Single Handed (Gareth Dawson Series Book 3)

by Nathan Burrows

  Intrigued, Malcolm opened up the e-mail. The request for information was from an old friend of his, Detective Inspector Jon Brandon, who was now working for the National Crime Agency down in London. Malcolm read the e-mail, which didn’t say a great deal, other than a request for him to call Brandon.

  Malcolm had last seen Jon on the television at a press briefing following the successful closure of an illegal cosmetic clinic being run by Eastern Europeans in Ipswich. He remembered the conference and smiled as he recalled the glum-looking copper from Suffolk sitting next to Jon. A few seconds later, Malcolm heard his friend’s voice on the end of the line.

  “National Crime Agency, DI Brandon speaking?”

  Malcolm put on his best Norfolk accent.

  “Alright, boy? How’s life down in that London?”

  “That must be Malcolm Griffiths, if I’m not mistaken.”

  “Bloody hell, mate,” Malcolm replied, grinning. “You should be a detective.”

  “How’s your wife and sister?” Brandon said. Malcolm didn’t reply, but waited for the punchline. “She’s a lovely woman.”

  “Don’t forget your roots, Jon.” If Malcolm remembered correctly, his friend was from Ludham, a small village not far from Norwich. Malcolm, by contrast, had been born in Bedford so was by definition less local than Jon. Even though Malcolm had lived in Norfolk since he was a baby, he would never be a proper local. Nor would his children, if he ever had any.

  “I’ve been trying to forget them since I left Nelson’s county,” Jon replied. Malcolm could tell from the tone in his voice that he was smiling.

  “Yeah, well, you can take the man out of Norfolk, but never take Norfolk out of the man,” Malcolm said. “So, what’s up? I saw your e-mail.”

  “McGuire. Philip McGuire. You found him off the coast up near Cley-next-the-Sea?”

  “We found some of him, yes. A hand. The rest of him’s swimming with the fishes.”

  “Ah, bollocks,” Jon said. “That’ll be that then. I was hoping it was a typo. I know what you lot are like with your webbed fingers and all.”

  “What’s your interest in him?” Malcolm asked, ignoring the jibe. “Why would the mighty NCA be interested in my dead scuba diver?”

  “He’s popped up above our radar, mate. We’re doing a workup on a network that’s right across the United Kingdom and there were a few naughty purchases a while ago from his bank account that we’re tracking. Can’t say too much—OPSEC and all that—but he looks good for it.”

  Malcolm was tempted to ask for more information on what the NCA was up to, but didn’t bother. If the operation was at an early stage, Jon wouldn’t give him anything. He was just about to ask what Jon needed from him when his friend continued.

  “It’s Annette, isn’t it?”

  “Sorry, who?” Malcolm said, momentarily confused.

  “His wife. She’s Annette McGuire, right?”

  “Yes. She doesn’t know yet that we’ve not quite got all of him, but she will this afternoon. We’re going round to tell her.”

  “Good luck with that one, mate.”

  “It’s not me doing the telling,” Malcolm replied with a smile. “I’ve got a young DC lined up for that pleasure.” He paused, thinking for a few seconds. “Are you interested in the wife as well?”

  “Possibly, but probably not. These purchases, they were made from a joint bank account so we don’t know for certain who made them. Just that it was one of them. More likely to be him than her, but you never know these days.”

  “What are you looking at them for, Jon?” Malcolm asked.

  When he put the handset down a few seconds later, Malcolm had to fight the urge to punch his computer screen. In his estimation, there was a hierarchy of criminals, and the ones at the bottom of the pile were the worst possible ones.

  Paedophiles.

  17

  Laura parked outside Annette’s house and sat in the car for a few moments, thinking. When Gareth had called her the previous evening and asked her if she would be able to be with his sister when the police visited again, she’d initially been reluctant. Laura didn’t really know Annette that well, having only met her a few days earlier, and she didn’t really want to get too involved. She had asked Gareth on the phone if there was someone else available.

