Snakes and Ladders

by Adam Croft

  It was true to say that local social media groups were often a cesspit of commentary. It was a sad indictment on society that the invention of Facebook and Twitter had made ordinary people confuse the distinction between having a right to an opinion and other people having the right to ignore it. With the advent of social media, everyone seemed to not only think they were an expert, but they also appeared to labour under the misapprehension that anybody else on earth cared as much about their opinion as they did, even if it did give them some momentary respite from their joyless existence.

  ‘Right,’ Jack said. ‘On that note, I’m fucking off home.’

  14

  Jack felt the stiffness in his shoulders and lower back as he unlocked the front door — the same stiffness he got after any long, stress-filled day. For many years, home had provided no real respite from those sorts of days, and he’d instead chosen to spend even longer hours at the office, preferring the dull, monotonous routine of work over the loneliness of an empty house. Now, though, the house was far from empty, and it was only going to get fuller.

  ‘Put the guns down, it’s only me,’ he called as he closed the door behind him. He walked through into the living room and found Emily lying on one of the sofas. ‘You alright, love? You look like shit.’

  ‘Wow. Thanks. I feel it.’

  ‘Still struggling?’ he asked, planting a kiss on her forehead.

  ‘It’s alright. Good days and bad days.’

  ‘I’m guessing today’s a bad one.’

  ‘Oh yes.’

  ‘Do you want chicken soup?’

  ‘Why would I want chicken soup?’ Emily asked, her face curling.

  Jack shrugged. ‘I dunno. Your mum used to get bad days when she was pregnant with you. For some reason, one day she worked out she had a real craving for chicken soup. Two bloody hours I spent, running round every supermarket in Mildenheath, trying to get all the ingredients. I got home, and you know what she said to me? She said “Why didn’t you just buy a tin from the first supermarket?” And that’s when I knew I’d had an even longer day than she had. Tell you what, though. I got every single one of those ingredients and I stood there in that kitchen and I made her chicken soup. It worked like a dream. Every time she had morning sickness or a shit day, chicken soup helped.’

  ‘Have we got any?’ Emily asked.

  ‘Well, no. At least I don’t think so. I can go and get some, though.’

  Emily chuckled. ‘No, don’t. As much as I love the idea of you jogging round all the supermarkets looking for herbs you’ve never heard of, I really haven’t got a craving for chicken soup.’

  ‘Thank god for that. I thought for a minute we’d have history repeating itself.’

  ‘Not likely.’

  ‘Oh I dunno. You’re pretty similar in a lot of ways.’

  ‘I don’t think so,’ Emily said, diverting her attention towards the television.

  ‘No, you are. She used to do that, too. Lying on the sofa, watching TV when things felt bad. Used to take her mind off it, she said.’

  Emily sat up, picked up the remote control and switched the TV off. ‘Yeah. Well, I’ve been doing enough of that today. And it’s killing my back anyway.’

  Jack smiled. ‘Your mum used to say the same thing. Obviously runs in the genes.’

  ‘For fuck’s sake, Dad!’ Emily barked, stunning Jack into silence. ‘Can you please stop telling me how much like her I am? Don’t you get it? I don’t want to be like her. There’s a reason I came back here and didn’t go off with her. I know what she’s like. What she’s really like. I don’t want anything to do with her, and I don’t want anything to do with her fucking genes!’

  Jack watched as Emily pulled herself to her feet and wandered off into the kitchen, listening as he heard her pulling pots and pans out of the cupboards and lighting the hob. He wanted to walk in and help her, tell her to sit down and rest. But he knew that wouldn’t do any good. That’d only make her more determined to show him that she was actually fine and was more than capable of doing things for herself, without the help of anyone else.

  In that moment, Jack realised she was right: those weren’t Helen’s genes at all. They were his. Helen had a tendency to run away from trouble and pretend it wasn’t happening. More often than not, she’d run away to somewhere even more dangerous, feeling a false sense of safety whilst simply doubling up on her problems. Jack, on the other hand, tried to face adversity head on. If someone told him he couldn’t do something, that made him only more determined to damn well make sure he did it.

