Find Them Dead

109 Friday 31 May

‘Dead?’ Roy Grace said, in near disbelief. ‘Stabbed by his co-defendant, in the dock, in broad daylight?’

It was just gone 2 p.m. Glenn Branson stood in front of him in his office, nodding. ‘Yep.’

Grace shook his head.

‘You all right, Roy, you seem very distracted recently?’

He waved a hand, dismissively. ‘More grief about Bruno. Cleo had a call from the school this morning, he was really rude to a teacher. Anyhow, we’ll deal with that later. So, tell me. How the hell did he get a weapon in through court security?’

‘Did I tell you Starr has a prosthetic right arm? He must have spent hours — days — on it, turning it into a weapon — a shank. It was plastic so wouldn’t have been picked up by the metal detector.’

‘Doesn’t sound like Terence Gready is a big loss to the human race but, shit, I’ve never heard of that happening, ever.’

‘No doubt Cassian Pewe will find a way to hold you responsible, boss,’ Branson said with a sardonic smile.

‘No doubt.’ He shrugged. ‘So, talk me through what exactly happened.’

Branson gave him chapter and verse. When he had finished, Roy Grace was pensive. ‘So, first Starr pleads guilty, to get a reduction in his tariff. Next, his brother, Stuie, his raison d’être for his “guilty” plea, is murdered. Then, in court, he negates his potential reduced tariff by murdering his co-defendant in cold blood. Why?’

‘Anger?’ Glenn ventured.

‘He must have planned the attack on Gready for at least several days. He would have known it would have blown out his reduced tariff — and given him a much longer sentence. What triggered him to do that?’ Grace was pensive for some moments. ‘In my view, he must have suspected Gready was behind his brother’s murder. Perhaps, as was mooted earlier, Gready had ordered Stuie to be beaten up, as a warning to Starr to keep schtum. And the beating went too far?’

‘What about if there was an ulterior motive?’

Grace frowned. ‘Such as?’

Branson smiled. ‘Bear with me. That shit, Conor Drewett — who the Mercedes was registered to and who we nicked yesterday morning — squealed pretty quickly on his accomplice when we offered to tell the judge he’d been a good boy. The accomplice was totally wasted when we picked him up. Derren Skinner. Before he was even interviewed, in the car on the way to the custody centre, he’d told the arresting officers who’d hired him and Drewett. Probably because he was shitfaced on something.’

‘Grassed him up?’

Branson nodded. ‘Perhaps ratted on him would be a better word for Skinner — horrible little creep.’

‘So, who was behind it — tell me?’

Glenn Branson spun the chair in front of Grace’s desk, sitting down on it the wrong way round, placed his arms over the backrest and leaned forward, a big grin pushing across his face. ‘I think you are going to like this. I mean, really like it! You’ve told me before that we can do all the planning in the world, be as professional as all our training has taught us, but that one elusive thing we can’t count on is luck. I think we just got lucky.’ He smiled. ‘Like, very seriously lucky!’