially at the moment, that’ll be for the morning people. Our job is to get Joey Costain – and if I ever hear you using a racist term like “Paki” again, your job will be on the line – OK?’

  ‘Ugh!’ The DS gasped as though sucker-punched.

  ‘Now come on, let’s get this job sorted.’ She walked on to the parade room.

  The number of officers surprised her pleasantly. Six uniforms rustled up by Henry, plus her three detectives, the DS and herself. Pretty bloody good, she thought. The only trouble was that Henry Christie himself was sitting at the fro
nt of the room, chatting intently to one of the detectives. Probably one of his old mates, one of the lads. Sod him, damn him, Roscoe thought. She took a breath, put her head down and decided to get on with things.

  The briefing was short and succinct and Roscoe thought it went well enough. No major hiccups, no drying up. The officers had been divided up randomly into the two arrest squads. The team of six – Alpha Sierra 1 – was headed up by Roscoe. They were going to take the Costain family home. The second squad of five were allocated the flat Joey was known to rent in South Shore.

  Ten minutes later, Roscoe and her team were parked in two unmarked cars round the corner from the target premises which was situated pretty much in the dead centre of the Shoreside Estate. The area was quiet now, nothing stirring in the night other than cops on the prowl. The debris on the streets, left over from the disturbances, was the only indication of what had been going on earlier.

  The other team – Alpha Sierra 2 – was a spit and a stride away from Costain’s flat.

  Henry Christie – having had the foresight, or luck, not to stand down the PSUs which had come to assist earlier – was sitting in the passenger seat of a personnel carrier on the outer edge of Shoreside. Six officers in full riot kit were in the back. Another carrier full of more sweaty cops was parked on the far side of the estate. They were here because the raid on the Costain home could easily be the trigger for further trouble on the streets. As soon as Roscoe gave the go-ahead to hit the house, Henry and his little army would become a very visible presence.

  ‘Alpha Sierra 2 to Alpha Sierra 1 . . . in position,’ DS Evans radioed in.

  ‘Received – likewise,’ Roscoe acknowledged. ‘Sierra 1 to Inspector.’

  ‘Also in position,’ Henry said.

  ‘OK,’ said Roscoe. A tinge of excitement crept into her voice as she said, ‘Let’s do it!’

  ‘Sierra 2 responding.’ In the background of the transmission there was the scream of an engine being revved.

  Thirty seconds later, Roscoe and her team were outside the Costain house, disgorging from their transport, running up the path. Two of them made straight for the back door to prevent escape. Ten seconds after that the front door was battered open, cops streamed through and were on the premises and Roscoe’s heart was in her mouth.