  He’d never quite known how to deal with Helen, and that had caused a huge number of problems over the years. Even now, he felt he’d never really known her. When Emily had come back into his life and shown signs of her personality traits, he’d panicked and worried whether he’d ever be able to build a relationship with his daughter. But that had all changed.

  He watched through the kitchen door as Emily started chopping onions and garlic, knowing full well that she didn’t know any more than him what she was going to end up cooking. But she was going to damn well cook, if only to prove a point. He looked at her and realised there was far less of Helen in her than he’d thought, and far more of himself. And in that moment, he felt a growing but satisfying realisation that things were going to be alright after all.

  15

  The next morning should’ve provided a sense of clarity and a new purpose, but in reality all it had done was make Jack feel anxious.

  If he was honest with himself, he knew the real reason for wanting to delay visiting Matt Hulford’s parents again yesterday evening was purely because he knew it would tear them apart. Their world had already collapsed on being told their son was dead — murdered — and the realisation that their model child had been a drug dealer, most likely killed because of his lifestyle, would deal them another severe hammer blow.

  Jack had already seen enough lives and families torn apart to last him a lifetime. And that wasn’t even including his own. He didn’t know if he was just going soft in his old age, but the cold, removed ‘simply business’ Jack Culverhouse appeared to have faded into the background recently. Not that he’d admit it to anyone.

  For Wendy, the morning’s task was a little more prosaic. Although no-one liked having to be the one to give families bad news about their loved ones, Wendy was under no illusions. As far as she was concerned, this was all part of the job. An unfortunate part, yes, but that was by the by.

  They’d decided to head out to the Hulford house in Wendy’s car, which allowed Jack to observe her a little more closely. He recalled the day Wendy Knight first joined his team: an apprehensive young detective, keen to put the world to rights and shake up the system. They all started like that. Even he had. They all thought time spent in the system would allow them to see and analyse its weaknesses, giving them the insight to make the changes that needed to be made. But the truth was, the system corrupts. Before you knew where you were, you’d become a product of it yourself.

  Maybe it was a result of him softening in his old age just as Wendy had become fully entrenched in her chosen career. Perhaps it was something to do with his family circumstances having changed whilst Wendy’s seemed to have stagnated. But regardless of the reasoning he gave, he couldn’t deny the realisation that he’d softened and she’d hardened.

  ‘I don’t imagine this’ll be much fun,’ he said, as they pulled out of the car park and headed in the direction of the Hulford house.

  ‘Nope. Probably the first time a family like that has realised the world of drugs is right on their doorstep.’

  Jack laughed. ‘I doubt that. Just look at all the London commuters getting off the train every night. Accountants, analysts, city boys, all wide-eyed with white powder under their noses. Course, all’s well and good until it’s a young lad doing a bit of puff behind a kebab shop. And don’t even get me started on the housewives keeping themselves perked up with painkillers and tranquillisers.’

 
‘I guess a lot of people would argue painkillers and tranquillisers are legal.’

  ‘Yep. And without questioning why. They’ll happily take a shot of morphine without even knowing it’s heroin under a different name. You and I know as much as anyone that something being legal doesn’t make it right. Slavery was legal.’

  ‘Bloody hell. You been up all night watching YouTube or something?’ Wendy said, chuckling to herself.

  ‘No. Just saying, that’s all. Why?’

  ‘Why? Because you seem to have woken up as Martin Luther King. That’s why.’

  ‘Yeah, well I don’t intend to get shot if that’s what you’re getting at.’

  There was an uncomfortable silence as they recognised the elephant in the room: that Jack had been shot at whilst apprehending the Mildenheath Ripper years earlier, only for his young protégé Luke Baxter to put himself between Jack and the bullet, losing his life in the process.

