‘I may only have one eye but I’m not blind. You’re still a copper,’ answered Carl, losing the smile.
‘Not tonight I’m not. And not where Madley’s concerned either.’
Carl studied him.
He was only in his early twenties but he had an air about him. One that said that he had seen it all. Even with one eye he was a handsome guy. Never short of female attention. Tall, with tousled curly dark blond hair and an unshaven look to match. Always sharply dressed though. Smart black suit, white open-neck shirt and sharp shoes.
Barman, receptionist and prime look-out – he did it all. Without effort.
Brady watched as he picked up a new, equally clean glass and began methodically polishing it. Without looking Brady in the eye, he started to talk.
‘Visa and Delta were in. Throwing money around. Acting like they owned the place.’
‘Ronnie Macmillan’s boys?’ asked Brady.
‘Yeah, the Macmillan boys. Nasty shits. Think the designer suits and sunglasses and the black Jag mean something. Means shit. They’re still ugly, hired thugs, regardless of the Armani name tag.’
‘Then what happened?’ asked Brady.
‘She comes in. The copper. Stunning looking. Too fucking good for those suited gorillas. Joins them at the bar. They know who she is and it seems that she already knows them. Macmillan’s boys buy a bottle of champagne but they never touch a drop. She drinks maybe four glasses, if that. Then an hour and a half later I notice that her speech has started to slur and her eyes … you know that look? Pupils dilated? Can’t stand up. She wasn’t pissed though. But she was wasted. I reckon when she went to the loos they slipped something in her drink. I see it happening all the time in here.’
Brady knew that Carl’s assumption was right. The lab had found significant traces of Rohypnol, the date rape drug, in Simone’s blood and urine.
‘Why didn’t you do something if you thought she’d been drugged?’ asked Brady, an edge to his voice.
‘I’m paid to serve people not to fucking babysit!’
Brady could hardly get in Carl’s face about this; he was no better. He had seen Simone talking to Macmillan’s suits and walked out. If he had only gone over and asked her what the fuck she was doing with them, then she might not be in intensive care.
‘Did she leave with them?’ he asked.
‘Visa made a call and then ten minutes later they leave. Literally carrying the copper. They walked off down East Parade towards Brook Street.’
Brady shot him a questioning look.
‘I was having a tab break out front,’ Carl explained.
‘Since when has Madley allowed his staff to have breaks? Let alone allow tab out front?’
‘When Madley wants me to keep an eye on a situation. Visa and Delta chucking money around in his club to impress a copper is a situation.’
Brady nodded. He could see that.
‘How did you know she was a copper?’ asked Brady.
‘Just did. Been around you too long. Anyway, I have a thing for faces. Remembered her being in here with you a couple of times.’
Brady winced. That was over a year ago when he had last been in the Blue Lagoon with Simone, then a DC and his junior colleague.
‘What happened next?’ he asked.
‘A black panel van, Mercedes I think, is parked up in the back lane of the Avenue pub. Visa and Delta and the copper approach it and are met by two evil-looking shits dressed in black suits. Ex-military, I’d say.’
Brady frowned. ‘Why do you say that?’
‘You can just tell. They had this edge about them. Real nasty edge.’
‘Did they look Eastern European?’ asked Brady.
‘Yeah … foreign. Dark, dangerous, with a fucking glint in their eye which told you they’d slit you from ear to ear if you looked at them the wrong way.’
The Dabkunas brothers, thought Brady.
‘What about the driver?’
Carl shook his head. ‘Couldn’t see the driver from where I was stood. The van was parked facing the other way.’
‘How did you see all this stood out front?’
‘I was having a tab break. I’m allowed to stretch my legs,’ slowly answered Carl as he started polishing again.
‘What made you follow them?’
‘Madley asks me to do something, I do it. No questions asked.’
‘Can you describe the van?’ asked Brady.
‘Yeah, cost a lot of money. New. Mercedes-Benz black panel van. Tinted windows. You know the type used for carrying cargo?’
‘Yeah,’ Brady replied, getting the idea of what kind of cargo they’d be carrying. ‘Did you get the licence plate at all?’ he asked hopefully.
