With A Vengeance

by Adam Croft

‘So you’re saying that Galloway was never trying to escape the fire? Jesus. He was never aiming for the pool, was he? He always intended to hit the deck and die quickly and painlessly.’

  ‘Exactly. Think about it. This is the kind of guy whose whole life has been built on pride. That’s what everything is about as far as he’s concerned. He’s proud he’s still doing well, proud of his beautiful house. Then a doctor tells him he’s dying and he can’t do a thing about it. That’s not how blokes like Freddie Galloway bow out. They do things their own way. Always in control, right to the last. He worked hard for that house as far as he was concerned, and he was going to take it with him. If he was going to die, he was going to do it his way and take the lot with him.’

  ‘The problem we’ve got,’ Wendy said, ‘is proving it. I don’t imagine any of the items in John Lucas’s garage will have Galloway’s DNA on them, but we’ll check against all known samples. We might be able to track down the purchase of the jerry can and trainers, but even if we do I very much doubt if Freddie Galloway himself nipped out to the shops to buy them. He’d have one of his men do it for him.’

  ‘If they were bought by someone we can link to Galloway, that could do it,’ Ryan said.

  ‘True, but it’s all circumstantial again. The way I see it, the situation is this. All signs point to John Lucas. But we can’t prove for definite Lucas was at the scene. It seems extraordinarily unlikely he would’ve been stupid enough to do something like that, and I for one believe him. I’ve sat opposite enough people in interview rooms to have a fairly decent idea over whether someone’s guilty or not. As we all know only too well, it’s not about working out whether someone’s guilty. That’s the easy bit. It’s about proving it. Now, we can’t prove something didn’t happen, so we’d have to prove that something else did. For that we’ll need to hammer the forensics. I’ve got a few ideas on that front.’

  ‘Nice one, Knight,’ Culverhouse said. ‘We’ll have a chat about that. Ryan, did you get anything on Newell’s financials?’

  ‘Yes and no,’ Ryan replied. ‘The guy barely uses cash at all, it seems. Everything is paid for on his debit card. He does take cash out occasionally, but rarely any more than thirty quid a month. Even at that, you’re talking less than four grand over eleven years — and that’s assuming every penny he withdrew was for the hitman. I don’t think you’d find many people who’d do a hit for that.’

  ‘Romanians might,’ Steve said.

  ‘Trust me, Steve. If we were looking at a four-grand hitman’s work, we’d know about it by now,’ Culverhouse replied.

  He was interrupted by the sound of his work mobile phone ringing. The number on the screen told him it was the operational command centre.

  ‘Culverhouse,’ he said, answering the phone.

  ‘Sir, we’ve just had a call from a commuter at Middlebrook station who reported a man threatening to throw himself off the bridge.’

  ‘Right, well you’ll have to send uniform in. There are negotiators they can call in who—’

  ‘No, sir. Sorry. He’s not there any more. He climbed down from the bridge after she called out to him, then legged it. But she saw him take his mobile out of his pocket and throw it down onto the tracks. There was a train coming in, but the phone fell between the lines and didn’t get damaged. They managed to get the lines deactivated while they retrieved it. The phone had a passcode lock, but they could see from the signal indicator that the phone was on the Tesco Mobile network. Because they were worried for the man’s safety and didn’t have an ID on him, they got the network to identify the owner of the mobile. It was the only phone on Tesco Mobile within the vicinity of the station, and they matched it to Mr John Lucas.’

  ‘Christ,’ Culverhouse said, glad he’d held on and not just hung up the phone when the rambling explanation started. ‘And where is he now?’

  ‘No idea, sir. Units are out looking for him as there are safety concerns about him, but according to the eyewitness he ran towards the station building. By the time units arrived at the scene, he was nowhere to be found.’