  “She hasn’t got anyone else, Laura,” Gareth had told her. He went on to explain that since coming back from Australia, Philip had kept Annette on such a tight leash that she’d not had the opportunity to make many friends. On hearing this, Laura’s heart went out to the woman, and she was about to relent when Gareth continued.

  “Listen,” he had said, “if you can help her out, I’ll take you out to dinner somewhere posh.”

  “What, somewhere I get to choose?” Laura had asked, sensing an opportunity. “And without a spending limit?”

  “Yep,” Gareth had agreed, but only after hesitating. “Within reason.”

  Laura got out of the car and made her way up the path. As she approached the front door, it opened, and Annette stood back to welcome her in.

  “Hey, Annette,” Laura said. “How are you?”

  “Not too bad, considering. Thanks for coming.” Laura looked at Annette as she walked into the house. She was wearing a baggy jumper and threadbare leggings. Her hair looked lanky and unwashed, and there wasn’t a trace of makeup on her face. In Laura’s opinion, the woman looked markedly different to when she had met her before, and not in a positive way.

  “It’s no problem,” Laura said, making her way into the lounge. “My boss is off sick, so the office is closed for a day or so.”

  “Is he okay?” Annette asked. She didn’t sound particularly concerned, more that she was just making conversation.

  “I think so,” Laura replied. “I hope so. It’s not like him to be off sick. He’s normally in, even if he’s dying of man-flu.” At least this cracked a smile from Annette.

  Thirty minutes later, just as they were drinking their second mug of tea, the doorbell rang. It was followed by a sharp knock on the door.

  “That’ll be them, then,” Laura said, getting to her feet. “Do you want me to grab it?”

  “Would you mind?” Annette replied. “I’ll put the kettle on.”

  Laura opened the front door to see Malcolm and Kate standing on the step. Laura smiled at them both, ensuring that she made eye contact with Kate as she did so. She didn’t want a re-run of their previous argument, although the fact that her boss was with her would probably keep her in line, anyway. To Laura’s surprise, Kate smiled back.

  “Come on in,” Laura said to them. “Annette’s just making yet another cup of tea.”

  “Occupational hazard for us, I’m afraid,” Kate said as she walked past Laura. She lowered her voice. “How’s she doing?”

  “I’m not sure,” Laura replied in a whisper. “I think she’s struggling a bit, going by her appearance. If you lot weren’t coming round, I reckon she would probably still be in her pyjamas.” Kate grimaced in response.

  “Right, I’ll bear that in mind.”

  “So, Annette,” Kate said a moment later. Kate and Malcolm were sitting in the lounge, in the same positions as they had when they came to break the news to Annette about Philip’s death. “Thank you for offering to meet with us this afternoon.” Kate’s hands were clasped tightly together in her lap, and Laura could see that her knuckles were clenched. For some reason, the policewoman looked nervous.

  “You said there had been some developments?” Annette said quietly, looking at Kate with a soulful expression.

  “Yes, there have.” Laura saw Kate’s eyes dart in Malcolm’s direction. He nodded his head ever so slightly and Laura leaned forward, eager to hear what Kate had to say. “It’s regarding the discovery of your husband’s, er, his body.”

  “What do you mean? You did find him, didn’t you?” Annette said, her voice suddenly urgent. Laura reached across and took her hand. From the look on Kate’s face, this wasn’t going to be good
news.

  “We found some human remains that belong to your husband, yes. But we didn’t recover all of his body. It was just a hand.”

  “Just a hand?” Annette said, squeezing Laura’s fingers. “You’re fucking joking, right?”

  “No, Annette.” It was Malcolm. “It’s not unusual in cases like this for human remains to become separated. The rest of the body may turn up in time, or it may not ever be found.”

  “But what does that mean?” Annette asked, her voice getting increasingly desperate. “I can’t just bury a sodding hand!”

  “Annette,” Laura said, “we can go over the details later. Can I get you anything? A glass of water, perhaps?”

  “Glass of wine would be better, but I’ll wait.” Annette stared at Kate, who was examining her fingernails. “So…?” The policewoman looked up.

  “Er, yes,” she replied, looking again at Malcolm.

  “The certificate?” he said, quietly.

