Dead of Winter

Chapter 19

Carmichael opened his laptop and connected his phone then waited for the instructions on the screen.

Did he want to download files from host?

Yes, he did.

He downloaded the photo of Sonny outside Digger’s club and saved it to his phone. Then he rang an old friend.

‘Long time no speak, Carmichael. It’s good to hear from you. How you keeping? I heard you became a sheep farmer?’

‘Hello, Micky. Yeah. . I’m heading back into the real world now. I need some help. The people who murdered my wife and kid are back in the UK.’

‘Ask away.’

‘I need you to do some intelligence work for me? Find out all you can about some people past and present. I’ll cover expenses for you.’

‘Sure; I need a rest anyway, put my feet up.’

‘Yeah. Saw you’d been rowing the Atlantic with your mates. You should try and challenge yourself a bit more.’

Micky laughed. ‘I’m working on it. You keep in contact with any of the others from our regiment?’

‘I have some numbers but I’m not sure who’s still around. I need to update some software. Have you got someone who can help?’

‘Sure. You tell me what you need and I’ll get it for you. What do you need from me?’

‘To start with I need you to find out all you can about a man named Digger Cain. He owns clip joints in Soho and a legit club called Cain’s. I want to know what else he makes money from: legit or otherwise.’

‘What do you already know about him? What are you looking for specifically?’

‘He’s the top man in a chain of club owners who pass trafficked women around the clubs and brothels here in the UK. He distributes and sells the girls on. One of the women ended up under a patio in Northwest London. I want to know if Digger could have put her there and if he could have anything to do with killing my wife and child. I’m looking for a connection to specific people. I’ll email you it in more detail. I also need your help in creating a new persona for myself. I will have to be able to gain entry into Digger’s world. I’m going to base it around the time we spent in Mexico in ’91 — most of the guys we were looking at then are dead.’

‘You want to go backwards and rewrite history? Tricky.’

‘Yes, but it just needs to gain me access and then I’ll be in and out before anyone realizes it doesn’t add up. I don’t have to set myself up as a major player in the Tijuana Cartel. I just need to be an “also-ran”.’

‘Sounds like it would be fun to weave yourself into the search engines and distort the truth a little. I’ll enjoy helping you with that. But Carmichael. . you don’t need to pay me. I owe you from way back.’

‘No. . all debts are paid. Can’t think of a better use for my money than watching you break another record.’

Micky shifted in his seat and lifted one stump at a time to rest on a stool in front of him. He began unhitching his artificial legs as he talked to Carmichael. Micky’s eyes went up to the photo on his wall next to the medal he’d received after he stepped on a mine and lost both his legs from the knee down. Carmichael had carried him to help and then returned for one of the bloodiest revenge attacks that their platoon had ever witnessed. It wouldn’t go down in history as one of the most ethical operations but it had done the job.

‘What you going to do when you find the people responsible?’

‘I’m going to kill every one of them. . slowly.’

Carmichael worked all night as he watched the information come in from Micky. He sat at his desk, kept the fire burning and focused like he hadn’t done for many years. He set a trail of retrospective events in place. Micky instant-messaged him all through the night. They went back and forth with ideas.

‘Airforce do?’ Micky wrote.

‘Yes.’

‘You had a girlfriend who disappeared. How does that sound?’

‘Captured by little known rivals to the Tijuana Cartel? Sounds perfect, Micky.’

Together they threaded Carmichael’s name in where there was a gap and only the dead knew the truth. Now he was Mr Hart: money-, arms-, drugs-and people-trafficker. He was as well connected to the great but dead names as you could get.

Carmichael had almost finished packing when Bridget arrived at ten the next morning. He saw her pass by the window on her way to the barn.

He went over to the shelf and took down the photo of Louise and Sophie and put it in the bag. He shut down the laptop and closed it up before packing it away in the holdall, then zipped it up ready. He walked out through the kitchen and tack room. The skinned dog fox swung from the end of a hook fixed to the edge of the stable block outside. Half of its face was missing where the bullet had passed through. Carmichael crossed the yard, opened the stable door, and led Tor out of his stable and tied him to a post in the yard.

Tor gave a sigh and then he snorted white dragon breath into the air through his flared nostrils as he shifted his weight from one leg to the other, pawing the ground with his unshod hoof gently scraping at the hardstanding.

‘Alright, Tor. . stand still.’

He stripped off the horse’s rugs and hung them over the open stable door. Then he picked up the brush and brushed long hard sweeps down over the animal’s flanks. Tor turned to bite him. Carmichael swore at him and the horse moved one ear at a time as it listened, then it shook its mane and carried on transferring weight from one leg to another.

Bridget passed him on her way down from the barn. She came to press the flat of her hand against Tor’s soft velvet muzzle. He began licking her palm.

‘I am going away for a while, Bridget. Look after things here for me till I get back. The sheep will need extra care now otherwise we’ll get no more lambs from them.’

She looked at him over Tor’s neck. ‘How long for?’

‘I don’t know.’ She looked away. ‘I’ll leave enough money and I’ll leave instructions with the bank so that you can get what you need.’ She nodded. ‘You stay here at the house and look after the animals. I don’t know whether Rusty will make it but I trust you to do the best you can for him.’