  Culverhouse tried to form a picture of Middlebrook station in his mind’s eye. ‘There’s a cab office there, isn’t there? In the station building. Get onto them and find out if they took a fare from a man matching John Lucas’s description. In the meantime, keep scouring the area. I’ll see if we can get Hotel Oscar Nine Nine up with thermal imaging. There’s a lot of woodland and scrubland around there. Oh fuck,’ he said, bringing his palm to his forehead.

  ‘What is it, sir?’

  ‘He’s only a mile or two away from the motorway junction, there. If he didn’t get any luck with the railway bridge, there’s a decent chance he might be heading for the road bridge over the motorway.’

  48

  John Lucas handed a twenty-pound note over to the cab driver and climbed out onto the pavement.

  He didn’t know why, but he’d had the good sense to bring his wallet out with him earlier. Maybe it was a subconscious bit of assistance for whoever would have had the grisly job of identifying his body. A little helping hand for the police. Well, that was totally out of the question now.

  The police were getting no favours from him. He’d spent his whole life being fucked over by the police. If that stupid officer hadn’t turned up while he was leaving Trenton-Lowe, if that idiot hadn’t pulled Peter over, if the twats in CID had worked out that he was obviously being fitted up...

  Life was all ifs and buts. And now he couldn’t even end it all himself. He was doomed, destined to stay on this bloody planet, in this pitiful existence. And there was nothing he could do about it.

  Except he knew exactly what he was going to do.

  He was going to show them what was what. He was going to let them know exactly what they’d done to him.

  He knew he wouldn’t have long before they’d start crawling round here. He’d chucked his phone onto the tracks so they wouldn’t be able to trace his movements, but he knew they would have identified it as his phone before too long. Then they’d be swarming round here like mosquitoes, baying for blood, ready to suck out even more of his soul.

  He opened the front door, marched through to the kitchen and twisted open the cap on the bottle of whisky. He threw his head back and took five or six big glugs. It was enough to make him feel instantly sick, but he swallowed that feeling back down with the realisation of what was to come.

  He walked over to the other side of the room, picked the carving knife out of the knife block and ran his finger over the blade.

  Good. It was sharp.

  49

  Back in the major incident room, the team were eagerly awaiting more news. There wasn’t much they could do — dog units were out on the ground and Hotel Oscar Nine Nine, the regional police helicopter, could be in the air within minutes. But first they needed to know whether Lucas was on foot or not.

  Culverhouse had held out on requesting the chopper, knowing there was a chance Lucas would have used the taxi firm at the station. He didn’t have a car of his own, and he would have had to rely on another form of transportation to reach Middlebrook in the first place. It wasn’t on the major bus routes, so that only left taxis or favours from friends. And it wasn’t often people called a friend for a lift to go and kill themselves.

  Once he heard back that Lucas hadn’t taken a taxi, he’d have the chopper in the air. Until then he’d have to hang fire, knowing it would cost the force a lot of money to engage Hotel Oscar Nine Nine and that the Police and Crime Commissioner would have his guts for garters if it was sent up unnecessarily.

  The phone on the desk in the middle of the incident room rang, and Culverhouse immediately jabbed the speakerphone button so the rest of the team could hear.

  ‘Culverhouse.’

  ‘Sir, we’ve got Mrs Wilson in reception. She wants to see a detective, she says. She thinks her next-door neighbour is breeding spy dogs for the Russians.’

  ‘Jesus Christ. Steve, get down there and do the dance
, will you?’ Culverhouse barked.

  ‘Not me, guv. I went last time. I think it’s your turn, actually.’

  Culverhouse’s face told Steve everything he needed to know about his reaction to that.

  ‘Do you not think I’m a bit fucking busy here?’

  ‘I’ll go,’ Wendy said, standing up. ‘I need the loo anyway.’

  A few seconds after Wendy had left the room, the phone rang again. Again, Culverhouse jabbed the speakerphone button and stated his name.

  ‘Sir, we’ve had an update from officers at the scene. The taxi company confirmed that a driver left about twenty minutes ago with a man who matches Lucas’s description. Said he wanted to be dropped off in Mildenheath, but gave no specific address.’