  ‘I imagine the parents will’ve had some sort of inkling,’ Wendy said. ‘Even if it looks like they’re completely oblivious, I don’t see how any parents could be. They must have at least suspected something, if only on a subconscious level.’

  ‘You’d be surprised,’ Jack muttered to the window, watching the rain run down in rivulets. ‘I don’t think parents pay as much attention to their kids as they used to. Everyone’s so bloody busy all the time. Plus the kids can hide what they’re doing now they’ve all got smartphones and everything’s online. Not like the old days when you had to sneak down to the phone box or hope people only called when your parents were out.’

  ‘I dunno. You can put a lot of blocks and parental controls on devices nowadays. It’s easy enough for parents to keep tabs on what kids are doing.’

  ‘Yeah, but most don’t. And anyway, where do you draw the line? Matthew Hulford was hardly a nine-year-old kid with his first iPod, was he? He’d left school. Old enough to pay taxes. Old enough to join the army. Old enough to get himself into a whole shitheap of trouble and end up assassinated in the woods.’

  Jack’s thoughts turned momentarily to his daughter, Emily. She’d seemed to him, just months earlier, to still be a child. But the revelation she was pregnant with a child of her own had dragged Jack’s mental image of her kicking and screaming into adulthood, even if she was barely fifteen herself. Although she was still a child on paper, there could be no doubt that this was the sort of situation that would make anyone grow up pretty damn quickly.

  They arrived at the Hulford house and walked up the driveway to the front door for the second time — both occasions to deal a hammer blow to Matthew’s parents. Dale Hulford recognised them immediately and welcomed them in, guiding them through to the living room.

  ‘Have you got some news?’ he asked once they’d all sat down. ‘Have you found out who did it?’

  Jack and Wendy shared a momentary look. ‘Not yet,’ Wendy said. ‘Although we do think we have a potential lead.’

  Dale and Cleo Hulford steadied themselves and looked at Wendy. ‘Okay,’ Dale said. ‘Go on.’

  Wendy swallowed and looked down at the carpet for a moment before speaking. ‘We’re looking into the possibility that Matthew’s death may have been drugs-related.’

  Matthew’s parents looked at her blankly.

  ‘No, that’s not possible,’ Dale said. ‘Not drugs. Matt didn’t take drugs.’

  ‘Drugs?’ Cleo asked. ‘But you told us he’d been murdered. His hands were tied behind his back. He’d been beaten.’

  ‘Yes. That’s correct,’ Wendy replied. ‘We don’t know for certain whether or not Matthew took drugs himself, but we have good reason to believe he was involved in the supply of drugs, and we’re looking into the possibility that this could have given someone a motive to murder him.’

  ‘No,’ Cleo said firmly. ‘No. That’s not true. Matthew didn’t deal drugs. That’s ridiculous. He was a good boy. That’s not him at all. You’re wrong.’

  ‘Cleo,’ her husband whispered.

  ‘No, Dale. They’re wrong. They’ve got their facts wrong.’

  ‘I’m sorry, Mrs Hulford,’ Wendy said. ‘But we’ve got witness statements that have told us that. And they’re not the sort of people who’d want to lie about it. They’ve potentially incriminated themselves by telling us. There’s no doubt in our minds whatsoever that Matthew was involved in selling drugs.’

  Jack and Wendy watched as Cleo Hulford crumbled in front of them.

  * * *

  Half an hour later, Wendy parked her car at Mildenheath Police Station and Jack glanced at his watch, as if he hadn’t been acutely aware of the time all morning and hadn’t had his mind firmly on the appointment he’d made.

  ‘Ah, ten o’clock,’ he said. ‘I’ve got to be somewhere at half past. Can you brief the team on what the Hulfords said? I should be back about lunchtime.’

  ‘Oh. Yeah, sure,’ Wendy said. ‘Everything okay? Emily got a scan?’