‘No,’ answered Carl.
Brady raised his eyebrow.
‘It was dark. You do the maths,’ answered Carl, giving Brady a look.
Brady wasn’t sure whether the barman had actually seen the licence plate. But he knew not to push him.
‘Why did they do that to her? Simone?’
‘Your guess is as good as mine,’ Carl shrugged.
‘Come on, Carl. You don’t expect me to believe that?’
‘Look, this goes nowhere. Alright? The shit that’s going on now is dangerous. For me … for Madley … Even you.’
‘Who? Who are you scared of?’
Carl stared at Brady. ‘Who do you think?’
‘Ronnie Macmillan.’
Carl’s reaction told Brady he was right.
‘Why? What’s Ronnie got to do with this?’
‘Everything,’ answered Carl as he stared hard at Brady.
‘Go on.’
Carl shook his head. ‘Alright, but I’m only telling you because he’s leaning really heavily on Madley. Understand? He needs sorting and if that means banging him up to get him off Madley’s back then so be it.’ Carl paused for a moment, looking down the corridor which led to the entrance upstairs to Madley’s office.
‘A black Jaguar turns up Brook Street and then pulls into the Avenue car park at the bottom of the back lane. Right by the Merc van.’
‘What happened next?’ asked Brady.
‘Visa and Delta had hold of the copper. She was completely wasted by now. Whatever they had given her had kicked in. Couldn’t stand up. They were arguing with the two Eastern European guys. It looked as if it was about to get nasty. Looked like the two ex-military-looking guys wanted to put her in the back of the van, but Macmillan’s boys weren’t letting her go. Then Ronnie Macmillan gets out the back of the Jaguar and steps in. He said something to the Eastern Europeans. Whatever he said calmed the situation down.’
‘Who took her then?’
‘Who do you think? Ronnie Macmillan. He opened the boot of his Jaguar and she got dumped in there. Visa and Delta got in the front, Ronnie Macmillan got back in the back and they drove off, followed by the Merc van.’
‘Did you see the driver of the van?’ asked Brady, trying to keep his voice level. He needed to know. To know whether it was Nick.
Carl looked at him and shook his head.
‘No, like I’ve already said, it was dark.’
‘Which direction?’ asked Brady.
He was already thinking that he’d get Conrad to check out the CCTV footage they had along the Promenade. He knew that where they’d parked up there were no cameras, which was why Adamson wouldn’t have seen either the black Jaguar or the Mercedes van. Let alone Ronnie Macmillan’s boys dumping Simone Henderson’s drugged body into the boot of Macmillan’s car.
‘They drove along the Promenade and turned up Marine Drive.’
Brady had a feeling that Macmillan might have taken her back to his club in Wallsend. After all, he did have private rooms there which guaranteed his clientele anonymity. It was the kind of place where no one would ask questions. A perfect front for whatever Ronnie Macmillan and the Eastern European brothers were involved in. And then there were the abandoned warehouses and buildings that Ronnie Macmillan had
been buying up. He could have taken Simone Henderson to any of those locations and mutilated her. Then again, Brady had to trust the fact that Claudia and her team and Kenny and Daniels had found nothing suspicious at any of Macmillan’s premises.
And, given the gravity of Simone’s attack, Brady couldn’t imagine that she had been taken far. Otherwise, Ronnie Macmillan and the Dabkunas brothers ran the risk of her dying in transit. And from the game that Macmillan was playing with Madley, he wanted the police to raid Madley’s club on a tip-off that a copper was lying with near fatal injuries in the gents’. Brady didn’t want to think of Nick. He didn’t want to think that his own brother could have had a hand in anything so heinous.
‘Why didn’t you contact the police when you saw her being abducted?’ asked Brady.
Carl looked at Brady.
‘I do what Madley tells me to do. I reported exactly what I saw to him. It’s then up to Madley what he does with that information.’
Brady simply nodded. ‘Thanks, Carl.’
‘This goes nowhere. Understand?’ demanded Carl.
‘Trust me.’
‘You’re a copper, what’s there to trust?’ replied Carl.