  Culverhouse let out a huge sigh.

  ‘Right. Get onto the driver and find out where he’s dropping him off. In the meantime, get units round to Lucas’s home address. That’s where he’s likely to be going. In fact, I’ll go too. I’ll take DS Wing and DC Mackenzie with me. Twenty minutes, did you say? That might even give us time to cut him off if the traffic was bad. There’s a decent chance he might not have got back yet. We can be there in three or four minutes.’ Culverhouse ended the call and turned to Steve Wing and Ryan Mackenzie, who’d already heard what he’d said and were putting on their jackets. ‘Right, you two. Let’s get moving.’

  50

  Alfie Little sat on the cold metal bench and sipped at a cup of sweet tea. He’d never had a jumper before. He was the only one on his shift who hadn’t, in fact.

  One of the things that was drilled into him while he was training was that he’d almost certainly come across a situation like this, but no number of fair warnings could ever prepare you for it. He was shaking as he recounted what he saw to the police constable, who was jotting it all down in his notepad.

  He was just glad the guy hadn’t actually jumped. If Alfie had reacted so badly to that close call, what would have happened if the guy had gone through with it, fallen through the air and smashed into the front of the speeding train, exploding in a bloody mess?

  Fortunately, he’d seen the man on the bridge as he approached the station and had immediately begun to slow the train down. It had eventually stopped almost a hundred yards past the station. He’d seen the man throw something onto the tracks, and had a duty to stop the train and report the incident immediately. That would ensure that no other trains would pass through the station, and would instead be halted a few hundred yards shy of it.

  Another police constable, a woman, came over to speak to the man who was taking his statement.

  ‘Karim, we’ve just had an update. He took a cab from here into Mildenheath. Driver dropped him off round the corner from where he lives. They’re en route to his home address as we speak. They’re pulling back the search units.’

  ‘Sounds like he’s gone home,’ PC Rashid said to Alfie Little. ‘Looks like it might be his and your lucky day.’

  Alfie raised his eyebrows and blinked a few times. It certainly didn’t feel very lucky to him.

  51

  John Lucas ran his finger along the blade of the carving knife inside his jacket pocket, the baseball cap pulled down low over his face, as he stood outside the Prince Albert pub, the building next door to Mildenheath Police station.

  He could feel the whisky running through him, making him breathe heavily. It hadn’t dulled the anger at all. Nothing ever would now. He’d been wronged too many times, and this time it was his turn to try and make things right. Because no-one else was going to bother.

  He didn’t care what happened afterwards. They could bang him up for the rest of his life for all he cared. What use was it being out here, anyway? He’d been safer on the inside. He’d known who to trust and who not to trust, known there were people there employed to watch out for his safety. Out here there was nothing.

  He knew the police just wanted to see him go down again. They were pissed off that one of their own had been shot all those years ago. They were like that, the police. Tribal. If you so much as looked the wrong way at one, the others would be on you like a ton of bricks. They didn’t do forgiving and forgetting. They did constant revenge, persistant reminders. And he was never going to be allowed to move on from what had happened eleven years ago, what had happened since.

  So what was the point? If you were never allowed to move on from injuring one officer — despite showing plenty of remorse when required — why not take out more of the pigs? He had nothing to lose. And it was their own stupid fault that they’d put him in this position. They’d given him no option. And they were about to realise that was very stupid indeed.

  He took a deep breath, adjusted the peak on his cap, took a firm grip of the knife inside his jacket pocket and walked towards the front doors of the police station.

  * * *

  ‘Mrs Wilson, I promise you absolutely we’ll look into it for you. I’ve got it all here: Russian spy dogs, radio signal interference, switching your TV on to find it tuned to Russia Today. I must admit it sounds very compelling. We’ll get straight onto it.’

  Wendy looked over Mrs Wilson’s shoulder as she spoke, meeting the eye of the civilian officer on the front desk, who was trying her best not to laugh out loud.