  “Oh, yes. The certificate.” Kate looked relieved and, despite their earlier argument, Laura felt quite sorry for the woman. “Now, this does mean that the coroner won’t be able to issue a death certificate.”

  “Well, how the hell am I supposed to move forward without that?” Annette barked, letting go of Laura’s hand. “I can’t do anything without one, can I?”

  “Annette, we can apply for a presumed death under the circumstances, I think. I’ll have to ask Paul, but I’m pretty sure we’ll be able to,” Laura replied with a sympathetic look.

  “That was what I was going to suggest,” Malcolm said. “We’ve searched for the, er, the rest of the body, but nothing has been found. So Philip is missing, presumed dead. Given the circumstances, it should be quite straightforward.”

  They talked some more for a while, but it soon became clear to Laura that Malcolm and Kate were keen to leave, having delivered the message that they had come to deliver. About twenty minutes later, they got to their feet. Malcolm said goodbye to Laura and Annette and excused himself, saying he had to make a quick call. He came back a few moments later as Laura and Kate were standing by the front door.

  “Kate, I’ve got to go to East Harling for a job. Can you phone a car to come and get you?”

  “Sure, sir,” she replied. “No problem. Although I’m Code 11 as of a few minutes ago, so I might just walk back into the city.”

  Malcolm turned and left, hurrying to the car.

  “Code 11?” Laura asked.

  “Off duty. I’m done for the day.”

  “Oh, right. Do you want a lift into the city? I’m going that way.”

  “That’d be magic,” Kate replied. “Thanks. Um, listen. Laura?”

  “Yep?”

  “The other day, we got off on the wrong foot. I was in a really bad mood, and I took it out on you. So, I’m sorry.”

  Laura looked at the policewoman, wondering for a moment if she was being genuine. Deciding that she was, she smiled at Kate.

  “No problem. I have days like that too. Don’t worry about it.”

  Kate sighed and smiled back.

  “Thank you. How about I buy you a drink sometime to make it up to you?”

  Laura glanced at her watch. It was almost four o’clock. She had been planning on going into the office to catch up on her e-mails, but with Paul being off there wouldn’t be anything that couldn’t wait.

  “Sure,” Laura said. “How about the Starbucks down on Hall Road?”

  “I was thinking more a paper cup of coffee at a McDonalds,” she said, grinning, “but if you want a Starbucks, then Starbucks it is.”

  18

  Ronnie paid the taxi driver, giving him a few extra rupiah for getting him to the Bajra Sandhi Monument in one piece, and in total silence. He climbed out of the car, leaving the pleasantness of the air-conditioned vehicle behind, and turned to look at the monument.

  It was a weird-looking thing, in his opinion. He’d read somewhere that it was modelled after a priest’s bell and, even though it was only built in the late 1980s, it looked a lot older. Ronnie had visited it once, before deciding that once was probably enough. He wasn’t that bothered about the Balinese peoples’ struggle for freedom, and by the time he’d ascended the spiral staircase in the centre, he wasn’t that bothered about the view from the top either.

  Turning and leaving the monument behind him, Ronnie made his way across the road before turning right down Raya Puputan. He walked past a variety of coffee shops and hairdressers, enjoying the bustle of the early evening. Around him, a cacophony of car and moped horns sounded as the locals went about their business. A few hundred metres later, he turned into Tukad Unda Street. The street was much narrower, and Ronnie had to watch his footing in the absence of a pavement. A few weeks ago, when he’d been scouting for a place like the one he was visiting, he’d almost fallen into a storm drain.

  Ronnie stopped when he reached the compact building that housed the Internet cafe. There was an enormous sign outside advertising the Majestic Internet Cafe, including the fact it was open 24 hours a day and had a blisteringly fast internet connection. The roof of the building was mostly tin sheeting, the windows were just holes in the walls, and the outside was painted yellow and green. He navigated past the mopeds parked haphazardly outside the building and walked inside.

  He’d not chosen this particular cafe because of its opening hours or fast internet connection. He’d chosen it because it was discrete, operated in cash only, and had no visible CCTV cameras. Ronnie handed over enough rupiah to pay for an hour on one of the terminals and made his way to his preferred computer in the far corner of the room. The table that the monitor was on was angled so that no-one else could see the screen.