  ‘No. No, nothing like that. Don’t worry. I’ll be back in a couple of hours.’

  Jack got out of her car and walked over to his own, feeling the adrenaline coursing through his legs at the thought of what was to come.

  16

  Jack switched off his car engine and looked up at the building in front of him. He wasn’t the sort of person to feel overawed or nervous in places like this. He’d dealt with some pretty nasty people in his time, and it was a sad indictment that — in many ways — it was just another day at work. But this time it was different. This time he did feel nervous.

  He wasn’t sure what he wanted to say to Frank. He’d had countless four-a.m. conversations with him in his head over the past weeks, but none of them had given him the answers he was looking for.

  If he was being honest with himself, he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the truth. It was bad enough knowing that one of his longest-serving and most trusted colleagues had betrayed him in the worst possible way, without needing to know the details.

  The fact was that any form of police corruption completely undermined the rule of law and order. Once the checks and balances broke down or were found to be corruptible, everything fell apart. It was one thing to have a justice system which failed to catch its criminals; it was another entirely when elements of that system actively worked for the other side.

  It could have been almost understandable if it’d been a young, impressionable officer who’d had their head turned by money or the lure of a quick payday. Perhaps someone who’d joined the police force then decided it wasn’t for them. But that wasn’t the case with Frank. He’d been a loyal and dedicated police officer for most of his life, and had been on the verge of retirement after a long and distinguished career. Why had he chosen to throw that all away and go down in history as a bent copper?

  Try as he might, Jack couldn’t shake the suspicion that Frank might have been working against his colleagues for much longer. It was no secret that Jack had been trying to nail McCann for a number of years. The whole team had. Or so he’d thought. But, try as they might, somehow McCann managed to wriggle off the hook every time. It wasn’t a thought Jack wanted to entertain, but the possibility that they’d had a mole on side the whole time certainly made a lot of other things fall into place.

  Jack had called ahead to let the prison know he’d be visiting. On paper, it was an official police visit. In reality, though, the investigation into Frank’s activities was being handled externally. In cases where corruption was involved or suspected, everything had to be investigated by another force, in order to ensure independence and impartiality. Jack wasn’t interested in gathering evidence. Not in an official capacity. As far as he was concerned, this was a private visit, albeit one on his terms.

  He waited as the man on the front desk checked and verified his ID, then surrendered his mobile phone and keys, before stepping into a body scanner. A few seconds later, a green light appeared and a prison officer gestured for Jack to follow her.

  When they eventually reached the small ro
om, Jack stepped inside to find Frank already seated behind the table.

  ‘There’ll be someone just outside,’ the officer said.

  Jack mumbled his thanks, unable to take his eyes off his old colleague.

  ‘You can sit down,’ Frank said, a few seconds after the door had clanged shut.

  ‘I know that. I’m just not sure if I want to.’

  ‘Well you’ll have to make your mind up sharpish. I’ve got so much to be getting on with.’

  Jack ignored Frank’s attempt at humour. ‘You know, I had so many things I wanted to say. Questions I wanted to ask. I had visions of them having to drag me out by my arms because there wouldn’t be enough hours in the day to get to the bottom of things. But then I walk in here and see you sitting there in that chair, and you know what I thought? “There’s a man who’s lost it all.” More than anything else, I feel sorry for you. And I think to myself, what’s the point? What does it matter? It ain’t gonna change anything. What’s done is done, you’ve turned into a sad, miserable little fuck and you’ll always be a sad, miserable little fuck.’

  Frank shuffled awkwardly in his seat and winced in pain.

  ‘Arse still hurting?’ Jack asked.

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Good. I hope it gets infected.’

  ‘You came here for a reason, Jack.’

  ‘I thought so too. But now I’ve seen you, I’m not so sure it matters anymore.’

  ‘I think you and I both know that’s not true. Look, I know you’re angry. I get that.’

  ‘Angry?’

  ‘What word do you want me to use? There isn’t one.’