  Mrs Wilson signalled that she was happy with that response and remarked that she expected to see a dawn raid on her neighbour’s property. Wendy knew she would have forgotten all about having even made this report by dawn tomorrow, so she nodded and smiled, vaguely aware of the sound of the front door to the police station opening behind her.

  * * *

  He looked down at the ground as he walked in, but tried not to look too suspicious. Closing the door behind him, he looked up, seeing two people in front of him.

  One was some doddery old bitch with a walking stick, and the other looked somewhat familiar. She was clearly a copper, so he guessed she could be any one of a... No. He knew exactly who it was now. It was that cow of a detective who’d interviewed him after he was arrested for the fire at Freddie Galloway’s.

  Oh yes. This was just too good to be true. This was perfect. This was the ideal way to take a stand and go down in a blaze of glory. It was beautiful.

  As the old woman started to walk towards the exit, the detective woman headed towards a door that seemed to lead to the back of the station, protected by an electronic key fob and number pad.

  He decided he needed to take his chance now.

  He ran towards her, shoved her against the door, and brought his left arm around her throat, dragging her back into the waiting area, the blade of the knife digging into the side of her neck.

  52

  Culverhouse arrived at John Lucas’s house as the first response officers were lifting the enforcer out of the back of the van. The enforcer, a huge metal battering ram, was used to force entry to properties by bashing the door in.

  ‘Steve, get round the back in case he escapes that way. Ryan, follow me.’ He marched up to the front of the house and showed his ID card to the officers. ‘DCI Culverhouse, Mildenheath CID. This is DC Mackenzie. Any signs of life in there?’

  ‘Not taking any chances, sir. We’re happy to force entry immediately if you are.’

  Culverhouse ran through the protocol in his mind. Lucas was a previous offender with a history of violence, particularly towards police officers. He’d shown signs of being psychologically unstable within the past half an hour. They didn’t know for certain he was in the house, but there was a pretty decent chance — especially as he’d had the taxi drop him off just around the corner.

  ‘I’m happy to authorise that,’ he replied, agreeing with the officer that they couldn’t afford to take any chances. ‘Stand back,’ he said to Ryan, as they gave the officer carrying the enforcer ample space to swing.

  On the second strike, the wooden door flew open and banged against the wall inside. The officer carrying the enforcer stepped aside, with Culverhouse entering first, followed by Mackenzie and the other o
fficers. This wasn’t strictly according to protocol, but Culverhouse had been trained for these events many moons ago, and was determined to be the man to nab John Lucas himself.

  He yelled ‘Police!’ at the top of his voice, as did the others. It was a surprisingly effective tactic, which tended to result in the occupants panicking and freezing on the spot. You could usually tell when there were people in a house that you’d forced entry to, and Culverhouse didn’t like the feel of this one.

  They pushed open the doors to each room and had a good look around, but it quickly became apparent that John Lucas was nowhere to be seen.

  Culverhouse walked through to the back of the house and into the kitchen. There was a whisky bottle on the worktop, its lid sitting next to it. He looked at the bottle more closely.

  ‘He’s been here very recently,’ he called out to Ryan Mackenzie, who came to join him in the kitchen. ‘Look.’ He pointed to the neck of the bottle, which had a small trickle of whisky running down the outside of the bottle, where it had already reached the label and soaked in. ‘It’s still wet. We must’ve just missed him.’

  Ryan looked at the bottle. ‘So he’s come home and taken a mouthful of whisky out of the bottle. Then what? Where’s he gone?’

  Culverhouse looked around the kitchen for anything else that might give them a clue. His eyes locked on the knife block.

  ‘Where’s his dishwasher?’ he asked.

  ‘Don’t know. Don’t think he’s got one,’ Ryan said, looking around. ‘Why’s that?’

  ‘Because there’s a knife missing from this bloody big gap in the knife block. And there isn’t one in the sink.’

  Before they got any further, a uniformed officer came jogging into the kitchen, clutching his radio.