She picked up the fork, went to get the wheelbarrow and started mucking out Tor’s stable. Twenty minutes later she heard the motorbike start up. She stopped working and listened to the sound of him leaving.

Carmichael stopped off at the bank to sign papers. He got a shave, a haircut. Four hours of riding, allowing for a stop-off at an out-of-town shopping outlet to buy some clothes, tools and get some cards printed up. He made sure they were sleek and top-quality, black and gold with just his name and his mobile number, then he drove through London and pulled his Triumph Tiger motorbike into the space in front of the old club in a run-down side street of Shoreditch. The estate agent stopped talking on his phone as he saw Carmichael get off his bike and walk across. He shook Carmichael’s hand with his hot one.

‘Great premises. Fab property. You certainly know a good deal when you see it. The owners are keen to get the property let.’ Either side of the club were empty properties. ‘This is the area in London. You’re guaranteed a great business once this is up and running.’

‘Why is it empty?’ Carmichael asked, but he already knew the answer. He followed the young Indian, heavily weighed down with muscles and jewellery, as he opened an envelope with keys inside and began unlocking the doors. There were locks top and bottom of the door and a padlock in the centre. Carmichael looked up to where the CCTV camera had been. Someone had ripped off the bracket but the plate was still drilled into the brickwork; that would save him some time.

‘They had some sort of trouble with the last tenants. Nothing to do with the landlords or this area. It was a personal matter.’ The estate agent smiled nervously and unlocked the large doors into the dark. ‘The press exaggerated things the way they always do.’

‘Yeah. . I’m sure.’ Carmichael smiled to himself.

‘There are offices behind here.’ They stood in the club, a cashier’s office to the left. The estate agent closed the doors behind them. ‘I’ll show you those in a minute.’ Stepping further inside he switched on the lights. ‘The landlords have kept the electricity running here so that we can show you round properly. Here to the right are stairs up to the cloakrooms and a further office and storage space. ‘Straight ahead is the main section of the club. If you’d like to follow me. .’ Inside, it still had the smell of years of smokers and spilt drinks embedded in its nicotine-filmed walls and spongy floor. A long bar stretched away to the right, the dance floor was down a few steps to the left. It was long and rectangular, a raised area to the left: dancing poles at either end of the floor; above it two cages were on a raised plinth, the hook and chains that held them in place still there. ‘Just to let you know, Mr Hart, the owners would accept a slightly lower offer than stated. And we can settle it all today. If all is agreed I have been instructed to give you the keys. You’ll have to apply for a licence but it shouldn’t be a problem.’

‘Got the contract for me to sign?’

When the estate agent left, Carmichael locked the main doors and went back around the club. He unlocked the door next to the cashier’s booth and walked into the first of two back rooms; one was storage, the other, an office which would be his bedroom. All that was left in the room was an old safe, a set of plastic chairs and a filthy mattress. He would have time to buy himself a camp bed. He’d do it tomorrow. He wouldn’t be sleeping there most nights, but he’d need somewhere safe to rest and, by the time he finished making it that way, the club would be a fortress.

Back at the bar, he sat on a stool opposite the empty optics and the dusty fittings that had once shone on a nightly basis; but not brightly. This was never a pukka club; this was a shabby nightclub in a once shabby part of town. It had been a notorious place for trafficked girls and gangsters. That was why Carmichael had chosen it. He opened his laptop on the counter. He had already decided on a name for the club: the Velvet Lagoon. He’d apply for the licence to reopen it in the morning. He wouldn’t get it, but that didn’t matter. By that time it would all be over. The place echoed to the sound of his fingers on the keyboard. Occasionally he heard the scuttle of a rat as it came up to investigate the new arrival. Carmichael opened up a ham sandwich he’d bought when he stopped on his way down and threw a corner of the crust over towards the sound of scuttling.

He turned his attention back to the screen as Ebony logged on. She was writing her notes up about her visit to Rose Cottage: Carmichael watched as Ebony typed in the password. The spyware recorded every key stroke she made and typed it directly onto his screen.

Forensic evidence missing: contaminated. She was raped. Semen on/inside the body of Louise Carmichael. . find these samples. . re-draw scene-of-crime plans. Go back to Doc Harding and talk through autopsy notes, missing sections. . enough blood? What was Carmichael’s relationship with Chrissie Newton. . did he lie to me?

Carmichael picked up his holdall and placed it on the bar top then he unzipped it and took out his rifle in its slimline fleece bag. He hopped over the bar and knelt down amongst the debris that had been left by the quick departure of the club’s owners. Someone had ripped out the glass-washing machine. Carmichael reached a hand in and felt the space that was left beside it. It was dry. He slid the rifle into the gap and hopped back over the bar.

He took out the new clothes he’d bought on the way and tore off the labels then he repacked them into his expensive new bag. He’d already booked a room in the Lansdown, a boutique hotel off Oxford Street. He had never allowed himself to spend his wife’s money before: the thought of touching it had been abhorrent to him. But he’d been waiting for this time.

He went around the club and re-drilled every lock and changed it. He put up web cams and aligned them over the entrance to the club and around the building. He made sure every point of entry was secure. Nothing was going to get into the club uninvited and, once inside, nothing was going to leave without his permission.