  Ronnie brought up the home page for Protonmail, the encrypted and anonymous e-mail service he had used to send a message to the slut, and logged in to his account. When he saw that Annette McGuire hadn’t replied to his e-mail, he swore under his breath. She had received the photographs, so why hadn’t she replied to him? Bitch, he muttered. His hand hovered over the mouse as he considered what to do next. He could send her some more photographs of her dearly beloved husband—Ronnie had enough of them—or he could up the ante a bit more.

  He came out of the e-mail page and navigated to his online storage. Like Protonmail, the service he used was anonymous and encrypted. It had to be for what he kept in there. When the browser window showed him the folders, he scrolled to find the one he had set up for the McGuires. Opening the folder, he selected a photograph of Annette and her husband that he’d saved from her Facebook page before it disappeared.

  In the photograph, the slut was standing with Philip in a pub. In the background were a bunch of other people, frozen mid-drink. Philip had his arm around her shoulders and was holding her tightly as the photograph was taken. Demonstrating ownership. Ronnie zoomed in on their faces and looked at Philip’s. His expression was contented and unambiguous, as if he wanted whoever was taking the picture to know that he was going to take this woman home and do whatever he wanted to her. The slut’s face, by contrast, wasn’t quite as contented. Perhaps she was thinking the same thing?

  Ronnie closed the photograph down and tapped his index finger on the top of the mouse as he considered his options. None of his marks to date had done what she had done, which was ignore him completely. A few of them had needed some more encouragement to part with their cash, but none of them had just blanked him. They weren’t that stupid. Did she think that if she ignored him, he would go away?

  He reopened Protonmail and clicked on the icon to send a new e-mail. There was no way of telling whether she’d actually received the e-mail or not. He could use the read receipt function, but if she declined to send one, then he would get nothing. Plus, it smacked of desperation. He needed something subtler.

  Ronnie opened up Paint on the computer and created a one pixel by one pixel image which he saved to the desktop. Then he navigated to a website hosting package that he had carefully set up a while ago though an int
ermediary but never used—he’d had to change his original plan because of the police in the United Kingdom, so it sat dormant, unused, and untraceable. He placed the tiny image onto a blank webpage and saved it before copying the web address of the image. Finally, he inserted the same address as a piece of code into the e-mail he was about to compose. It was perfect. She wouldn’t see any trace of the image unless she looked at the source code of the e-mail—which was unlikely—but when she opened the e-mail, his website host would register the fact that the image had been downloaded.

  Grinning to himself, Ronnie glanced over his shoulder to make sure that no-one could see his screen before navigating back to his photograph collection. He selected a photograph of Philip that wasn’t particularly explicit and attached it to the e-mail. It was much tamer than the ones he had sent her in the post, but clearly showed the slut’s husband and a young girl. A very young girl.

  His fingers hovered over the keyboard as he considered the message he was about to send. It needed to have the right tone so that she knew he could be trusted, but at the same time, should be feared. In the end, he decided on something simple.

  We need to chat, or the next one’s going to the newspapers.

  19

  Annette lay in bed, the duvet wrapped around her legs. She had been tossing and turning for the best part of a couple of hours, but couldn’t get to sleep. Every time she closed her eyes, she saw the photographs of Philip on the back of her eyelids. Even though they were shredded and burned, they hadn’t gone away. Annette couldn’t un-see them.

  In a sense, she wasn’t surprised. Horrified and sickened, yes, but not surprised. Philip had always had a nasty streak, sexually speaking. He’d managed to hide it well, at least until they were married, but the veneer he put over the top of his desires was fairly thin and soon disappeared.

  It had started with what had seemed at the time to be fairly normal role-playing games. That wasn’t something that Annette necessarily enjoyed, but he was her husband, so she went along with it at first. She would be a secretary, and he would be the boss. Then, she would be a secretary who had done something wrong, and needed to make up for it. Then a secretary who had done something awful and needed to be punished.