Brady nodded. He understood Carl’s point.
‘Right now being a copper is the furthest thing from my mind,’ he replied quietly. ‘And right now, I reckon I’m the only person Madley can trust. And with Ronnie Macmillan prepared to do anything to get him out, I’d say he needs me. Wouldn’t you?’ His voice was heavy with concern.
Carl didn’t say a word. He didn’t need to: they both knew that Brady was right.
No surprise then that Madley was shitting himself, thought Brady as he watched Carl start to get the bar ready for the crowd that would be in soon enough. He had every right to be. Mayor Macmillan was clever. A new threat had come to the North East: Eastern European gangsters. And Macmillan had made sure that he was aligned with them. After all, they were a breed apart from the likes of Madley and Johnny Slaughter and even his own brother, Ronnie. At least they had some kind of morality code, thought Brady. Whereas these Eastern European gangsters had no morals. And that’s precisely what made them so dangerous; that and the fact that they were ex-military.
Chapter Forty
He’d gone out for a tab first, before going up to see Madley. He needed an excuse to get out and make a call. One that had to be made in private without Carl overhearing.
He sucked hard on his cigarette to keep it alight as he stared up at the sky. It had been a dark, dismal grey day but now that evening had come there was a change in the air. The sky was lightening as the mute, overcast blanket that had covered it started to lift.
Brady could just make out a blood red sun, burning on the horizon. An omen if ever there was one.
‘Conrad?’
‘Yes, sir?’ answered Conrad.
‘What have you got?’
‘Not much, sir. I did get some background on Nykantas Vydunas, the Lithuanian Ambassador, and he’s on his third marriage to some French ex-model. He has one child, a nineteen-year-old daughter from his first marriage, currently studying at Oxford. From all accounts a bit of party girl. Spends more of her time in London clubbing it than she does at university.’
‘Did you get anything connecting him and Macmillan?’ Brady asked.
‘No, sir. Whatever business deal is going on between the Ambassador and Mayor Macmillan appears to be kosher. Vydunas is a multi-millionaire, old money. His business is shipping. Runs a highly successful cargo shipping company. And that’s the only connection I can make with Mayor Macmillan. He wants to use Vydunas’ cargo company to ship over Polish provisions to the North East. It’s all to do with some multi-cultural push between the North East of England and Eastern Europe, in particular Poland.’
‘Anything else?’ asked Brady.
‘That’s it, sir. Apart from …’
‘Yes?’
‘Well, it seems that there’s a lot of activity around him just now. He’s called in extra security. Whether he’s expecting trouble in the North East, I can’t say but he has got an unusual amount of armed personnel surrounding him. He’s also booked in at the Hotel du Vin, close to Newcastle quayside. Ideal location given it’s off the beaten track. He’s booked the whole hotel for a week. The staff there have intimated that he seems obsessed about privacy and security. Especially when he’s holding business meetings or has clients visit.’
‘Like who?’ asked Brady.
‘I don’t know, sir. I couldn’t find that out.’
‘When you say clients do you mean women?’ asked Brady.
‘I honestly can’t say. The staff said that he’s extremely cautious and demands absolute privacy for his visiting guests.’
Brady knew the Hotel du Vin. He had taken Claudia there once for dinner to sample the delights of its noted wine cellar. It had commanding views of the River Tyne and the quayside. It had formerly been a shipping headquarters and had been renovated, as had most of the old buildings down that part of the quayside.
‘Conrad, you wouldn’t know if a black Mercedes panel van has been making visits to the Ambassador’s hotel, would you?’ Brady thought back to his conversation with Carl, Madley’s bartender, and Nicoletta’s description of the black Mercedes van used to transport the Dabkunas’ girls around.
‘No, sir,’ answered Conrad sounding confused. ‘But I can make enquiries.’
‘Can you also go over the CCTV footage of the Promenade in Whitley Bay from last night? A black Mercedes-Benz panel van pulled out from Brook Street and headed down the Promenade turning up Marine Avenue. The Mercedes was tailing the black Jaguar that we saw Macmillan and his boys in earlier. I want to know where they go. See if you can trace their movements at all. I have a gut feeling that they were heading for Macmillan’s club or maybe one of the disused properties that he’s bought up.’
‘Sir?’ questioned Conrad, realising the job he was being asked to do.
‘Contact me when you have something,’ answered Brady.
‘If this is to do with Simone Henderson’s attack, shouldn’t we take this information to Adamson and Gates, sir?’
‘What do you think, Conrad?’
‘Sir?’ repeated Conrad, unsure.
‘I wouldn’t piss on Adamson if he was on fire. Does that answer your question?’
‘Yes, sir,’ replied Conrad.
‘The murder of the Lithuanian girl, Melissa Ryecroft’s abduction and Simone’s attack are all connected, Conrad. Trust me on this. Which makes it our investigation now. We’ve just got to prove it and I’ll be dammed if I hand anything over to that bastard and then watch him take the glory.’
‘How do you know, sir? How can you be so certain?’
‘I just know, Conrad.’
Brady hung up.
He drew heavily on his cigarette as he listened to the pulsating music coming from further down East Parade, in the direction of South Parade. The back of the Blue Lagoon nightclub. It was a miserable sight. Bricked walls on either side, beer crates and overflowing bins blocked Brady in. In front of him were two cars. The gleaming, new Bentley was Madley’s and the three-year-old silver BMW was Gibbs’.
Brady drew again on his cigarette. The air was suffocating. Filled with intoxicating smells. The Pizza Cottage, the Indian restaurants and the two Italian restaurants along East Parade were in full battle when it came to the heady aromas spewing from their kitchen extractor fans. Brady’s stomach growled. He realised he hadn’t eaten anything since the bacon stottie he’d had for breakfast that morning. But all he had to do was think of the shit that Nick was caught up in to quell his appetite.
He took one last drag on his cigarette before throwing the smouldering stub away. He had to call Claudia. He needed to make sure that they had searched all of the rooms at Macmillan’s club. Including the cellar and those on the first floor and the attic rooms. He just needed reassurance that nothing had been missed. That there were no traces of blood anywhere, or weapons h
idden. In particular the hunting/survival knife that was used to decapitate Edita Aginatas. And that they had definitely found nothing incriminating at the buildings and wasteland that Macmillan now owned. He knew Claudia would be getting ready for the dinner in honour of the Lithuanian Ambassador, held by Mayor Macmillan. But Brady had no choice. He had to be sure.
He scrolled down, found her name and pressed call.
As he did so, he shoved his free hand in his trouser pocket, absent-mindedly fingering his wedding ring.
‘Claudia?’ he questioned when the phone picked up.
‘No,’ came the answer. Simple and to the point.
‘Can I talk to her?’
‘She’s busy.’
Before Brady had a chance to answer the phone went dead. He knew it was Davidson. Recognised the voice. And Davidson clearly knew it was Brady.
Brady stood for a moment holding his BlackBerry. He felt as if he had been kicked in the guts. And if the truth be known, he had. DCI Davidson had made it very clear that Claudia was off-bounds to him.
*
‘Jack,’ greeted Madley as Brady walked into his spacious first-floor office.
Brady knew straight away that he was pissed off. Who with, he didn’t yet know, but he was certain he was about to find out.
He cast his eye over the huge room. Madley was standing with his back to Brady, staring out of the impressive ceiling-to-floor window. Weasel Face was behind the door, watching Brady’s every move while Gibbs waited by Madley’s side.
The tension in the room was palpable. Brady wasn’t sure what he had walked into, but he knew he didn’t like it. There was an edge, a desperation to hold onto power regardless of the consequences, that Brady could feel clinging to the air. Ronnie Macmillan had gone one step too far with Madley and Brady presumed Madley was now in the throes of working out how to get the bastard back.
Brady should have been worried, but he knew Madley could look after himself. He, after all, had been raised on the hardened streets of the Ridges, just as Brady had. A childhood that set you up for anything that life would throw at you; Ronnie Macmillan and his politician brother being two of them. Even ex-military SAS types like the Dabkunas brothers.
Vanishing Point Page 27
